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��the Khjbcr and Kiiram passes. Frotu Kabul to Pesbnwar (1!I0 initcs), the raaci lettde by the Kliurd Kabul or Lutabnnd passes to the •tagdalak Pass. It was in these narrow dehlcs tbal the English army was slaughtered by the ATglians in 1842. Thence by Gandamak and Jalalabad, on the Kabul River, the road runs to Lalpura. There it leases the river, nnd follows two mountain streams over the Kliylier Pass (3,000 feet), to Peshawar. This route was followed by Elphinstoue and Pollock in the first Afghan war : anrl, now that the terminus of the Punjab railway is at Peshawni", it is the mosi, important route from India to eastern Afglianistan, although Gen. (now Sir Fred- eriek) Roberls. in 1S7SI, led his army over the more southern Knram Pass to Kabul.
Kandahar, the great trade-centre of the soulb, lying on the direct road from India to Herat, is likely to be of more importance in cose of a war between England and Russia. It is situated in a small plain between the Ai^band-Ab and Tarnak rivers, and commands the road through the Tarnak valley, by Ghazni, to Kabul (3)1! miles). Sir John Keane look this route on his march to Kandahar in 18^8 ; Nott marcliod by it in I84:J, to aid Pollock in avenging the massacre of Elphinstone's ex- pedition ; and it was by this road that Sir Frederick Roberts made hia famous march (Vom Kabul to the relief of Kaudahar in 1880. The railroad from India to Kandahar leaves the main line from Karachi to Lahore, at Sukkur on the Indus; thence by Sbikarpur and Sibi to Rindli, at the entrance of the Bolan Pass. Here the railway stops ; but a good car- riage-road has been constructed, at least as far as Quetta. Unfortunately no bridges were built over the streams, thoj' being crossed by fords ; and this has made it impossible to lay a light military railway along the road. Indeed. it has been stateil that a thoroughly built rail- way could not be o])ened to Quetta in less than two years. Quetta. or .Sbal, is situated between the bead of the Bolan Pass and the Pishin valley, ll commands the ixiad, and is there- fore a place of very great military importance. The Bolan Pass and Cjuetta are in Bahicbistan ; but the English acquired by treaty, in 1876, the right to bold and nse the pass and to^'n for military purposes, and Quetta is now lite moat advanceci English outpost, The joad leads thence through the Pishin valley, and oi-er the Kojak or Gwaja passes to Kandahar. From the end of the railway at Rindli, to Kandahar, is somewhere between 200 and 260 miles. Authority baa been given to c-omplele it to the Pishin valley within a hundred miles of Kan-
��dahar. That city was occupied by the English from 1839 to 1842, and again from ISjy to 1881. The trade-route thence to Herat, nearly 370 miles away, leads by two Strang positions, — Kusbk-i-Nakud, the scene of Burrows's defeat in 1880, and Girislik, — and over several mountain passes. But the importance of this road, and of Kandahar itself, has been les- sened by the discovery of a much longer, but neverllieless good, route from Quetta to Herat without passing Kandahar. It was by this road that Gen. Lumsden'a Indian escort, over 1,300 strong, and wiih a train of 1.300 camels and 400 mules, marched at an average rate of eighteen miles a day to meet bim on the frontier.
Herat (Heri) is situated on a fertile plain, neai- the river Hari-Rud (river of Heri or Herat), between the western extremities of the spura of the Hindu Kueh, above men- tioned. Its imiiortance, both commercial and strategic, is due to the fact that it dominates the best road from the Caspian by Mash-had, to the Indus by Kandahar. The position of the city itself, from a military i>oint of view. is not good ; because its defences are. as Gen. Grodekotr pointed out, commanded by a neighboring hill.
The Hari'Riid rises in the heart of Afghan- istan, and flowing almost due west along the northern base of the Paropamisus Hills, within a few miles of Herat, strikes the Persian fron- tier seventy miles beyond that cily, at Kusan. There it abruptly turns fcortb, and. passing Zolflkar, — a name given to a ford, but more correctly, perhaps, to a neighboring pass in the hills, — reaches Pul-i-Khatun. At this point it receives its principal affluent, the Kashaf Rud, from the west. The Kashaf and Hari- Rud, after leaving Pul-i-Khatun. lake the name of Tajand. and, passing Sarakha. become desic- cated in the Turkoman Steppe. The oasis thus formed lies between Merv and Persia, .inil for this reason has been nearly umnliabited imtil the recent Russian advance upon Merv.
The river Mnrgh-ab rises to the south of the Paropamisus Hills, and. flowing in a general northerly direction, passes the Afghan strong- hold of BalaMurghab, on the road from Herat to Uaimana and Afghan Turkestan; thence it flows by Mcruchak (where, according to the Russians, the north-western boundary of.Af- giianistan crosses the river) , by I'anj Deh and Yulatan, to Merv, where it loses itself in the irrigation canals of that oasis.
A few miles below Panj Deh the Murgb-db receives from the west the river Kuahk, which rises to the north of the water-parting not far
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