the stream—at this time reduced to very small dimensions, by being largely drawn upon for irrigation purposes in the Chardeh Valley—but begins at once on the opposite side of the river. A strong tower, with a base of stones fifteen feet high, raised on the solid rock, is the starting point on this, the northern side of the river, and the wall zig-zags up just in the same way as that in continuation of the upper Bala Hissar. The line of fortification extends along the hill top, and then turns down for some distance along a spur facing towards Sherpur. On the crest of this ridge (the Asmai Heights), three white standards were flying near the guns of the enemy, who had one heavy piece on the summit, the report of which made the bark of the mountain guns sound quite contemptible. The line of fire on both sides was at right angles to the bed of the Cabul River, the shells flying over the gorge and bursting on the opposing heights. From our position in the plain below we could watch the artillery and judge pretty accurately as to the fall of the shells, and it was annoying to see that as it was “end-on” firing, the enemy were receiving but little injury. Their policy was plainly to hold on till nightfall and to attempt to escape under cover of darkness; and as the sun sank slowly behind us, it became obvious that unless the infantry attack was soon delivered, they would succeed only too well. Our chagrin was great that there were not guns with our cavalry, as we could see men in little clusters of 50 or 100 lying under the lee of the rocks on our side of the ridge, perfectly sheltered from General Baker’s shells. General Massy had applied for horse artillery before leaving Beni Hissar; but it was reported that the country he would have to pass over was cut up by deep irrigation channels which would hinder the guns from keeping up with the cavalry. It was decided therefore not to send out artillery. With a couple of R.H.A. guns we could have made the enemy’s camp and the hillside quite untenable, and the 2,800 men gathered there would either have had to come down into the plain, where our cavalry would have chosen their own ground to charge them, or to take refuge in Cabul city, which they could easily have reached. An old native officer, a Cabuli, who saw service in the Mutiny, was much struck with our plan of cutting off the retreat; and when he saw the cavalry debouch into the Chardeh plain, he said in his fervent thankfulness:—“God has delivered these _budmashes_ into your hands even as the Embassy was delivered into theirs.” And it certainly did seem as if these three regiments, which were said to have been chief in the attack upon the handful of men under Sir Louis Cavagnari in the Bala Hissar, were about to be exterminated. But night fell, and still our infantry attack was not delivered. General Massy ordered his videttes and the chain of cavalry to be maintained until it was quite dark, so as