The absolute impracticability of any mountain barrier is, we believe, disputed; but, without offering any opinion on that point, we are happy to have it in our power to correct the mistake into which the author has fallen, in supposing that it was by bribing that Sir George Pollock carried his army through the Khyber Pass. It is true that, in the anxious time preceding our army’s movement from Peshawar, negotiations had been entered into with the local tribes; but we have the most unquestionable authority for asserting that, before the march towards Cabool began, the sum advanced to their chiefs, being 20,000 rupees or £2000, was demanded back from them by the political agent on the frontier, and actually repaid; so that the mountaineers had not only the clearest warning of the British general’s intention, but the strongest possible inducement to oppose him, as they did to the utmost of their power. But our chief motive for alluding to the Afghan war is, that we may show how the spirit of the two schools, under which, according to our theory, those engaged in the work of Indian government may now be classed, showed itself even in the direction of our armies in the field. Sir George Pollock was there the representative of what would be called by us the considerate and moderate, by Mr Campbell the soft-hearted and over-cautious school; while Sir William Nott was at the head of that which, going straight to its object, tramples under foot, without compunction, every consideration that might hamper its freedom of movement. We select but a few instances in proof of our position, choosing such as, from their notoriety, can be cited without injury or offence. As the two avenging armies, the one from Candahar on the south, the other from Peshawar on the east, drew nigh to Cabool, a powerful party, consisting chiefly of the Kuzzilbashes or Persians, who had never taken part against us, prayed earnestly that the citadel, the Bala Hissar, might be spared to serve as a place of refuge to themselves amid the troubles likely to ensue on our again evacuating the country.