All the criminals of the Central Empire condemned to corporal punishments shall be flogged with whips; and those of the Empire of the Oros shall be beaten with canes.

The convention now concluded has been exchanged in the following manner :

The grandees of the Central Empire delivered a copy of it in Mandchou and Mongol, sealed, to the plenipotentiary commissioner of the Oros, and the latter delivered to the grandees of the Central Empire another copy in the Oros language, and confirmed in the same way, with a seal.

In order to make it generally known, printed copies of the transaction shall be distributed among the frontier subjects on both sides. The thirty-third year of Abkai Wekhiyekhe,* the nineteenth day of the ninth moon. (October 18, 1786.)

The immense line of demarcation which separates the two greatest empires in the world commences on the West, at the river Bouktourma, and finishes on the East, on the shores of the sea of Okhotzk. Its breadth is five, ten, or thirty toises, according to the nature of the ground which it traverses. It belongs properly to neither country, and forms their true limit. This frontier is to be protected by the two powers, and can only be crossed at the places fixed for passing it.

Guard-houses have been established at greater or less distances, according as required by the number of inhabitants. The same circumstances regulated likewise the number of soldiers stationed there.

The respective guard-houses are all placed opposite to one another, at such a distance as permits them mutually to observe each other. They are generally not more than five, ten, or at most twenty wersts from the frontier itself. The line of demarcation is carefully inspected every day, not only to prevent it from being passed, but also to prevent all communication between the

In Chinese Khian Loung, a term of honour given to the years of the reign of the Emperor Kaotsoung chun houang, the grandfather of the present emperor, who reigned from 1736 to 1795.

VOL. III.NO. XXV.

LL

frontier people. In the wild and mountainous districts, where the distance between the guard-houses is greater, heaps of earth and stones have been raised upon the heights and rocks, and in the plains and forests, to mark the direction of the frontier: in places where it is crossed by rivulets, stakes have been set up on each side, between which cords of horse-hair were stretched, the ends being fastened to the stakes, so that no one could pass the frontier without being aware of it.

:

The members of the congress in 1727 went all along this line, and agreed that each post should be guarded by mounted Mongols well armed their number is from twenty to thirty men, with a commandant, who is obliged to see that the frontier is daily visited as far as the next guard-house. In desert countries, this inspection is not made every day, on account of the great distances which must be traversed. The advanced posts are close to the frontier: they are composed of several men, and are at some distance from the guard-house. Their horses remain always tied up, to prevent them from crossing the frontier. The chief duty of the commandant of the guard-house is to survey in person every day the line of demarcation, to examine if no traces are apparent on the turf or on the sand of men having crossed the frontier. The Mongols, like all the inhabitants of the steppes, have such acute sight, that, even on horseback, the slightest trace does not escape their eye. As soon as any trace is discovered, they dismount, and endeavour carefully to follow it on the neutral line, without effacing it. If the trace is that of a horse, or of any domestic animal, they place little pieces of wood, stones, or turf round it, in order not to lose it. on the spot, they advance towards the opposite post as far as the first vidette, calling out to him to send the commandant with an escort. The two parties go to the place where the traces are, to examine from which side they come, and whither they lead. Then the respective commandants surround the ground they have trodden upon during the search, with stakes with small cords fastened between them, in order to prevent other thieves or runaways from taking advantage of these traces to pass the

After having placed a sentinel

boundaries.

The party to whose territory the traces lead is obliged to follow them to the spot where they end, in order to ascertain exactly whether any stranger has arrived, or whether any thefts or robberies have been committed there. If the deserters are discovered, they are conducted to the guard-house, whither the commandant of the opposite side is summoned to take charge of them. Matters of this kind are judicially treated, and the jurisdictions of the frontiers respectively inform each other of the result, in order to give all possible satisfaction.

In this manner the frontier is protected and preserved inviolate : illicit intercourse between the frontier people is prevented. It is by this care, which may appear trivial, that the line of demarcation has been preserved as it was fixed by the Congresses of 1727 and 1768.

The first and principal entrepot of commerce was established on the rivulet of Kiakhta, which falls into the Boro, ninety-one wersts from Selenginsk; and the second near the Gan, which joins the Argoun at Tsouroukhaitou. All private trade ceased at the Ourga and other places on the new frontier, as well as the intercourse between the Bouriates and the Mongols.

(To be continued.)

[The large space we have lately allotted to the affairs of Greece may appear to some of our readers as requiring an apology. The motives we are about to state will, we trust, suffice to justify our doing so. Greece we conceive to be the only country where England has taken an active part. Spain and Portugal we do not refer to, as her acting in these countries has to do with party, not national, interests. Greece is, on the contrary, a power of the greatest weight in its connection with Russian policy. We have felt it to be so, as the long labours of our diplomacy, the thunders of our cannon, the millions of our money, sufficiently tell. We have asserted, and we maintain, that these labours and this expenditure have brought about, through Greece, the very state of things which we intended by these means to prevent. A charge of so serious a nature-a charge implying consequences so grave and so gratuitous, even though not refuted, requires substantiation; though not contradicted, stands in need of explanation. Greece, moreover, by the diplomatic combinations which centering in it have extended to the whole of Europe, and engaged the attention of every statesman of the present period, is a field of inquiry essentially European. Poland, Circassia, Persia, even Turkey itself, are questions as it were in the air; because, whatever their importance, they have not been reduced to specific and practical questions. Greece has, and the character of every distinguished diplomatist of the present day is more or less involved in this question. Two important consequences thus result from the exposure of the mismanagement of the affairs of Greece; first, the rectifying of a question so important in its bearings on Russian policy; secondly, the exposure of the weakness of our whole diplomatic system, by the exhibition of its incapacity on a field to which its whole energies and its chief ability were directed. We may also add that, the state of Greece being the key to Turkey and the East, and to the objects pursued in those countries by Russia, through the influence she exercises over Greece, a statement of the events of that country is more than any thing else necessary to the just appreciation of the documents revealing the policy of Russia.]

NARRATIVE OF THE AFFAIRS OF GREECE

PART III.

Impartial History will one day brand their acts more openly than is permitted now."

MANIFESTO OF THE GREEK NATIONAL ASSEMBLY.-1832.

To continue our Narrative.-The Protocol of March the 7th recommended the pacification of Greece on the bases of the memorandum presented in the preceding December by Sir Stratford Canning to A. Capodistrias. The Residents had at that time written to the Conference, stating "that they had invited the government to enter into confidential relations with them, in order to concert measures for putting an end to the disastrous conflicts which had just taken place."

We have seen the mode in which they had concerted with the government in inducing it to publish a fraudulent amnesty. A new opportunity now presented itself of pacifying Greece.

The Protocol of March was evidently framed by the Conference, under the supposition that hostilities had not commenced, and had been