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Doubtless the fact of Khiva being under the Russian Government has something to do with the latter otherwise unaccountable fact. After supper we sit down on a newly arrived bale of Manchester calico in the caravanserai court, cross one knee and whittle chips like Michigan grangers at a cross-roads post-office, and spend two hours conversing on different topics.
Geographic difficulties had at once prolonged the period of Ignorance, and acted as obstructions, if ever the idea arose of pushing exploring parties into the southern regions; the Caucasus, the Caspian, the sandy deserts of Khiva and Kharesm, and the great central Asiatic mountain-chains, forming barriers which naturally restrained the northern hordes from progressing in this direction.
In 1703, during the reign of Peter the Great, the Khan of Khiva placed his dominions under Russian rule, and during the century Khiva continued friendly, but after the opening of the nineteenth century it became bitterly hostile. Meanwhile Russia was making its way towards the Caspian and Aral seas.
Of the different tribes some are independent and others recognize either the sovereignty of Russia or that of the Khans of Khiva, Khokhand, and Bokhara, the most formidable chiefs of Turkestan. The middle horde, the richest, is also the largest, and its encampments occupy all the space between the rivers Sara Sou, Irtish, and the Upper Ishim, Lake Saisang and Lake Aksakal.
Khiva had been captured by the Russians. This Khanate intervened between Bokhara and the Caspian Sea, which the Russians used as their base of operations on the west. The plea of necessity was again put forward, and it might have been urged as forcibly on geographical and strategic grounds as on the causes that were alleged for the rupture.
Ten years before he started for Khiva, there was much talk at the Rag of the wonderful feat of the young Guardsman, who undertook for a small wager to hop a quarter of a mile, run a quarter of a mile, ride a quarter of a mile, row a quarter of a mile, and walk a quarter of a mile in a quarter of an hour, and who covered the mile and a quarter of distance in ten minutes and twenty seconds.
In Asia beyond the Caspian, the southern boundary of the empire remains vague; the advance into the Turcoman Steppes and Afghan Turkestan, and on the Pamir plateau is still in progress. Bokhara and Khiva, though represented as vassal khanates, are in reality mere dependencies of Russia.
Finally, at Gorlen Hezaresp near Khiva, the breadth of the Oxus is so great that both banks are hardly distinguishable at the same time; but the stream is here comparatively shallow, ceasing to be navigable at about this point. The present course of the Oxus from its rise in Lake Sir-i-Kol to its termination in the Sea of Aral is estimated at 1400 miles.
After removing the twelve gold hoops or bands from the supporting columns and twenty similar silver rings from the second row of pillars, the boys penetrated the elevation in the center of the "khiva." As the end of the blower pipe was directed against this square column, the sediment of centuries disappeared.
But, as it happened, on the evening before the day we had fixed for our departure the Zulu Khiva informed me that a Kafir was waiting to see me. Accordingly, when we had done dinner, for we were at table at the time, I told Khiva to bring him in.
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