and 175 wounded.  The strange disproportion between these totals may serve as a measure of the ferocity of Afghans in the hour of victory.  Of the non-combatants 790 fell under the knives of the ghazis.  The remnant struggled towards Candahar, whence, on the 28th, General Primrose despatched a column to the aid of the exhausted survivors.  In the citadel of that fortress there mustered as many as 4360 effectives as night fell.  But what were these in face of Ayub’s victorious army, now joined by tribesmen eager for revenge and plunder[323]?

[Footnote 323:  S.H.  Shadbolt, The Afghan Campaigns of 1878-80, pp. 96-100.  Parl.  Papers, Afghanistan, No. 2 (1880), p. 21; No. 3, pp. 103-5; Lord Roberts, op. cit. vol. ii. pp. 333-5; Hensman, op. cit. pp. 553-4.]

In face of this disaster, the British generals in Northern Afghanistan formed a decision commendable alike for its boldness and its sagacity.  They decided to despatch at once all available troops from Cabul to the relief of the beleaguered garrison at Candahar.  General Sir Frederick Roberts had handed over the command at Cabul to Sir Donald Stewart, and was about to operate among the tribes on the Afghan frontier when the news of the disaster sent him hurrying back to confer with the new commander-in-chief.  Together they recommended the plan named above.

It involved grave dangers:  for affairs in the north of Afghanistan were unsettled; and to withdraw the rest of our force from Cabul to the Khyber would give the rein to local disaffection.  The Indian authorities at Simla inclined to the despatch of the force at Quetta, comprising seven regiments of native troops, from Bombay.  The route was certainly far easier; for, thanks to the toil of engineers, the railway from the Indus Valley towards Quetta had been completed up to a point in advance of Sibi; and the labours of Major Sandeman, Bruce, and others, had kept that district fairly quiet[324].  But the troops at Quetta and Pishin were held to be incapable of facing a superior force of victorious Afghans.  At Cabul there were nine regiments of infantry, three of cavalry, and three mountain-batteries, all of them British or picked Indian troops.  On August 3, Lord Ripon telegraphed his permission for the despatch of the Cabul field-force to Candahar.  It amounted to 2835 British (the 72nd and 92nd Highlanders and 2nd battalion of the 60th Rifles, and 9th Lancers), 7151 Indian troops, together with 18 guns.  On August 9 it struck camp and set out on a march which was destined to be famous.

[Footnote 324:  Colonel Sandeman:  His Life and Work on our Indian Frontier, by T.H.  Thornton; R.I.  Bruce, The Forward Policy and its Results (1900), chaps. iv. v.; Candahar in 1879; being the Diary of Major Le Mesurier, R.E. (1880).  The last had reported in 1879 that the fortifications of Candahar were weak and the citadel in bad repair.]