The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-03-21
FIGHT ON INDIAS FRONTIER.
SPIRITED STORY OF THE MALA-
KAND FIELD FORCE.

! Picture of the Country at the Foot
of the HfmnIayas in which the
! Fighting Took PIace-The Tribes
I men Always Involved in Bloody
Feuds With Each other and the
Foreigner, the Common FOe-0p-
| position 10 the British Advance
Infiamed by the Priesthood for
| Selfish Reasons.
New York, March 2O.-In this city and
London to-day. a bright and breezy book,
| THE Story of the Mainland Field Force"
from the pen of Liuet. Winston Spencer
Churchill of the Fourth CBritisD Hussars,
was placed before the pubic by Messrs.
Longmans Green & Co. Lieut.. Churchill
is grandson of the late Leonard Jerome
of New York. and Is the son of the late
Lord Randolph Churchill. The book will
doubtless be welcomed by those who Ge-
| light in reports, pictursequely made, of
| deeds of valor and hard fighting generally
under the greatest difficulties. The young
| lieutenant has blended accurate details,
hard facts and figures, dates and names
with pretty pictures of Indian warfare, and
fine examples of herosm and endurance
both among friend and foe.
Some idea of the country in which the
| fighting took place can be formed from the
| following extract:
THE Himalayas are not a. line, but
| great country of mountains. Standing on
! some lofty pass or commanding point IN
| Dir, Swat or Bajaur, range after rangs is
| seen as the long surges of an Atlantic
swell, and in the distance some glittering
| snow peak suggests a white-crested roller,
| higher than the rest. The drenching rains
| which fall each year have washed the soil
! from the sides Of the hills until they have
become strangely grooved by numberless
water courses, and the black primeval rock
is everywhere exposed The silt and sedi-
ment has filled the valleys which lie be-
| tween and made their surface sandy, level
and broad. Again the rain had cut wide,
deep, and MISUNDERSTANDING channels
! through this soft deposit; great cutters,
| which are sometimes seventy-feet deep
| and 200 or 800 yards across. These are the
"nullahs." Usually the smaller ones are
| dry and the larger occupied only by
! streams, but In the season of the rains,
| abundant water pours down all and in a
| few hours the brook has become an impas-
| sable torrent and the river sweiled into
rolling flood which caves the banks round
which 1t swirls and cuts the channel deep
er year by year.
! The gallant tribesmen are described as
| follows: Except at the times of sowing
! and of harvest, a continual state of fued
and strife prevails throughout the land.
Tribe wars with tribe The people of one
| valley fight with those of the next. One
| village attacks another. To the quarrels
of communities are added the combats of
of individuals. Khan assails khan each
| supported by his retainers. Every tribes
man has a blood fued with his neighbor.
Every mans hand is against the other,
and all against the stranger.
Nor are these struggles conducted with
the weapons which usually belong to the
| races of such development To the feroci-
ty of the Zulu are added the craft of
the Redskin and the craftsmanship of
the Boer. At thousand yards the trav
eler falls wounded by the well-amed bull
let of breech loading rifle. His assail-
ant. approaching cuts him in pieces, as
he lies bleeding, with the fury of a South
Sea Islander The weapons of the nine
teenth century are in the hands of the
savages of the stone age"
The Malakand is then described at
length, the following extract giving some
idea of the scene of 50 much severe fight
ing:
THE Malakand is like a great cup of
which the rim is broken into numerous
clefts and jagged points. At the bottom
of this cup is the crater camp. The deep
est cleft is the Malakand pass. The high
est of the jagged points is Guides hill
on a spur of which the fort stands 1t
needs no technical knowledge TO see that
to defend such place the rim of the cup
must be held. But in the Malakand the
bottom of the cup is too small to contain
the necessary garrison. The whole posi-
of view, bad and indefensible."
Touching upon the policy which brought
about the outbreak, Lieut.. Churchill
says:
Here then, at once, the whole vast
question of frontier policy is raised. We
hold the Malakand pass to keep the Chit
raj road open. We keep the Chitral road
open because we have retained Chitral
We retain Chitral in accordance with the
forward policy l am thus confronted at
the very outset of this book, which was
intended to be devoted chiefly to the mar
ration of military events and small incl
dents, with that wide political question,
on which the keenest intellects in Eng
land are in doubt, and the most valuable
expert evidence in India is divided"
A comprehensive review of the Chitral
campaign follows. and then comes the
story of the outbreak which is led up to
J in this manner:
/ But single class had viewed with
quick intelligence and intense hostility the
approach of the British power The
, priesthood of the Afghan border instant
ly recognized the full meaning of the Chit
raj road. The cause of their antagonism
is not hard to discern. Contact with civil
ization assalls the superstition and Gre
dulity on which the wealth and influence
OF the Mullah depends A general COM
bination of the religious forces of India
against that civilizing, educating rule,
which unconsciousiy saps the strength of
superstition, is one of the dangers of the
, future. Here Accommodation was
threatened and resisted A vast, but silent.
agitation was begun. Messengers passed
; to and fro among the tribes. Whispers
! of war, a holy war. were breathed to a
race intensely passionate and fanatical
Vast and mysterious agencies, the force
of which are incomprehensible to rational
minds, were employed. More astute
brains that the wild valleys of the North
produce conducted the preparations. Sc