acrossasiaminoro00chiluoft

458 ACROSS ASIA MINOR ON FOOT
failure at the close of the war will be whether or no
the Central Powers and Asia Minor are politically
wedged apart and sundered beyond hope of the road
to expansion in the East ever being open again. So
much is clear to Russia and Serbia ; it should be as
clear to us.
Regarding the Near and Middle East, however, as
being now in the melting-pot for recasting, we should
take long views. Let us well understand what has
attracted the Germans, practical people pursuing no
mirage. Let us well understand, further, that the
changes and developments in these fertile and
sparsely populated regions during the next hundred
years will equal in importance the changes likely to
take place in any other part of the world in the same
period. With the Straits from the Black Sea and
the Coveted City upon them in the capable hands of
Russia ; with a Jewish nation arising in Palestine,
and great ports springing up on the Syrian coast and
the Gulf of Alexandretta ; and with the Suez Canal
a waterway of greater value than ever— the eastern
end of the Mediterranean will assume an importance
never imagined before. Let us make no mistake on
this point.
Even with Egypt in our hands, and Cyprus fortunately
still British, we shall stand as aloof
spectators of great changes which will affect our
Imperial interests. We should profit by the lesson
of our past mistakes, and looking well into the
future, take our present opportunity while we
may. The western port of the railway to India
should be ours ; ours, too, the oil-fields and rich but
derelict corn-lands of Mesopotamia, through which
the railway must pass. The world is filling up, and
corn-lands and oil-fields will soon become possessions
of vastly greater national importance than they are
now.
The day after visiting Jonah's Pillars I left Alexandretta
by a British mail steamer for Beirlit and