Transcriber’s Note: The final illustration was originally described as “The Serai at Ingdalak”, a place which does not exist. A few other minor typographical errors were also corrected.
UNDER THE ABSOLUTE AMIR
CHAPTER I
ON THE ROAD
Order of march—Soldiers and guards—Method of carrying goods by pack animals—Description of camps—Marches—Welcome given to Sirdar Nasrullah at villages and cities—Description of country passed through—Kandahar—Amir and the moullah who took refuge in the Kandahar Sanctuary.
In the summer of 1895 the Afghan prince, Shahzada Nasrullah Khan, was the guest of the English Government for three or four months, and he had been entertained and fêted and generally made much of while his visit lasted, and his return journey had been made pleasant by a stay in Paris, Rome, and Naples before going on by sea to Karachi and thence by rail to Chaman, the railway terminus close to the Afghan frontier on the Quetta side of Beloochistan.
The Shahzada was met and entertained at the railway terminus by General Sir J. Brown, commanding the Quetta district, with other officers and officials, and afterwards rode on to his camp across the border, where he was joined by a multitude of troops and followers, who had been sent by the Amir to accompany him on his further journey.
I had accompanied the Shahzada, as he was commonly called in England, on his return from London, and rode with him through Kandahar to Kabul, and when he set out from his camp early the following day I formed one of his retinue. It was near the end of October and late in the season, but the day we started was a very hot one, and grew hotter as we went on, and the multitude of horsemen who accompanied the prince caused clouds of dust to rise as they rode along and made it still more sultry and oppressive.
The country looked very desolate and inhospitable, for on all sides stretched a large undulating sandy plain, bare of vegetation, save a few tufts of coarse grass here and there, and rocks jutting out of the plain in places, while in the distance were bare foot-hills and barren rocky mountains, and over all the sun threw its burning rays until the sand and rocks seemed to give out as much heat as the sun itself. There is no made road from Chaman to Kandahar, nothing but a track worn into the earth by the passing of caravans from time immemorial, and at places on the side of the track were the bones of horses and camels whitening where they had fallen. The prince and his retinue, however, rode along cheerfully, for they had returned safely through all the dangers of foreign travel and had many tales of strange lands and stranger customs to tell their relations and friends when they got to Kabul, and had brought with them finely wrought produce of these lands to make presents of and to trade with and reap much profit.