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Hensman, in his "History of Rhodesia," says: "One hardly knows which to most admire, the men who went on this dangerous errand, through brush swarming with natives, or those who remained behind battling against overwhelming odds."
Hensman and another woman found between the mattress and the bed a packet of papers. These were also submitted for analysis. One of them contained 35 grains of strychnine; another had crystals of strychnine upon it. There was writing on one of the packets, and it was the handwriting of the prisoner; it said, "Take in a little water; it is quite harmless. Will come over in a day or two."
In the words of Mr Hensman, a correspondent who accompanied the column: 'There were no old men, women, and children, and there was no snow. British officers cannot be supposed to have found pleasure, on the verge of the bitter Afghan winter, in the destruction of the hovels and the winter stores of food belonging to a number of miserable villagers; but experience has proved that only by such stern measures is there any possibility of cowing the rancour of Afghan tribesmen.
In a letter of February 17th Mr Hensman speaks of him as being in Badakshan, where his wife's kinsmen were in power, and describes him as having a following of 2000 or 3000 Turcoman horsemen and possessed according to native report of twelve lakhs of rupees.
In fact, Ayub's force ceased to exist; many of his troops at once assumed the garb of peaceful cultivators, and the Pretender himself fled to Herat . Papers, Afghanistan, No. 3 , p. 82. Hensman, The Afghan War; Shadbolt, op. cit. pp. 108-110.
Sir Frederick Roberts determined to take on these troops with him, as he needed all his strength to cope with the growing power of Yakub. Mr. Hensman, the war correspondent of the Daily News, summed up in one telling phrase the chief difficulties of the troops. "The sun laughed to scorn 100° F. in the shade." On the 27th the commander fell with a sharp attack of fever.
'From beyond Behmaroo and the eastern trenches and walls, writes Mr Hensman, 'came a roar of voices so loud and menacing that it seemed as if an army fifty thousand strong was charging down on our thin line of men.
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