lometres, the Central Union, five thousand two
hundred and sixty, the Santa Fe line, four thousand eight hundred and
seventy-five, the Atlantic Pacific, five thousand six hundred and
thirty, the Northern Pacific, six thousand two hundred and fifty. There
is only one line which will be longer when it is finished, and that is
the Grand Transsiberian, from the Urals to Vladivostock, which will
measure six thousand five hundred kilometres.

Between Tiflis and Pekin our journey will not last more than thirteen
days, from Uzun Ada it will only last eleven. The train will only stop
at the smaller stations to take in fuel and water. At the chief towns
like Merv, Bokhara, Samarkand, Tashkend, Kachgar, Kokhand, Sou Tcheou,
Lan Tcheou, Tai Youan, it will stop a few hours--and that will enable
me to do these towns in reporter style.

Of course, the same driver and stoker will not take us through. They
will be relieved every six hours. Russians will take us up to the
frontier of Turkestan, and Chinese will take us on through China.

But there is one representative of the company who will not leave his
post, and that is Popof, our head guard, a true Russian of soldierly
bearing, hairy and bearded, with a folded overcoat and a Muscovite cap.
I intend to talk a good deal with this gallant fellow, although he is
not very talkative. If he does not despise a glass of vodka,
opportunity offered, he may have a good deal to say to me; for ten
years he has been on the Transcaspian between Uzun Ada and the Pamirs,
and during the last month he has been all along the line to Pekin.

I call him No. 7 in my notebook, and I hope he will give me information
enough. I only want a few incidents of the journey, just a few little
incidents worthy of the _Twentieth Century._

Among the passengers I see on the platform are a few Jews, recognizable
more by their faces than their attire. Formerly, in Central Asia, they
could only wear the "toppe," a sort of round cap, and a plain rope
belt, without any silk ornamentation--under pain of death. And I am
told that they could ride on asses in certain towns and walk on foot in
others. Now they wear the oriental turban and roll in their carriages
if their purse allows of it. Who would hinder them now they are
subjects of the White Czar, Russian citizens, rejoicing in civil and
political rights equal to those of their Turkoman compatriots?

There are a few Tadjiks of Persian origin, the handsomest men you can