Afghanistan and the Anglo-Russian Dispute, page 19 by Theo F. Rodenbough
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h large numbers are assembled in Afghanistan for fighting purposes, so the dispersing of an Afghan army together with its attendant masses of tribal levies in flight is almost beyond comprehension; men who have been actually engaged in hand-to-hand combat dispose of their arms in the villages they pass through, and meet their pursuers with melons or other fruit in their hands, While they adopt the role of peaceful inhabitants.
A brief description of some of the more noted cities of Afghanistan may be appropriate here.
Sir Henry Rawlinson gives the following details respecting the so-called Key of India--the city of Herat:
"That which distinguishes Herat from all other Oriental cities, and at the same time constitutes its main defence, is the stupendous character of the earthwork upon which the city wall is built. This earthwork averages 250 feet in width at the base and about 50 feet in height, and as it is crowned by a wall 25 feet high and 14 feet thick at the base, supported by about 150 semicircular towers, and is further protected by a ditch 45 feet in width and 16 feet in depth, it presents an appearance of imposing strength. Whether the place is really as strong as it looks has been differently estimated. General Ferrier, who resided for some time in Herat, in 1846, states that the city is nothing more than an immense redoubt, and gives it as his opinion that, as the line of wall is entirely without flanking defences, the place could not hold out for twenty days against a European army; and M. Khanikoff, who, although not a professional soldier, was a very acute observer, further remarks that the whole interior of the city is dominated from the rising ground 700 yards distant and covered with solid buildings at the northeast angle, while the water supply both for the ditch and the city would be at the mercy of an enemy holding the outside country; the wells and reservoirs inside the wall, which could then alone be available--being quite inadequate to the wants of the inhabitan