414 RUSSIA IN EUEOPE. 



Lower Volga Basin. 



(Governments of Penza, Simbirsk, Samara, Saratov, and Astrakhan.) 



This region is not so densely peopled as that of the Kama, nor is there here 

 such a chaos of Slav, Finnish, Tatar, and other nationalities as in the north. 

 Chuvashes, Mordvinians, and Tatars are the only non -Slav peoples south of Kazan 

 and Chistopol as far as the confluence of the Great Irgiz in Samara. But here 

 begin the German settlements, occupying a space of 8,000 square miles on both 

 sides of the main stream. The appeal made in 1763 by Catherine II. to "Western 

 colonists to settle here, as a barrier against the nomad populations of the Lower 

 Volga, was chiefly responded to, besides the Slavs, by the Germans and Swiss, and 

 the few French and Swede settlers have long been absorbed by the other immi- 

 grants. Although less highly favoured than the German colonies of New Russia, 

 those of the Volga are more flourishing, thanks to the adoption of the Russian 

 principle of holding their lands in common. The hundred and two original settle- 

 ments have greatly increased in numbers, and the Germans are now spread all over 

 the country, where they preserve intact their nationality, and still speak their mother 

 tongue. They have recently founded higher schools in order to insure to their 

 children the privileges granted to the military classes, who are better educated and 

 familiar with Russian. The Germans in Saratov and Samara number probably 

 over 800,000, and are increasing rapidly by the natural excess of the birth rate over 

 the mortality. The tracts between the German settlements are occupied chiefly 

 by Little Russians, who, like the Ukranian Chumaks, are largely engaged in the 

 salt trade. 



The Kalmuks and Kirghiz. 



South and east of the great bend of the Volga at Tzaritzîn the Russians are 

 found only on the river banks, the bare steppes on both sides being still held by 

 nomad populations. The nature of the soil, which is totally unfit for tillage, 

 sufficiently accounts for this circumstance. Even the Russian officials in charge 

 of the natives are obliged to shift their quarters with the Avandering nomad 

 encampments. The Kalmuks (Kalmîki, called also Eliuts and Oirats), who are 

 the southernmost of these nomad peoples, occupy a tract of about 48,000 square 

 miles between the Volga and the Kuma, in the saline depression formerly flooded 

 by the waters of the Caspian. They also roam over the steppes along the left 

 bank of the Don, and some of their tribes pitch their tents near the Kirghiz, east 

 of the Akhtuba. Military service and migration to the towns have caused some 

 reduction in their numbers, but these barren or grassy steppes still support about 

 120,000 of them, so far, at least, as the estimates can be relied upon. Few live to 

 a great age, mortality is enormous amongst the children, and the men are said to 

 exceed the women by one- fourth.* 



The Kalmuks, a branch of the Mongolian race, with perhaps an admixture of 



* Kalmuks in European Eussia (1879) : 68,329 men; 51,267 (?) women; total 119,956 (?). 



