halted on the 30th March, in order to allow the second detachment of
the Pioneers and the guns to come up, as from here Colonel Kelly
intended to march in one column. Here also we picked up the Hunza and
Nagar Levies, numbering a hundred men, under their own leaders. They
were posted in the village of Teru, some four miles up the valley, and
from there could give timely warning if any hostile force crossed the
pass. Wazir Humayun led the Hunza crowd, and Wazir Taifu the Nagar. I
got to know Humayun very well indeed, and a right good sort he is. He
had formerly lived for some five years in Chitral, when Raja Safdar Ali
Khan of Hunza had made things too hot for him, but when Safdar Ali fled
when we took the country in 1891-92, he was reinstated. Wazir Taifu I
did not get to know so well, as the Nagar Levies were left behind at
Mastuj, when we went on from there to Chitral. The second detachment
under Peterson, and the guns with Stewart, got into camp some time
after midday on the 31st March.

In the meantime, every available coolie and pony had been collected, and
we calculated on being able to start the next morning, with ten days'
rations for the whole force. By 6 A.M. on the 1st April the troops had
fallen in and were ready to start, and a nice handy little lot we had.
Four hundred Pioneers, two mountain guns, forty Kashmir Sappers and a
hundred Levies. Then the coolies were told to load up, and the trouble
began. It now appeared that some hundred coolies and ponies from Yasin
had bolted during the night. We had put too much faith in Mihrbhan
Shah's influence, and all those villagers who were not directly under
his government had gone. Those hundred coolies meant the transport of
our supplies, and without them we should only have the food actually
carried in the men's haversacks. We had cut down our baggage to the
vanishing point, and the men were carrying all they could, and we did
not dare leave our reserve ammunition behind.

The column had just moved off when this state of things became known and
was reported to me. Colonel Kelly was at the head of the column, so I
snatched the nearest pony, tumbled its load on to the ground, and went
scrambling through the snow after the troops. Of course there was
nothing to be done except halt the column until the coolies could be
collared and brought back, so Stewart, who had a battery pony with him,
was sent off down the road after the absconding coolies. They must have
star