“Another peculiarity in several Russians which I remarked ... was their desire to impress upon my mind the great advantage it would be for England to have a civilised neighbour like Russia on her Indian frontier; and when I did not take the trouble to dissent from their views—for it is a waste of breath to argue with Russians about this question—how eager they were for me to impress their line of thought upon the circle of people with whom I was most immediately connected. Of course, the arguments brought forward were based upon purely philanthropic motives, upon Christianity and civilisation. They said that the two great Powers ought to go together hand in glove; that there ought to be railways all through Asia, formed by Anglo-Russian companies; that Russia and England had every sympathy in common which should unite them; that they both hated Germany and loved France; that England and Russia could conquer the world, and so on.
“It was a line of reasoning delightfully Russian, and though I was not so rude as to differ from my would-be persuaders, and lent an attentive ear to all their eloquence, I could not help thinking that the mutual sympathy between England and Germany is much greater than that between England and Russia; that the Christian faith as practised by the lower orders in Russia is pure paganism in comparison with the Protestant religion which exists in Prussia and Great Britain; that Germany and Great Britain are natural allies against Russia ... that Germans and Englishmen understand by the term ‘Russian civilisation’ something diametrically opposite to what is attributed to it by those people who form their ideas of Muscovite progress from the few Russians they meet abroad.”
Burnaby’s remarks seem pretty foolish in 1916. And his views are representative of the views of many English in 1875. Prussia, whom he admires so, had just crushed the French whilst we stood by. The Boer War had not come. The Kaiser had not sent his telegram to Kruger. Our military conceit had not been taken out of us; and so, when Russia offers Britannia the hand of friendship, Britannia round her draws her cloak and folds her arms.
But Russia was sincere. She admired the English. She alone of Continental nations appreciated the spirit of Dickens and our Victorian novelists. England was still the foolish friend of Turkey, it is true, but she was not perfide Albion. Nor was she simply “Mr. Cotton,” as Ibsen dismissed us, or “a nation of shopkeepers.” From the first Russia has had some sort of flair for the English gentleman, has seen the best thing in our race; and their wish for friendship with us has been a sentimental matter, not a desire for commercial partnership, not a bond of sympathy between revolutionary Russia and our Socialists. The desire for friendship with England dates to before the emergence of our Socialists as a party in England. It is a genuine craving for mutual understanding between the real Russia and the real England.
Fortunately, that desire on Russia’s part found an answer on this side. We became friends—we are now brothers-in-arms against a common foe. If the shedding of blood for a common ideal strengthens friendship, we should be good friends for this generation at least. Those who are young now will keep in remembrance the stress of these days, the sacrifice, the common sadness, the shared triumph. Holy Russia has become near to us, and, despite all machinations and insinuations, will remain near. And, with the hope of making things more easy, let me indicate the points of resistance to Russian friendship still remaining in our national life.
I. India.—A number of our people, chiefly on the Unionist side in politics, still fear Russian designs on India, and for that reason deny Russia the right to Constantinople and the Straits, should she take them. In doing this they unwittingly play the German game, which is to reserve Constantinople for Germany. There are several European journalists in the pay of Germany, and among other things they do for their money is the stirring up of British suspicion about Constantinople and Russia. The fact is that this is Russia’s legitimate outlet, her front door, and there can be no settled peace in Europe as long as it is barred up or liable to be barred. It is also the seat and capital of the Russian faith, and what in 1876 Dostoieffsky answered to the question on what high ground Russia demanded Constantinople from Europe is still true:
“As the leader of Orthodoxy, as protectress and preserver of Orthodoxy, the rôle predestined for Russia since the days of Ivan III. ... that the nations professing Orthodoxy may be unified under her, that the Slav nations may know that her protection is the guarantee of their individual personality and the safeguard against mutual hostility. Such a union would not be for the purpose of political aggression and tyranny, not a matter of commercial gain. No, it will be a raising of Christ’s truth, preserved in the East, a real new raising of Christ’s Cross, and the conclusive word of Orthodoxy at the head of which will be Russia.... And if anyone holds that the ‘new word’ which Russia will speak is ‘utopia,’ worthy only of mockery, then I must be numbered among the Utopians——”
Still, it must be said that at the present moment Constantinople does not seem likely to fall as a fruit to the Allies or to Russia, and unless Bulgaria should turn upon her unnatural allies there is not much question of St. Sophia becoming Christian again. We ought only to keep in mind that Russia has striven for Constantinople not to have a base from which to oppose us, but in order to keep the door of her own house and to be Queen of the Eastern Church.
The next point, and where the question of India causes us to be suspicious, is that of Persia. Here, happily, some understanding has been obtained and spheres of influence allotted; but our distrust has stood in the way of the consummation of one of the most interesting schemes of the century: the trans-Persian railway. If this railway had been built before the outbreak of this world-war, it would have been of extraordinary value to the Allies, an effectual means of checking the inflammation of Islam. There will be little money left when the war is over, but certainly the overland route to India should be one of the first big civilising schemes to receive attention. World railways, instead of little bits of lines, belong to the future of the Old World, and we can have them now or put it off for another era. It depends on the faith and imagination of our generation. Then Persia falls inevitably under European surveillance, and there is no reason for English and Russians at the outposts of Empire to compete and be jealous and suspicious and to squabble.
For the rest, Russian Central Asia raises no further problems. It is a peaceful, growing Russian colony, shut away from the chances of attack by foreign Powers—likely to remain for a thousand years one of the most peaceful places upon earth. Unlike India, it is comparatively empty and its peoples are decaying. The railways which Russia has built were built in order to subdue the Tekintsi and the Afghans. The railways which she is building have in view only the convenience of the colonists, the development of the colony, and trade with China. Russia is slow out there, and she is laying the sound foundations of a healthy and happy colonial country.