History of the War in Afghanistan. Sir John William Kaye

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ Wuzeer, to endeavour to persuade the Afghans to consent to the terms offered by Mahomed Shah. It was better, he said, for them to settle their differences among themselves, than to employ the mediation of infidels.[170] At the same time, he assured the Afghans that Mahomed Shah had no desire to interfere in the internal administration of Herat. What he required them to do was, to supply his army with soldiers, as they had, in times past, supplied the armies of Nadir Shah. The present movement, he said, was not an expedition against Herat, but an expedition against Hindostan, and that it behoved, therefore, all true Mahomedans to join the army of the King-of-Kings. Let them only unite themselves under the banner of the great defender of the faith, and he would lead them to the conquest and the plunder of India and Toorkistan.

      The Persian emissary returned, on the following day, bearing promises of a vague and delusive kind, and suggestions that, if the Persians were really inclined for peace, the best proof they could give of the sincerity of their inclinations would be the retirement of the besieging force. Great was the excitement after his departure, and various the views taken of his mission. By some, the young and thoughtless, it was conjectured that his visit betokened a consciousness of weakness on the part of the enemy; and they already began to picture to themselves the flight and plunder of the Persian army. But the elder and more sensible shook their heads, and began, with manifest anxiety, to canvass the Persian terms. It mattered little, they said, whether Kamran were designated Prince or King—whether the supremacy of the Persian Shah were, or were not, acknowledged in Herat, so long as they did not endeavour to plant a Persian garrison in the city. But the Wuzeer declared that he had no confidence in the Persians—that he desired to be guided by the advice, and to be aided by the mediation of the English; and that if the Shah would place the conduct of negotiations in the hands of Colonel Stoddart, he on his part would trust everything to Lieutenant Pottinger, and agree to whatever was decided upon by the two English officers. “This,” wrote the latter, “was a most politic measure. It threw all the odium of continuing the war off the shoulders of the Afghan war party on those of the Persians, whom every one would blame, if they declined to trust their guest, Colonel Stoddart; and it would tend to make the Afghans believe that nothing but their destruction would satisfy Mahomed Shah.”

      On the 20th of February, the Persian emissary again appeared with a letter from the camp of the besiegers. It stated that the Shah had no desire to possess himself of Herat; he only claimed that his sovereignty should be acknowledged. The answer, sent back on the following day, was full of compliments and promises. Everything asked for would be done, if the Persian army would only retire. On the 24th, the negotiations were continued—but with no result. The siege, in the mean while, proceeded. The garrison continued their sallies and sorties—sent out foraging parties—carried off large quantities of wood—and generally contrived to return to the city without suffering any injury from the activity of the investing force.

      On the part of the latter, as time advanced, the firing became more steady; but the severity and uncertainty of the weather, and the scarcity of food, which was now beginning to be painfully felt, damped the energy of the besiegers. Continuing, however, to push on their approaches, they did at least mischief enough to keep the garrison in a constant state of activity. Some unimportant outworks were carried; and on the 8th of March, to the great mortification of the Wuzeer, the enemy gained possession of a fortified post about 300 yards from the north-east angle of the fort. The Afghans who manned the post were found wanting in the hour of danger, and were visited with summary punishment for this cowardly offence. Their faces were daubed with mud, and they were sent round the works and through the streets of the city, accompanied by a crier, commissioned to proclaim their cowardice to the world.

      From the moment that this post fell into the hands of the enemy, “the investment,” says Pottinger, “began to be really felt.” The operations of the besiegers were pushed forward with some vigour, but the constancy of the garrison was not to be shaken.[171] Towards the end of March, the Asoof-ood-dowlah, whose force had encamped on the plain to the north-west of the city, sent in a message to the Afghan minister, offering to be the medium of negotiations for the suspension of hostilities. The Afghans sent word back that they were prepared to listen to any reasonable overtures; but that if peace were to be made, it must be made quickly. Seed-time, it was said, was passing; and once passed, peace was impossible. Their subsistence would then depend upon their plunder. After a few days, an interview was arranged between Yar Mahomed and the Asoof-ood-dowlah, and on the 2nd of April it was held on the edge of the ditch opposite the north-east tower. But the Wuzeer returned, hopeless of any arrangement.[172] On the following day a grand meeting of chiefs was held; but there was an end of all thought of peace.

      On the 6th of April, Mr. M’Neill, the British minister at the Persian Court, arrived in the camp of Mahomed Shah. He had left Teheran on the 10th of March; and, in spite of efforts made by the Persian ministers to arrest his progress at Ghorian, had pushed on with all possible rapidity to the Persian camp. It was urged that his presence could not fail to encourage the Heratees in their resistance. But the British minister pleaded his duty to his sovereign, and was not to be detained. He was coldly received in the Persian camp; but he demanded and obtained admittance to the Shah, and having exacted the customary formalities of reception, presented his credentials recently received from the Queen. The impression made upon the King, and subsequently upon the minister, was favourable to the British envoy, and soon his discreet and conciliatory bearing smoothed down the irritation which had been engendered by his advance. But the Russian minister, Count Simonich, was also on his way from Teheran; and Mr. M’Neill felt that the approach of this man might be fatal to his success.[173]

      On the 13th of April, Mr. M’Neill had an audience of the Persian monarch, in the course of which he stated that the proceedings of Persia in Afghanistan were an obvious violation of the treaty between Great Britain and the former state; and that the British Government would be justified, therefore, in declaring it to be at an end, and in taking active measures to compel the withdrawal of the Persian army from Herat. The audience lasted two hours. The Shah solemnly protested that he had never meditated anything injurious to the interests of Great Britain; and the minister, with still stronger emphasis, repeated the declaration. At a subsequent interview, the Shah consented to accept the mediation of the British mission; and on the 16th of April, the Persian soldiers proclaimed from the trenches that Mahomed Shah had determined to send Shere Mahomed Khan into Herat, accompanied by the British minister. But it was not Mr. M’Neill, but an inferior officer of the embassy, who was about to present himself on the morrow, in the character of a mediator, beneath the walls of the beleagured city.

      The 18th of April was one of the most memorable days of the siege. The Persian batteries opened before noon, with unwonted activity, against the ramparts behind the great mosque. The walls soon began to crumble beneath the heavy fire of the enemy. First the thin parapets fell; then the terre-plein came down; “the old walls sliding into masses at every round.”[174] Before evening, on the eastern and northern sides, the breaches were practicable, and that on the west was greatly enlarged. But the Afghans were in no way disheartened. They saw their walls crumbling beneath the heavy fire of the Persian batteries, and were neither alarmed nor discouraged by the spectacle. They had never trusted, they said, to their walls. The real defence, they declared, was the fausse-braie. About noon the Persians, having pushed on a gallery at this point, the garrison exploded it with a mine, and taking advantage of the alarm occasioned by the explosion, the Afghans rushed upon the besiegers, and at first carried everything before them. But in a short time the trenches of the enemy were lined with musketeers. The small-arm fire of the Persians overwhelmed that of the garrison, whilst the breaching batteries resumed their fire against the wall. Yar Mahomed and Pottinger were both upon the works. The Wuzeer ordered the men to cease firing, and to sit down, that they might be sheltered from the storm of musket-balls; but instead of this they drew their swords, brandished them over their heads, and calling to the Persians to come on, rushed down to the attack. They paid dearly for this bravado.[175] Pottinger himself narrowly escaped a bullet, which entered the lungs of Aga Ruhem, a favourite and devoted eunuch of Yar Mahomed, and sent him to his grave.

      In the evening, the Persians in the trenches announced that an Englishman in their СКАЧАТЬ