village beyond the strong position of Kizil Aryat. The results of those investigations have not been made known, but we can judge of the importance of the latter by the fact that General Lomakine has recently advanced to Kizil Arvat and Kizil Tchesme, still further on, at the head of a considerable army, and that he is supposed to be meditating a coup against Merv from those posts of vantage. Notwithstanding these results, which have however been obtained entirely within the Russian frontier, it may be said that Russia has not done much towards exploring the country held by the Turcomans, and that the great sandy expanse of Kara Kum, with its oasis of Merv, and the fertile strip of country from Sarakhs to Abiverd is still a terra incognita to Russia as well as to ourselves. Of course it is just possible that great diligence may have been shown by the Russian officials in collecting information concerning these places from native sources in Khiva and at Charjui; but if there has been this diligence it has apparently borne little fruit. The Russian official map of Central Asia, which is to be obtained only with great difficulty outside Russia, and which the author has been so far privileged as to have secured for these volumes, throws no more light on the Kara Kum desert than Petermann's or Walker's Turkestan. Russia, with great opportunities, has done scarcely anything for the advancement of geographical knowledge in this quarter, and this apathy has been the more surprising because political and military advantages were here the sure rewards of success. It should, however, be remembered by those who may
