THE COSSACKS. 



241 



THE COSSACKS. 



By Captain CYPRIAN A. G. BRIDGE. 



OF late years the labors of a certain school 

 of historical inquirers have been frequent- 

 ly employed in the " rehabilitation " of those 

 characters which, by the pretty general consent 

 of the writers of every period, have been con- 

 sistently blackened for ages. Now that King 

 John — the " trifler and coward " of Macaulay — 

 has been made out by a recent historian to have 

 possessed an unusual share of boldness and as- 

 tuteness, and to have been led into an antagonism 

 with his barons and people by the consciousness 

 of political virtues, of which he had a larger 

 share than fell to the lot of even the more illus- 

 trious Plantagenets, the work of historical " white- 

 washing " will probably cease from the want of 

 objects to which to devote it. One consequence 

 of the Russo-Turkish War has been the discovery 

 of virtues, hitherto unperceived or denied, among 

 several of the minor races or communities of 

 Southeastern Europe. The Roumanians are no 

 longer to-be regarded as a soft and effeminate 

 people, careless of all political questions save 

 those involved in the pursuit of place, and with 

 an insouciant indifference to military glory. The 

 Montenegrins are not only gallant warriors and 

 hardy mountaineers, they are the professors of 

 enlightened opinions upon self-government, and 

 more than ordinarily alive to the benefits to be 

 derived from extended primary education. The 

 recently-discovered virtues of the Bulgarians have 

 been made almost a casus belli between different 

 sets of writers and observers, and their unhappy 

 race has been the object of wordy contentions 

 almost as fierce as the terrible physical struggles 

 which for so many months hove desolated their 

 unfortunate country. There is one community, 

 however, with which each of the above have often 

 been brought in contact, whose bad name has, 

 if possible, been made rather worse of late. That 

 community is known by the name of " The Cos- 

 sacks." The remarks of some very recent ob- 

 servers may be construed as almost denying them 

 the possession of the one virtue which has scarce- 

 ly ever been questioned before — the military vir- 

 tue of courage. It is true, indeed, that Mr. Lau- 

 rence Oliphant, who traveled among them just 

 b£fore the Crimean War, spoke of their valor in 

 action as one of those fictions which the Russian 

 Government found it convenient to keeD up. But 

 88 



he spoke, not after personal observation of their 

 conduct in war, but — as he informs us — upon 

 Russian authority, and of the Don Cossacks more 

 particularly, whom other families of Cossacks are 

 accustomed to look down upon and disparage. 



The prevalent idea in Western Europe of a 

 Cossack is of a half-barbarian plunderer — a kind 

 of wild horseman but half reclaimed by the stern 

 military discipline of the czars from the savagery 

 of the nomad state. Even a special correspond- 

 ent of one of the London newspapers with the 

 Russian armies in Bulgaria has represented the 

 Cossacks — on Russian authority, be it noted — 

 as little better than a set of mere plundering free- 

 booters. The terrors of a Muscovite invasion owe 

 much of their intensity to the dread which the 

 character of ruthless marauders, given to these 

 auxiliaries, always inspires. An incursion of the 

 Turcos was not more feared in Germany in 18*70 

 than would be a Cossack inroad by any Western 

 nation now. Phrases which have become almost 

 proverbial support the feeling with which the 

 Cossack is regarded. In his spitefully epigram- 

 matic prophecy of the fate of Europe, Napoleon, 

 who could hardly have been expected to look 

 very kindly upon the species, declared that in 

 fifty years it would be either republican or Cos- 

 sack. The whole point of the antithesis lies in 

 the belief that " Cossacks " are the very an- 

 tipodes of " republicans." Among seamen the 

 most opprobrious intensification of the disparaging 

 term "land-lubber" is Cossack, preceded, of 

 course, by a suitable procession of adjectives. 

 The decline of Cossack military virtue is attrib- 

 uted, in a recent discussion of the armed strength 

 of Russia, to the civilization which of late years 

 is supposed to have overtaken that hitherto semi- 

 savage people. 



Surprising as it may seem, the unvarying tes- 

 timony of travelers and inquirers who have visit- 

 ed their homes and consulted native authorities 

 has, for many generations, uniformly represented 

 the Cossacks as exactly the opposite of what we 

 so persistently believe them to be. Perhaps there 

 are few matters upon which travelers have been 

 so frequently in agreement, and even fewer on 

 which their unanimity has had so little effect in 

 the direction of removing prejudices and precon- 

 ceptions. It is not putting it at all too strongly 



