IX.] THE NORTHERN MONGOLS. 331 



In the same way many Uzbeg and Kirghiz Turki tribes are 

 named from famous Mongol chiefs, although no one will deny a 

 strain of true Mongol blood in all these heterogeneous groups. 

 This is evident enough from the square and somewhat flat Mongol 

 features, prominent cheek-bones, oblique eyes, large mouth, feet 

 and hands, yellowish brown complexion, ungainly obese figures 

 and short stature, all of which are characteristic of both sections, 

 the Kara-Kirghiz highlanders, and the Kazaks of the lowlands. 

 Some ethnologists regard these Kirghiz groups, not as a distinct 

 branch of the Mongolo-Turki race, but rather as a confederation 

 of several nomad tribes stretching from the Gobi to the Lower 

 Volga, and mingled together by Jenghiz-Khan and his successors'. 



The true national name is Kazdk, " Riders," and as they 

 were originally for the most part mounted 

 marauders, or free lances of the steppe, the term v K ^ z ^ and 



l\. OSS 3. C rl 



came to be gradually applied to all nomad and 

 other horsemen engaged in predatory warfare. It thus at an early 

 date reached the South Russian steppe, where it was adopted in 

 the form of Kosscick by the Russians themselves. It should be 

 noted that the compound term Kirghiz-Kazak, introduced by 

 the Russians to distinguish these nomads from their own Cossacks. 

 is really a misnomer. The word "Kirghiz," what- 

 ever its origin, is never used by the Kazaks in Kirghi* ara 

 reference to themselves, but only to their near 

 relations, the Kirghiz, or Kara- Kirghiz' 2 , of the uplands. 



These highlanders, who roam the Tian-shan and Pamir valleys, 

 form two sections : On, " Right '' or East, and Sol, " Left," or 

 West. They are the Diko Kamennyi, that is, "Wild Rock People," 

 of the Russians, whence the expression "Block Kirghiz" still found 

 in some English books of travel. But they call themselves simply 

 Kirghiz, claiming descent from an original tribe of that name, 

 itself sprung from a legendary Kirghiz-beg, from whom are also 

 descended the Chiliks, Kitars and others, all now reunited with 

 the Ons and the Sols. 



The Kazaks also are grouped in long-established and still 

 jealously maintained sections the Great, Middle, Little, and 



1 M. Balkashin in Izvestia Russ. Geogi: Soc. April, 1883. 



; = " Black.'' with reference to the colour of their round felt tents. 



