around Herat, and had been the chief coadjutor in planning the mischievous policy against England. Now against M. de Staal, in company with M. Lessar, poor Lord Kimberley and Lord Granville were certainly an unequal match; but, nevertheless, the consultations went on, and in order to ensure the result of these consultations, an arrangement or an agreement was entered into, that the Russians and Afghans should maintain their positions in the debatable country during that time, or at least so long as the deliberations in London had not come to an end. Russia pledged her word, on the condition that no untoward event should occur; and, as the occurrence of such untoward events rested in her own hands, she was clever and mischievous enough to bring on the famous catastrophe of the 30th of March, in which, as is pretty well-known, nearly 700 Afghans were slaughtered in cold blood on the banks of the Khushk. This incident, which forms even now, as I am writing, the subject of discussion between the two Governments, was, as Sir Peter Lumsden is reported to have said to The Times correspondent at Vienna, an unprovoked and utterly unjus tifiable aggression on the part of General Komaroff, an act premeditated a long time ago, and committed in direct violation of all international law; an assertion which is tolerably justified by the fact that the

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result of this untoward event was reaped by Russia, inasmuch as she took possession of the much-coveted Penjdeh and holds it even now.

We need not be astonished at the extraordinary sensation, mixed with bitter feelings of animosity against Russia, the bloody affair on the Khushk has produced in England. Not only Conservative, but also Liberal politicians, unanimous in their condemnation of Russian treachery, were loudly crying for war. All England was ablaze; only the Liberal Ministry kept cool, and, in their indefatigable zeal to discover the real cause of that mischief, they happily found out that the Muscovite lambs were again innocent, that they were pressed upon to fight against the Afghans; nay, they went even farther, and, immolating the good name of their own countryman, they were not ashamed to come forward with the assertion that it was the harshness of Sir Peter Lumsden and his party which had hastened the illfated event.

This escape, the greatest blot which has ever stained the character of British statesmen, having been found, the negotiations went on again uninterruptedly, and are going on even now as I write these lines, for no definite information is extant about the frontier regulations between Russia and Afghanistan, and all that has oozed out hitherto consists of

the fact that Russia is to remain in possession of Penjdeh, in spite of all the geographical, historical, and ethnical arguments speaking against her, and that only her position on the Heri-Rud still remains open to discussion. Referring to this part of the question, we hear that the Czar has been kind enough to give up the Zulfikar Pass, that he is ready to fix the most southerly point of his frontier in the north of the last-named place, and that this frontier line is now to run from the Heri-Rud, skirting the ElbirinKir in the south, and including the Er-Oilan salt lakes; it will cross the Murghab south of Penjdeh, and thence to the Oxus. The details of this delimitation, being hitherto unknown, and requiring a good deal of time until they will be finally settled, we may now well consider the results which Russia has obtained in this protracted contest, by stating at once that the unheard of short-sightedness of British statesmen has handed over to her the very keys with which she can now open, at her leisure, the gate of India; for she is in full possession of all the ways which can bring her to Herat in a comparatively short time and without any difficulty whatever.

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CHAPTER VII.

IMPORTANCE OF HERAT.

IN full accordance with our opinion are also the views expressed, quite recently, by competent military authorities of Great Britain. Amongst others we shall quote the following portion extracted from a paper published in The Times, (May 26, 1885), under the title "Our Strategical Position in Asia with regard to Russia," from the pen of a writer whose modesty in remaining anonymous, is only equalled by the rare ability with which he handles his subject.

“But it is unnecessary to dilate on the importance of Herat and the danger to us of its falling into hostile hands. On that importance and danger, all military experts, with few exceptions, are unanimous and positive. Indeed, the measure of its value is afforded by the eager desire of Russia to obtain it. With the frontier line conceded to her, she not only has the town itself within her grasp, but even without it she is practically the master of the whole of the vast resources of the district; and it is the district, rather

than the mere fortress, which it is her object to seize, and which will be valuable to her. Even, however, if she contents herself for the moment with a line, the extremities of which, as regards the Badghis, are points a few miles to the north of Maruchak and Zulficar, she will still possess a large district, part of which is already cultivated, most of the remainder being capable of being shortly rendered very productive. She will possess a substantial slice of the place d'assemblée which she covets, and can in the course of a fortnight seize the whole of the remainder; for we may assume that in the course of the next twelve months the railway from the Caspian will be completed as far as the Murghab, if not up to the Oxus. Then she will be in a position to reinforce the troops occupying the line Zulficar-Penjdeh by troops from the Caucasus at the rate of a division a week. It is idle to talk about leaving to the Afghans this or that pass in the Borkhut or Paropamisus ranges, if the Russians possess all the roads which lead to them. The passes are numerous, but most of them are easy to force, and probably there numerous by-paths by which they could be turned. The so-called impassable ranges are not impassable at all, and can be crossed, according to Lessar, at a height of 900 feet above the plain. A few distances will enable the reader to appreciate the

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