THE MURGHAB VALLEY RAILWAY
[Illustration: STREET SCENE, ANDIJAN]
The Russian Government has shown remarkable energy during the past few
years in improving its railway communications in Central Asian regions.
After the Trans-Caspian line had been finished from the Caspian Sea to
Samarkand there was a lull in construction, but presently an extension
was carried on to Tashkent and thence to Andijan. By creating railway
communication with Merv, Russia met half-way the difficulties of her
station in Trans-Caspia. In the event of any military crisis arising
with Afghanistan 300 versts of difficult country yet remained to be
crossed before concentration upon that frontier could be effected. At
a later date, a branch was run from Merv to Pendjeh, by which this
hiatus was at once repaired and Russia secured to herself a position of
commanding importance across the road to Herat.
Surveys, carried out in the year 1894 in two directions, from the
station of Tejend and from Merv, demonstrated that the Merv-Murghab
route did not present any technical difficulties. Shorter than
the Tejend line by 65 versts and more level, it traversed the
well-populated Merv, Yulatan and Pendjeh oases. Water was also
plentiful. On the other hand the line from Tejend crossed very
difficult country; while it doubled the distance, necessitating 700,000
cubic sagenes’ additional excavation. Perhaps a more emphatic objection
arose from the inadequacy of water between Tejend and Sarakhs, supplies
in the Tejend district drying up between September and January. As a
consequence the line was constructed from Merv to Kushkinski Post,
on the Afghan frontier, through the valleys of the Murghab and Kushk
rivers, just over 293 versts or 192 miles in length, with a terminal
depôt only 80 miles distant from Herat. From motives of economy one
station was allowed to every 50 versts, with sidings half-way between
them; only two engine sheds and workshops were provided, while all
other buildings were limited and none but the cheapest materials
employed. Bridges were made of wood instead of stone, the rolling-stock
sufficing for four trains in the twenty-four hours. Railway and
military telegraph wires were fixed to the same posts and it was not
intended to ballast the permanent way. Construction was reduced by
these precautions to 8,408,000 roubles. After revision by a commission
of the General Staff this sum was increased by the cost of ballasting
the permanent way, 329,000 roubles; the total expenditure upon the work
finally amounting to 9,669,000 roubles or 33,000 roubles per verst.
Imperial ukase authorised construction on August 26, 1896, actual work
beginning on April 27, 1897.
Colonel Ulyanin, of the Corps of Engineers, was appointed Chief
Constructor and the overseers were also engineer officers, the majority
of whom had already taken part in the laying of the Krasnovodsk-Merv
section of the Trans-Caspian railway. The workmen consisted of
Russians, Persians, Bokharans, Sarts from the province of Samarkand,
Ersaris and Afghans from Maimana, the daily roll averaging between
3500 and 5000. Of this number from 27 per cent. to 45 per cent. were
Russians, who were paid from eighty-nine kopecks to one rouble eighty
kopecks per day. Native workmen received no more than eighty kopecks
daily; several hundred of them worked for a monthly salary of between
fifteen and seventeen roubles. The prevalence of malaria in the Kushk
and Murghab valleys interrupted the building and hundreds of instances
of labourers breaking their contracts occurred, the authorities being
obliged to repair the shortage by enlisting inexperienced men. In
spite of this difficulty work upon the permanent way was completed
in November 1898, and the task of laying the rails, which began on
November 15, 1897, was finished on December 4, 1898. Rails were laid at
a rate varying between 1 and 2½ versts per day, the job being carried
out by the newly formed companies of the Railway Battalion. The cost
per verst fluctuated from 350 to 450 roubles. The difference existing
between the gauge of this railway and the standard of the Russian
railways has since been altered. At first the line was of narrow gauge
with rails weighing 18 lbs. to the cubic foot, metals of a heavier type
only being laid for a distance of forty versts. The service of trains
from Merv to Kushkinski was opened on December 4, 1898. At the present
time, it comprises four daily local trains and two bi-weekly expresses,
“through” trains, which complete the journey in eighteen hours at a
speed of 11 miles an hour.
Upon completion and after inspection by a commission, control of the
Murghab valley line reverted to the Minister of Ways and Communications
by whom the original narrow gauge was adapted to the broad gauge of
the Russian system. Various other alterations and improvements in the
siding and hutting accommodation were also carried out. In 1901-02
branch lines to Chahil Dukteran and Tanur Sangi, skirting the left
bank of the Murghab and passing Maruchak on the Afghan bank, were
constructed. It is now proposed to double the entire track between
Merv and Kushkinski Post, these highly significant changes making the
railway available for any service the military authorities might impose
upon it. The line itself is veiled in such close secrecy by the Russian
authorities that peculiar interest attaches to any particulars upon it,
and these notes, presented for the first time to the public, convey an
accurate and not unimportant description of its character, from the
junction at Merv to the terminus at Chahil Dukteran.
[Illustration: A NOTABLE GATHERING]
From Merv station, 118.01 sagenes above sea-level, the railway runs at
first in a south-easterly direction, passing due south and south-west
along the valleys of the Murghab and Kushk rivers. The first station
beyond Merv is Talkhatan Baba, some 37 versts distant at an elevation
of 127.06 sagenes. This place is situated in country which is both
sandy and flat, while barely 6 versts away is the Murghab river, upon
which the station is dependent for its water-supply. Twenty versts
further the line meets the spreading prosperity of the Yulatan oasis,
from which the point derives its name. Yulatan station stands at
a height of 134.16 sagenes; and, although a pleasant freshness is
imparted by the oasis to its environment, the general spectacle is very
dreary, being broken only by the contours of low dunes and undulating
sand ridges. A small village has been founded by the Russians on the
banks of the stream, the first colonists to establish themselves in
Yulatan appearing in 1885. An open square, surrounded by little brick
and stone buildings distinguishes the centre of the settlement. Four
wide streets, along the gutters of which are planted tall trees,
radiate from it; while the population consists principally of Persians,
Khivans, Sarts, Armenians and Bokharan Jews. The percentage of Russians
is inconsiderable.
Yulatan contains the headquarters of the District Commissioner, the
Sixth Company of the 1st Trans-Caspian Railway Battalion and two
companies of the 1st Caucasian Rifle Battalion. There are also a post
and telegraph office, a mixed primary school, an hospital with six
beds, a synagogue and a large public garden. The trade is in the hands
of Bokharan Jews and the market assembles upon Mondays and Thursdays.
In the district around the station there is a Tekke population of
15,000, occupied, for the most part, in the cotton industry. By reason
of its trade this station is the most important commercial centre
on the line. In 1901, for which statistics have only just become
available, there were:
Passengers.
_Arrivals._ _Departures._
2108 2084
_Imports._ _Exports._
Merchandise 10,569 poods Merchandise 30,161 poods.
Sugar 413 ” Wheat 2,109 ”
Kerosene 602 ” Barley 3,581 ”
Flour 856 ” Cotton 16,763 ”
These figures have increased greatly in more recent years, the bulk of
the trade from the Yulatan oasis line now converging upon this point.
The third station from Merv is Sultan-i-band, some 76 versts distant
and at an altitude of 139.55 sagenes. A slight change in the character
of the country is here noticeable; the flat, sandy, barren expanse
which begins wherever the Yulatan oasis leaves off giving place
to dense reeds and marshes. Water is not drawn from the Murghab
river at this station, the supply coming from the Khani Yab canal.
Originally the region was fertilised by the Sultan-i-band; but that
once magnificent work has fallen into decay, and, although the
surrounding country contains a large Tekke population, there is very
little industry. The ruins of the Sultan-i-band lie in the immediate
vicinity,--the word “band” means “dam,”--this famous canal once being
connected very closely with the history of Old Merv when the waters of
the Murghab irrigated that oasis. But to-day the commercial importance
of the district is insignificant and in the year under review only
3689 poods of cotton were forwarded to Merv.
[Illustration: ON THE CENTRAL ASIAN RAILWAY.]
The environment of the next station, Imam Baba, which is 44 versts
distant, reveals on account of the prevalence of malaria a very
desolate appearance. It is situated where the sand-hills approach the
banks of the Murghab river, but the spot is desert and marshy. It rests
148.60 sagenes above the sea, drawing its water from the Murghab river.
There is little local industry and the district owing to the fever, is
very scantily populated.
The fifth station from Merv is Sari Yazi, where a small buffet denotes
its importance. The mean gradient of the line between Merv and this
point is 0.0005 and the distance is 157 versts. The depôt is situated
in the Murghab valley, bounded on the east by the Karabyl hills, a
low-lying ridge of sandy clay. It lies 155.57 sagenes high and depends
for its water upon the Murghab river. Sari Yazi occupies an interesting
region and is itself the site of an important Turcoman fortress, now in
ruins. Among the valleys on the northern slopes of the Karabyl hills
there are the traces of numerous Tekke villages, whose men held the
region in subjection while the women cultivated the ground. At the
station there are railway yards and workshops; attached to it is an
hospital with fifteen beds and barracks for one company of the Railway
Battalion. In 1901 there arrived:
_Imports._ _Exports._
Merchandise, 9188 poods. Cotton and Merchandise, 2139 poods.
Tash Kepri, the sixth station from Merv and 197 versts from that place,
is situated in the broad valley of the Murghab river at its confluence
with the Kushk river. It is at a height of 164.0 sagenes and the
water-supply is from the Murghab river. The place derives its name
from a handsome old brick bridge of nine arches, which spans the Kushk
river at a distance of three-quarters of a mile to the south-west of Ak
Tepe and connects the station with the village. It is also described
as Pul-i-Khisti. The Karabyl hills, which bound the valley of the
Murghab on the east, here recede somewhat from the river and there is
a vestige of cultivation, the green plots imparting a welcome note of
relief to the general aspect of the scene. Close to the station is a
monument to the soldiers who fell during the expedition of 1885, which
was commanded by Lieut.-General Komaroff. Among the trophies of the
fight were eight guns and the whole of the Afghan camp. The monument
was erected at the instance of the late Commander of the Forces in the
Trans-Caspian province, Lieut.-General Kuropatkin, by those who took
part in the fight together with the troops in garrison in the district.
The commercial development of the Tash Kepri district is growing and,
conformably with the increase of trade with Afghanistan, the station
itself is becoming of greater importance. In 1901 there were:
_Arrivals._ _Departures._
1631 1710
_Imports._ _Exports._
33,632 poods 41,913 poods
[Illustration: SCHOOL CHILDREN]
Almost upon the frontier and connected with it by a carriage-road
22 versts in length, is Takhta Bazar, the headquarters of the
Harzagi section of the Pendjeh Sariks who control the Kashan valley
cultivation. It is situated on the Murghab river and is the only
settlement of importance in the Pendjeh district. The population
comprises Jews, Persians, Bokharans, Armenians, Khivans, Russians,
Afghans and Tartars. There are, including a native school under Russian
supervision, fifty-seven buildings, in the village of which at least
one-half belongs to the Jews. The Pendjeh Custom House, a frontier
establishment of the third class through which passes the trade with
Afghanistan, is situated near it. The trade statistics of the year
under notice are:
_Exports._
Merchandise, 28,226 poods Roubles, 128,124.
_Imports._
Sheep, 86,630} Roubles, 297,836.
Cattle, 2,863}
From Pendjeh the main line, taking a south-westerly direction, runs
through the narrow valley of the Kushk river to Kushkinski Post. Since
the completion of this work a branch line has been carried through
from Tash Kepri a distance of 22 versts along the Murghab to Tanur
Sangi, affording a supplementary avenue of approach for the purposes
of concentration and the transport of stores to points on the actual
Russo-Afghan frontier. From this extension a further line, 25 versts in
length, has been projected towards Torashekh from a little south-east
of Pendjeh up the Kashan valley. Ten miles south-east of Tanur Sangi,
at Bala Murghab and 30 miles south of Torashekh, at Kala Nao the
Afghans possess strong frontier posts. Herat already lay so snugly in
the grasp of Russia that it might have been spared this little further
attention.
Kala-i-Mor, the station before Kushkinski Post, is situated almost
mid-way between Pendjeh and the terminus at Kushk. It is 244 versts
from Merv and 202 sagenes above sea-level. The position of the station,
bounded by hills where wild boars are plentiful and snipe and pheasants
offer attractive sport, occupies a dreary and desolate scene. There
is little vegetation and considerable malaria; the local springs are
quite brackish as the result of extensive deposits of salt in the sand.
Fresh water is brought by train to the station where a drinking-water
reservoir has been established. No trade exists at Kala-i-Mor, which
fails to attract a population.
[Illustration: HINDU TRADERS AT PENDJEH]
Beyond Kala-i-Mor, at a distance of 259 versts from Merv, the line
crosses the Kushk river by a bridge with stone abutments supported
upon iron piles. Half-way to Kushkinski Post station, near the railway
siding, are the ruins of the small fortress of Chemen-i-Bed. While
approaching it the line passes the Alexeieffski village, established
by Russian colonists in 1892 and containing forty-one families. This
village and the neighbouring one of Poltavski, founded in 1896 and
where there are thirty-five families, are the most southern settlements
within the Russian Empire. The inhabitants exist almost entirely by the
exportation of inconsiderable quantities of wheat, hay and straw to
Kushkinski Post for the purposes of the garrison.
Kushkinski Post station, 306.4 sagenes above sea-level, is 293 versts
from Merv. It possesses a fine buffet. The military post, situated
near the frontier in the broad valley of the Kushk river, is bounded
by the undulating slopes of the Bend Chengurek chain, an off-shoot
of the Paropamisus. With the completion of the Murghab railway,
Kushkinski Post immediately attained special importance and, in 1900,
it was declared a fortress of the fourth rank. The hoisting of the
Imperial standard over the walls was carried out in the presence of
the late Minister of War, General Kuropatkin. In the early days,
before the lines of the fortress had been planned, Kushkinski Post
comprised a number of detached works within which the various arms
were quartered. At that time, too, the officers’ accommodation,
consisting of one-storey buildings roughly constructed out of mud,
was in the railway settlement where, pending the completion of the
main works, long narrow sheds for the use of the troops had been
erected. Now improvement has followed upon preliminary chaos and the
men are comfortably housed in cool barracks upon the upper slopes of
the adjacent heights. The officers are disposed with equal care and
convenience elsewhere. Public buildings likewise have improved upon
their original sites. The military hospital, the post and telegraph
bureau and the Custom House have taken up locations upon high ground,
their positions crowned, if not protected by forts upon the crest of
these very useful eminences. Kushkinski Post, therefore, may be said to
be a thriving settlement where, if the hours are wearisome and the days
charged with _ennui_, there is always the prospect of a “dust up.”
Attempts have been made from time to time, by officers stationed at
Kushkinski Post, to become familiar with the officers in command of
the Afghan posts across the frontier. More often these attempts at
friendliness have been rebuffed, the Afghan soldiery neither accepting
advances from the Russians nor making any overtures themselves.
Strained relations exist, as a rule, between military posts on either
side of any frontier, although, in regard to the Russo-Afghan frontier,
there was an occasion when friendly conditions prevailed between the
Russians and the Afghans.[10] At that time the staff of the frontier
regiment on guard along the Afghan side of the border had accepted
an invitation to the mess at the Russian post. They arrived in due
course--appearing in all the full-dress grandeur of second-hand railway
uniforms! The officer commanding the detachment exhibited on the collar
of his tunic the mystic words “Ticket Collector”; his subordinate, a
subaltern, was content with the less exalted label of “Guard.” Out
of courtesy to their guests the Russians suppressed their merriment,
receiving nevertheless the impression that a portion of the subsidy,
granted by the Government of India to the Amir of Afghanistan, was
taken out in the castoff uniforms of British public companies. The
facts were that the Amir, through his Agent in India, had acquired
a large parcel of discarded clothing at one of the annual sales of
condemned stores in Northern India.
This exchange of courtesies on the frontier illustrates only the
pleasant side of service in this region. More serious incidents
occur. Occasionally in the heat of the chase, when parties of Russian
officers have crossed the frontier in pursuit of their quarry they
have been fired upon by the Afghan patrols or ridden down by Afghan
sowars. Sporting trips around Kushkinski Post or in the valleys of the
Murghab are infrequent among the Russians, although wild boar abound in
the thick patches of reeds which hem in the banks of the rivers; the
tufts of grass, the hardy scrub and the patches of bush also afford
excellent cover for partridges and pheasants. The scarcity of good
water at any distance from the railway is the great drawback to such
excursions, since the transport of water is both costly and cumbersome.
In cantonments goat-skins of the precious fluid are brought for sale by
water-sellers who come round, earning a precarious livelihood by their
industry.
This custom, which prevails throughout the East, was once turned to
account by an Afghan who was afterwards discovered to be an Hazara
sapper from the Kabul garrison. Disguised as a water-seller he spent
three weeks at Kushkinski Post, conducting an exhaustive inspection
of the works and coming every night and morning to the fort with his
supplies of water. Chance, which in Asia plays no less a part in the
affairs of man than in Europe, threw across his path a native who had
visited Kabul some weeks before with letters from the Governor-General
of Turkestan. The Afghan had been deputed by the Amir to attend to the
Turkestani. He had met and escorted him to the capital and back again
to the western boundary. As the Russian had entered Afghanistan from
the Kushkinski Post, along the Hari Rud valley, he was conducted from
the capital to the frontier by the route he had first followed. At the
frontier he had dismissed his Afghan attendant, who promptly proceeded
to disguise himself as a water-carrier and to obtain admission to
the station. Here he busied himself daily until, meeting of a sudden
his late charge, recognition upon the part of the Russian subject
was immediate and the spy was arrested in the act of escaping from
the precincts of the fort. Suspicion as to the man’s identity became
assured when a packet of notes was found, wrapped in a rubber sheath,
at the bottom of the goat-skin water-bag.
Until the advent of the railway the colony at Kushkinski Post apart
from the garrison, comprised a few Armenian and Persian traders. With
the prolongation of the line from Merv the civilian population began
to increase rapidly. There is, of course, no hotel in the station;
although the officers of the garrison have established a small military
club wherein they mess together and where, when the bi-weekly trains
bring the supply of ice, there is usually an animated gathering of
desolated humanity. At the present time there are in Kushkinski Post
123 buildings, of which some thirty odd belong to private persons.
Apart from the garrison the civil population numbers fifty people.
[Illustration: NATIVE WATER-SELLERS]
Kushkinski Post station consists of a handsome, spacious structure in
the white stone which is brought from quarries in the basin of the
Kushk. The railway buildings include a depôt with workshops, eight
bungalows for the heads of the staff and special quarters for the
employés. There are also large barracks for the 6th Company of the 1st
Trans-Caspian Railway Battalion, who are not included in the field
state of the post. All buildings are lighted by electricity and the
workshops are furnished with electric motors, while the water is drawn
from springs on Gumesli mountain.
Kushk region is malarial in consequence of the marshy nature of the
surrounding country. For some years past measures have been undertaken
with a view to draining the swamps and regulating the running of the
streams. By these means it has been hoped to render more healthy the
general environment of the station, including the fortress works,
Kushkinski village and the district lying between the Afghan frontier
post of Kara Teppe and the Russian Alexeieffski and Poltavski villages.
The specific disease which makes duty in the Murghab and Kushk
valleys peculiarly obnoxious is a low fever of an endemic nature. Its
pathological history is still undetermined and, although investigations
have been made into its character and numerous experiments essayed,
the malady is usually fatal. In general, the patient is stricken
suddenly when the liver would appear immediately to be affected, the
skin becoming yellow and the sufferer lapsing into unconsciousness
within a few hours of the attack. Systematic study of the disease has
enabled the medical authorities to trace it indirectly to the soil from
which, just as in Africa and any of the countries lying within the
fever belt, germs are released whenever it is disturbed. In this way
the most infectious points in the Kushk and Murghab valleys are those
lying within the cultivated areas, more especially around those places
where digging operations are of frequent occurrence. As the order of
life becomes more settled and the necessity for any interference with
the soil disappears, it is anticipated that the extreme virulence of
the disease may diminish. At one time the soldiers of the Railway
Battalions were so susceptible to its ravages that its course assumed
the appearance of an epidemic.
No commercial importance belongs to Kushkinski Post and it is solely
the strategic considerations which attach to it that give it so much
value. In the hands of Russia and commanding the trade routes into
Afghanistan, as well as the road to Herat, Kushkinski Post well might
play a leading part in the settlement of questions still outstanding
between Russia and Great Britain in respect of Afghanistan. Whether the
existence of the post will promote the development of trade relations,
which are now restricted by the Amir’s Government and directed by the
Afghan frontier authorities through Khorassan, remains to be seen.
Nothing can underestimate its significance. The post, together with the
whole of this branch line, is a deliberate military measure against
Afghanistan, the boundaries of which kingdom can almost be seen from
the ramparts of the forts which crown the crest of the hills.
[Illustration: KHORASSAN DERVISH]
Eighteen versts to the south of the fortress, at Chahil Dukteran, there
is the post of the Russian Frontier Guard and the present terminus of
the Murghab Valley railway. Beyond may be noted the solitary figures of
the Russian sentinels keeping their beat along the extensive line of
their position; while southward and serving at the moment for a caravan
route lies the road to Herat. As an interesting link in the chain of
evidence which points to the future use of this road in another way,
there is the existence of a large store of light railway plant prepared
for the purposes of extending it into Afghanistan itself, whenever
the troops of Russia may require to be carried forward to the walls
of Herat through the passes of the Paropamisus, a little less than 80
miles.
To Englishmen another, perhaps less direct and more ficticious,
interest attaches to this railway. A glance at the map of the
Eastern hemisphere will show that the shortest practicable line of
communication between London and India lies through Russia and across
Central Asia. The direction would be _viâ_ Calais, Berlin, Warsaw,
Rostov-on-Don, Petrovski, Baku, Krasnovodsk, Merv, Kushkinski, Girishk
and Kandahar. The whole of this distance has now been covered by
railway, with the exception of the span of 195 miles across the Caspian
Sea, between Baku and Krasnovodsk and the gap of 500 miles which still
separates Kushkinski Post from New Chaman. If these sections were
bridged the journey from London to India might be very considerably
shortened, assuming that the present rate of speed--32 miles an hour
on the European and 25 on the Asiatic lines--were maintained. The net
saving in time, if the railway were completed, would be seven days;
while the horrors of the Red Sea and the monsoon would be but bad
dreams to the Anglo-Indian traveller. The country between Kushkinski
Post and New Chaman presents no obstacle to the engineer; the
Paropamisus range could be crossed by the Ardewan or the Chashma Sabz
pass, neither of which is more than 3400 feet above sea-level or 1000
feet higher than that of the tableland on either side. From this point
Herat, the garden city of Afghanistan and the key of India, is distant
only 30 miles; thence the line would be carried by way of Sabzawar,
Farah, Girishk and Kandahar to New Chaman.
However if further railway construction in this region is to take
place, it will be in connection with the development of plans which
concern the requirements of potential strategy rather than the humours
of experimental fantasies. For some time past there have been abundant
signs that Russia is proposing to find compensation in the Middle East
for the downfall of her prestige in Further Asia. Certainly there is
a field for her energies lying fallow in Central Asia. The precise
quarter where the furrows are waiting to be ploughed is between
the Central Asian railway and the frontiers of Northern Persia and
Northern Afghanistan. It is to-day evident that sooner or later Russia
will improve her communications in this direction by adding to the
Orenburg-Tashkent system its natural complement--an extension to Termes
on the Oxus, where there is a Russian fortress--or by imparting to her
position on the Perso-Afghan border that little requisite attention
which it merits--a railway to Meshed in Khorassan. Long since is it
that these schemes entered the domain of practical politics, the
Russian military position on the Middle Oxus requiring an alternative
line of communications to that offered by the Amu Daria, which, when
frozen in winter with the post-roads across the mountains blocked by
snow, wraps in dangerous isolation the Russian garrisons at Termes,
Kelif and elsewhere along this section of the frontier. Preliminary
surveys for a railway were conducted in 1902, when the routes selected
followed from Samarkand the Shar-i-Sabz, Huzar, Shirabad caravan
highway to Termes; and, from Farab to Termes, the trade route along the
Oxus through Burdalik and Kelif. Further extensions in this direction
would provide railway communication between Huzar and Karki by a bridge
across the river, by which Huzar would become as important a railway
junction as it is a caravan and trading centre. Still more in the
future is the strong probability that Karki will be joined with the
Afghan frontier at Imam Nasar, by following the caravan route from the
river, or with Pendjeh across the fringe of the Kara Kum.
[Illustration: THE MURGHAB VALLEY RAILWAY]
Equally determined has been the intention to open up railway
communication with the north, north-eastern frontier of Persia, the
original surveys taking place simultaneously with the parties working
towards the Oxus. For purposes of the Persian railway two routes were
also inspected in this quarter, the Askhabad-Meshed line receiving the
earliest attention and warmest support. This scheme, after passing
through the defiles between Firuza, the summer resort of Askhabad
society, and Badjira, entered Persian territory at Kettechinar; running
up the Deregez valley and leaving the Atrek waters near their source at
Kuchan, it then broke into the Keshef Rud valley, striking the caravan
road to Meshed between Durbadam and Imam Kuli. Great initial outlay was
made in connection with this railway. Its course had been pegged out
under the supervision of M. Stroieff, dragoman of the Russian Consulate
at Meshed, with the help of the Ikram-ul-Mul late Karguzar of Kuchan,
to whom 12,000 roubles were presented. Further, it was arranged to open
a branch of the Imperial Russian Bank at Meshed to assist the financing
of the work, the staff comprising an official from St. Petersburg as
manager-in-chief, an assistant manager from Teheran, with Ali Askar
Khan, the interpreter of the State Bank at Askhabad. The outbreak of
hostilities in Manchuria imposed a temporary check upon the labours
of the construction parties, the reflection thus obtained giving rise
to the advantage of dropping a branch line from Tejend station on
the Central Asian railway _viâ_ Sarakhs, Daulatabad, Pul-i-Khatun to
between Zulfikar and Kala Kafir, wherever some future extension of
the Askhabad-Meshed line, following the Keshef Rud to its meeting with
the Hari Rud on the actual Perso-Afghan frontier, may terminate. The
Tejend Rud is the name given to the lower waters of the Hari Rud which,
flowing by Herat, receives midway in its course the Keshef Rud and
thence runs close to Sarakhs, presenting to any line running along the
Had Rud valley an alternative approach to the Afghan city.
That Herat and Meshed are the objectives of Russian railway policy is
obvious from a pamphlet issued in 1902 by the Topographical Bureau in
St. Petersburg and entitled _Railways Across Persia_. In its pages a
railway was projected from Kara Kliss, a station midway between Tiflis
and Erivan, _viâ_ Tabriz, Teheran, Shahrud to Meshed. The mileage,
cost, the number of sidings and names of stations were all laid down.
The principal stations in the first section--Kara Kliss to Tabriz--were
Erivan and Julfa. At this moment the span from Kara Kliss to Julfa
a distance of 135 miles is completed, the first hundred miles--Kara
Kliss to Erivan--being open to traffic and the remaining thirty-five
miles--Erivan to Julfa--in working order. From Julfa a carriageway,
constructed under Russian auspices and in all essentials a Russian
military road, runs to Tabriz, so that Russian schemes for broad gauge
railways to Herat and Meshed are at least removed from their incipient
obscurity.
[Illustration: NATIVE SCHOOL]
[10] “All the Russias.” H. V. Norman.