This custom, so universal among them, ofdelaying to cart home both their hay and corn, where in so hot a country the one is halfburnt up, and the other sheds out so much of its seed on the ground, arises from the singular practice of waiting until the entire village be ready to begin this operation together : so that ifninetynine out of an hundred be prepared, and one, from accident or idleness, has not finished his mowing or reaping, the others (regardless of their interest, and consulting their ease) quietly sleep out the time at home, until the idler is ready. The consequences of this inconceivable folly are such as might be expected ; the haycocks in the meadows are stolen without mercy by the Cossack of the neighbourhood during the night : their oats are threshed out in the field, and fill the panniers of the same banditti, who also turn their horses among the shocks of corn to feast at discretion. Sometimes, though not frequently, unexpected and sudden torrents from the mountains overflow the meadows, and the hay is swept away, or spoiled in a single night.
The corn is almost all fit to carry as soon as it is cut, and is then threshed out upon the Stepp, where every man prepares his threshing-floor with great care, in the following manner: the ground being first pared, so that the grass is cut finely off, it is next well watered until it becomes almost a pool ; when the water has soaked in, a layer of clean short straw, chaff, &c. about two inches in thickness, is thrown upon it, in order to preserve it from the sun, which would otherwise crack and spoil it. As soon as it is somewhat more than half dry, horses are driven round it until it acquires the proper degree of firmness and solidity.
The size ofthe floor depends upon the number of horses to be used in threshing. When this operation is to be performed, they are fastened abreast by a rope, to a post which stands in the centre. As the horses move round, the rope wraps round the post, and when they have worked up close to it, this rope is expeditiously removed from the neck of the near to that of the off-horse, and they go round once more in an opposite direction, until it is unwound and wound again. If it be expected that the grain will thresh well, the sheaves (which are arranged in close and regular circles) are laid on the floor in the proportion of one hundred to each horse.
The Bulgarians have a curious implement, made with flints fixed in a frame ofwood, which they employ in threshing, by driving it over the corn ; but it is not so expeditious a method as that ofthe Tatars.
It is customary with these latter, both in hay time and harvest, to wait until all in the village shall have finished cutting before any one begins to carry home his share : thus the more active and industrious often suffer for the idle. This period of the year is the most toilsome and unpleasant for the proprietors of estates on which these villagers reside. They are obliged to be constantly on the alert, to secure their stipulated proportion ofthe produce, since the Tatars have in, this much trick and chicanery, and take every possible means to deceive. Though in general a quiet and harmless race, not given to violence or open plunder, they cannot resist any promising temptation to theft. It results from the extreme laziness oftheir character, that they always value an acquisition more which only costs them a little cunning, than one which makes them pay in bodily labour. Thus, robbing a neighbouring garden of its fruit or firewood, is much more agreeable to a Tatar's taste than going to hew wood in a forest a few miles off, though the permission to do so costs him a mere trifle, the stated price being fifty kopeeks (about fivepe'rice) for as timch as a pair ofoxen can draw.
This wood is brought to Kaffa, frotn the distance of about twenty miles, and there sold for four or five rubles the load. I believe the latter to be about the average price, but in the severest part of the winter it is sold as high as eight rubles, and I have even heard of ten, but very rarely. The prime cost always remains fixed at fifty kopeeks.
From this character of them, it may be inferred that they are the very worst labourers in the world; and indeed an English master views with an impatient eye the slow, unwilling, uninterested manner in which the generality of them set about their work. The act of digging in a sitting posture is perhaps as good a specimen as can be given of Tatar industry.
It is very usual to see them hewing wood with a pipe in their mouths, and performing this double operation, even in moderate weather, with the additional incumbrance of a heavy pelisse. A Tatar, however, makes very few holidays. He never refuses to work on hisown Sabbath, and it T2 rests with the conscience of his Christian master to enforce, or not, his employment on Sunday.
The method of stacking hay which is used on the south coast is quite peculiar to that part of the Crimea. It is raisedupon poles orlow trees, five or six feet from the ground. This is probably done to preserve it from wet, in places where the constant descent of water from the mountains would otherwise render it liable to spoil.