Wide as the territory of Turkestan-Proper extends, so far does the literature of which we have tried to give a slight sketch in the foregoing pages. And the further we betake ourselves from the frontiers into the desert, so in like manner does Islam become weaker, and here commences the change from Mohamedan civilisation into the old Shamanism. Among the Kirghis, notwithstanding the greater part of them profess Islam, one meets here and there with a tale which was generated in the Khanats; this, however, is looked upon as an exotic plant, and never preferred to the native. The popular poetry that one finds among them forms the point of transition from the currents of ideas of one society into another. Indeed, only two days' distance from the borders of the Yaxartes, or northward from the Sea of Aral, may a bakhshi prosper, provided he can give in the best fashion tales or narratives of a purely Kirghis character. The poetry of the wild inhabitants of the steppe is more strange and odd than pretty. Here and there a happy image occurs, at other times there are only broken exclamations and solitary verses without the smallest connection. Since each person is a poet, a tale cannot long preserve its originality, either they add something new to it or cast the whole off, and few people can keep themselves from annexing to their songs the momentary influence of their fantasy. Of the love-lays of the Kirghis, Lewschine has introduced a short poem, not without charm, in his book, p. 380:-- "Dost thou see this snow? The body of my loved one is whiter still." "Dost thou see the dropping blood of the slain lamb? Her cheeks are redder still." "Dost thou see the trunk of this burnt tree? Her hair is blacker still." "Dost thou know with what the mollahs of our Khan write? Her eyebrows are blacker than their ink." "Dost thou see these glowing embers? Her eyes are brighter still." Another specimen which follows this consists of detached sentences without any connection. "The hawk has pounced on the ducks--on a flight of ducks--on a great flight!" "I am very ill, and hardly ever think of eating," or "yonder is a tall pine-tree, the mist has fallen over it." "Yesterday she allowed me to enter her house. Formerly she would come herself and caress me." These more or less may be found among all purely popular tales of oriental people. There is even a trace of them in Hungarian, as for example,-- "Three apples and a half, I invited thee, and thou camest not," or "the crane flies high, singing beautifully, my loved one is angry, for she will not speak to me," &c.