Melville Chater - Land of Stalking Death (1919) - Part 2

Source: Melville Chater, "The Land of the Stalking Death: A Journey through Starving Armenia on an American Relief Train," The National Geographic Magazine, XXXVI 1919.

TIFLIS A CITY OF SURPRISES

Though one has penetrated fairly far into the East at Tiflis, if one expects vistas of caravans, camels, and Rebekahs-at-the-well, he will suffer disillusionment in his first impressions. The Golovinsky Prospekt, which runs through the heart of the Georgian capital, is as handsome a bit of modern metropolitanism as can be found anywhere. With its restaurants and cafes, its jewelers, art shops and opera, its vice-regal palace—now ousted of the Romanoff dynasty's last grand ducal vice-regent, and flying the Georgian republic's black and cerise flag—the Prospekt, especially when seen in the lounging hour, is undeniably chic.

Here stroll Russians, Georgians, Armenians, and the representatives of a score of mountain tribes who have business in the new capital. There is a splendor of uniforms and of side-arms, the Caucasian national costume dominating the picture. A very long, swagger overgarment of brown or gray, padded square at the shoulders, with wasp-like waist, and descending as a smartly flared skirt—this, together with high, heel-less boots, a square astrakhan cap, a clanking sword, two magnificently chased daggers, a brace of pistols, and sixteen fountain-pens strung across his chest represents what I would term the picturesque scenery worn by your typical Georgian in war, in peace, and in the bosom of his countrymen. What I have called fountain-pens turned out to be more weapons—hollow tubes, anciently designed to contain powder and shot.

One looks at these magnificently accoutered swaggerers, with their stiff mustaches and close-shaven skulls, and thinks of comic opera and of the dear old Kingdom of Zenda; also one trembles for the League of Nations, fearing that the Georgian will never consent to a reduction of his armament. 

WHERE EVERY ONE WEARS A UNIFORM

Mere militarism has no mortgage on uniforms at Tiflis. Everybody wears one, including school children and their teachers, according to Russian custom; and hundreds upon hundreds of civilians are thus attired because clothes being scarce and expensive, they prefer buying some officer's cast-off outfit.

I had almost overlooked the presence of the British uniform along the Prospekt; and perhaps that is because the British, being in occupation, comport themselves so quietly. Compared to the arsenal-carrying Georgian, the British officer, with his little swagger stick, is an exemplification of that "invisible force" principle which makes one believe in the League of Nations.

The Tommy, too, is seen everywhere, having adapted himself to the ways and speech of the Georgian, after his own peculiar method.

THE ART OF CONVERSATION IN GEORGIA

The Doctor and I were puzzled by one Tommy who stood on the street corner with a Georgian soldier, carrying on what seemed to be fluent conversation. We afterward questioned him about it.

"You don"t speak Georgian?" asked the Doctor.

"No, sir," answered Tommy.

"And that Georgian doesn't understand English?”

"No. sir.”

We stared at each other.

"How on earth, then, do you manage it?" asked the Doctor.

"Well, you see it's this way, sir," replied Thomas with the utmost solemnity. "One of these 'ere foreign chaps 'll come up and say to me, 'Nitchyvilla, nitchyvilla?' And I'll say to 'im, 'Don't mind if I do 'ave one.' And then maybe 'ee 'll say to me 'Bittsky-ittsky, boo!' And then I biffs 'im one on the jaw.”

"But why?" I asked. "Why knock him down?”

"Because, sir," answered Thomas with simplicity, “for all I know, sir, ‘ee may be making insulting remarks about me.”

HOW THE GEORGIAN ENTERTAINS

I have mentioned the "lounging hour." In fact, there are some sixteen of these to the Georgian's day, and perhaps it would be simpler to speak of the working hour. Between 2 and 3 o'clock in the afternoon, down go the steel lattices which guard the shop windows—windows which present to your amazed glance a fifth-year war stock of champagne, liqueurs, and articles de luxe of every kind: then Tiflis resumes its national pastime of joie de vivre until 6 o'clock of the following morning: for that is the hour when the Georgians' all night parties break up—break up, I mean, with a crash of china and with shots exchanged across the table.

The Georgian is renowned for his hospitality. His customary greeting is,"While in Tiflis you will consider my home yours"—an offer which was tendered us so regularly that we suffered, I may almost say, from an embarrassment of homes.

The Georgian dinner-party, a mighty matter of courses and wines, begins at 2.30 in the afternoon and lasts until 5. Then there will be a dance in the evening, refreshments commencing at 9 o'clock and continuing between dance-numbers until the company reels homeward in the dawn.

Occasionally the floor is cleared for a dagger-dance, a picturesque and barbaric business performed to a rhythmic accompaniment of hand-clapping by some tall, beskirted native, who prances murderously about with from five to seven daggers held between bis teeth.

The Georgian public function is a superb affair of uniforms, healths drunk, huzzahs, celebrities carried shoulder high about the room, and a chorus of liveried trumpeters who sound fanfares at the close of every toast. Once again one realizes that, though the Georgians have gone red republican, Zenda's dear old comic-opera kingdom still lies deep in their hearts.

THE GEORGIAN IS ENJOYING A BELSHAZ-ZAR’S FEAST  

In short, the Georgian has absorbed all that was worst in the luxurious Russian civilization, under which he lived from the conquest of the Transcaucasus in 1801 to the downfall of Tsardom. Of earlier influences, the Persian is betrayed in his national costumes and in his arts, which have been completely obliterated by the Turks. He and his language alike are unclassifiable. They originated too far back of that respectably remote past when Tiflis was already a caravan center, linking East and West.

Whencever he came, the Georgian is of an ancient race, and embodies all of an ancient race's charm, together with its tendency toward degeneration. The Georgian nobility is a byword, resting upon a feudalism which endured so long as to become an anachronism and a decay.

What with an incredibly fertile soil of pasture land and vineyards, exhaustless manganese mines, and an enriching tithe system, the Georgian noble sank into a sloth from which his present-day descendants have never risen, and which left them an easy prey to Russian upperclass luxury. Just now, drunk with the heady wine of sudden liberty, they are enjoying what looks to the outsider very much like a Belshazzar's feast.