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]