heading towards the
Indian Ocean. The Anglo-Russian convention of August 31st, 1907,
yielding to Russia all northern Persia as her sphere of influence,
enables her to advance half way to the Persian Gulf, though British
statesmen regard it as a check upon her ambition, because England has
secured right to the littoral. But Russia by this great stride toward
her goal is working with causes, satisfied to let the effects follow at
their leisure. She has gained the best portion of Persia, comprising
the six largest cities and the most important lines of communication
radiating from the capital.[252] This country will make a solid base for
her further advance to the Persian Gulf; and, when developed by Russian
enterprise in railroad building and commerce, it will make a heavy
weight bearing down upon the coast. The Muscovite area which is pressing
upon England's Persian littoral reaches from Ispahan and Yezd to the
far-away shores of the Arctic Ocean.

[Sidenote: Periphery as goal of expansion.]

In the essentially complementary character of interior and periphery are
rooted all these coastward and landward movements of expansion. Where an
equilibrium seems to have been reached, the peoples who have accepted
either the one or the other one-sided location have generally for the
time being ceased to grow. Such a location has therefore a passive
character. But the surprising elasticity of many nations may start up an
unexpected activity which will upset this equilibrium. Where the central
location is that of small mountain states, which are handicapped by
limited resources and population, like Nepal and Afghanistan, or
overshadowed by far more powerful neighbors, like Switzerland, the
passive character is plain enough. In the case of larger states, like
Servia, Abyssinia, and Bolivia, which offer the material and
geographical base for larger populations than they now support, it is
often difficult to say whether progression or retrogression is to be
their fate. As a rule, however, the expulsion of a people from a
peripheral point of advantage and their confinement in the interior
gives the sign of national decay, as did Poland's loss of her Baltic
seaboard. Russia's loss of her Manchurian port and the resignation of
her ambition on the Chinese coasts is at least a serious check. On the
other hand, if an inland country enclosed by neighbors succeeds in
somewhere getting a maritime outlet, the sign is hopeful. The
century-old p