Read Ebook: Under the absolute Amir by Martin Frank A

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Ebook has 815 lines and 93983 words, and 17 pages

PAGE

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 1

The Mihman khana or Guest-house--Description of hamams --Description of people met with on roads and streets--Amir Abdur Rahman--Description of palace and audience chamber, and his reception of me--Situation of Kabul and description of country around--Kabul city, its bazars, streets, and filth--Water-supply and drainage systems--Sanitary arrangements--Pariah dogs and crows scavenging city 33

How streets are governed--City magistrate--Robberies and murders--Bazar shops--Style of palaces and better-class houses--Climate of Kabul 47

Belief in the supernatural--Dress of men--Complexion--Character of people--Description of various tribes--Languages and schools--Feuds between families--How holidays are spent by the people--Singing and musical instruments--Games and amusements 58

Superstitions, fairies, and devils--A curious legend--Astrologers--Children singing prayers on roofs to avert calamity--Different foods in use--Smoking and tobacco--The Amir's chief physician--Snuff--Method of keeping warm in winter--How time is kept--Weddings of different classes--Funerals 78

Form of government--Abuse of authority--Amir's food and drinking water and taster--Soldiers and horses always ready for flight--Amir's habits--Amir's amusements, attendants, etc.--Amir's feelings towards England--Amir's views on Afridi rising and Boer War--Amir's stratagem 98

Amir's sons and his treatment of them--Princes and their duties and durbars--Food supplied by Government to members of royal family--How officials are paid--Civil and Military titles--Court life and officials--Law courts--Amir's lingering illness, death, and burial--Rumours of rising--Fears of populace--Burial of household treasures--Plots to get body--Coronation of Amir Habibullah--New Amir's promises of Reform--Amusements 120

Kotwal and Kotwali --Policemen as thieves--Description of prisons--Description of how prisoners are treated and their irons--The old well in Bala Hisar--The spy system--Cutting a man's throat--False reporting--Fanah tortures 142

Amir's iron rule--Hanging by hair and skinning alive--Beating to death with sticks--Cutting men in pieces--Throwing down mountain-side--Starving to death in cages--Boiling woman to soup and man drinking it before execution--Punishment by exposure and starvation--Scaffold scenes--Burying alive--Throwing into soap boilers--Cutting off hands--Blinding--Tying to bent trees and disrupting--Blowing from guns--Hanging, etc. 157

Life in Kabul--Houses and gardens--Guards and danger from "Ghazis"-- Allowances given wives--Servants and swindling 173

Lawlessness--Food: Raising cattle, sheep, fowls, etc.--Presents from princes and others--Famines in Kabul--Cholera--Moullah's pilgrimage and preaching--Use of roofs of houses--Work and working hours--Amusements--Hindu dealers and old curios--Festival visits to Amir and princes--Europeans tried by jury--Letters, cost of postage--Interpreters 192

Clothing--Reviews--Drill--Uniforms of Amir's bodyguard--Arms--Pay--Medals--Length of service--Substitutes--Barracks--Mode of life--Gambling among soldiers--Different tribes forming regiments--Thief tribe and regiment--Officers and promotion--Bands--Afghan anecdotes of incidents during war, 1879-81--Afghan army as a fighting machine--Condition of country for warfare--Illustration of one side of Afghan character 213

Amir's interest in mechanical tools, guns, etc.--Workshops--Consumption of fuel--Ustads and workmen--Pay of men--Trades, shopkeepers, and merchants--Produce of country--Exports and imports--Irrigation of crops and fights about water--Caravans and methods of carrying freight--Weights and measures--Mirzas and offices--Debt collecting--Hindoos and Hindoo money-lenders--Mint and coinage of country 229

Kabul valley once crater of volcano--Earthquakes--Kabul once a large lake--Mines outcropping, gold, lead, copper, coal, etc.--Rivers, and gold in them--Existence of kept secret for fear of trouble--Turkestan mines--The question of fuel for Kabul workshops--Local supply exhausted--Coal under the valley of Kabul 254

Suni and Shiah--Moullahs and their influence on the people--Jihads or holy wars--The Koran--Late Amir's distrust of Moullahs--Holy men, fakirs, and holy graves--Madmen and reverence paid them as God-stricken--Sayid and Hafiz--Beggars and alms--Stoning to death for religious offences--Prayers--Punishments for not knowing prayers--Musjids--Ramazan and fastings--Haj--Afghan colony in Australia--Lawful and unlawful food--Plurality of wives 266

Amir's policy in killing off leading men of country to ensure his son's reign--Dwindling revenue--Why Amir could not meet Lord Curzon in India--Russian encroachment on frontier--Russian influence in Kabul--Afghanistan a menace to Russian approach towards India--Afghan rule cheapest means of keeping unruly tribes in order--Policy to keep the Afghans well armed--Sympathy with English justice and government--Influence of British Agent on the people--Why railways are not wanted in Afghanistan--Reason rich mines are left unworked--Seaboard wanted by Amir on Beloochistan coast--Internal policy of Amir Abdur Rahman 289

Difficulty of getting permission to enter Afghanistan and to leave it--Description of country passed through--Camping-places on way down and distances--Description of Jelalabad City--Usbeg horseback game of Buz-bazee--Kabul river at Jelalabad and beyond--The musak--Summer heat--The last day's journey 308

TO FACE PAGE

THE SHAHZADA ON THE MARCH FROM KANDAHAR TO KABUL 8

SIRDAR MAHOMED OMAR KHAN AND STAFF 24

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN IN EVERYDAY DURBAR. SIRDAR HABIBULLAH SITTING WITH HIM 40

THE MIHMAN KHANA , KABUL 48

PORTION OF GARDEN ATTACHED TO MY HOUSE--SAINT'S GRAVE IN THE CORNER OF GARDEN 48

GROUP OF AFGHAN GUARDS AND SERVANTS--TAKEN IN COMPOUND OF MY HOUSE--KITCHEN AT THE BACK 80

MARRIAGE PARTY OF THE "UPPER TEN." BRIDE AND WAITING-WOMEN CARRIED IN LITTERS 88

MARRIAGE PARTY OF POORER CLASS--BRIDEGROOM AND BRIDE FOLLOWED BY GIRL CARRYING THE BRIDE'S CLOTHES 96

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN AND OFFICIALS AT DINNER 104

PRINCE INIATULLAH--ELDEST SON OF AMIR HABIBULLAH KHAN--AND STAFF 120

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN KHAN 128

KABULI WOMAN'S INDOOR DRESS 200

NEW PORTION OF KABUL WORKSHOPS, WITH THE SIRDAR'S BUNGALOW AND OFFICE IN CENTRE 232

SOLDIERS ON GUARD IN GARDEN OUTSIDE THE KABUL WORKSHOPS EATING FOOD 240

GROUP OF KABUL MIRZAS 248

THE SERAI AT JAGDALAK, ON THE ROAD FROM KABUL TO PESHAWAR 312

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

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.

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.

In front of the Shahzada were two long lines, wide apart, of Usbeg Lancers. At an interval on either side of him, and following the Usbegs, were two other lines of the bodyguard, the Rissalah Shahi, armed with sword and carbine, and better uniformed than the others, and following these were troops of sowars who were roughly dressed and wild-looking, though not so wild-looking as the Usbegs with their sheepskin busbies, the hair of which falls about their faces and makes them look wilder than nature made them. The sowars' mode of keeping line would, perhaps, have offended a military eye, but they nevertheless looked very serviceable in case of need.

Before all rode a man with a native drum strapped to the saddle in front of him, which he kept continuously tapping in time to his horse's hoof beats; this is the custom used to signify the approach of a royal personage when travelling.

Beside the prince ran a man carrying a huge gold embroidered umbrella, as a protection from the scorching rays of the sun, and around him were syces and foot guards, while a little in front were other syces leading spare horses. Behind rode attendants and the Khans and chiefs who were accompanying him, and I rode with these and knew what it was like to ride in a cloud of dust which caked the perspiration on one's face and was so dense that the horses stumbled over stones in the road they were unable to see.

Along the track, and stretching away into the distance, both before and behind, were strings of camels and pack-horses, each with its own dust-cloud and accompanied by their drivers, who were on foot. These carried the tents and baggage of this small army, and with each string of animals was a sowar, or trooper, whose duty it was to see that there was no undue delay on the road and to ensure the full load reaching the next camp, for most of the pack animals were the property of men who make a trade of carrying goods, and these men are not averse to making a little extra profit when opportunity offers.

It was with a feeling of thankfulness that I heard the prince order a halt for tea soon after midday, for my mouth was parched with heat and dust. We all dismounted by the side of a hillock, and seated ourselves on the stones and rocks round about while tea was prepared; excepting, of course, attendants and soldiers, who are not supposed to feel fatigue. After drinking tea the prince offered me a cigarette, and I may mention that he showed me many courtesies and kindnesses on the journey and ordered fur-lined overcoats to be made for me by his tailors, saying that English coats were unsuitable for the extreme cold we should afterwards experience, and I appreciated his thoughtfulness in this very thoroughly afterwards. The Shahzada was a different being in his own country, not at all like the Afghan Prince in London.

After a short rest the march was resumed and continued until camp was reached. The afternoon's ride was more pleasant, for the heat was less, and, the track running over harder ground, the dust was not quite so much in evidence.

At all of the villages we passed the inhabitants were crowded outside the walls to see the Shahzada and his people, while the head men of the village stood in front of the others, and, as the prince came up, took off their turbans with both hands, and prayed for him and his safe journey. Outside most of the villages long poles were fixed in the ground on either side of the track, with a string stretching across from top to top, and from the centre of the string the Koran was suspended, wrapped in cloths. The prince and his followers, when passing under the Koran, stretched up their right hands and touched it, and then with that hand touched each of their eyes, their mouths, and hearts, saying a short prayer the while. After this the Shahzada would stop for a time and talk with the head men of the village, and then ride on. Two or three bands accompanied the party, and on the prince's arrival at each camping-ground they played the royal salute as he rode in . At each camp also a large shamiana was ready, and there he would hold durbar, which all the chief men of the country round about attended, either to salaam the prince or to receive payment for the provisions and forage supplied to the men sent on in advance to prepare everything against his coming.

At many of the places stopped at were men who had come to meet those friends or relations who had been to England, but it was at Chaman that the Afghans first got news of their relatives. When first meeting a friend they embrace three times, first to the right, then to the left, and then to the right again, after which streams of question and answer follow. It was touching to see the eager questions after the triple embrace, and to see some turn away crying, possibly at the news of the death of a relative, or it may have been that they were overcome at meeting with friend or relative.

While superintending the unloading of baggage from the goods train at the Chaman terminus, before crossing the frontier, I noticed the Kotwal, one of the prince's staff who accompanied him on his visit to England, sitting on some boxes and looking very glum. He knew sufficient Urdu to carry on a conversation, and so I asked what troubled him. He sighed, and said that he had just heard that his brother in Kabul had been made prisoner, and now his own enemies--may their fathers be cursed!--had taken advantage of his brother's downfall to poison the Amir's mind against him, and he was told that if he returned to Kabul it was probable the Amir would kill him. So he had thought it over, and concluded that it was better he should go back to Karachi and stay there with some friends until he could return with safety, and he asked me to help him in getting away by the next train.

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