k place under Kasi-Mullah,
about the year 1829; from which time, until his death in a battle at
Himry, in 1831, he waged a terrible, and, although often defeated,
a virtually successful warfare, against the Russians, while he
prosecuted the work of conversion among the tribes of Islam who
delayed to acknowledge his mission, and to join in his enmity to the
Russians, by the extremities of bloodshed and rapine. His death, after
an heroic resistance, was hailed as a triumph by the Russians. They
counted on the extinction of the new sect in the defeat of its leader,
whose dead body they carried about the country to prove the imposture
of his pretensions. This piece of barbarism produced an effect the
reverse of what they expected. The venerable face of the Imam, the
attitude in which he had expired, with one hand pointed as if to
heaven, was more impressive to those who crowded round the body than
his fearless enthusiasm had been,--and thousands who till then had
held aloof, now joined his followers in venerating him as a prophet.
Of this first warrior-priest of Daghestan, Schamyl was the favorite
disciple and the most trusted soldier. Kasi-Mullah was not killed
until Schamyl had already fallen as it seemed, under several deadly
wounds:--his reappearance after this bloody scene was but the first of
many similar escapes, the report of which sounds like a fable. He did
not, however, at once succeed to the dignity of Imam: the office was
usurped for more than a year by Hamsad Beg (Bey), whose rapacious and
savage treatment of some of the princely families of Daghestan nearly
caused a fatal reaction against the new sect, and the destruction
of its main support, the Murids. Hamsad Beg performed no action of
consequence against the Russians; but expended his rage upon the
natives allied with them, or reluctant to obey his mandates. He
was assassinated in 1834, by some kinsmen of a princely house whose
territories he had usurped after a massacre of its princes. In the
affray which took place on this occasion, there perished with him
many of the fanatic Murids, who had become odious as instruments of
the cruelties of their Imam. On his death, Schamyl was raised to
the dignity,--but it was some time before the mischief done by his
predecessor was so far repaired as to allow him to act with energy
as the prophet of the new doctrine. One of the ill effects of Hamsad
Beg's iniquities had been the defection to the Russians of n notable