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62 THE EXTLUliATlUX UF THE CAUCASUS of the population of the lowlands ; but in the mountains it yielded in many places to Mohammedanism, and as years went on, both faiths became little more than a cover to more primitive forms of religion. There was a revival of Paganism. The churches and chapels were desecrated and profaned. The powers of Nature, the spirits of the storm, the forest, and the flood, were separately worshipped. Sacred yews and groves regained their former reverence ; the spirits of ancestors were appeased or solaced with the ancient offerings. In modern geography Georgia is equivalent to the basin of the Kur. But the old Georgian Kingdom extended its territory or its suzerainty to the shores of the Black Sea and the sources of the Rion and the Ingur. The reign of Queen Thamara, in the first years of the thirteenth century, was the time of Georgia's glory and greatest extent. In the succeeding centuries the country suffered severely from the Persians and the Turks, until in 1802 its last sovereign secured the peace of his kingdom l)y putting an end to its separate existence and accepting the rule of Russia. His feudatories, the semi-independent princelets of Mingrelia and Imeretia, the Dadians and Dadish Kilians of Suanetia, soon followed his example. The beginning of the nineteenth century found the Russians firmly established on both sides of the Caucasus, but holding only a narrow line of communication through the mountains. Vladikavkaz was a forti'ess exposed to the assaults of hostile tribes. The hills to the east of it were as much forbidden ground to the Russian as the mountains round Peshawur wei'e to the Englishman — up to last summer. On the western flank the postroad to the north had to be protected from the forays of the independent Circassians by a chain of Cossack stations. It was not until 1834 that the Russians undertook the subjugation of Circassia and Daghestan. The Crimean War found them with the task stiU incomplete. Attempts to support the tribes were made by the Allies, but owing to the ignorance of Western statesmen of the political and physical conditions of the Caucasus, they were ill-planned and futile. The operations of the Turkish
CAUCASIAN lllSTOKV AND TRAVEL 63 array, landed near Sukhum Kale, were entirely misdirected, and the opportunity of" setting up an independent Transcaucasian State was lost, probably for ever. It must not be taken for granted that this was any great loss to civilisation. Tlie talents of the Caucasians ; Georgians, Annenians, and uthrrs, may l)e ])etter employed in the .service of a great nation than in .setting up independent and insignificant States, while it is extremely doul)tful whether these races could have amalgamated under the leadeiship of any one of them. The natives of the highlands of Daghestan, under the leader- ship of the famous Schamyl —who had no more to do with Circassia than William Wallace had with Wales— carried on until 1859 a separate struggle against the invaders with varying and at times considerable success. In 1860 the conquest of the Caucasus was practically complete ; but the tribes which had been subdued would not submit to be ruled, fre.sh disorders broke out, and ended in 1866 in the famous expulsion of the Circassians and Abkhasians, which has left the Western Cau- casus a desert. Happily for the mountaineer, the natives of tlie valleys of tlio central chain have as yet found no reason to leave their homes. The Ming-relians have not unwillingly submitted to the results of the abolition of serfdom, which in their case meant the close of a system of oppression by petty nobles, comprising most of the worst features of the feudal SUANETIANS system of Western Europe. The Suanetians are beginning to find life endurable without the daily excitement of killing or l)eing
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62 THE EXTLUliATlUX UF THE CAUCASUS<br />
of the population of the lowlands ; but in the mountains it yielded<br />
in many places to Mohammedanism, and as years went on, both<br />
faiths became little more than a cover to more primitive forms<br />
of religion. There was a revival of Paganism. The churches<br />
and chapels were desecrated and profaned.<br />
The powers of Nature,<br />
the spirits of the storm, the forest, and the flood, were separately<br />
worshipped. Sacred yews and groves regained their former reverence<br />
; the spirits of ancestors were appeased or solaced with the<br />
ancient offerings.<br />
In modern geography Georgia is equivalent to the basin of the<br />
Kur. But the old Georgian Kingdom extended its territory or<br />
its suzerainty to the shores of the Black Sea and the sources of<br />
the Rion and the Ingur.<br />
The reign of Queen Thamara, in the first<br />
years of the thirteenth century, was the time of Georgia's glory<br />
and greatest extent. In the succeeding centuries the country<br />
suffered severely from the Persians and the Turks, until in 1802<br />
its last sovereign secured the peace of his kingdom l)y putting<br />
an end to its separate existence and accepting the rule of Russia.<br />
His feudatories, the semi-independent princelets of Mingrelia and<br />
Imeretia, the Dadians and Dadish Kilians of Suanetia, soon followed<br />
his example.<br />
The beginning of the nineteenth century found the Russians<br />
firmly established on both sides of the Caucasus, but holding<br />
only a narrow line of communication through the mountains.<br />
Vladikavkaz was a forti'ess exposed to the assaults of hostile<br />
tribes. The hills to the east of it were as much forbidden ground<br />
to the Russian as the mountains round Peshawur wei'e to the<br />
Englishman — up to last summer. On the western flank the postroad<br />
to the north had to be protected from the forays of the<br />
independent Circassians by a chain of Cossack stations. It was<br />
not until 1834 that the Russians undertook the subjugation of<br />
Circassia and Daghestan. The Crimean War found them with<br />
the task stiU incomplete. Attempts to support the tribes were<br />
made by the Allies, but owing to the ignorance of Western<br />
statesmen of the political and physical conditions of the Caucasus,<br />
they were ill-planned and futile. The operations of the Turkish