Illustrated Treatise on the Maritime Kingdoms, Volume 56

...Districts such as Smolensk original: 司馬連斯科; Sima-lian-si-ke, Saint Petersburg original: 三皮提里普爾斯科; San-pi-ti-li-pu-er-si-ke, and Gorod original: 郭羅多; likely referring to a city or 'grad' have officials stationed within them. In Kazan original: 哈斯科; Ha-si-ke, every Skoe original: 斯斯科; a transcription of the Russian suffix '-skoe', referring here to an administrative district or province functions like a Chinese provincial capital, with countless other small districts under their jurisdiction. Each district is overseen by a single presiding official called a Gagarin original: 噶噶林; a transcription of the Russian 'Gubernator' or Governor. Throughout the various provinces, cities, and forts—one of which is called Bai—the system is much like Chinese departments and counties. The larger ones have a population of soldiers and civilians numbering several hundred or over a thousand, while the smaller ones have one or two hundred, each led by a single headman. They possess multi-story buildings and houses. Along their southern borders, they use large timber to construct city walls of interwoven wood, though these are often more for show than for actual defense.

Beyond the various Kazakh nations and the Khalkha Northern Mongol tribes who have submitted to the interior, there are more than ten other nations to the northwest. The larger ones are called Siberia original: 西費耶斯科; Xi-fei-ye-si-ke and Tobolsk original: 圖里耶斯科; Tu-li-ye-si-ke. Recently, they have been invaded and plundered [by Russia] and are said to be very weak.

During the Kangxi reign, Russia sent people to the capital [Beijing] to study. The Russian School Russian School (E-lo-ssu kuan); a diplomatic and educational institution in Beijing where Russians studied Chinese and Manchu, and Qing officials studied Russian was established, and one Manchu assistant instructor and one Han assistant instructor were appointed to teach them. In the fifth year of the Yongzheng reign [1727], it was decreed that Russia would send six Lamas Lama; refers here to Russian-affiliated Buddhist monks, likely of Buryat or Kalmyk origin, who served the religious needs of the Russian mission and four students to study, with the group being replaced every ten years. In the thirty-second year of the Qianlong reign [1767], the Imperial army pursued the rebel leader of the Dzungar Dzungar; a powerful confederation of Mongol Oirat tribes that fought a long series of wars against the Qing Dynasty tribe, Amursana a Dzungar prince who led a major revolt against the Qing before fleeing to Russian territory, who had fled through the territory of the Kazakhs...