As an example of this, it is related that on a certain frontier expedition the regiments were passing up a defile on a height, above which some of the enemy had ensconced themselves in ambush behind their sangars. The Afghans had been soldiers in the Indian Army, who had now completed their service and retired to their hills, and were, as is often the case, using the skill which they had learnt in their regiments against us. They were about to fire, when one of them recognized the officer riding at the head of the regiment as his own Colonel. He stopped the others, and said: "That is our own Karnal Sahib. We must not fire on him or his regiment." That regiment was allowed to pass in safety, but they opened fire on the one which succeeded. CHAPTER V THE CHRISTIAN'S REVENGE Police posts versus dispensaries--The poisoning scare--A native doctor's influence--Wazir marauders spare the mission hospital--A terrible revenge--The Conolly bed--A political mission--A treacherous King--Imprisonment in Bukhara--The Prayer-Book--Martyrdom--The sequel--Influence of the mission hospital--The medical missionary's passport. I was once urging on a certain official the need of a Government dispensary in a certain frontier district. "There is no need there," he replied; "the people are quiet and law-abiding. Now A---, that is a disturbed area: there we ought to have medical work"--an unintentional testimony to one result of the doctor's work, though rather hard on the law-abiding section of the populace that they should have no hope of a hospital unless they can organize a few raids, or get a reputation for truculence. Which will be better--a punitive police post or a civil dispensary? This seems a not very logical conundrum, yet it is based on sound reasoning, and a well-managed establishment of the latter kind will often remove the necessity of setting up the former. The doctor is a confidant in more matters than one, and the right man will often smooth down little frictions and mollify sorenesses which bid fair to cause widespread conflagrations. A medical mission is a pacific, as well as an essentially pioneer, agency. There was a little missionary dispensary on the frontier, in charge of a native doctor, a convert from Muhammadanism, who had gone in and out among the people till he was a household friend all down the country-side. One day he was sitting in his dispensary seeing out-patients, when he heard the following conversation: Abdultalib. "The Sarkar has sent out agents to kill the Mussulmans by poisoning their drinking-water." Balyamin. "Mauzbillah! how do you know that?" A. "Mullah D. arrived last night, and, sitting in the chauk, he told how he had seen a man throwing pills into the well at Dabb village. He went after him, but as soon as the man saw him he ran away." B. "What is to be done?"