Be
the cause what it might, it is certain that the Western Kalmucks were
in some way prevented from forming the intended junction with their
brethren of the opposite bank; and the result was, that at least one
hundred thousand of these Tartars were left behind in Russia. This
accident it was which saved their Russian neighbors universally from
the desolation which else awaited them. One general massacre and
conflagration would assuredly have surprised them, to the utter
extermination of their property, their houses, and themselves, had it
not been for this disappointment. But the Eastern chieftains did not
dare to put to hazard the safety of their brethren under the first
impulse of the Czarina's vengeance for so dreadful a tragedy; for as
they were well aware of too many circumstances by which she might
discover the concurrence of the Western people in the general scheme of
revolt, they justly feared that she would thence infer their
concurrence also in the bloody events which marked its outset.
Little did the Western Kalmucks guess what reasons they also had for
gratitude on account of an interposition so unexpected, and which at
the moment they so generally deplored. Could they but have witnessed
the thousandth part of the sufferings which overtook their Eastern
brethren in the first month of their sad flight, they would have
blessed Heaven for their own narrow escape; and yet these sufferings of
the first month were but a prelude or foretaste comparatively slight of
those which afterwards succeeded.
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