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TRAVEL AND MOUNTAINEERING IN SUANETIA 233
and our Chamoniard, Francois Devouassoud, up in the barn, had
failed, we succeeded in hoisting our slender baggage, partly on the
one horse
forming
we had secured, partly on our own shoulders. Then
in close order, and holding our revolvers in our hands, we
made readv for a sudden start. Meantime some of the inhabitants,
yelling and jabbering, barred the way, othere brandished swords,
daggers, and pistols on either wall of the sunk lane which led
woiild fetch
through the %Tllage : a few ran off" making signs they
their guns.
The women, screaming and apparently endeavom-ing to
restrain the passions of their relations, added to the picturesque
confiision.
Things seemed getting worse and worse, and the issue more and
more doubtfvd, when a demand of some sort, shouted out by a man
on the right-hand wall, suggested a simple stratagem. I flung a
handful of kopeks into the crowd, and at the same moment we all
made a sudden push down the lane. The crowd scrambled and
fought for the coppers, the men in tie roadway yielded as the cold
muzzle of the revolver touched their faces, and in less time than
it has taken to describe the incident, we were outside the hamlet
and among open
fields. With our fifteen barrels we now felt com-
paratively safe. When roused to passion, the Suanetian will
occasionally use his dagger in open fight — I have more than once
seen daggers drawn—but he much prefei-s the safety of a neighboming
thicket, whence he can take a deliberate aim with the help of
his forked gun-rest, and shoot his enemy unobserved. The owner of
our horse, a native of another village, who had disappeared during
the disturbance, now came up to tender his services and his con-
gratulations, whUe our Mingrelian interpreter explained to us the
'
Let us tie them up, let us rob, let us kill.'
voices on the wall :
Such was my
first introduction to Suanetians. It wiU be
allowed that, if I have written some hard things of them, it has not
been without provocation. There is no doubt, however, that in the
last twenty-five years the Suanetians have changed very much for
the better. But readers who may be disposed to consider my early
descriptions overcharged, because more recent experiences
do not
correspond with them, may do well to look into narratives contem-