The language of the Galcha resembles Persian, but has many words of an older Aryan type. The dialects of the Hill States also are known as the Wakhi, Ishkashimi, Shighnani. The Galcha are brave, more than a match for the predatory Kara Kirghiz. The different states are each ruled by a hereditary monarch, most of whom claim descent from Alexander the Great. In their states they form separate communities. In all the others they are dispersed amongst the Turks and Uzbak races, and are following agricultural and commercial pursuits. They have little feeling of nationality, and Khanikoff and Vambery describe them unfavourably for courage, morals, or honesty. The Tajak of the plains are zealous Sunnis.
Ishkashini is a small Tajak state on both sides of the Upper Oxus, tributary to the Mir of Badakhshan. It contains the ruby mines for which Badakhshan is famous.
Wakhan is a small territory in a portion of the valley of the Upper Oxus, or Darya-i-Panj, extending about 94 miles from the fort of Ishka shim, in about lat. 36° 45' N., long. 71° 38' E., on the Pamir Kul branch of the Oxus, 42 miles be yond Kala-Panj. It is N. of Hindu Kush, between the Chitral country and the Pamir khanate of Shighnan. It has always been subject to Badakh shan, which it touches in the west. Its in habitants are of purer Aryan stock than the Tajak, and their language is akin to Sanskrit or Takri. It holds the southern route of the caravan be tween Turkestan and Afghanistan. To the N. and S. the valley is bounded by high hills, on whose slopes the Wakhan people pasture their flocks. They are Shiah Muhammadans, disciples of Aga Khan of Bombay (died 1881), to whom they sent contributions. They dress in thick trousers and choghas. The valley is ruled by a hereditary chief, whose revenue is derived from the slave trade in which he engages.
Eastern Turkestan rulers have been Muham madan from the time of Taghalaq Timur, who was, we are told, the first Muhammadan sovereign of Kashgar of the lineage of Chengiz. Buddhism, indeed, was found still prevalent in the cities of Turfan and Kamil at the time of the embassy of Shah Rukh in 1419, and probably did not become extinct much before the end of the century. But in western states Muhammadanism seems to have been universal from an earlier date, and maintained with fanatical zeal. Saintly teachers and workers of miracles, claiming descent from Mahomed, and known as Khaja or Khoja, ac quired great influence, and the sectaries attached to the chief of these divided the people into rival factions, whose mutual hostility eventually led to the subjugation of the whole country. For late in the seventeenth century, Khoja Appak, the leader of one of those parties called the White Mountain (having been expelled from Kashgar by Ismail Khan, the chief of that state, who was a zealous supporter of the opposite party or Black Mountain), sought the aid of the Galdan Khan, sovereign of the Eleut or Kalmuk of Zungaria.
Taking the occasion so afforded, that chief in 1678 invaded the states south of the Tian Shan, carried off the Khan of Kashgar and his family, and established the Khaja of the White Moun tain over the country in authority subordinate to his own. Great discords for many years suc ceeded, sometimes one, sometimes another being uppermost, but some supremacy always continuing to be exercised by the khans of Zungaria. In 1757 the latter country was conquered by the Chinese, who in the following year, making a tool of the White party, which was then in opposition, succeeded in bringing the states of Turkestan also under their rule.
The Turk, wherever met with, is ever heavy and lethargic in his mind and body, but in his resolves firm and stedfast, not from principle, but from apathy and aversion to change ; and it is from these characteristics that his appearance is earnest and solemn,—a profound seriousness, a marked cold expression of countenance, with a great inclination to pomp and magnificence. An Uzbak or Turkoman has a proud bearing, as if possessed with a self-consciousness of greatness and power. The Usmanli Turk's love of independ ence is boundless. He considers himself born to rule ; that hunting and war alone are worthy of him, and husbandry ignominious. In Central Asia, agriculture is exclusively in the hands of the Persian slaves, commerce and business with the Tajak, Hindu, and Jew. The Turk is intel lectually the inferior of the Iranian and Semitic nations. This defect is noticed by other nations, who apply the terms Turkluk (Turkdom), Kabalik (coarseness), and Yugunluk (thickness), Sadeluk (simpleness) ; and with these qualities, as the Usmanli is easily taken in by the Armenian, Greek, and Arab, the Turk is as easily so by the Tajak and Hindu. In transactions the Turk are regarded as possessing more honesty, frankness, and confidence, plainness, simplicity, and upright ness. Compared with the Persians, the Turk is a faithful servant, attached soldier, and upright man. They are more brave, persevering, and love more to rule than any other Asiatic people. They are unpolished, wild, and uncultivated, but seldom cruel out of malice. They crave riches, but only to expend them. They exact much labour from their subordinates, but protect and deal liberally with them. The Turk is innately a nomade, and, like other nomades, is distinguished for hospitality. The Burnt is the wildest and most savage and most superstitious of them, but less malicious than the Kirghiz and Turkoman. The Burnt has not wholly abandoned Shamanism, and knows little of the Muhammadan religion.