The Hindustani poet Amir Khosru gives a picture of the Mongols more forcible than elegant, which Elliot has translated (III. 528).

This is Hayton’s account of the Parthian tactics of the Tartars:  “They will run away, but always keeping their companies together; and it is very dangerous to give them chase, for as they flee they shoot back over their heads, and do great execution among their pursuers.  They keep very close rank, so that you would not guess them for half their real strength.”  Carpini speaks to the same effect.  Baber, himself of Mongol descent, but heartily hating his kindred, gives this account of their military usage in his day:  “Such is the uniform practice of these wretches the Moghuls; if they defeat the enemy they instantly seize the booty; if they are defeated, they plunder and dismount their own allies, and, betide what may, carry off the spoil.” (Erdmann, 364, 383, 620; Gold.  Horde, 77, 80; Elliot, II. 388; Hayton in Ram. ch. xlviii.; Baber, 93; Carpini, p. 694.)

NOTE 7.—­“The Scythians” (i.e. in the absurd Byzantine pedantry, Tartars), says Nicephorus Gregoras, “from converse with the Assyrians, Persians, and Chaldaeans, in time acquired their manners and adopted their religion, casting off their ancestral atheism....  And to such a degree were they changed, that though in former days they had been wont to cover the head with nothing better than a loose felt cap, and for other clothing had thought themselves well off with the skins of wild beasts or ill-dressed leather, and had for weapons only clubs and slings, or spears, arrows, and bows extemporised from the oaks and other trees of their mountains and forests, now, forsooth, they will have no meaner clothing than brocades of silk and gold!  And their luxury and delicate living came to such a pitch that they stood far as the poles asunder from their original habits” (II. v. 6).

[1] This is Chomeni in the original, but I have ventured to correct it.

CHAPTER LV.

CONCERNING THE ADMINISTERING OF JUSTICE AMONG THE TARTARS.

The way they administer justice is this.  When any one has committed a petty theft, they give him, under the orders of authority, seven blows of a stick, or seventeen, or twenty-seven, or thirty-seven, or forty-seven, and so forth, always increasing by tens in proportion to the injury done, and running up to one hundred and seven.  Of these beatings sometimes they die.[NOTE 1] But if the offence be horse-stealing, or some other great matter, they cut the thief in two with a sword.  Howbeit, if he be able to ransom himself by paying nine times the value of the thing stolen, he is let off.  Every Lord or other person who possesses beasts has them marked with his peculiar brand, be they horses, mares, camels, oxen, cows, or other great cattle, and then they are sent abroad to graze over the plains without any keeper.  They get all mixt together, but eventually every beast is recovered by means of its owner’s brand, which is known.  For their sheep and goats they have shepherds.  All their cattle are remarkably fine, big, and in good condition.[NOTE 2]