W H G Kingston

Our Soldiers W H G Kingston

Book Excerpt: ...oochees would not trust the British. At length Lieutenant Loveday was sent up to them alone. It was a critical moment for him; but they listened to his proposals, and surrendered. And Khelat was won, the British loss being 138 killed and wounded. These defeats had a very depressing effect upon the followers of Dost Mahomed, who, although still at the head of an army of 14,000 men, found that there was no courage in his faint-hearted followers, and that they could not be trusted even to be true to himself. His position being thus hopeless, Dost Mahomed fled from Cabul on the 2nd of August, and that city was entered in state by Shah Soojah, who then, though for a short time, was restored to the throne which he had lost thirty years before. The army now ceased to be an expeditionary force, and became settled as an army of occupation. The officers sent for their wives and families, and for a time English society and English amusements may be said to have been established in Cabul. Still Shah Soojah...