400 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



so ardently desire. The consequence was, that when 

 the Turkish army arrived at Souchoum Kaleh, Prince 

 Michael found himself compelled to receive them with 

 the utmost friendship and cordiality, for he was as 

 unable to change the sympathies of the greater portion 

 of his own subjects as he was to prevent the landing 

 of Omer Pasha and his forces. Like the Uboochians, 

 they too contributed their quota to the Turkish army, 

 but, like them, they will gain nothing by the war 

 in return for their co-operation. Had a condition 

 prohibiting Eussia from rebuilding the forts on the 

 eastern coast of the Black Sea been inserted, that 

 alone would have sufficed to secure their independence. 

 For although she might have reserved to herself the 

 right of garrisoning troops in the interior of Abkhasia, 

 that attempt would have been found perfectly im- 

 practicable, except in the low country, where, as has 

 already been shown, the population is not so strongly 

 opposed to her rule. The evacuation of Souchoum 

 Kaleh by Eussian troops, and the residence there of 

 foreign consuls, would have opened up the whole of 

 the Mahometan part of the country to the commercial 

 enterprise of the world. So far from that being the 

 case, in consequence of those hostilities which must 

 inevitably be resumed between the Mahometan Ab- 

 khasians and Eussians, as soon as Souchoum Kaleh is 

 regarrisoned, the country will revert to the condition 

 in which it was before the war, and which is precisely 

 similar to that of Ubooch. The chances of their 



