writers on that subject, and for the sake of endorsement I shall quote the following authorities:

General Sir Edward Hamley, undoubtedly one of the greatest living authorities on military topics, said amongst other things, "The one advantage of the possession (of Merv) is that the caravan route passing Bokhara to Meshed and the interior, and that from India by Herat to Central Asia, lie through Merv. But that it was once a centre of great prosperity, is proved by the fact that the remains of four great cities exist there, the inhabitants of the last of which were driven out by the semi-barbarians about a century ago. Under Russian rule that prosperity will revive, the lands will once more teem with the crops to which nothing is wanting but good husbandry, and, when once again become populous and fertile, it will form a secondary base against the Afghan frontier. In the meantime it closes the gap aforesaid, and as soon as Russia lays down her frontier line, the whole of that vast empire, from the Baltic to the Danube, thence along the Black Sea, across the Caucasus to the Caspian, along the Persian frontier to Merv and Turkestan, and so on to Siberia, will lie in a ring fence. This is the power which is now separated from a frontier which, presumably, we cannot allow her to overstep, by a border land which is a barrier

in no sense, and which I will endeavour briefly to describe."

Colonel Valentine Baker wrote on his return from the Perso-Turkoman frontier in 1873: "Merv, with its water communication nearly complete, lies only 240 miles from Herat, to which place it is the key. There can be no doubt that Merv is the natural outwork of Herat, with the advantage of water supply all the way between the two cities. Strategically, the Russian occupation of Merv would be, so to say, the formation of a lodgment on the glacis of Herat. It would place Herat completely at

her mercy."

Sir Charles Macgregor wrote in 1875: "There is no doubt in my mind that the real danger lies in our permitting the Russians to concentrate unopposed at Merv, which is quite within coup de main distance of Herat; and it is in this fact that the value of Merv to the Russians lies. Once place Herat beyond the possibility of a coup de main, and I cannot imagine the astute statesmen of Russia persisting in the occupation of an isolated spot in the desert, the maintenance of which must cost a great deal."

Finally, we may quote the words of Charles Marvin,. written in February, 1884: "The conquest of Merv is something more than the annexation of a sand-desert oasis. It means the complete junction of

the military forces of the Caucasus and Turkestan. It means, with the annexation of Akhal, the absorption of 100,000 of the best irregular cavalry in the world, at a week's march from the city of Herat. It means the meeting, for the first time, of the Cossack and the Afghan. It means the complete enclosure of Khiva within the Russian Empire, and the reduction of Bokhara from the independent position of a border state to the dependence of an incorporated province. It means the enclosure of more than 200,000 square miles of territory, and the addition to the Russian Empire of a region as large as France. It means the completion of the conquest of the Central Asian deserts, and the commencement of the annexation of the great fertile mountain region of Persia and Afghanistan. It means the deliberate occupation of a strategical point, fraught with political entanglements of such a widespread nature that, whether Russia desire it or not, she will be inevitably led, unless forestalled or checked by England, to Meshed, to Herat, to Balkh, and to Kabul. And she will not remain there. She will continue her swift advance until she triumphantly lays down her Cossack border alongside the Sepoy line of India.”

I could easily add other statements by English and foreign authorities on that subject, but I I have succeeded in proving that Merv, although

suppose

actually a heap of ruins, haunted by reckless robbers and lawless bands, is by no means that worthless piece of sand described by optimistic politicians; for if the sand be removed there may be found a precious jewel of military and commercial importance beneath the arid crust.

CHAPTER V.

ENGLAND'S POLICY IN THE FACE OF RUSSIAN

CONQUESTS.

WE have followed hitherto the history of Russian conquests from Tashkend to Merv. We have given a succinct account of the varied events, without interrupting our relation by a side glance upon the attitude which the partly mediate, partly immediate, neighbours have maintained during the whole course of Russian encroachment. We shall now turn to this question, and begin by showing the views exhibited in England in the face of these emergencies. In England, where the liveliest interest ought to have prevailed, nevertheless, we are sorry to remark that criminal indifference, coupled with utter want of courage and lack of due appreciation of the question, have marked the whole long process of her diplomatic relations with Russia, as well as of the defensive steps taken in that direction.

In the beginning, when the black cloud loomed up in the north, there was a sufficient amount of