120

PERSIANS CONQUER KHORASAN.

[CHAP. in reliance on this engagement that the Persians embarked with eagerness in this war with a superior power. But a strong pressure of male, and more especially of female, diplomacy in London was brought to bear on the British Ministry, and hints were conveyed that any attempt to carry out this article of the treaty would lead to a rupture with Russia. All assistance was therefore refused under the convenient pretext that Persia was the aggressor, though she had been goaded into the war by the constant encroachments of her imperious neighbour. The Persian army, though a portion of it had been disciplined by English officers, was completely routed, and the Shah was obliged to submit to the humiliation of ceding two of his finest provinces to Russia, and indemnifying her for the expenses of the war. The Persian court was driven to extremity by this pecuniary mulet when the English Ministry came to its relief with a large ready money payment on condition that the inconvenient article in the treaty of 1814 should be abrogated.

Persian expedi

The Persians sought to indemnify themselves tion to Khorasan for these losses by the conquest of the province and Herat, 1834. of Khorasan, lying to the east of their dominions, which they were enabled to accomplish in 1832 by the aid of English and Russian officers. The next year Mahomed Shah, the grandson of the reigning prince, proceeded on an expedition to Herat; but he had made little progress in the siege before he was obliged, to his great chagrin, to return to Teheran, in consequence of the death of his father. Futteh Ali, the old king who had welcomed Captain Malcolm in 1802, and had always been favourable to an alliance with England, died in the following year. Mahomed Shah, who now ascended the throne, evinced a strong disposition to fraternize with Russia, more especially as the result of the late war had inspired him with a lively dread of her power. Since the first mission of Captain Malcolm, the British Government had expended a sum of no less than ninety-three lacs of rupees in embassies and subsidies to Persia. British officers had been sent to discipline her armies, and her arsenals had been filled

хххп.]

NEGOTIATIONS REGARDING HERAT.

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with the munitions of war by British treasure, with the object of establishing a preponderant sway at the court which might serve as a bulwark of the British empire in India. The Ministry had now the mortification of seeing this expenditure and labour neutralized, and British influence completely overpowered by that of Russia. The expedition to Herat, which was the favourite project of the young and impetuous monarch, became the test of the strength of these rival influences at Teheran.

Negotiations regarding

Herat, 1835.

Kamran, the ruler of Herat, had openly violated the treaties subsisting between him and Persia, and had, likewise, made repeated inroads into the territories of the Shah, and kidnapped his subjects to the number, as the Persians affirmed, of 12,000, and sold them into slavery. In the opinion of the British Minister, Mr.now Sir John-McNeill, these atrocities fully justified the Persians in resorting to hostilities; but he did not fail to represent to the Ministry that, in the present state of the relations between Russia and Persia, the advance of the latter into Afghanistan, of which Herat was considered the gate, was tantamount to the progress of the former towards the Indus, and ought to be counteracted by the British Government to the fullest extent which the obligations of public faith would permit. He affirmed that the influence and intrigues of Russia would thus be extended, through the conquests of Persia, up to the threshold of India, the public mind in the north-west provinces unsettled, and the tranquillity of the British empire disturbed. Mr. McNeill used every argument to dissuade the Shah from the prosecution of the enterprise, which he affirmed would compromise him with the British Government, and advised him to seek a redress of grievances by an amicable arrangement with Herat. At the same time, he recommended Kamran to avoid the risks of a second invasion by making suitable concessions to the Persian monarch. A conference was accordingly held, but the Persian representative made the most arrogant demands, claiming the whole of

122

THE HERAT EXPEDITION.

[СНАР.

Afghanistan up to Ghuzni as Persian territory, and Herat as a Persian province. The attempt to reconcile differences proved abortive, but Mr. McNeill did not the less endeavour to dissuade the Shah from the expedition, while, on the other hand, the Russian minister, Count Simonich, encouraged him to persevere, and offered him every assistance. The question was then referred to the Ministry in London, and a remonstrance was addressed to the Russian authorities at St. Petersburg, who replied that the Count had exceeded his instructions, and that the Emperor entirely disapproved of the expedition. The Count was not recalled, and his proceedings at Teheran were so completely in unison with the national feeling in Russia, if not likewise with that of the public functionaries, that the Moscow Gazette threatened to dictate the next treaty with England in Calcutta.

dition, 1837.

The Shah set out for Herat in the month of July, The Herat expe- with 50,000 troops and fifty pieces of cannon, dwelling with delight on the facility with which his disciplined infantry and artillery would overturn the Sikhs, and pursue the course of Nadir Shah to Delhi. The expedition was regarded as the triumph of Russian over British influence, and created an extraordinary impression in Central Asia. Throughout India the sensation was greater than had been felt since the invasion of Zemaun Shah at the beginning of the century. The native princes again began to speculate on the downfall of the Company's supremacy. Threats of invasion were muttered in Nepal and in Burmah. The native journals fanned the excitement to such a degree as to bring in question the wisdom of having bestowed freedom on the press, but happily no attempt was made to bridle it. Inflammatory papers which were traced to Persian agency were diligently scattered through the country. The Mahomedans looked for the advent of a countless host of the faithful, backed, it was believed, by two hundred thousand Russians, to wrest the country from the hands of the Company. The country was agitated with the report of great movements in Central Asia,

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LORD AUCKLAND'S ADVISERS.

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the cradle of revolutions for eight centuries, and men in the remote districts of the Deccan began to bury their money and jewels in the earth. The fall of Herat under these circumstances would, in the opinion of Mr. McNeill, have inflicted a blow on the prestige of the Indian Government which would be felt throughout the east.

Lord Auckland's

At this juncture Lord Auckland left Calcutta and advisers, 1837. proceeded towards the sanitarium of Simla, with Mr. Macnaghten, as the public secretary in attendance on him, and Mr. John Colvin as his private secretary. The north-west provinces were at the time visited with a more severe famine than had been known since they came under British authority, and which was calculated to have swept away half a million of the inhabitants. The Governor-General's camp consisted, as usual, of more than 20,000 men, and its progress tended to aggravate the general distress. On reaching Cawnpore, Mr. Macnaghten advised Lord Auckland to return to Calcutta, and if the advice had been followed, the Government would probably have been spared the disasters of the Afghan war, but it was determined to push on to Simla. Mr. William Hay Macnaghten had been for several years a cavalry officer in the Madras army before he entered the Bengal civil service. In the college of Fort William he had carried away the highest prizes, and he was one of the most profound oriental scholars in India. After having risen to great distinction in the judicial branch of the service, he entered the political department during the administration of Lord W. Bentinck, who formed a high estimate of the soundness of his judgment and the sobriety of his opinions. Mr. Colvin, the private secretary, was a man of considerable abilities, and lofty bearing, with a spirit of greater resolution than his master, over whom he exerted a paramount influence. On these two officers, but more especially on Mr. Colvin, devolved the duty of giving advice to the Governor-General at this momentous crisis, when he was separated from the constitutional advice of his Council. The under-secretary, Mr. Henry Torrens, whose

124

CAPTAIN BURNES AT CABUL.

[CHAP. influence in the Simla cabinet, was altogether secondary, was an accomplished scholar, a man of great parts and versatile genius, but too volatile to be a safe political guide. The home Government, seeing in every direction the indication of a restless and aggressive spirit, directed on the part of Russia and her political agents, against the security of the British empire in India, had instructed the Governor-General to adopt vigorous measures for its protection. Mr. McNeill, who had already sounded the note of alarm in his pamphlet on the progress of Russia in the cast, which produced a profound sensation in England, advised Lord Auckland to meet the crisis by raising up the barrier of a friendly power in Afghanistan, and recommended that Dost Mahomed should be subsidized and strengthened.

Captain Burnes

It was at this period of fermentation that Capat Cabul, 1837. tain Burnes made his appearance at the court of Cabul, to work out the policy of opening the Indus to commerce, but he found himself at once in the very vortex of political complications, and his character of mercantile agent was speedily merged into that of diplomatist. Native courts are accustomed to measure the esteem and respect in which they are held, and the importance of a political mission, by the character of the presents which accompany it, and the Afghans had a vivid remembrance of the magnificent gifts brought by Mr. Mountstewart Elphinstone thirty years before. Captain Burnes was escorted to the durbar by Akbar Khan, at the head of a fine body of Afghan cavalry, on the 20th September, and honoured with a splendid reception, but when he came to exhibit the presents with which he was charged, a pistol and a telescope for the Dost, and some pins and needles for the ladies of the zenana, he and his embassy sunk at once into contempt in the eyes of the court. The first glance at the state of affairs convinced him that Afghanistan was ready to throw herself into the arms of Persia, and he considered it fortunate that he should have arrived at the nick of time to counteract the hostile projects of the Persian court. The