Ch. vii. among modern Pastoral Nations. 127 



chants who fall into their hands.* The only com- 

 merce which is countenanced, is the commerce in 

 slaves. These form a principal part of the booty 

 which they carry off in their predatory incursions, 

 and are considered as a chief source of their 

 riches. Those which they have occasion for them- 

 selves, either for the attendance on their herds, 

 or as wives and concubines, they keep, and the 

 rest they sell-t The Circassian and Daghestan 

 Tartars, and the other tribes in the neighbour- 

 hood of Caucasus, living in a poor and mountain- 

 ous country, and on that account less subject to 

 invasion, generally overflow with inhabitants; 

 and when they cannot obtain slaves in the com- 

 mon way, steal from one another, and even sell 

 their own wives and children.^ This trade in 

 slaves, so general among the Mahometan Tartars, 

 may be one of the causes of their constant wars; 

 as, when a prospect of a plentiful supply for this 

 kind of traffic offers itself, neither peace nor al- 

 liance can restrain them.§ 



The heathen Tartars, the Kalmucks and Mo- 



* Geneal. Hist. Tart. vol. ii. p. 412. 



f Id. vol. ii. p. 413. 



{ Id. p. 413, 414, and cli. xii. 



§ " They j ustify it as lawful to have many wives, because they 

 " say they bring us many children, which we can sell for ready- 

 " money, or exchange for necessary conveniencies ; yet when they 

 " have not wherewithal to maintain them, they hold it a piece of 

 " charity to murder infants new-born, as also they do such as arc 

 " sick and past recovery, because they say they free them from a 

 " great deal of misery." Sir John Chardin's Travels, Harris's 

 Col. b. iii. c. ii. p. 8C5. 



