Macnaghten did not take alarm at this significant demonstration, regarding the outbreak merely as 'provoking,' and writing to Rawlinson that 'the rascals would be well trounced for their pains.' Yet warnings of gathering danger were rife, which but for his mood of optimism should have struck home to his apprehension. Pottinger had come down from the Kohistan, where he was acting as political officer, bent on impressing on him that a general rising of that region was certain unless strong measures of prevention were resorted to. For some time before the actual outbreak of the Ghilzais, the Afghan hatred to our people had been showing itself with exceptional openness and bitterness. Europeans and camp followers had been murdered, but the sinister evidences of growing danger had been regarded merely as ebullitions of private rancour. Akbar Khan, Dost Mahomed's son, had moved forward from Khooloom into the Bamian country, and there was little doubt that he was fomenting the disaffection of the Ghilzai chiefs, with some of whom this indomitable man, who in his intense hatred of the English intruders had resolutely rejected all offers of accommodation, and preferred the life of a homeless exile to the forfeiture of his independence, was closely connected by marriage. The time was approaching when Sale's brigade was to quit Cabul on its return journey to India. Macnaghten seems to have originally intended to accompany this force, for he wrote that he 'hoped to settle the hash of the Ghilzais on the way down, if not before.' The rising, however, spread so widely and so rapidly that immediate action was judged necessary, and on October 9th Colonel Monteath marched towards the passes with his own regiment, the 35th Native Infantry, some artillery and cavalry details, and a detachment of Broadfoot's sappers. How able, resolute, and high-souled a man was George Broadfoot, the course of this narrative will later disclose. He was one of three gallant brothers, all of whom died sword in hand. The corps of sappers which he commanded was a remarkable body--a strange medley of Hindustanees, Goorkhas, and Afghan tribesmen of divers regions. Many were desperate and intractable characters, but Broadfoot, with mingled strength and kindness, moulded his heterogeneous recruits into skilful, obedient and disciplined soldiers. Broadfoot's description of his endeavours to learn something of the nature of the duties expected of him in the expedition for which he had been detailed, and to obtain such equipment as those duties might require, throws a melancholy light on the deteriorated state of affairs among our people at this period, and on the relations between the military and civilian authorities.