CAUCASUS. The main chain of the Caucasus crosses obliquely, from north-east to south-west, the great isthmus which lies between the Black Sea and the Caspian, separating Europe from Asia. The chain extends on a line of more than 1000 608 miles from the neighbourhood of Anapa, at the entrance of the Sea of Azof, almost in a straight lino to Baku and the peninsula of Apscheron jutting out into the Caspian. The crest averages a height of about 11,000 feet. The valleys on both sides are steep and narrow, and the Terek pass, 7977 feet. Tho principal range boasts the gigantic Elburz, 17,746 feet, and Kasibeek, 16,546 feet. Tim heads of these two celebrated mountains are almost always obscured with clouds; and the snow-line on them is 11,000 feet, and cereals grow up to 7000 feet.
The whole of the Caucasian region consists of tho old territories of Daghestan and Circassia, north of the main chain, and of the old kingdom of Georgia on the south, to which Russia added at various epochs the Armenian districts of Erivan, Elisavetpol, and Alexandropol, and more lately those of Kars and Batoum. The Caucasus is of importance to Russia as the channel through which her trade can be extended to all parts of Central and Southern Asia, her commercial enterprise rather outstripping than following close her terri torial aggrandizement. The Caucasus is like a great wedge thrust between Persia and Asiatic Turkey. It is the highway which is to lead the merchandise as well as the arms of Russia to the shores of the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, sooner than any of her roads or railroads across the Ural, via Perm or Orenburg,--sooner than her almost exclusive navigation of the Caspian Sea.
The whole of the Caucasian regions is ruled by a Russian lieutenant, residing at Tiflis. It is divided into 12 governments or provinces, exclusive of Kars and Batoum. It has, in round numbers, an area of half a million square kilometres, with a popu lation of 5,000,000. In Tiflis, the capital, out of 104,000 there are at least 20 races of men. Russians muster 30,823 ; but the Armenians outnumber them by 6787. Next come 22,152 Georgians of various tribes ; and the rest is made up of Tartars, Persians, Turks, Jews, Assyrians, and Chaldwans, besides various mountain tribes deemed indigen ous, the Ossets, Ingush, Aisors, Khefsurs, Les ghians, etc., with 2741 Poles, 2135 Germans, 257 French, 163 Italians, 52 English. With respect to creeds, 52,392 Russians and Georgians belong to the orthodox or Greco-Russian Church ; 36,000 are Gregorian Armenians ; 871 Armenian Catholics, with 3698other Roman Catholics; 2177 Lutherans, 1276 Jews, and 4338 .Mahomedans. Petroleum, in enormous subterranean lakes and reservoirs, underlies the Caucasian region from sea to sea. It is largely found beneath the steppes both north and south of the mountain chain. At Baku, at its southern end, on the Caspian, naphtha bursts forth in copious springs, sending up tall liquid columns not unlike the geysers of Iceland.— ill'Gregor's Persia ; Wheeler's Mist. of India; Porter's Travels, i. p. 152.