Page:England & Russia in Central Asia,Vol-I.djvu/86

66 66 ENGLAND AND EUSSIA IN CENTEAL ASIA. Suleiman and the banks of the Indus. That was the object which loomed far ahead as the out-come of their task, and the Steppe Commission — of which M. de Giers, Head of the Asiatic Department of the Foreign Office, was a prominent member — more than any other person, or any other body of persons, laid the seeds from which in ten years has sprung the formidable aggressive power of Russia in Central Asia. But there was a powerful opposition to its proposals, which were at one moment withdrawn. The Governor- General of Orenburg, under whose supervision all the previous military operations had been carried out along the Syr Darya and against the Kirghiz, was naturally loth that his old authority should be taken from him. General Krjihanoffsky was unable to turn the opinion of the Government against the changes advocated by the Steppe Commission, and — although his opinion, in so far as it protested against submitting the Kirghiz tribes to two different forms of government, has been proved accurate by later experience — those who take a larger view of the question must admit that the trans- fer of the central authority from Orenburg to Tashkent gave a vitality and impetus to Russia's progress to- wards India, that it is impossible as yet accurately to measure. "With the installation of a Russian governor, and a settled administration at Tashkent, it became only a question of time when the neighbouring effete and tyrannical rulers should either sink into a state of subjection, or disappear altogether before the destroy- ing influence of the Russian presence. The advance to Tashkent made a further progress also absolutely