k I am visited by a fatherly old khan in a sky-blue
gown, and an interesting Cabooli cavalry colonel, with pieces of chain
mail distributed about his uniform, and a fierce-looking moustache that
stands straight out from his upper lip. Sweetmeats enough to start a
small candy shop have been sent me during the afternoon, and setting them
out before my guests, we are soon on the most familiar terms. The colonel
shows me his weapons in return for a squint down the shining rifled
barrel of my Smith & Wesson, and he explains the merits and demerits of
both his own firearms and mine. The 38-calibre S. & W. he thinks a
perfect weapon in its way, but altogether too small for Afghanistan. With
expressive pantomime he explains that, while my 38 bullet would kill a
person as well as a larger one, it requires a heavier missile to crash
into a man who is making for you with a knife or sword, and stop him. His
favorite weapon for close quarters is a murderous-looking piece, half
blunderbuss, half pistol, that he carries thrust in his kammerbund, so
that the muzzle points behind him. This weapon has a small single-hand
musket stock, and the bell-mouthed barrel is filled nearly to the muzzle
with powder and round bullets the size of buckshot. This formidable
firearm is for hand-to-hand fighting on horseback, and at ten paces might
easily be warranted to blow a man's head into smithereens.

The colonel is an amiable old warrior, and kindly points this interesting
weapon at my head for me to peer down the barrel and satisfy myself that
it is really loaded almost to the top! Like Injun-slaying youngsters in
America, the doughty Afghan warriors seem to delight in having their
weapons loaded, their sidearms sharp, and their bayonets fixed, and seem
anxious to impress the beholder with the fact that they are real
warriors, and not mere make-believe soldiers. The colonel wears a
dark-brown uniform profusely trimmed with braid, a Kashgarian military
hat, and English army shoes. In matters pertaining to his wardrobe it is
very evident that he has profited to no small extent by Afghanistan being
adjacent territory to British India; but his semi-civilized ambition has
not yet soared into the aesthetic realm of socks; doubtless he considers
Northampton-made shoes sufficiently luxurious without the addition of
socks.

The mission of these two officers is apparently to prepare me gradually
for the intelligence that I am to be taken back to Herat. So