Hissar as a military position, led to the early discussion of
the expediency of abandoning the cantonment, and consolidating
our forces in the above-mentioned stronghold. The Envoy himself
was, from the first, greatly in favour of this move, until
overruled by the many objections urged against it by the
military authorities; to which, as will be seen by a letter
from him presently quoted, he learned by degrees to attach some
weight himself; but to the very last it was a measure that had
many advocates, and I venture to state my own firm belief that,
had we at this time moved into the Bala Hissar, Cabul would
have been still in our possession.

"But Brigadier Shelton having firmly set his face against the
movement from the first moment of its proposition, all serious
idea of it was gradually abandoned, though it continued to the
very last a subject of common discussion."

"_Nov_. 18. Accounts were this day received from Jellalabad, that
General Sale, having sallied from the town, had repulsed the enemy with
considerable loss.... The hope of his return has tended much to support
our spirits; our disappointment was therefore great, to learn that all
expectation of aid from that quarter was at an end. Our eyes were now
turned towards the Kandahar force as our last resource though an advance
from that quarter seemed scarcely practicable so late in the year."

The propriety of attacking Mahomed Khan's fort, the possession of which
would have opened an easy communication with the Bala Hissar, was
discussed; but, on some sudden objection raised by Lieutenant Sturt of
the engineers, the project was abandoned.

On the 19th, a letter was addressed by the Envoy to the General, the
object of which seems not to be very apparent. He raises objections to a
retreat either to Jellalabad or to the Bala Hissar, and expresses a
decided objection to abandon the cantonment under any circumstances, if
food can be procured; but, nevertheless, it is sufficiently evident
that his hopes of successful resistance had even now become feeble, and
he refers to the possibility that succours may arrive from Kandahar, or
that "something might turn up in our favour."

The village of Beymaroo, (or Husbandless, from a beautiful virgin who
was nursed there,) within half a mile of the cantonments, had been our
chief source of supply, to which the enemy had in some measure put a
stop