Trade does not extend largely between Afghanistan and India
by the Tochi route, being locally confined to the valley
and the districts at its head, yet this is the shortest and
most direct route between Ghazni and the frontier, and in
the palmy days of Ghazni miding was the road by which the
great robber Mahmud occasionally descended on to the Indus
plains. Traces of his raiding and roadmakina are still
visible, but it is certain that he made use of the more direct
route to Peshawar far more frequently than he did of the
Tochi. The exact nature of the connexion between the head
of the Tochi and the Ghazni plain is still unknown to us.
The Gomal is the great central trade route between Afvhanistan
and India; and the position, which is held by a tribal post at
Wana, will do much to ensure its continued popularity. The
Gomal involves no passes of any great difficulty, although
it is impossible to follow the actual course of the river
on account of the narrow defiles which have been cut through
the recent conglomerate beds which flank the plains of the
Indus. It has been carefully surveyed for a possible railway
alignment; and an excellent road now connects Tank (at
its foot) with the Zhob line of communications to Quetta,
and with Wana on the southern flank of Waziristan. The
Gomal route is of immense importance, both as a commercial
and strategic line, and in both particulars is of far
greater significance than either the Kurram or the Tochi.
(2) Of the interior lines of communication, those which
connect the great cities of Afghanistan, Herat, Kabul and
Kandahar, are obviously the most important. Between Kabul
and Herat there is no ``royal'' road, the existing route
passing over the frequently snow-bound wastes that lie below
the southern flank of the great Koh-i-Baba into the upper
valleys of the Hari Rud tributaries. lt is a waste, elevated,
desolate region that the route traverses, and the road itself
is only open at certain seasons of the year. Between Kabul
and Kandahar exists the well-known and oft-traversed route by
Ghazni and Kalat-i-Ghilzai. There is but one insignificant
water-parting--or kotal--a little to the north of Ghazni;
and the road, although unmade, may be considered equal to any
road of its length in Europe for military purposes. Berween
Kandahar and Herat there is the recognized trade route which
crosses the Helmund at Girishk and passes through Farahand
Sabzawar. It includes about 360 miles of easy road, with
spaces where water is scarce. There is not a pass of any
great importance, nor a river of any great difficulty, to be
encountered from end to end, but the route is flanked on the
north between Kandahar and Girishk by the Zamindawar hills,
containing the most truculent and fanatical clans of all the
Southern Afghan tribes. Little need be said of the 65 m. of
route between Kandahar and the Baluchistan frontier at New
Chaman. It is on the whole a route across open plains and
hard, stony ``dasht''---a route which would offer no great
difficulties to that railway extension from1 Olhaman which
has so long been contemplated. A very considerable trade
now passes along this route to India, in spite of almost
prohibitive imposts; but the trade does not follow the railway
from New Chaman to the eastern foot of the Khojak. Long
strings of camels may still be seen from the train windows
patiently treading their slow way over the Khoiak pass
to Kila Abdullah, whilst the train alongside them rapidly
twists through the mountain tunnel into the Peshin valley.
Climate.
The variety of climate is immense, as might be expected.
Taking the highlands of the country as a whole, there is no
great difference between the mean temperature of Afghanistan
and that of the lower Himalayas. Each may be placed at a point
between 50 deg. and 60 deg. F. But the remarkable feature of Afghan
climate (as also of that of Baluchistan) is its extreme range
of temperature within limited periods. The least daily range
in the north is during the cold weather, the greatest in the
hot. For seven months of the year (from May to November)
this range exceeds 30 deg. F. daily. Waves of intense cold
occur, lasting for several days, and one may have to endure
a cold of 12 deg. below zero, rising to a maximum of 17 deg. below
freezing-point. On the other hand the summer temperature is
exceedingly high, especially in the Oxus regions, where a shade
maximum of 110 deg. to 120 deg. is not uncommon. At Kabul, and over
all the northern part of the country to the descent at Gandamak,
winter is rigorous, but especially so on the high Arachosian
plateau. In Kabul the snow lies for two or three months;
the people seldom leave their houses, and sleep close to
stoves. At Ghazni the snow has been known to lie long beyond
the vernal equinox; the thermometer sinks to 10 deg. and 15 deg.
below zero (Fahr.); and tradition relates the entire destruction
of the population of Ghazni by snowstorms more than once.
At Jalalabad the winter and the climate generally assume an
Indian character. The summer heat is great everywhere in
Afghanistan, but most of all in the districts bordering on the
Indus, especially Sewi, on the lower Helmund and in Seistan.
All over Kandahar province the summer heat is intense, and
the simoon is not unknown. The hot season throughout this
part of the country is rendered more trying by frequent dust
storms and fiery winds; whilst the bare rocky ridges that
traverse the country, absorbing heat by day and radiating it
by night, render the summer nights most oppressive. At Kabul
the summer sun has great power, though the heat is tempered
occasionally by cool breezes from the Hindu Kush, and the
nights are usually cool. At Kandahar snow seldom falls on
the plains or lower hills; when it does, it melts at once.
At Herat, though 800 ft. lower than Kandahar, the summer climate
is more temperate; and, in fact, the climate altogether is
far from disagreeable. From May to September the wind blows
from the N.W. with great violence, and this extends across
the country to Kandahar. The winter is tolerably mild; snow
melts as it falls, and even on the mountains does not lie
long. Three years out of four at Herat it does not freeze
hard enough for the people to store ice; yet it was not very
far from Herat, and could not have been at a greatly higher
level (at Rafir Kala, near Kassan) that, in 1750, Ahmad Shah's
army, retreating from Persia, is said to have lost 18,000
men from cold in a single night. In the northern Herat
districts, too, records of the coldest month (February) show
the mean minimum as 17 deg. F., and the maximum 38 deg. . The eastern
reaches of the Hari Rud river are frozen hard in the winter,
rapids and all, and the people travel on it as on a road.
The summer rains that accompany the S.W. monsoon in India,
beating along the southern slopes of the Himalaya, travel
up the Kabul valley as far as Laghman, though they are more
clearly felt in Bajour and Panjkora, under the high spurs
of the Hindu Kush, and in the eastern branches of Safed
Koh. Rain also falls at this season at the head of Kurram
valley. South of this the Suliman mountains may be taken as
the western limit of the monsoon's action. It is quite unfelt
in the rest of Afghanistan, in which, as in all the west of
Asia, the winter rains are the most considerable. The spring
rain, though less copious, is more important to agriculture than
the winter rain, unless where the latter falls in the form of
snow. In the absence of monsoon influences there are steadier
weather indications than in India. The north-west blizzards
which occur in winter and spring are the most noticeable
feature, and their influence is clearly felt on the Indian
frontier. The cold is then intense and the force of the wind
cyclonic. Speaking generally, the Afghanistan climate is a dry
one. The sun shines with splendour for three-fourths of the
year, and the nights are even more clear than the days. Marked
characteristics are the great differences of summer and winter
temperature and of day and night temperature, as well as the extent
to which change of climate can be attained by slight change of
place. As the emperor Baber said of Kabul, at one day's journey
from it you may find a place where snow never falls, and at
two hours' journey a place where snow almost never melts!
The Afghans vaunt the salubrity and charm of some local
climates, as of the Toba hills above the Kakar country,
and of some of the high valleys of the Safed Koh.
The people have by no means that immunity from disease
which the bright, dry character of the climate and the fine
physical aspect of a large proportion of them might lead
us to expect. Intermittent and remittent fevers are very
prevalent; bowel complaints are common, and often fatal in the
autumn. The universal custom of sleeping on the house-top
in summer promotes rheumatic and neuralgic affections;
and in the Koh Daman of Dabul, which the natives regard
as having the finest of climates, the mortality from fever
and bowel complaint, between July and October, is great,
the immoderate use of fruit predisposing to such ailments.
Population.
The term Afghan really applies to one section only of the
mixed conglomeration of nationalities which forms the people
of Afghanistan, but this is the dominant section known as the
Durani. The Ghilzai (who is almost as powerful as the Durani)
claims to be of Turkish origin; the Hazaras, the Chahar-Aimak,
Tajiks, Uzbegs, Kafirs and others are more or less subject
races. Popularly any inhabitant of Afghanistan is known
as Afghan on the Indian frontier without distinction of
origin or language; but the language division between the
Parsiwan (or Persian-speaking Afghan) and the Pathan is
a very distinct one. The predominance of the Afghan in
Afghanistan dates from the middle of the 18th century,
when Ahmad Shah carved out Afghanistan from the previous
conquests of Nadir Shah and called it the Durani empire.
The Durani Afghans claim to be Ben-i-Israel, and insist
on their descent from the tribes who were carried away
captive from Palestine to Media by Nebuchadrezzar. Yet
they also claim to be Pukhtun (or Pathan) in common with all
other Pushtu-speaking tribes, whom they do not admit to be
Afghan. The bond of affinity between the various peoples who
compose the Pathan community is simply the bond of a common
language. All of them recognize a common code or unwritten
law called Pukhtunwali, which appears to be similar in general
character to the old Hebraic law, though modified by Mahommedan
ordinances, and strangely similar in certain particulars to
Rajput custom. Besides their division into clans and tribes,
the whole Afghan people may be divided into dwellers in tents
and dwellers in houses; and this division is apparently not
coincident with tribal divisions, for of several of the great
clans at least a part is nomad and a part settled. Such,
e.g., is the (use with the Durani and with the Ghilzai.
The settled Afghans form the village communities, and in
part the population of the few towns. Their chief occupation
is with the soil. They form the core of the nation and the
main part of the army. Nearly all own the land on which
they live, and which they cultivate with their own hands
or by hired labour. Roundly speaking, agriculture and
soldiering are their sole occupations. No Afghan will pursue
a handicraft or keep a shop, though the Ghilzai Povindahs
engage largely in travelling trade and transport of goods.
