s 2 A.M. before the rearguard
reached the camp at Bygram, a distance of five miles. Here all was
confusion; different regiments, with baggage, camp-followers, camels,
and horses, mixed up together. The cold towards morning became more
intense, and thousands were lying on the bare snow, without shelter,
fire, or food. Several died during the night, amongst whom was an
European conductor; and the proportion of those who escaped without
frostbites was small. Yet this was but the _beginning_ of sorrows.

_January 7th_.--At 8 A.M. the force moved on in the same inextricable
confusion. Already nearly half the sepoys, from sheer inability to keep
their ranks, had joined the crowd of non-combatants. The rearguard was
attacked, and much baggage lost, and one of the guns having been
overturned, was taken by the Affghans, whose cavalry charged into the
very heart of the column.

Akber Khan said, that the force had been attacked because it had marched
contrary to the wish of the chiefs. He insisted that it should halt, and
promised to supply food, forage, and fuel for the troops, but demanded
six more hostages, which were given. These terms having been agreed to,
the firing ceased for the present, and the army encamped at Bootkhak,
where the confusion was indescribable. "Night again," says Lieutenant
Eyre, "closed over us, with its attendant horrors--starvation, cold,
exhaustion, death."

At an early hour on the 8th the Affghans commenced firing into the camp;
and as they collected in considerable numbers, Major Thain led the 44th
to attack them. In this business the regiment behaved with a resolution
and gallantry worthy of British soldiers. Again Akber Khan demanded
hostages. Again they were given, and again the firing ceased. This seems
to prove that Akber Khan had the power, if he had chosen to exert it, to
restrain those tribes. Once more the living mass of men and animals was
put in motion. The frost had so crippled the hands and feet of the
strongest men, as to prostrate their powers and to incapacitate them for
service.

The Khoord-Cabul pass, which they were about to enter, is about five
miles long, shut in by lofty hills, and by precipices of 500 or 600 feet
in height, whose summits approach one another in some parts to within
about fifty or sixty yards. Down the centre dashed a torrent, bordered
with ice, which was crossed about eight-and-twenty times.

While in this dark and narrow gorge, a hot fire was opened upon