Crossing a fertile region where poplars like distaffs rise gracefully
erect, skirting fields bristling with vines, running by gardens where
fruit trees abound, our train stops at the new town.
As is inevitable since the Russian conquest, there are two towns side
by side at Tachkend as at Samarkand, as at Bokhara, as at Merv. Here
the old town has tortuous streets, houses of mud and clay, bazaars of
poor appearance, caravanserais built of bricks dried in the sun, a few
mosques, and schools as numerous as if the czar had decreed by ukase
that everything French should be imitated. It is true that the scholars
are wanting, but there is no want of schools.
The population of Tachkend does not differ very much from that met with
in other parts of Turkestan. It comprises Sarthes, Usbegs, Tadjiks,
Khirgizes, Nogais, Israelites, a few Afghans and Hindoos and--as may be
naturally supposed--a fair supply of Russians.
It is perhaps at Tachkend that the Jews are gathered in the greatest
numbers. And from the day that the town passed under Russian
administration their situation has considerably improved. From that
epoch dates the complete civil and political liberty they now enjoy.
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