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Accordingly, Brigadier-General Burrows, with 2300 British and Indian troops, marched out from Candahar on July 11. On the other side of the Helmand lay an Afghan force, acting in the British interest, sent thither by the Sirdar, Shere Ali. Two days later the whole native force mutinied and marched off towards Ayub Khan.
On one occasion a report was circulated that Abdurrahman Khan, the Ameer of Afghanistan, was lying at the point of death. Great preparations, it was said, were being made for an expedition over the Pamir, to establish on the throne the Russian candidate, Is-shah Khan from Samarkand, before Ayub Khan, the rival British protégé, could be brought from India.
Its Moorish name means the "Castle of Ayûb" or Job the nephew of Mûsa, who used the ancient Bilbilis as a quarry whence to obtain stones for its construction. The Dominican convent of Calatayud has a glorious patio with three galleries rising one above another, and a portion of the exterior is enriched with pseudo-Moorish work like the prisons at Guadalajara.
Framing his measures so as to encourage Ayub to stand his ground, Roberts planned his attack in the way that had already led to success, namely, a frontal attack more imposing than serious, while the enemy's flank was turned and his communications threatened. These moves were carried out by Generals Ross and Baker with great skill.
Nevertheless he instructed the Indian cavalry to push on to Robat and open up heliographic communication with Candahar. It then transpired that the approach of the column had already changed the situation. Already, on August 23, Ayub had raised the siege and retired to the hills north of the city.
They might bewail the loss, or commemorate the martyrdom, of thirty thousand Moslems, who fell in the siege of Constantinople; and the solemn funeral of Abu Ayub, or Job, excited the curiosity of the Christians themselves. That venerable Arab, one of the last of the companions of Mahomet, was numbered among the ansars, or auxiliaries, of Medina, who sheltered the head of the flying prophet.
All hope of maintaining his rule vanished when tidings arrived that Ayub Khan, a younger brother of the deported Yakub, was marching from the side of Herat to claim the crown. Already the new pretender had gained the support of several Afghan chiefs around Herat, and now proclaimed a jehad, or holy war, against the infidels holding Cabul.
A form of election is to the present day observed at Constantinople in token of this right; and each new Sultan of the house of Othman, as he succeeds to the temporal sovereignty of Turkey, must wait before being recognized as Caliph till he has received the sword of office at the hands of the Ulema. This ceremony it is customary to perform in the mosque of Ayub. Nomination.
The fingers thrilled him, and, though he had made solemn vow that he would ride like an anchorite, he bent his head and kissed her with a claiming warmth that caused her to cry out as if in misery. Presently a whimsical fancy swayed the girl, and she said, "Ayub Alli!" Barlow laughed, and answered: "Bismillah!"
It is, however, scarcely correct to say that Roberts had no line of retreat assured in case of defeat . No serious fighting was to be expected before Candahar; for the Afghan plundering instinct was likely to keep Ayub near to that city, where the garrison was hard pressed. After leaving Ghazni, the Quetta route became the natural way of retirement.
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