NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE news from St. Petersburg and Afghanistan is far from reassuring. It is admitted that there is another hitch in the negotiations. The Russians wish so to define the Zulfikar Pass, that the Afghans shall not be able to hold the pass with any security ; and when the British Government remonstrates, the only reply is that the Russians are willing, if Great Britain likes, to refer the whole thing back to the Delimitation Commission, —that is, to postpone all decision sine die. Russian troops, too, are being massed at Askabad, and all the news seems to point at least to this,—that the Russians wish to produce a new scare, and to embarrass the British Government so far as they can, whether they contemplate going to war or not. We are disposed to think that this course of policy is, at present at all events, only meant as a mode of taking reprisals for Lord Salisbury's and Lord Randolph Churchill's insulting language, now that they are responsible for the conduct of affairs. But it is not to be forgotten that scares of this kind not unfrequently produce results much more serious than those who originate them in- tended. And war may result from the activity of such men as Komaroff and Alikhanoff, even though war is not intended.
