Khalkas is vague at present--her indignation is clear and easily defined at Russia retaining possession of Kuldja after she has demanded its restoration. In short, all her apprehension along the northern frontier, which has slumbered, but never died out, since the Russians seized the Amoor posts during the Crimean War, is reduced to a focus in Central Asia, where Russia appears inclined to throw herself in the path of, or at least to retard, their victorious career. It is not so much the Kuldja question, which is of local importance, that is of pressing moment, as the rupture between Russia and China, that a crisis in the Issik Kul region will make complete. That rupture has already taken place, and no concession on the part of Russia will restore her good name with the Chinese. She may hand Kuldja over now, or she may keep it by the strong arm if she can; but she has forfeited all claim to consideration by the Chinese, through delaying to accede to that which those people consider in every sense their right and due. Had Russia at once said to China, "We will abandon Kuldja, and only require you to guarantee the safety of the population," there would have been not only the preservation of the good understanding between the countries, but there might have been, for fresh purposes, a Russo-Chinese alliance in Central Asia. That alliance must have been fraught with danger to this country, and for reasons that will best be described under the head of Anglo-Chinese relations. But the Russian authorities failed to grasp the situation in its full extent. They treated the Kuldja question as a mere local affair, and they trifled with the Chinese as if the latter had no very strong interest in the matter. They altogether ignored the terrible earnestness of the Chinese character, and they treated the demands of Tso Tsung Tang in a spirit of levity that must have roused the ire of that general. Their policy, regarded from any point of view, was shallow and unwise, but, bearing in mind the past tact and diplomatic skill shown by Russia in her dealings with China, it must appear more shallow and foolish. Of course this Kuldja question differs from all previous questions in the essential point of all, that here for the first time Russia had to go back instead of advancing, as always had been the case heretofore. The Russian authorities simply regarded the matter from the point of view of what effect it would have upon the peoples of Central Asia. They persuaded themselves that to hand over Kuldja would be to give an impetus to every hostile element in Western Turkestan, as well as to lower their prestige generally throughout Asia. As a leading Russian paper expressed it, "the retrocession of Kuldja would be an act of political suicide, for not only would it raise the prestige of China to a higher point than ever before, but it would also undermine our position in Eastern Asia, by giving the Chinese a strong military position within our natural frontier.