Two telegrams received about this time caused the greatest gratification throughout the force.  One was from the Commander-in-Chief, conveying Her Majesty’s expression of ’warm satisfaction’ at the conduct of the troops; the other was from the Viceroy, expressing his ‘cordial congratulations’ and His Excellency’s ’high appreciation of the ability with which the action was directed, and the courage with which it was so successfully carried out.’  I was informed at the same time by Lord Lytton that, on the recommendation of the Commander-in-Chief, I was given the local rank of Lieutenant-General, to enable me to be placed in command of all the troops in eastern Afghanistan, a force of 20,000 men and 46 guns, in two divisions.  The first division remained under my own immediate command, and Major-General R. O. Bright, C.B.,[5] was appointed to the command of the other.  I was, of course very much pleased at this proof of the confidence reposed in me.

[Footnote 1:  Yahia Khan was Yakub Khan’s father-in-law.]

[Footnote 2:  At an interview which Major Hastings, the Political Officer, and Mr. Durand, my Political Secretary, had with His Highness at my request on the 23rd October, he said, referring to the subject of the Amirship:  ’I call God and the Koran to witness, and everything a Mussulman holds sacred, that my only desire is to be set free, and end my days in liberty.  I have conceived an utter aversion for these people.  I always treated them well, and you see how they have rewarded me.  So long as I was fighting in one place or another, they liked me well enough.  Directly I became Amir, and consulted their own good by making peace with you, they turned on me.  Now I detest them all, and long to be out of Afghanistan for ever.  It is not that I am unable to hold the country; I have held it before and could hold it again, but I have no further wish to rule such a people, and I beg of you to let me go.  If the British Government wish me to stay, I will stay, as their servant or as the Amir, if you like to call me so, until my son is of an age to succeed me, or even without that condition; but it will be wholly against my own inclination, and I earnestly beg to be set free.’]

[Footnote 3:  Dr. Bellew was with the brothers Lumsden at Kandahar in 1857.]

[Footnote 4:  My action in endorsing the proceedings of this court, and my treatment of Afghans generally, were so adversely and severely criticized by party newspapers and periodicals, and by members of the Opposition in the House of Commons, that I was called upon for an explanation of my conduct, which was submitted and read in both Houses of Parliament by the Secretary of State for India, Viscount Cranbrook, and the Under-Secretary of State for India, the Hon. E. Stanhope.  In the Parliamentary records of February, 1880, can be seen my reply to the accusations, as well as an abstract statement of the executions carried out at Kabul in accordance with the findings of the military Court.]