They are Lamaists by religion and immigrated to the mouth of the Volga from Dzungaria, in the 17th century, driving out the Tatars and Nogais, and after many wars with the Don Cossacks, one part of them was taken in by the Don Cossacks, so that even now there are among these Cossacks several Kalmuck sotnias or squadrons.
Last is the Altai, near the 50th parallel, rising to 10,000 or 12,000 ft., which separates the waters of the great rivers of western Siberia from those that collect into the lakes of northwest Mongolia, Dzungaria and Kalka.
The Kalmucks are a Buddhist and Mongolian people who originated in a confederacy of tribes dwelling in Dzungaria, migrated to Siberia, and settled on the Lower Volga.
From Manchuria and China it is separated by the border ridge of the plateau - the Great Khingan, while in the south-west it runs up to the foot of the high northern border ridges of the Tibetan plateau - an artificial frontier separating it from east Turkestan and Dzungaria.
This massive swelling is cut into, between the Ektagh Altai and the eastern T`ien-shan, by the relative depression of Tarbagatai and Dzungaria, 1500 to 3000 ft.