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Updated: June 28, 2025
Khorasan played a vital part in the development of the modern Persian literature and especially its chief department, poetry. The entire early period of the history of modern Persian poetry, from Abbas welcoming with an ode Khalif Mamun into Merv down to Firdausi, may be labelled Khorasanian.
It is very unlikely that Delhi or any other rich city in India will be given over to sack and pillage, during this generation, but the remembrance of the days of 1857, and of the traditional wealth of the country, still exists amongst the nations of the East, and only recently, during the scare arising out of the Russian occupation of Merv, it was stated that the Turkomans, now feudatories of that Empire, cast longing eyes on Hindostan, "where gold and diamonds could be picked up in the streets of the large cities."
Formerly the natural line of advance for Russia was from Orenburg to Tashkend and the upper Oxus; and even now that railway would enable her to make a powerful diversion against Northern Afghanistan . But the route from Krasnovodsk on the Caspian to Merv and Kushk presents a shorter and far easier route, leading, moreover, to the open side of Afghanistan, Herat, and Candahar.
There was no arrangement for water, travellers being frequently delayed three or four hours, while blocks of ice were melted for the boiler; while the so-called first-class carriages were filthy, and crowded with vermin. The advance of Holy Russia had apparently not improved Merv, which had become, since its annexation, a kind of inferior Port Said, a refuge for the scum, male and female, of St.
Though they may have lent him some encouragement, no real effort was made by either potentate on his behalf. Isdigerd, at Merv, during his later years, experienced the usual fate of sovereigns who have lost their kingdoms.
In 1881 he returned to England, and published his book, "The Merv Oasis," and afterwards read a paper before the Royal Geographical Society on "Merv and its surroundings." Finally, in 1883, he went as special correspondent to the Soudan, and there this brilliant Irishman perished with the whole of Hicks Pasha's army.
In 1879 he went through Russia to the shores of the Caspian Sea, travelled through the north of Persia and the adjacent territory of Khorassan, to the land of the Tekke Turcomans, and to Merv, thus penetrating the mysteries of Central Asia as no European traveller had ever done so perfectly before.
Always occupying some secure fortress far in the rear of his army, he fled from each as the enemy made a step in advance, quitting Ctesiphon for Holwan, Holwan for Rei, and Rei for Merv, never venturing upon a stand, never making an appeal to the loyalty which was amongst the best qualities of the Persians, and which would have caused them to fight with desperation in defence of a present king.
Gliding swiftly homewards along the now brilliantly lit boulevards, I realize for the first time that mine has been but a wild-goose chase after all; that, if India is to be reached by land, it is not viâ Merv and Cábul, but by way of Persia and Baluchistán. The original scheme was a bold one, and I derive some consolation in the thought that the journey would most probably have ended in defeat.
There are a few Tadjiks of Persian origin, the handsomest men you can imagine. They have booked for Merv, or Bokhara, or Samarkand, or Tachkend, or Kokhand, and will not pass the Russo-Chinese frontier. As a rule they are second-class passengers.
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