of the said lands to the North and South of the Oxus. By this Note the matter of the Afghan position on the Pamirs was referred to the Anglo-Russian Pamirs Commission of 1895-96. That tribunal settled the question by dispossessing the Amir in favour of the Tsar. In the interval which elapsed between November 1893 and the assembly of the Commission, a fresh skirmish took place at Yaims in 1894, when an Afghan post was wiped out by Cossacks. The disposal of the difficulties between Russia and Afghanistan was preliminary to the real work of the Durand Mission. This task, the adjustment of the many grievances set in train by the forward movement, was based upon many important and substantial concessions, the existence of which caused high hopes of the ultimate success of the Mission to be entertained. The assurance of assistance in case of unprovoked aggression given in 1880, and repeated in 1885, was confirmed, the subsidy of twelve lakhs increased to eighteen lakhs, and the right to import munitions of war admitted. Further, this additional engagement, entered as Clause II. of the Durand Agreement, November 12, 1893, was contracted: The Government of India will at no time exercise interference in the territories lying ... on the side of Afghanistan, and His Highness the Amir will at no time exercise interference in the territories lying ... on the side of India. Two days after the conclusion of its labours, November 14, the Mission left Kabul, sharing upon its arrival in India in that prodigal distribution of honours which occasionally reveals but a faint relation between cause and effect. Included in these favours was Mr. Pyne, whose services undoubtedly had constituted him a beneficent factor in the course of the negotiations. This gentleman was knighted, a similar distinction falling to the chief of the Mission. Time, however, has disclosed the Durand Agreement itself to be merely pretentious and possessed of very indifferent qualities.