Spite of all his shortcomings, I could not help feeling sorry for the self-deposed Ruler, and before leaving him I explained that he would be treated with the same consideration that had always been accorded to him, that Nawab Sir Ghulam Hussein Khan[8] should have a tent next to his, and that it should be the Nawab’s care to look after his comfort in every way, and that I should be glad to see him whenever he wished for an interview.  That same day, under instructions, I issued the following further manifesto: 

’In my Proclamation of yesterday I announced that His Highness the Amir had of his own free will abdicated, and that for the present the government of Afghanistan would be carried on under my supervision.  I now proclaim that, in order to provide for the cost of administration, I have taken possession of the State treasury, and that, until the British Government shall declare its will as to the permanent arrangements to be made for the future good government of the country, the collection of revenue and the expenditure of public money will be regulated by me.  All persons concerned are hereby informed that they must obey without dispute or delay such orders as may be issued by me in regard to the payment of taxes and other connected matters; and I give plain warning that anyone resisting or obstructing the execution of such orders will be treated with the utmost severity as an enemy to the British Government.’

[Footnote 1:  In Pushtu the word tarbur signifies a cousin to any degree, and is not unfrequently used as ‘enemy,’ the inference being that in Afghanistan a cousin is necessarily an enemy.]

[Footnote 2:  As I reported at the time, the magnitude of Sher Ali’s military preparations was, in my opinion, a fact of peculiar significance.  He had raised and equipped with arms of precision sixteen regiments of Cavalry and sixty-eight of Infantry, while his Artillery amounted to nearly 300 guns.  Numbers of skilled artisans were constantly employed in the manufacture of rifled cannon and breech-loading small arms.  Swords, helmets, uniforms, and other articles of military equipment, were stored in proportionate quantities.  Upon the construction of the Sherpur cantonment Sher Ali had expended an astonishing amount of labour and money.  The size and cost of this work may be judged from the fact that the main line of rampart, with barrack accommodation, extended to a length of nearly two miles under the western and southern slopes of the Bimaru hills, while the original design was to carry the wall entirely round the hills, a distance of four and a half miles, and the foundations were laid for a considerable portion of this length.  All these military preparations must have been going on for some years, and were quite unnecessary, except as a provision for contemplated hostilities with ourselves.  Sher Ali had refused during this time to accept the subsidy we had agreed to pay him, and it is difficult to understand how their entire cost could have been met from the Afghan treasury, the annual gross revenue of the country at that time amounting only to about 80 lakhs of rupees.]