TIMUR BEG. 
89 
hanged by order of the conqueror ; thus tarnishing one 
of his greatest victories by an act which must ever 
remain a foul blot upon his name. Toktamish was 
pursued; but he contrived to cross the Wolga with a 
few officers and escape into Bulgaria. Timur now 
appointed one of his own nobles Khan or sovereign 
of Kipchak, and sent him to collect together the scat- 
tered forces of that country, leaving him in possession 
of a subdued and impoverished kingdom. The Jaga- 
tay army on its return ravaged the conquered pro- 
vinces, and collected an immense booty, consisting of 
gold and silver, precious stones, furs, and slaves. 
As he had now no enemy to engage his arms, the 
emperor, resolving to become master of all Asia to 
the north, crossed the Dnieper, or Borysthenes of the 
ancients, and entered the great desert which leads 
into Europe. Encountering the Uzbecks, he slew 
vast numbers of them, and obliged them to evacuate 
the country. Changing his route, the victorious Ja- 
gatay led his army towards Muscovy. Arriving at 
Moscow, he pillaged it, laid waste the neighbouring 
provinces, and thus amassed a prodigious quantity of 
treasure. Having set at liberty all the Mohamme- 
dans who had been made captives by the Russians, 
and put a great number of the latter to _ the sword, 
he marched to Azoph, a fortified town on the eastern 
extremity of the lake of that name in Asiatic Russia, 
on the confines of Tartary, and finally encamped be- 
fore the Circassian capital, whence he despatched the 
two princes Mohammed Sultan and Miran Shah into 
Circassia, which they quickly subdued, and returned 
to the imperial camp laden with spoil. 
