A
PEEP INTO TOORKISTHAN.
BY CAPTAIN ROLLO BURSLEM,
THIRTEENTH PRINCE ALBERT'S LIGHT INFANTRY.
1846.
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[Transcriber's Note: [=a] is representing a-macron, unicode character
U0101, and [=A] is representing A-macron, unicode character U0100.
This is usually pronounced as a long a.
There are around 240 instances of vowels accented with macrons
(straight line above), mostly A-macron or a-macron, with one instance
of e-macron, and five instances of u-macron, and one u that should be
u-macron(Dao[=u]b) and isn't (Daoub).
Use of the macron is _not_ consistent throughout the text...
...and the spelling of some place names is not consistent either:
e.g. Toorkisth[=an]; Toorkisthan; Toorkistan.
(There are also a number of words with 'unusual' spellings.
These spellings I have corrected:
territories for territorities; retrograde for retrogade; amongst for amonst.
These 'period' spellings I have left intact:
befel, chace, surprized, loth, gallopped, gallopping, secresy, shew, shewed,
shewing, preeminence, handfull, negociation, threshhold, trellice,
picketted, barricadoed, compaign.
I have also retained M'Naghten for the modern McNaghten.)]
* * * * *
[Illustration: Drawn by Mr Gompertz Pelham Richardson Litho. View of
the Outer Cave of Yeermallik, shewing the Entrance Hole to the larger
Cavern]
* * * * *
[Illustration: MAP OF CABUL AND THE KOHISTAN WITH THE ROUTE FOR
KOOLLUM]
* * * * *
A PEEP INTO TOORKISTHAN.
BY CAPTAIN ROLLO BURSLEM, THIRTEENTH PRINCE ALBERT'S LIGHT INFANTRY.
1846.
TO THE
RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF CARNARVON, HIGHCLERE CASTLE.
MY LORD,
Having received your Lordship's permission to dedicate to you this my
first essay as an Author, I beg to tender my best acknowledgements for
the honour, and for the interest you have so kindly expressed in the
success of the following pages. Under such favourable auspices a
successful result may be confidently anticipated by
Your Lordship's Obliged and obedient servant,
ROLLO BURSLEM.
HAREWOOD LODGE, HAMPSHIRE.
TO THE READER.
The following pages are literally what they profess to be, a record
of a few weeks snatched from a soldier's life in Affghanist[=a]n, and
spent in travels through a region which few Europeans have ever visited
before. The notes from which it is compiled were written on the desert
mountains of Central Asia, with very little opportunity, as will be
easily supposed, for study or polish. Under these circumstances, it can
hardly be necessary to deprecate the criticism of the reader.
Composition is not one of the acquirements usually expected of a
soldier. What is looked for in his narrative is not elegance, but
plainness. He sees more than other people, but he studies less, and the
strangeness of his story must make up for the want of ornament. I can
hardly expect but that the reader may consider the style of my chapters
inferior to many of those which are supplied to the public by those who
are fortunate enough to enjoy good libraries and plenty of leisure; two
advantages which a soldier on service seldom experiences. But this I
cannot help. Such as they are, I offer him my unadorned notes; and
perhaps he will be good enough to let one thing compensate another, and
to recollect that if the style of the book is different from what he
sometimes sees, yet the scenery is so too. If instead of a poetical
composition he gets a straightforward story, yet instead of the Rhine
or the Lakes he gets a mountain chain between Independent Tartary and
China.
WALMAR BARRACKS, _March_, 1846.
A PEEP INTO TOORKISTH[=A]N.[*]
[* Note: A portion of the following pages in their original form has
appeared in the Asiatic Journal.]
CHAPTER I.
During the summer of 1840, the aspect of the political horizon in
Affghanist[=a]n afforded but slight grounds for prognosticating the
awful catastrophe which two short years after befel the British arms.
Dost Mahommed had not yet given himself up, but was a fugitive, and
detained by the King of Bokhara, while many of the principal Sirdars
had already tendered their allegiance to Shah Sooja: and there was in
truth some foundation for the boast that an Englishman might travel
in safety from one end of Affghanist[=a]n to the other. An efficient
force of tried soldiers occupied Ghuzni, Cabul, Candahar, Jellalabad,
and the other strongholds of the country; our outposts were pushed
to the north-west some fifty miles beyond Bamee[=a]n, the Khyber
and Bolun passes were open, and to the superficial observer all was
tranquil. The elements of strife indeed existed, but at the time when
I took the ramble which these pages attempt to describe, British
power was paramount, and the rumour was already rife of the speedy
diminution of the force which supported it.
Notwithstanding the modern rage for exploration, but few of our
countrymen have hitherto pierced the stupendous barrier of the
Paropamisan range; but the works of Hanway, Forster, Moorcroft, and
Trebeck, Masson, and Sir Alexander Burnes, convey most valuable
information concerning the wild regions through which they travelled,
and I am bound in simple honesty to confess that my little book does
not aspire to rank with publications of such standard merit. An
author's apology, however humble and sincere, is seldom attended to
and more rarely accepted. Surely I am not wrong in assuming that a
feeling of mournful interest will pervade the bosom of those who have
the patience to follow my perhaps over-minute description of places
whose names may be already familiar to them as connected with the
career of those bold spirits who in life devoted their energies to the
good of their country and the advancement of science, and who in the
hour of disaster, when every hope was dead, met their fate with the
unflinching gallantry of soldiers and the patient resignation of
Christians.
My lamented friend, Lieutenant Sturt, of the Bengal Engineers, was
one of the foremost of those who endeavoured, during the critical
situation of the Cabul force previous to its annihilation, to rally
the drooping spirits of the soldiers; and without wishing in any way
to reflect on others, it may fairly be said that his scientific
attainments and personal exertions contributed not a little to those
partial successes, which to the sanguine seemed for a moment to
restore the favourable aspect of our military position. But I forbear
from now dwelling upon these circumstances, lest I might undesignedly
give pain to those who still survive the fatal event, merely stating
my humble opinion that the memory of any mistake committed, either in
a political or military light, will by the noble-minded be drowned in
sorrow for the sufferings and death of so many thousands of brave men.
In the month of June, 1840, Lieutenant Sturt was ordered to survey the
passes of the Hindoo Koosh, and I obtained leave from my regiment,
then in camp at Cabul, for the purpose of accompanying him; my object
was simply to seek pleasant adventures; the "_cacoethes ambulandi_"
was strong upon me, and I thirsted to visit the capital of ancient
Bactria; the circumstances which prevented our reaching Balkh will
hereafter be detailed, but the main object of the expedition was
attained, as Sturt executed an excellent map of the passes alluded to,
and satisfactorily demonstrated that almost all the defiles of this
vast chain, or rather group of mountains, may be turned, and that it
would require a large and active well-disciplined force to defend the
principal ones. I have made every possible inquiry as to the fate of
the results of Sturt's labours, but fear that they too were lost
in the dreadful retreat. Whatever still exists must be in the
Quarter-Master General's Department in India, far out of my reach, so
that I am obliged again to request the indulgence of my reader for the
want of a proper map on which he might, if he felt so inclined, trace
our daily progress,[*] and to crave his forgiveness if I occasionally
repeat what has been far more ably related by Moorcroft and the other
authors whom I have already mentioned.
[* Note: Since receiving the proof sheets for correction I have been
kindly supplied by my friend Major Wade with a map taken principally
from the one executed by the late Lieutenant Sturt.]
To the traveller whose experience of mountain scenery is confined to
Switzerland, the bold rocks and rich though narrow valleys of the
frontiers of Toorkisth[=a]n offer all the charms of novelty; the lower
ranges of hills are gloomy and shrubless, contrasting strikingly with
the dazzling, yet distant splendour of the snowy mountains. It is
an extraordinary fact, that throughout the whole extent of country
occupied by these under features, which presents every variety of form
and geological structure, there are scarcely any hills bearing trees
or even shrubs; every valley, however, is intersected by its native
stream, which in winter pursues its headlong course with all the
impetuosity of a mountain torrent, but in the summer season glides
calmly along as in our native meadows.
The multitude and variety of well-preserved fossils which are imbedded
in the different strata of the Toorkisth[=a]n hills would amply reward
the researches of the Geologist, and to the Numismatologist this
portion of Asia proves eminently interesting, Balkh and other
localities in its vicinity abounding in ancient coins, gems, and other
relics of former days; and I much regret that I was unable to reach
the field from whence I expected to gather so rich a harvest.