been maintained unbroken. In a semi-official article, which appeared in the _Edinburgh Review_ for January, 1867, Sir John Lawrence now strives to show how hard and vain it is to enter into diplomatic intercourse with neighbours so wild and turbulent as those who surround India on all sides. Still, I cannot understand why the Viceroy should not take example from Russia, who, with the same elements on her frontier, sends envoy after envoy, knows how to obtain for them respect and safety, and so keeps moving forward to her wished-for goal. Why does not England pursue, in this case, the same policy which she once began in China, Japan, and other Asiatic countries? It seems to me that people are less convinced of the difficulty of carrying out such a purpose, than of the extreme remoteness of the consequent gain. Or are these gentlemen really unaware of the permanent support thus rearable, not only for English interests in Afghanistan, but even for the special welfare of the Afghans themselves? Sir Henry Rawlinson's diplomatic bearing in Kandahar, which enabled him so long to maintain himself there with his suite in the most difficult position, at a period the most critical, is a splendid proof that even the rudest Asiatics are not unmanageable. And if the said officer could accomplish so much in the threatening attitude of a conqueror, what might not first have been attained through political tact and friendly persuasion? The tangible results of uninterrupted diplomatic intercourse would, if we mistake not, be:-- 1st. A greater impulse given to trade; for, as English goods have long enjoyed a good name in Central Asia, English products, imported direct from England, could certainly drive similar but less-prized Russian products out of the market. At present this is naturally not the case: at this moment, in the bazaars of Kabul, Kandahar, Herat, and other places, there is much more sold of many Russian articles,--such as ironware and working tools, coarse cotton and handkerchiefs,--than of English ones; solely because the former, owing to the lower price at which they were first saleable, are not raised by the additional payments to so high a figure as the English goods, whose value, originally dear, is raised twofold in the transit. Moreover, in Bokhara, here and there in Khiva and in Karshi, Russian traders may be found who, secure in the energy of their government, can of course advance their own interests better than foreign mercantile agents. In vain should we seek for a better apostle, a better pioneer for civilisation, than trade; in vain, for a better teacher to turn men to our own ways of thinking, than the silent bales of goods which are carried over from Europe; and England, apart from her commercial interests, is bound, for the ends of humanity also, to help forward trade in Central Asia.