ry soon
afterward the new grass would spring up with great luxuriance. The
people thought that the rich verdure which the new grass displayed,
and its subsequent rapid growth, were owing simply to the fact that
the old dead grass was out of the way. It is now known, however, that
the burning of the old grass leaves an ash upon the ground which acts
powerfully as a fertilizer, and that the richness of the fresh
vegetation is due, in a great measure, to this cause.

Such was the country which was inhabited by the wandering pastoral
tribes that were now under the sway of Genghis Khan. His dominion had
no settled boundaries, for it was a dominion over certain tribes
rather than over a certain district of country. Nearly all the tribes
composing both the Mongul and the Tartar nations had now submitted to
him, though he still had some small wars to wage from time to time
with some of the more distant tribes before his authority was fully
and finally acknowledged. The history of some of these conflicts will
be narrated in the next chapter.

CHAPTER XIII.

ADVENTURES OF PRINCE KUSHLUK.

1203-1208

Kushluk's escape.--Tukta Bey.--Kashin.--Temujin pursues Tukta Bey
and Kushluk.--Retreat to Boyrak's country.----The various
tribes submit.--Fall and destruction of Kashin.--Proclamation.--Temujin
returns to Karakorom.--Boyrak's precautions.--Great battle.--Boyrak is
taken and slain.--Flight of Kushluk and Tukta Bey.--Ardish.--River
Irtish.--Tukta Bey's adherents.--Genghis Khan pursues them in
winter.--Difficulties of the country.--Death of Tukta Bey.--Kushluk
escapes again.--Turkestan.--He is received by Gurkhan.--Presentation
of the _shongar_.--Urus Inal.

Prince Kushluk, as the reader will perhaps recollect, was the son of
Tayian, the khan of the Naymans, who organized the grand league of
khans against Temujin at the instigation of Yemuka, as related in a
preceding chapter. He was the young prince who was opposed to Jughi,
the son of Temujin, in the great final battle. The reader will
recollect that in that battle Tayian himself was slain, as was also
Yemuka, but the young prince succeeded in making his escape.

He was accompanied in his flight by a certain general or chieftain
named Tukta Bey. This Tukta Bey was the khan of a powerful tribe. The
name of the town or village which he considered his capital was
Kashin. It was situated toward the southwest, not far from the borders
of China. Tukta Bey, taking Kushluk