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81 THE RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT IN TURKESTAN. 81 his dominions. His interviews with the late M. Wein- berg, one of the most skilled of all the Russian nego- tiators, apparently left him in a still more friendly mood, for it was after them that he made these sug- gestions concerning the construction of a telegraph wire to the Oxus. The few irrigation works which have been com- menced have been signal failures; but in the bridging of innumerable small rivers there has been greater success. The Syr Darya has been bridged in several places in Khokand, but below the town of Khodjent there has been no attempt to do so, although at Chinaz a bridge is much needed. At Khodjent, however, a wooden bridge has been erected by a M. Flavitsky within the last few years, and the tolls have been made over to him for a period of thirty years. That is consequently a private and not a public undertaking, for which the credit belongs to M. Flavitsky alone. Between Orenburg and Tashkent there are caravanserais and stations for post-horses at frequent intervals ; and in Semiretchinsk there are equal facilities for State tra- velling. The old Chinese roads in Naryn and Kuldja have been repaired, and Mr. Schuyler speaks of these as being far superior to any others he had travelled by within the Russian dominions. In Europe it is well known that the roads are execrable. These improve- ments in means of locomotion are regarded simply as military necessaries, and are carried out as such. The distances are so great, and the time required to trans- port merchandise from one point to another so long, that there has been scarcely any increase in the trade 6