140 MAJOR W. HODSON. 



name, or it might do you harm) and say that if he 

 moves in your favour, you think Lord Hardinge 

 will agree. If you could get local rank till you are 

 a captain it would be a great matter. Say nothing 

 to any one on the matter." 



Mrs Hodson had gone to the hill station of Marri, 

 about 140 miles from Peshawar. Here in the 

 middle of September Hodson w^as " enjoying a little 

 holiday from arms and kutchery up in the cool with 

 Susie." In the same letter he declares that the 

 whole upper part of the Punjab is mountainous. 

 " If you draw a line from Peshawar, through Rawal 

 Pindi, to Simla or Sabathu, or any place marked on 

 the maps thereabouts, you may assume that all to 

 the north of that line is mountain country. . . . 

 The Peshawar valley is a wide open plain lying on 

 the banks of the Kabul river, about sixty miles long 

 by forty broad, encircled by mountains, some of 

 them covered with snow for eight or nine months of 

 the year. Yuzafzai is the north-eastern portion of 

 this valley, embraced between the Kabul river and 

 the Indus. Half of Yuzafzai (the ' abode of the 

 children of Joseph ') is mountain, but we only hold 

 the level or plain part of it. Nevertheless, a large 

 part of my little province is very hilly. In the 

 north-east corner of Yuzafzai, hanging over the 

 Indus, is a vast lump of a hill called ' Mahabun ' (or 

 the ' great forest '), thickly peopled on its slopes, and 

 giving shelter to some 12,000 armed men, the bitter- 

 est bigots which even Islam can produce. The hill is 

 about 7800 feet above the level of the sea. This has 

 been identified by the wise men with the Aornos of 

 Arrian, and Alexander is supposed to have crossed 

 the Indus at its foot. . . . 



