AMERICAN EXPLORATION--MASSON
In 1832 Lord William Bentinck, then Governor-General of India, found
Shah Sujah, the deposed Amir of Kabul, living as a pensioner at
Ludhiana when he visited the Punjab for an interview with its ruler
Ranjit Singh. At that interview the question of aiding Shah Sujah to
regain his throne from the usurper Dost Mahomed, who was suspected of
Russian proclivities, was mooted; and it was then, probably, that the
seeds of active interference in Afghan politics were sown, although
the idea of aiding Shah Sujah was negatived for the time being. The
result was the mission of Alexander Burnes to Kabul, which formed a
new era in Central Asian geography. From this time forward the map of
Afghanistan commenced to grow. The story of Burnes' first journey to
Kabul was published by Murray in 1834, and his example as a
geographical observer stimulated his assistants Leech, Lord, and Wood
to further enterprise during a second journey to the same capital.
Indeed the geographical work of some of these explorers still remains
as our standard reference for a knowledge of the configuration of
Northern Badakshan. This was the beginning of official recognition of
the value of trans-Indian geographical knowledge to Indian
administration; but then, as now, information obtained through
recognized official agents was apt to be regarded as the only
information worth having; and far too little effort was made to secure
the results of travellers' work, who, in a private capacity and
unhindered by official red tape, were able to acquire a direct
personal knowledge of Afghan geography such as was absolutely
impossible to political agents or their assistants.
Before Indian administrators had seriously turned their attention to
the Afghan buffer-land and set to work to fill up "intelligence"
material at second hand, there was at least one active European agent
in the field who was in direct touch with the chief political actors
in that strange land of everlasting unrest, and who has left behind
him a record which is unsurpassed on the Indian frontier for the width
of its scope of inquiry into matters political, social, economic, and
scientific, and the general accuracy of his conclusions. This was the
American, Masson. It must be remembered that the Punjab and Sind were
almost as much _terra incognita_ to us in 1830 as was Afghanistan. The
approach to the latter country was through foreign territory. The Sikh
chiefs of the Punjab and the Amirs of Sind were not then necessarily
hostile to British interests. They watched, no doubt, the gradual
extension of the red line of our maps towards the north-west and west,
and were fully alive to the probability that, so far as regarded their
own countries, they would all soon be "painted red." But there was no
official discourtesy or intoleration shown towards European
travellers, and in the Sikh-governed Punjab, at any rate, much of the
military control of that most military nationality was in the hands of
European leaders. Nor do we find much of the spirit of fanatical
hatred to the Feringhi even in Afghanistan at that time. The European
came and went, and it was only due to the disturbed state of the
country and the local absence of law and order that he ran any risk of
serious misadventure.
In these days it would be impossible for any European to travel as
Masson or Ferrier travelled in Afghanistan, but in those days there
was something to be gained by friendship with England, and the
weakness of our support was hardly suspected until it was disclosed by
the results of the first Afghan war. So Masson and Ferrier assumed the
rôle of Afghan travellers, clothed in Afghan garments, but more or
less ignorant of the Afghan language, living with the people,
partaking of their hospitality, studying their ways, joining their
pursuits, discussing their politics, and placing themselves on terms
of familiarity, if not of intimacy, with their many hosts in a way
which has never been imitated since. No one now ever assumes the
dress of the Afghan and lives with him. No one joins a caravan and
sits over the nightly fire discussing bazaar prices or the character
of a chief. A hurried rush to Kabul, a few brief and badly conducted
interviews with the Amir, and the official representative of India's
foreign policy returns to India as an Afghan oracle, but with no more
knowledge of the real inwardness of Afghan political aspiration, or of
the trend of national thought and feeling, than is acquired during a
six months' trip of a travelling M.P. in India. Consequently there is
a peculiar value in the records of such a traveller as Masson. They
are in many ways as valuable now as they were eighty years ago, for
the character of the Afghan has not changed with his history or his
politics. To some extent they are even more valuable, for it is
inevitable that the story of a long travel through an unknown and
unimagined world should be received with a certain amount of
reservation until later experience confirms the tale and verifies
localities.
Fifty years elapsed before the footsteps of Masson could be traced
with certainty. Not till the conclusion of the last Afghan war, and
the final reshaping of the surveys of Baluchistan, could it be said
exactly where he wandered during those strenuous years of unremitting
travel. And now that we can take his story in detail, and follow him
stage by stage through the Indian borderlands, we can only say that,
considering the circumstances under which his observations were taken
and recorded, it is marvellously accurate in geographical detail. Were
his long past history of those stirring times as accurate as his
geography or as his antiquarian information there would be little
indeed left for subsequent investigators to add.
Masson was in the field before Burnes. In the month of September 1830
the Resident in the Persian Gulf writes to the Chief Secretary to the
Government of India[10] that "an American gentleman of the name of
Masson" arrived at Bushire from Bassadore on the "13th June last," and
that he described himself as belonging to the state of Kentucky,
having been absent for ten years from his country, "which he must
consequently have left when he was young, as he is now only about
two-and-thirty years of age." The same letter says that previous to
the breaking out of the war between Russia and Persia in 1826 Masson
"appears to have visited Khorasan from Tiflis by way of Mashed and
Herat, making no effort to conceal his European origin," and that from
Herat he went to Kandahar, Shikarpur, and Sind.
Masson appears to have furnished some valuable information to the
Indian Government regarding the Durani occupation of Herat and the
political situation in Kabul and Kandahar, which, according to his
own account, he subsequently regretted, as he obviously regarded the
British attitude towards Afghanistan at that time in much the same
light as certain continental nations regarded the British attitude
towards the Transvaal previous to the last Boer war. "About the same
time," says the same letter from the Resident at Bushire, Masson was
much in the Bahawalpur country (Sind), after which he proceeded to
Peshawar, Kabul, Ghazni, etc. Extracts from his reports of his
journeys are forwarded with other information. In his book (_Travels
in Afghanistan, Baluchistan, the Punjab, and Kalat_, published in
1842) Masson opens his story with the autumn of 1826, when he was in
Bahawalpur and Sind, which he had approached through Rajputana, and
not from Afghanistan. He has much to say about Bahawalpur which,
however interesting and valuable as first-hand information about a
foreign state in 1826, no longer concerns this story. From Bahawalpur
he passed on to Peshawar and Kabul, from Kabul to Kandahar, and thence
to Shikarpur. As the incidents of his remarkable journey between
Kandahar and Shikarpur, described in the letter of the Bushire
Resident, are obviously the same as those in his book, the inference
is strong that the journey from Tiflis to Herat and Kandahar (which is
not mentioned in the book) has been somehow misplaced in the
Resident's record.
When Masson entered Afghanistan from Peshawar there is certain
indirect evidence that this was the first time that he crossed the
Afghan border. He knew nothing of the Pashto language, which would be
remarkable in the case of a man like Masson, who always lived with the
people and not with the chiefs, and there is not the remotest
reference to any previous visit to Herat in his subsequent history. We
will at any rate follow the text of his own narrative, and surely no
narrative of adventure that has ever appeared before or since in
connection with Afghan exploration can rival it for interest. Peshawar
was at that time held by four Pathan Sirdars, brothers, who were
hardly independent, as they held their country (a small space
extending to about 25 miles round Peshawar, and which included Kohat
and Hangu) entirely at the pleasure of Ranjit Singh, the Sikh Chief of
the Punjab. Some show of making a strike for independence had been
made in connection with the Yusufzai rising led by Saiad Ahmad Shah,
but it had been suppressed, and during the temporary occupation of
Peshawar by the Sikhs the city had been despoiled and devastated.
Masson estimated that there were about fifty or sixty thousand
inhabitants in Peshawar, where he was exceedingly well treated.
"People of all classes were most civil and desirous to oblige." He was
an honoured guest at all entertainments.
How long Masson remained at Peshawar it is difficult to say, for there
is a most lamentable absence of dates from his records, and Peshawar
appears to have been the base from which he started on a good many
excursions. Finally he made acquaintance with a Pathan who offered to
accompany him to Kabul, and he left Peshawar for Afghanistan by the
Khaibar route. He mentions two other routes as being popular in those
days, _i.e._ those of Abkhana and Karapa, and he asserts that they
were far more secure for traders than the Khaibar, but not so level
nor so direct. Masson started with his companion, dressed as a Pathan,
but taking nothing but a few pais (copper coins) and a book. His
companion, however, possessed a knife tied up in a corner of his
pyjamas. After cautiously crossing the plains and some intervening
hills, they struck the high road of the Khaibar apparently not far
from Ali Masjid, and here they fell in with the first people they had
met _en route_--about twenty men sitting in the shade of a rock,
"elderly, respectable, and venerable." They were hospitably received
and entertained, and news of the arrival of a European quickly spread.
Every European was expected to be a doctor in those days, and Masson
had to assume the rôle and make the most of his limited medical
knowledge. He either prescribed local remedies, or healed the sick on
Christian Science principles with a certain amount of success--enough
to ensure him a welcome wherever he went. It is a curious story for
any one who has traversed the Khaibar in these later days to read. A
European with a most limited knowledge of Pushto tramping the road in
company with a Pathan, living the simple life of the people, picking
up information every yard of the way, keenly interested in his rough
surroundings, taking count of the ragged groups of stone-built huts
clinging to the hill-sides or massed around a central citadel in the
open plain, with here and there a disintegrating monument crowning the
hill-top with a cupola or dome, the like of which he had never seen
before.
Masson had hardly realized in these early days that he was on one of
the routes most sacred to pilgrimage of all those known to the
disciples of Buddha, and it was not till later years that he set about
a systematic exploration of the extraordinary wealth of Buddhist
relics which lie about Jalalabad and the valleys adjoining the Khaibar
route to Kabul. On his journey he made his way with the varied
incidents of adventure common to the time--robbed at one place,
treated with hospitality at another; sitting under the mulberry trees
discussing politics with all the energy of the true Afghan (who is
never deficient in the power of expressing his political sentiments),
and, taking it altogether, enjoying a close, if not an absolutely
friendly, intimacy with the half-savage people of those wholly savage
hills. An intimacy, such as no other educated European has ever
attained, and which tells a tale of a totally different attitude on
the part of the Afghan towards the European then, to that which has
existed since. The fact that Masson was American and not English
counted for nothing. The difference was not recognized by the Afghans,
although it was explained by him sometimes with careful elaboration.
It was the time when Dost Mahomed ruled in Kabul, but with the claims
of Shah Sujah (possibly backed by both Sikh and British) on the
political horizon. It was a time of political intrigue amongst Afghan
Sirdars and chiefs so complicated and so widespread as to be almost
unintelligible at this distance of time, and not even Masson, with all
his advantages of intimate association and great powers of intuition,
seems to have fathomed the position satisfactorily. Consequently it
was to the interests of the Afghan Government to stand well with the
British, even if it were equally their aim to keep on good terms with
Russia--in short, to play the same game that has lasted during the
rest of the century, and which threatens to last for many another
decade yet. But this was before the mission of Burnes, and before the
events of the subsequent Afghan war had taught the Afghan that British
arms were not necessarily invincible, nor British promises always
trustworthy.
Apart from the ordinary chances of disaster on the roads arising from
the lack of law and order, any European would have met with a
hospitable reception at that time, and Masson himself relates how, in
Kabul, during some of the friendly gatherings which he attended, the
respective probabilities of British or Russian intervention in Kabul
affairs was a common subject of discussion. It is easy for one who
knows the country to picture him sitting under the shade of the
mulberry trees, with the soft lush of the Afghan summer in grass and
flowers about him, the scent of the willow in the air, and, across the
sliding blue of the Kabul River, a dim haze shadowing the rounded
outlines of some ancient stupa, whilst trying to unriddle the tangle
of Afghan politics or taking notes of weird stories and ancient
legends. Nothing seems to have come amiss to his inquiring mind.
Archæology, numismatics, botany, geology, and history--it was all new
to him, and an inexhaustible opportunity lay before him. He certainly
made good use of it. He busied himself, amongst other things, with an
inquiry into the origin of the Siahposh Kafirs, and, although his
speculations regarding them have long been discounted by the results
of subsequent investigation from nearer points of view, it is
interesting to note how these savages were then regarded by the
nearest Mahomedan communities. Masson admits that the history of a
Greek origin is supported by all natural and historical indications,
but he declines to accept "so bold and welcome an inference." Why he
should call it "bold and welcome" and then reject it, is not
explained, but it is probable that he accepted the claim to a Greek
origin on the part of the Kafirs as indicating that they claimed to
be Greek and nothing but Greek. When we consider the number and extent
of the Greek colonies which once existed beyond the Hindu Kush it
would indeed be surprising if there were no survival of Greek blood in
the veins of the people who, in the last stronghold of a conquered and
hunted race, represent the debris of the once powerful Baktrian
kingdom. Incidentally he discussed the interesting episode of Timur's
invasion of Kafiristan, a subject on which no recent investigations
have thrown any further light. The story, as told by Timur's
historian, Sharifudin, says that in A.D. 1399, when Timur was at
Andarab, complaints were made to him of outrage and oppression by the
exaction of tribute, or "Karaj," against the idolaters of Katawar and
the Siahposh. It appears that Katawar was then the general name for
the northern regions of Kafiristan, although no reference to that name
had been recorded lately.
Timur is said to have taken a third part of the army of the Andarab
against the infidels, and to have reached Perjan (probably Parwan),
from whence he detached a part of his force to act to the north of
that place, whilst he himself proceeded to Kawak, which is certainly
Khawak at the head of the Panjshir valley. If Perjan is Parwan (which
I think most probable) this distribution of his force would indicate
that he held the Panjshir valley at both ends, and thus secured his
flank whilst operating in Kafiristan. From Khawak he "made the
ascent" of the mountains of "Ketnev" (_i.e._ he crossed the
intervening snow-covered divide between the Panjshir and the head of
the Alishang) and descended upon the fortress of Najil. This was
abandoned by the Siahposh Kafirs, who held a high hill on the left
bank of the river. After an obstinate fight the hill was carried, and
the male infidels, "whose souls were blacker than their garments,"
were killed, and their women and children carried away. Timur set up a
marble pillar with an inscription recording the event, and it would be
exceedingly interesting if that pillar could be identified. Masson
thinks that a structure which he ascertained to have been in existence
in his time a little to the north of Najil, known as the Timur Hissar
(Timur's Fort), may be the fort which Timur destroyed after it had
been abandoned by the Kafirs, and that the record of his victory would
be found near by. The chief of Najil in Masson's time claimed descent
from Timur, and there was (and is still) so much of Tartar tradition
enveloping the valley of Najil (or the upper Alishang) as to make it
fairly certain that Tartar, or Mongol, troops did actually invade that
valley from the Panjshir, and that there is consequently a practicable
pass from the Panjshir into the upper Alishang.
If we are correct in our assumption of the position of Farajghan and
Najil in the modern maps of Afghanistan, as determined from native
sources of information (for no surveyor has ever laid down the course
of the upper affluents of the Alishang) this Mongol force must have
crossed from about the centre of the Panjshir valley. It is a matter
of interest to observe that, historically, between Afghan Turkistan
and the Kabul plain the fashionable pass over the Hindu Kush until
quite recently was the Parwan, and this, no doubt, was due to the fact
that its altitude (12,300 feet) is less by quite 2000 feet than that
of the Kaoshan which closely adjoins it, although the Kaoshan is in
some other important respects the easier pass of the two. The Khawak,
at the head of the Panjshir, is lower still (11,650 feet), but it
offers a more circuitous route; whilst the Chahardar, the pass
selected by the Amir Abdurrahmon for the construction of a high-road
into Afghan Turkistan from the Kabul plain, is as high as the Kaoshan.
All these routes converge on the important strategical position of
Charikar, adjoining the junction of the Ghorband and Panjshir rivers;
and they all lead from that ancient strategical centre of Baktria, the
Andarab basin. Undoubtedly through all time the passage over the
Khawak (now a well-trodden khafila route, said to be open to traffic
all the year round) must have been the most attractive to the
freebooters and adventurers of the north; but there appears to have
been a reputation for ferocity and strength attached to the
inhabitants of the Panjshir valley, which was remarkable even in the
days when the only recognized right was might, and half Asia was
peopled by barbarians. They were spoken of with the respect due to a
condition of savage independence by the Arab writers who detail the
geography of these regions, and it is probable that they shared the
historical lawlessness of their Kafir neighbours (the Siahposh), even
if in those days they did not share a race affinity. At the beginning
of the sixteenth century the Emperor Babar notes that the Panjshir
people paid tribute to their neighbours the Kafirs.
Masson's observations on this troublous corner of Asiatic geography
are shrewd and interesting, and as much to the purpose to-day as they
were when they were written. The explorations of McNair and Robertson
over the Kafiristan border from Chitral, and the march of Lockhart's
party through the Arnawai valley, added much to the geographical
knowledge of the eastern fringe of Kafiristan, whilst the
identification of the Koh-i-Mor with the classic Meros, and of certain
sections of the eastern Kafirs as representative of the ancient
Nysæans, clearly establishes the Greek connection about which Masson
was so sceptical. But the Kafirs of Central and Western Kafiristan,
the inhabitants of the upper basins of the Alishang and Alingar about
the centre of the Hindu Kush and of the Badakshan rivers to the north,
are just as unknown to us as they were to him. The only certain
inference that we can draw from the total absence of history about
these valleys of the Hindu Kush is that between the Khawak Pass at
the head of the Panjshir valley on the west, and the Minjan Pass
leading to Chitral on the east, there is not, and never has been, a
practicable route connecting the Kabul basin with Badakshan. No Arab
khafilas ever passed that way; no hordes of raiding robbers from
Central Asian fields ever forced a passage southward through those
Kafir defiles; they are still dark and impenetrable, the home of
distinct and separate valley communities, differing as widely in form
of speech as in superstitious ritual, the very flotsam and jetsam of
High Asia, as wild as the eagles above them or the markhor on their
craggy hill-sides.
We will not follow Masson into the mazes of Afghan political history.
It is all a story of the past, but a story with a moral to it. Had the
Government of India in those days but troubled itself to obtain
information from existing practical sources within its reach, instead
of improvising a most imperfect political intelligence system, the
subsequent war with Afghanistan would have been conducted on very
different lines to those which were adopted, if it ever took place at
all.
Masson made his way steadily to Kabul after meeting with adventures
and vicissitudes enough for a two-volume novel, and passed on to
Ghazni, where the army of Dost Mahomed Khan was then encamped, and
with which he took up his quarters. Here he was well received, and he
interviewed the great Afghan Chief (who settled his quarrel with his
brothers from Kandahar without fighting), and thus records his opinion
of a remarkable personage in history: "Dost Mahomed Khan has
distinguished himself on various occasions by acts of personal
intrepidity ... has proved himself an able Commander, equally well
skilled in stratagem and polity, and only employs the sword when other
means fail. He is remarkably plain in attire.... I should not have
conjectured him a man of ability either from his conversation or his
appearance"; but "a stranger must be cautious in estimating the
character of a Durani from his appearance," which caution he also
found it necessary to exercise in the case of Dost Mahomed's corpulent
brother, Mahomed Khan, the Governor of Ghazni. From Ghazni, Masson
continued his journey to Kandahar, still trudging the weary road on
foot in the doubtful company of casual Pathan wayfarers; and he
accepts the savage treatment which he experienced at the hands of
certain Lohanis near Ghazni as all in the day's work, never
complaining of his want of luck so long as he got off with his life,
and always ready to accept the chances of the most unsafe road rather
than remain inactive. At Kandahar he again set himself to acquire a
store of useful political information, though with what object it is
difficult to say. He certainly did not mean it for the Indian
Government, for he regrets later on in his career that he ever gave
any of it away, and as a record of almost unintelligible Afghan
intrigue it could hardly have interested his own. He was a wide
observer, however, and must have been the possessor of a most
remarkable memory. He was indeed a whole intelligence department in
himself. After some weird and gruesome experiences in Kandahar (where,
however, he was personally made welcome) he left for Shikarpur by the
Quetta and Bolan route, and it was on this journey that he nearly lost
his life. He committed the error of allowing the caravan with which he
was to travel to precede him, trusting to his being able to catch it
up _en route_. He fell amongst the Achakzai thieves of those ugly
plains, and being everywhere known and recognised as a Feringhi, he
passed a very rough time with them. They stripped him of his clothing
after beating him and robbing him of his money, and left him
"destitute, a stranger in the centre of Asia, unacquainted with the
language--which would have been useful to me--and from my colour
exposed on all occasions to notice, inquiry, ridicule, and insult."
However, "it was some consolation to find the khafila was not far
off," and eventually he joined it; but he nearly died of cold and
exposure, and it took him years to recover from the rheumatism set up
by crouching naked over the embers of the fire at night.
There are several points about this remarkable journey which might
lead one to suspect that romance was not altogether a stranger to it,
were it not that the route itself is described with surprising
accuracy. It has only lately been possible to verify step by step the
road described by Masson. He could hardly have carried about volumes
of notes with him under such conditions as his story depicts, and it
might very well have happened that he dislocated his topography or his
ethnography from lapse of memory. But he does neither; and the most
amazing feature of Masson's tales of travel is that in all essential
features we knew little more about the country of the Afghans after
the last war with Afghanistan than he could have told us before the
first. Shall (or Quetta as we know it now) is described as a town of
about 300 houses, surrounded by a slight crenelated wall. The "huge
mound" (now the fort) is noted as supporting a ruinous citadel, the
residence of the Governor. Fruit was plentiful then, and he adds that
"Shall is proverbially celebrated for the excellence of its lambs." By
the desolate plain of Dasht-i-bedoulat and the Bolan Pass, Masson trod
the well-known route to Dadar and Shikarpur. He lived a strange life
in those days. No one since his time has rubbed shoulders with Afghan
and Baluch, intimately associating himself with all their simple and
savage ways; reckoning every man he met on the road as a robber till
he proved a friend; absolutely penniless, yet still meeting with rough
hospitality and real kindness now and then, and ever absorbing with a
most marvellous power of digestion all that was useful in the way of
information, whether it concerned the red-hot sand-strewn plains, or
the vermin-covered thieves and outcasts that disgraced them. It was
quite as often with the lowest of the gang as with the leaders that he
found himself most intimately associated.
In those days Sind was a country as unknown to us geographically as
Afghanistan. The Indus and its capacity for navigation was a matter of
supreme interest, but the deserts of Sind were eyed askance, and
across those deserts came little call for exploration. The government
of the country under the Sind Amirs was decrepit and loose, leaving
district municipalities to look after themselves, and promoting no
general scheme for the public good. Shikarpur had been a great centre
of trade under the Duranis, and its financial credit extended far into
Central Asia. But in Masson's time much of that credit had disappeared
with the capitalists who supported it--chiefly Hindu bankers--who
migrated to the cities of Multan and Amritsar as the Sikh power in the
Punjab became a more and more powerful factor in frontier politics.
Whether Masson is correct in his estimate of the mischief done by the
reckless supply of funds from Shikarpur to the restless nobles of
Afghanistan, who were thus enabled to set on foot raids and inroads
into each other's territories, is, I think, doubtful. The want of
money never stayed an Afghan raid--on the contrary it is more apt to
instigate it. From Shikarpur he bent his steps towards the Punjab. No
modern traveller, racing down the Indus valley by a north-western
train, can well appreciate the amount of human interest and activity
which lies hidden beyond the wide flat plains of tamarisk jungle that
stretch between him and the frontier hills. This same Indus valley was
Arabic India for centuries, and there were Greek settlements centuries
earlier than the Arabs; none of this escaped Masson.
The vicissitudes of this weary walk were many. Masson was put to
curious expedients in order to keep himself even decently clothed.
From under one hospitable roof he stole out in the evening, when the
ragged retinue of his host were all in a state of stupefaction from
drink, in order to be spared their too familiar adieux. It is a
remarkable fact that he found himself able to pass muster as a Mongol
on his journey, there being a tradition in Sind that some Mongols were
as fair as Englishmen. From Rohri on the Indus he made his way almost
exactly along the line of the present railway, through Bhawalpur to
Uch, continually losing his way in the narrow tracks that intersected
the intricate jungle, with but a rupee or two in his pocket, and
nothing but the saving grace of the village masjid as a refuge for the
night. His experiences with wayfarers like himself, the lies that he
heard (and I am afraid also told), the hospitality which he received
both from men and women, and the variety of incident generally which
adorns this part of Masson's tale is a refreshing contrast to the
dreary monotony of the modern traveller's tale of Indian travel, the
bare record of a dusty railway experience, with here and there a new
impression of old and worn-out themes. He was impressed with the
"contented, orderly, and hospitable" character of the people of
Northern Sind, whose condition was "very respectable" notwithstanding
an oppressive government. Saiads and fakirs, pirs and spiritual guides
of all sorts were an abomination to him, but it is somewhat new to
hear of Saiads that "they may commit any crime with impunity." At
Fazilpur (in Bhawalpur) he found an old friend, one Rahmat Khan, and
was once again in the lap of native luxury. Clean clothes, a bed to
lie on, and good food, kept him idle for a month ere he started again
northward for Lahore. Rahmat Khan was almost too generous. He spent
his last rupee recklessly on a nautch, and had to borrow from the
Hindus of his bazaar in order to find two rupees to present to his
guest for the cost of his journey to Lahore. Of this large sum it is
interesting to note that Masson had still eight annas left in his
pocket on his arrival at that city. Alas for the good old days! What a
modern tramp might achieve in India if he were allowed free play it is
difficult to guess, but never again will any European travel 360 miles
in India and feed himself for two months on a rupee and a half.
Masson notes the extraordinary extent of ancient ruins around Uch,
and correctly infers the importance of that city in the days of Arab
ascendency. He has much to say that is still interesting about Multan
and its surroundings. It must have been new to historians to hear that
the heat of Multan is due to the maledictions of the Saint Shams
Tabieri, who was flayed alive by the progenitors of the people who now
venerate his shrine. Multan was in the hands of the Sikhs when Masson
was there. From Multan Masson ceased to follow the modern line of
railway, and adopted a route north of the Ravi River until near the
city, when he recrossed to the southern bank. Lost in admiration of
the luxuriance of the cultivation of this part of the Punjab, and full
of the interest aroused by the fact that he was on classical ground,
the ground of ancient history, he wandered into Lahore. Lahore and the
Sikh administration, the character of Ranjit Singh and his policy
towards British and Afghan neighbours, are all part of Indian history,
but it is interesting to recall the prominence of French and Italians
in the Punjab 100 years ago. General Allard was encountered quite
accidentally by Masson, who was at once recognized as a European, and
found himself able to talk French fluently. This naturally led to his
entertainment by the General at his own splendid establishments. The
beautiful tomb of Jehangir, the Shahdera, was occupied as a residence
by the French general, Amise, who died, so they said, in expiation of
his impiety in cleaning it up and making it tidy--which was probably
very necessary. The tomb of Anarkalli, south of the city, was used as
a harem by M. Ventura, the Italian general, whilst the well-known
Avitabile lived in a house decorated after the fashion of Neapolitan
art in cantonments to the east of the city. The lovely gardens of
Shalimar had already been robbed of much of their beauty by the
transfer of marble and stone from their pavilions for the building of
Amritsar, the new religious capital of the Sikhs. Lahore is "a dull
city in the commercial sense," says Masson, and Amritsar "has become
the great mart of the Punjab." We need not follow Masson's
explorations in the Punjab and Sind, further than to relate that he
finally left Lahore during the rainy season (he was riding now, and in
fairly easy circumstances) and made his way south again _via_ Multan,
Haidarabad, and Tatta, to Karachi. There is a lamentable want of dates
about this narrative, and it is almost impossible to fix the month, or
even the year, in which Masson visited any particular part of the
frontier.
His next exploits and explorations conducted from Karachi are
sufficiently remarkable in themselves to place Masson quite at the
head of the list of frontier explorers. He stands, indeed, in the same
relation to the Indian borderland as Livingstone does to Africa. He
first made a sea trip in Arab crafts up the Persian Gulf, visiting
Muskat and obtaining a passage in a cruiser of the H.E.I. Company to
Bushire. This we know from Major David Wilson's report to have been in
1830. It was then that he gave up the record of his previous travels,
to which we have referred, and which he subsequently thought he had
reason to regret. A month or two was passed at Tabriz, and a trip up
the Tigris to Bagdad and Basrah. From Basrah he returned in a merchant
vessel to Muskat, and finally made Karachi again in an Arab bagala. At
Karachi he was not permitted to land, owing (as he suspected) to
another party of Englishmen who were then attempting to explore the
Indus. This turned out to be Captain Burnes' (afterwards Sir Alex.
Burnes) party. The objection was based on a somewhat ridiculous notion
of the capacity of the English to carry about regiments of soldiers
concealed in _boxes_, and Masson subsequently learned that having no
boxes with him, the opposition in his case had been withdrawn by the
Amirs of Sind as tantamount to a breach of hospitality. However, for
the time he was forced to return to Urmara on the Makran coast, from
which place he hoped to reach Kalat. In this he was disappointed, but
he found his way back to Sonmiani in an Arab dunghi (or bagala),
which, with the monsoon wind at her back, was run in gallant style
straight over the shallow bar into the harbour with hardly a foot of
water below her. The practice of medicine was what sustained Masson at
this period, but his reputation was slightly impaired by a crude
prescription of sea water. A lady, too, who suffered from a
disposition of her face to break out into white blotches, and who
appealed for a remedy, was told that she would look much better all
white. This again led to a lively controversy; but on the whole the
practice of medicine was as useful to Masson as it has proved through
all ages to explorers in all regions of the world.
The story of Masson's next journey through Las Bela and Eastern
Baluchistan to Kalat and the neighbourhood of Quetta, must have been
an almost unintelligible record for half a century after it was
written. It is almost useless to repeat the names of the places he
visited. Five-and-twenty years ago these names were absolutely
unfamiliar, an empty sound signifying nothing to the dwellers on the
British side of the Baluch frontier. Gradually they have emerged from
the regions of the vague unknown into the ordered series of completed
maps; and nothing testifies more surely to the general accuracy of
Masson's narrative than the possibility which now exists of tracing
his steps from point to point through these wild and desolate regions
of rocky ridge and salt-edged jungle in Eastern Baluchistan. It is
certainly significant that in the year 1830 more should have been
known of the regions that lie between Karachi and Quetta or Kandahar,
than was known fifty years later when plans were elaborated for
bringing Quetta into railway communication with India.
Had Masson's information been properly digested, the most direct route
to Kalat, Quetta, or Kandahar, _via_ the Purali River, would surely
have been weighed in administrative councils, and the advantage of
direct communication with the seaport by a cheaply constructed line
would have received due consideration. But Masson's work was still
unproven and unchecked, and it would have been more than any
Englishman's life was worth to have attempted in 1880 the task which
he undertook with such light-hearted energy. His observations of the
country he passed through, and the complicated tribal distribution
which distinguishes it are necessarily superficial, but they are
shrewd. It was clearly impossible for him to attempt any form of
survey, and without some map evidence of the scene of his wanderings
his explorations were deprived at the time of their chief
significance. From Las Bela to Kalat he appears to have encountered no
more dangerous adventure than might befall any Baluch traveller in the
same regions. From Kalat he wandered at leisure northward till he
overlooked the Dasht-i-bedaulat from the heights of Chahiltan. This
well-known Quetta peak has probably often been ascended by Englishmen
in late years, and the misty legend which is wreathed around it is
familiar to every regimental mess in the Quetta garrison. It is
perhaps a little disappointing to remember that the first white man
who achieved its ascent and told the story of the forty heaven-sent
infants who gambol about its summit to the eternal glory of the
sainted Hazart Ghaos (the patron saint of Baluch children), was an
American. Masson's interesting record of Chahiltan botany, however,
would be more useful if he translated the native names into botanical
language.
From Quetta he returned to Kalat, and, determined to see as much of
the borderland as possible, he made his return journey from Kalat to
Sonmiani _via_ the Mulla Pass. The pass is still an interesting
feature in Baluch geography. It was once the popular route from the
plains to the highlands, when trade was more frequent between Kalat
and Hindustan, and may serve a useful purpose again. Very few even of
frontier officials know anything of it. Masson gives a capital
description of the Mulla route, "easy and safe, and may be travelled
at all seasons." From Jhal he went south through Sind to Sehwan, the
antiquity of which place gives him room for much speculation; but from
Sehwan to Sonmiani his route is not so clear. He started backwards on
his tracks from Sehwan, then struck southward through lower Sind,
passing on his way many ancient sites (locally known as "gôt," _i.e._
kôt, or fort), the origin of which he was apparently unable to
determine, but halting at no place with a name that is still
prominent, unless the modern Pokran represents his Pokar. I am not
aware whether the "gôts" described by Masson in lower Sind have as yet
been scientifically examined, but his description of them tallies
with that of similar ruins lately found near Las Bela (especially as
regards the stone-built circle), which, occurring as they do in Makran
and the valley of the Purali (the ancient Arabis), are possibly relics
of the building races of Arabs (Sab[oe]an or Himyaritic) who occupied
these districts in early ages before they became withered and
waterless with the gradual alteration of their geographical
conditions. Other constructions, such as the cylindrical heaps on the
hills, are more certainly Buddhist. Masson was unaware that he was
traversing a province which figured as Bodh in Arab chronicles, and is
full of the traces of Buddhist occupation. Makran, Las Bela, and the
Sind borderland still offer a mine of wealth for archæological
research. The last two or three days' march was in company with a
Bulfut (Lumri) camel-man, whose mount was shared by Masson. As the
Lumri sowar was in the habit not only of taking opium himself but of
giving it to his camel, the morning's ride was sometimes perilously
lively.
One would have thought that after so extensive an exploration, filled,
as it was, with daily risk from the hostility of fanatics, or the more
common (in those days) assaults of robbers, Masson would have had
enough of adventure to last him some years. It was not so. He appears
to have been an irreclaimable nomadic vagabond, and his only thought,
now that he had reached the West, was to be off again to Afghanistan.
Kalat again was his first objective, and to reach that place he
followed very much the same route as before. From Kalat, however, to
Kandahar and Kabul, he opened up a new line which is worth
description. There is little to record as far as Kalat. Once again he
joined a mixed Afghan khafila returning from India, and followed the
route which leads through Las Bela, Wad, and Khozdar. It was spring,
and the country was bright with flowers, the narrow little valleys
being full of the brilliance of upspringing crops. It is a mistake to
regard Baluchistan as a waste corner of Asia, the dumping ground of
the rubbish left over from the world's creation. Much of it,
doubtless, is inexpressibly dreary, and in certain dry and sun-baked
plains scarred with leprous streaks of salt eruption, it is
occasionally difficult to realize the beauty of the spring and summer
time in valleys where water is still fairly abundant, and the green
things of the earth seem mostly to congregate. A bed of scarlet
tulips, or the yellow sheen of the flowering shrub which spreads
across the plain of Wad would make any landscape gay, and the long
jagged lines of purple hills with chequered shadows patching their
rugged spurs would be a fascinating background to any picture. "Only
man is vile,"--but this is not true either.
The character of the mixed inhabitants of these valleys of Eastern
Baluchistan (we have no room for ethnological disquisitions) is as
rugged as their hills, and as varied with patches of brightness as
their plains. Masson knew them as no one knows them now, and he
evidently loved them. His life was never safe from day to day, but
that did not prevent much good comradeship, some genuine friendship,
and a shrewd appreciation of the straight uprightness of those who,
like the patriarchs and prophets of old, seemed to be the righteous
few who leaven the whole lump. Masson was not a missionary, he was
only a well-educated and most observant vagabond, but what he has to
say of Baluch (or Brahui) character is just what Sandeman said half a
century later, and what Barnes or MacMahon[11] would say to-day.
What Masson never seemed to appreciate (any more than the Arab traders
who trod the same roads in mediæval centuries) was the change of
altitude that accrued after long travelling over apparently flat
roads. The natural change in the character of vegetation with the
increase of altitude appears, therefore, to surprise him. He reached
Kalat without much incident. Here he parted with the Peshin Saiads and
the Brahuis of the caravan, and proceeded with the Afghan contingent
to Kandahar. The direct road from Kalat to Kandahar runs through the
Mangachar valley and thence crosses the Khwaja Amran, or Kojak range,
by the Kotal-i-bed into Shorawak, and runs northward to Kandahar
through the eastern part of the Registan, without touching the main
road from Quetta till within a march or two of Kandahar itself. It is
worth noting that there was no want of water on this route, and no
great difficulties were experienced in passing through the hills.
Irrigation canals and the intricacies of natural ravines in Shorawak
seem to have been the chief obstacles. It is a route which was never
made use of during the last Afghan war, nor, so far as I can discover,
during the previous one. The Achakzai tribespeople (some of whom were
with the khafila returning to their country from Bombay) behaved with
remarkable modesty and good faith, and altogether belied their natural
characteristics of truculence and treachery. The journey was made on
camel-back in a kajáwa, a method of travelling which ensures a good
overlook of the proceedings of the khafila and the country traversed
by it, but which can have few other recommendations. Kandahar,
however, was not Masson's objective on this trip. Afghanistan was in
its usual state of distracted politics, and Kabul was the centre of
distraction. To Kabul, therefore, Masson felt himself impelled; like
the stormy petrel he preferred a troubled horizon and plenty of
incident to the calmer seas of oriental existence in the flat plains
of Kandahar. His journey with an Afghan khafila by the well-trodden
road which leads to Ghazni was quite sufficiently full of incident,
and the extraordinary rapacity of the Ghilzai tribes, who occupy the
road as far as that city, leaves one astonished that enough was left
of the khafila for useful business purposes in Kabul. Masson was
impressed with the desolation and degradation of Ghazni. He can hardly
believe that this waste wilderness of mounds around an insignificant
town, with its two dreary sentinel minars standing out on the plain,
and a dilapidated tomb where rests all that is left of the great
conqueror Mahmud, can be the city of such former magnificence as is
described in Afghan history. Every traveller to Ghazni has been
touched with the same feeling of incredulity, but it only testifies to
the remarkable power possessed by the destroying hordes of Chenghiz
Khan and his successors of making a clean sweep of the cities which
fell into their hands.
A few days before Masson's arrival in Kabul (this is one of the rare
dates which we find recorded in his story) in June 1832, three
Englishmen had visited the city. These were Lieutenant Burnes, Dr.
Gerard, and the Rev. Joseph Wolff. He does not appear to have actually
met them. Mr. Wolff had been fortunate enough to distinguish himself
as a prophet, and had acquired considerable reputation. An earthquake
preceding certain local disturbances between the Sunis and the Shiahs,
which he foretold, had established his position, and imitators had
begun to arise amongst the people. No better account of the city of
Kabul, the beauty of its surroundings, its fruit and its trade, and
the social customs of its people, is to be found than that of Masson.
What he observed of the city and suburbs in 1832 might almost have
been written of the Kabul of fifty years later; but the last
twenty-five years have introduced many radical changes, and good roads
for wheeled vehicles (not to mention motors) and a small local railway
have done more even than the stucco palaces and fantastic halls of the
late Amir Abdurrahmon to change the character of the place. The
curious spirit of tolerance and liberality which still pervades Kabul
and distinguishes it from other Afghan towns, which makes the life of
an individual European far more secure there than it would be in
Kandahar, the absence of Ghazidom and fanaticism, was even more marked
then than it is now. Armenian Christians were treated with more than
toleration, they intermarried with Mahomedans; the fact that Masson
was known to be a Feringhi never interfered with the spirit of
hospitality with which he was received and treated. Only on one
occasion was he insulted in the streets, and that was when he wore a
Persian cap instead of the usual lunghi. But the Jews were as much
anathema as they are now, and Masson tells a curious tale of one Jew
who was stoned to death by Mahomedans for denying the divinity of
Jesus Christ, after the Christian community of Armenians had declined
to carry out the punishment. To this day nothing arouses Afghan hatred
like the cry of Yahudi (Jew), and it may very possibly be partly due
to their firm conviction in their origin as Ben-i-Israel.
The summer of 1832 at Kabul must have been a delightful experience,
but with the coming autumn the restlessness of the nomad again seized
on Masson and he made that journey to Bamian in company with an Afghan
friend, one Haji Khan, chief of Bamian, which followed the mission of
Burnes to Kunduz, and proved the possibilities of the route to Afghan
Turkestan by the southern passes of the Hindu Kush. Bamian was then
separated from Kabul by the width of the Besud territory, which was
practically controlled by a semi-independent Hazara chief,
Yezdambaksh. Beyond Bamian the pass of Ak Robat defined the northern
frontier of Afghanistan, beyond which again were more semi-independent
chiefs, of whom by far the most powerful, south of the Oxus, was Mir
Murad Beg of Kunduz. Amongst them all political intrigue was in a
state of boiling effervescence. Haji Khan (a Kakar soldier of fortune)
from Western Afghanistan knew himself to be unpopular with the Amir
Dost Mahomed Khan, and had shrewd suspicions that spite of a
long-tried friendship, he was regarded as a dangerous factor in Kabul
politics. Yezdambaksh, influenced doubtless by his gallant wife, who
rode and fought by his side and was ever at his elbow in council,
trimmed his course to patch up a temporary alliance with Haji Khan
under the pretext of suffocating the ambition of the local chief of
Saighan; whilst Murad Beg about that time was strong enough to
preserve his own position unassisted and aloof. Into the seething
welter of intrigue arising from the conflicting interests of these
many candidates for distinction in the Afghan border field Masson
plunged when he accepted Haji Khan's invitation to join him at Bamian.
Across the lovely plain of Chardeh, bright with the orange blossoms of
the safflower, Masson followed the well-known route to Argandi and
over the Safed Khak Pass to the foot of the divide which is crossed by
the Unai (called Honai by Masson), meeting with the usual demands for
"karij," or duty, from the Hazaras at their border, with the usual
altercations and violence on both sides. Well known as is this route,
it may be doubted whether any better description of it has ever been
written than that of Masson. Instead of striking straight across the
Helmund at Gardandiwal by the direct route to Bamian, the party
followed the course of the Helmund, then fringed with rose bushes and
willows, passing through a delightfully picturesque country till they
fell in with the Afghan camp, after much wandering in unknown parts on
the banks of the Helmund, at a point which it is difficult to
identify.
The story of the daily progress of the oriental military camp, and the
daily discussions with Haji Khan, who appeared to be as frank and
childlike in his disclosures of his methods as any chattering booby,
is excellent. There is no doubt that Masson at this time exercised
very considerable influence over his Afghan and Hazara acquaintances,
and he is probably justified in his claim to have prevented more than
one serious row over the everlasting demands for karij. It is to be
noted that two guns were dragged along with this expedition by forced
Hazara labour, eighty men being required for one, and two hundred for
the other, assisted by an elephant. The calibre of the guns is not
mentioned. At a place called Shaitana they were still south of the
Helmund, and in the course of their progress through Besud visited the
sources of the Logar. Near these sources is the Azdha of Besud, the
petrified dragon slain by Hazrat Ali (not to be confused with Azdha of
Bamian), a volcanic formation stretching its white length through
about 170 yards, exhaling sulphurous odours. The red rock found about
its head is supposed to be tinged with blood. The Azdha afterwards
seen and described at Bamian is of "more imposing size."
Another long march (apparently on the road to Ghazni) brought the
expedition to the frontier of Besud, at a point reckoned by Masson as
three marches from the Ghazni district. From here they retraced their
steps and crossed the Helmund at Ghoweh Kol (? Pai Kol), making for
Bamian. This closed the Besud expedition, which, regarded as a
geographical exploration, is still authoritative, no complete survey
of that district having ever been made. From the Helmund they reached
Bamian by the Siah Reg Pass, thus proving the possibility of
traversing that district by comparatively unknown routes which were
"not on the whole difficult to cavalry, though impracticable to
wheeled carriages." The guns were left in Besud, to be dragged through
by Hazaras. It must be remembered that this was early winter, and the
frozen snow rendered the passes slippery and difficult. The aspect of
the Koh-i-Baba (? Babar) mountains, and their "craggy pinnacles"
(which, by reason of their similarity of outline, gave much trouble to
our surveyors in 1882-83) seems to have impressed Masson greatly. The
descent into the Bamian valley was "perfectly easy, and the road
excellent throughout." Masson's contributions to the Asiatic Society
on the subject of Bamian and its "idols" are well known. His
observations were acute, and on the whole accurate. He rightly
conjectured these wonderful relics to be Buddhist, although he never
grasped the full extent of Buddhist influence, nor the extraordinary
width of their occupation in Northern Afghanistan. His conjectures and
impressions need not be repeated, but his somewhat crude sketches of
Bamian and the citadel of Gulgula intensify the regret which I always
feel that a thoroughly competent photographer was not attached to the
long subsequent Russo-Afghan Boundary Commission.
Masson's wanderings in the company of the Afghan chief Haji Khan and
his redoubtable army through the valleys and over the passes of the
Hindu Kush and its western spurs is full of interest to the military
reader. The Afghan force consisted largely of cavalry, as did that of
the gallant Hazara chief, Yezdambaksh. Nothing is said about infantry,
but it was probably little better than a badly armed mob chiefly
concerned in guarding the guns which reached the valley of Bamian,
but, as already stated, they could not follow the cavalry over the
Siah Reg Pass from Besud. They were sent round by the "Karza" Pass,
which is probably the one known as Kafza on our maps, which indicates
the most direct route from Kabul to Bamian.
It is necessary to follow the ostensible policy of these military
movements in order to render Masson's account of them intelligible.
Haji Khan was acting in concert with Yezdambaksh and his Hazara
troops, with the presumed object of crushing first Mahomed Ali, the
chief of Saighan (north of Bamian), and ultimately repeating the
process on Rahmatulla Khan, the chief of Kamard (north of Saighan). In
order to effect this he had to pass up the Bamian valley to its
northern head, marked by the Ak Robat Pass (10,200 feet high), and
thence descend into the Saighan valley by the route formed by one of
its southern tributaries. It was early winter (or late autumn), but
still the passes seemed to have been more or less free from snow, and
the Ak Robat Pass in particular appears to have given little trouble,
although the valley contracts almost to a gorge in the descent.
Masson noted evidences of the former existence of a considerable town
near this route on the descent from Ak Robat. Much to his
astonishment, instead of smashing the Saighan opposition with his
superior force, Haji Khan proceeded to patch up an alliance with
Mahomed Ali, which was cemented by his marrying one of the daughters
of that wily chief. Here, however, he experienced a cruel
disappointment. Instead of the lovely bride whom he had been led to
expect, he received a squat and snub-nosed Hazara girl, who was,
indeed, of very doubtful parentage. This little swindle, however, was
not permitted to interfere with his politics. The alliance ought to
have aroused the suspicion of Yezdambaksh, but the latter seems to
have trusted to the strength of his following to meet any possible
contingency.
The next step was to proceed to Kamard and repeat the process of
occupation. Here, however, an unexpected difficulty arose. The
easy-going, hard-drinking Tajik chief of Kamard was far too wily to
put himself into Haji Khan's power, and with some of the Uzbek chiefs
who owed their allegiance to that fine old border bandit Murad Khan of
Kunduz (of whom we shall hear again), positively declined to permit
Haji Khan to come farther. Meanwhile, however, a force had advanced
over the divide between Saighan and Kamard by a pass which Masson
calls the Nalpach (or horseshoe-breaking pass), which can hardly be
the same as the well-known Dandan Shikan (or tooth-breaking pass),
but is probably to the east of it, leading more directly to Bajgah.
Before ascending the pass, Masson noted the remains of an ancient town
or fort built of immense stones, and here they halted. Here also snow
fell. Next day a reconnaissance in force was made over the Nalpach
Pass ("long, but not difficult"), and apparently part of the force
descended into Kamard and commenced hostile operations against the
Kamard chieftain. Haji Khan, however, returned to camp. He had now
succeeded in breaking up the Hazara force which was with him into two
or three detached bodies, so the opportunity was ripe for one of the
blackest acts of treachery that ever disgraced Afghan history--which
is saying a good deal. He entrapped and seized the fine old Hazara
chief, Yezdambaksh, and, after dragging him about with him under
circumstances of great indignity, he finally executed him. The Hazara
troops seem to have scattered without striking a concerted blow; their
camp was looted, whilst such wretched refugees as were caught were
stripped and enslaved.
The savage barbarity of these proceedings, especially of the method of
the execution of Yezdambaksh (a rope being looped round the wretched
victim's neck, the two ends of which were hauled tight by a mixed
company of relatives and enemies), disgusted Masson deeply, and there
is a very obvious disposition evinced hereafter to part company with
his treacherous host, although he makes some attempt to excuse these
proceedings by pointing out that Haji Khan, after meeting with an
unexpected rebuff from Kamard (which he dare not resent so long as the
redoubtable Murad Beg loomed in the distance as the protector of the
frontier chiefs of Badakshan), would have been unable to keep and feed
his troops in the winter without scattering the Hazara contingent and
possessing himself of the resources of Besud.
Winter had already set in, and the subsequent story is instructive in
illustration of the difficulties which beset the road between Kabul
and Bamian during the winter season. The resources of Bamian were
insufficient even for his diminished force (now reduced to about its
original strength of eight hundred), and the Ghulam Khana contingent
grew restive and impatient, demanding to go back to Kabul. The passes,
however, were not only closed by snow, but the position at Karzar was
held by Hazaras, who, however much they were demoralised by the
execution of their chief, might well be expected to make reprisals.
The Ghulam Khana men, about two hundred and twenty strong, therefore
moved in force from Bamian, with the hope of being able to influence
the Hazaras to let them pass through Besud. Apparently they did not
rank as true Afghans. No great resistance was made at Karzar, although
they were not admitted to shelter. They were freely looted, and
eventually allowed to pass after three days' detention, exposed to
the terrific blasts of a winter shamal (north-west wind) in snow which
was then breast high. Many of them perished before reaching Kabul, and
many more were permanently disabled from frostbites.
Haji Khan, meanwhile, settled down as the uninvited guest of the
people of Bamian, and ensconced himself and his wives in the fort of
Saidabad, a strongly built construction of burnt bricks of immense
size, which Masson believed to have been built by the Arabs. Saidabad
is hard by the detached position of Gulgula; it is described by Masson
in considerable detail. Here, at an altitude of about 8500 feet, a
winter in Bamian is endurable, and Haji Khan avowed his intention of
remaining. It is interesting to note that a khafila from Bokhara for
Kabul arrived about this time, and was duly looted. Even in winter the
route (as a commercial route) was open.
Masson's efforts were now directed towards getting back to Kabul. His
first essay was in company of two brothers of Haji Khan, who vowed to
get to Kabul somehow, even if, as Afghans, they had to fight their way
through Besud. The party followed up the Topchi valley from Bamian,
and crossing by the Shutar Gardan Pass, they reached Karzar. Here
again Masson noted extensive ruins _en route_. The road was bad and
the difficulties great, "leading over precipices," but they did,
nevertheless, succeed in crossing the main divide. Here Masson
experienced a very bad time, and to his disgust found that he must
retrace his steps to Bamian, owing to counter orders from Haji Khan
recalling the escort. There appeared, however, a prospect of getting
out of Bamian by the Shibar Pass (an easy pass), leading to the head
of the Ghorband valley; and trusting to certain arrangements made by a
Paghmani chief, Masson made a fresh attempt, passing eastward the
ancient remains of Zohak, and ascending by a fairly easy open track to
the valley or plain of Irak. Probably this pass is the one known as
Khashka in our maps. The wind was terrific, but the comparative
freedom from snow was an unexpected advantage.
Passing eastwards from Irak (still on the northern slopes of the Hindu
Kush) the party made comparatively easy progress by a valley which
Masson calls Bubulak (where he observed tobacco to be growing). They
gradually ascended until once again they found themselves in snow, but
instead of making direct for the Shibar they inclined to a more
northerly pass called Bitchilik, which is separated from the Shibar by
a slight kotal (or divide). Here they found the Paghmani chief whom
they expected to join, but they found also that the section of Hazaras
who held these passes then were determined to bar their passage. Once
again Masson had to abandon the attempt (albeit the Shibar route to
Kabul would have been a very devious and dangerous one), and returned
to Bamian.
There are one or two circumstances about this exploration of the
western Hindu Kush passes which deserve attention. For once Masson is
slightly inaccurate in his geography when he states that the Irak
stream drains into the Bamian valley. It joins the Bamian River after
it has left the valley and turned northward. So slight an error is
only a useful proof of his general accuracy. Another remarkable fact
was that he, a Feringhi, was elected by the Afghan gang with which he
was temporarily associated as their Khan, or chief! He was a little
better dressed than most of them in European chintzes. He found
himself utterly unable to restrain their looting propensities, but he
made himself quite popular by his civility and his small presents to
the wretched Hazaras on whom they were quartered. Incidentally he
gives us a most valuable impression of the nature of an important
group of Afghan passes, and I doubt if his information has ever been
much improved upon.
Finally, the surrender of the Karzar position by the Hazaras reopened
the road to Kabul, and Masson was enabled to reach that capital by the
Topchi, Shutar Gardan, Kalu, Hajigak routes to Gardandiwal on the
Helmund. The Hajigak route he describes as easy of ascent, but "steep
and very troublesome" in the south. The Shutar Gardan (called
Panjpilan now) was "intricate and dangerous," but the passing of it
was done at night. This is, and always has been, the main khafila
route between Kabul, Bamian, and Bokhara. The journey from the Helmund
across the Unai (which pass was itself "difficult") was not
accomplished without great distress. A winter shumal caught Masson on
the road, and but for the timely shelter at Zaimuni would have
terminated his career there and then. Masson describes the terrific
effect of the wind with great vigour, but those who have experienced
it will not accuse him of exaggeration.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] _Selections from Travels and Journals preserved in the Bombay
Secretariat_, Forrest, 1908.
[11] Now Sir Hugh Barnes and Sir Henry MacMahon, one a past, and the
other the present, Agent for the Governor-General in Baluchistan.