AMONG THE KIRGHIZ 
289 
troop were upon us ag-ain. They flung themselves upon 
the still smoking carcass of the goat, and began to 
struggle for it as though they were fightino- for 
a bag full of gold. All I could see of them wls an 
mdistinguishable confusion of horses and men enveloped 
m a cloud of dust. Some of the horses fell ; others reared ; 
others shied. Holding fast to their saddles, the riders 
leaned over towards the ground and snatched at the 
carcass as they swept past it. Some fell off and were 
nearly trampled under foot. Others clung underneath 
their horse’s ^ belly. All grasped at the goat, tuggino- 
and hauling in the wildest disarray. The stragglers in 
the gallop, the new arrivals, all plunged headlong into 
the milde as though they would ride right over the mass 
of struggling horsemen. The men shouted. The horses 
whinnied. The dust rolled up in clouds. The contestants 
were allowed to practise certain artifices, such as pulling 
at another man’s bridle, striking his horse over the nose 
with his whip-stock to force him back, or even drao-ging 
one another out of the saddle. 
The confusion was still worse confounded by a couple 
of champions who rode yaks with sharp horns. As these 
strong-necked animals pushed their way into the niel^e, 
they kept tickling the horses with their horns. This made 
the horses plunge and kick. The yaks, irritated by the 
kicks, thrust themselves in all the more stubbornly, till 
the contest began to look remarkably like a bull-fight. 
At length one of the men got a firm hold upon the goat’s 
skin. He snatched the body up, clasped it tight between 
his knee and his saddle, and, bursting out of the throno-, 
galloped away like the wind, describing a wide circle 
round the plain. Hard after him raced all the others. 
They disappeared from sight in the distance. Two or 
three minutes passed. Again the dull thud— thud of 
scores of horses’ hoofs beating the ground. Straight 
down upon us they charged, oblivious of all hindrances. 
nother moment and they would have ridden over us and 
crushed us. We could not get out of their way. But, 
when within two or three yards of us, they wheeled 
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