30
and Kirghises began to retire. The pursuit was not as
vigorous as the Kalmuck hatred would have desired.
But, at the same time, the very gloomiest hatred could
not but find, in their own dreadful experience of the
Asiatic deserts, and in the certainty that these wretched
Bashkirs had to repeat that same experience a second
time, for thousands of miles, as the price exacted by a
retributary Providence for their vindictive cruelty--not
the very gloomiest of the Kalmucks, or the least reflecting, 5
but found in all this a retaliatory chastisement more
complete and absolute than any which their swords and
lances could have obtained or human vengeance could
have devised.

* * * * *

Here ends the tale of the Kalmuck wanderings in the 10
Desert; for any subsequent marches which awaited them
were neither long nor painful. Every possible alleviation
and refreshment for their exhausted bodies had been
already provided by Kien Long with the most princely
munificence; and lands of great fertility were immediately 15
assigned to them in ample extent along the River Ily, not
very far from the point at which they had first emerged
from the wilderness of Kobi. But the beneficent attention
of the Chinese Emperor may be best stated in his own
words, as translated into French by one of the Jesuit 20
missionaries: "La nation des Torgotes (_savoir les Kalmuques_)
arriva a Ily, toute delabree, n'ayant ni de quoi
vivre, ni de quoi se vetir. Je l'avais prevu; et j'avais
ordonne de faire en tout genre les provisions necessaires
pour pouvoir les secourir promptement: c'est ce qui a ete 25
execute. On a fait la division des terres: et on a assigne
a chaque famille une portion suffisante pour pouvoir servir
a son entretien, soit en la cultivant, soit en y nourissant
des bestiaux. On a donne a chaque particulier des etoffes
pour l'habiller, des grains pour se nourrir pendant l'espace 30
d'une annee, des ustensiles pour le menage et d'autres
choses necessaires: et outre cela plusieurs onces d'argent,
pour se pourvoir de ce qu'on aurait pu oublier. On a
designe des lieux particuliers, fertiles en paturages; et on
leur a donne des boeufs, moutons, etc., pour qu'ils pussent
dans la suite travailler par eux-memes a leur entretien et
a leur bien-etre."

These are the words of the Emperor himself, speaking 5
in his own p