Britain might attach to acts in violation of that pledge. The Russian Ambassador, however, kept that despatch nine months in his pocket, until the time came when he was obliged to use it in defence of the aggressive proceedings of his Government. Lord Dufferin, when appealed to, stated that the Emperor's assurance was positive, and added (March 8, 1881) – "When the Emperor deigned on two occasions to give me similar assurances, his Majesty made use of the most unequivocal language; and an intimation of this kind proceeding from so august a source possessed a direct and abiding force, which, of necessity, endured until it was formally retracted." From the time that the Liberal Government took office, Russia adopted a new tone with regard to her encroachments in Central Asia. She treated all demands for explanations de haut en bas; she replied to all requests for assurances about the future with a curt "mind your own business"; she no longer sought to present laboured justifications of her actions, as she had attempted when the Conservative Government was in office. Lord Granville uttered feeble complaints, and the rest of his colleagues treated the subject as one unworthy of their attention. The crack of an assassin's rifle in Connemara roused them to greater energies than the booming of cannon to the north of the Caucasus, which announced the onward march of Russia to the Afghan frontier. In March 1881, Sir Charles Dilke, then Under Foreign Secretary, refused in the House of Commons to be at the expense of a telegram to inquire into the truth of a rumour – which after all was merely premature – that the Russians were at Merv. This incident, otherwise trifling, is an excellent specimen of the indifference which Mr Gladstone's Government manifested to a danger which every person of intelligence saw to be, month by month, assuming larger proportions. When Lord Granville pressed for information as to the frontiers of the newly annexed Tekke country, the snubbing reply M. de Giers gave him was, "He was not aware that when the English annexed territories they were asked what their frontiers were." When, in February 1882, he endeavoured to obtain "some agreement as regards the policy and position of the two Powers in Asia," Prince Lobanow quietly told him that "it was with Persia that they had then to deal;" and indirectly hinted that until the Russian frontier impinged upon Afghanistan, Britain had no claim to interpose. Again, in the same year, Lord Granville urged "that if the possession of Sarakhs were at any time aimed at by Russia, it could not be for the purposes which have hitherto been stated by them as their object," – a plea the piteousness of which deserved a more gentle answer than the rebuff that "the matter concerned Russia and the Shah exclusively."
In fact, from the time when Mr Gladstone came into the Government and the Foreign Office fell into the hands of Lord Granville, all power of influencing the Central Asian question was lost to England. From that time down to the present, Russia has not had the decency to resort even to dissimulation, and has gone straight to her goal as if there had been an amicable understanding with the British Government upon the subject. Sarakhs and Merv were annexed, almost without a murmur from the Liberal Government, and certainly without any remonstrance that was worth Russia's attention.
