JOURNEY FROM HERAT TO ORENBURG. 281 



Their mode of attack, after mature deliberation, was 

 to drive on the camels which they had just seized, 

 and to advance in their rear ; the result was, as might 

 have been anticipated, that the camels being wounded 

 and frightened by the fire opened on them from the 

 Russian intrenchment, turned on the Turkomans, 

 throwing the latter into hopeless confusion taking 

 advantage of which, the Eussians succeeded in secur- 

 ing such of the camels as had not been shot. This 

 Russian force did not exceed 10,000 fighting men 

 and forty pieces of artillery. The reports so in- 

 dustriously spread in India of an intended invasion 

 on our provinces were altogether without foundation, 

 as no idea of an immediate advance beyond Khiva 

 could have been entertained. The expedition failed 

 from the excessive severity of the Avinter, which 

 destroyed all the camels ; but apart from this, when 

 it is remembered that from Orenburg to the mouth of 

 the Oxus is a distance of 800 miles, and that in the 

 whole extent there is not one fixed dwelling, that no 

 supplies whatever could be procured, and that even 

 fuel was not to be found I say, when these obstacles 

 are taken into consideration, we can hardly be sur- 

 prised at the failure of the expedition. There are two 

 men appointed to collect and superintend the hired 

 camels, of which I find we require 220. One of 

 these is a Cossack, by name Niaz, an enormously fat 

 creature without any beard, but of a pleasing, good- 

 humoured expression of face ; the other is a haggard, 



