but no reinforcements arrived from Russia, and Yermak's Russian forces were growing small.
One time the Tartar Kachara sent a messenger to Yermak, saying:—
"We have submitted to your sway, but the Nogaï[1] are harassing us; let some of your braves come to our aid. We will conquer the Nogaï together. And we give you our oath that we will do no manner of harm to your braves."
Yermak had faith in their oath, and he sent to them Ivan Koltso with forty men. As soon as these forty men came to them, the Tartars fell on them and killed them; and this still further reduced the Cossacks.
Another time some Bukhara traders sent word to Yermak that they were on their way with merchandise which they wished to give him in his city of Sibir, but that Kuchum and his army were in their way, and would not let them pass.
Yermak took fifty men and went out to clear the road for the Bukharians. But when he reached the Irtuish River he did not find any merchants. So they prepared to bivouac there.
The night was dark and rainy. No sooner had the Cossacks lain down for the night, than the Tartars rushed in from every side, threw themselves on the sleeping Cossacks, and began to hew them down. Yermak leaped up and began to fight. He was wounded in the arm by a knife. Then he ran to the river and threw himself into it—the Tartars after him. He was already in the water. But he was never seen again, and his body was never found, and no one knows how he died.[2]
- ↑ A tribe of Tartars.
- ↑ One of the most brilliant scenes in Count Alekseï K. Tolstoï's great historical novel, "Prince Serebrannui," is devoted to the description of the embassy that brought to the Tsar Ivan the Terrible the news of the conquest of Siberia by the former rebel Yermak.—Tr.
