To Herat and Cabul: A Story of the First Afghan War

by G. A. Henty

As Lieutenant Pottinger's gallant defence of Herat was the theme of general admiration throughout India, Angus could not have had a better introduction, and he was warmly received by the three officers, who at once took him away with them.

"You will share my tent with me," Lieutenant Macgregor said. "I am alone at present. You have a horse, of course, and a servant, I suppose?"

"I have a very fair horse, and an excellent servant, who is a young fellow, a Persian, the son of a door-keeper at the embassy. He was with me through the siege, and I found him invaluable. He is a strong fellow, and has plenty of courage and shrewdness; I should never have got away out of Candahar had it not been for his assistance.

"Sir Alexander has advised me to get an Eastern dress, as I cannot wear uniform; and I must see about that at once, for this Persian dress would in any case have been out of place, and my journey down the Bolan has ruined it altogether. But in the first place, I shall be obliged if you will tell me where my two horses are to be put up."

"Your horse will be picketed with ours in our tents; our servants' horses are in the line behind them. Is that your man over there with the two horses? I will send an orderly to tell him to take them over and picket them. Now, I suppose you want something to eat? We had tiffin an hour ago, but the servants can get something for you."

"Thank you; I will go down into the town. I had something before mounting this morning, and I own I should not care about going into the mess-tent till I have got something to wear a little more respectable than these clothes."

"Oh, that is nonsense. Besides, you need not go into the mess-tent. I will order them to warm something up at once, and to bring it into my tent. We are all wanting to hear more about Herat. The official despatches only give us bare facts."

For the next two hours Angus was fully occupied in relating his experiences of the siege to the three officers; after that he went down with Azim to the town. There he bought for himself a dress such as would be worn by a native of some rank—a white turban, a blue tunic opening at the breast and showing a white cambric shirt, several white robes, and loose white linen trousers tightened in at the ankle. He bought a good supply of under-linen and a couple of pairs of native riding-boots. For Azim he bought clothes appropriate to a retainer of a Mohammedan gentleman. As he was unable to procure a camp bed of European make, he bought a native charpoy, which could be taken to pieces and conveniently carried. He had found that his fellow-officers had each three native servants—a butler or body servant, a syce for their riding horses, and a man who looked after and led on the line of march two baggage animals. He had no difficulty in engaging a syce, and let the question of the baggage animals stand over until next day.

Azim would, of course, act as his personal servant. The lad, who had during the past year become imbued with the spirit of adventure, was delighted to hear that his master was to accompany the army. He had, during his stay in Herat, picked up the language, and could converse in it as fluently as Angus himself was able to do; and although he had no pleasant recollections of the journey from Candahar, he felt sure that it would be a very different affair when accompanying a British army. He expressed as much to his master, who said:

"I should not make so sure of that, Azim. We had no great difficulty in obtaining provisions for ourselves, but it will be a very different thing with an army of thousands of men, with an even larger number of camp followers and five or six thousand camels. Except just round one of those little villages, we did not see a blade of grass from the time we left the Shawl valley, and how the animals will exist till we get up to Quettah I have no idea. Once there no doubt we shall do fairly well, but we shall have a very bad time on the journey, unless I am mistaken. If I had the management of affairs, I should send off at once the whole of the camels with a sufficient escort as far as Dadur. There they should leave the provisions and forage they took up, and return here to accompany the army with a further supply. No doubt it would cause a month's delay, but it would be better to do that than to lose half our baggage animals and to risk famine for the troops."