CHAPTER II.

CENTRAL ASIA.

ON the 12th of April, 1829, Humboldt, Rose, and Ehrenberg departed from Berlin for St. Petersburg. They had arranged the different branches of science to which each was to devote himself. Ehrenberg was to attend to the botany and zoology of the countries through which they should pass, Rose was to analyse the minerals, and keep the travelling diary, while Humboldt undertook the magnetic observations, the results of geographical astronomy, and the geology and natural history generally. To show the respect in which he held him, before he started, the King of Prussia appointed Humboldt an acting privy councillor. It was the rank of a minister, and his title thenceforth was Excellency-" His Excellency the Baron Von Humboldt."

On their way from Berlin to St. Petersburg, the travellers passed through Königsberg and Dorpat, Esthonia and Livonia. As the sea shore in the neighbourhood of Königsberg abounded with amber, it was almost a forbidden ground to the inhabitants. It was farmed out at a high rate, and carefully guarded, so that the fishermen could only put to sea at certain prescribed points of the coast. The coast between Dantzic and Memel was let

out to a rich contractor for ten thousand dollars a-year. His magazines contained, at the time the travellers visited them, one hundred and fifty thousand pounds of amber. Being highly inflammable it was kept in vaulted rooms, which were secured with iron doors.

They arrived at St. Petersburg on the 1st of May, and found everything in readiness for their journey. Carriages, couriers, and horses were placed at their disposal by Count Cancrin; a military escort was provided for them, and even their residences on the way were selected. A Russian mining officer was appointed as Humboldt's companion, to give him information regarding the roads and localities, and to see that the authorities performed what was required of them.

The travellers remained some time in St. Petersburg, in order to see its sights before they commenced their journey. They visited the public institutions of the capital, and most of the show-places in the vicinity. As might have been expected, from their tastes, and the objects of their journey, they were attracted by the mineralogical collections of St. Petersburgh, and the size and splendour of the crown jewels. The largest of these jewels was on the top of the imperial sceptre. It weighed one hundred ninety-four and three-quarter carats, and its greatest diameter was one inch three and and a half lines. Formerly in the possession of Nadir Shah, whose throne it long adorned, it was bought, with other jewels, after his death, by an Armenian at at Bagdad, for fifty thousand piastres. From this Armenian it was purchased by Catharine the Second, at the price of four hundred and fifty thousand silver rubles, and a patent of nobility.

On the 20th of May the party started for Moscow. Be sides a courier, and the mining officer already mentioned, they were furnished with a Russian cook, as in the sta tions beyond Moscow travellers were obliged to cook for themselves. The broad highway between St. Petersburg and Moscow was soon traversed, and they halted for a few days in the old capital of Moscovy. After making some barometric observations and examining the geology of the country, they continued their journey over a marshy level until they reached Nishni Novgorod, on the Volga. Here they met with Count Polier, the owner of several large mining estates in the Ural, and as he was on his way thither he joined the party. They em barked on the Volga on the last of May, and reached Kasan on the 4th of June.

Originally the seat of a Tartar Khanate which was overturned in 1552, after flourishing for three hundred years, Kasan was still inhabited by Tartars, especially in the suburbs. The travellers visited the temples of these Tartars to see their form of worship: the guides removed their slippers as they entered, but as the travellers wore boots they were permitted to keep them on.

The party remained at Kasan five days, during which they made several excursions in the neighbourhood. The most interesting of these was to the ruins of Bulgar, the capital of ancient Bulgaria. As they drew near the modern village they were met by groups of men, women, and children; the whole population came forth to meet them. At the head of these groups walked the oldest inhabitants, who, when they came to Humboldt, offered him bread and salt as a token of reverence, according to the Russian custom.

THE RUINS OF BULGAR.

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Dismissing these good people when their hospitable ceremony was over, the travellers proceeded to the ruins of the old capital. They found the walls of some buildings still standing, two towers, and a number of tombstones bearing monumental inscriptions, in Turkish, Arabic, and Armenian. These inscriptions dated back to the year 623 of the Hegira (A. D. 1226). Silver and copper coins and copper rings and trinkets were some times found in the rubbish of Bulgar. There were several tombs among the ruins, which were objects of veneration to the faithful. They were the tombs of Tartar saints, who, as the Tartars generally were anything but saints, were undoubtedly, in their time, the cream of Tartars. The travellers found a Mollah performing his devotions at one of these tombs. He repeated his form of prayer, and bowed his body without being disturbed by their presence. They offered him a seat in their carriage, which he accepted, as the ruins were some distance from each other; and he managed each time. they stopped, to finish his devotions before they finished their examinations. Devotion was a good thing, so was a comfortable ride. Returning to Kasan they witnessed the Saban, a Tartar festival, celebrated every year after seed-time. The Tartars wrestled with each other, and ran foot races, and galloped their horses at full speed. It was a scene of barbaric merriment.

They left Kasan on the 9th, and passed through a district inhabited by the Wotjaks. This tribe was a branch of the family of Finns; they had embraced Christianity, and spoke the Russian language, although they retained the customs of their ancestors. The women wore high caps of birch-bark, covered with blue cloth, bedecked

388

JEKATHARINENBURG.

with fringes, and hung with silver coins. On the 12th they reached the estate of Count Polier, at Werchne Mulinsk, where they halted to partake of his hospitality.

From Werchne Mulinsk, they journeyed to Jekatharinenburg, the Count accompanying them. Near Perm they fell in with a party of exiles on the way to Siberia. This party consisted of sixty or eighty women and girls, and as they were not fettered, they were probably ban ished for trivial offences. The worst class of criminals were always fettered while on their way to Siberia, being fastened by one hand to a long rope. The party that the travellers overtook was escorted by a band of armed and mounted Bashkirs.

The postmaster at Malmüsch was a mineralogist, with a taste for anatomy, for around and within his house were the teeth and bones of an immense mammoth, found on the banks of the Wjatka.

On the 14th the travellers reached the outskirts of the Ural-a series of delicious vallies. When they left the Neva three weeks before, it was crusted with ice; now the grass was out, the plants were in full bloom, and the ground was profusely covered with flowers. On the 15th they arrived at Jekatharinenburg.

Jekatharinenburg was situated among the mountains on the Asiatic side of the Ural ridge. This ridge consisted of several nearly parallel lines, whose highest point rose to the height of nearly five thousand feet. Its direction in the meridian, which was in a line standing perpendicularly upon the equator from the pole, reminded Humboldt of a similar situation in a chain of the Andes. The northern and central portions of the Ural mountains contained gold and platina, and abounded in minerals of all kinds.