Page:England & Russia in Central Asia,Vol-I.djvu/135

115 Russia's military strength in central asia. 115 striven — and with some success — to monopolise the task of solving the Central Asian Question. By push- ing their advanced posts from Krasnovodsk and Chikishlar forward to Kizil Arvat, and by fortifying that place, Lomakine secured the head of the road to Sarakhs, which, as far as Abiverd at the least, is out- side the Persian border line. By carrying on this forward movement Russia may expect to find that she has secured possession of a large portion of the best road to India, and one which will also give her a hold upon Merv and the country of the Tekes. But the most important point is that it places an object before a Russian army which in numbers, efficiency, and position is immeasurably the superior of the Turkestan and Orenburg armies combined. We may now look forward to increased activity on the part of Russia through the emulation that will be caused between the authorities of Tiflis and Tashkent. The conquest of India had come to be considered the perquisite of that army which had over-run Central Asia, and had carried the terror of the White Czar's name to the sources of the Oxus and the Jaxartes. The Persian phase of the question was, and is, dis- tasteful to the generals at Tashkent ; for in the Persian enterprise their share can only be secondary. It is because these facts were well appreciated that such energetic efforts have been made to find new roads to India across the Pamir, and to make the most of the passes which lead through the Hindoo Koosh to Cabul. In Tashkent, the favourite Indian conquerer of the 8 *