ut to such
degradations the Athalik Ghazi--true "champion father" as he was--never
stooped. With whatever imaginary power the sympathy and good-will of
the Mahomedan peoples of Turkestan may have clothed this ruler, there is
no question that his attitude towards the Muscovite would have warranted
the assertion of greater power than was ever attributed to him; and the
secret of this delusion, an attitude of defiant strength without any
solid foundation for so bold a course, can only be unravelled by
remembering that the Athalik Ghazi strove to represent, not so much
Kashgaria, as the whole Mahomedan world of Central Asia. The necessities
of his own position, when, having conquered Kashgar, he found that he
had aroused the susceptibilities of the Russians, compelled him to seek
in every direction for aid, and to have recourse to every artifice for
increasing his strength, or its semblance, in order to avoid the
dissolution of his state and a subjection to the Czar. So well did he
succeed in his efforts, and so prompt were his movements and so fearless
his attitude, that the Russians were deluded into a belief--which was,
as we emphatically insist, unfounded--that Kashgar would prove a more
formidable antagonist than either Bokhara, or Khokand, or Khiva.

The interior management of a state, which, young in years, yet seemed to
tower among its fellows, might be supposed to be a very interesting
topic to dilate upon; but on this subject there is less direct evidence
than could be wished. Even Sir Douglas Forsyth, in his official report,
is not able to throw as much light as is desired on the inner working of
the administrative system of Yakoob Beg. Still, such as it is, with the
exception of the Russian writer, Gregorieff, he is the only authority on
the subject.

To commence with the court and the immediate surroundings of Yakoob Beg,
we are struck by two inconsistencies. In the first place, there were no
great nobles, or indeed adherents or his family; those chiefs who,
whether they were Khokandian nobles or Kirghiz or Afghan adventurers,
had proved their fidelity to his rule, and their capacity for service,
were actively employed as governors of districts, or as commandants of
fortresses in the wide-stretching dominions of their imperious master.
Periodically they came to pay their respects in the capital, and at
frequent intervals Yakoob Beg, in his journeys to the frontier, visited
them, and superintended their operati