Tartars, on wonderful shaggy-haired horses, who ride at a furious pace
around their flocks and guard them from attack by the wolves which
infest this part of the world. It is worth recording how they do so. The
wolf is a very cunning animal who has numerous methods of attack, and,
like a hare, is very difficult to locate if in his form and practically
level with the ground. But his very cunning is often his undoing. On no
account will the wolf allow a string on which there are little coloured
rags fluttering to pass over him, nor will he willingly get near it. The
Tartar herdsmen go forward in line over the plain in the direction their
flocks are feeding with a small strong string with little coloured flags
fluttering along it, fastened from horse to horse. This effectively
sweeps the whole space as the trawler sweeps the sea. No wolf can hope
to escape the trained eye of the Tartar near the horse where the strain
of the line lifts it high off the ground, and no wolf will allow the
line to pass near him, hence the herdsman gets both sport and profit
out of his occupation. Having fed off the grass and herbs in one place,
the whole Tartar tribe moves forward at regular periods on what appears
to be an endless crawl across the world, but what is really an appointed
round, settled and definite, within the territorial lands of the race to
which it belongs. Their women and children journey with them and hunt
and ride with the men, free as the plains over which they travel. In
spite of this community of interests the men seem to place but very
little value upon their women except as a sort of communist coolie
attachment for carrying the camp from one place to another, for
preparing the rude meals, and for the care of the boys, of whom the
tribe is very proud.

Over this featureless wilderness we progressed day after day, each
stopping-place marked by a few aspen trees mixed up with a few others
that look very much like mountain ash but are not. The winter houses of