Jeg the aw wxmmm-i them, bu 1-1 ndierer i : mo he the How will that if we cared to accompany him he would Aake us to a German's, where we should find plenty of ahooper specimens. The German's shop was situated in the some abest, on the opposite side of the way, and proved to be a large hardware establishment, with an assortment of antiquities in one corner-vases, bottles, image, color, &, obtained from the tumuli outside March. The tetor spoke a little English. n, and, while bargaining, our guide re bound to by the steamer, and on nte destination might il Arvat, said that he bact, the greater part of to Askabad and Merv, er places. I pricked up my A DISCOVERY, NOT CLASSIC BUT MODERN. 67 ears at this. When had he been to Cabul? Last year, was his answer; he had been interpreter to a Russian mission to the Ameer Abdurrahman Khan. This was the first I had heard of any Russian expedition to Afghanistan in 1882. Nothing was known about it in England. It was clear that if this man was telling the truth, there was some basis for the reports that had been continually coming from Afghanistan respecting the presence of secret Russian agents at Herat and Cabul. Leaving Mr. Cail, who spoke German, to settle the bargain with the German shopkeeper, I commenced to closely interrogate the man. As we pursued an eager interrogation I do not know who seemed more astonished -myself, that this working jeweller at Kertch should have turned out to be a secret Russian agent recently returned from Cabul, or himself, that a person who had never been beyond the Caspian should know so much about what the Russians had been doing there for the last five years. Probably, for months past he had come in contact with no one who cared a rap what he had seen and done in Central Asia, and now that he had met with some one who knew all about Skobeleff's siege at Geok Tepé, in which he had participated, and who could fight over again the conflict with him, he was delighted at his experience being appreciated, and was only too ready to talk of old times. In the course of a few moments the following particulars transpired. During Skobeleff's expedition against the Turcomans, 1880-81, he accompanied the army to Geok Tepé as a sutler. He was perfectly familiar with the incidents of So, and described all the leading events and the tors in them with a minuteness that could ted from personal participation in the day after the storm of Geok Tepé he llage of the Tekké fortress, and secured a large number of valuable carpets, which, however, were taken from him by the military authorities. After the pacification of the country he resided at Askabad until the early part of 1882, and the probability of this was borne out by his account of Lessar's surveys and Alikhanoff's journey to Merv in disguise. He told me many things about Alikhanoff, which I knew to be correct; that he had once been a major, but had been reduced to the ranks for fighting a duel; that the Merv Tekkés had been so hostile to his caravan that the Russians had abandoned their goods at Merv in a panic; that his companions had been Lieutenant Sokoloff and the trader Gospodin Kosikh, together with other details that could have only been obtained at Askabad, and which he recounted without the slightest prompting or pressing. On the 27th of January (Russian style), 1882, he set out from Askabad for Cabul. The party consisted of three persons, all disguised-Captain Venkhovsky, of the Engineers, who had been attached to General Gloukhovsky's survey of the old bed of the Amu Daria (Oxus), and spoke Turki and Pushtoo (he had once before visited Afghanistan); Prince Khilkoff, manager of the Transcaspian Railway; and finally himself, Samuel, a Jew. Venkhovsky was the envoy; he, Samuel, acted as interpreter, and was disguised as a travelling watchmaker and jeweller. Leaving Askabad, they proceeded to Merv, where they stopped fourteen days. Then they went to Khiva, afterwards to Bokhara, and then back over the Oxus and the mountains to Herat, which was reached in March. From Herat they proceeded direct to Cabul, where they stayed eight days in May. Returning by the same way, they reached Herat again June 10 (o.s.), and spent there also eight days. Questioned as to what he did at Cabul, he said he could not tell me ; as, on his return to Askabad, he had THE RUSSIANS AT CABUL. 69 been compelled to sign a paper that he would never divulge what he had interpreted during his travels. Finding my interrogations on this point made him suspicious, I said I quite understood how he was placed, and changed the conversation to Turcoman carpets, of which he said he had some specimens from Merv and Geok Tepé. After a time I resumed the talk about his travels, and got him to write in Russ in my pocket-book the name of the envoy, Venkhovsky, that there might be no doubt about it. The second Russian's name he had forgotten, but he bore the title of prince. After he had thought for a few seconds, I asked if it was Eristoff, the name of an enterprising Transcaspian petroleum pioneer. Eristoff was a "No," replied Samuel, "it was not he. Georgian. The person I mean was a Russian prince, who spoke many languages, including English." "Was it Khilkoff?" "That's the name," replied the Jew," Prince Khilkoff. Travelling about so much makes one forget and mix up names. Khilkoff was controller of the Transcaspian Railway. He was once in America, and worked as a locomotive driver. He is now in Bulgaria, Minister of Railways. He promised me a situation if he got the appointment, but he has forgotten me, I suppose." These personal details of Khilkoff were perfectly accurate. To them he added others which need not be repeated here. Nearly the whole of the conversation was carried on in Russ; but he repeatedly dropped into German, and this induced me to ask Mr. Cail, who spoke that language, to also question him on the subject. To him he readily repeated much that he had related to me. He said he spoke most of the Central Asian dialects, and also French and German, but no English. Altogether he had spent four years in the Transcaspian region. While with the Russian expedition in Afghan istan he received 100 roubles a month. His name, at my request, he wrote in my pocket-book. First he wrote "Samuel" in French characters, and then began "watchmaker" in German-“Uhr . . .”—but I checked him, and told him to write it in Russian. Thereupon he wrote "Samoilo. Watchmaker. Vorontsovsky Street. Own House. Kertch." Во собственоме The above is a fac-simile of what he wrote in my pocket-book. near. On my expressing a desire to see a photograph of himself in the costume he wore at Cabul, and also some Turcoman carpets, he said that if we would proceed to his shop, and wait while he closed it for the night, he would go home and bring them to us in a public garden We accordingly repaired to his shop, where Messrs. Coxon and Cail bought some Persian krans mounted as studs, and I obtained a coin picked up in Geok Tepé. When he had packed up the few articles of jewellery displayed in the window to take home, we proceeded to a garden near the Fruit Market. He excused himself that he could not take us to his house, on the score that his wife and children were probably asleep. In a quarter of an hour's time he joined us again with |