the Vakeel was instructed to propose a meeting at Peshawur between Sir Lewis Pelly, as the representative of the Indian Government, and Noor Mohammed Shah, the Minister of the Ameer. The basis of negotiations between them was to be the admission of British officers to certain places in the territories of the Ameer. Unless the Ameer was prepared to concede this, as a preliminary condition, there was no good in his sending a representative to confer with Sir Lewis Pelly. Great was the consternation at the Court of the Ameer when our Vakeel unfolded the message with which he was charged. They bowed before the storm; and on December 21, 1876, Atta Mohammed Khan wrote to the Government of India, that the Ameer, though still disliking to receive English officers, would on account of the insistence of the British Government, yield the point; but only after his Minister had, at the conference, made representations of his views and stated all his difficulties. Behold, then, the Government of India arrived at the goal of its desires. The Ameer consents to receive English officers if, after hearing all his reasons, Lord Lytton remains convinced of the expediency of that policy. But what follows? The conference is begun; but while the discussions were still unfinished, Noor Mohammed Shah fell sick, and died; and then what was the action of Lord Lytton? I quote his own words:-- "At the moment when Sir Lewis Pelly was closing the conference, his Highness was sending to the Mir Akhir instructions to prolong it by every means in his power; a fresh Envoy was already on his way from Kabul to Peshawur; and it was reported that this Envoy had authority to accept eventually all the conditions of the British Government. _The Viceroy was aware of these facts when he instructed our Envoy to close the conference._" The closing of the conference was followed by the withdrawal from Kabul of the British agency which had been established there for more than twenty years, and the suspension of all intercourse between us and the Ameer. There is but one conclusion possible from these strange proceedings. The demands made upon the Ameer were made in the hope that he would refuse to concede them, and so furnish the Indian Government with a pretext for attacking him. The last thing which Lord Lytton desired was that the Ameer should accept his demands. And, therefore, as soon as it became apparent that Shere Ali was prepared to do this rather than forfeit the protection and friendship of the British Government, Lord Lytton broke up the conference, which (be it remembered) he had himself proposed. Lord Lytton, not Shere Ali, without provocation or ostensible cause, assumes towards Afghanistan "an attitude of isolation and scarcely veiled hostility;" and Lord Salisbury thus comments upon the situation (October 4, 1877):--