The town boasts two good new hotels; a fine public library, especially rich in works on Central Asia; an observatory; a museum; two large public schools; an experimental agricultural station and school; a seminary; a bank, and various public buildings. There is also a park containing a bicycle track, where they have races; at the entrance we saw a large monument commemorating the conquests of the Russians in different parts of Turkestan. They first invaded it in 1863, and took this city and also Chemkend; in 1866 they took Khojend and Kokand, and completely destroyed the power of the latter, this proving the beginning of Turkestan as a Russian province. In the next two years they pushed their conquests further westward, and defeated the troops of the Emir of Bokhara and entered Samarkand. In 1873 Khiva was invaded and navigation rights obtained over the whole of the Oxus River, now known as the Amu Daria. Russia decided to leave Bokhara under the rule of the Emir, merely maintaining a protectorate, but the remainder of Turkestan has since that time been under Russian rule. We called at the office of the Wagons Lits Company for information about our journey to Samarkand, and the manager obligingly got a young Russian, attached to the newspaper staff, to act as our guide for the afternoon. He spoke English with a strong American accent, and was extremely garrulous, having attained a thoroughly journalistic style of conversation. We took a carriage and drove to the old city, of which the walls, alas, have completely disappeared. It is buried in the midst of trees and gardens, for there is a fine system of irrigation there. All through both the Russian and also the native town we saw streams flowing; the watering is done by a simple process; a man goes down each side of the road simultaneously, armed with a long wooden scoop, with which he sweeps the water out of the little canals as far as the centre, even on a wide road. This takes place at intervals during the day. Here and there in the native city is a good pond surrounded by trees. The houses are low and made of sun-dried bricks, looking more ruinous than the other cities we visited. Tashkent, it seems, is subject to earthquakes, which probably accounts for its dishevelled appearance, and it is difficult to believe that the population inhabiting it is both large and growing. According to the latest census the inhabitants number over 100,000, so evidently its decadent look is entirely misleading.