of a light wooden framework, and red cloth or felt covering, with an opening above for light and ventilation.
The camp life of the Kazaks seems almost unendurable to Europeans in winter, when they are confined altogether to the tent, and exposed to endless discomforts. In summer the day is spent mostly in sleep or drinking koumiss, followed at night by feasting and the recital of tales, varied with songs accompanied by the music of the flute and balalaika. But horsemanship is the great amusement of all true Kazaks, who may almost be said to be born in the saddle. Hence, though excellent riders, they are bad walkers. Though hardy and long-lived, they are uncleanly in their habits and often decimated by small-pox and Siberian plague. They have no fixed meals, and live mainly on mutton and goat and horse flesh, and instead of bread use the so-called balamyk, a mess of flour fried in dripping and diluted in water. The universal drink is koumiss, which is wholesome, nourishing and a specific against all chest diseases.
The dress consists of the chapân, a flowing robe of which one or two are worn in summer and several in winter, fastened with a silk or leather girdle, in which are stuck a knife, tobacco pouch, seal and a few other trinkets. Broad silk or cloth pantaloons are often worn over the chapân, which is of velvet, silk, cotton or felt, according to the rank of the wearer. Large black or red leather boots, with round white felt pointed caps, complete the costume, which is much the same for both sexes.
Like the Kara-Kirghiz, the Kazaks are nominally Sunnites, but Shamanists at heart, worshipping, besides the Kudai or good divinity, the Shaitan or bad spirit. Their faith is strong in the talchi or soothsayer and other charlatans, who know everything, can do everything, and heal all disorders at pleasure. But they are not fanatics, though holding the abstract doctrine that the “Kafir” may be lawfully oppressed, including in this category not only Buddhists and Christians, but even Mahommedans of the Shiah sect. There are no fasts or ablutions, mosques or mollahs, or regular prayers. Although Mussulmans since the beginning of the 16th century, they have scarcely yet found their way to Mecca, their pilgrims visiting instead the more convenient shrines of the “saints” scattered over eastern Turkestan. Unlike the Mongolians, the Kazaks treat their dead with great respect, and the low steppe hills are often entirely covered with monuments raised above their graves.
Letters are neglected to such an extent that whoever can merely write is regarded as a savant, while he becomes a prodigy of learning if able to read the Koran in the original. Yet the Kazaks are naturally both musical and poetical, and possess a considerable number of national songs, which are usually repeated with variations from mouth to mouth.
The Kazaks still choose their own khans, who, though confirmed by the Russian government, possess little authority beyond their respective tribes. The real rulers are the elders or umpires and sultans, all appointed by public election. Brigandage and raids arising out of tribal feuds, which were formerly recognized institutions, are now severely punished, sometimes even with death. Capital punishment, usually by hanging or strangling, is inflicted for murder and adultery, while three, nine or twenty-seven times the value of the stolen property is exacted for theft.
The domestic animals, daily pursuits and industries of the Kazaks differ but slightly from those of the Kara-Kirghiz. Some of the wealthy steppe nomads own as many as 20,000 of the large fat-tailed sheep. Goats are kept chiefly as guides for these flocks; and the horses, though small, are hardy, swift, light-footed and capable of covering from 50 to 60 miles at a stretch. Amongst the Kazaks there are a few workers in silver, copper and iron, the chief arts besides, being skin dressing, wool spinning and dyeing, carpet and felt weaving. Trade is confined mainly to an exchange of live stock for woven and other goods from Russia, China and Turkestan.
Since their subjection to Russia the Kazaks have become less lawless, but scarcely less nomadic. A change of habit in this respect is opposed alike to their tastes and to the climatic and other outward conditions. See also Turks.
Literature.—Alexis Levshin, Description des hordes et des steppes des Kirghiz-Kazaks, translated from the Russian by Ferry de Cigny (1840); W. Radloff, Proben der Volksliteratur der Türkischen Stämme Südsiberiens; Ch. de Ujfalvy, Le Kohistan, le Ferghanah, et Kouldja; also Bull. de la Soc. de Géo. (1878–1879); Semenoff, paper in Petermann’s Mittheilungen (1859), No. 3; Valikhanov’s Travels in 1858–1859; Madame de Ujfalvy, papers in Tour du Monde (1874); Vambéry, Die primitive Cultur des Turko-Tatarischen Volkes; P. S. Pallas, Observations sur les Kirghiz (1769; French trans., 1803); Andriev, “La Horde Moyenne,” in Bull. de la Soc. de Géogr. de St Petersburg (1875); Radomtsev, Excursion dans le steppe Kirghiz; Lansdell, Russian Centralasia (1885); Jadrinzer, La Sibérie (1886). Skrine and Ross, Heart of Asia (1899); E. H. Parker, A Thousand Years of the Tartars (1895). Various Russian works by Nalivkin, published in Turkestan, contain much valuable information, and N. N. Pantusov, Specimens of Kirghiz Popular Poetry, with Russian translations (Kazan, 1903–1904).
KIRIN, a province of central Manchuria, with a capital bearing the same name. The province has an area of 90,000 sq. m., and a population of 6,500,000. The chief towns besides the capital are Kwang-chêng-tsze, 80 m. N.W. of the capital, and Harbin on the Sungari river. The city of Kirin is situated at the foot of the Lau-Ye-Ling mountains, on the left bank of the Sungari or Girin-ula, there 300 yds. wide, and is served by a branch of the Manchurian railway. The situation is one of exceptional beauty; but the streets are narrow, irregular and indescribably filthy. The western part of the town is built upon a swamp and is under water a great part of the year. The dockyards are supplied with machinery from Europe and are efficient. Tobacco is the principal article of trade, the kind grown in the province being greatly prized throughout the Chinese empire under the name of “Manchu leaf.” Formerly ginseng was also an important staple, but the supply from this quarter of the country has been exhausted. Outside the town lies a plain “thickly covered with open coffins containing the dead bodies of Chinese emigrants exposed for identification and removal by their friends; if no claim is made during ten years the remains are buried on the spot.” Kirin was chosen by the emperor K’anghi as a military post during the wars with the Eleuths; and it owes its Chinese name of Ch’uen-ch’ang, i.e. Naval Yard, to his building there the vessels for the transport of his troops. The population was estimated at 300,000 in 1812; in 1909 it was about 120,000.
KIRK, SIR JOHN (1832– ), British naturalist and administrator, son of the Rev. John Kirk, was born at Barry, near Arbroath, on the 19th of December 1832. He was educated at Edinburgh for the medical profession, and after serving on the civil medical staff throughout the Crimean War, was appointed in February 1858 physician and naturalist to David Livingstone’s second expedition to Central Africa. He was by Livingstone’s side in most of his journeyings during the next five years, and was one of the first four white men to behold Lake Nyassa (Sept. 16, 1859). He was finally invalided home on the 9th of May 1863. The reputation he gained during this expedition led to his appointment in January 1866 as acting surgeon to the political agency at Zanzibar. In 1868 he became assistant political agent, being raised to the rank of consul-general in 1873 and agent in 1880. He retired from that post in 1887. The twenty-one years spent by Kirk in Zanzibar covered the most critical period of the history of European intervention in East Africa; and during the greater part of that time he was the virtual ruler of the country. With Seyyid Bargash, who became sultan in 1870, he had a controlling influence, and after the failure of Sir Bartle Frere’s efforts he succeeded in obtaining (June 5, 1873) the sultan’s signature to a treaty abolishing the slave trade in his dominions. In 1877 Bargash offered to a British merchant—Sir W. Mackinnon—a lease of his mainland territories, and he gave Kirk a declaration in which he bound himself not to cede territory to any other power than Great Britain, a declaration ignored by the British government. When Germany in 1885 claimed districts considered by the sultan to belong to Zanzibar, Kirk intervened to prevent Bargash going in person to Berlin to protest and induced him to submit to the dismemberment of his dominions. In the delicate negotiations which followed
