TO AZOF AND TAGANROG. 399 
Tahtars, Turks, Greeks, Cossacks, Russians, Italians, chap. 
Calmucks, and Armenians ; these, together with ^ ■ 
our English party, formed a representation of 
the costume of nine different nations within the 
compass of a quarter of an English mile. The 
Tahtars were fishing in the river, or driving 
cattle towards the town; the Turks were smoking 
in their coffee-houses; the Greeks, a bustling 
race, were walking about, telling lies, and barter- 
ing merchandize ; the Cossacks were scampering 
in all directions on horseback ; the Russians, as 
police-officers, were scratching their heads ; the 
Italians appeared as Venetian and Neapolitan 
sailors ; the Calmucks jabbering with each other; 
the Armenians, both men and women, airing in 
droskies ; and the English staring at them all. 
Towards the Don, and especially towards its 
embouchure, Tahtars are found in great num- 
bers; and this race of men appears in journeying 
hence, westward, the whole way towards the 
Dnieper, in all the towns by the Sea of Azof , 
and in the Crimea, and throughout the dreary 
plains lying to the north of that Peninsula. 
All the South of Russia, from the Dnieper to General 
the Volga, and even to the territories of the somh°of he 
Kirgissian and Thibet Tahtars, with all the North Russia - 
°f the Crimea, is one flat uncultivated desolate 
waste, forming, as it. were, a series of those 
