But Dost Mahomed could not submit patiently to this. Exasperated against Runjeet Singh, and indignant at the fatuous conduct of his brothers, he determined on declaring a religious war against the Sikhs, and began with characteristic energy to organise a force sufficiently strong to wrest Peshawur from the hands of the usurpers. To strengthen his influence he assumed, at this time, the title of Ameer-al-Mominin (commander of the faithful[83]), and exerted himself to inflame the breasts of his followers with that burning Mahomedan zeal which has so often impelled the disciples of the Prophet to deeds of the most consummate daring and most heroic self-abandonment. Money was now to be obtained, and to obtain it much extortion was, doubtless, practised. An Afghan chief has a rude and somewhat arbitrary manner of levying rates and taxes. Dost Mahomed made no exception in his conduct to “the good old rule,” which had so long, in critical conjunctures, been observed in that part of the world. He took all that he could get, raised a very respectable force, coined money in his own name, and then prepared for battle. At the head of an imposing array of fighting men, the Ameer marched out of Caubul. He had judged wisely. The declaration of war against the infidel—war proclaimed in the name of the Prophet—had brought thousands to his banner; and ever as he marched the great stream of humanity seemed to swell and swell, as new tributaries came pouring in from every part, and the thousands became tens of thousands. From the Kohistan, from the hills beyond, from the regions of the Hindoo-Koosh, from the remoter fastnesses of Toorkistan, multitudes of various tribes and denominations, moved by various impulses, but all noisily boasting their true Mahomedan zeal, came flocking in to the Ameer’s standard. Ghilzyes and Kohistanees, sleek Kuzzilbashes and rugged Oosbegs, horsemen and foot-men, all who could wield a sword or lift a matchlock, obeyed the call in the name of the Prophet. “Savages from the remotest recesses of the mountainous districts,” wrote one, who saw this strange congeries of Mussulman humanity,[84] “who were dignified with the profession of the Mahomedan faith, many of them giants in form and strength, promiscuously armed with sword and shield, bows and arrows, matchlocks, rifles, spears and blunderbusses, concentrated themselves around the standard of religion, and were prepared to slay, plunder, and destroy, for the sake of God and the Prophet, the unenlighted infidels of the Punjab.”