records in brick, records in writing, and records in coin, of nearly every great Asiatic movement which has influenced the destinies of India from the days of Assyria to those of Mohamed. What a history to unfold! Of the Badakshan uplands south and south-east of Balkh, we have but most unsatisfying geographical record. In the days preceding the first Afghan war when Burnes, Moorcroft, Lord, and Wood were in the field, we certainly acquired much useful information which is still all that we have for scientific reference. Moorcroft, as we have seen, made several hurried journeys between Balkh and Kunduz under most perilous conditions, when endeavouring to escape from the clutches of the border chief, Murad Beg. But Moorcroft's opportunities of scientific observation were small, and his means of ascertaining his geographical position were crude, and we gain little or nothing from his thrilling story of adventure, beyond a general description of a desolate region of swamp and upland which forms the main features of Northern Badakshan. Lord and Wood, who followed Moorcroft at no great interval, and who were also in direct personal touch with Murad Beg under much the same political circumstances, have furnished much more useful information of the routes and passes between Haibak and Kunduz, and given us a very fair idea of the physical configuration of that desolate district. Lord's memoir on the _Uzbek State of Kundooz_ (published at Simla in July 1838) is indeed the best, if not the only, authoritative document concerning the history and policy of Badakshan, giving us a fair idea of the conditions under which Murad Beg established and consolidated his position as the paramount chief of that country, and the guardian of the great commercial route between Kabul and Bokhara; but there is little geographical information in the memoir. The four fortified towns of the Kunduz state, Kunduz, Rustak, Talikhan, and Hazrat Imam, are described rather as depositories for plunder than as positions of any great importance, and the real strength of Murad Beg's military force lay in the quality of his hordes of irregular Uzbek horsemen and the extraordinary hardiness and endurance of the Kataghani horses. So highly esteemed is this particular breed that the late Amir of Afghanistan would permit of no export of horses from Kataghan, reserving them especially for the purpose of mounting his own cavalry.