of the members, with the exception of Sir
Charles Macgregor and the secretary, Major W.G. Nicholson, at all
appreciated the great change which had taken place in our position
since the near approach of Russia, and our consequent promise to the
Amir to preserve the integrity of his kingdom, had widened the limit
of our responsibilities from the southern to the northern boundary of
Afghanistan.

Less than a year before we had been on the point of declaring war with
Russia because of her active interference with 'the authority of a
sovereign--our protected ally--who had committed no offence[6];' and
even now it was not certain that peace could be preserved, by reason
of the outrageous demands made by the Russian members of the Boundary
Commission as to the direction which the line of delimitation between
Russian and Afghan territory should take.

It was this widening of our responsibilities which prevented me from
agreeing with the recommendations of the Defence Committee, for the
majority of the members laid greater stress on the necessity
for constructing numerous fortifications, than upon lines of
communication, which I conceived to be of infinitely greater
importance, as affording the means of bringing all the strategical
points on the frontier into direct communication with the railway
system of India, and enabling us to mass our troops rapidly, should we
be called upon to aid Afghanistan in repelling attack from a foreign
Power.

Fortifications, of the nature of entrenched positions, were no
doubt, to some extent, necessary, not to guard against our immediate
neighbours, for experience had taught us that without outside
assistance they are incapable of a combined movement, but for the
protection of such depots and storehouses as would have to be
constructed, and as a support to the army in the field.

The line chosen at that time for an advance was by Quetta and
Kandahar. In the first instance, therefore, I wended my way to
Baluchistan, where I met and consulted with the Governor-General's
Agent, Sir Robert Sandeman, and the Chief Engineer of the Sind-Pishin
Railway, Brigadier-General Browne.[7]

We together inspected the Kwaja-Amran range, through which the
Kohjak tunnel now runs, and I decided that the best position for an
entrenched camp was to the rear of that range, in the space between
the Takatu and Mashalik mountains. This open ground was less than four
miles broad; nature had made its flanks perfectl