Page:England & Russia in Central Asia,Vol-I.djvu/125

Russia's military strength in central asia. 105 There is great jealousy also between the Governor- Generals of these provinces; and Kaufmann could not count on the hearty co-operation of Krjihanoffsky in an enterprise in which Kaufmann would be supreme. But even if ten thousand men were spared from Oren- burg the Russian force would still be only thirty thousand strong, and it is doubtful whether more than four batteries — thirty-two guns — could be brought into the field. The first reserve may therefore be pronounced to be wholly inadequate to its purpose ; and if General Kaufmann' s force is to be brought up to an effective strength of fifty thousand men and one hundred and fifty guns, very nearly half ^the troops, and more than two-thirds of the guns, must be sent from Europe. It will require very little knowledge of the subject to perceive the truth of the assertion that to convey these troops and artillery, with the neces- sary amount of stores and ammunition, would be an Herculean undertaking. By exertions almost incred- ible Russia has built a railway as far as Orenburg, and its continuation to Orsk — one hundred and fifty miles further on — is sanctioned, if not actually com- menced ; but from Orsk to Tashkent the distance is more than one thousand miles. The road — for there is a road — lies mainly through the steppe country, a waste expanse of treeless and grassless soil. Between Orsk and Kazala, at the mouth of the Syr Darya, there is no place where even a small army could be halted for a short period. It would be necessary therefore to push the detachments steadily forward, after depots had been formed at all