POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS.-The political institutions of the Afghans present the rude and disjointed materials of a free constitution. The nation is theoretically divided into four great stocks, supposed to spring from four brothers. But these four divisions are practically obsolete, and only come up in genealogies. Each tribe has split into several branches, and in the more numerous and scattered tribes these branches have separated, and each has its own chief. They retain, however, the common name, and an idea of community in blood and interests.

The type of the Afghan institutions is perhaps best seen in some of the independent tribes near the British frontier. These cling most closely to the democratic traditions. Their rude state of society is held together by a code as rude, which is acknowledged, however, and understood by every one, and enforced by the community, every member of which considers its infringement as an act committed against his own privileges. The Maliks or chiefs are the representatives of the tribe, division, or family to which they each belong, but they possess no independent power of action, and before they can speak in council, they must have collected the wishes of the bodies which they represent. The men of the section (kandi) of a village, having come to a decision, send their representative to a council of the whole village, and these again to that of the sept (khail), | and the appointed chiefs of the septs finally assemble as the council of the úlûs or tribe. These meetings, in all their stages, are apt to be stormy. If persuasion and argument fail to produce unanimity, no further steps can be taken, unless one party be much the weaker, when sometimes the stronger side will forcibly extort assent. When once a council has decided, implicit compliance is incumbent on the tribe under heavy penalties, and the maliks have the power of enforcing these.

Justice is administered in the towns, more or less defectively, according to Mahommedan law, by a kâzi and muftis. But the unwritten code by which Afghan communities in their typical state are guided, and the maxims of which penetrate the whole nation, is the Pukhtûnwali, or usage of the Pathans, a rude system of customary law, founded on principles such as one might suppose to have prevailed before the institution of civil government.1

A prominent law in this code is that called Nanawatai, or "entering in." By this law the Pathan is bound to grant any boon claimed by the person who passes his threshold and invokes its sanctions, even at the sacrifice of his own life and property. So also the Pathan is bound to feed and shelter any traveller claiming hospitality. Retaliation must be exacted by the Pathan for every injury or insult, and for the life of a kinsman. If immediate opportunity fail, a man will dodge his foe for years, with the cruel purpose ever uppermost, using every treacherous artifice to entrap him. To omit such obligations, above all the vendetta, exposes the Pathan to scorn. The injuries of one generation may be avenged in the next, or even by remoter posterity. The relatives of a murdered man may, however, before the tribal council, accept a blood-price. Crimes punished by the Pathan code are such as murder without cause, refusal to go to battle, contravention of the decision of a tribal council, adultery.

The Afghans are Mahommedans of the Sunni or orthodox body, with the exception of a few tribes, perhaps not truly Pathan, who are Shiahs. They are much under the influence of their Mullahs, especially for evil; and have a stronger feeling against the Shiah heretic than against the

1 Elphinstone.

thereby. But to those of another faith they are more tolerant than most Mahoinmedans, unless when creed becomes a war-cry. They are very superstitious in regard to charms, omens, astrology, and so forth; and greatly addicted to the worship of local saints, whose shrines (ziyarat) are found on every hill-top. The shrine, a domed tomb, or mayhap a heap of stones within a wall, sometimes marks the saint's grave, but is often a cenotaph. The saint may have been unknown in life for his virtues, but becomes after death an object of veneration, for reasons often hard to discern. In the immediate environs of Ghazni there are no less than 197 of these shrines.

A very marked feature in Afghan character is the passionate love of field sports, especially hawking. Deerstalking in the open plains, the driving of game to wellknown points by a host of beaters, and wild-fowl shooting with decoys, are others of their sports. They are capital horsemen, and unerring marksmen with the native rifle (jezail).

Among themselves the people are convivial and humorous. Festive gatherings are frequent, where they come together, not to buy or sell, or even to quarrel, but to make a noise and be happy. Tilting, shooting, racing, and wild music vary the amusements.

They have a wild dance called the útan, in which the men work themselves into great excitement. Among some Kakar tribes it is said the atan is sometimes danced by both sexes together.

GOVERNMENT.-Afghanistan is now, and has been before, under one prince, but it is hardly a monarchy as we are used to understand the term. It is rather the government of a dictator for life over a military aristocracy, and within this a congeries of small democracies. Elphinstone compares it with Scotland in the middle ages; some things suggest a comparison with Poland, in spite of difference of physical geography; but in neither was there the democratic constitution of the Afghan ulus. The sirdars govern in their respective districts, each after his own fashion; jealous, ambitious, turbulent, the sovereign can restrain them only by their divisions. There is no unity nor permanence; everything depends on the pleasure of a number of chiefs bound by no law, always at variance, and always ready to revolt when they have the slightest interest in doing so-almost always ready to plunge into strife with a wild delight in it for its own sake. In war, as in peace, chiefs and soldiers are ready to pass from one service to another without scruple. It is a matter of speculation, and no disgrace.

The spirit of Afghan character and institutions was tersely expressed by an old man to Elphinstone, who had urged the advantages of quiet and security under a strong king: "We are content with discord, we are content with alarms, we are content with blood; but we will never be content with a master."

REVENUES. The revenues of Dost Mahommed Khan were estimated in 1857 at 4,000,000 rupees, or about £400,000. This included Afghan Turkestan, but not Herat, which he did not hold. The Herat revenue was estimated some years before (probably too low) at £80,000. In the later years of Dost Mahommed the net revenue is stated to have amounted to £710,000, of which the army cost £430,000.1 Information on this subject is very imperfect, and not always consistent. There seems to be a tax on the produce of the soil, both in kind and in money, and a special tax on garden ground. A house-tax of about 5 rupees is paid by all who are not Pathans. The latter pay a much lighter tax under another name; and

1 See Edin. Review, July 1873, p. 273.

The aggregate of taxation is not great, but the smallest exaction seems a tyrannical violence to an Afghan. Nor does payment guarantee the cultivator from further squeezing. In many parts of the country collections are only made spasmodically by military force. The people are let alone for years, till need and opportunity arise, when a force is marched in, and arrears extorted.

Customs dues at Kabul and Kandahar are only 2 per cent. nominally, but this is increased a good deal by exactions. There is a considerable tax on horses exported for sale, and a toll on beasts of burden exporting merchandise, from 6 rupees on a loaded camel to 1 rupee on a donkey.

MILITARY FORCE.-According to the old system the Afghan forces were entirely composed of the ulus, or tribesmen of the chiefs, who were supposed to hold their lands on a condition of service, but who, as frequently as not, went over to the enemy in the day of need. As a counterpoise, the late Amir Dost Mahommed began to form a regular army. In 1858 this contained 16 infantry regiments of (nominally) 800 men, 3 of cavalry of 300 men, and about 80 field-pieces, besides a few heavy guns. The pay was bad, and extremely irregular, and punishments were severe. The men were fine, but recruited in the worst manner, viz., the arbitrary and forcible seizure of able-bodied men. There were also Jezailchi (riflemen), irregulars, some in the Amir's pay, others levies of the local chiefs; and a considerable number of irregular cavalry. We have failed to obtain recent data on this subject.

LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE.-Persian is the vernacular of a large part of the non-Afghan population, and is familiar to all educated Afghans. But the proper language of the Afghans is Pushtû, or Pukhtú (these are dialectic variations). Currency has been given to the notion that this language has a Semitic character, but this appears to be quite erroneous, and is entirely rejected by competent authorities, the majority of whom class Pushtu positively as an Aryan or Indo-Persian language. The Pushtu vocabulary preserves a number of ancient forms and connections with words that remain isolated in other Aryan languages. Interesting illustrations of this and other points connected with Pushtu will be found in a paper by Isidor Löwenthal in the J. of the As. Soc. of Bengal, vol. xxix.

Pushtu does not seem to be spoken in Herat, or (roughly speaking) west of the Helmand.

There is a respectable amount of Afghan literature. The oldest work in Pushtu as yet mentioned is a history of the conquest of Swat by Shaikh Mâli, a chief of the Yusufzais, and leader in the conquest (A.D. 1413-24). In 1494 Kâjú Khan became chief of the same clan; during his rule Buner and Panjkora were completely conquered, and he wrote a history of the events. But these works have not been met with. In the reign of Akbar, Bayazîd Ansâri, called Pîr-i-Roshan, "The Saint of Light," the founder of an heretical sect, wrote in Pushtu; as did his chief antagonist, a famous Afghan saint called Akhund Darweza.

The literature is richest in poetry. Abdarrahmân (17th century) is the best known poet. Another very popular poet is Khushal Khan, the warlike chief of the Khattaks in the time of Aurangzib. Many other members of his family were poets also. Ahmed Shah, the founder of the monarchy, likewise wrote poetry. Ballads are numerous. HISTORY.-The Afghan chroniclers call their people Bani-Israil (Arab. for Children of Israel), and claim descent from King Saul (whom they call by the Mahommedan cor

called Jeremiah, who again had a son called Afghana. The numerous stock of Afghana were removed by Nebuchadnezzar, and found their way to the mountains of Ghur and Feroza (east and north of Herat). Only nine years after Mahommed's announcement of his mission they heard of the new prophet, and sent to Medina a deputation headed by a wise and holy man called Kais, to make inquiry. The deputation became zealous converts, and on their return converted their countrymen. From Kais and his three sons the whole of the genuine Afghans claim descent.

This story is repeated in great and varying detail in sundry books by Afghans, the oldest of which appears to be of the 16th century; nor do we know that any trace of the legend is found of older date. In the version given by Major Raverty (Introd. to Afghan Grammar), Afghanah is settled by King Solomon himself in the Sulimani mountains; there is nothing about Nebuchadnezzar or Ghur. The historian Firishta says he had read that the Afghans were descended from Copts of the race of Pharaoh. And one of the Afghan histories, quoted by Mr Bellew, relates "a current tradition" that previous to the time of Kais, Bilo the father of the Biluchis, Uzbak (evidently the father of the Uzbegs), and Afghana were considered as brethren. As Mahommed Uzbeg Khan, the eponymus of the medley of Tartar tribes called Uzbegs, reigned in the 14th century A.D., this gives some possible light on the value of these so-called traditions.

We have analogous stories in the literature of almost all nations that derive their religion or their civilisation from a foreign source. To say nothing of the farce of the Book of Mormon, there is in our own age and in our own country a considerable number of persons who seriously hold and propagate the doctrine that the English people are descended from the tribes of Israel, and the literature of this whimsical theory would fill a much larger shelf than the Afghan histories. But the Hebrew ancestry of the Afghans is more worthy at least of consideration, for a respectable number of intelligent officers, well acquainted with the Afghans, have been strong in their belief of it; and though the customs alleged in proof will not bear the stress laid on them, undoubtedly a prevailing type of the Afghan physi ognomy has a character strongly Jewish. This characteristic is certainly a remarkable one; but it is shared, to a considerable extent, by the Kashmiris (a circumstance which led Bernier to speculate on the Kashmiris representing the lost tribes of Israel), and, we believe, by the Tajik people of Badakhshan.

In the time of Darius Hystaspes (B. C. 500) we find the region now called Afghanistan embraced in the Achæmenian satrapies, and various parts of it occupied by Sarangians (in Seistan), Arian. (in Herat), Sattagydians (supposed in highlands of upper Helmand and the plateau of Ghazni), Dadica (suggested to be Tajiks), Aparyta (mountaineers, perhaps of Safed Koh, where lay the Paryeta of Ptolemy), Gandarii (in Lower Kabul basin), and Paktycs, on or near the Indus. In the last name it has been plausibly suggested that we have the Pukhtun, as the eastern Afghans pronounce their name. Indeed, Pusht, Pasht, or Pakht, would seem to be the oldest name of the country of the Afghans in their traditions.

Alexander's march led him to Artacoana (Herat ?), the capital of Aria, and thence to the country of the Zaranga (Seistan), to that of the Euergeta, upon the Etymander (Helmand river), to Arachosia, thence to the Indians dwelling among snows in a barren country, probably the highlands between Ghazni and Kabul. Thence he marched to the foot of Caucasus, and spent the winter among the Hupian, near Charikar. Paropamisada, founding a city, Alexandria, supposed to be On his return from Bactria he prosecuted his march to India by the north side of the Kabul river. The Ariana of Strabo corresponds generally with the existing dominions of Kabul, but overpasses their limits on the west and

south.

About 310 B.C. Seleucus is said by Strabo to have given to the Indian Sandrocottus (Chandragupta), in consequence of a marriage

contract, some part of the country west of the Indus, occupied by an Indian population, and no doubt embracing a part of the Kabul basin. Some 60 years later occurred the establishment of an independent Greek dynasty in Bactria. Of the details of their history and extent of their dominion in different reigns we know almost nothing, and conjecture is often dependent on such vague data as are afforded by the collation of the localities in which the coins of independent princes have been found. But their power extended certainly over the Kabul basin, and probably, at times, over the whole of Afghanistan. The ancient architecture of Kashmir, the tope of Manikyala in the Panjab, and many sculptures found in the Peshawar valley, show unmistakable Greek influence. Demetrius (circa B.C. 190) is supposed to have reigned in Arachosia after being expelled from Bactria, much as, at a later date, Baber reigned in Kabul after his expulsion from Samarkand. Eucratides (181 B. C.) is alleged by Justin to have warred in India. With his coins, found abundantly in the Kabul basin, commences the use of an Arianian inscription, in addition to the Greek, supposed to imply the transfer of rule to the south of the mountains, over a people whom the Greek dynasty sought to conciliate. Under Heliocles (147 B.C.?), the Parthians, who had already encroached on Ariana, pressed their conquests into India. Menander (126 B.C.) invaded India at least to the Jumna, and perhaps also to the Indus delta. The coinage of a succeeding king, Hermæus, indicates a barbaric irruption. There is a general correspondence between classical and Chinese accounts of the time when Bactria was overrun by Scythian invaders. The chief nation among these, called by the Chinese Yuechi, about 126 B.C. established themselves in Sogdiana and on the Oxus in five hordes. Near the Christian era the chief of one of these, which was called Kushan, subdued the rest, and extended his conquests over the countries south of Hindu Kush, including Sind as well as Afghanistan, thus establishing a great dominion, of which we hear from Greek writers as Indo-Scythia.

Buddhism had already acquired influence over the people of the Kabul basin, and some of the barbaric invaders adopted that system. Its traces are extensive, especially in the plains of Jalalabad and Peshawar, but also in the vicinity of Kabul.

Various barbaric dynasties succeeded each other, among which a notable monarch was Kanishka or Kanerkes, who reigned and conquered apparently about the time of Our Lord, and whose power extended over the upper Oxus basin, Kabul, Peshawar, Kashmir, and probably far into India. His name and legends still filled the land, or at least the Buddhist portion of it, 600 years later, when the Chinese pilgrim Hwen Thsang travelled in India; they had even reached the great Mahommedan philosopher, traveller, and geographer, Abu Rihan Al-Birûni, in the 11th century; and they are still celebrated in the Mongol versions of Buddhist ecclesiastical story.

In the time of Hwen Thsang (630-45 A.D.) there were both Indian

and Turk princes in the Kabul valley, and in the succeeding centuries both these races seem to have predominated in succession. The first Mahommedan attempts at the conquest of Kabul were unsuccessful, though Seistan and Arachosia were permanently held from an early date. It was not till the end of the 10th century that a Hindu prince ceased to reign in Kabul, and it fell into the hands of the Turk Sabaktegin, who had established his capital at Ghazni. There, too, reigned his famous son Mahmûd, and a series of descendants, till the middle of the 12th century, rendering the city one of the most splendid in Asia. We then have a powerful dynasty, commonly believed to have been of Afghan race; and if so, the first. But the historians give them a legendary descent from Zohâk, which is no Afghan genealogy. The founder of the dynasty was Alâuddin, chief of Ghur, whose vengeance for the cruel death of his brother at the hands of Bahram the Ghaznevide was wreaked in devastating the great city. His nephew Shahâbuddin Mahommed repeatedly invaded India, conquering as far as Benares. His empire in India indeed-ruled by his freedmen who after his death became independent-may be regarded as the origin of that great Mahomas the origin of that great Mahommedan monarchy which endured nominally till 1857. For a brief period the Afghan countries were subject to the king of Kharizm, and it was here chiefly that occurred the gallant attempts of Jala luddin of Kharizm to withstand the progress of Chinghiz Khan.

on.

A passage in Firishta seems to imply that the Afghans in the Sulimani mountains were already known by that name in the first century of the Hegira, but it is uncertain how far this may be built The name Afghans is very distinctly mentioned in 'Utbi's History of Sultan Mahmud, written about A.D. 1030, coupled with that of the Khiljis. It also appears frequently in connection with the history of India in the 13th and 14th centuries. The successive dynasties of Dehli are generally called Pathan, but were really so only in part. Of the Khiljis (1288-1321) we have already spoken. The Tughlaks (1321-1421) were originally Tartars of the Karauna tribe. The Lodis (1450-1526) were pure Pathans. For a century and more after the Mongol invasion the whole of the Afghan countries were under Mongol rule; but in the middle of the 14th century a native dynasty sprang up in western Afghanistan, that of the Kurts, which extended its rule over Ghur, Herat, and Kandahar. The

history of the Afghan countries under the Mongols is obscure; but that régime must have left its mark upon the country if we judge from the occurrence of frequent Mongol names of places, and even of Mongol expressions adopted into familiar language.

All these countries were included in Timur's conquests, and Kabul at least had remained in the possession of one of his descendants till 1501, only three years before it fell into the hands of another and more illustrious one, Sultan Baber. It was not till 1522 that Baber succeeded in permanently wresting Kandahar from the Arghuns, a family of Mongol descent, who had long held it. From the time of his conquest of Hindustan (victory at Panipat, April 21, 1526), Kabul and Kandahar may be regarded as part of the empire of Dehli under the (so-called) Moghul dynasty which Baber founded. Kabul so continued till the invasion of Nadir (1738). Kandahar often changed hands between the Moghuls and the rising Safavis (or Sofis) of Persia. Under the latter it had remained from 1642 till 1708, when in the reign of Husain, the last of them, the Ghilzais, provoked by the oppressive Persian governor Shahnawâz Khan (a Georgian prince of the Bagratid house) revolted' under Mir Wais, and expelled the Persians. Mir Wais was acknowledged sovereign of Kandahar, and eventually defeated the Persian armies sent against him, but did not long survive (d. 1715).

Mahmud, the son of Mir Wais, a man of great courage and energy, carried out a project of his father's, the conquest of Persia itself. After a long siege, Shah Husain came forth from Ispahan with all his court, and surrendered the sword and diadem of the Sofis into the hands of the Ghilzai (Oct. 1722). Two years later Mahmud died mad, and a few years saw the end of Ghilzai rule in Persia.

Nadir Shah (1737-38) both recovered Kandahar and took Kabul. But he gained the goodwill of the Afghans, and enrolled many in his army. Among these was a noble young soldier, Ahmed Khan, of the Saddozai family of the Abdali clan, who after the assassination of Nadir (1747) was chosen by the Afghan chiefs at Kandahar to be their leader, and assumed kingly authority over the eastern part of Nadir's empire, with the style of Dur-i-Durran, "Pearl of the Age," bestowing that of Durrani upon his clan, the Abdalis. With Ahmed Shah, Afghanistan, as such, first took a place among the kingdoms of the earth. During the twenty-six years of his reign he carried his warlike expeditions far and wide. Westward they extended nearly to the shores of the Caspian; eastward he repeatedly entered India as a conqueror. At his great battle of Panipat (Jan. 6, 1761), with vastly inferior numbers, he gave the Mahrattas, then at the zenith of power, a tremendous defeat, almost annihilating their vast army; but the sucfered from a terrible disease, he died in 1773, bequeathing cess had for him no important result. Having long sufto his son Timûr a dominion which embraced not only Afghanistan to its utmost limits, but the Panjab, Kashmir, and Turkestan to the Oxus, with Sind, Biluchistan, and Khorasan as tributary governments.

Timur transferred his residence from Kandahar to Kabul, and continued during a reign of twenty years to stave off the anarchy which followed close on his death. He left twenty-three sons, of whom the fifth, Zamân Mirza, by help of Payindah Khan, head of the Bârakzai family of the Abdalis, succeeded in grasping the royal power. For many years barbarous wars raged between the brothers, during which Zaman Shah, Shuja-ul-Mulk, and Mahmûd, The last owed success to successively held the throne. Fatteh Khan, son of Payindah, a man of masterly ability in war and politics, the eldest of twenty-one brothers, a family of notable intelligence and force of character, and many of these he placed over the provinces. The malignity of Kamrân, the worthless son of Mahmud, succeeded

in making the king jealous of his minister; and with matchless treachery, ingratitude, and cruelty, the latter was first blinded, and afterwards murdered with prolonged torture, the brutal Kamran striking the first blow.

The Barakzai brothers united to avenge Fatteh Khan. The Saddozais were driven from Kabul, Ghazni, and Kandahar, and with difficulty reached Herat (1818). Herat remained thus till Kamran's death (1842), and after that was held by his able and wicked minister Yar Mahommed. The rest of the country was divided among the Barakzais-Dost Mahommed, the ablest, getting Kabul. Peshawar and the right bank of the Indus fell to the Sikhs after their victory at Naoshera in 1823. The last Afghan hold of the Panjab had been lost long before-Kashmir in 1819; Sind had cast off all allegiance since 1808; the Turkestan provinces had been practically independent since the death of Timur Shah.

The

In 1809, in consequence of the intrigues of Napoleon in Persia, the Hon. Mountstewart Elphinstone had been sent as envoy to Shah Shuja, then in power, and had been well received by him at Peshawar. This was the first time the Afghans made any acquaintance with Englishmen. Lieut. Alex. Burnes visited Kabul on his way to Bokhara in 1832. In 1837 the Persian siege of Herat and the proceedings of Russia created uneasiness, and Burnes was sent by the Governor-General as resident to the Amir's court at Kabul. But the terms which the Dost sought were not conceded by the government, and the rash resolution was taken of re-establishing Shah Shuja, long a refugee in British territory. Ranjit Singh, king of the Panjab, bound himself to co-operate, but eventually declined to let the expedition cross his territories. "Army of the Indus," amounting to 21,000 men, therefore assembled in Upper Sind (March 1838), and advanced through the Bolan Pass under the command of Sir John Keane. There was hardship, but scarcely any opposition. Kohandil Khan of Kandahar fled to Persia. That city was occupied in April 1839, and Shah Shuja was crowned in his grandfather's mosque. Ghazni was reached 21st July; a gate of the city was blown open by the engineers (the match was fired by Lieut. afterwards Sir Henry Durand); and the place was taken by storm. Dost Mahommed, finding his troops deserting, passed the Hindu Kush, and Shah Shuja entered the capital (7th August). The war was thought at an end, and Sir John Keane (made a peer) returned to India with a considerable part of the force, leaving behind 8000 men, besides the Shah's force, with Sir W. Macnaghten as envoy, and Sir A. Burnes as his colleague.

During the two following years Shah Shuja and his allies remained in possession of Kabul and Kandahar. The British outposts extended to Saighân, in the Oxus basin, and to Mullah Khan, in the plain of Seistan. Dost Mahommed surrendered (Nov. 3, 1840), and was sent to India, where he was honourably treated. From the beginning, insurrection against the new government had been rife. The political authorities were over-confident, and neglected warnings. On the 2d November 1841 the revolt broke out violently at Kabul, with the massacre of Burnes and other officers. The position of the British camp, its communications with the citadel, and the location of the stores were the worst possible; and the general (Elphinstone) was shattered in constitution. Disaster after disaster occurred, not without misconduct. At a conference (23d December) with the Dost's son, Akbar Khan, who had taken the lead of the Afghans, Sir W. Macnaghten was murdered by that chief's own hand. On 6th January 1842, after a convention to evacuate the country had been signed, the British garrison, still numbering 4500 soldiers (of whom 690 were Europeans), with some 12,000 followers,

marched out of the camp. The winter was severe, the troops demoralised, the march a mass of confusion and massacre; for there was hardly a pretence of keeping the terms. On the 13th the last survivors mustered at Gandamak only twenty muskets. Of those who left Kabul, Dr Brydone only reached Jalalabad, wounded and half dead. Ninety-five prisoners were afterwards recovered. The garrison of Ghazni had already been forced to surrender (10th December). But General Nott held Kandahar with a stern hand, and General Sale, who had reached Jalalabad from Kabul at the beginning of the outbreak, maintained that important point gallantly. To avenge these disasters and recover the prisoners preparations were made in India on a fitting scale; but it was the 16th April 1842 before General Pollock could relieve Jalalabad, after forcing the Khybar Pass. After a long halt there, he advanced (20th August), and gaining rapid successes, occupied Kabul (15th September), where Nott, after retaking and dismantling Ghazni, joined him two days later. The prisoners were happily recovered from Bamian. The citadel and central bazaar of Kabul were destroyed, and the army finally evacuated Afghanistan | December 1842.

Shah Shuja had been assassinated soon after the departure of the ill-fated garrison. Dost Mahommed, released, was able to resume his position at Kabul, which he retained till his death in 1863. Akbar Khan was made vazir, but died in 1848.

The most notable facts in later history must be briefly stated. In 1848, when the Sikh revolt broke out, Dost Mahommed, stimulated by popular outcry and by the Sikh offer to restore Peshawar, crossed the frontier and took Attok. A cavalry force of Afghans was sent to join Sher Singh against the British, and was present at the battle of Gujerat (21st Feb. 1849). The pursuit of the Afghans by Sir Walter Raleigh Gilbert, right up to the passes, was so hot that the Dost owed his escape to a fleet horse. In 1850 the Afghans re-conquered Balkh. In January 1855, friendly intercourse, which had been renewed between the Dost and the British government, led to the conclusion of a treaty at Peshawar.

In November 1855, after the death of his half-brother, Kohandil Khan of Kandahar, the Dost made himself master of that province. In 1856 came the new Persian advance to Herat, ending in its capture, and the English expedition to the Persian Gulf. In January 1857 the Dost had an interview at Peshawar with Sir J. Lawrence, at which the former was promised arms and a subsidy for protection against Persia. In consequence of this treaty a British mission under Major Lumsden proceeded to Kandahar. The Indian mutiny followed, and the Afghan excitement strongly tried the Dost's fidelity, but he maintained it. Lumsden's party held their ground, and returned in May 1858.

In 1863, Dost Mahommed, after a ten months' siege, captured Herat; but he died there thirteen days later (9th June), and was succeeded by his son Sher Ali Khan.

Since then the latter has passed through many vicissitudes in rivalry with his brothers and nephews, and at one time (1867) his fortunes were so low that he held only Balkh and Herat. By the autumn of 1868, however, he was again established on the throne of Kabul, and his competitors were beaten and dispersed. In April 1869 Sher Ali Khan was honourably and splendidly received at Amballa by the Earl of Mayo, who had shortly before replaced Sir J. Lawrence. Friendly relations were confirmed, though the Amir's expectations were not fulfilled. He received the balance of a donation of £120,000 which had been promised and partly paid by Sir John Lawrence. A considerable present of artillery and arms was made to

him; since then some small additional aid in money and arms has been sent, but no periodical subsidy.

Sher Ali Khan now reigns over all Afghanistan and Afghan Turkestan, whilst Badakhshan is tributary to him. In the latter part of 1872 a correspondence which had gone on between the Governments of Russia and England resulted in a declaration by the former that Afghanistan was beyond the field of Russian influence; whilst the Oxus, from its source in Lake Sirikol to the western limit of Balkh, was recognised as the frontier of Afghan dominion.

ANTIQUITIES.--We can afford space for only the briefest indication on this subject. The basin of the Kabul river especially abounds in remains of the period when Buddhism flourished, beginning with the Inscribed Rock of Shahbâzgarhi, or Kapur-di-giri, in the Peshawar plain, which bears one of the repliche of the famous edicts of Asoka (not later than B.C. 250). In the Koh-Daman, north of Kabul, are the sites of several ancient cities, the greatest of which, called Beghram, has furnished coins in scores of thousands, and has been supposed to represent Alexander's Nicæa. Nearer Kabul, and especially on the hills some miles south of the city, are numerous topes. In the valley of Jalalabad are many remains of the same character. In the Peshawar plain and on the adjoining heights are numerous ancient cities and walled villages, in many cases presenting ruins of much interest, besides the remains of topes, monasteries, cave temples, &c.; and frequently sculptures have been found on those sites, exhibiting evident traces of the influence of Greek art. The Mahâban moun

tain, near the Indus, which has been plausibly identified with the Aornos of the Greeks, and the hills more immediately compassing the Peshawar valley, abound in the ruins of very ancient fortresses. At Talash, on the Panjkora river, are extensive ruins of massive fortifications; and in Swat there are said to be remains of several ancient cities. In the valley of the Tarnak are the ruins of a great city (Ulan Robat), supposed to be ancient Arachosia. About Girishk, on the Helmand, are extensive mounds and other traces of buildings; and the remains of several great cities exist in the plain of Seistan, as at Pulki, Peshawaran, and Lakh, relics of ancient Drangiana, as yet unexamined. An ancient stone vessel, preserved in a mosque at Kandahar, is almost certainly the same that was treasured at Peshawar in the 5th century as the begging-pot of Sakya-Muni. of the city of Ghazni, the vast capital of Mahmud and his race, no substantial relics survive, except the tomb of Mahmud and two remarkable brick minarets.

To the vast and fruitful harvest of coins that has been gathered in Afghanistan and the adjoining regions, we can here but make an allusion.

(Elphinstone's Caubool; various papers in J. As. Soc. Bengal; Ferrier's Journeys, and Hist. of the Afghans; Bellew's Journal, Report on the Yusufzais, and Notes on Flora of Afgh.; James's Report on Peshawar District; Raverty's Afghan Grammar; Panjab Trade Report; Baber's Memoirs; Kaye's History; papers by Major Lumsden, and by Lieut.-Col. C. M. Macgregor, &c. The paragraph on the Animal Kingdom has been revised by Prof Henry Giglioli of Florence.) (u. Y.)

AFGHAN TURKESTAN is a convenient name applied of late years to those provinces in the basin of the Oxus which are subject to the Amir of Kabul. BADAKHSHAN and its dependencies, now tributary to the Amir, are sometimes included under the name, but will not be so included here. The whole of the Afghan dominions consist of AFGHANISTAN as defined under that heading, AFGHAN TURKESTAN, and BADAKHSHAN with its dependencies.

The territories included here will be, beginning from the east, the khanates or principalities of Kunduz, Khulm, Balkh with Akcha; and the western khanates of Sir-i-pul, Shibrghân, Andkhûi, and Maimana, sometimes classed together as the Chihár Vilâyat, or "Four Domains ;" and besides these, such part of the Hazara tribes as lie north of the Hindu Kush and its prolongation, defined in the article AFGHANISTAN. The tract thus includes the whole southern moiety of the Oxus basin, from the frontier of Badakhshan on the east to the upper Murghâb river on the west. The Oxus itself forms the northern boundary, from the confluence of the Kokcha or river of Badakhshan, in 691 E. long., to Khoja Salih ferry, in 65° E. long. nearly. Here the boundary quits the river and skirts the Turkman desert to the point where the Murghâb issues upon it. Along the whole southern boundary we have a tract of lofty mountain country. Thus, in the east, above Kunduz, we have the Hindu Kush rising far into the region of perpetual snow, and with passes ranging from 12,000 to 13,000 feet and upwards. Above Khulm and Balkh is the prolongation of Hindu Kush, called Koh-i-baba, in which the elevation of the cols or passes seems to be nearly as high, though the general height of the crest is lower. The mountains then fork in three branches westward, viz., Koh-i-Siah, "The Black Mountain," to the south of the Herat river; Koh-i-Safed, "The White Mountain," between the Herat river and the Murghab, and a third ridge north of the latter river. The second branch (Safed-Koh) has been assumed in the article AFGHANISTAN as the boundary of

that region. We know almost nothing of these mountains, except from the journey of Ferrier, who crossed all three watersheds in four days of July 1845. He describes the middle range as very lofty, with a good deal of snow on the pass; the southern range not so high, the northern one not nearly so high.

RIVERS.-We shall first describe the rivers of this region in succession.

For the Oxus itself, see that article.

Beginning from the eastward, its first tributary within our limits is the river of Kunduz, known also as the river of Aksarai, the Surkhâb, and what not. As the principal source of this river we may regard the stream of Bamian, fed close under the Koh-i-Baba by a variety of torrents which join from the pass of Akrobat and other gorges of the Hazara country, adjoining that famous site (8496 feet above sea level). The names of some of these seem to preserve a tradition of the ancient population; such are the "Cutlers' Vale," "the Smiths' Vale," the "Valley of Eye-paint." At the eastern end of the valley the Bamian stream receives another of nearly equal bulk, descending from the pass of Hajjigak, the most important crossing of the mountains between Kabul and the Oxus, and from which the road descends upon Bamian, and thence by Saighân, Khurram, and Haibak, to Khulm, in the Oxus valley. On the volcanic rock which parts the streams stand extensive ruins, the name of which, Zohâk, connects them with the most ancient legends of Persian history. From this the river turns nearly north, passing the country of the Sheikh 'Alis, one of the most famous Hazara clans, and closely skirting the great range of Hindu Kush. About 40 miles N.N.E. of Zohak it receives from the left two confluents, of size probably almost equal to its own-the rivers of Saighan and of Kamard, both rising to the westward of Bamian, and crossing the highway from Bamian to Khulm. Hereabouts the river seems to take the name of Surkhab. The first considerable confluent on the right is the Andarâb river, draining the valley of that name, and joining at Doshi, about 85 miles in a direct line N.E. of Zohak. About Ghori, still a place of some note, the valley widens out greatly, and becomes in places swampy, with expanses of tall grass, a character which it thenceforth retains. The river is, or has been, bridged at Thomri, a few miles beyond Ghori, a work ascribed to Aurangzib. It then receives from the right the Baghlân river, coming from Nârîn and the hills of Khost. The only remaining confluent is the important one which joins immediately below the town of Kunduz, sometimes called the Khânâbâd river, sometimes by the names of its chief contributaries, the Farokhar and Bangi.