ENGLAND AND RUSSIA IN CENTRAL ASIA. CHAPTER I. RECENT RUSSIAN EXPLORATIONS IN CENTRAL ASIA. IN commencing a work of this character, which aspires above everything to place the intricate phases of the Central Asian Question in a clear light before the English reader, it is necessary to state concisely what meaning we attach to the definition Central Asia. No term has been more abused in its use than that of Central Asia, for, geographically speaking, it has never been applied with accuracy; and those events which have attracted so much notice in Turkestan, and have become known as the Central Asian Question, have really taken place in Western Asia. Yet it would be perfectly useless for anyone to attempt to revolutionise the phraseology of the subject by seeking to apply to that burning Central Asian topic any new title. It only remains to fix some limit, some pre cise signification to the term, and this is by no means easy. For we may give it too wide a significance or too narrow; and as the term is convenient rather than correct, we should seek to confine it to those limits. which are required by convenience alone. Therefore it would seem that Central Asia is an elastic phrase that must yet be defined before we proceed any further, both for the sake of perspicuity and for the assistance of the ordinary reader. The simplest definition we take to be the following: Central Asia is that portion of Asia which intervenes between the English and Russian frontiers wherever they now are, or wherever they in the future may be. It is consequently a variable tract of country in accordance as those frontiers advance or recede. Khokand and the districts Amou Darya and TransCaspiania are by this definition no longer in Central Asia; but Bokhara, Khiva, the Turcoman country, and Afghanistan remain included in it, and these countries, with Persia and the Pamir Khanates, actually constitute the whole of what may be called Central Asia. Beloochistan and Cashmere, which now extends to Baroghil, are within the practical limits of our Indian Empire, and Central Asia is consequently restricted to those countries and regions before mentioned. In this sense, therefore, Eastern Turkestan, which has passed once more into the possession of China, the third great power in Asia, is outside the sphere we have defined as Central Asia; but as some most interesting explorations have recently been made in the Tian Shan regions, it is proposed to include them in this chapter, which summarises the results, so far as they are yet known, of the discoveries of the last three years on the part of Russian explorers. To shut out the highly important journeys of Potanin, Prjevalsky, and Kuropatkine from our retrospect, would be to give a very partial description of what has been done by the Russian Government and its subordinates. But in treating of political events Central Asia has, for convenience sake, been assumed only to embrace all those minor countries which lie between the frontiers of England and Russia in Asia. The Central Asian Question really is, What is to be the destiny of those countries? Are they to remain independent, or to become portions of the dominions. either of Russia or of England? Regarded in this light its complexity would not appear to be great. In 1874 the Czar, acting upon his own authority, sanctioned the scheme which had been proposed by the Grand Duke Michael, Lieutenant of the Caucasus, for the formation of the country east of the Caspian Sea into a district under the immediate control of the Tiflis authorities. The extent of this district was held to be from a place known as Mertvii Kultuk on the north to the river Atrek on the south, and from the Caspian on the west to the Khivan frontier on the east. The Turcomans were practically ignored. It is scarcely necessary to say that over a considerable portion of this extensive region the authority of Russia was, and still is, vague, and that even geographical information about it is not as complete or as accurate as could be desired. Yet, despite these weak points in the Russian administration over the Trans-Caspian district, it is the law that every Turcoman and every Kirghiz within that zone shall pay an annual tax to the Russian Government. The district or governorship is divided into two sections, that of Mangishlak and that of Krasnovodsk. The latter is the more important, and under the immediate supervision of the governor of the whole region. In the Mangishlak sub-division the Kirghiz element greatly preponderates, and we may suppose that their taxes are paid with a certain amount of regularity. The wells that the Russians have sunk in two directions across the Ust Urt plateau as far as the Aral Sea, and Khiva, place in the hands of their officers the means of acting with promptitude against any turbulent Kirghiz. Moreover, since the days of that daring leader, Kutebar, the Kirghiz appear to have lost all their former courage, and have never dared to resist in any form the demands, just or unjust, of the Russian officials. We may assume that the Kibitka tax of three roubles for each tent is paid without murmuring, and at the stipulated season. But it has been far different in the Krasnovodsk district, where the people are not Kirghiz, but Turcomans. It will be more to the purpose to defer any remarks upon these people until a later chapter, but we may say here that the reconnoissances of General Lomakine have resulted in the acquisition of precise information concerning the river Atrek to a distance of one hundred miles from its mouth, that is to say, to its junction with the river Sunbur, as well as of the country between Krasnovodsk and Beurma, a |