find out what men said across the border. The Afghans were always a
secretive race, and vastly preferred doing something wicked to saying
anything at all. They would be quiet and well-behaved for months,
till one night, without word or warning, they would rush a
police-post, cut the throats of a constable or two, dash through a
village, carry away three or four women, and withdraw, in the red
glare of burning thatch, driving the cattle and goats before them to
their own desolate hills. The Indian Government would become almost
tearful on these occasions. First it would say, 'Please be good and
we'll forgive you.' The tribe concerned in the latest depredation
would collectively put its thumb to its nose and answer rudely. Then
the Government would say: 'Hadn't you better pay up a little money
for those few corpses you left behind you the other night?' Here the
tribe would temporise, and lie and bully, and some of the younger
men, merely to show contempt of authority, would raid another
police-post and fire into some frontier mud fort, and, if lucky, kill
a real English officer. Then the Government would say: 'Observe; if
you really persist in this line of conduct you will be hurt.' If the
tribe knew exactly what was going on in India, it would apologise or
be rude, according as it learned whether the Government was busy with
other things, or able to devote its full attention to their
performances. Some of the tribes knew to one corpse how far to go.
Others became excited, lost their heads, and told the Government to
come on. With sorrow and tears, and one eye on the British taxpayer
at home, who insisted on regarding these exercises as brutal wars of
annexation, the Government would prepare an expensive little
field-brigade and some guns, and send all up into the hills to chase
the wicked tribe out of the valleys, where the corn grew, into the
hill-tops where there was nothing to eat. The tribe would turn out in
full strength and enjoy the campaign, for they knew that their women