much to my
surprise as to my gratification, that he meant to offer to me, if his
views were accepted by the Secretary of State. It was above all others
the appointment I should have liked. I delighted in frontier life and
frontier men, who, with all their faults, are men, and grand men, too.
I had felt for years what an important factor the trans-Indus tribes
are in the defence of India, and how desirable it was that we should
be on better terms with them than was possible so long as our policy
consisted in keeping them at arm's length, and our only intercourse
with them was confined to punitive expeditions or the visits of their
head-men to our hard-worked officials, whose whole time was occupied
in writing long reports, or in settling troublesome disputes to the
satisfaction of no one.

I now hoped to be able to put a stop to the futile blockades and
inconclusive reprisals which had been carried on for nearly thirty
years with such unsatisfactory results, and I looked forward to
turning the wild tribesmen from enemies into friends, a strength
instead of a weakness, to our Government, and to bringing them by
degrees within the pale of civilization. My wife quite shared my
feelings, and we were both eager to begin our frontier life.

As a preliminary to my engaging in this congenial employment, Lord
Lytton proposed that I should take up the command of the Punjab
Frontier Force. I gladly acquiesced; for I had been a long time on the
staff, and had had three years of the Quartermaster-Generalship.
My friends expressed surprise at my accepting the position of
Brigadier-General, after having filled an appointment carrying with it
the rank of Major-General; but this was not my view. I longed for
a command, and the Frontier Force offered opportunities for active
service afforded by no other post.

We were in Calcutta when the question was decided, and started very
soon afterwards to make our arrangements for the breaking up of our
home at Simla. I took over the command of the Force on the 15th March,
1878. My wife accompanied me to Abbottabad--the pretty, quiet little
place in Hazara, about 4,000 feet above the sea, which was to be
henceforth our winter head-quarters. For the summer months we were to
be located in the higher hills, and my wife was anxious to see the
house which I had purchased from my predecessor, General Keyes, at
Natiagali. So off we set, nothing daunted by being told that we were
likely to find snow s