came, and the religion Christ preached was the true religion until Mohammed came. This new man, therefore, if his preaching was listened to, would upset Mohammedanism, and as he preached that Mussulmans must regard Christians as brothers, and not as infidels, this would render useless the Amir’s chief weapon, Jihad (religious war), in case of English or Russian aggression. So the Amir, when he heard of all this, sent word to the moullah to return, and the moullah did so, preaching the new religion as he came, and as soon as he was well within the boundaries of the country, he was made prisoner and brought to Kabul. Here he was examined by the Amir, but the Amir could find in the moullah’s clever replies nothing against the true religion which would make him an infidel, and therefore worthy of death, for a Mussulman, according to the Koran, who becomes an apostate, must be stoned to death. He was then sent for examination to Sirdar Nasrullah Khan, who is regarded as more than a moullah in knowledge of his religion, but the prince could not convict the man out of his own mouth, and so a jury of twelve of the most learned moullahs was convened, and even their examination of the accused could elicit nothing on which the man might be killed, and they reported this to the Amir. But the Amir said the man must be convicted, and so he was again sent to the moullahs, who were told that they must sign a paper, saying the man was an apostate and worthy of death. Again the majority of the moullahs made affirmation that he was innocent of anything against their religion, but two of the moullahs, who were friends of Sirdar Nasrullah Khan, and had been talked over by him, gave their verdict for death, and on the finding of these two moullahs the man was condemned by the Amir and stoned to death. Before being led away from the Amir’s presence to be killed, the moullah prophesied that a great calamity would overtake the country, and that both the Amir and the Sirdar would suffer. About nine o’clock at night the day the moullah was killed, a great storm of wind suddenly rose and raged with violence for half an hour, and then stopped as suddenly as it came. Such a wind at night was altogether unusual, so the people said that this was the passing of the soul of the moullah. Then cholera came, and, according to former outbreaks, another visitation was not due for four years to come, and this was also regarded as part of the fulfilment of the moullah’s prophecy, and hence the great fear of the Amir and the prince, who thought they saw in all this their own death, and it accounts also for the prince losing control of himself when his favourite wife died. The murdered moullah was a man with a large and powerful following, and the two moullahs who gave the verdict for his death lived in constant fear of the retaliation of his followers, who had sworn to avenge him. One of them got cholera, and almost died of it.