very different from the portly colonel who
might be seen any day in his tent. Bou
Maza was equally changed, seeming to put
on the reality of freedom with the garb of
the desert, and to forget the light trousers
by which he was ordinarily fettered. Bou
Maza, the last time that I saw him in fighting
apparel, told me that, if his men encountered
the enemy, he had determined to drag
from his horse the commanding officer
opposed  to him, and to make him a prisoner at
all risks. As it befel, he had not the
opportunity;  but, as he told me on the same day
that he would, if I were hungry, cut off his
flesh to feed me, it is very possible that both
speeches were tempered, in the same degree,
by Oriental hyperbole.

The arrangements for Bashi-Bazouk
equitation, under the command of Sifley Bey, were
based upon strictly Arab principles; all
the men had acquired the balanced seat so
remarkable in the horsemen of the desert.
Without appearing to have the slightest hold
with the leg, they turned in the saddle with
perfect ease; and not only moved their bodies
in any direction, but used their hands with
facility, whatever the speed of the horse, and
whether he was proceeding forward, wheeling,
or suddenly stopping. They appeared to
accommodate themselves intuitively to the
movements of the animal, as a sailor does to
the movements of his ship; and, in the same
manner, to be always balanced and at their
ease. They loaded their muskets during a
charge, with extreme rapidity, and fired them
with great steadiness: the Arabs carrying
their cartridges in the cord that secured their
head gear; but, their weapons were usually
so old, and the powder served out to them was
so bad, that their fire was very inefficient, and
only useful for the sake of its moral effect
upon themselves. In fact, I could not avoid
the conviction that my friends were a
thoroughly useless corps, in spite of their
individual dash and gallantry. To an
inexperienced eye, their appearance on a charge
was most formidable—rushing along in loose
array, with floating draperies and frantic
yells, performing strange gymnastics upon
their saddles, and guiding their horses to
some spot where they were least expected.
But, all this display would be worse than
useless, against disciplined troops drawn up
in line; and such, indeed, the Bashies would
prefer to leave alone. I have seen them
induce Cossacks to scatter, for the purpose of
meeting them, and in order to cover the
retreat of Russian infantry before a superior
Turkish force; then, in a number of duels,
the Bashies had it all their own way, and
killed many of their adversaries without
losing a man. But the Bashies are not
to be depended upon, even for the sort of
service for which they are adapted. Plunder
is their great aim in warfare; if they
enter a village, it is their practice to report
that some of the horses in the troop are
lame, so as to give the riders an opportunity
of pillage, and of returning quietly to camp
with the booty that may reward their industry.
The construction of the eastern horse-shoe
(a plate with a small hole in the centre),
affords facilities for the production of temporary
lameness; and the arrangement is
winked at by the officers who should control
it. Hence, in every expedition undertaken
from Eupatoria against the Russian corps of
observation that surrounded the town, the
Bashies went out in full force, and returned
in driblets, laden with heterogeneous trumpery.
To do them justice, they showed great
ingenuity in attaching the spoil to their
saddles and persons: surrounding themselves
with large and small articles, until the man
in the centre could scarcely be distinguished.
Weapons were the things that most excited
their cupidity; but, if weapons were not to
be had, nothing came amiss, from a bed or
a table to a pack of cards or a corkscrew. I
remember a man who rejoined the camp,
hung all round with lithographed portraits
of the Imperial family of Russia; and another
who had found points of attachment for a dozen
or so of champagne. The head-gear of this
last worthy was surmounted by the smart
helmet of an officer of Russian lancers, who
had made his escape bareheaded. I vainly
wished for a photographic camera, to preserve
the stern grave face of the Arab, whose
incongruous get-up would have moved a Mute
to laughter, and whose bottles chinked as he
rode along. A dead or wounded comrade to
be carried, would tax the ingenuity of a
regular cavalry man; but, a Bashi-Bazouk
made light of such a burden, when
circumstances  imposed it on him, and managed so to
arrange it as that his own arms were free.
The corpses of their comrades were spoken
of as those of witnesses, who had been
summoned  by the prophet to tell him about the
conduct of the war; and Sifley Bey was
accustomed to pronounce orations over them,
declaratory of the blessedness of their lot,
laughing in his sleeve the while at the
simplicity of his followers. Like most
Mussulmen in a position of military
command,  the Bey had his private opinions
touching the character and inspiration of
Mahomet.

The horses that carried these eccentric
cavaliers were always swift, hardy, and
useful; sometimes, of great beauty and
value. They were always well fed, because
ridden by their owners; who would not submit
to commissariat mystifications about
forage; but insisted—sternly toying with
their yataghans—upon the chopped straw and
the barley, in the full weight and the perfect
tale. There was one horse in the camp,
through whose veins flowed the best Arab
blood of the desert, and whose owner slept
with the end of the tether rope secured to
his wrist. The horse, second in value,
belonged to Sifley Bey: who refused an offer of