the most careful grooming. The riders wore coats of
mail with steel gauntlets, and their arms consisted of a sabre, heavier
and longer than ours, a dagger, and in some instances shields and
matchlocks. I have no hesitation in saying that the Affghan Cavalry, if
these were a fair sample of them, are a most effective body of men. They
may not be equal to ours in the field, but for a harassing system of
mountain warfare where they are required to make sudden descents upon
Infantry, hemmed in between defiles, and embarrassed by ignorance of the
country, no body of troops can be better adapted. Their horses are light
limbed, but strong and wiry, and capable of undergoing incredible
fatigue while the trooper himself, practised from infancy in the
management of the animal, can ride him over places where no European
horseman would venture. Had these wild mountaineers but the advantages
of discipline and proper organization their country would be
inaccessible to any troops in the world.

CHAPTER VI.

Installation of Shah Soojah.--Attack on the camel guards.--Heroism of an
Affghan Youth.--Murder of Cornet Inverarity of the 16th
Lancers.--Departure from Candahar.--The Ghiljie
Hills.--Locusts.--Arrival of new Auxiliaries.--Camel Batteries.--Hyder
Khail.--Arrival at Ghuznee.--Tomb of Mahommed.--Remains of the Old Town
of Ghuznee.

In order to give a sort of political eclat to the steps taken to
reinstate Shah Soojah on the throne of his ancestors, it was resolved
that he should be solemnly inaugurated at Candahar, and nothing was
omitted that could possibly tend to render the ceremony imposing. On
the morning fixed for its celebration, the whole of the British forces
were paraded in review order on a large plain to the north of the city,
whilst the Shah's troops were drawn up at a little distance. In the
centre of the field stood a platform canopied with crimson silk, and
ornamented with numerous banners and devices, the seat reserved for the
Shah being ascended by a broad flight of tapestried steps, and covered
with cushions of crimson and gold. The other accessories of the pageant
were got up in similar costly style, but the effect, on the whole,
conveyed to the mind rather the unsatisfied feeling which attends the
hollow show and glitter of the theatre, than the idea of substantial
power. The weather was beautiful, the sun shedding its gorgeous rays
full upon us, and finding innumerable reflections in the military
pa