The increase in population, large as it has been under Russian rule, would have been still greater but for the prevalence of intermittent fever. That this scourge is connected with irrigation is beyond doubt, for the western districts, where water is scarce, are comparatively free from it; while in Tajand 30, and in Merv 85, per cent. of the applications for medical relief were due to intermittent fevers.[666] The conditions prevailing in the irrigated tracts are precisely the same as those in Central Bengal, which is in process of being slowly depopulated by malarial fevers. In both countries we have a waterlogged subsoil, due in the one case to excessive rainfall and inundations from the rivers; in the other, to the presence of a network of irrigating channels. The lesson to be learnt by administrators of both provinces is the necessity of providing drainage. Smallpox was as fatal in Transcaspia as malarial fever. Epidemics recurred almost annually, and 50 per cent. of the children were slain or disfigured by the pest. One of the first steps taken by the Russians was to introduce vaccination. They encountered a vast amount of prejudice, especially among the priesthood, but the value of the boon conferred on suffering humanity by Jenner has long been recognised. Vaccination is decidedly popular, and as a consequence smallpox is almost unknown.[667] Enteric fever, which is increasing in an alarming ratio in Indian garrisons, is rare in Transcaspian cantonments, and unknown elsewhere in that province. Epidemics of cholera are also uncommon. The last took place in 1892, when the infection was introduced from India by way of Herāt. It ravaged Meshed, the capital of Khorāsān, in May, and reached Askabad on the 1st June, having travelled 100 miles in eighteen days; thence it followed the line of rail, causing a mortality of 1859 out of 3471 attacks. The health of the Russian troops in Central Asia is, as might be expected, less satisfactory than that of the civil population. The annual admissions to hospital during the six years ending with 1895 were no less than 705 per mille; the deaths, 12.5; while 20.2 were discharged as unfit for further service. Thus the loss by death and incurable disease to the Russian army serving in Transcaspia exceeds 3 per cent. annually.
Readers who have followed our description of the physical conditions encountered in Transcaspia will have grasped the fact that its tillage depends wholly on the timely supply of water by artificial means. The Turkoman farmer is not, like his European comrade, at the mercy of the seasons, for he taps the rivers and streams descending from the Persian and Afghan highlands, which enjoy a fairly constant rainfall.[668] Dams erected in channels give a “head” of water which is drawn off into distributories or arīks, and these, again, are subdivided into tiny rills which afford to every plot of cultivated land its portion of the precious fluid. The parent stream thus gradually loses its speed and volume, and finally disappears in the arid desert sands. Where visible water is not met with, the springs on the mountain flanks are reached by a system of tunnelling. A well is sunk at a higher level than the area to be irrigated, and, when water is found, a lateral tunnel is excavated which carries the subterranean water several hundred feet nearer its object. At its extremity another well is dug, and the piercing process is repeated till the thirsty tract is reached. A well-known natural law compels the water in the last of the chain of wells to rise to the level of that first sunk; and thus a head is formed which supplies a system of distributors. The method is known as the Persian, and is of extreme antiquity. So great is the skill of the older labourers practising it that the mole-like excavations in which they work are barely two feet in diameter by four in height.
On assuming the government of Transcaspia, the Russians made a special study of this all-important question, and came to the conclusion that it was impossible to improve on the methods evolved by ages of practical experience. Their policy, therefore, as regards irrigation, has been one of non-interference. Steps were taken to prevent cultivators in the Persian and Afghan territory from tampering with the sources of the water-supply. A chief engineer is posted at the provincial capital, Askabad, and subordinate ones at the district headquarters; but their functions are limited to suggesting improvements and supervising the repairs to canals and distributories. The task of allotting the water-supply was left in the hands of the Mīrāb,[669] a native official elected by the inhabitants of every village dependent on irrigation. His operations are guided by the average quantity of water required by individual peasants. The unit is termed Sū,[670] and is by no means a constant quantity. In some parts it implies the volume of water sufficient to irrigate a given area, varying between one and five acres. In Merv the Sū implies the quantity which flows in two hours through a distributory discharging water at the rate of 1¼ quarts per second. In Tajand it is equivalent to the needs of an average garden, or to a discharge of half a gallon per second. In many parts of the Merv and Akkal oasis the process is simplified by the existence of associations of peasants, termed Artel, each of whom receives a Sarkār,[671] or head of water, consisting of 8 to 36 Sū. The ordinary irrigation channels are held in common by the villages which they supply, but wells and underground aqueducts vest in the person who excavates them and in his heirs. The Russians have shown great practical wisdom in avoiding unnecessary interference with a system so complex; for an attempt at stringent control would bring them in contact with fierce prejudices and lead to loss of prestige.
Turning from the system to its operation, we find the most important works connected with the Murghāb, that ancient source of Merv’s prosperity. It rises in Afghanistān, as do its confluents, the Kāshān and Kushk, a fact which places the Merv oasis at the mercy of the Amīr. It is more than probable that the next rectification of frontier demanded by Russia will comprise the whole watershed of these streams. The course of the Murghāb in Russian territory is 530 miles long; its breadth at Merv is 84 feet, and its depth 7. The Panjdih oasis, with a cultivated area of 75,000 acres, owes its fertility to this river, whose waters are confined by a dam called the Kawshut Khān Band. Farther north we have the Yolatan oasis, inhabited by Sārik Turkomans, with another huge dam, known as the Kāzī Keui Band, affording water to 125,000 acres, at a velocity of 1500 feet per second. Near its site are the ruins of the Sultān Band, a work far vaster than any of the present day. It gave a head of 28 feet, and made the fields and gardens of Old Merv the most fertile region on the globe’s surface. The Sultān Band was destroyed in 1784 by the Amīr Murād of Bokhārā,[672] a piece of vandalism which ruined Merv’s prosperity and made it a robbers’ lair. Just a century later the Tsar, to whose private estates the site of Old Merv belongs, ordered the construction of an anicut 13 miles up stream. The work was carried out by Colonel Kashtalinski, superintendent of the state domains at Bahrām `Ali, the first railway station east of modern Merv. It includes a dam which gives a 14 feet head of water, and is connected with a series of storage basins feeding a central canal 20 miles long. This, in its turn, supplies 35 miles of secondary canals and 105 of distributories. The area thus irrigated amounts to 15,000 acres, 5000 of which are under cotton, and 3675 grow wheat and barley. The whole is let out to Turkomans and Bokhārans, and the mountains of cotton waiting for transport by rail in the season are a standing proof of the excellence of the crops; the return is indeed said to be not far short of a hundredfold. So great is the demand for farms that the natives compete for the privilege of holding one at a rent in kind amounting to a quarter of the gross produce. In spite of prohibitions, subletting is very rife, and the same plot supports several families. The cost of these splendid operations was about £105,000, an expenditure which was declared by an eminent English authority on irrigation to be one-fifth of what a similar work would entail in India. It is in contemplation to restore the Sultān Band, at a cost estimated at £210,000. There can be few better investments for capital than one which will restore to the brightest jewel of Russia’s Asiatic diadem a portion of her ancient splendour.
The policy of laissez-faire has been extended by Russian administration to popular education. Every village of importance has its Maktab,[673] or primary school, where a modicum of corrupt Persian and Arabic is combined with an inordinate amount of parrot-like repetition of passages from the Koran. In 1893 these numbered 179, with an attendance of 2629 boys and 331 girls. The teachers generally belong to the priestly class, which in old days enjoyed less authority than in any Mohammedan country. Since the Russian invasion their occult influence has increased, and it is not exerted in the invaders’ favour. Throughout Islām, indeed, the mullās are irreconcilable enemies to Western progress, and a recent rebellion in Farghāna has led many experts to doubt whether tenderness to indigenous institutions has not been carried too far; for the Maktabs are forcing-grounds for the Madrasas, or colleges, which are to be found at every district headquarters, and are centres of obscure intrigue. Russian education has indeed advanced with giant strides. The first school in which the difficult tongue of the conqueror was taught dates from 1882, when this was opened at Kizil Arvat for the railway staff. Mdlle. Komaroff, daughter of the first military governor, founded one in that headquarter in 1884. It has now become the “Town School,” with 184 pupils, including 62 natives. In 1890 there were but 5 schools throughout the provinces, with an attendance of 395. General Kurapatkine has spared no effort during his long term of office to promote Russian education; but, until 1894, he encountered sullen opposition. In that year the tide began to turn, and in 1896 there were no fewer than 69 Russian schools, with an attendance of 1196. It is to be hoped, in the best interest of Transcaspia, that the mistake which has had such sinister results in India will not be repeated there. Vernacular education under close Russian supervision is far preferable to a system which encourages a mechanical study of an alien tongue by classes which can never be rendered better or happier by its acquisition.
The method of collecting revenue in Transcaspia displays the simplicity and reliance on native agency which are seen in other branches of the administration. The principal tax is one levied on each “kibitka,” a term which conventionally includes fixed as well as movable dwellings. The rate in force at the present day is six roubles, or nearly thirteen shillings; and the incidence per head of the population, assuming the kibitka to shelter five persons, is only two shillings and sevenpence. The starshina is held responsible for the realisation of an amount equivalent to the number of kibitkas in the village multiplied by six, and he pays the sum directly into the district treasury. In practice the tax is treated as one on income, and a wide latitude is left to the starshina. He reduces the demand from widows and daily labourers to a few pence, and exempts paupers altogether; while wealthy families are made to pay as much as £22. As the kibitka tax amounts to no more than a twenty-fifth of the average family’s earnings, there is rarely any difficulty in collecting the entire demand. Malversation is extremely rare, and, in one case at least, the villagers voluntarily subscribed a sum sufficient to cover its mayor’s defalcations. In the Sarakhs district a different system is in force. There a tax is levied proportionately to the Sū, or unit of water, used in irrigation. Small excise duties are levied on tobacco, matches, and kerosene oil, and the owners of cattle driven from Persian territory to Transcaspian grazing-grounds pay a trifle on each head. The only other tax is one on trade, which has long been current in the Central Asian Khānates. Merchants who are not Russian subjects pay Government one-fortieth of the value of wares received or despatched by caravans. No budgets as we understand the term are published by the provincial governor; for the immense cost of the garrisons maintained in Central Asia should fairly be set off against the receipts from taxation. It is tolerably certain, however, that Russia finds her Asiatic possessions a source of heavy expenditure from the imperial treasury, which she is content to endure in view of indirect advantages which she reaps from them. Their strategical value is incalculable, for they place Persia, Afghanistān, and Western China at her mercy; while the benefit to Russian commerce, by the daily increasing movement of goods on the Transcaspian railway system, is equally conspicuous.
The proceeds of taxation are allotted to local as well as imperial purposes. Among the former, roads are of the greatest importance. The province possesses 458 miles of metalled roads, exclusive of one constructed in 1888 between Askabad and Meshed, the capital of Khorāsān. On this a waggon service plies daily, and every high-road has its line of telegraph wires. The latter are connected with 17 offices, which dealt in 1896 with 113,434 messages. There are 25 postal stations, connected by a series of hand vehicles, which in the same year cost nearly £50,000 sterling.[674]
The entire system of transport, however, is in a transition state, for the railway has already revolutionised the mechanism of commerce. Its length in Transcaspian territory is 663 miles, and an extension from Merv to Kushk, on the Afghan frontier, a distance of 192 miles, will be completed before the 1st June 1899. The old caravan roads southward lay through Persia and Afghanistān; but the insecurity which reigns there, and the transit duties levied, have driven merchants to adopt the longer but safer route by steamer and railway. Thus goods for China and India travel by way of Bombay, Batum, and Baku. The Caspian is traversed by steamer,[675] and at Krasnovodsk the railway is met with. The whole line was placed under the charge of General Kurapatkine in 1892; but on his transfer in the beginning of 1898 to the Ministry of War it passed under the control of the Minister of Ways and Communications.
This necessarily brief sketch of Transcaspian administration reveals an honest attempt on the part of the Russians to promote the material welfare of her former foes. It is too often repeated by writers who are blinded by political passion, or have no personal knowledge of Central Asia, that the subject peoples there are groaning under the heel of a ruthless military oppression. Englishmen who have visited the heart of the great continent, and mixed freely with every class of the population, agree in denying the truth of these charges. General Kurapatkine, when on the eve of laying down his high office, declared that Russian policy might be defined as the maintenance of peace, order, and prosperity in every class of the population. Those, he went on to say, who fill responsible positions are expressly informed by Government that the assumption of sovereignty over other nationalities must not be attempted without very serious deliberation, inasmuch as such become, on annexation, Russian subjects, children of the Tsar, and invested with every privilege enjoyed by citizens of the empire.[676] These noble words reflect the attitude of General Kurapatkine and his lieutenants. Many of the latter had a lifelong experience of native manners and mode of thought; and one at least, Colonel Arandarenko, district officer of Merv, is adored by the inhabitants of the oasis. That the forces of disorder have been rendered impotent is certainly not the case. The contrast between the prosaic present and the wild romance of that past which is fast fading into legend must be bitter indeed to the half-tamed Turkomans. Nature, we know, nihil facit per saltum; and governments, however despotic, are incapable of suddenly changing the trend of a nation’s instincts, the legacy of unnumbered generations. It may, however, be said with perfect truth that the Russians in Central Asia strive earnestly, and with a great measure of success, to promote the greatest good of the greatest number.