Khokhol

[p 145] His parents were Russians, but he had been born on his master’s estate in Little Russia, and prided himself on being a Khókhol, i.e. Little Russian. [p 146] I found good company there, I can tell you—twelve Khokhly,¹ all fine fellows and every one of them as strong as a horse. [footnote] 1 Plural of Khókhol.

Specially characteristic of Russia, as of a land abounding in endless plains, are two jocular allusions to the inhabitants of the Steppes—‘I can’t bear this crowding,’ a Khokhol, or Little-Russian, is supposed to say, as he upsets a kettle which he finds suspended over a camp-fire in the open plain; and ‘These accursed Muscovites! there’s no driving-room left!’ cries another, as he runs into a verst-post (answering to our milestone) in the midst of the boundless waste.

The Great Russians ought to be carefully distinguished from “the Malo-Russians” or the “Little Russians.” The inhabitants of the Ukraine, or of the governments Tchernigof, Poltava, Kharkof, call the great Russians or the Muscovites “kazaps, goats,” from their wearing beards, and are in their turn termed by the Great Russians khokhols, “hair tufts,” which they themselves call tchub, tchupran, a tuft of the same kind as that which the Chinese wear on the top of the head; this is an old Slavonian custom, as appears from history, which mentions such a one being worn by the Russian Prince Sviatoslav, when carrying on war in Bulgaria.

These Khokhols (the familiar term used, rather slightingly by the Great Russians for the Ukrainians) were drawn up in serried ranks in a public square.