enterprise, the chief credit of which he was wont to claim for himself. The usual honours and rewards were bestowed by a grateful nation upon their victorious troops. Their commander, Sir John Keane, received a peerage, and Willshire a baronetcy. The Governor-General was promoted to an earldom. Of the chief political officers Macnaghten and Pottinger were made baronets, and Wade a Knight of the Bath. Burnes had already got his reward.
The moment seemed to have come when the Army of the Indus might be withdrawn from Afghánistán in accordance with the pledges of the Simla Manifesto. The Ludhiána pensioner had been brought back in triumph to his grandfather's capital. Herát was safe in the hands of a Saduzai prince, Sháh Shujá's own nephew. Dost Muhammad was a powerless fugitive. The troops of all arms which Sháh Shujá and his son had brought from India were quite strong enough to cope with any local outbreak against the new rule. If the Sháh was worthy of all the help we had given him, now was the time for putting his kingly qualities to fair proof. If he were half as popular as Macnaghten had reported him, why should we hesitate to leave him alone, face to face with his own people? Most of our officers at Kábul were looking forward, as a thing of course, to the immediate withdrawal of our troops under the guarantee of October, 1838.
But the time for withdrawal did not seem ripe either to Sir William Macnaghten or to Lord Auckland. Even in his letters from Kandahár Macnaghten
