Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1885-08-22
THE ssSUCCESSOR OF TAMERLANE.''
An Important Coronation Ceremonial.

From the New Orleans Times-Democrat
A very curious and significant fact in mod
ern history will be the approaching coronation
Of Alexander Ill, Emperor of Russia, al
Samarcand. The dry announcement that he
will then only add to his countless preceding
titles that of Emperor Of Central Asia-a
statement already familiar to all American
newspaper readers-does not convey by any
means the full meaning Of the event. The as
sumption Of the title emperor Of Central
Asia''-impos!ng as it might seem-could not
have that impression upon the Imagination of
Orien tails which the ceremony is intended to
produce; and the truth is that Alexander III.
will not merely proclaim himself lord Of those
wild territories, but also successor of Tanner
nomad princes bearing the warlike relics of
that mighty destroyer the jeweled crown of
helmet, and the sword and buckler Of the con-
querer of Bajazet will be brandished by the
strong hands OF the Russian car. These heir
looms have been treasured up for centuries by
the emirs OF Samarcand, claiming descent from
Iimour. who was born forty miles south of that
city In 1886, on the 9th day OF April.
SO tremendous title cannot fail to have It's
effects upon the Imagination of races who still
preserve the memory of Timour in their wild
vacations, such as that preserved for US by Hue:
1--WE have burned the sweet-smelling wood at
the foot of the divine Timour. Bending our
foreheads to the earth, we have offered him the
green leaf of tea, and the milk of our herds We
are ready; the Mongols are afoot @ TimOnr, q
divine Timour, when will thy great soul revive?
Return. return-we wait for theer' And
If the tribes of the steppes fail to behold in this
new emperor Of Central Asia descendant of
self q usurper, they must at least recognize one
worthy to succeed him by right of conGuest and
extent ext Of dominion. For, like the empire of
VOga to the Pacific, and northward even to the
regions OF perpetual day-where Mohammedan
doctors have declared the evening prayer NAV
be dispensed with. forasmuch as there is no
evening!
The twenty-seven crowns of Timour are ont
numbered by those of the car of all the Rus
sias; and If Persia and India have not yet been
seized, the former already trembles and the
continually threatens China as did 'Ti nSSla
and has quite as fair a chance of ruling it as
Kublai and the descendants OF Jenghis before
In assuming to bethe "Successor of Tanner.
lane" Alexander III indeed seems to give the
world hint not only that he purposes to rule
all the domains that TimOur reigned over in
Guiding Persia, but likewise that he NAV deem
It according to the eternal fitness of things to
follow the MOngOl in his invasion of india
and to initiate his descendants in achievinu,
dominion ''frOm the mountains of Cashmere to
Cape CONFORM, and from Candahar to the bay
which neither the shah of Persia, nor the sultan
Of Turkey, nor the emperor of China, nor the
British rulers of India can fail to comprehend.
The enormous growing peril, which weighed
vaguely for centuries upon the Occident and
upon the Orient as a national nightmare. snd
Despite the golden beard and blue ewes. the
tall potentate who assumes the crownsOf Tam.
erlane, and 6randishes his Tartar blade at
Samarcand, will seem less q man than a Force .e'
the force, not OF people or policy but OF a
Fate. That human figure symboiizes not
Europe but Asia,-The Asia that has rolled her
tidal-waves OF conquest westward at long in
tervals since the beginning of history. It signi-
fies as little that this successor OF Tameriand'
of the pagan throne Of Genghis should have been
Moslem Shiite;-he typifies the same ethnic
forces, and the same race destinies Nor is the
title SO inappropriate from an ethnic point of
view as might be hastily imagined. The modern
science Of race history has Confirmed what
o only sus
amalgamation of her many races the infiueoce
Of the nomadic blood was dominant and made
gols will prevail; the spirit of Timour will be re-
| incarnated, but he will be the champion, not of
Shite dissenters, but of the schismatics Of Pho
weapons more efficient than bows and lances.
Even the new military system Of Russia is es.
sentially Tartar: the slow infantry tactics OF
the Occldent nave been practically eschewed:
the millions OF foot soldiers are being trans,
formed into millions of cavalry. The invent
| but not entirely changed 1t; for, whether nm.
consciously or otherwise. Skobelof, In the Russo
Turkish campaign, pursued O system of attack
| those laid down by Timour In his Institutes
After an ebb OF centuries the tide Of Asiatic
| life swells again under the breath of the new
Russian spirit, as the ocean under q strong
north wind. These fast ebbings and fiowings
| of human existence are coincident with the de-
cline of the growth Of civilizations. Russian
| civilization is barely commencing, but its de-
velopment promises a colossal viROr without
precedent. Her yearly increase Of population
will soon be double that OF even SO prolific
nation of Germany, and is already nearly triple
that OF Great Britain. In fifty years more it is
predicted that her population will be close
upon 15S,OO0,O 900: and in yet another half
! century, how will that food increase! The
overlooking will scarcely happen In our day
strange events might postpone 1t into the
twenty-first century; but what Western dixie
| may ever be built mighty enough to keep it
| back, since its volume will have the whole in
| caicuiable'weighto of Asia? With equal appro-
priateness might some KOran-reader of Samar-
cand read at the forthcoming coronation the
| same verse which an aged sheik Is said to have
| Deen accidentally repeating when visited by
| the mother Of Tamerlane:
4 hob nIA 4