Afghanistan (Hamilton, Angus)/Preface

# Preface

Since 1871, when Sir Charles MacGregor drew up a very exhaustive *précis* of information on Afghanistan for the use of the Government of India, no book dealing with our buffer state in a general manner has been issued. The thirty-five years which have intervened have not been without important contributions to our knowledge of Afghanistan, but those works which have appeared cannot altogether be described as presenting a single comprehensive study of contemporary conditions in the country. In 1886 Lieutenant A. C. Yate, and in 1888 Major C. E. Yate, C.S.I., C.M.G., described in two very interesting volumes the proceedings of the Afghan Boundary Commission. Ten years elapsed before anything of importance appeared, when, by a rare coincidence, two books dealing with Afghanistan saw the light in 1895: Mr. Stephen Wheeler's admirable account of *The Amir Abdur Rahman*, and that most entertaining and graphic volume, *My Residence at the Court of the Amir*, by the late Amir's private physician, Dr. A. J. Gray. In 1900 Sultan Mahomed Khan, Mir Munshi to Abdur Rahman, presented to the public his remarkable production, *The Life of Abdur Rahman*, as well as a treatise on *The Constitution and Laws of Afghanistan*. In the following year, 1901, Colonel Sir Thomas Holdich embodied in *The Indian Borderland* many graceful descriptions of scenery and various centres in Afghanistan while, in 1905, in a series of articles in the *Wide World Magazine*, Mrs. Kate Daly, physician to Habib Uliah's harem and the Government of Afghanistan, illustrated with many delightful touches a sojourn of *Eight Years Among the Afghans*. These few works practically exhaust contemporary literature on Afghanistan, and it is in an endeavour to provide a more complete record of the subject than has hitherto existed that the author of *Korea* has compiled this little book. Mistakes are those of his own making; reflections and criticisms arise from his own opinions; but, in hoping that his critics may find something of value in the results of two years' toil, the author wishes to say that if good qualities exist in it, they are attributable to the encouragement and gracious assistance which he has received and here wishes to acknowledge.

With a view to the careful preparation of this volume the author, after returning to London from the war in Manchuria, visited Central Asia, his travels terminating abruptly in an attack of small-pox contracted from the natives, while he was wandering in the region of the Pamirs. Descending via Gilgit to India from the Taghdumbash, twelve months have been spent in the labour of writing, in the examination of a number of works, and in reference to those authorities who are so justly distinguished for their knowledge of the heart of Mid-Asia. In this direction it is perhaps of interest to point out that in order to establish a standard of accuracy, certain chapters have been submitted in page proof to the criticism of this little group of Central Asian experts, and their corrections embodied in its final form. The author very warmly appreciates the help which has in this way been given him, and to Colonel de la Poer Beresford and Captain Charles Bancroft in connection with chaps. i., ii., iii.; to Colonel Sir Thomas Holdich, K.C.I.E., K.C.M.G., C.B., in chap. iv; to Colonel C. E. Yate, C.S.I., C.M.G., in chaps. v. and vi.; to Colonel Sir Henry McMahon, K.C.I.E., C.S.I., in chap. ix.; to Dr. A. J. Gray, Mrs. Kate Daly, and Major Cleveland, I.M.S., in chaps. .xiv and xv. he is very much indebted, as the indulgent manner in which his inquiries have been received has materially assisted the conclusion of his task.

In other quarters similar help has been given, and the author desires to express his deep obligation to the Secretary of State for India, Mr. Morley, to Mr. John E. Ellis, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for India, to Sir William Lee-Warner, and to Mr. Thomas, of the Political Department, India Office, for the considerate way in which services have been rendered him. The very pleasant hospitality bestowed upon the author by Mr. George Macartney, C.S.I., the representative of the Government of India in Kashgar, Chinese Turkestan; by Mr. L. G. Fraser, the editor of *The Times of India*; by Mr. C. F. Meyer, Standard Oil Company’s Agent in Bombay; by Major Cleveland, in Poona; and by Mr. Ivor Heron-Maxwell, late of Baku in that centre, has provided him with many haunting memories which, in a later volume, will be more suitably described. To Dr. Chalmers Mitchell, Secretary of the Zoological Society of London, and to Mr. J. Bryant Sowerby, Secretary of the Royal Botanic Society, the author is indebted for assistance in compiling the tables of species which illustrate chap. xii.; while to the Librarian of the India Office, and to the Librarian of the Royal Geographical Society, he would express his grateful thanks.

As correspondent to *The Pall Mall Gazette*, and to *The Times of India* from Central Asia, it is the pleasant duty of the author to acknowledge the permission of Sir Douglas Straight and Mr. L. G. Fraser to make use of certain articles which, although entirely altered and greatly amplified since their original appearance, were first presented in the respective columns of these organs. These extracts, a few brief paragraphs on various pages, are confined solely to the first six chapters of the book. Acknowledgments are also due to the proprietors of that esteemed Indian journal *The Pioneer*, whose London staff permitted the files of their well-known paper to be inspected; to the proprietors of *The Daily Graphic* for permission to reproduce the block of the Amir's proclamation, and accompanying translation, appearing on pages 370, 371; to Messrs. Macmillan for the right to reproduce their copper engraving of Dr. A. J. Gray’s painting of the Amir Abdur Rahman; to Baron Herbert de Reuter, Managing Director of Reuter's Telegram Company, for courteous assistance; to Mr J. D. Holmes, an Indian photographer of renown, whose unique photographs of the Khyber Pass illustrate chaps. xvi. and xvii.; to Lieutenant Stewart, whose photographs appear in chap. ix.; to Lieutenant Olufsen for the right to reproduce certain interesting photographs from that informative work *Through the Unknown Pamirs*; to Colonel Sir Thomas Holdich for authority to base upon his original sketches enlarged drawings of Herat and Kandahar, by Mr. Percy Home; to Major Cleveland, I.M.S., to whose great credit very many of the illustrations in this volume must be placed; to Major Molesworth Sykes, H.B.M. Consul at Meshed, for photograpiis appearing in chap. vii.; to Professor Victor Marsden, of Moscow University, for general courtesies ; to Captain Charles Bancroft for assistance in translating extracts from papers placed at the author's disposal by his Excellency Prince Khilkoff, Russian Minister of Railways; to that well-known military novelist, Mr. Horace Wyndham, who has been good enough to assist the author in the revision of his proofs; and to Mr. Thomas Bumpus, of Messrs. J. and E. Bumpus, Limited.

The final, but by no means the least gratifying, duty now remains to be fulfilled. It is concerned with the dedication of this volume which, by special permission, is inscribed:

TO HIM

WHO,

BY THE SPLENDOUR OF HIS GIFTS

AND

THE WISDOM OF HIS RULE,

HAS LEFT

AN INDELIBLE AND MEMORABLE

IMPRESSION

UPON INDIA:

LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON,

G.C.S.I., G.C.I.E., P.C.

ETC. ETC. ETC.