Of two out of their four main valleys the following descriptions are given by Holdich: “The Khanki Valley offers no special attractions in the matter of scenery. The flanking mountains are rugged and rough, and unbroken by the craggy peaks and fantastic outlines which generally give a weird sort of charm to frontier hills. The long slopes of the mountain spurs gradually shape themselves downwards into terraced flats, bounded by steep-sided ravines, along which meander a few insignificant streams, and the whole scene, under the waning sun of late October, is a dreary expanse of misty dust colour, unrelieved by the brilliant patchwork which enlivens the landscape elsewhere. On a terraced slope between the Khanki and the Kandi Mishti ravines, under the Pass of Sampagha, stands a mud-built village with an enclosure of trees, called Ghandaki; and it is through this village that the road to Sampagha runs after crossing the Kandi Mishti declivities, ere it winds its devious course up a long spur to the pass.... Beyond the Sampagha lay the elevated Valley of Mastura (some 1500 feet higher than the Khanki, itself 4300 feet above sea-level), and 700 feet below, the pass. The difference in elevation was at once apparent in the general appearance of the landscape. Six thousand feet of altitude lifts Mastura above the dust-begrimed and heat-riddled atmosphere of Khanki or Miranzai, and gives it all the clear, soft beauty of an Alpine climate. Mastura is one of the prettiest valleys of the frontier. In spite of the lateness of the season, apricot and mulberry trees had not yet parted with scarlet and yellow of the waning year. Each little hamlet clinging to the grey cliffs, or perched on the flat spaces of the bordering plateau below, was set in its own surrounding of autumn’s gold-tinted jewellery; and in the blue haze born of the first breath of clear October frost, the crowded villages and the graceful watch-towers keeping ward over them were mistily visible across the breadth of the valleys, tier above tier, on the far slopes of the mountains, till lost in the vagueness of the shadows of the hills.” [Sidenote: Kharmana and Bara Valleys] The Kharmana Valley has been described as dotted with hamlets and towers, well-wooded and cultivated, and abundantly watered. It is entered from the south by the Kharmana defile, some seven miles in length, the hills on either side being very steep and covered with scrub jungle; and from the east over the Durbi Khel Kotal, a rough and difficult pass, and by way of the Lozaka defile, a narrow ravine with precipitous hills on either side.