was natural enough, considering with what
naked audacity self-interest and brute force
override all considerations of reason and
equity in the East. The Shah had just
enough of excuse in the conduct of the
Afghan rulers towards the Persian dwellers
in the city to give a faint colouring of justification
to the expedition. The Persians were
undoubtedly heavily oppressed by the reigning
powers at Herat. It was not merely that
they were robbed and sold as slaves. Behind
these iniquities there was a sectarian grudge,
which gave a marked and special character to
the tyranny under which they suffered. The
Persians generally belong to the Sheeah, the
Afghans to the Soonee, sect. Christendom
itself—even to the fires of Smithfield and the
massacres of Paris—never exhibited fiercer
heartburnings and hostilities than rage
between Soonee and Sheeah; an analogy which
will help the reader to as vivid a picture as
we can give him of the unchristian enmities
by which these faithful infidels are
distinguished. The rulers and the soldiery of
Herat, the classes in whom all arbitrary
power was vested, were Soonees to a man,
while the shopkeepers and peaceful inhabitants
were for the most part Sheeahs. Hence,
in addition to the vulgar object of mere
confiscation, the Afghan governing powers were
enabled to indulge their pious enthusiasm in
the persecution of the heretic citizens. The
case was a hard one upon the Sheeahs; and
it was worthy of so magnificent a monarch
as the Shah to take it up. But how did it
happen that Russian officers and engineers
were mixed up in his councils and strategies
on this occasion ? What had they to do with
the rights of conscience, or the souls, bodies,
and goods of the Sheeahs?

Simply this, that Russia was interested in
urging on the Shah to the conquest of that
commanding position, for exactly the same
reason which moved the monkey to make
use of the cat's paw in snatching the nut
out of the fire. For upwards of a century,
Russia has been possessed by the grand idea
of founding an Eastern empire; and the way
to it, as we have shown, lies through Persia.
But as the subjugation of the whole of Persia
by force of arms would have been a work of
indefinite expenditure in time and treasures,
it has been skilfully prosecuted up to the
present hour by other means—by bit-by-bit
acquisitions, by corrupting the governors of
provinces, to which the institutions of Persia
afford peculiar facilities, and by that subtle
machinery of secret diplomacy in which
Russia excels all the rest of the world. Thus,
constantly interfering in the affairs of the
Shah, giving him the most friendly advice,
professing the most anxious interest in his
prosperity, placing armies at his disposal,
fiattering his ambition, and pampering his
love of show and aggrandisement by a variety
of seductive suggestions and proposals, Russia
has never lost sight of the grand object which
she hopes ultimately to achieve, by insensibly
sapping the internal strength and self-reliance
of Persia, weakening her relations with
England, and rendering her more and more
dependent on Russian aid and protection.
Over and over again she has pointed out to
Persia the advantages that would accrue
from the subjugation of Herat, Khorassan,
and Khiva; and the Shah, too eager to swallow
the bait, seems never to have been able to
detect the hook it concealed.

The same game is now playing over again;
Persia is actually represented in Herat by
twelve thousand men; and Russia is moving to
her help from the shores of the Caspian. In
1838, Persia had some ground of justification;
now she has none. It is a sheer act of invasion,
rendered additionally suspicious by the
sympathy of the still remoter power who is
on the road to her assistance. As to the
claims of the Candahar chiefs to the throne
of Herat, which Persia has undertaken to
champion—how is she concerned in them,
even supposing them to be valid ? The fact
that they are destitute of any legitimate
foundation, only proves that her object is to
heighten and exasperate the internal feuds
out of which she expects to snatch a profit for
herself.

It would entangle us in an intricate story of
Royal-family jars to trace out the question of
legitimacy; but there is no difficulty in showing,
that whoever may be the rightful heir of
the smeared and shattered sceptre, it certainly
cannot be the aspiring individual set up by
the Candahar chiefs. The population of
Afghanistan is divided into two principal clans
or tribes, the Populzyes and the Barukzyes.
The Suddozye, or royal race, was a branch of
the former; and out of these Suddozyes came
all the kings, by the Oriental right divine;
even the prime ministers being created from
the same privileged stock. The Suddozyes,
however, were no more immortal than the
Bourbons in their holdings, and it happened
some thirty years ago, more or less, that the
Suddozyes were dethroned and driven out by
the Barukzyes, who, in the person of Dost
Mahomed, took possession of the throne. The
history of Dost Mahomed's career, and of the
war which was undertaken to depose him, and
which ended in his final restoration and
recognition, is related so fully and clearly by
Mr. Kaye, that, for all requisite information
concerning the popular Barukzye dynasty,
we cannot do better than refer the reader to
that work.

When Dost Mahomed assumed the
government of Cabul, the only vestige of the
Suddozye royalties that remained above the
earth, was concentrated in Shah Kamran,
a wretched old man, debilitated by debauchery,
and ferocious and heartless by nature, who
was allowed to retain a pageant of sovereignty
in the Khanship of Herat. It was under his
rule that the city was stricken with the
curses of that fiendish despotism to which we