with the belief that the exiled monarch, if once replaced on the throne, would have a party strong enough to maintain him in power; but it now appeared that he was solely supported by the arms of the British, who were thus placed in the invidious light of conquerors on their own account, and heartily detested as such by the Affghans, who were themselves the proudest and the bravest people in Asia. They now saw themselves a vanquished people, compelled to acknowledge the superiority of a distant nation, of strange language, religion, and manners; and it is not so much a wonder that they should feel both indignant and vindictive, as that the operation of these two powerful incentives, on a people of such fervid imaginations, should be entirely overlooked by those civil functionaries in whose hands were now the destinies of all. Such, however, was the case: under their advice and assurances of the pacific dispositions of the Affghans, the military force at Cabul was reduced to a very inadequate amount, at a period when disaffection and discontent were most rife amongst that people; and the same total absence of judgment and precaution appears to have influenced both Sir William Macnaghten and Sir Alexander Burnes up to the very moment when not only their own lives were sacrificed, but the safety of the whole force irretrievably compromised by their temerity.
This uncalculating reliance on Affghan professions had its natural influence on the military, whose scattered and unguarded positions were such as might be admissible at a cantonment in the Carnatic, but were certainly most injudicious, to say the least of it, under existing circumstances. In the beginning of October, 1841, the force at and near Cabul had consisted of her Majesty's 13th and 44th Foot, the 5th, 35th, 37th, and 54th Bengal Native Infantry, the 5th Bengal Light Cavalry, a company of Foot and a troop of Horse Artillery, two regiments of the Shah's infantry, a mountain train of artillery, with some others belonging to the Shah, and some cavalry, both Hindostanee and Affghan, forming part also of the Shah's
