inexhaustible, and we could place, if needs be, four million soldiers
and more than half a million of horses in the field. However, I am more
than doubtful whether England would meet us in Afghanistan. The English
generals would not, in any case, be well advised to leave India. Were
they defeated in Afghanistan only small fragments of their army at most
would escape back to India. The Afghans would show no mercy to a
fleeing English army and would destroy it, as has happened on a previous
occasion. If, on the other hand, which God forbid! the fortune of war
should turn against us, we should always find a line of retreat to
Turkestan open and be able to renew the attack at pleasure. If the
English army is defeated, then India is lost to Great Britain; for the
English are, in India, in the enemy's country; as a defeated people they
will find no support in the Indian people. They would be attacked on all
sides by the Indian native chieftains, whose independence they have so
brutally destroyed, at the very moment that their power is broken. We,
on the other hand, should be received with open arms, as rescuers of the
Indian people from their intolerable yoke. The Anglo-Indian army looks
on paper much more formidable than it really is; its strength is put at
200,000 men, yet only one-third of this number are English soldiers, the
rest being composed of natives. This army, moreover, consists of four
divisions, which are scattered over the whole great territory of India.
A field army, for employment on the frontier or across it, cannot
possibly consist of more than 60,000 men; for, considering the
untrustworthiness of the population, the land cannot be denuded of its
garrisons. As a result of what I have said, I record my conviction that
the war will have to be waged in India itself, and that God will give us
the victory."

The words of the General, spoken in an energetic and confident tone,
made a deep impression upon his hearers; only respect for the presence