“1. Improvement of the Siberian and Eastern Chinese lines so as gradually to work up to fourteen pairs of military trains in the twenty-four hours over the whole length, and eighteen pairs on the southern branch. Every additional pair of trains will not only shorten the time for concentration, but will at the same time help the supply services. Great difficulties will be encountered in carrying out what I recommend, especially in increasing the running capacity on the Central Siberian and Trans-Baikal lines. Once these difficulties are overcome, the necessary increase of traffic can easily be attained by means of a loan of rolling-stock from other lines. I venture to assert that of all urgently pressing questions, that of improving the railway communication between Russia and Siberia is the most important. It must therefore be taken up at once in spite of the enormous cost. The money expended will not be wasted; it will, on the contrary, be in the highest sense productive, inasmuch as it will shorten the duration of the war. “2.... Together with the carriage of troops and goods by rail, a transport service must be organized on the old Siberian road and on that alongside the Eastern Chinese Railway. For a successful concentration and the rapid transit of supplies, we ought to have thirty troop trains in the twenty-four hours. Even when the measures I suggest are carried out, we shall only have a total of fourteen pairs—less than half of what are really required. Our present precarious position, therefore, can be realized, as the total number of military trains we are able to count upon between Baikal and Harbin is four pairs!” When I travelled over the Siberian and Manchurian lines in March, 1904, I was accompanied by M. Pavlovski, who was in charge of the Siberian line. He told me that if he were given rolling-stock on loan, he would be able that year to increase the number of military trains to ten, and later on to fourteen, pairs, at a cost of £650,000. On receiving his report, I sent on March 19 the following message to General Sakharoff: “With this I am telegraphing to Secret Councillor Miasiedoff Ivanoff as follows: