PREFACE.
The steady progress of Russian conquest in Turkistan during the past half-century, and, during late years, the rapid advance of her frontiers in the direction of India, have raised the States of Central Asia to a position of importance in the eyes of European politicians higher than they ever before occupied.
The accounts published from time to time by venturesome travellers in those regions have informed us of the barbarism and bigotry of their peoples—of the anarchy and weakness of their Governments—and of the growing decay and approaching dissolution of the polity that holds them together by the bonds of a common religion and common interest. And now the military operations against Khiva at present in course of prosecution by Russia, whilst opening up that country to the influences of European civilisation, promise to unfold to that power a field of enterprise that must, I believe, culminate in her paramount ascendancy over all the region draining to the valley of the Oxus. This is a prospect full of the weightiest moment to ourselves in India, and one that furnishes matter for the gravest consideration of our statesmen. Much has been already written on this subject from different points of view, and much remains to be written; and doubtless the public journals will keep alive the discussion of the question. But let us becareful lest, while straining at the gnat of Yárkand, we swallow the camel of Herat.
Since the region intervening between the Asiatic possessions of Russia and England now claims the attention of the several Governments concerned, and is by the current of progressing events brought prominently before the notice of the politicians of Europe generally, any recent information regarding these countries cannot fail to prove of interest to the general reader. With this conviction, therefore, I venture to set before the public an account of the incidents and experiences of a journey made across this region during last year—from the Indus to the Tigris.
In explanation of all shortcomings as to matter and defects as to style, I have to remind the reader that the narrative has been written at odd hours, between the duties of an onerous charge in the principal frontier station of India, without leisure for generalisation, or opportunity for reference to authorities.
Further, I am constrained by the force of circumstances to commit my manuscript to the care of the publisher, without the advantage of correcting the proof-sheets in their passage through the press.
H. W. B.
Peshawar,18th April 1873.