The object of the expedition was to seize men and cattle of the Malik Shahi section as security for their share of the fine. These people are almost entirely nomadic, spending the summer on the slopes of the Siah Koh Mountains, and wintering on both banks of the Kurram River between the ninth and sixteenth milestones on the Thal-Bannu road. In order to reach them it was necessary to traverse the whole of the Kabul Khel settlements; and the difficulty, therefore, of the enterprise lay in moving through Kabul Khel country without warning reaching the Malik Shahi section, and so giving them time to escape from the comparatively open country watered by the Kurram River, into the more intricate hill country to the west in the direction of the Siah Koh. The force left Thal at 9.30 p.m.; the advance party surrounded the Malik Shahi encampment at the south-west of the valley, another party, detached to the left, surrounded other settlements on the Charkhanai plateau; while a third small party went to the right to try and capture some noted Wazir thieves; the supports remained at Drozanda on the Thal-Bannu road. The surprise was complete, 2000 head of cattle and 109 prisoners were taken, and the force returned to Thal on the 28th, where, two days later, the jirgahs came in, and within a few weeks the whole of the fines due had been realised from the Malik Shahi and Kabul Khels; their conduct did not, however, materially improve, despite the punishment they had received and the knowledge they had acquired of our ability to exact reparation from them whenever it should suit us to do so. Our later dealings with the Darwesh Khel Wazirs will be described further on in this chapter. [Sidenote: The Mahsud Wazirs] _Mahsud Wazirs._—The reputation of the Mahsuds has never been good; they have from the earliest days been notorious robbers, and their raids upon British territory have been frequent and serious. The Powindah caravans of the warrior traders, mostly Ghilzais, which pass to and fro by the Gomal Pass between Afghanistan and India, bringing Central Asian merchandise as far as the markets of Benares and Patna, have ever been the objects of constant attack and harassment by the Mahsuds, whose country commands the Gomal; and both in 1855 and 1857 John Lawrence, the Chief Commissioner, urged the Government to undertake retributive measures against them. Again, in 1859 and 1860, Brigadier-General Chamberlain, Commanding the Punjab Frontier Force, made similar appeals, but Lord Canning, to whom the matter was then referred, decided against an expedition as not being actually urgent at the moment.