The progress of geodetic surveys in Russia had long ago extended
across the European half of the great empire, St Petersburg being
connected with Tiflis on the southern slopes of the Caucasus by a
direct system of triangulation carried out with the highest scientific
precision. St Petersburg, again, is connected with Greenwich by
European systems of triangulation; and the Greenwich meridian is
adopted by Russia as the zero for all her longitude values. But beyond
the eastern shores of the Caspian no system of direct geodetic
measurements by first-class triangulation has been possible, and the
surveys of Asiatic Russia are separated from those of Europe by the
width of that inland sea. The arid nature of the trans-Caspian deserts
has proved an insuperable obstacle to those rigorous methods of
geodetic survey which distinguish Russian methods in Europe, so that
Russian geography in central Asia is dependent on other means than
that of direct measurement for the co-ordinate values in latitude and
longitude for any given point. The astronomical observatory at
Tashkent is adopted for the initial starting-point of the
trans-Caspian triangulation of Russia; the triangulation ranks as
second-class only, and now extends to the Pamir frontier beyond Osh.
The longitude of the Tashkent observatory has been determined by
telegraph differentially with Pulkova as follows:--
H. M. S.
In 1875 via Ekaterinburg and Omsk 2 35 52.151
" 1891 " Saratov " Orenburg 2 35 52.228
" 1895 " Kiev " Baku 2 35 51.997
With these three independent values, all falling within a range of
0^S.25, it is improbable that the mean value has an error as large as
0^S.10.
Extent of exact surveys in Asia.
Exact surveys in Russia, based upon triangulation, extend as far east
as Chinese Turkestan in longitude about 75 deg. E. of Greenwich. In
India geodetic triangulation furnishes the basis for exact surveys as
far east as the eastern boundaries of Burma in longitude about 100
deg. E.
The close of the 19th century witnessed the forging of the final links
in the great geodetic triangulation of India, so far as the peninsula
is concerned. Further geodetic connexion with the European systems
remains to be accomplished. Since 1890 further and more rigorous
application of the telegraphic method of determining longitudes
differentially with Greenwich has resulted in a slight correction
(amounting to about 2" of arc) to the previous determination by the
same method through Suez. This last determination was effected through
four arcs as follows:--
I. Greenwich--Potsdam.
II. Potsdam--Teheran.
III. Teheran--Bushire.
IV. Bushire--Karachi.
Each arc was measured with every precaution and a multitude of
observations. The only element of uncertainty was caused by the
retardation of the current, which between Potsdam and Teheran (3000
m.) took 0^S.20 to travel; but it is probable that the final value can
be accepted as correct to within 0^S.05.
The final result of this latest determination is to place the Madras
observatory 2' 27" to the west of the position adopted for it on the
strength of absolute astronomical determinations.
Connexion between Russian and Indian surveys.
But while we have yet to wait for that expansion of principal
triangulation which will bring Asia into connexion with Europe by the
direct process of earth measurement, a topographical connexion has
been effected between Russian and Indian surveys which sufficiently
proves that the deductive methods employed by both countries for the
determination of the co-ordinate values of fixed points so far agree
that, for all practical purposes of future Asiatic cartography, no
difficulty in adjustment between Indian and Russian mapping need be
apprehended.
Extension of geographical surveys.
In connexion with the Indian triangulation minor extensions carried
out on systems involving more or less irregularity have been pushed
outwards on all sides. They reach through Afghanistan and Baluchistan
to the eastern districts of Persia, and along the coast of Makran to
that of Arabia. They have long ago included the farther mountain peaks
of Nepal, and they now branch outwards towards western China and into
Siam. These far extensions furnish the basis for a vast amount of
exploratory survey of a strictly geographical character, and they have
contributed largely towards raising the standard of accuracy in
Asiatic geographical surveys to a level which was deemed unattainable
fifty years ago. There is yet a vast field open in Asia for this class
of surveys. While at the close of the 19th century western Asia
(exclusive of Arabia) may be said to have been freed from all
geographical perplexity, China, Mongolia and eastern Siberia still
include enormous areas of which geographical knowledge is in a
primitive stage of nebulous uncertainty.
Indian explorers.
Of scientific geographical exploration in Asia (beyond the limits of
actual surveys) the modern period has been so prolific that it is only
possible to refer in barest outline to some of the principal
expeditions, most of which have been directed either to the great
elevated table-land of Tibet or to the central depression which exists
to the north of it. In southern Tibet the trans-Himalayan explorations
of the native surveyors attached to the Indian survey, notably Pundits
Nain Singh and Krishna, added largely to our knowledge of the great
plateau. Nain Singh explored the sources of the Indus and of the Upper
Brahmaputra in the years 1865-1867; and in 1874-1875 he followed a
line from the eastern frontiers of Kashmir to the Tengri Nor lake and
thence to Lhasa, in which city he remained for some months. Krishna's
remarkable journey in 1879-1882 extended from Lhasa northwards through
Tsaidam to Sachu, or Saitu, in Mongolia. He subsequently passed
through eastern Tibet to the town of Darchendo, or Tachienlu, on the
high road between Lhasa and Peking, and on the borders of China.
Failing to reach India through Upper Assam he returned to the
neighbourhood of Lhasa, and crossed the Himalayas by a more westerly
route. Both these explorers visited Lhasa.
Russian explorers.
In 1871-1873 the great Russian explorer, Nicolai Prjevalsky, crossed
the Gobi desert from the north to Kansu in western China. He first
defined the geography of Tsaidam, and mapped the hydrography of that
remarkable region, from which emanate the great rivers of China, Siam
and Burma. He penetrated southwards to within a month's march of
Lhasa. In 1876 he visited the Lop Nor and discovered the Altyn Tagh
range. In 1879 he followed up the Urangi river to the Altai Mountains,
and demonstrated to the world the extraordinary physical changes which
have passed over the heart of the Asiatic continent since Jenghiz Khan
massed his vast armies in those provinces. He crossed, and named, the
Dzungarian extension of the Gobi desert, and then traversed the Gobi
itself from Hami to Sachu, which became a point of junction between
his journeys and those of Krishna. He visited the sources of the
Hwang-ho (Yellow river) and the Salween, and then returned to Russia.
His fourth journey in 1883-1885 was to Sining (the great trade centre
of the Chinese borderland), and thence through northern Tibet
(crossing the Altyn Tagh to Lop Nor), and by the Cherchen-Keriya trade
route to Khotan. From Khotan he followed the Tarim to Aksu.
Following Prjevalsky the Russian explorers, Pevtsov and Roborovski, in
1889-1890 (and again in 1894), added greatly to our knowledge of the
topography of western Chinese Turkestan and the northern borders of
Tibet; all these Russian expeditions being conducted on scientific
principles and yielding results of the highest value. Among other
distinguished Russian explorers in Asia, the names of Lessar,
Annentkov (who bridged the Trans-Caspian deserts by a railway), P.K.
Kozlov and Potanin are conspicuous during the 19th century.
Other explorations in central Asia.
Although the establishment of a lucrative trade between India and
central Asia had been the dream of many successive Indian viceroys,
and much had been done towards improving the approaches to Simla from
the north, very little was really known of the highlands of the
Pamirs, or of the regions of the great central depression, before the
mission of Sir Douglas Forsyth to Yarkand in 1870. Robert Barkley Shaw
and George Hayward were the European pioneers of geography into the
central dominion of Kashgar, arriving at Yarkand within a few weeks of
each other in 1868. Shaw subsequently accompanied Forsyth's mission in
1870, when Henry Trotter made the first maps of Chinese Turkestan. The
next great accession to our knowledge of central Asiatic geography was
gained with the Russo-Afghan Boundary Commission of 1884-1886, when
Afghan Turkestan and the Oxus regions were mapped by Colonel Sir T.H.
Holdich, Colonel St George Gore and Sir Adelbert Talbot; and when Ney
Elias crossed from China through the Pamirs and Badakshan to the camp
of the commission, identifying the great "Dragon Lake," Rangkul, on
his way. About the same time a mission, under Captain (afterwards Sir
Willaim) Lockhart, crossed the Hindu Kush into Wakhan, and returned to
India by the Bashgol valley of Kafiristan. This was Colonel
Woodthorpe's opportunity, and he was then enabled to verify the
results of W.W. M'Nair's previous explorations, and to determine the
conformation of the Hindu Kush. In 1885 Arthur Douglas Carey and
Andrew Dalgleish, following more or less the tracks of Prjevalsky,
contributed much that was new to the map of Asia; and in 1886 Captain
(afterwards Sir Francis) Younghusband completed a most adventurous
journey across the heart of the continent by crossing the Muztagh, the
great mountain barrier between China and Kashmir.
Tibetan explorations.
It was in 1886-1887 that Pierre G. Bonvalot, accompanied by Prince
Henri d'Orleans, crossed the Tibetan plateau from north to south but
failed to enter Lhasa. In 1889-1891 the American traveller, W.W.
Rockhill, commenced his Tibetan journeys, and also attempted to reach
Lhasa, without success. By his writings, as much as by his
explorations, Rockhill has made his name great in the annals of
Asiatic research. In 1891 Hamilton Bower made his famous journey from
Leh to Peking. He, too, failed to penetrate the jealously-guarded
portals of Lhasa; but he secured (with the assistance of a native
surveyor) a splendid addition to our previous Tibetan mapping. In
1891-1892-1893 the gallant French explorer, Dutreuil de Rhins, was in
the field of Tibet, where he finally sacrificed his life to his work;
and the same years saw George N. (afterwards Lord) Curzon in the
Pamirs, and St George Littledale on his first great Tibetan journey,
accompanied by his wife. Littledale's first journey ended at Peking;
his second, in 1894-1895, took him almost within sight of the sacred
walls of Lhasa, but he failed to pass inside. Greatest among modern
Asiatic explorers (if we except Prjevalsky) is the brave Swede,
Professor Sven Hedin, whose travels through the deserts of Takla Makan
and Tibet, and whose investigations in the glacial regions of the
Sarikol mountains, occupied him from 1894 to 1896. His is a truly
monumental record. From 1896 to 1898 we find two British cavalry
officers taking the front position in the list of Tibetan
travellers-Captain M.S. Wellby of the 18th Hussars and Captain H.
Deasy of the 16th Lancers, each striking out a new line, and rendering
most valuable service to geography. The latter continued the Pamir
triangulation, which had been carried across the Hindu Kush by
Colonels Sir T.H. Holdich and R.A. Wahab during the Pamir Boundary
Commission of 1895, into the plains of Kashgar and to the sources of
the Zarafshan.
Since the beginning of the century the work of Deasy in western Tibet
has been well extended by Dr M.A. Stein and Captain C. G. Rawling, who
have increased our knowledge of ancient fields of industry and
commerce in Turkestan and Tibet. Ellsworth Huntington threw new light
on the Tian-shan plateau and the Alai range by his explorations of
1903; and Sven Hedin, between 1899 and 1902, was collecting material
in Turkestan and Tibetan fields, and resumed his journeys in
1905-1908, the result being to revolutionize our knowledge of the
region north of the upper Tsanpo (see TIBET). The mission of Sir
Francis Younghusband to Lhasa in 1904 resulted in an extension of the
Indian system of triangulation which finally determined the
geographical position of that city, and in a most valuable
reconnaissance of the valleys of the Upper Brahmaputra and Indus by
Captains C.H.D. Ryder and C.G. Rawling.
Chinese explorations.
Meanwhile, in the Farther East so rapid has been the progress of
geographical research since the first beginnings of investigation into
the route connexion between Burma and China in 1874 (when the brave
Augustus Margary lost his life), that a gradually increasing tide of
exploration, setting from east to west and back again, has culminated
in a flood of inquiring experts intent on economic and commercial
development in China, essaying to unlock those doors to trade which
are hereafter to be propped open for the benefit of humanity. Captain
William Gill, of the Indian survey, first made his way across China to
eastern Tibet and Burma, and subsequently delighted the world with his
story of the _River of Golden Sand_. Then followed another charming
writer, E.C. Baber, who, in 1877-1878, unravelled the geographic
mysteries of the western provinces of the Celestial empire. Mark Bell
crossed the continent in 1887 and illustrated its ancient trade
routes, following the steps of Archibald Colquhoun, who wandered from
Peking to Talifu in 1881. Meanwhile, the acquisition of Burma and the
demarcation of boundaries had opened the way to the extension of
geographical surveys in directions hitherto untraversed. Woodthorpe
was followed into Burmese fields by many others; and amongst the
earliest travellers to those mysterious mountains which hide the
sources of the Irrawaddy, the Salween and the Mekong, was Prince Henri
d'Orleans. Burma was rapidly brought under survey; Siam was already in
the map-making hands of James M'Carthy, whilst Curzon and Warrington
Smyth added much to our knowledge of its picturesque coast districts.
No more valuable contribution to the illustration of western Chinese
configuration has been given to the public than that of C.C. Manifold
who explored and mapped the upper basin of the Yang-tsze river between
the years 1900 and 1904, whilst our knowledge of the geography of the
Russo-Chinese borderland on the north-east has been largely advanced
by the operations attending the Russo-Japanese war which terminated in
1905.
Indian frontiers--Afghanistan, Baluchistan, Persia.
Turning our attention westwards, no advance in the progress of
scientific geography is more remarkable than that recorded on the
northern and north-western frontiers of India. Here there is little
matter of exploration. It has rather been a wide extension of
scientific geographical mapping. Afghan war of 1878-80; the
Russo-Afghan Boundary Commission of 1884-1885; the occupation of
Gilgit and Chitral; the extension of boundaries east and north of
Afghanistan, and again, between Baluchistan and Persia--these, added
to the opportunities afforded by the systematic survey of Baluchistan
which has been steadily progressing since 1880--combined to produce a
series of geographical maps which extend from the Oxus to the Indus,
and from the Indus to the Euphrates.
In these professional labours the Indian surveyors have been assisted
by such scientific geographers as General Sir A. Houtum Schindler,
Captain H.B. Vaughan and Major Percy M. Sykes in Persia, and by Sir
George Robertson and Cockerill in Kafiristan and the Hindu Kush.
Arabia.
In still more western fields of research much additional light has
been thrown since 1875 on the physiography of the great deserts and
oases of Arabia. The labours of Charles Doughty and Wilfrid S. Blunt
in northern Arabia in 1877-1878 were followed by those of G.
Schweinfurth and E. Glaser in the south-west about ten years later. In
1884-1885 Colonel S.B. Miles made his adventurous journey through
Oman, while Theodore Bent threw searchlights backwards into ancient
Semitic history by his investigations in the Bahrein Islands in 1888
and in Hadramut in 1894-1895.
Northern Asia, Siberia, &c.
In northern Asia it is impossible to follow in detail the results of
the organized Russian surveys. The vast steppes and forest-clad
mountain regions of Siberia have assumed a new geographical aspect in
the light of these revelations, and already promise a new world of
economic resources to Russian enterprise in the near future. A
remarkable expedition by Baron Toll in 1892 through the regions
watered by the Lena, resulted in the collection of material which
will greatly help to elucidate some of the problems which beset the
geological history of the world, proving _inter alia_ the primeval
existence of a boreal zone of the Jurassic sea round the North Pole.
General results of investigation.
In no other period of the world's history, of equal length of time,
has so much scientific enterprise been directed towards the field of
Asiatic inquiry. The first great result of recent geographical
research has been to modify pre-existing ideas of the orography of the
vast central region represented by Tibet and Mongolia. The great
highland plateau which stretches from the Himalaya northwards to
Chinese Turkestan, and from the frontier of Kashmir eastwards to
China, has now been defined with comparative geographical exactness.
The position of Sachu (or Saitu) in Mongolia may be taken as an
obligatory point in modern map construction. The longitude value now
adopted is 94 deg. 54' E. of Greenwich, which is the revised value
given by Prjevalsky in the map accompanying the account of his fourth
exploration into central Asia. Other values are as follows:--
Prjevalsky, by his second and third explorations 94 deg. 26'
Krishna . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 deg. 23'
Carey and Dalgleish . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 deg. 48'
Littledale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 deg. 49'
Kreitner (with Szecheny's expedition) . . . . . 94 deg. 58'
The longitude of Darchendo, or Tachienlu, on the extreme east, may be
accepted as another obligatory point. The adopted value by the Royal
Geographical Society is 102 deg. 12". Krishna gives 102 deg. 15",
Kreitner 102 deg. 5", Baber 102 deg. 18".
South and west the bounding territories are well fixed in geographical
position by the Indian survey determinations of the value of Himalayan
peaks. On the north the Chinese Turkestan explorations are now brought
into survey connexion with Kashmir and India.
No longer do we regard the Kuen-lun mountains, which extend from the
frontiers of Kashmir, north of Leh, almost due east to the Chinese
province of Kansu, as the southern limit of the Gobi or Turkestan
depression. This very remarkable longitudinal chain is undoubtedly the
northern limit of the Chang Tang, the elevated highland steppes of
Tibet; but from it there branches a minor system to the north-east
from a point in about 83 deg. E. longitude, which culminates in the
Altyn Tagh, and extends eastwards in a continuous water-divide to the
Nan Shan mountains, north of the Koko Nor basin. Thus between Tibet
and the low-lying sands of Gobi we have, thrust in, a system of
elevated valleys (Tsaidam), 8000 to 9000 ft. above sea-level, forming
an intermediate steppe between the highest regions and the lowest,
east of Lop Nor. All this is comparatively new geography, and it goes
far to explain why the great trade routes from Peking to the west were
pushed so far to the north.
Russo-Chinese boundary.
On the western edge of the Kashgar plains, the political boundary
between Russia and China is defined by the meridional range of
Sarikol. This range (known to the ancients as Taurus and in medieval
times as Bolor) like many others of the most important great natural
mountain divisions of the world, consists of two parallel chains, of
which the western is the water-divide of the Pamirs, and the eastern
(which has been known as the Kashgar or Kandar range) is split at
intervals by lateral gorges to allow of the passage of the main
drainage from the eastern Pamir slopes.
Indian frontiers--Afghanistan, &c.
In western Asia we have learned the exact value of the mountain
barrier which lies between Merv and Herat, and have mapped its
connexion with the Elburz of Persia. We can now fully appreciate the
factor in practical politics which that definite but somewhat
irregular mountain system represents which connects the water-divide
north of Herat with the southern abutment of the Hindu Kush, near
Bamian. Every pass of importance is known and recorded; every route of
significance has been explored and mapped; Afghanistan has assumed a
new political entity by the demarcation of a boundary; the value of
Herat and of the Pamirs as bases of aggression has been assessed, and
the whole intervening space of mountain and plain thoroughly examined.
Persia.
Although within the limits of western Asiatic states, still under
Asiatic government and beyond the active influence of European
interests, the material progress of the Eastern world has appeared to
remain stationary, yet large accessions to geographical knowledge have
at least been made, and in some instances a deeper knowledge of the
surface of the country and modern conditions of life has led to the
straightening of many crooked paths in history, and a better
appreciation of the slow processes of advancing civilization. The
steady advance of scientific inquiry into every corner of Persia,
backed by the unceasing efforts of a new school of geographical
explorers, has left nothing unexamined that can be subjected to
superficial observation. The geographical map of the country is fairly
complete, and with it much detailed information is now accessible
regarding the coast and harbours of the Persian Gulf, the routes and
passes of the interior, and the possibilities of commercial
development by the construction of trade roads uniting the Caspian,
the Karun, the Persian Gulf, and India, via Seistan. Persia has
assumed a comprehensible position as a factor in future Eastern
politics.
Arabia.
In Arabia progress has been slower, although the surveys carried out
by Colonel Wahab in connexion with the boundary determined in the Aden
hinterland added more exact geographical knowledge within a limited
area. Little more is known of the wide spaces of interior desert than
has already been given to the world in the works of Sir Richard F.
Burton, Wm. Gifford Palgrave and Sir Lewis Pelly amongst Englishmen,
and Karsten Niebuhr, John Lewis Burckhardt, Visconte, Joseph Halevy
and others, amongst foreign travellers. Charles Doughty and Wilfrid S.
Blunt have visited and illustrated the district of Nejd, and described
the waning glories of the Wahabi empire. But extended geographical
knowledge does not point to any great practical issue. Commercial
relations with Arabia remain much as they were in 1875.
Asia Minor, &c.
In Asia Minor, Syria and Mesopotamia there is little to record of
progress in material development beyond the promises held out by the
Euphrates Valley railway concession to a German company. The exact
information obtained by the researches of English surveyors in
Palestine and beyond Jordan, or by the efforts of explorers in the
regions that lie between the Mediterranean and the Caspian, have so
far led rather to the elucidation of history than to fresh commercial
enterprise or the possible increase of material wealth.
Russia in Asia.
Asiatic Russia, especially eastern Siberia and Mongolia, have been
brought within the sphere of Russian exploration, with results so
surprising as to form an epoch in the history of Asia. Here there has
been a development of the resources of the Old World which parallels
the best records of the New.
Chinese Turkestan and Oxus basin.
The great central depression of the continent which reaches from the
foot of the Pamir plateau on the west through the Tarim desert to Lop
Nor and the Gobi has yielded up many interesting secrets. The
remarkable phenomenon of the periodic shifting of the Lop Nor system
has been revealed by the researches of Sven Hedin, and the former
existence of highly civilized centres of Buddhist art and industry in
the now sand-strewn wastes of the Turkestan desert has been clearly
demonstrated by the same great explorer and by Dr M.A. Stein. The
depression westward of the Caspian and Aral basins, and the original
connexion of these seas, have also come under the close investigation
of Russian scientists, with the result that the theory of an ancient
connexion between the Oxus and the Caspian has been displaced by the
more recent hypothesis of an extension of the Caspian Sea eastwards
into Trans-Caspian territory within the post-Pleiocene age. The
discovery of shells (now living in the Caspian) at a distance of about
100 m. inland, at an altitude of 140 to 280 ft. above the present
level of the Caspian, gives support to this hypothesis, which is
further advanced by the ascertained nature of the Kara-kum sands,
which appear to be a purely marine formation exhibiting no traces of
fluviatile deposits which might be considered as delta deposits of the
Oxus.
In the discussion of this problem we find the names of Baron A.
Kaulbars, Annentkov, P.M. Lessar, and A.M. Konshin prominent. Further
matter of interest in connexion with the Oxus basin was elucidated by
the researches of L. Griesbach in connexion with the Russo-Afghan
Boundary Commission. He reported the gradual formation of an
anticlinal or ridge extending longitudinally through the great Balkh
plain of Afghan Turkestan, which effectually shuts off the northern
affluents of that basin from actual junction with the river. This
evidence of a gradual process of upheaval still in action may throw
some light on the physical (especially the climatic) changes which
must have passed over that part of Asia since Balkh was the "mother of
cities," the great trade centre of Asia, and the plains of Balkh were
green with cultivation. In the restoration of the outlines of ancient
and medieval geography in Asia Sven Hedin's discoveries of the actual
remains of cities which have long been buried under the advancing
waves of sand in the Takla Makan desert, cities which flourished in
the comparatively recent period of Buddhist ascendancy in High Asia,
is of the very highest interest, filling up a blank in the
identification of sites mentioned by early geographers and
illustrating more fully the course of old pilgrim routes.
Baluchistan and Makran.
With the completion of the surveys of Baluchistan and Makran much
light has also been thrown on the ancient connexion between east and
west; and the final settlement of the southern boundaries of
Afghanistan has led to the reopening of one at least of the old trade
routes between Seistan and India.
Burma and China.
Farther east no part of Asia has been brought under more careful
investigation than the hydrography of the strange mountain wilderness
that divides Tibet and Burma from China. In this field the researches
of travellers already mentioned, combined with the more exact
reconnaissance of native surveyors and of those exploring parties
which have recently been working in the interests of commercial
projects, have left little to future inquiry. We know now for certain
that the great Tsanpo of Tibet and the Brahmaputra are one and the
same river; that north of the point where the great countermarch of
that river from east to west is effected are to be found the sources
of the Salween, the Mekong, the Yang-tsze-kiang and the Hwang-ho, or
Yellow river, in order, from west to east; and that south of it,
thrust in between the extreme eastern edge of the Brahmaputra basin
and the Salween, rise the dual sources of the Irrawaddy. From the
water-divide which separates the most eastern affluent of the
Brahmaputra, eastwards to the deep gorges which enclose the most
westerly branch of the upper Yang-tsze-kiang (here running from north
to south), is a short space of 100 m.; and within that space two
mighty rivers, the Salween and the Mekong, send down their torrents to
Burma and Siam. These three rivers flow parallel to each other for
some 300 m., deep hidden in narrow and precipitous troughs, amidst
some of the grandest scenery of Asia; spreading apart where the
Yank-tsze takes its course eastwards, not far north of the parallel of
25 deg.
The comparatively restricted area which still remains for close
investigation includes the most easterly sources of the Brahmaputra,
the most northerly sources of the Irrawaddy, and some 300 m. of the
course of the upper Salween.
_Modern Boundary Demarcation._--The period from about 1880 has been an
era of boundary-making in Asia, of defining the politico-geographical
limits of empire, and of determining the responsibilities of
government. Russia, Persia, Afghanistan, Baluchistan, India and China
have all revised their borders, and with the revision the political
relations between these countries have acquired a new and more assured
basis. See also the articles on the different countries. We are not
here concerned with understandings as to "spheres of influence," or
with arrangements such as the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907
concerning Persia.
Southern boundary of Russia in Asia.
The advance of Russia to the Turkoman deserts and the Oxus demanded a
definite boundary between her trans-Caspian conquests and the kingdom
of Afghanistan. This was determined on the north-west by the
Russo-Afghan Boundary Commission of 1884-1886. A boundary was then
fixed between the Hari Rud (the river of Herat) and the Oxus, which is
almost entirely artificial in its construction. Zulfikar, where the
boundary leaves the Hari Rud, is about 70 m. south of Sarakhs, and the
most southerly point of the boundary (where it crosses the Kushk) is
about 60 m. north of Herat. From the junction of the boundary with the
Oxus at Khamiab about 150 m. above the crossing-point of the Russian
Trans-Caspian railway at Charjui, the main channel of the Oxus river
becomes the northern boundary of Afghanistan, separating that country
from Russia, and so continues to its source in Victoria Lake of the
Great Pamir. Beyond this point the Anglo-Russian Commission of 1895
demarcated a line to the snowfields and glaciers which overlook the
Chinese border. Between the Russian Pamirs and Chinese Turkestan the
rugged line of the Sarikol range intervenes, the actual dividing line
being still indefinite. Beyond Kashgar the southern boundary of
Siberia follows an irregular course to the north-east, partly defined
by the Tian-shan and Alatau mountains, till it attains a northerly
point in about 53 deg. N. lat. marked by the Sayan range to the west
of Irkutsk. It then deflects south-east till it touches the Kerulen
affluent of the Amur river at a point which is shown in unofficial
maps as about 117 deg. 30' E. long, and 49 deg. 20' N. lat. From here
it follows this affluent to its junction with the Amur river, and the
Amur river to its junction with the Usuri. It follows the Usuri to its
head (its direction now being a little west of south), and finally
strikes the Pacific coast on about 42 deg. 30' N. lat. at the mouth of
the Tumen river 100 m. south of the Amur bay, at the head of which
lies the Russian port of Vladivostok. At two points the Russian
boundary nearly approaches that of provinces which are directly under
British suzerainty. Where the Oxus river takes its great bend to the
north from Ishkashim, the breadth of the Afghan territory intervening
between that river and the main water-divide of the Hindu Kush is not
more than 10 or 12 m.; and east of the Pamir extension of Afghanistan,
where the Beyik Pass crosses the Sarikol range and drops into the
Taghdumbash Pamir, there is but the narrow width of the Karachukar
valley between the Sarikol and the Muztagh. Here, however, the
boundary is again undefined. Eastwards of this the great Kashgar
depression, which includes the Tarim desert, separates Russia from the
vast sterile highlands of Tibet; and a continuous series of desert
spaces of low elevation, marking the limits of a primeval inland sea
from the Sarikol meridional watershed to the Khingan mountains on the
western borders of Manchuria, divide her from the northern provinces
of China. From the Khingan ranges to the Pacific, south of the Amur,
stretch the rich districts of Manchuria, a province which connects
Russia with the Korea by a series of valleys formed by the Sungari and
its affluents--a land of hill and plain, forest and swamp, possessing
a delightful climate, and vast undeveloped agricultural resources.
Throughout this land of promise Russian influence was destroyed by
Japan in the war of 1904. The possession of Port Arthur, and direct
political control over Korea, place Japan in the dominant position as
regards Manchuria.
Afghan political boundaries.
Coincident with the demarcation of Russian boundaries in Turkestan was
that of northern Afghanistan. From the Hari Rud on the west to the
Sarikol mountains on the east her northern limits were set by the
Boundary Commissions of 1884-1886 and of 1895 respectively. Her
southern and eastern boundaries were further defined by a series of
minor commissions, working on the basis of the Kabul agreement of
1893, which lasted for nearly four years, terminating with the Mohmand
settlement at the close of an expedition in 1897.
The Pamir extension of Afghan territory to the north-east reaches to a
point a little short of 75 deg. E., from whence it follows the
water-divide to the head of the Taghdumbash Pamir, and is
thenceforward defined by the water-parting of the Hindu Kush. It
leaves the Hindu Kush near the Dorah Pass at the head of one of the
minor Chitral affluents, and passing south-west divides Kafiristan
from Chitral and Bajour, separates the sections of the Mohmands who
are within the respective spheres of Afghan and British sovereignty,
and crosses the Peshawar-Kabul route at Lundi-Khana. It thus places a
broad width of independent territory between the boundaries of British
India (which have remained practically, though not absolutely,
untouched) and Afghanistan; and this independent belt includes Swat,
Bajour and a part of the Mohmand territory north of the Kabul river.
The same principle of maintaining an intervening width of neutral
territory between the two countries is definitely established
throughout the eastern borders of Afghanistan, along the full length
of which a definite boundary has been demarcated to the point where it
touches the northern limits of Baluchistan on the Gomal river. From
the Gomal Baluchistan itself becomes an intervening state between
British India and Afghanistan, and the dividing line between
Baluchistan and Afghanistan is laid down with all the precision
employed on the more northerly sections of the demarcation.
Baluchistan.
Baluchistan can no longer be regarded as a distinct entity amongst
Asiatic nations, such as Afghanistan undoubtedly is. Baluchistan
independence demands qualification. There is British Baluchistan _par
excellence_, and there is the rest of Baluchistan which exists in
various degrees of independence, but is everywhere subject to British
control. British Baluchistan officially includes the districts of
Peshin, Sibi and of Thal-Chotiali. As these districts had originally
been Afghan, they were transferred to British authority by the treaty
of Gandamak in 1879, although nominally they had been handed over to
Kalat forty years previously. Now they form an official province of
British Baluchistan within the Baluchistan Agency; and the agency
extends from the Gomal to the Arabian Sea and the Persian frontier.
Within this agency there are districts as independent as any in
Afghanistan, but the political status of the province as a whole is
almost precisely that of the native states of the Indian peninsula.
The agent to the governor-general of India, with a staff of political
assistants, practically exercises supreme control.
Kirman.
The increase of Russian influence on the northern Persian border and
its extension southwards towards Seistan led to the appointment of a
British consul at Kirman, the dominating town of southern Khorasan,
directly connected with Meshed on the north; and the acquisition of
rights of administration of the Nushki district secured to Great
Britain the trade between Seistan and Quetta by the new Helmund desert
route.
Boundary between French territory and India.
While British India has so far avoided actual geographical contact
with one great European power in Asia on the north and west, she has
touched another on the east. The Mekong river which limits British
interests in Burma limits also those of France in Tongking. The
eastern boundaries of Burma are not yet fully demarcated on the
Chinese frontier. At a point level in latitude with Mogaung, near the
northern termination of the Burmese railway system, this boundary is
defined by the eastern watershed of the Nmaikha, the eastern of the
two great northern affluents of the Irrawaddy. Then it follows an
irregular course southwards to a position south-east of Bhamo in lat.
24 deg. It next defines the northern edge of the Shan States, and
finally strikes the Mekong river in lat. 21 deg. 45' (approximately).
From that point southwards the river becomes the boundary between the
Shan States and Tongking for some 200 m., the channel of the river
defining the limits of occupation (though not entirely of interest)
between French and British subjects. Approximately on the parallel of
20 deg. N. lat. the Burmese boundary leaves the Mekong to run
westwards towards the Salween, and thereafter following the eastern
watershed of the Salween basin it divides the Lower Burma provinces
from Siam.
Area and political division.
The following table shows the areas of territories in Asia
(continental and insular) dependent on the various extra-Asiatic
powers, and of those which are independent or nominally so:--
Territory. Sq. m.
Russian . . . . . . . . . . . . 6,495,970
British . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,998,220
Dutch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 586,980
French . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247,580
U.S.A. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114,370
German . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Turkish . . . . . . . . . . . . . 681,980
Chinese . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,299,600
Japanese . . . . . . . . . . . . 161,110
Other independent territories . 2,232,270
The total area of Asia, continental and insular, is therefore somewhat
over 16,819,000 sq. m. (but various authorities differ considerably in
their detailed estimates). The population may be set down roughly as
823,000,000, of which 330,000,000 inhabit Chinese territory,
302,000,000 British, and 25,000,000 Russian. (T. H. H.*)
[Illustration: Geological map of Asia]