IN THE KHYBER

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIV, Issue 9165, 8 June 1908, Page 7

IN THE KHYBER

An article on the Khyher Pass, of great interest in view of the recent campaign, appears in Blackwood’s from the pen of a man who went through the “sword-cut in the hills” as far. as Ali Mnsjid, the small fort in the middle of the Pass. Peshawar stands on a great expanse of level ground, and from the town to the mouth of the Khyher every yard of the ground has been marked out with a view to fighting a great battle against an army which might have forced the ""Pass. Trenches are marked out where crops grow, and there is a net work of telephone and telegraph wires. “It is ground that any general might pray for and dream about as the theatre of a master-struggle, with his great army pitched against another, and all the odds in his favour, should ever the matchless security of the Khyher be penetrated.” On two days of the week troops are stationed along the Pass to ensure.the safe passage of caravans, and on these days visitors may drive through. The entrance to;*the Pass is narrow and the road is commanded from either side. “A wind, crisp and invigorating as red champagne, hurtled through the Pass, drawn to the hot plains ox India from the snows above.” Standing aloft are soldiers, motionless as the surrounding boulders. Indeed, some of the objects taken at first for soldiers were really boulders, for the wily guardians of this road to India*have purposely put stones on end, “to serve the double purpose of affording cover and an opportunity for the introduction, unnoticed, of a head of flesh and blood.” A native soldier can sit x’or hours without moving, and even the keen-eyed Afridi finds it difficult to pick out the men from the stones. Every man met carried a rifle. Cultivation is in progress in every nook that will hold sufficient earth and water, and while one man guides the plough, another paces alongside with a rifle, for the vendetta exists in this place, and any moment an enemy may come over the hill. The writer j drove home with the “proud consciousness that no hostile force with commnuications and a base to support, could make that passage against opposition into our groat Empire of India. And should an unforeseen situation arise in which local help might smooth an enemy’s way, there still will remain the fortified plain beyond.”