Raiders of the Sarhad

Once again I felt it policy to acquiesce and to admit that I was a prophet. As a fact, I had not fired a single shot during the engagement.

Soon after I had returned to my tent an irate, native officer of the Hazaras craved admission, which was accorded. Without preface he opened bluntly. "Sahib, will you give us Halil Khan's body?"

I asked, "Why? What do you mean to do with it? Do you want to mutilate it?"

He replied, "Sahib, when we lost men the day before yesterday, and buried them before retiring, the Yarmahommedzais, who came down after our departure, dug up the bodies, mutilated them horribly and flung them to the jackals. Therefore, in justice, Halil Khan's body is ours."

"Halil Khan was a brave man as well as a great leader," I replied. "You are going to give him a soldier's funeral. You surely have no wish to treat him in the same terrible way that your men were treated?"

He urged his point of view with such heat that I at last grew angry and asked him by what right he demanded Halil Khan's body, and to answer me as to who had killed him.

"You did, Sahib," he replied, eyeing me curiously.

"Exactly," I said with decision. "Then to whom does the body belong – to you or to me?"

This seemed rather to appeal to him, for he replied with greater calm:

"To you, Sahib, I suppose."

"I suppose so too, and I am going to do what I like with it. Go at once to Gusht, buy a new winding sheet, and we will give Halil Khan a soldier's burial; one befitting his brave deeds and position. Bring in all the mullahs (priests) you can find in Gusht. Oh, and, by the way, you can pay for the winding sheet for wasting so much of my time in argument."

So we accorded Halil Khan a really fine soldier's funeral. Nor was this without results, for we learned, later, that it had made a great and favourable impression throughout the Sarhad.

CHAPTER XII

VICTORY AND PEACE

News of the herds – Towards Dast-Kird – Water! – Mutton for all – Dast-Kird – A stampede – Back to Khwash – On the track of the Gamshadzais – Twice a prophet – The Sarhad-dar's roost – Before Jalk – Rejected terms – More strategy and a bloodless victory – Remain only terms and sick leave

We had certainly won a decisive victory from a military point of view, but, according to the unwritten code regulating victory in the Sarhad, we had yet to capture the Raiders' ramas or herds of goats and sheep.

This omission still confronted us when one of Idu's special Reki scouts declared he knew the exact whereabouts of Jiand's herds, and that he could lead us there in two marches. At the end of each of these he declared we should also find a good camping ground, and a good water supply. As these men had never yet promised water and failed us, orders were given to strike camp and march out in the direction of Dast-Kird, through the valley lying between the Morpeish and Sar-i-drokan Ranges.

Although we made a very early start the heat soon became intense. There was not a particle of shade, and our route lay slightly uphill all the way, over rugged broken ground. Also, as we were confident of finding water at the camping ground, the men had emptied their water bottles before mid-day, and were enduring agonies of thirst long before we reached our proposed camping place; whilst the suffering of the animals was pitiful to see. But the prospect of a good drink at the end of the march kept up our spirits.

At last, late in the afternoon, the Reki, who had constituted himself our guide, gave a cry and ran forward, telling us that we had reached the spot where we should find water.

No sign of stream or spring showed itself, but I remembered that the Sarhadis have a way of finding water seemingly miraculous to the white man, and when the Reki proceeded to dig and scratch in the ground at the foot of a stunted tree we fully expected to see a little spring gush forth. The men, therefore, with lips swollen and tongues cleaving to the roofs of their mouths, crowded round, eager and impatient.

But, for once, Nature and the Reki failed us. For though the latter dug and dug, with the sweat pouring down his face, the dry, arid ground showed not the faintest sign of moisture.

At last he desisted and fell at my feet, saying despairingly, "Sahib, there is no water! I found water here once, in the cold season, and I thought it would always be here. The heat must have dried it all up."

Our situation was pretty desperate. We had not a drop of water for man or beast, and now could not tell when we should get any. All through the latter part of that day's march we had succeeded in getting the men along solely by encouraging them with promises of water. "Just a mile farther on" and then, "perhaps another half-mile." Only those who have marched without water in torrid countries can have any conception of the depression that grips men when they do not know when, or where, water may next be found.

I cursed the man for misleading us, and he shook with fear. "It is not my fault, Sahib. Water was here when last I came to this place. But to-morrow, without fail, I will lead you to a fine stream of water."

"To-morrow?" I echoed. "How are we to exist till to-morrow? Why should I believe you? You have deceived us to-day, why not again to-morrow?"

The man swore on the Koran he could and would lead us to a place where we should find water. "If I do not succeed, Sahib, in finding water before eleven o'clock, then take my life."

I replied grimly that if he failed again, his life would most certainly be forfeit – that was to say if any of us then remained in a condition to shoot him.

The whole force suffered horribly that night, and when we set out again it was still dark. The Reki went on ahead with the advance guard. I rather imagine he was anxious to put a safe distance between himself and my revolver, for I had, indeed, determined to have him shot if he deceived us a second time. No man could face a second day of that blinding heat and glare without water and keep his sanity.

We had only been marching a few hours when a Sawar rode back from the advance guard to report that large herds of sheep and goats had been sighted a short distance ahead.

Our spirits instantly rose. Where there were sheep there would, most probably, be water. Shouting to the men to encourage them we galloped forward and were soon pushing our way through masses of sheep to find ourselves on the banks of a stream of clear, cool water.

The difficulty, of course, was now to restrain man and beast from over-drinking; for if ever nectar flowed on this earth it flowed that day in that parched, sun-baked Saragan Valley.

Unfortunately, like the majority of streams in the Sarhad, and in Persia generally, it only flowed above ground for a short distance, to be soon lost again in the arid, sandy ground. So orders were given to halt at that spot till we were all rested, and had absorbed sufficient water to make up for the past thirty-six hours.

The thirty-four herds of sheep and goats found here were claimed as spoils of war, and I determined to give the men a real, good feast for once. Here was any amount of mutton for the killing, and well-nigh as much goats' milk as water.

The hungry Hazaras sent in a request that they might each have a whole sheep a day. I naturally thought such a request fantastic, and, not taking it literally, sent back word that they might, for once, have as much meat as they wanted.

But they took the permission literally, and actually did slaughter a sheep for each man. I discovered afterwards that their great idea had been to be able to boast, in the future, that, after their great victory over the Yarmahommedzais, led by the Gamshadzai Chief, Halil Khan, their rations had been "a sheep per man per day."

After this feast the carcasses of the uneaten sheep, and of the half-cooked meat, lay about in an orgy of waste, and the sight of the camping-ground was, as may be imagined, a sickening one. Never again was such a ration-order given!

Late in the afternoon, with the whole force in fine fettle, we continued our forward march, driving the herds with us, and, a little later, found a good camping ground with a plentiful supply of water. For many hours that night, owing to the bleating of thousands of sheep, there was little rest for anyone. But as they were now our sheep and not the enemy's, the annoyance was cheerfully borne.

Upon the following day water proved scarce, and a great deal of digging had to be done before even a trickle could be found. The unfortunate sheep and animals had, therefore, to go very short. The country was also from this point getting very difficult, and marching became a great labour in consequence. Part of our route lay through a narrow, rocky defile; one of the worst to negotiate, from a military point of view, that I have ever encountered. Had a mere handful of the enemy chosen to obstruct us it would have been utterly impossible to get through.

Much picketing of the heights had to be done, and this called for a great effort on the part of the Hazara Pioneers. These duties were well carried out under the very able direction of Major Lang.

Fortunately the Yarmahommedzais had had enough of it, and left us severely alone. In fact, the only signs we had of them were the blood tracks of their wounded, walking or carried. But even these were significant enough evidence of their losses during the fight.

The next day brought us more open ground, though marching still remained arduous, as we were tackling an uphill route. But later it fell away again towards the Dast-Kird gorge, and, by the afternoon, we were able to pitch our camp in a wild, but very picturesque, little valley, close to Jiand's Summer haunt. This valley, as I have already explained, lies between the Morpeish and Sar-i-drokan heights, which at this point rise sheer from it on either side. There are also a good many trees in the neighbourhood, and the ground round the bases of these had been flattened, and then plastered with mud, in order to form good flooring for jugis.

We spent the night here, and on the following day arrived at Dast-Kird, where we camped close to a small stream. Unfortunately this stream was so small, a mere trickle, that it would not suffice for the animals, who had had insufficient water for the last two or three days.

These herds were some little distance behind, for, poor brutes, they were feeling the heat and lack of water terribly. We, therefore, proceeded to make some provision for them, before their arrival, by damming the stream, and trying to make a small reservoir.

The first animals to arrive were the battery mules, who, when they smelt water, made a dash for it. But they had scarcely begun to drink than a mass of twelve thousand sheep and goats, also smelling water, broke from their would-be shepherds, and, in a solid phalanx, charged the mules, routed them, and took possession of the water-supply. The men pulled and tugged, and struck them with their rifles in their endeavour to stampede them and drink themselves. But those sheep knew the power of numbers and of combination. With their heads well down they slaked their thirst from a stream which, now that the dam had been trodden down, had again become a trickle, and they held that position, against all comers, for twenty minutes. Poor beasts, they paid for their orgy at the price of some two hundred lives that night.

Upon the following day we started on our return march to Khwash, and, upon our entry there, were accorded a great reception, and the story of the fight had to be told again and again.

It was during this march that we began to realise the extent of the Yarmahommedzai casualties in the recent fighting; for, during the whole of it, from the scene of the fight right through to Khwash, a distance of about a hundred miles, not a single one of the enemy did we see, nor was a solitary shot fired at us.

But I was still not quite satisfied with results. We had not yet closely engaged and beaten the Gamshadzais, nor had we put into operation that deciding factor, the capture of their herds. On the contrary, when we had attempted to pierce the Saragan defile, they had forced us to retire.

I have never yet been able to understand why Halil Khan never brought his own force against us near Gusht, but only the Yarmahommedzais, after he had persuaded Jiand to let him lead the latter into battle.

It can only be supposed that he thought he had a task easy enough to tackle with one lashkar, and that he would not, in consequence, endanger his own men's lives. The mystery is the deeper because he had previously been at great pains to collect all his scattered tribesmen, and had concentrated them in the Safed-koh. Yet these men, even when news reached them of our victory over Jiand's tribe and of the death of their leader, never made the smallest attempt to attack us or to reverse the decision of arms.

It will be understood, then, that while the Gamshadzais remained unbeaten and their herds intact, our claim to dominance in the Sarhad could not be claimed as anything but partial. If, therefore, we were to hope for lasting peace in the future, they too must have a lesson.