AFGHANISTAN. 



11 



complained further that English officers had 

 directed the Afghan attack. In the answering 

 dispatch to Sir Edward Thornton at St. Peters- 

 burg, Earl Granville denied the latter state- 

 ment, and declined to admit that the Boundary 

 Commission had any relation to the subject. 

 On the 21st of April came Sir Peter Lumsden's 

 detailed statement. The Government on the 

 Neva declined to submit the Penjdeh. affair to 

 further inquiry. Earl Granville then proposed 

 to Baron de Staal, the Russian minister at 

 London, to submit the question to arbitration. 

 The Russian representative thought that his 

 Government would not admit the principle 

 of arbitration, and that, if it did, the only 

 acceptable arbitrator would be the Emperor 

 Wilhelm, who would probably refuse to serve. 

 The British minister expressed satisfaction 

 with the arbitration of the German Emperor, 

 and thought that he would act, if both gov- 

 ernments urged it, for the sake of averting a 

 great calamity. On the 26th came a dispatch 

 from Sir Peter Lumsden reporting, on the au- 

 thority of the Governor of Herat, a Russian 

 advance on Maruchak. This rumor, contra- 

 dicted three days later, produced intense alarm 

 in England. 



On April 27 Mr. Gladstone spoke in the 

 House of Commons in support of the vote of 

 credit for war preparations, announcing the 

 probable withdrawal of the troops from the 

 Soodan to meet the emergency, and declaring 

 that there was abundant cause for prepara- 

 tion: 



I am not called upon to define and I would find 

 great difficulty in doing so, since it does not stand 

 upon any choice of mine or of my colleagues the de- 

 gree of danger that may be before us. We have la- 

 bored and we continue to labor for an honorable set- 

 tlement by pacific means ; but one thing I will venture 

 to say with regard to that sad contingency of an out- 

 breaK of war, a rupture of relations between two great 

 powers like Russia and England one thing I will 

 say, with great strength of conviction and great ear- 

 nestness in my endeavor to impress it upon the com- 

 mittee, that we will strive to conduct ourselves to the 

 end of this diplomatic controversy in such a way as 

 that if, unhappily, it is to end in violence or rupture, 

 we may at least be able to challenge the verdict of 

 civilized mankind upon a review of the correspond- 

 ence, upon a review of the demands and refusals, to 

 say whether we have or whether we have not done 

 all that men could do, by every just and honorable 

 effort, to prevent the plunging of two such countries, 

 with all the millions that own their sway, into blood- 

 shed and strife. 



He spoke of the delimitation plan as frus- 

 trated to the extent that it had not been car- 

 ried into effect, and pointed out that the delay 

 u allowed for military advances upon debated 

 ground that were obviously and on the face of 

 them in a high degree dangerous to peace and 

 dangerous to the future settlement of the ques- 

 tion." This danger the ministry sought to neu- 

 tralize by the agreement of the 16th of March, 

 usually described under the date of the 17th, 

 when it was telegraphed to Sir Peter Lums- 

 den, which he characterized as a " very sol- 

 emn covenant, involving great issues " : 



There were thousands of men, on the one side 

 standing for their country and on the other side for 

 what they thought their patriotic duty ; placed in a 

 position of dangerous contiguity and in danger of 

 bloody collision. This engagement came between the 

 danger and the people exposed to it, and we believed 

 that it would be recognized as one of the most sacred 

 covenants ever made between two great nations, and 

 that there would be a rivalry between the two pow- 

 ers to sift the incident that followed to the end, and 

 how it had come about, and who and where were the 

 persons upon whom the responsibility rested. All 

 this, sir, remains in suspense. What happened ? The 

 bloody engagement of the 30th of March followed the 

 covenant. I shall overstate nothing I shall not pur- 

 posely overstate anything. All I say is this, that that 

 woful engagement of the 30th of March distinctly 

 showed that one party or both had either through ill- 

 will or through unfortunate mishap failed to fulfill 

 the conditions of the engagement. We considered, 

 and we consider it still, to be the duty of both coun- 

 tries and, above all, 1 will say for the honor of both 

 countries to examine how and by whose fault this 

 calamity came about. I will have no foregone con- 

 clusion ; I will not anticipate that we are in the right, 

 and although I have perfect confidence in the honor 

 and intelligence of our officers, I will not now assume 

 that thev may not have been misled. I will prepare 

 myself for the issue, and I will abide by it as far as I 

 can in a spirit of impartiality. What I say is that 

 those who have caused such an engagement to fail 

 ought to become known to their own Government 

 and to every contracting party. I will not say that 

 we are even now in possession of all the facts of the 

 case, but we are in possession of facts which create 

 in our minds impressions unfavorable to the conduct 

 of some of those who form the other party to these 

 negotiations. But I will not deviate from the strict- 

 est principle of justice in anticipating anything of the 

 ultimate issue of that fair inquiry which we desire to 

 prosecute and are endeavoring to prosecute. The 

 cause of that deplorable collision may be uncertain. 

 Whose was the provocation is a matter of the utmost 

 consequence. We know that the attack was a Rus- 

 sian attack j we know that the Afghans suffered in 

 life, in spirit, and in repute ; we know that a blow 

 was struck at the credit and authority of a sovereign, 

 our protected ally, who had committed no offense. 

 All I say, sir, is that we can not, in that state of 

 things, close this book and say, We will look into it 

 no more. 



The question of arbitration was submitted to 

 the Russian Emperor, and his reply was tele- 

 graphed April 28. He refused to admit any- 

 thing like an inquiry into the acts of Gen. 

 Komaroff, as he considered himself the sole 

 judge of their conformity with his orders ; the 

 only misunderstanding that could exist was 

 between the two governments. The Russian 

 Government considered that it had been quite 

 faithful to its promises ; but if any question of 

 dignity prevented the direct settlement of the 

 matter and the close of the incidental discus- 

 sion, so that they could resume the boundary 

 negotiations, then the Czar reserved to him- 

 self to consider the question of arbitration. On 

 the 30th of April, M. de Giers then proposed 

 to neutralize the Penjdeh district pending dis- 

 cussion, and resume the frontier negotiations. 

 Earl Granville stipulated that both Russian 

 and Afghan troops should retire from the dis- 

 trict, and on May 4 agreed to resume nego- 

 tiations and to submit the Penjdeh dispute to 

 arbitration if the two governments could not 

 harmonize their views. The case for arbi- 



