1840.] Notes on the Eusofaye ti^ibes of Afghanistan, 931 



ceived courteously, promises of favour and protection were showered on 

 liim, and he was requested to send for his family, when a maintenance 

 and a place of residence would be fixed for them. 



This last request opened the eyes of the prisoner to the intentions of 

 his captors ; he pretended compliance, however, with their wishes, and re- 

 quested only that " Jam pans" (litters) might be sent with his son Paieendah 

 Khan (then a lad, 17 years old) to bring the ladies. As the cortege was start- 

 ing, Nawab Khan took his son aside, and whispered in his ear, " Take care 

 of yourself, consider me as a dead man, and give me your prayers." When 

 the party reached the Tanawul territory, Paieendah Khan broke the fine 

 " Jam pans," and stripping the servants of Azeem Khan, sent them back to 

 their master with the message — " My father is in your hands — do what 

 you please with him; me, you will never get into your clutches again." 



A heavy stone was tied to Nawab Khan, and he was thrown into the river. 

 From this time, Paieendah Khan has been a sort of wild man, at war with 

 all around him. Driven from his home, east of the Indus, by the Afghans, 

 the Sikhs, and the Pulals, who had partially submitted to Runjeit Singh, 

 and whose chief, Surbulund Khan, is n6w at Lahore, Paieendah Khan took 

 possession of Am, on the right bank of the Indus, which originally belonged 

 to the Pulals, and from thence, for twenty six years, has never ceased to 

 carry on a series of depredations on the Sikhs and all who submitted to 

 them. He boasts that he has four diJEferent times raised an army of Ghazis, 

 who have all fallen martyrs in the cause. Of his first band only three men 

 are alive, and they are literally one mass of wounds. Am is a small nook 

 of land, only a few hundred yards square, shut in between the deep and 

 rapid Indus, and the lofty chain of the Mabeen'" hills, which close in 

 upon it in a crescent. 



The only road to it from the south, is over a difficult path cut in the face 

 of the rocks which over hang the river. This and a somewhat similar 

 spot higher up, called Chutter bai (where his son resides), and a few villages 

 on the left bank of the Indus, are all the lands of which Paieendah Khan 

 can now boast. The aggregate return from them is said not to exceed two 

 thousand rupees a year, but by his forays on the Sikhs, he is able to 

 maintain 1,000 paid soldiers ; and he is openly and secretly assisted by 

 3,000 or 4,000 of the Tanawulees. 



He seizes Hindoos, from the wealthy of whom he extorts money ; some 

 he forces to labour in chains ; others he compels to become Mussulmans, and 

 if they are refractory, he ties a stone round their necks, and flings them 

 into the river ; — no oaths or ties bind him. He takes money from a village 

 as exemption from plunder one day, and plunders it the next. His own bro- 

 ther even he has stripped of every thing. The Sikhs have numerous forts 

 on the opposite bank of the river ; they dare not leave them ; his very grass- 



6 c 



