Our prestige,

to perennial pestilence and famine? indeed, is vitally concerned in upholding an empire which is the wonder and the envy of the world, and we reap solid advantage from owning so considerable an outlet for our manufactures and the redundant energies of our middle class. In Russia social and economic conditions differ widely from our own; and her conquests in Eastern Asia will absorb her surplus activity for many years to come. It is true that the path opened by nature for her expansion leads southwards. Peter the Great's famous will is a forgery, but no one can doubt that its promptings have sunk deeply into the hearts of the Russian people. In their eyes the Tsar is the heir of the Byzantine Empire which gave them laws and religion, and they are firmly convinced that a day will come when the Greek Cross will replace the Crescent which desecrates the summit of St. Sophia.

Twice has the road to Constantinople been blocked by England. In 1854 she drew the sword in order to keep the Key of the World in Turkish hands; and a quarter of a century later she turned back the Tsar's victorious legions when the splendid quarry was within their grasp. Baffled in an ambition which educated Russians deem legitimate, their eyes are turned to the Far East; and here, again, England has set limits to their expansion. It is this latent antagonism, ever ready to burst into uncontrollable fury, which constitutes the chief danger to the stability of our rule in India. The latter is our one vulnerable point, and, when national interests are become divergent, it is in Russia's power to create a diversion by fomenting trouble in Afghanistan, in the highlands which separate the two empires, and within the limits of

1 See a very interesting note at pp. 258-9, vol. ii. of Schuyler's Turkestan.

India itself. Every friend of humanity must deplore the existence of a gulf between two forces which, if united, would give civilisation to Asia and assure the peace of the world. When we pass from the tendency of Russian policy in the heart of Asia to the results achieved there, we are on firmer ground-in politics nothing happens but the unexpected, while ocular evidence can hardly be impeached. We left home full of prejudices, the result of a course of Central Asian literature. The Cassandra notes of Vambéry were ringing in our ears, and the latent chauvinism of Lord Curzon of Kedleston1 had prejudiced the Russians in our eyes. But unfavourable prepossessions vanished

when we had seen the results of their rule in Central Asia, and had gathered estimates of its character in every class of the population. We are convinced that the Tsar's explicit instructions to his lieutenants to exercise a fatherly care over his Asiatic subjects are scrupulously obeyed.2 The peoples of Asia, from the Caspian to China, from Siberia to the borders of Persia and Afghanistān, enjoy as large a measure of happiness and freedom as those of any part of our Indian dominions. The fiscal policy of the conquering race is one of extreme moderation. Imperial and local taxation are indeed too light; and, in Samarkand at least, a turn might be given to the screw with great advantage to an exchequer which finds these Asiatic possessions a serious drain on its resources. The problem of local self-government has been solved, and indigenous institutions have not been ruthlessly trampled upon. Respect for the dominant race has been inculcated by prompt

1 Lord Curzon's great work on Central Asia is considered by the Russians themselves as a text-book, though they vigorously combat his views on their policy.

2 See Appendix, p. 425.

and severe punishment meted out for revolt or outrage on a European's person or property. Every picture has its shadows, and it is not difficult to point to defects in the administrative machine. Russia has carried an attitude of laissez-faire to an extreme limit in dealing with education, and it has been left in the hands of a class which must always be bitterly hostile to infidel rule. The process of Russification has been pushed with excessive zeal. Local colour and racial characteristics have been swept away, which were precious indeed in times when mankind was oppressed by a deluge of commonplace throughout the Eastern world. Structures which made the cities of Central Asia the theme of Eastern poets have been suffered to lapse into hopeless ruin. And what shall be said of a commercial policy framed on principles exploded a century ago by Adam Smith, and proved by the history of our own East India Company to be positively injurious to the Government which cherishes them? That policy aims at nothing less than the maintenance of a Chinese Wall round the Russian Empire, albeit that railways and steam navigation have made the whole world kin and brought about a solidarity between nations which renders each unit sensitive to the injuries inflicted on the commerce and manufactures of the rest. The heavy protective tariff, the unwillingness to admit consular agents for the protection of English trade, and the jealous restrictions on the movements of Europeans are strangely out of date at the dawn of the twentieth century. An Anglo-Indian official travelling in Central Asia would find it difficult to avoid instituting comparisons between our own methods of dealing with Orientals and those employed by the Russians. The dissimilarity of the conditions encountered deprives the process of half its value. We have in India a swarming

population, which overtaxes the productive power of the soil and yet shows no sign of having reached its utmost limits. In the bitter struggle for life an enormous criminal class has been evolved, which is a perpetual thorn in the side of authority. And then, we are face to face with a civilisation more ancient than our own, and on its own lines, as complex, presenting features which baffle the closest study. Nor must the religious problem be left out of account. Hinduism is stirred to its inmost being by a revival, and displays an elasticity and a militant spirit which appear incompatible with its principles. The forces of Islām are also equipped for a coming struggle. A Puritan movement, inaugurated by Wahabi missionaries eighty years ago, has spread far and wide, and the Mohammedans of India have formed secret societies which are exploited by wirepullers for their own ends. Thus we find arrayed against us millions who firmly believe that a good Government must necessarily be a theocracy. Our own institutions, founded as they are on a sincere regard for the good of subject races, have conspired to bring about a state of things which is full of political danger. The dissemination of the English language and of the half-truths with which our political literature teems has produced aspirations which can be gratified only by the abdication of our supremacy. Thus the prestige of the conquerors, which must be upheld if 200,000 white men are to govern three hundred millions of their fellow - creatures, has been declining for many years past. And we labour under the immense disadvantage of being aliens in blood, language, and traditions from the Asiatics whom we are called upon to rule. For communities which have arrived at a high pitch of civilisation, conquest is an anachronism, and assimilation with a subject race an

impossibility. We can have no sympathy with the workings of these enigmatic Oriental minds, for we view every problem that presents itself from an entirely different standpoint. Thus we must always be sojourners in India, and our dominion can never strike its roots deeply into the soil. But for the bayonets on which our throne is supported it would fall, even as those of our predecessors in the purple have fallen. Central Asia, on the other hand, is thinly peopled, and the standard of comfort is comparatively high. The conquerors and conquered are connected by the ties of blood, and there is a latent and unconscious sympathy between them which renders the task of government easy and assures its stability. In one point the difference between British and Russian methods of administration is very marked the relations between the judicial and executive functions. Our readers are doubtless aware that in India, under the native rule, there was an entire separation between the judge and the ruler. This divorce continued till, under the régime of Lord William Bentinck, functions apparently dissonant were united. It was considered essential in a country so peculiarly constituted as India that the Central Government should have, in every district, a single representative in whose hands all the threads of administration are gathered. In Russian Asia, on the other hand, offences against the state and individuals alike come within the purview of courts entirely independent of the executive, which is on a military basis. and concerns itself only with obedience to these tribunals' behests. Some friction occurred between the rival branches when the country was first invaded by Judges of Instruction and of the Peace, free from the control of local authorities and subordinate to the Ministry of Justice at St. Petersburg. This agitation