The Life of Yakoob Beg; Athalik Ghazi, and Badaulet; Ameer of Kashgar. James D. Boulger

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СКАЧАТЬ Mussulman revolts in Barkul and Shensi until the spring of 1831, but then, when they returned, they found that Yusuf and the Khokandian army had retreated some months before. The facts were that the moment Khokand invaded Kashgar, Bokhara attacked Khokand, and Hacc Kuli Beg had to be recalled to cope with matters more pressing than Khoja rights. With the general had gone Yusuf, far from anxious to encounter the Chinese alone. The return of the Khokandian army sufficed to dispel all danger from Bokhara, and, a few months after, Mahomed Ali Khan recommenced operations – in the east this time – against the Kirghiz under Chinese protection. The Chinese were thoroughly sick of these petty disputes, and made a treaty with Khokand, by which that state acquired fresh commercial privileges, in addition to the old ones, and by which the importance of the Aksakals rather increased than waned. Mahomed Ali Khan had acquired all he wanted, and discouraged the Khoja party, as, indeed, the terms of this treaty compelled him to do. The risings under Jehangir and Yusuf were undoubtedly a great blow to Chinese prestige. To all appearance each had nearly been successful, and the Chinese, whose prestige was enormous in Central Asia – quite as great as that of Russia is now – had been, on one or two occasions, openly defeated. But, after all, this was a little matter compared to the shock the sentiments, called into being by sixty happy years, had received. Between Buddhist and Mussulman, between Chinaman and Central Asiatic, all the old antipathy was revived in the butcheries of Yarkand and Kashgar. The Kashgari showed that they could not appreciate the benefits they had received from China, and the Chinese, enraged at the slaughter of their countrymen, and, perhaps, also at the ingratitude evinced towards them, retaliated in kind. They did not appreciate that moderation, which Europeans have not always shown under similar circumstances, and wrought out their revenge in their own ancient fashion. It is absolutely necessary that the reader should remember that the two rapidly succeeding invasions of Jehangir and Yusuf form a turning-point in the history of the Chinese rule in Kashgar. Up to that epoch it is difficult to find words sufficient to do justice to China's beneficent government there; after that year it would be absurd to employ the same language. For the change the chief blame must fall upon the fickle and ungrateful Kashgari themselves, and then on the intriguing Andijanis. The Chinese are justified, at least, in saying that, having for more than half a century ruled this people with justice, they only relaxed in their efforts to promote its well-being when their unarmed countrymen and soldiers had been surprised and butchered by thousands.

      Strange, and almost contradictory, as it may appear, there was a brief respite during which things seemed to have got into their old groove of happy prosperity; and the chief credit for this must be given to a Mahomedan sub-governor of the Chinese viceroy. Zuhuruddin, such was his name, had raised himself to the high post of Amban in Kashgar, a post never before held by any other than a Khitay. By birth he was of Kashgar, but he always represented himself as having been born and brought up in Khokand, where he had been imprisoned for a political offence. For seven or eight years he governed Kashgar to the perfect satisfaction both of the people and of the Chinese, and among some of his public acts may be mentioned the reconstruction of new forts outside the cities, in the place of those destroyed in the recent revolts. These were known now as Yangyshahr instead of Gulbagh. But in 1846 Zuhuruddin's rule was disturbed by hostilities on the part of Khokand and the Khojas.

      In 1845 Khudayar Khan had been called to the throne after the death of Mahomed Ali, but his authority was not without its rivals. In the state of confusion that then ensued, Khokandian adventurers urged the Khoja princes, who were now represented by the sons of Jehangir, to renew their old attacks against the Chinese. To these advisers the Khojas turned a willing ear, and preparations were accordingly made for the enterprise. At that time Khokand was full of adventurers to whom Mahomed Ali had been able to give constant employment, but who now under the more peaceful rule of Khudayar idled their time in the cities of that khanate. Among these and the ever willing Kirghiz, it was not difficult for the princes of Kashgar to raise an army, formidable in numbers, if not remarkable for cohesion. At that time there were seven prominent Khoja princes in Khokand, of whom we may here mention Eshan Khan, usually called Katti Torah, Buzurg Khan, and Wali Khan. This inroad did not take its name from any one of these, but from them all combined; thus it was distinguished as Haft Khojagan, or that of the Seven Khojas.

      With his brothers and relations and a considerable following, Katti Torah advanced upon Kashgar, always the first object of these invaders, which fell after a siege of thirteen days through treachery. This was the only success they achieved; the other cities would have nothing to do with them; and after two months' indulgence in unbridled licence the Chinese beat them in a fight at Kok Robat, and drove them out of the country. For the first time there was an air of ridicule thrown over these Khoja invasions in the eyes of the Kashgari, while the outrages they had committed during their brief stay had raised bitterer feelings still. Zuhuruddin, who fell under the displeasure of the Chinese, was removed from his post, and fresh Ambans, once more Khitay, were appointed. For nine years the Khojas remained passive, but in 1855 Wali Khan and his brother Kichik Khan, began to bustle once more on the Kashgarian frontier. It was not until 1857 that Wali Khan succeeded in forcing the advanced guard of pickets maintained in the passes by the Chinese, but having accomplished that his triumph was rapid. Kashgar fell into his possession by a coup de main, and once more a Khoja prince was seated in the orda at Kashgar. Artosh and Yangy Hissar fell into his possession, and he threatened Yarkand. But everywhere the Chinese garrisons remained unconquered in the forts, biding the exhaustion of their foe and the arrival of reinforcements. After a rule of nearly four months the armies of Wali Khan having been then defeated by the Chinese, the Khoja fled to the remote state of Darwas, where he was surrendered to Khokand by its chief Ismail Shah. This ruler, the most tyrannical, bloodthirsty, and licentious of all the Khojas, met the fate which he deserved long afterwards at the hands of Yakoob Beg. His temporary tenure of power is still remembered with dread by the people, who consider him to have been the most incarnate monster who ever held the destinies of their country in his hand. The Chinese were more severe in their punitive measures after this campaign than they had been after any other, but, notwithstanding the part Khudayar and his people had played in Wali Khan's affair, the old relations between "these incompatible people," as Dr. Bellew aptly calls them, were restored. After this event there was but one minor disturbance caused by an inroad of Kirghiz nomads, headed by the sons of one of the principal victims of Chinese vengeance, but this had no political importance.

      The invasion of Wali Khan was the last of those Khoja expeditions which took place prior to the Tungan revolt. In the thirty-two years that elapsed from the date of Jehangir's attempt to that of his son, there had in all been four of them. That of Jehangir himself being the first; of his elder brother Yusuf, the second; of Yusuf's eldest son, Katti Torah, the third; and of Jehangir's second son, Wali, the fourth. Not one of these is in any sense noteworthy, except for the crimes with which it was attended, and none of them did more than inflict an untold amount of misery and suffering on their own followers, as well as on the people they claimed to represent by right divine. It may also be noticed that with each enterprise there was a decline in moral character. Thus Jehangir was infinitely the best of them in every sense, and ruled fairly according to his lights. His brother Yusuf was of a more timid mind, but evidently not less imbued with some notion as to the sanctity of his mission. But from these to Katti Torah is a long descent. That prince seemed to aspire to securing his personal comfort and enjoyment alone, and disregarded all his subjects' complaints at the arbitrary rule of his deputies. But Wali Khan, the next of these Khoja kings from "over the mountains," excelled his cousin in vice, and tyranny, and utter want of purpose, not to speak of honour, quite as much as Katti Torah surpassed their sires. Nor can there be much hesitation in saying, from what Buzurg Khan did during the few months he held power, that, had not Yakoob Beg clipped his flight, he would have surpassed Wali Khan in his own peculiar vices. The reader will scarcely be disposed to take much interest in this irredeemable family, mad with the insanity of wickedness. But in justice to the Chinese, and to Yakoob Beg, it is only right that the rivals of the former should be made to appear in their true colours. All the sanctity that a peculiarly venerable descent from Hazrat Afak could give; all the stories told of the good deeds of some of their ancestors; all the affection that naturally attaches to a native rule, and all the dislike that must undermine a foreign, be it never so beneficent; all these things were destroyed by the weakness and ill success that attended the first two Khojas, СКАЧАТЬ