great Mongol movement which, starting seven centuries ago, has not yet spent its force. Like the other Turkoman tribes, the Tekkes were ranged in divisions and clans--the Tokhtamish inhabiting the eastern portion of the Merv oasis, while the Otamish occupied the western. In the extreme east lived the Beks.[576] These great divisions were split up into minor ones, and the latter again ramified into clans. The organisation applied to Tekkes of the Akkal and Merv oases alike, for members of the various sections were scattered over the entire territory in their occupation.[577] Government among the Tekkes of every tribe was a pure democracy.[578] Affairs of state were discussed by an assembly consisting of the entire population. These gatherings elected a Khān to represent the executive by acclamation, and withdrew the dignity when the chosen one ceased to please. The office was not an object of ambition, for the Khān’s authority was little more than a matter of form. He had forty jigits, or attendants, to enforce order; but he had not the power of the purse. For special purposes a tribal representative, termed Ikhtiyār, was chosen by the popular assembly. Thus, in 1881, O’Donovan found one at Merv who had been sent to treat with the Shāh of Persia at Teheran.[579] In latter days the tribe exhibited a tendency to follow the ordinary evolution of a state, which is from a democracy to a hereditary monarchy acquired by the sword. The new departure began with a famous chieftain named Nūr Verdi Khān, who had led the Tekkes in the victories over the Khivans, the Persians, and the Sāriks. He was intrepid, just, and hospitable, moulded in the stamp of those who carve for themselves empire, and his influence was so great that he was permitted to hand over the chiefship of the Akkal Tekkes to his son Makhdūm Kulī Khān,[580] when he assumed that of the Merv oasis. The growth of the hereditary principle was doubtless fostered by the sense of impending danger from the Russian avalanche. In earlier times an attempt to introduce it would have been fiercely resisted by the untamed nomads. Old age and experience alone commanded weight, and the yoke of Mohammedanism, elsewhere so heavy in the East, pressed but lightly on these popular assemblies. Though nominally Sunnis or orthodox followers of the Prophet, the Turkomans practised few of the interminable observances prescribed by the Koran; and the mullās, mostly steeped in ignorance, possessed no influence over them.[581] But the Tekkes felt instinctively the impossibility of maintaining democratic methods in times of stress. Military operations were confided to the tribesmen of known valour and intelligence, termed Sardārs,[582] who had a minute knowledge of the country to be traversed, and were intrusted with the direction of the raids, which were the main object of the Turkoman’s existence. Thus did these banditti acquire prisoners who could be held to ransom, and slaves who