CHAPTER XIII.
The Report of the Commission of Inquiry upon the Massacre—The Suspicion against the Amir Yakub Khan—The Report forwarded to the Government of India—Probable Deportation of the Amir to India—Gatherings of Tribesmen at Ghazni—The Necessity of collecting Supplies for the Winter—The Khyber Line of Communications—No Supplies obtainable from Peshawur—Slowness of the Khyber Advance—Projected Expedition to Ghazni—The Reason of its falling through—The Strength of the Army of the Indus—General Baker’s Excursion to the Maidan Valley—The Chardeh Valley in Winter—Sir F. Roberts joins General Baker-The Destruction of Bahadur Khan’s Villages in the Darra Narkh.
Sherpur, 18th November.
One part of the important work which the British force came to Cabul to fulfil has been done: the Commission appointed to inquire into the circumstances of the massacre of our Envoy and the after-events, culminating in the battle of Charasia, has completed its task, and to-day the report was duly signed by Colonel Macgregor, Dr. Bellew, and Mahomed Hyat Khan. For the past two days Sir F. Roberts has had the report before him, and has telegraphed a summary of it to the Government of India, who will thus be put in possession of its main features several days before the text of the document can reach them. In due course the Government will, no doubt, furnish a connected narrative of the events of the early part of September, and the world at large will then be able to judge on what basis of proof our suspicions against Yakub Khan and his most favoured ministers have rested.[[26]] The Commission began examining witnesses on the 18th of October; so that it is exactly a month to-day since the first step was taken towards compiling the mass of evidence now understood to have been recorded. I have before pointed out very fully how difficult was the work which lay before the Commissioners: there was scarcely any clue to be laid hold of which would lead them direct to their chief point—the cause of the outbreak of the Herat regiments; and they had to take such witnesses as were forthcoming, and to trust to later evidence to clear away the darkness in which they were at first groping. The consideration shown to the Amir seemed, to the suspicious minds of the Cabulis, a sign which foreboded his future restoration, or that of his near relatives; and those who were well inclined to us shrank from declaring their partisanship too boldly, for fear of after-consequences, when the Barakzai family should again be all-powerful in the country. There was a slight dissipation of this feeling when the Proclamation of October 28th was issued, announcing Yakub Khan’s voluntary abdication, and ordering all chiefs in Afghanistan to look to the Commander of the British force at Cabul for their authority in future; but we are known to be so eccentric a people that there still lurked uneasiness in many minds, and mouths were sealed that might reasonably have been expected to be open. The actual presence of the late sovereign in our Camp—even though he was known to be under a close guard—was too powerful an influence to be easily swept away: if he had been hurried away to India in disgrace, the atmosphere of doubt and uncertainty would have cleared up. But our ideas of justice are too strict to be warped by passionate anger, and it was resolved to give Yakub Khan as fair a chance of defending himself as he could possibly expect. That he lost his personal liberty by listening to foolish councillors, who thought he might gain something by flight, was nothing to us. One cannot always guard a man against his own stupidity. Having, then, to keep Yakub Khan with us, we had to do as best we could in gaining means of judging what were his relations with the men who stood forth as leaders of the rebel army, and how far he had sympathized with their plans. In endeavouring to trace out the palace intrigues which Nek Mahomed, Kushdil Khan, and others had set on foot, the Commission had often to rely upon men themselves tainted with suspicion; and when this was the case the statements had to be carefully weighed and critically compared with facts which were attested beyond doubt. To dwell, as I have dwelt before, upon the strong point of an Afghan, and the strongest of a Barakzai—the capacity for lying—would be merely to repeat an old story: the lies might contain in them a germ of truth shining out as a silent protest against the mass of falsehood; and many of these germs have, after careful nursing, borne such fruit, that very tangible results have been arrived at. In spite of the religious antipathy always manifested by Mussulmans against Christians, increased a thousandfold when it is thought a Mussulman’s life is in danger; in the face of a strong feeling against the restoration of a Barakzai Amir on the one hand, and of the feudal reverence shown towards the dynasty on the other; in silent but cautious calculation of those opposing influences, the Commission felt its way forward. Such men as professed friendship for us were invited to tell us all they knew, and that all seemed so little that it was disheartening to listen to it; such others as were Yakub Khan’s faithful followers were asked to give their version of events, and their garbled stories were just as disappointing. Towards the close of the inquiry, however, there was more tangible matter to be used as a lever by which to force disclosures; and I believe that such fair evidence as will fully justify Yakub Khan’s deportation to India was obtained. That it will justify more I cannot venture to hope, and I must guard myself against misconception by saying that officially no sign has been given as to the conclusions of the Commission. There are inferences which observant men cannot fail to draw from little episodes in a camp-life so limited as this, and the rigorous attention paid to the safe-keeping of Yakub Khan is but one in a string of collateral circumstances which have been interesting us since the Proclamation in the Bala Hissar and the arrest of the Wazir and his fellow-ministers. We may be all wrong in our surmises as to what will occur: there is only the charmed circle of three, who have had to shape the conclusions now before the Government of India, in which speculation may be safe; but we believe in our prescience, and are proportionately happy. The final decision on so important a step as the punishment of a sovereign supposed to have been guilty of treachery—whether of the blackest kind, or merely of the nature arising from pusillanimity and indecision—must rest with the highest authorities; and if we were tempted to chafe at our helplessness in having the knowledge of all that has transpired withheld from us, we should be consoled at once by the thought that it is the voice of the Government alone which can pronounce the final sentence. That the Commission will have spoken freely, and not have shrunk from any startling conclusions it may have been driven to, I am fully convinced—they are not the men for half measures who have composed it—and in the full expectation that their recommendations will be carried out, even if the end is more than usually bitter, all of us who have sojourned before Cabul since we camped on Siah Sung Ridge, on 8th October, are content to rest until everything is made known.
The latest arrivals in Camp are Mahomed Syud, Governor of Ghazni, and Faiz Mahomed, the Afghan General, whose name became so familiar when Sir Neville Chamberlain’s Mission was turned back in the Khyber. Faiz Mahomed was then in command at Ali Musjid, and his interview[interview] with Cavagnari just below the fortress is matter of history. He does not seem to have shared in the rebellion, and his adherence to Yakub Khan was never shaken. Mahomed Syud was compelled to leave Ghazni, as he found himself powerless to control the local moollahs, who have been preaching a jehad on their own account, and have gathered together several thousand tribesmen from the villages in the district. There are but few trained sepoys in their ranks, and, although they have made the road between Ghazni and the more northern districts very unsafe, their efforts are too insignificant to be at present seriously regarded.
21st November.
“Nae, nae! I’ll nae fa’ out till I’ve washed ma’ hands in th’ Caspian!” These were the words, not of any veteran soldier looking forward to crossing bayonets with the Russians, but of a plucky little drummer boy, of the 92nd Highlanders, when toiling painfully along the road to Cabul. The lad had his heart in the right place at any rate; and if the strength of an army is to be judged by its marching powers, we have rare material in our ranks. It is a long cry from Cabul to the Caspian; but the drummer boy may have many years of soldiering before him; and if ever the Gordon Highlanders form up on the shores of Russia’s inland sea, to that boy should belong the honour of leading the van. But we are only at Cabul, and it now seems beyond doubt that we shall not advance any further this year. The winter has come down upon us with a suddenness that we little expected from the mildness of the last season; and 20° of frost have warned us that bivouacking out would be nearly impossible for well-clad soldiers, and would be certain death to hundreds of camp-followers. The news of the disturbances on the Ghazni Road may, perhaps, call forth the remark, that after Cabul had been captured, and the country around cowed into order, a rapid march to Ghazni should have been ordered. There is much virtue in sudden and striking displays of force in an enemy’s country, particularly when the enemy is disorganized by defeat, and is debating as to the possibility of waging guerilla warfare. But there are considerations which must override even rapidity of action, and the first of these is the provision of supplies on which an army can subsist when far removed from its base of action. Cabul was practically in our possession on the 9th of October, though the formal march into the Bala Hissar did not take place until three days later; and our cavalry and spies had shown us that no organized resistance was being prepared within many miles of the capital. The rebel regiments had melted away; the city people were cowering in abject submission; and the local tribes had seen that their day had not come and were once more in their homesteads, nursing their wrath and their jhezails until the Kafirs should be delivered into their hands. Sir. F. Roberts was at this time quite cut off from India, so far as a connected line of communication went; the Shutargardan post was the only link between Cabul and Kurram, and that was beset by an army of hill-men. From that direction he might hope, by relieving the garrison, to get one convoy through; but beyond that point he could not go. The great height of the Shutargardan Pass precluded all hope of keeping troops there during the winter. He had come from Ali Kheyl with but a few days’ provisions; and it was plain that, unless supplies came by way of the Khyber, the army must rely upon the country for food for its 18,000 soldiers and followers. That one might have reasonably expected a long string of baggage animals to be moving westwards from Peshawur at the end of October did not seem so preposterous as men with General Bright’s column would now have us believe. To say that Peshawur was swept clean of all transport animals for Kurram, is begging the question. The Kurram Valley Force was only half-equipped when it began the advance upon Cabul, and northern India still held many thousands of mules, donkeys, camels, and their kind. We hoped that some of the energy our own Commander had shown would have been displayed in the “Army of the Indus,” and that a few troops at least would have kept pace with us, or, say, have moved on a parallel line five marches in rear. If this had been done, and a well-equipped brigade of 2,500 men had been pushed forward to Jugdulluck, the massing of 12,000 men in rear might have been postponed—for a few months, say,—and some of the transport (swallowed up by regiments who will never be wanted west of Peshawur) then liberated. But to look to the Khyber for supplies was soon found to be an expensive amusement. The troops would starve before a seer of atta or grain passed Jumrood. We could live from hand-to-mouth for a week or two; but there were the four months of winter to be thought of; and it became merely a question of arithmetic whether a brigade strong enough to march to Ghazni could be spared, with all its equipment of baggage animals and followers, and at the same time four months’ supplies could be bought up and swept into our Camp by those left behind at Cabul. There seemed just a chance of this being done, if our broken reed in the Jellalabad Valley could be propped fairly straight for a few weeks. The work of collecting grain, forage, and all other supplies, was begun in earnest; and we resigned ourselves to hard labour until the troops from the Shutargardan should come in, and our communications viâ Jugdulluck be well established. Expeditions to Kohistan and Ghazni were looked upon as certain of accomplishment in the near future. We knew that Jellalabad had been occupied by the advanced brigade of General Bright’s force on October 12th, and it was only sixty miles from that post to the point beyond Jugdulluck, where they would join hands with the Cabul Army. The end of October would surely see them within a few marches of us. But it had been apparent from the first that drag-ropes were upon the “Army of the Indus,” and that every tug forward made by Brigadier Charles Gough was responded to by a double tug behind. The end of the month came; the convoys from the Shutargardan were well on their way, the troops under Brigadier Hugh Gough had also started; and the Jugdulluck route seemed about to be opened. On 1st November Brigadier Macpherson was at Butkhak, and four days later he shook hands with General Bright at Kata Sung. Then it was decided at head-quarters here that a force should visit Ghazni. The mass of our supplies were being stored away in Sherpur; General Macpherson could march his brigade back after garrisoning Luttabund and Butkhak; Cabul would not be denuded of troops; and from Sherpur to Peshawur the road would be guarded by an overwhelming force. But the programme went all wrong: the broken reed, after being straightened for twenty-four hours, failed us. The Khyber advanced brigade had no supplies; General Macpherson had to cross into Tagao to feed his force; and we, in Sherpur, saw the 15th November—the day fixed for our departure for Ghazni—come and go, and still the army remained stationary. The weather, too—an element that can never be despised in our calculations in a semi-barren country like Afghanistan—had punished our delay by declaring against us. Snow and sleet fell in and around Cabul, and no man knew when the next storm might come. So the Ghazni expedition fell through; and if the ruffians who are now trying to make capital out of our failure to visit the place, succeed in their efforts to cry a jehad, the blame for any mischief that may ensue cannot be thrown upon the Cabul Army, but upon the short-sighted policy which could leave it to its own resources, while nominally moving a supporting force in a parallel line in order to secure its alternative communications. Foreign military critics have reflected severely upon the want of skill shown in the plan of the campaign, and have condemned the rashness of the Shutargardan-Cabul advance, without support from the Khyber. But the supports were said to be there, and General Roberts could not know that they would be steadily kept back, and would be unable to take up their share of the alternative road a month after he had captured the position they were both supposed to be converging upon. Supports which travel at the rate of two or three miles a day are worse than useless.
When it is considered what the numerical strength of the Khyber supporting column is, one cannot understand the timidity of the advance. There may have been tribes in front, in flank, and in rear; but so there were on the Shutargardan route, and tribes far more capable of mischief than Afridis and Shinwaris. Yet the menace at Budesh Kheyl, Ali Kheyl, the Shutargardan, and on either flank at Charasia, did not check the forward movement of an army half the strength of that supposed to have been put in motion from Peshawur simultaneously with the advance from the Kurram side. Looking at General Bright’s force at the end of October, we find that, inclusive of troops at Nowshera and Peshawur, he had under his orders over 16,000 men, viz., British troops: 148 officers and 4,287 men; Native troops: 147 British officers and 11,795 men. These included five batteries of artillery and one mountain battery, and six cavalry regiments, three British and three Native. Out of the total, two batteries were in Peshawur; and there must also be subtracted the following regiments, which had not crossed the old frontier:—11th Bengal Lancers (356), part of the 17th Bengal Cavalry (338), 1-17th Foot (443), 1-25th (715), part of 51st (209), 1st Native Infantry (774), 22nd Native Infantry (638), and 39th Native Infantry (609). Deducting all these, there was left a force of 11,800 men actually moving on, or garrisoning the Peshawur-Gundamak line; supports equal, it might have been supposed, to any work required of them. That there were conflicting ideas as to the object with which such a body of troops had been sent from India, must have been apparent even to a superficial observer; but upon whom the responsibility of playing with such an army rests, no one here pretends to say. The local rank of Lieutenant-General, which has at last been given to Sir F. Roberts, brings these 11,800 men under his command, and their future movements are likely to be directed in sympathy with the advanced army at Cabul. For the next few months they will probably be required to do little more than keep the road; but during the winter their transport equipment and commissariat arrangements—defects in which are said to have been the chief cause of their tardy movements—will have to be so far put on a footing of efficiency that, if the necessity arises in the spring for the Cabul Army continuing its march westwards, they will be able to keep pace with its movements. There are good men and tried soldiers enough in the Khyber Force to do all that is required, if they are allowed scope for their energies, and are not trammelled and crippled at every step by those influences in the background, which I have already described as being “drag-ropes” upon their freedom of action. General Roberts has now in his command—that of Eastern Afghanistan—two divisions of 8,000, and 11,800 men, respectively: in all, nearly 20,000 troops, whose movements he controls from his headquarters at Sherpur. Matters of detail on the Khyber side are left, as before, to local commanders. I have dwelt at length upon the shortcomings of the Peshawur column, not so much because very serious results have followed its laggard advance, but as showing how helpless the small force here would have been if, in case of a check, it had looked for support to “the Army of the Indus.”
General Macpherson’s brigade returned to Sherpur cantonments yesterday, having left at Luttabund 300 of the 23rd Pioneers and half the 28th Punjab Native Infantry. Before the brigade marched in, a strong body of troops had been warned for service, their destination being the district of Maidan, twenty-five miles distant on the Ghazni Road, where large supplies of grain and bhoosa are said to have been collected for us by the sirdars employed to purchase it on our account. Over 100,000 maunds of bhoosa are still wanted to complete our winter supply; and as the villagers have not sufficient carriage to bring in their supplies so long a distance, we must needs go out ourselves. Every available baggage animal will be employed for the next week or ten days in carrying in this forage; and as there are rumours innumerable of gatherings on the Ghazni Road further south, it has been determined to run no risk with reference to our valuable mules and yaboos. A string of between 2,000 and 3,000 animals needs to be well protected, and the brigade which marched out this morning under General Baker was therefore very strong. It was made up as follows:—500 of the 92nd Highlanders; 400 of the 3rd Sikhs; 400 of the 5th Punjab Infantry; two guns, G-3, Royal Artillery; four guns Kohat Mountain Battery; one squadron 9th Lancers, two squadrons 5th Punjab Cavalry, and two squadrons of the 14th Bengal Lancers. The display of so large a force half-way to Ghazni is sure to have an excellent effect upon the surrounding country. Sir F. Roberts rides out to-morrow to join General Baker at Maidan.
A Divisional order was issued to-night, directing the public reading of an order of the Commander-in-Chief dismissing Subadar Mahomed Karim Khan, 1st Punjab Infantry, from the service for having failed in his duty to the Queen-Empress on the occasion of the attack upon the Residency. This man is a Logari, and was on furlough at Cabul in September. On the morning of the outbreak he was in the Residency, and after the lull following the first collision of the Herat troops with the Guides—while the Afghans went for their arms—he was sent with a message to the Amir by Sir Louis Cavagnari. This he does not seem to have delivered with the spirit that might have been expected from a soldier in our service; and afterwards, when Gholam Nubbi, Cavagnari’s chuprasse, found money and horses for him to carry the news of the disaster to the British Camp at Ali Kheyl, he behaved in a dastardly way. He changed clothes with Gholam Nubbi and started out, but only went as far as Beni Hissar. There he stayed for two days, and then returned to Cabul, where he hid himself for five days in the Kizilbash quarter. Afterwards he quietly made his way to his own village; and, upon our troops appearing at Kushi, came into camp and told some wonderful stories of what he had done. These were afterwards proved to be false, and the Military Commission when trying prisoners found that his conduct had been really that of a poltroon. They recommended his dismissal from the service, and he has now been summarily discharged, all arrears of pay being forfeited. This is another striking instance of the shifty and untrustworthy nature of our Pathan soldiers, for Karim Khan was an old native officer.
Camp Maidan, Ghazni Road, 24th November.
The Lieutenant-General Commanding is now out on a visit to the force under Brigadier-General Baker, which is collecting supplies of forage from the villages along the Ghazni Road. Leaving Brigadier-General Macpherson in command at Sherpur, Sir F. Roberts, accompanied by his personal Staff and Colonel Macgregor, Chief of the Staff, with a small escort of ten men of the 14th Bengal Lancers, rode through the Cabul gorge on the afternoon of the 22nd, and, following the road which traverses the Chardeh Valley, made for the village of Argandeh, about sixteen miles away. The Chardeh Valley, which we passed through, gave evidence on all sides of that fertility which has earned for it the name of the “Garden of Cabul;” but it is so late in the year that only autumn tints mark the fields on either side. Here and there the young wheat is shooting up, but the small green blades are scarcely strong enough to do more than chequer the general area of brownness. The long lines of willows and poplars which line the hundreds of watercourses threading the valley, are mere skeletons of trees; their leaves rustling down in eddying circles as the cold wind sweeps blusteringly from the snowy tops of the Pughman Hills. The valley is shut in on all sides by high mountain ranges, the hills which guard Cabul from approach on the west seeming to rise perpendicularly from the plain. The range above Indikee village is overtopped by the sheer cliffs which dominate the plain between Zahidabad and Charasia, and these are already covered with snow, which gleams out in startling whiteness above the barren rocks in the foreground. Far away to the north lies the Hindu Kush, with its long undulating sky-line similarly snow-laden, the lower intermediate hills of Kohistan being still mere brown masses jostling each other in grand confusion. Looking towards Bamian the view is bounded scarcely ten miles away by the Pughman spur, which boasts of several lofty peaks rising in sullen grandeur from the hills about Argandeh. For fully twelve miles, or about as far as Kila Kazi, the road is an extremely good one; stones, the curse of Afghanistan, being few and far between. After this the dry bed of a snow-fed stream has frequently to be crossed or followed, and boulders are not uncommon. Guns, however, could be got along without much trouble, and if necessary a new track on a higher level, across the cultivated land, could be laid out. The road ascends gradually the whole way, and when near Argandeh a kotal is gained, about a mile and a half across and two or three miles long. It is now a bare plain without tree or shrub, but for the most part is under cultivation, the fields of course lying fallow during the winter. To the right or north the hills are rather precipitous, and in a sheltered curve at their base the village of Argandeh lies. It is fully a mile from the road, and all about it are terraced fields said to yield magnificent crops of wheat and barley. The high pitch to which irrigation attains in Afghanistan is strikingly exemplified in this district, the water-channels being so arranged that the distribution of the water is admirable.
Sir Frederick Roberts rested for the night at Argandeh, and yesterday morning rode on to Maidan. Striking the Ghazni Road a mile from Argandeh, we followed its course over the kotal and soon began to descend. The hills on either side were as bare as any in Afghanistan, and the plain between them was only partially cultivated. After about four miles a chowki (watch-tower) was reached on a little rise, and looking to the south we saw the district of Maidan stretching before us. It is a beautiful valley, landlocked on every side, the Cabul river running through it about a mile from the foot of the western hills. The valley must be at least four miles across; and, with the exception of low rolling downs, covered with stones and rocks, for about a mile on its eastern flank is as flat as its name, Maidan (open plain), implies. Twenty or thirty walled enclosures and villages on the banks of the Cabul stream stand out from amid poplars, willows, and plane trees, which fringe the banks of the sparkling little river, and for many square miles nothing is seen but endless corn-fields, each with its little boundary of mud, along which the water slowly wanders as it does its work of irrigation. The road falls rapidly from the chowki, and a few hundred yards below bifurcates, the main route to Ghazni going straight to the south over the rolling downs I have mentioned, and a bridle-path leading down to the villages of the plain. General Baker’s camp is pitched at Naure Falad, two miles from the chowki, down in the plain near the first of the fortified enclosures, its rear being guarded by a high rocky ridge. From the summit of this a splendid view of Maidan is obtained, and the extraordinary fertility of the valley fully appreciated. To the west the ridge runs sharply down into the plain, and the valley is there narrowed to half a mile, but it opens out again to the north among the hills. The main road to Bamian, which strikes off from the Ghazni Road before the chowki in the kotal is reached, runs across this part of the valley and enters the Ispekhawk Pass, a few miles further on.
Yesterday afternoon a small party of cavalry were fired upon in the Darra Narkh, a valley running in the Bamian direction, and to-day Bahadur Khan, who was responsible for the action, and who is known to be harbouring Afghan soldiers, has been visited and punished. He had already given much trouble. General Baker, since his arrival in Maidan, has found much difficulty in inducing the maliks of the villages of the district to bring in corn and bhoosa. They have given the tribute grain and forage readily enough, but have evaded furnishing the amount we required in addition to this. Every maund was paid for at a forced rate, which, I may state, was far higher than the normal prices; but the village headmen hung back, and, though profuse in promises, made but little effort to meet our wants. Several of them were very insolent in their bearing, and no doubt thought to worry us out by their procrastination. But General Baker is not the stamp of man to have his orders disobeyed, and by confining some of the maliks to the camp for a few days, he had gradually brought them to their senses. One malik, however, trusting to the obscure valley in which he lived, wherein Europeans had never been known to penetrate, was obstinate. This was Bahadur Khan, whose fort is about eight miles from the Maidan villages, along the branch road which leads to Bamian. He not only refused to sell any of his huge store of grain and forage, but insolently declined to come into camp. He was known to have great influence among the tribesmen in his neighbourhood, and it was reported that some sepoys of the Ardal regiments were living under his protection. When Sir F. Roberts heard of the contumacy of this malik, he agreed with General Baker that it would be well to fetch him in by force, and at the same time to arrest any sepoys found in his villages. To accomplish this double object the cavalry were sent out yesterday, with the result already stated, that they were fired upon by a large body of men, including some 200 sepoys armed with Sniders. It was necessary to make an example of Bahadur Khan, and at the same time to break up the tribal gathering, which, if left alone, might grow to serious proportions. Our foraging parties would probably have been roughly handled in scattered villages, all of which boast of towers and fortified enclosures, if the rumour had been allowed to circulate that our cavalry had been driven back.
Tents having been struck at daybreak, the baggage of the force was packed up and placed within a fort near the Cabul river, under a guard of 300 men, drawn equally from the 92nd Highlanders, 3rd Sikhs, and 5th Punjab Infantry, with a squadron of the 14th Bengal Lancers and a troop of the 9th Lancers. The two guns of 9-3[prev G-3], R.H.A., were also left behind, as the road to the villages was known to be difficult for wheeled guns. The troops which marched out were 400 of the 92nd, 300 of the 3rd Sikhs, 300 of the 5th N.I., a troop of the 9th Lancers, a squadron of the 14th B.L., and four guns of the Kohat Mountain Battery. General Baker was in command of this compact little column, which was not encumbered with transport animals, as a rapid march was intended. Sir F. Roberts, with Colonel Macgregor, also rode out with his personal escort. It was bitterly cold in the early morning, and all but the swiftest running streams were coated over with ice. The troops carried with them one day’s cooked provisions, but were otherwise in light marching order. A point was made for a little to the south-west, where the Darra Narkh stream falls into the Cabul river, and then a due westerly course was followed up the narrow valley through which the former stream runs. The usual mountainous country was seen on either hand, high hills closing down on the valley, and presenting treeless slopes barren of all verdure. The two rivers had to be crossed by fords, and the men went through the icy-cold water as carelessly as if wading a stream in summer. The sepoys stripped off their putties, and made light of the floating ice which barked their shins, while the Highlanders in their kilts seemed rather to enjoy the bracing cold. The road was fairly well-defined and ran through cultivated fields, with an occasional fortified homestead or country villa relieving the monotony of the landscape. Information was brought from time to time of the movements of Bahadur Khan, it being at first stated that he had 2,000 or 3,000 men ready to meet us. About seven miles from the camp the road was commanded by a high ridge on the left, and beyond this, we were told, lay the open valley in which the cavalry had been attacked. This ridge was at its highest point 800 or 1,000 feet above the roadway, and on the previous evening had been lined with men. Now it appeared quite deserted, and the cavalry swept round it and waited in a friendly village until the infantry could come up. A local malik volunteered the news that Bahadur Khan and his followers had taken all their movable property away during the night and had fled to the hills. When the Lancers first appeared round the ridge and pushed forward into the horseshoe-shaped valley, they saw fifty or sixty men on some low hills to the north, a gunshot from Bahadur Khan’s chief fort; and as these moved down the slopes, it seemed probable that a body of tribesmen might be lying hidden behind the crests. Possibly the Ghilzais expected that only cavalry were again about to pay them a visit, and were emboldened to come to the lower levels. As soon as the advanced company of the Highlanders appeared on the road, the “enemy,” if fifty are worthy of the name, drew off hurriedly to the highest hill, a couple of miles distant, and watched our movements. General Baker directed one company of the 92nd to advance in skirmishing order, and occupy a rocky hill overlooking Bahadur Khan’s fort, and commanding it at 700 or 800 yards, and sent a company of Sikhs round to the north, with orders to drive out any men who might be occupying the lower hills. It was soon seen that the place was quite deserted, and not a shot was fired from any of the hills. The whole valley lay before us dotted over with fortified homesteads, surrounded by grain-fields already green with sprouting corn. It seemed wonderfully fertile, and extended over many square miles; other and smaller valleys penetrating between the hills wherever there was a break in their continuous line. The exact extent of these minor valleys could not be estimated, but native report stated that the fertility was equal to that of the rich plain stretching away to the north-west for five or six miles. When it was seen that no opposition was to be offered, the Sikhs doubled down upon the fort from the low hills above it, and at the same time another company raced across the fields from the southern entrance to the valley, all being anxious to be in “at the loot.” It was a pretty sight watching the sepoys doubling along and spreading out as the fort and the village near it were gained. Clouds of dust with the gleam of lance-heads shining out soon arose further to the left in the heart of the valley, showing where the cavalry were galloping off to more distant homesteads. All Bahadur Khan’s villages, some ten in number, were marked down to be looted and burnt, and Sikhs and sowars were quickly engaged in the work. The houses were found stored with bhoosa, straw, firewood, and twigs for the winter as well as a small quantity of corn, and as there was not time to clear this out, and we could not afford to leave a force for the night in such a dangerous position so near to the hills, orders were given to fire the villages and destroy the houses and their contents. No better men than Sikhs could he found for such work, and in a few minutes Bahadur Khan’s villages were in flames, and volumes of dense black smoke pouring over the valley, a high wind aiding the fire with frantic earnestness. The villagers had carried off all their portable property, not even a charpoy remaining, but the Sikhs ransacked every place for hidden treasure, and smashed down the earthen corn-bins in hope of gaining a prize. These corn-bins seemed quite a feature of every house. They are three or four feet square and made of sun-dried clay, often fancifully ornamented with scroll-work. They stand on a raised platform in the living-room, and have near the bottom a small hole in which a piece of rag is stuffed. This answers to the tap of a barrel, for when the rag is withdrawn the grain pours out, and the daily supply can he drawn just as we would draw a tankard of beer in an English farm-house. Indian corn, from which rich chupaties (unleavened cakes) are made, is chiefly stored in this way, and near the bins stand the grinding-stones, at which the women of the house prepare the flour for the household. Generally an adjoining room is turned into a kitchen, the earthen floor being skilfully burrowed to form ovens, and round holes cut out on which to place the dekchies which serve for Afghan pots and kettles. Such of the rooms as I went into were dark and dirty enough, small square holes in the walls serving as windows, and the roofs being made up of thick logs laid a foot apart, and covered over with twigs, on which a foot of mud had been plastered. The Sikhs fired house after house, and every room was soon converted into a huge reverberating furnace, the fire having no means of escape through the roofs, which were very strong. Nearly all the houses were two-storied, with narrow wooden or mud staircases, and many a sepoy in his haste first fired the lower rooms, stored with wood or bhoosa, and then rushed upstairs intent on loot, soon to be driven down again by the smoke and flames from below. The search after household goods was varied by exciting chases after the fowls, ducks, and donkeys of the village. Sikhs and kahars, who had come up with the dandies (stretchers for wounded men), scrambled over housetops, and through blinding smoke, to capture the dearly-prized moorgie, while below an unoffending donkey would be chased frantically round awkward corners and over frozen watercourses, where pursuers and pursued alike came to grief. A donkey when captured was laden with such little loot as the men thought worth while carrying off. Each fowl had its neck wrung on the spot, was thrown into a convenient bit of fire in some blazing house, and having been singed clean of its feathers, was cooked in a few minutes, and eaten with infinite enjoyment. The cavalry were fortunate enough to secure fifty sheep and a few cows, which were driven to camp. After two or three hours had been spent in firing the various villages owned by Bahadur Khan, the order to fall in for the homeward march was given, and leaving the valley draped in smoke and the fire still working its will, the troops filed off for Maidan. They reached camp by evening, having marched seventeen miles over difficult ground and through half-frozen streams without mishap. As the rear-guard left, a few men appeared on the heights of the north and fired a few shots at long ranges, but these were merely in bravado.[[27]] We could learn nothing of the body of tribesmen and the 200 sepoys, and it is believed they have dispersed. The punishment of Bahadur Khan will have a great effect upon the whole district of Maidan, as it will show the maliks that they are not safe from our troops even in their most obscure valleys. General Baker remains in the neighbourhood of Maidan until next week, all the available transport animals from Sherpur being now engaged in carrying to our cantonments the large quantities of corn and bhoosa collected. Our winter supply of forage seems likely to be assured.