The Russian minister informed the Persian Government that this ultimatum was based on the following two grounds:  First, that I had appointed a certain Mr. Lecoffre, a British subject, to be a tax collector in the Russian sphere of influence; and, second, that I had caused to be printed and circulated in Persia a translation into Persian of my letter to the London Times of October 21, 1911, thereby greatly injuring Russian influence in northern Persia.  These grounds might be classified as “unimportant, if true.”  The truth is, however, that they are both well known to have been utterly unfounded in fact.  I did not appoint Mr. Lecoffre, a British subject, to a financial post in northern Persia.  I found him in the Finance Department at Teheran (the capital, which is in the so-called Russian sphere) when I arrived there last May, and he had been occupying an important position there for nearly two years, without the slightest objection ever having been raised by the Russian Government.  I proposed to transfer him to a somewhat less important position, but one in which I thought he could be of greater service.

As to the second ground or pretext, in effect, that I had caused to be printed and circulated a Persian translation of my letter to the Times, it was simply false.  It was well known to be false—­so well known, in fact, that a newspaper in Teheran, the Tamadun (Civilization) which did print it and circulate it, publicly admitted the fact the minute they heard that I was charged by Russia with having done so.  So these two at best rather puerile pretexts upon which to base an ultimatum from a powerful nation to a weaker one lacked even the merit of truth.

This second ultimatum, despite all hypocritical attempts made to justify it, fairly stunned the Persian people.  Accustomed as they had become in recent years to the high-handed and cynical actions of the St. Petersburg cabinet, they had not looked for such a foul blow as this.  They had been realizing dimly that the peace of Europe was being threatened by the open hostility of Germany and England over the Moroccan incident, and that British foreign policy was apparently leaving Russia absolutely free to work her will in Asia, so long, at least, as Russia pretended to acknowledge the.  Anglo-Russian entente of 1907; but the Persian people had too much, far too much, confidence in the sacredness of treaty stipulations and the solemnly pledged words of the great Christian nations of the world to imagine that their own whole national existence and liberty could be jeopardized overnight, and on a pretext so shallow and farcical as to excite world-wide ridicule.  Their disillusionment came too late.  The trap had been unwittingly set by hands that made unexpected moves on the European chessboard, and the Bear’s paw had this time been skilful enough to spring it at the proper moment.