ppears to have been acknowledged in
almost every part of his dominions. A partial revolt of the Giljyes was
speedily suppressed by our troops. The Kohistan, or more correctly,
Koohdaman of Cabul, a mountainous tract, inhabited by a warlike people,
over whom the authority of the governments of the country had long been
imperfect and precarious, had submitted, or had ceased to resist. A
detachment from the British force at Kandahar, after defeating Akter
Khan, who had been instigated by the Vezeer of Herat to rebel, swept the
country of Zemindawer, drove Akter Khan a fugitive to Herat, received
the submission of all the chiefs in that part of the kingdom, and
secured the persons of such as it was not thought prudent to leave at
large in those districts.

The Shah's authority was not believed to be so firmly established, that
both Sir William Macnaghten, the British envoy at Cabul, who had
recently been appointed governor of Bombay, and Sir Alexander Burnes, on
whom the duties of the envoy would have devolved on Sir W. Macnaghten's
departure, thought that the time had arrived when the amount of the
British force in Affghanistan, which was so heavy a charge upon the
revenues of India, might with safety be reduced, and General Sale's
brigade was ordered to hold itself in readiness to march to Jellalabad,
on its route to India.

Even at this time, however, Major Pottinger, the political agent in
Kohistan, including, we presume, the Koohdaman, thought the force at his
disposal too small to maintain the tranquillity of the district; and the
chiefs of the valley of Nijrow, or Nijrab, a valley of Kohistan Proper,
had not only refused to submit, but had harboured the restless and
disaffected who had made themselves obnoxious to the Shah's government.
But although Major Pottinger had no confidence in the good feelings of
the people of his own district to the government, and even seems to have
anticipated insurrection, no movement of that description had yet taken
place.

Early in September, however, Captain Hay, who was with a small force in
the Zoormut valley, situated nearly west from Ghuznee and south from
Cabul, having been induced by the representations of Moollah Momin--the
collector of the revenues, who was a Barikzye, and a near relation of
one of the leaders of the insurrection, in which he afterwards himself
took an active part--to move against a fort in which the murderers of
Colonel Herring were said to have taken sh