Dardanelles connecting the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. Beginning from the early 19th century, depictions of Russia in the UK media, largely drawing on the reports of British travel writers and newspaper correspondents, frequently presented a "distorted picture" of the country; scholar Iwona Sawkowicz argues that this was due to the "brief visits" of these writers and correspondents, many of whom did not speak Russian and were "looking mostly for cultural differences." These depictions had the effect of increasing Russophobia in Britain despite growing economic and political ties between the two countries. In 1874, tension lessened as Queen Victoria's second son Prince Alfred married Tsar Alexander II's only daughter Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, followed by a cordial state visit by the tsar. The goodwill lasted no more than three years, when structural forces again pushed the two nations to the verge of war. Panjdeh incident 1885 Anglo-Russian rivalries grew steadily over Central Asia during the so-called "Great Game" of the late 19th century. Russia desired warm-water ports on the Indian Ocean while Britain wanted to prevent Russian troops from gaining a potential invasion route to India. In 1885 Russia annexed part of Afghanistan in the Panjdeh incident, which caused a war scare. After nearly completing the Russian conquest of Central Asia (Russian Turkestan) the Russians captured an Afghan border fort. Seeing a threat to India, Britain came close to threatening war but both sides backed down and the matter was settled by diplomacy. The effect was to stop further Russian expansion in Asia, except for the Pamir Mountains, and to define the north-western border of Afghanistan. However, Russia's foreign minister Nikolay Girs and her ambassador to London Baron de Staal in 1887 set up a buffer zone in Central Asia. Russian diplomacy thereby won grudging British acceptance of its expansionism. Persia was also an arena of tension, but without warfare. Far East, 1860-1917 Although Britain had serious disagreements with Russia regarding Russia's threat to the Ottoman Empire, and perhaps even to India, tensions were much lower in the Far East. London tried to maintain friendly relations in the 1860-1917 period and did reach a number of accommodations with Russia in northeastern Asia. Both nations were expanding in that direction. Russia built the Trans-Siberian Railway in the 1890s, and the British were expanding their large-scale commercial activities in China using Hong Kong, and the treaty ports of China. Russia sought