The Dallas weekly herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1885, 1885-03-19
ECo.v.&fUllAA FRJSGER.
ENGLISH SIDE on The QUESTION,
Nciiher side wants Wac. bat a single
Frontier nfnwl MAJ Commit Them
To iiostiiitics-A Description
~ the Territory.

Discussing the prospect Of conflict
with Russla upon the question Of tho
Afghan boundary, the Pail Mali Gazette
OF a recent date explains as follows the
points In controversy; "In tho dohata.
BILE land in which Sir Peter Lumsden
has been spending tho winter in making
preliminary surveys and IN establish
ing the influence of England among the
Afghan tribes, We are face to face with
more or less barbarious tribes, behind
whom stands the empire OF Russia. The
position In which We find ourselves In
indeed alarming. 1t IL essentially false.
Neither Russia nor England want war.
But n single frontier brawl may commit
them 10 hostililies, That matters should
ever have got into so serious position
IL due, like all our other troubles.
TO the one over mastering detormina-
ton OF the government TO avoid r0-
sponsibllity. Whom II was proposed Ia
delimit tho Russ0-Aighan frontier from
Khojeh-Saleh on the Oxus % some
point about SaralShs ON the Heri Rud,
Russia suggested that the principles
upon which the frontier should DO
drawn should be defined, and that then
Joint commission should be dispatched
L
new boundary. Was the frontier 10 DO
drawn on purely photographic or
economic or stragetiu principles, or was
IL 10 DO based exclusively upon the
maintaiuance Of the statu quo? These
were broad, general principles which
ought unquestionably 10 have been set
lied by tho governments before their
agents were deputed to define the bOun-
Diary on tho spot. The English govern
ment objected to decide anything, pro
posing TO leave everything to the joint
boundary commission. That objec-
ton was a mistake, and Russia was
quite right in pressing for its reconsider
alton. We refused, and Russia fool
ishly gave In. That was blunder
which she committed, with which, OF
course, we can not reproach her, seeing
that she did IL to oblige us. IL was
agreed that the frontier should DO set-
tied entirely out of the heads of the
commissioners on the spot, and Sir
Peter Lumsden started for the trysting-
place. Unfortunately the Russian COM
missioner, who was said to have been
specially selected for his good sense and
English sympathies, was so unpaVriotic
as TO fall i'll, and in the delay thus
caused everything went wrong. The
Afghans, feeling no doubt insplrited by
the presence of the British commissioner
with his escort, and anxious to make
butlI puslIioi 40
ing delimitation, threw some troops into
the Turkoman village of PenjdeA.
From Penjdeh the Russians declared
the Afghans could threaten tho Russian
advance post at Sarakhs, aud as re-
ply to the Afghan advance, they threw
their troops forward to Pul-l-khatun.
There were great protests on both sides,
and Sir Peter Lumsden waxed very
wroth. AS the situation was becoming
more and more strained every day, the
Russian government dispatched M.
Lessar to London to try to arrange the
principles on which the now frontier
should be drawn. The line suggested
by Russia is based, not on strategic con-
siderations, for the only strategic from
tier, that of tho mountains-falls much
nearer Herat, but upon the simple ne
and salt-bods OF the Russian
Turkomans within the Russian from
tier. With M. Lessar's frontier-or
rather with the principles on which il
is founded-we have no quarrel. If all
the strategic advantages of a defensive
frontier are left in the hands of the AT |
ghans--for that is what M. Lessar de- |
clares the Russian government is will |
ing to accept as the first principle of the
new boundary-we see no disadvantage
to England, but quite the reverse, in
agreeing to the Russian proposal to
draw the new frontier as far to the
north of Herat as is consistent with al
lowing the SAILOR Turkomans of Sarakhs
the territory essential to their exist
ence."