bably be kept away from me; and though Sitana was within sight, I learned that the colony of discontented Indians there had been removed further into the mountains, as the agitation they kept up in our territory transgressed even the liberal bounds of Afghan hospitality. The question may well be raised as to the expediency of allowing fugitives from English justice to look on us in safety from immediately across the border; but it is at least obvious that we could not well interfere with them without departing from the whole line of policy which we have pursued towards Afghanistan of late years. That policy may be-and, I think, is-a mistaken one; but, if adhered to at all, we require to treat the border as a line which neither party should transgress in ordinary circumstances. On recrossing the river, a number of the youth of Kubbul accompanied us on mussaks, or inflated hides, on which they moved with considerable rapidity, the front of the mussak being in form something like a swan's breast, and gliding easily through or over the water. Some of these skins were so small that they must have been those of sheep or young calves, and each bore a single swimmer, whose body was thus kept out of the water while his limbs were free to paddle in it. From this point to its origin, about the Tibetan Kailas, great part of the long sweep of the Indus is unknown to Europeans, and its course is set down on our maps by a conjectural dotted line. We know it again where it enters Baltistan, and as it passes through Ládak, but that is all. Indus incolis Sindus appellatus, said Pliny, and the Sanscrit meaning of the word is said to be "the sea;" but the Aryans who spoke Sanscrit must have had rather vague ideas as to what the sea was. As the Sutlej is supposed to proceed from the mouth of a crocodile, so the Indus comes from that of a lion. Edward Thornton, in his 'Gazetteer of the Countries adjacent to India,' has collected and reproduced all the information of any importance we have in regard to this great and historically interesting river, and I must refer my reader to that work for the details, as also to General Cunningham's Ladak.' It has been measured near Torbela and found to be 100 yards broad; but at Torbela I should think it was about 200 yards, though the current was rapid and deep. Between that place and Attok it is so shallow in winter, when it is not fed by melting snow, that there are several points at which it can be forded. From this point, also, boats can go down all the way to the sea, as they can also from very near Kaubul, floating down the Kaubul river till it reaches the Indus. CHAPTER XLVII. THE BASE OF THE HINDÚ KÚSH. CROSSING THE INDUS-A PICTURESQUE SCENE-MEN IN CHAIN-AR MOUR -THE ROCK OF PIHÚR · THE HINDU KUSH-SWABI STARTING from Torbela on the afternoon of this day, I went about seven or eight miles down the left bank of the Indus to a ferry there is nearly opposite the mighty rock of Pihúr, which rises on the opposite shore, or rather almost out of the bed of the river, for in seasons of flood this rock is surrounded by the stream. Here I was passed over from the protection of the Hazara authorities to those of the Yusufzai district. Crossing the great river in another of those large high-pooped carved boats of white wood, such as, in all probability, bore Alexander the Great across the Indus, on the opposite bank a very strange sight appeared, which looked as if it might have been taken out of the middle ages, or even out of the time of the Grecian conqueror. The boundary-line between our territory and that of Afghanistan here leaves the Indus and runs along the foot of the Hindú Kúsh, and one is supposed now to be in special need of being taken care of; so I was received on landing, and with great dignity, by a number of Afghan Khans belonging to our side of the border, by a native officer of police, a body of mounted police, and a number of the retainers of the Khans, some of whom were horsemen in chain-armour. Nothing could be more picturesque than the scene. It was now evening, and through the clear air the red light of the setting sun flamed over the yellow sands of the Indus, and burned on the high summits of the wild mountains around. The Afghan chiefs, with the retainers beside them, and their fine horses, were picturesque enough figures; but the most picturesque feature in the scene was, undoubtedly, the men in chain-armour, who carried immensely long spears, rode the wildest and shaggiest looking of horses, wore brass helmets on their heads over crimson handkerchiefs, and galloped about between us and the hills, shaking their long spears, as if an immediate descent of the enemy was expected and they were prepared to do battle for us to the death. Unfortunately the enemy never did put in an appearance all the way along the border; but the men in armour did very well instead, and imparted a delightful sense of danger to the mysterious mountains. The rock of Pihúr is between 300 and 400 feet high, and it would be a pleasant place of residence were it not for the wind which blows very violently up or down the Indus valley, and did so all night when I was there. Here I began to realise for the first time (belief being quite a different thing) that I was of some importance in the world. Guards slept in the veranda of the bungalow in which I was, though it was placed on the extreme summit of the rock and looked down. precipices; guards paced round it all night; there was a guard half-way down the rock; another guard at the foot of the rock; and, when I looked down to the valley below, in the morning before daybreak, there were my friends in chain-armour riding round the rock in the moonlight, but slowly, and drooping in their saddles as if they were asleep and recruiting after the fatigues of the day. From Pihúr we rode about twenty miles along the base of the mountains to the Thána of Swabi, passing through the village of Topi, the Khan of which accompanied us on the journey. The mountains here and all along the border have a very singular effect, because they rise so suddenly above the plain. Our transIndus territory is here almost a dead level, being broken only by water-courses, at this season dry, which descend abruptly below the surface of the plain. From this wide level, which is scarcely 1800 feet above the sea, the mountains of the Hindú Kúsh rise quite abruptly for thousands of feet, range towering above range till we come to the line of snowy summits. As I have already pointed out, these mountains are really a continuation of the Himalaya, being separated from the latter by the gorge of the Indus, and running more directly to the west. Sir A. Burnes has told us that the name Hindú Kúsh is unknown to the Afghans, but that there is a particular peak, and also a pass, bearing that name. This mountain is far from our present neighbourhood, being between Afghanistan and Túrkestan. A good deal of doubt hangs over the derivation and meaning of the word; but, fancifully or not, the Kush has been identified with the Gaukasus of Pliny, and the whole of the immense range from the Himá |