man, but to drown the senses in brutish oblivion. A compromise between religious duty and worldly interest has been arrived at. Bokhārans may not make wine themselves, but they are at liberty to sell the grapes to Armenians and Jews, who have a monopoly of the manufacture. A dealer vending wine or spirits to a Mohammedan is punished with a fine of 1000 roubles. The Resident has a court of his own for the decision of civil and criminal cases in which the injured party is a foreigner. His jurisdiction is unlimited, and his sentences without appeal. Documentary evidence is insisted on as a basis of money claims. The Russian law is administered, as modified by local custom, and no advocate is allowed to intervene between the tribunal and the parties. Where the defendant belongs to that category, the case comes before a judge of the peace, who is independent of the Resident and a subordinate of the Ministry of Justice at St. Petersburg. His sentences run through a gamut of appeals, precisely as those tried by the courts of the mother country. This alien jurisdiction is highly popular, and subterfuges are adopted in order to bring cases triable by the native judges within its purview. The post and telegraph services are in Russian hands; and a hospital is maintained, under European management, which costs the Amīr £2000 annually. Those who are cognisant of the perennial friction between Chief and Resident at many Indian courts will be surprised to learn that the relations between suzerain and vassal in Bokhārā have invariably been cordial. The Amīr, Sayyid `Abd ul-Ahad, is now in his thirty-seventh year.[724] He is tall and muscular, and would be handsome but for growing corpulence, that curse of Eastern princes. He is still devoted to hawking and other forms of sport, affable and dignified. Every year he visits one of the hot springs in the Caucasus, and often winters in the Crimea. The heir-apparent, Sayyid Mīr `Alīm, has been educated in St. Petersburg, and holds the rank of lieutenant in a Cossack regiment. In early youth the Amīr had convincing proof of the resistless power of Russia. He saw his haughty father die broken-hearted of the humiliation entailed by his abortive effort to roll back the tide of European aggression. He knows, too, that the capital is at the Russians’ mercy, for they own the rich province of Samarkand, through which the Zarafshān flows to fertilise his thirsty fields, and that it would be an easy matter to divert its course; and so he is always ready to anticipate his master’s wishes. There was a spice of truth in the late governor-general’s remark, “the Amīr of Bokhārā is the most zealous of my lieutenants.” While a ruler so pliant continues to sit on the throne of Bokhārā he need not fear annexation. The Russians are well aware that the people of the Khānate prize the measure of national life allowed them, and prefer the rough-and-ready methods of an Amīr of their own race to