I have just had a most interesting conversation with one who is of the highest authority on all matters relating to the foreign policy of our empire. He was very pleased with the fairness and justice of your brief Note on Mr. Goschen’s reference to the negotiations about the north-west frontier of Afghanistan, and I asked him to tell me quite frankly the vérité vraie about our alleged advance on Herat.

“The question,” he replied, “is as simple as possible. We do not want Herat, and we cannot get it. If we seized it, it would bring us immediately into conflict, not only with the Afghans, but also with Persia, not to speak of England.”

“But,” I rejoined, “have we not already made a forward movement which we thought unnecessary?”

“Yes,” he answered, “but do you not know how that came to pass? Unfortunately, Sir Peter Lumsden has taken with him two or three young fellows, like Mr. Stephen, who speak Russian, and who imagine that they serve their cause, or the cause of England, by inciting the Afghans to occupy positions far in advance of their own frontier. The Afghans, acting under the instigation of these young Englishmen, occupied a position at Penjdeh; in territory which had never been under Afghan rule, either in the time of Shere Ali or of Dost Mohamed, and which all the travellers, and they are very few, who have visited that region, from the Englishman Abbot downward, describe as belonging to the Khanate of Khiva. Our military people, hearing and seeing everywhere evidences of English hostility and English intrigues, immediately responded to the Afghan advance by a further advance on their own account, and they went further than was either prudent or useful. Thus a mistake has been made on both sides; but the initiative has been taken by the English, or by those among them who pushed the Afghans forward to go where no Afghans had ever been before—into the midst of a purely Turkoman population, within the dominions formerly belonging to the Khan of Khiva.”

“There the English were wrong,” he continued. “But nearly everybody here made a mistake in fancying that they were also wrong in sending so great an escort with Sir Peter Lumsden. People fancy that he brought it with the sole desire to outrival the Russian Commissioner, and so to gain more prestige among the Afghans. It is a positive mistake. The English were obliged to bring an escort in sheer self-defence. Unless they were well protected the Afghans would attack them.”

“General Zelenoy,” concluded my visitor, “is sure to go to Central Asia, and to be ready for the rendezvous, but unless England accepts the zone pointed out as the natural frontier by the economical conditions of the region in question the meeting of the Commissioners will come to no result. Very few people know anything about these regions, and there is no perfectly correct map to guide us. M. Lessar is the only authority on the question, and we may fairly hope that his sojourn in England may be useful, as he is very anxious to come to an understanding with England.”

That was the principal subject upon which we spoke. After that the conversation turned as usual upon Gordon, who is greatly deplored by every one in Russia. Every one is speaking of his heroism, of his genius, and of his simplicity, and we especially remember how fearlessly he spoke in defence of the oppressed Christians of the Balkan. He is quite a Christian champion with us, and his death, it is feared, may have serious consequences among our Mahommedan population. The Moscow Gazette has recently been publishing a translation of a long series of Gordon’s letters to his sister, which have met with great sympathy and have awakened enthusiastic admiration.