On leaving Lahore Burnes received this salutary advice from M. Court, packed in a French proverb, "Si tu veux vivre en paix en voyageant, fais en sorte de hurler comme les loups avec qui tu te trouves." And he set himself to conform to this text (and to the excellent sermon which accompanied it) with a determination which undoubtedly served as the foundation of his remarkable success as a traveller. It cannot be too often insisted that the experiences of intelligent and cultivated Europeans in the days of close association with the Asiatic led to an appreciation of native character and to an intimacy with native methods, which is only to be found in India now amongst missionaries and police officers, if it is to be found at all. But even with all the advantages possessed by such experiences as those of Burnes and of the intrepid school of Asiatic travellers of his time, it required an intuitive discernment almost amounting to genius to detect the motive springs of Eastern political action.
It may be doubted (as Masson doubted) whether to the day of his death Burnes himself quite understood either the Afghan or the Sikh. But he vigorously conformed to native usages in all outward show: "We threw away all our European clothes and adopted without reserve the costume of the Asiatic. We gave away our tents, beds, and boxes, and broke our tables and chairs—a blanket serves to cover the saddle and to sleep under.... The greater portion of my now limited wardrobe found a place in the 'kurjin.' A single mule carried the whole of the baggage." Armed with letters of introduction from a holy man (Fazl Haq), who boasted a horde of disciples in Bokhara, and with all the graceful good wishes which an Afghan potentate knows how to bestow, Burnes left Peshawar and the two Afghan sirdars, and started for Kabul. It is instructive to note that he avoided the Khaibar route, which had an evil reputation.
It would be interesting to trace Burnes' route from Peshawar to Bokhara, via Kabul and Bamian, were it not that we are dealing with ground already sufficiently well discussed in these pages. Moreover, Burnes travelled to Kabul in company which permitted him to make little or no use of his opportunities for original geographical research. After he left Kabul the vicissitudes and difficulties that beset him were only such as might be experienced by any recognised official political mission, and he experienced none of the vexatious opposition and delay which was so fatal to Moorcroft. En route he passed through Bamian, Haibak, Khulm, and Balkh; he visited Kunduz, and identified the tomb of Trebeck at Mazar; and by the light of a brilliant moon he stood by the grave of Moorcroft, which he found under a wall outside the city, apart from the Mussulman cemeteries. The three days passed at Balkh were assiduously employed in local investigation and the collection of coins and relics. He found coins, or tokens, dating from early Persian occupation to the Mogul dynasties, and he notes the size of the bricks and their shape, which he describes as oblong approaching to square; but he mentions no inscriptions.
At this time Balkh was in the hands of the Bokhara chief, and Burnes was already in Bokhara territory. The journey across the plains to the Oxus was made on camels, Burnes being seated in a kajawa, and balancing his servant on the other side. It was slow, but it gave him the opportunity of overlooking the broad Oxus plain and noting the general accuracy of the description given of it by Quintus Curtius. As they approached the Oxus it was found necessary to employ a Turkman guard. Burnes does not say from what Turkman tribe his guard was taken, but from his description of them, their dress, equipment, and steeds, they were clearly men of the same Ersari tribe that was found fifty years later in the same neighbourhood by the Russo-Afghan Boundary Commission. "They rode good horses and were armed with a sword and long spear. They were not encumbered with shields and powder-horns like other Asiatics, and only a few had matchlocks.... They never use more than a single rein, which sets off their horses to advantage."
On the banks of the river they halted near the small village of Khwaja Salar. This was the same place evidently that Moorcroft visited, and which he described as destroyed in a raid; and it was here that Burnes made use of the peculiar horse-drawn ferry which has already been described. Fifty years later the ferry was at Kilif, and nothing was to be found of the "village" of Khwaja Salar. Burnes' astonishment at the quaint, but most efficient, method of utilizing the power of swimming horses to haul the great ferry-boats has been shared by every one who has seen them since; but he noted a fact which has not been observed by other travellers, viz. that any horse was taken for the purpose, no matter whether trained or not; and he states that the horses were yoked to the boat by a rope fixed to the hair of the mane. If so, this method was improved on during the next half-century, for the rope is now attached to a surcingle. "One of the boats was dragged over by two of our jaded ponies; and the vessel which attempted to follow us without them was carried so far down the stream as to detain us a whole day on the banks till it could be brought up to the camp of our caravan." The river at this point is about 800 yards wide, and runs at the rate of three to four miles an hour. The crossing was effected in fifteen minutes. Burnes adds: "I see nothing to prevent the general adoption of this expeditious mode of crossing a river.... I had never before seen the horse converted to such a use; and in my travels through India I had always considered that noble animal as a great encumbrance in crossing a river." And yet after two centuries of military training in the plains of India, we English have not yet arrived at this economical use of this great motive power always at our command in a campaign!
After passing the Oxus the chief interest of Burnes' story commences. His life at Bokhara and his subsequent journey through the Turkman deserts to Persia form a record which, combined with his own physical capability, his energy, and his unfailing tact, good humour, and modesty, stamp him as one of the greatest of English travellers. His name has its own high place in geographical annals. We shall never cease to admire the traveller, whatever we may think of the diplomat. But once over the Oxus his story hardly concerns the gates of India. He was beyond them, he had passed through, and was now on the far landward side, still on a road to India; but it is a road over which it no longer concerns us to follow him.
CHAPTER XV
THE GATES OF GHAZNI—VIGNE
Amongst original explorers of Afghanistan place must be found for G. T. Vigne, who made in 1836 a venturesome, and, as it proved, a most successful exploration of the Gomul route from the Indus to Ghazni. Vigne was not a professional geographer so much as a botanist and geologist, and the value of his work lies chiefly in the results of his researches in those two branches of science, although he has left on record a map of his journey which quite sufficiently illustrates his route. He had previously visited Ladak (Little Tibet) and Kashmir, and had made passing acquaintance with the Chief of the Punjab, Ranjit Singh, in whose service foreigners found honourable employment. Masson was in the field at the same time as Vigne, and the success of his antiquarian researches in Northern Afghanistan, as well as those of Honigberger and other archæologists during the time that Dost Mahomed ruled in Kabul, and whilst the Amir's brother, Jabar Khan, befriended Europeans, indicated a very different political atmosphere from that which has subsequently clouded the Afghan horizon, so far as European travellers are concerned.
Vigne found no difficulty whatever in passing through Punjab territory to the Indus Valley near Dera Ismail Khan, where he joined a Lohani khafila which was making its annual journey to Ghazni with a valuable stock of merchandise consisting chiefly of English goods. In the genial month of May the khafila left Draband and took the world-old Gomul route through the frontier hills to the central uplands of Afghanistan. The heat must have been awful, and as Vigne lived the life of the Lohani merchants, and shared their primitive shelter from day to day, it is not surprising that we find him complaining gently of the climate. The Lohanis treated him with the utmost kindness and consideration from first to last; and the story of his travels is in pleasing contrast to the tale told by Masson about the same time, of his adventures on the Kandahar side. This was due chiefly, no doubt, to Vigne's success as a doctor. It is always the doctors who make the best way amongst uncivilized peoples, and India especially (or rather the British Raj in India) owes almost as much to doctors as to politicians. There is also a fellow-feeling which binds together travellers of all sorts and conditions when bound for the same bourne, taking together the same risks, experiencing the same trials and difficulties, and enjoying unrestrained intercourse. This kind of fellowship is world wide. One can trace a genial spirit of camaraderie pervading the wanderings of Chinese pilgrims, the tracks of mediæval Arab merchants, the ways of modern missionaries, or the ocean paths of sailors. Once on the move, with the sweet influences of primitive nature pervading earth and air around, we may find, even in these days, that the Afghan becomes quite a sociable companion, and that he is to be trusted so far as he gives his word.