The Ark-i-nao, or new citadel, serves as a parade-ground for the garrison. Weak both in plan and profile, it is constructed in advance of the mound, but 80 feet below it and upon a level with the country. It consists of 4 straight walls 300 yards in length. The face is flanked by 5 semi-circular towers, each possessing a diameter of 30 feet. The walls are 13 feet thick at the base and 8 feet at the top, crowned on their outer edge by a parapet 6 feet high and 1½ feet thick. There was once a ditch 30 feet in width and 15 feet in depth at a distance of 60 feet from its base, but it is now a general receptacle for the refuse of the city.
HERAT CITADEL
Within recent years the fortifications of Herat have undergone radical alteration. At one time, prior to the Pendjeh crisis, the city could not be said to possess an esplanade nor any free field of fire. Detached buildings, even small villages, surrounded it, while cultivation extended close to the walls; and where agriculture ended the cemeteries of the city began. Mosques, tombs and reservoirs stood opposite the gateways, some of them lying within 100 yards of the walls. Vast mounds of earth were also close at hand. Many of these defects were removed[13] under the guidance of the British officers who were assisting in the demarcation of the Russo-Afghan boundary in 1884-87; in 1903-04, under the supervision of Feramorz Khan, additional improvements were made and a number of mountain and field batteries installed.
In general the Herati is not a fighting man and cares little for military appearances. Indeed, if choice were left to the Heratis they would sooner surrender at once to the Russians than run the risk of future disturbances. The garrison is not generally drawn from the locality and seldom includes many Herati, Hazara or Taimani recruits. Commanded by Feramorz Khan, it is composed mainly of regiments from Kandahar and Kabul, whose men lounge through the streets in unkempt undress or clad in dirty linen and to whom belongs such little martial spirit as may be detected in the city. In this direction nothing can be more marked than the difference between the Herati and the Afghan soldier. The former, a peasant pure and simple, is unversed in military science, while it is a rare sight to see the soldiers without an extraordinary number and variety of weapons attached to their persons. Each carries, as a rule, two pistols, a sword, rifle and many knives, their swagger and overbearing disposition causing them to be hated by the wretched population. The position of the city to-day as between Russia and India is rather that of a woman whose wares are put up to the highest bidder. It is not particularly partial to the rule of the Amir, to the overtures of Russia or to the influence of India. One might say that it were indifferent alike to each of these three interested parties and that it is merely a question of price which will determine its surrender. It must be confessed that the fortress occupies an unfortunate position. Whatever the garrison might attempt in support of the huge earthworks which the place boasts, there is no doubt that the sympathies of the population—if the history of the past goes for anything—would be given to any who contrived to evict the Afghans; and, as all reports concur in alluding to the lavish manner in which Russian roubles have circulated in the province, the statement may be hazarded that, under certain contingencies, the tribes on the north-western border of Afghanistan would declare for the Russians. Upon this aspect of the situation various changes introduced by the Amir into the administration of Herat province, and concerning equally all posts along the banks of the Oxus and the western border, have direct bearing. Although there is practically no intercourse between the Afghan and Russian posts on either bank of the Amu Daria, indeed the ferry station at Chushka Guzar is constantly sniped from the Afghan bank by Pathan pickets, there has been an insidious growth of association between the Herat officials and the Russians. Quite lately the Kazi Saad-ud-Din, Governor of Herat, was recalled, the Shahgassi Mahomed Sarwar Khan taking his place, while a warning was administered to the commander-in-chief. There is no doubt that these officials accepted complimentary gifts from the Russian officials at Merv, and the transference of the one and the rebuke of the other may check the propensity of the native to find in the efficacious application of the Russian rouble a panacea for all evils. In respect of the soldiers themselves, orders have been issued from Kabul that all detachments on frontier duty are to be relieved monthly. Obviously Herat is too close to the Russian border not to have been intimidated by the spectacle of Russia’s strength in Central Asia. A similar state of things might not be expected to prevail in Kabul and Kandahar. Kabul is too much under the personal sway of the Amir to express any active interest in Russia or India, while Kandahar has been associated too closely with the reverses which British arms have experienced in Afghanistan to have over much respect for the greatness of Hindustan. Russia is really the supreme and dominating factor in Afghanistan, not only along the northern, eastern and western frontiers, but throughout the kingdom.
KITCHEN IN NATIVE HOUSE
Herat is a dirty town. The small lanes, crooked and narrow which branch from the main thoroughfares, are roofed and their gloom offers safe harbourage for the perpetration of every possible offence. The breadth of the streets is only 12 feet, but in their narrowest parts even this space is reduced. Pools of stagnant water left by the rains, piles of refuse thrown from the houses, together with dead cats, dogs and the excrement of human beings, mingle their effluvia in these low tunnels. Much of the city has been abandoned and various travellers, in reporting their experiences, agree that the bazaars are of a very inferior order. On either side of the streets there are spacious serais where the merchants have their depôts. The western face of the city is the least populated, the buildings in this quarter being a mass of ruins. The houses are constructed usually in the form of hollow squares. They are commonly of one storey, built of brick and mud, with very thick walls. The roofs are vaulted and composed, equally with the walls, of mud; the entrances are low and winding. These houses are quite incombustible. The larger establishments have stable and servants’ courts attached to them, and every courtyard has, in its centre, a well or small reservoir for the reception of water. All the houses are more or less capable of resisting men armed with rifles, and a determined garrison might, by barricading the streets leading to the ramparts and loopholing the adjacent houses, protract the defence of the place for some time after the walls had been gained by the enemy. There are several spacious caravansaries in the town, all of which open upon the street leading from the Kandahar Gate to the citadel and would serve, in emergency, for the accommodation of troops. At the time of Connolly there were: