The age-herald., 1901-11-17

- - She is a woman hidden away in semi-savage harem. Only one white man ever has seen her face. Her life has been spent in a wild Land among wilder people. She knows nothing of world politics. Yet if it so happens to become necessary in the course of her purely private plottings. she may be- come a far greater firebrand than was the other hidden woman, the Empress Dowager of China. This woman's plans may culminate in the final war, long awaiting and feared, between Russia and the British, with Afghanistan as the di- rect cause. For the hidden plotter of the harem is an Afghan Sultana, the chief widow of that wonderful man. Adbur Rahman.
 She is bitterly disappointed woman now and revengeful one. She is of royal blood herself, and she desired that her son, Mahomet Omar, be made Ameer on the death of his father But that astute gentleman had his own prefer
 ences, and long before his death he had been playing fine domestic politics, with the result that his eldest son, Habib Oullah, who was born to him by wom- an of common birth. had the reins well in hand and controlled the army when his father died.
 The Sultana holds the record of being the only woman that ever was seen in the streets of Cabul. And the manner in which she was seen put the fear of her into every heart in Afghanistan, for be- hind her she left carved corpses. The Ameer had ridden off on one of his swift pleasure jaunts with his fighting men to argue with chief who had become suddenly careless of the royal will. While he was busy killing the chief and his intimate friends other disaffected per- | sons seized the happy opportunity and
 started a promising revolt right in Ca-
 bull. For time they did beautifully. | Cabul appeared to be lost to the absent old gentleman, and the population was | preparing to change its loyalty. when suddenly a mad troop thundered out of
 the fortified papalce gates. At the head, on a magnificent horse, rode a heavily
 yelled woman with a sword.
 The details of that ride made delightful | matter for exact description by Afghan
 knife fighters, but a little strong for civil | lzed stomachs. Behind that savage yelled
 Queen and her savage men lay several heads and limbs and bodies, fantastically
 and terribly cut up. Afghans can drive
 their heavy knives through a man and cut him in two. Such objects marked the path of the chief lady of the harem
 of Abdur Rahman, who twisted his fing- CTS in his black beard and laughed pleas antly when he saw his beloved people of Cabul peering from their houses, cowed and terrified to their souls
 But the old lion was no Samson to per- init the shearing of his locAs. He knew that Habib Oullah was his strongest and
 most able son, and he would not be turn
 ed from him even by his beloved and ad- mired lioness. Then she who had fought Tor him began to plot against him. but she guarded his life and power jealously. And they who plotted against her in turn also guarded her life and power jealous ly. For this Abdur Rahman deserved indeed what his courtiers said of him Before God, this is a manv' For here was a man that Would Be King and that Became King and Was King indeed When he lost that kingdom for a space he did not disdane to work as a coolie carrying packages and obeying with hu- mility when he was driven like a slave,
 
 coursed through royal veins for a time so long that 1t runs back into dim his- tory He was beaten by a money lender in those days and called a thief, and he did not kill He passed from his land and dwelled among brutal and stupid ard thought he had been wont to spit, and he did not forget that he had been a king and that he could repay in time, but
 not then. He went back into his own land by hidden mountain passes. a lonely man without money or help. and began
 the work of winning back his kingdom
 almost with his own bare hands And
 he who had conquered his own hot self
 did so conquer his land that from it's
 highest peak to its furtherest valley the name of Abdur Rahman became greater than that of God.
 The time was ripe for neither side to act, and in the meanwhile Abdur Rah- ! man developed alarming symptoms. He would be seized suddenly by attacks of pain that were terrible enough to make him helpless. Tortured and raging, he lay prostrate in those times, calling down the curses of heaven on the court phy- sicians and threatening them with death | if they did not relieve him. Whatever threats he forgot to utter were uttered against the hapless doctors by the intri- guing factions for both parties wanted to keep him alive, not to mention the faithful men who loved him beyond all other beings in this world and who would have killed any number of physicians
 with real joy if it promised the least al- deviation of their idols sufferngs
 Now, among the most devoted of Ab- dur Rahman's court circle were men who believed firmly in the art of healing as pradticed by the halKims-half priests and