Kosaques, published in 1814, the author acknowledges himself especially indebted) we owe a more objective treatment of the Cossack's story. Following their lead the writer will attempt in his work to dispel something of the ignorance so strangely persistent outside of Russia with respect to the origin and significance of this military caste or people. The term "Cossack," while generally applied to a characteristic branch of the old Russian cavalry ser\4ce — more properly designates a community' of warlike clans loosely bound together by the common tradition of a long and stirring lii story. If during the closing decades of the imperial system the Cossack "nations" became more or less identified with the other peoples of the Russian empire, they were nevertheless permitted through the strength of their free traditions and the importance of their services to the state, to retain the marks of an outstanding individuality — a policy wholly in opposition to the great unifjTng aim of Russian imperiahsm.
It is the proudest boast of the Cossacks of today — as of their forbears of the Ukraine — that they have never been classed as serfs nor for a moment lost their freeman's instinct for the principles of hbert5\ ^Vhile the peasants of North Russia were bowed in shameful submission to the Great Princes of Moscc v and later to the "dark forces" of the Tsar's court and the Baltic-German officialdom of the capital on the Neva, the history of the viii FOREWORD
Cossack inhabitants of the southern steppes was (as we shall later see) a long epic of heroic resistance to the '.ncroachments of autocracy. If their distrust of vne infinite docility of the moujik class has often n?ade them in the past the blind instruments of reaction, their loyalty to Tsardom has never implied any abdication of the privileges guaranteed their own caste.
While the organization of the present Cossack armies is the outcome of a system which may generally be termed "Democratic-Feudalism" — i. e., a popular system of land tenure in return for military service to the old regime — their basic traditions were essentially free and republican. In spite of their old-time loyalty to the Tsar, the Cossack troops of the army — and notably those about the imperial court — were among the first to raise the standard of revolt during the constructive changes of March, 1917. The return of the Cossacks to the side of popular government was but the logical outcome of the whole trend of their history.
In order to understand the significance of the present Cossack movement in Southern Russia and the difference separating the former "Free People'* of the Russian Empire from the moujiki or peasantry of the north, some knowledge of their history and origin i