The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-04-22

ton of Cabul ended AN uncontested though ex-
| pensive campaign, the operations of which orig
| mated causes of expenditure, against whish the
Duke of Wellington had propheticaly fore
warned his countrymen
The government of Afghans by their own in
sttutions would have been an experiment suf-
fciently facile, and conquest, the achievement
of which might have been effected with the pre-
text and the show Of right. But no confiiction
of submission short of absolute seryility and
/ the abolition of their national identity could
satisfy the English in their projected conquest
of Afghanistan. They accordingly attacked the
system of government which has been the
cherished form of society amongst the people
| from the earliest period of their political exist
ence. The population is divided into numerous
| tribes independent of each other, every one
separately governed by chief selected from the
| oldest family in the community, though not
| always the oldest member of that famy the
power is held during good behavior, and in case
| of vacancy by death, an election is made of
the heir of the late chief; or, should
fen he Decline brother Sa c5ef "a to rea bs
viewed as an executive officer, and administers
the laws of the tribe, which are the result of
usage arising from expedency strictly in con-
sonance with the customs of the people. lie can
levy no revenue; there are in fact, no expenses
of government. In tribe each head of fam
| lily is patriarch ruling in the undsturbed pos
session of his domestic hearth, bound by the
| common interest to sustain the peaceable and
| safe enjoyment or life ana property or his COM
munity, and himself as an integral part thereof
The attachment of the people is to the COM
munity, and not to the chief, who is liable to be
removed by a council of the tribe for any fla
grant misconduct The chief represents the
/ tribe in their foreign relations, calls out and
commands the militia, who maintain them.
selves, and administers the judicial system of
his tribe If the English had conciliated the
heads of tribes, arranged them round the
king as sustainers of the government
W hich privilege they had right to expect they
would have become willing hostages for the
good conduct of their tribes. But the King
who can do no wrong" drove these representa-
| tives of the people away from his court, seized
and imprisoned many who presented themselves
| for employment and honors, telling them plainly
his bayonets were preferable to their swords;
deputed the officers of state to swarm of hun
| cry expectants, who attended him during his
thirty years exile and filed up the districts
with household slaves and military retainers.
These proceedings, being sustained by the
| English, gave rise to the prevalence of profound
| but subdued disgust, which lately displayed its
The English, who know well the value of gold
could have controlled the movements and policy
of the Afghans by fiscal diplomacy. without in
curing the odium Of invading and subjugating
an uncffending and distant free people, whom to
subdue to European forms Of civilization was
| impossible. They are but the s'spirirs of the
waste who inhabit the wild and sterile deserts
| of the Caucasian mountains.
Their indomitable love of independence is
characteristic and incorrigible They are
what they appeared to be under the name of Bac-
| trianS in the muster roll of nations as given by
| Herodotus in the expedition of Xerxes into
| Greece, the fiercest of the savage nations of
| Scythia. Kings have risen among the Afghans
and conquered India, but in retaining their con-
| quests have relnqushed their native country
They have been transiently subdued, but never
enslaved or permanently conquered and held in
! subjugation by foreign power. The Greeks
| when they ruled Bactria, did by a race of
| hereditary princes born in the country, who
| ceased to be subject to the Greeks in Europe
| The experience of history, derived from the
| period of Alexander, from the legends of the
| Seleucida the Greco -Bactrian successors to
| that dynasty, the invasion of the Parthian
Prince Mithridates or the defeat of Crassus so
| similar in many of the incidents to the melan-
| choly fate of 1.-The army OF the Indus" and the
| contempOrane0us operations of Russia in the
same range-Cabul being on the eastern and
| Circassia the western extremity-all go to prove
| the unconquerable nature of the semi civilized
| communities.
! Sir William McNaghten was self -conceted
| gentleman, who marched into Afghanistan with
! the air of Bombasres Furioso, advocating to the
| Governor general a system of policy which has
wrought the reward that cruelty, false faith and
criminal duplicity will ever receive nation
whose principle of existence lies in the disunion
and separate interests of its constituent tribes
became united by common oppression into one
| unanimous com munity goaded to madness by
| the systematic and consecutive tyranny of their
invaders. The pop1lace were infuriated by
sanguinary and unjusti6able act, and, in modern
warfare, a measure of unheardo of barharity on
the part of McNaghten. English papers of
March state: HE requested the King to ad-
| nit mortar battery into Balla Hissar, to shell
the town" to revenge the murder of Nurnes
whose death was perpetrated by body of re-
| ligious fanatics.
| When the mortar battery opened on the CITY,
and the confding, unoffendng inhabitants, who
had always been taught to repose on English
justice, faith and mercy, saw the manged limbs
of their wives, and children and sucking infants
| strewed about their domestic HEARTH with a
desperate and simultaneous impulse they rushed
on the commissariate godawns, and another mo-
ment saw the British army in the grasp of an
insulted and unreenting foe. The headless
trunk of their chief now lay weltering in its CORY
death, for NcNaghten was murdered in forced
| interview with the Afghans; and they looked
| around in vain for the prospect of retreat Their
route for ninety miles lay through mass of
mountains, inaccessible at all seasons except by
narrow dehes, in some places mere ravines or
chasms in the immense Alpine masses, often
towering two thousand feet above the plain
from whose natural sides and elevated heights
rocks and stones might be securely rolled down
on the fugitives.
Now all nature reposed in her cold, inter-
minable sheet of snow. The ihclemencies of
winter, which always completely incapacitate
| the Indian soldier were in their full prevalence
| in climate where the earth is usually frozen
hard as steel nearly four months in the year
| They gaZed upon the vast expanse before them
the mountains around them and all the country
covered with snow, presented the dread result of
a hopeless retreat: despair froze up the current
of the blood it curdled round the fainting
heart; death stared them in the face with the
option of starvation perishing through cold,
or Of dying with arms in their hands If there
ever was doubt of the utter worthiessness of
the Anglo-lndian army on occasions of great
| emergency and extreme peril, let this example
suffice to set the question forever at rest for the
English prints expressly state as the cause Of
the massacre that the Indian troops, becoming
disorganized. deserted their officers. disbanded
| and dispersed some to safety and dishonor Sc
| cured by treason. but many to death from the
hands of an unmercful enemy, or the still more
merciless incemency of climate,
There are several small forts and stronghods
| in Yari0us nartS of the CITY. avaru larno hnnen