On the 25th the First Division entered the Bazar Valley in two columns from the immediate vicinity of Ali Musjid, where it had concentrated the day previous. The 1st Brigade moved by the Alachi Pass to Karamna, and the 2nd by way of the Chora Pass to Chora; neither was seriously opposed, but the roads were found to be very difficult. On the 26th the 1st Brigade was only able to march as far as Barg, no more than two and a half miles, but a road presenting extraordinary difficulties to the progress of troops and almost impassable to transport. The same day the 2nd Brigade was advancing to China, with its rearguard harassed all the way; it returned next day to Chora, followed up on both flanks, and reached the Khyber on the 28th and Jamrud on the 29th. The 1st Brigade supported, on the 27th, the retirement of the 2nd Brigade from China, moved back to Karamna on the 28th, and on the next day returned to the Khyber, the rearguard, furnished by the Derbyshire Regiment, being persistently followed up nearly to Lala China in the Khyber. During the latter part of December and beginning of January 1898, the Peshawar column was frequently engaged with the Zakha Khels about Lundi Kotal, and on all sides punitive measures, accompanied by desultory and indecisive fighting, continued as before. Many of the Afridi clans—the Malikdin Khels, Kambar Khels, Sipah and Kamar Khels—had sent in asking for peace, while bewailing the severity of our terms; but the Aka Khels were obdurate, and the Zakha Khels as defiant as at the very commencement of the campaign, their two most recalcitrant maliks, Khwas Khan and Wali Muhammad Khan, from the secure haven of Afghanistan, exhorting them to stand firm and to continue to resist. [Sidenote: End of Tirah Campaign] The last action of the campaign took place at the Shinkamar Pass on the 29th January, when all the four brigades combined to endeavour to surround the Kajurai plain, where the Afridis were reported to be again grazing their cattle. Few of the columns employed experienced any opposition, but one operating from Mamanai, and belonging to General Westmacott’s brigade, when about to retire was hotly engaged by the enemy, and sustained some seventy casualties; these were chiefly among the Yorkshire Light Infantry and the 36th Sikhs, the last-named regiment losing a splendid frontier soldier in their commanding officer, Colonel John Haughton.