The boundaries of Badgheis seem to have fluctuated according to the power of the neighboring states, and it is not always easy to verify the notices of the geographers, owing to the disappearance of the old names. Still, it is important to note that Hafiz Abrú, who was a minister of Herat under Shah Rúkh, states categorically that Badgheis was bounded on the west by the Persian districts of Jam and Serakhs, thus proving that, at any rate at that period, the district extended northward up to the confines of the desert. To the east Badgheis was frequently made to include Merv-er-Rúd (Ak Tepeh), Penj-deh, Baghshúr (Kileh Maúr), Baún or Bavan (Kara Tepeh), and the entire valley of the Kushk river, while to the south it was separated from the plain of Herat, as at present, by a range of hills (now called Barkhút), the prolongation of the great Paropamisus. Such being the concurrent testimony of all writers as to the configuration of the country in antiquity, and Badgheis being so intimately connected with Herat as is the Campagna with Rome, it is difficult to understand on what grounds it can now be excluded from Afghan territory as indicated in the memorandum of 1872. The argument that neither Dost Mohammed Khan, nor Shir Ali Khan, nor even Abdur Rahman Khan until quite lately, exercised any effective jurisdiction in the district, or held it in military subjection, is certainly of no value; for this condition of recent possession, which at one time did really govern the distribution, was specially excluded from consideration in determining claims to Afghan nationality by Prince Gortchakoff’s letter of the 19th of December, 1872; and it would be a monstrous aggravation of the original outrage if the Turcomans, who had rendered Badgheis uninhabitable for fifty years, were, in virtue of their forcible interruption of Afghan government, to become themselves the legal owners of the country.
With regard again to the claims of Russia to inherit through the Saryk Turcomans, a portion of whom have lately become her subjects, the pretension is still more preposterous, since her outposts were not within 500 miles of the disputed territory when in 1872 the dependencies of Herat were adjudged to Afghanistan. It must be acknowledged that Badgheis has for the last fifty years been swept and harried by the Turcoman raiders till not a vestige of habitation has been left in the district. The land, especially along the Heri-rúd, is utterly desolate; but who will pretend that violence and outrage of this exceptional character has obliterated the rights of Herat to resume possession of the country on the re-establishment of order and security? In real truth Herat has never abandoned her hold _de jure_ upon Badgheis. The towers along the southern hills, which Macgregor remarked in 1875, were intended to protect the immediate plain of Herat from the further incursions of the Tekkeh savages, who suddenly swept down like a hurricane from the north whenever an opportunity offered, not to serve as landmarks for the Afghan territorial border; they were strictly works of internal defence, and as such have no analogy with the line of border towers along the course of the Heri-rúd, which at an earlier period had been erected by Kilich Khan, an officer of Shah Zamán’s, with a view to resist invasion from Persia, and the ruins of which are still to be seen in a scattered line, extending from Kohsán to Garmáb in the vicinity of Púl-i-Khatún. Practically, and in so far as the safety of Herat is concerned, it can make no great difference if the Russian outposts are stationed at Púl-i-Khatún, or Zulficár, or at Kohsán. Herat would be equally open to attack from any of these points, and must rely for protection on its own means of defence; but it must be remembered that this is not a mere strategical question: on the contrary we are dealing with the rights and property of an independent sovereign as the guardian of his interests, and have no sort of authority to override the one or alienate the other on grounds of geographical or political convenience. Badgheis is unquestionably Afghan territory. Rescripts are still extant, addressed to the inhabitants by the Suddozye kings of Cabul. In 1873 Shir Ali Khan specifically named Badgheis, in his negotiations with Lord Northbrook, as an Afghan district which was likely to be overrun by the Turcomans if these tribes were expelled from Merv by the Russian arms. Again, in the famous memorandum of 1872, I have a certain knowledge that the phrase, “dependency of Herat,” was specially intended to cover Badgheis, and finally the assessment of the district is actually borne on the Herat register at the present day.