In the following year, 1891, columns twice moved against the Orakzai clans in the Miranzai valley, the operations against the Hazaras were repeated for the second time, and hostilities, resulting in the subjugation of Hunza and Nagar and the occupation of Chitral, broke out. The troops of the Amir were also on active service in 1891, occupying the Asmar valley in December under the Sipah Salar Ghulam Haidar Khan, a proceeding aimed in a measure at the Government of India, who were contemplating similar action. In 1892 troops again were sent across the frontier, moving against the Isazai clan in the Trans-Indus Isazai territory. The entire frontier was now in a restless state; and, as the tension between Kabul and Calcutta had increased steadily, it seemed desirable that the Amir should be given an opportunity to declare his intentions. Lord Lansdowne thereupon invited Abdur Rahman to visit India; and, when the Amir refused on the plea of the disturbed condition of his country, the Viceroy suggested that a meeting should take place on the Indo-Afghan frontier. Again the Amir of Afghanistan demurred; when, since hostilities appeared inevitable and preparations for war were in progress, the proposal that a British mission should visit Kabul, which Abdur Rahman had first addressed to Lord Ripon and repeated to Lord Dufferin in 1887, was taken up. Abdur Rahman was informed that a military mission under the personal direction of Lord Roberts, the Commander-in-Chief in India, and escorted by a brigade of British troops, would visit Jelalabad. Lord Roberts had been the active exponent of the forward policy since Lord Lansdowne had assumed vice-regal office. The long series of military operations in the frontier region, which had resulted from his energetic direction of affairs, made his selection for a peaceful mission obnoxious to the Amir, who naturally also appreciated the objections of the people of Afghanistan to receive a visit from the hero of the 1878-80 war. Moreover, the situation in Afghanistan itself, at the time when this ultimatum was despatched to Kabul, was menaced with the danger of widespread rebellion. The Hazaras had led the revolt against the Amir and disaffection was manifested even in the capital. Abdur Rahman’s natural adroitness never stood him in better stead than at this period. Returning a polite and very diplomatic reply to the notification to the Government of India, he stated that he was sending to the Viceroy his own personal representative. After a little interval, Mr. (now Sir Salter) Pyne was entrusted with letters for the Viceroy and the Foreign Secretary to the Government of India, Mr. (now Sir Mortimer) Durand. By travelling slowly and acting with studied deliberation Mr. Pyne achieved his employer’s object, which was to procrastinate until Lord Roberts, then on the eve of his return to England, had left India. By these means war was undoubtedly averted, misunderstandings abridged, and the way paved by Mr.