The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

432 RUSSIA IX EUROPE.Muscovite colonists of the Lower Don had already become numerous enough toform a powerful confederacy, fully able to hold their own and retaliate on theirTatar neighbours. In their plundering expeditions, however, it was agreedbetween the two marauding races that the prairie grass, which fed the herds ofboth, was never to be burnt. Later on -the Zaporog Cossacks and other LittleRussians joined the Great Russian Cossacks on a footing of equality, settlingFi?228.—Voronej.mostly on the Lower Don. Even now the Little Russian Cossack travellersseeking hospitality in this district are welcomed as kinsmen, whereas the GreatRussian peasantry are received only as guests. In these communities, however,fugitives from all the races of East Europe and the Euxine seaboard found arefuge ; all were hailed by these adventurers, at once brigands and heroes, on thesole condition of taking the name of Cossack. Here are even met many German