. Russia's railway advance into Central Asia; . ies, Kara-Koiounlis and Ak-Koiounlis,men of the Black Shepherd clan and the White,long ruled over Western Asia. History, andin the further East the testimony of our owndays, show us the Turkoman shepherds andneatherds in the main rarely as fixed cultiva-tors or villagers. But from the pastoral life,—unlike that of the hunter or the savage,—to theagricultural is but a step, and whenever anopportunity occurs this step is readily made :once made, it always tends to become irrevo-cable. Their skill in agriculture, the wideharvest-covered fields that
. Russia's railway advance into Central Asia; . ies, Kara-Koiounlis and Ak-Koiounlis,men of the Black Shepherd clan and the White,long ruled over Western Asia. History, andin the further East the testimony of our owndays, show us the Turkoman shepherds andneatherds in the main rarely as fixed cultiva-tors or villagers. But from the pastoral life,—unlike that of the hunter or the savage,—to theagricultural is but a step, and whenever anopportunity occurs this step is readily made :once made, it always tends to become irrevo-cable. Their skill in agriculture, the wideharvest-covered fields that surround their settle-ments, the comparative comfort of their dwell-ings, and the constructive ingenuity of the hugestables in which their sheep and cattle findrefuge and provender during the long wintermonths, all prove tJiat their nomad condition inCentral Asia is more the result of circumstancesthan of an innate and irrepressible bent; thatunder the forms of tribe they have the materialsof a nation ; and that the city, with all its con-. Merv and the Tttrkonians. 335 sequences of wealth, culture, and peaceful civi-lization, is at least as natural to them as thetent and the mountain side. Considering the ill-conditioned nature andsavage aspect of their surroundings, it is not sur-prising that the Tekkes and other cognate tribesshould have developed so very differently fromtheir better favoured kindred on the uplandsof Asiatic Turkey. Covered in prehistorictimes by the sea, and subsequently supportingflourishing cities and prosperous populations,which lured the conquering hosts of Alexanderthe Great, and the desolating hordes of Timurthe Lame, these great plains have now for cen-turies past been plagued by a sea of sand asshifting and restless as the Turkoman shep-herds, whose sphere of peaceful occupation itmust have continually diminished. After flittingfrom place to place round the ever-wideningedges of the Kara Kum, through which theirwanderings and efforts to battle w
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, bookpublisherlondo, bookyear1890
