from McNair. Perhaps his best achievement about this part of his career
was the mapping of all the approaches to, and the general features of
the lower Tochi valley.

In 1883 he conceived the bold scheme of taking leave and exploring
Kaffiristan in disguise, trusting to the good fellowship of certain
Pathan friends, amongst whom two members of the Kakur Khel were chief.
It was a bold scheme for many reasons. The physical difficulties of the
project were many. The impossibility of keeping up a continuous
disguise was well known to him, and last, but not least, "What would
Government say?" For fear of involving others in any venture of his
own, he resolved to cut himself adrift from his department for the time
being and take his chance. In order to appreciate properly the spirit
of enterprise which animated the man, critics of his actions should put
themselves in his place. He was well aware that the information which
he could obtain would be of the highest value; further, he knew that
probably there was not another man in India who could obtain it as
successfully as himself, and he judged that some slight exception might
be made in his favour if he took on himself the responsibility of
accepting a most favourable opportunity of doing most valuable work at
the expense of infringing certain rules about crossing the border.
These rules were, to say the least, vague and indefinite, and had never
been officially promulgated. Reward or recognition of service he
rightly never expected. It must fairly be conceded that the conditions
under which such a spirit of enterprise was shown made that spirit
especially honourable--for the Government of India has never been in a
position to encourage any such ventures. On the contrary, the possible
gain in information has always been held to be more than
counterbalanced by the chance of "complications." Lord Lytton, ever
ready to bewail the decadence of a soldierly spirit of enterprise