The Clifton clarion., 1885-05-20
lIerat.

With the probability of Russia seizing Herat, tho interest Tn that 2lasece 23llaee iintensifies. When the Gates of Herat are spoken of it is not metaphorical. Malleson in his work described the city as one of the oldest of the East, and once one of the richest. It has been fifty times taken, fifty times destroyed and fifty times has 1t risen from its ashes. Six hundred and sixty years ago it had 12,0O0 retail shops, 5000 public baths, cara vansaries and water mills, $50 schools and monastic institutions and IA, ,000 occupied houses, and was yearly visited by caravans from all parts of Asia. When Chingiz Khan passed across the East, devastating the region, He rat is said to have suffered by the two stormings it experienced at his hands a loss of a million and a half of men. In subsequent ages its splendor revived, and it was a great and flourishing city down to comparatively modern times. Malleson adds:
 A glance at the record of the past will show that from time i'm memorial the city was regarded as an outlying bulwark, the posses sion of which was necessary prior to attempting the conquest of India; the holding of which by India or by quasi-vassal powers dependent on India, would render impossible an invasion of that country. It was so considered by Alexander, by Mahmud and his successors, Chingiz Khan, by Tai mur, by Nadir Shah, by Ahmid Shah and by Muhammad Shah, the Persian Prince who attacked 1t in 1887. In the cases of all but the last the possession of Herat led to the conquest of India; in the case of the last the successful defense of that city rendered in vasion impossible. What can the possession of one city signify? Herat is called the gate of India, because through it, and through it alone, the valleys can be entered which lead to the only vulnerable part of India. Those valleys, running nearly north and south, are protected to the East by inac- cessible ranges, to the West by lmpracticable deserts. No invad- ing army could dare to attempt to traverse the great salt desert, and the desert immediately south of it, the Daset-i-Naubad, whilst a British army held Herat. As long as that army should hold Herat so long would an invasion of India be impossible.
 Charles Marvin in his recent work thus describes It:
 The city stands on the right bank of the Hari Rud, from which water is brought by several chan nels. It is built in the form of a rectangle, north and south faces being about 1,50O, and the east and west faces 1,600 yards in length. Inclosing the city is an immense earthwork about 50 feet high, surmounted by a wall rang ing from 25 to 30 feet, with deep moat, which can be easily flooded from the Hari Rud. The citadel is situated in the center of the city, and is also surrounded by moat There are five gates. of which one, however, is closed up, and each is fanked by two bas- tions. The city is brldged at each of the four gates by a wooden drawbridge, which is raised and lowered by mechanical appliances worked from inside the walls. Each face of the four walls is furnished with from twenty-five to thirty bastions. On the exterior slope of the embankment, sup porting the walls, are two lines of shelter trenches, one above the other, carried all around the city, except where the gates are. A correspondent with Lumsden's mission describes the mounted armament as some twenty guns of varied calibers, besides num- berless others lying dismounted on the ramparts." Twenty guns to defend three and quarter miles of wall! The garrison con sists of 4,000 or 5000 troops, ex-