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Macnaghten ceived a reply in the negative signed by Elphinstone and subordinate officers. On the 11th he met the rebel chiefs in a conference on the plain in the direction of Seeah Sung, and after some debate accepted their terms ; namely, the complete but unmolested evacuation of Afghanistan by the British troops, never to return unless summoned by the Afghan people ; the restoration of Dost Mahomed ; and leave to Shah Soojah to return to India or to reside at Cabul as he pleased. The chiefs bound themselves to facilitate the evacuation by furnishing a supply of provisions. The envoy designedly manifested great confidence in their good faith ; he had attended this hazardous conference almost unattended, and placed Captain Trevor in their hands as a hostage. From the first, however, they violated their obligations; they refused to supply provisions, and frequently molested the troops. Macnaghten endeavoured, by negotiations with the Ghilzais and Kuzzdbashes, which were somewhat inconsistent with this treaty, to procure supplies, but, conformably with its terms, the feala Hissar was finally evacuated and Ghuzni was given up. The chiefs thereupon increased their demands, and on 20 Dec. they demanded that Brigadier-general Shelton should be given up to them as a hostage, and that the British guns and ammunition should be surrendered. Worn out with fatigue and anxiety, convinced of the faithlessness of the chiefs, and driven to resort to almost any expedient, Macnaghten now listened to overtures, which he was not justified in entertaining, and which were themselves a trap designed by the Dost's son, Mahomed Akbar Khan, to show that the British were incapable of keeping faith with the Afghans. Akbar sent on the 22nd a message by Captain Skinner, who was then in his hands, offering to play into the hands of the British and to outwit the combination of Barukzye chiefs. Mahomed Khan's fort and the Bala Hissar were to be occupied by British troops, at any rate until the summer ; Shah Soojah was to be maintained on the throne, and Akbar Khan was to be his vizier. These terms, inconsistent as they were with his obligations to the rebel Khans, the envoy unhappily accepted, and signed an assent to them in Persian. An offer made at the same time by Mahomed Sudeeq, who accompanied Skinner, to procure the assassination of Ameenoollah Khan, one of the rebels, for a price, was refused. In token of his goodwill Macnaghten sent to Akbar a handsome pair of pistols.

Next day the plot was carried out. Akbar had undertaken with the other chiefs to prove Macnaghten'8 want of faith to them and to take him prisoner. He had the proof of the one in his hands. It was determined to effect the seizure at an interview to take place at noon of the 23rd on the Seeah Sung plain. Knowing his peril, and in spite of warning, Macnaghten went out to the place of meet- ing with Captains Trevor, Mackenzie, and George St. Patrick Lawrence [q. v.], but otherwise almost unattended. After a short discussion they were seized, and with difficulty were saved by the Khans from being torn to pieces by their followers. Trevor was killed on the way to the city, Lawrence and Mackenzie were carried thither as prisoners, Macnaghten was thrown to the ground, and Akbar, fearing a rescue from the cantonments, and disappointed of securing his person as a hostage according to his promise to his confederates, shot him in a sudden fit of fury with the very weapon which the envoy had presented to him the day before. The body was at once hacked to pieces by the fanatical Ghazis, the head was carried through the streets of Cabul, and fragments of the limbs were exposed in the Char Uhouk, the principal bazaar. The massacre of the British army in its retreat through the Khyber Pass followed [see ]. Macnaghten's remains were removed by the second Afghan expedition under Sir George Pollock in the autumn of 1842, and were buried at Calcutta, where there is a monument to his memory.

There has been much controversy about Macnaghten's conduct in the negotiation with Akbar Khan and his fitness for the conduct of the British relations with Afghanistan, but there is no doubt of his personal high character and his brilliant attainments. He was a most accomplished orientalist, and possessed an almost unique knowledge of the habits and modes of thought of the various native races of India, and almost to the end he maintained his interest in oriental scholarship. So late as 1838 he edited an edition of the 'Thousand and One Nights,' and in the following year 'Alif Laila.' He was an admirable secretary, unwearying and facile, a fluent writer of despatches, and an assiduous official. The defect of his character was that he was too impulsive, too optimistic, and too self-confident, and thus was unable, in spite of warnings, to perceive the patent facts of his position in Afghanistan. His courage and steadfastness during the last seven weeks of his life are beyond praise ; and if his acceptance of Mahomed Akbar's offer must be censured, it is to be recollected that he was worn out with weeks of harassing anxiety, and surrounded by almost helpless colleagues; that he thought the Barukzye chiefs utterly