troubling the reader with the miscellaneous
facts which, with the assistance of these two friends, I succeeded in
collecting--indeed, I could not if I would, for the notes I then made
were afterwards lost--but I wish to say a few words about the actual
economic condition of the Bashkirs. They are at present passing from
pastoral to agricultural life; and it is not a little interesting to
note the causes which induce them to make this change, and the way in
which it is made.

Philosophers have long held a theory of social development according
to which men were at first hunters, then shepherds, and lastly
agriculturists. How far this theory is in accordance with reality we
need not for the present inquire, but we may examine an important part
of it and ask ourselves the question, Why did pastoral tribes adopt
agriculture? The common explanation is that they changed their mode of
life in consequence of some ill-defined, fortuitous circumstances. A
great legislator arose amongst them and taught them to till the soil, or
they came in contact with an agricultural race and adopted the customs
of their neighbours. Such explanations must appear unsatisfactory to
any one who has lived with a pastoral people. Pastoral life is so
incomparably more agreeable than the hard lot of the agriculturist, and
so much more in accordance with the natural indolence of human nature,
that no great legislator, though he had the wisdom of a Solon and the
eloquence of a Demosthenes, could possibly induce his fellow-countrymen
to pass voluntarily from the one to the other. Of all the ordinary
means of gaining a livelihood--with the exception perhaps of
mining--agriculture is the most laborious, and is never voluntarily
adopted by men who have not been accustomed to it from their childhood.
The life of a pastoral race, on the contrary, is a perennial holiday,
and I can imagine nothing except the prospect of starvation which could
induce men who live by their flocks and herds to make the transition to
agricultural life.

The prospect of starvation is, in fact, the cause of the
transition--probably in all cases, and certainly in the case of the
Bashkirs. So long as they had abundance of pasturage they never thought
of tilling the soil. Their flocks and herds supplied them with all that
they required, and enabled them to lead a tranquil, indolent existence.
No great legislator arose among them to teach them the use of the plough
and the sickle, and w