unfortunate Ameer Mozaffur Eddin. By
that treaty the Russians obtained the right to place military
cantonments at Kermina, Charjui, and Karshi. Kermina is situated about
fifty miles east of the town of Bokhara, on the road from Katti Kurgan
and Samarcand; Karshi about sixty miles south of Katti Kurgan, and half
way to the Oxus; while Charjui is on the Oxus and some eighty miles west
of Bokhara. Of all these the last is the most important, for thence a
direct caravan route leads to Merv and Meshed. Once more, in 1870-71,
Bokhara entered the field, but the enterprise collapsed through the
unconcerted measures of the allies and the weakness of Khokand. During
these five eventful years of rebellion amongst the races of Western
Turkestan, Yakoob Beg preserved his neutrality. If the assertion is
correct that he had played an underhand part in the formation of the
league against Russia, assuredly he endeavoured to make his actions
contradict his diplomacy. Not a Kashgarian soldier participated in the
efforts made so repeatedly by Bokhara and Khokand to shake off the bonds
of Russian vassalage. Like Shere Ali of Cabul, he devoted his attention
exclusively to the affairs of his immediate province, and wars in the
extreme east of his dominions against co-religionists were a preferable
alternative to the risks attending a _jehad_ against the most formidable
enemy of Islam! Russia had indeed little to complain of in Yakoob Beg's
interference in their possessions. His instigation of premature
rebellions, or, if he did not instigate them, the approval extended to
them by some of his chief ministers, was the very kindest act he could
have conferred on the ruling power of Turkestan, for Russia never has
had anything to fear from any isolated risings among the people of this
part of Central Asia. Nothing less than an unanimous and concerted
rising in Western Turkestan, aided with a nucleus of regular troops and
officers, such as, to go no farther, either Afghanistan can supply, or
Kashgar could at one time have supplied--nothing less than this will
ever produce a complete catastrophe to the Russian arms, and in a short
campaign of a few months send the Russian legions back to their old
quarters of thirteen years ago. Whether Yakoob Beg ever was strong
enough to risk the independence of his state on so important an
enterprise may fairly be doubted, and he showed a commendable prudence
in abstaining from hostilities when he had sufficient