Yet it is not at all impossible that Makran may once again rise to significance in Indian Councils. Men's eyes have been so much turned to the proximity of Russia and Russian railways to the Indian frontier that they have hardly taken into serious consideration the problems of the future, which deal with the direct connection overland between India and Europe other than those which touch Seistan or Herat. That such connection will finally eventuate either through Seistan or Herat (or through both) no one who has any appreciation of the power of commercial interests to overcome purely military or political objections will doubt; but meanwhile it may be more than interesting to prove that a line through Persia is quite a practicable scheme, although it would not be practicable on any alignment that has as yet been suggested. It would not be practicable by following the coast, for instance. It would be useless to link up Teheran with Mashad, unless the Seistan line were adopted in extension; and the proposal to join Ispahan to Seistan through Central Persia would involve such a lengthening of the route to India as would seriously discount its value. The only solution of the difficulty is through Makran to Karachi. Military nervousness would thus be met by the fact that Russia could make no use of such a line for purposes of invasion, inasmuch as it would be commanded and protected from the sea. Political difficulties with Afghanistan would be absolutely avoided by a Persian line. Whether that would be better than a final agreement with Russia based on mutual interest, which would certainly make strongly for the peace of our borders, is another question. I am only concerned just now in illustrating the geography of Makran and pointing out its facilities as a land of possible routes to India, and in showing how the exploration of Baluchistan and of Western India was secured in mediæval times by means of these routes.