negotiating with Portugal for Delogoa Bay in
South-eastern Africa; price, three million dollars. But this people are
not satisfied with all these gates. They want--and they will get what
they want in a very short time, thank Heaven; not what they
deserve!--they want the famous Khyber Pass. This pass is a narrow road
between mountain rocks that rise over two thousand feet at the lowest
point. It is some twenty-eight miles long, while for twenty-two miles
the average width is only 150 feet. The Eastern end the English already
hold, called the Peshawur Pass.

Afghanistan is a country in Asia. It is about the size of England, 460
miles from North to South, and 430 from East to West. On the North it is
bounded by Turkestan, East by India, South by Beloochistan, and West by
Persia. The population numbers about 7,000,000. They are as wild as the
country is broken and irregular. They are chiefly agriculturists. The
country is rich in minerals and timber. In time past they have seldom
been at peace, being very generally at war among themselves. Afghan is a
Persian word, and means that which is wrapped around--no doubt having
reference to the mountain chain that hems in the whole land. The people
themselves, however, name their country Vilayet, which means the land of
our ancestors. They claim that in their country lived Adam and his
children, also Noah and his. They say they had in their possession once
the ark of the covenant, but they have lost it. While it was with them,
if they took it into battle, victory was sure to be theirs. At the
present time they have Noah's ark. It is embedded in the ground, with a
portion protruding out, which pilgrims to the top of Dera Ismael
Khan--that is, the sacred mountain of Israel--are permitted to see and
touch. Many have supposed the Afghans to be the Ten Lost Tribes. It has
been the folly of many of the learned, in time past, to hunt for, and
actually expect to find, the chosen of God in some out-of-the-way place;
to find them few, poor, and deluded--the poorer, the fewer, and the more
wretched, the better. Hence, the wild Indians of the continent, the
bushmen of Africa, the aborigines of Australia, the Laplanders of the
North, and many such have been chosen of men--though not of God.

The Afghan country, no doubt, once had intercourse with Palestine.
During Solomon's reign many Jews left the land as merchants. Solomon
built store cities in Hamath, Tadmor in the wi