Taking all these circumstances into consideration, this campaign, in an abstract military point of view, has thus far turned out more fortunately, and with less and feebler opposition from the enemy, than the most sanguine of its instigators or conductors could reasonably have anticipated.
Politically, I shall not discuss the subject, because I could never perceive one sound reason for taking the haphazard and unprofitable tour.
On advancing towards the position lately occupied by Dost Mahomed, nearly the whole line of march was flanked by troops of the deposed monarch. Many of them were well mounted, and all well armed, although little uniformity was maintained in dress or weapons.
Some wore steel caps and gauntlets, chain-armour variously wrought, and light, neatly-finished cimeters, which bore a remarkably keen edge, owing to the hardness of the material; others were clad in padded cotton or silk dresses, of every variety of colour, the head being covered by turbans of thick and embroidered Cashmere, or plain white muslin. They carried over their shoulders long matchlocks, inlaid with silver or ivory.
The Kuzzilbashes, or Persian mercenaries, were the only troops amongst whom prevailed any uniformity, and they were generally distinguished by a high, black, sheepskin cap, with a small red cloth top, and a sort of frock dress, generally white, which reached to the knees, opening in four places from the waist. Light deerskin boots, fitting closely to the leg, completed this plain and serviceable costume.
Amongst the cavalry were certainly some of the handsomest and most powerful-looking fellows I ever saw; the complexions of many were fairer than those of some of our own sunburnt veterans; and amongst them, also, were some of the dirtiest, long-bearded, ferocious-looking savages I had hitherto seen: men who would doubtless have taken no small pleasure in carving and dissecting any luckless straggler from our camp whom they might happen to meet singly and unarmed. The descriptions I have read of the Huns and Goths who overran the Roman empire in the fifth century, forcibly occurred to me as I marked their personification on each side of the road, unaltered and unimproved by a lapse of fourteen centuries; while the western emigrants have progressed to a state of civilization and intelligence, having subverted nations and monarchies in their resistless course.
As we surmounted the hill near Urghundee, which is flanked by dark lofty mountains, without a trace of vegetation, the peaks of the Hindoo Koosh were visible, glittering in the morning sun from their snowy summits. The intervening country, to the foot of this mighty barrier of Afghanistan, presented a most unattractive appearance: an undulating, rocky soil, with a few patches of short dry grass, extended apparently a great portion of the way towards their foot.
The guns remained in the same position in which they had been left by Dost Mahomed, on high ground, and were ranged to command a gorge from which our army issued. The ground, in front and rear, was flat and favourable for cavalry, in which his principal strength consisted. All that was requisite for the fray was a little more heart and less distrust.
FOOTNOTES:
[31] The Zenana is the sanctum allotted to the ladies.