Page:The Earl of Auckland.djvu/87

Rh arms were awaiting the order to march forward, when unpleasant news from Herát and the Bolán hills decided Macnaghten to urge upon Cotton the need of hurrying on towards Dádar without a reference to Sir John Keane. On the 22nd the march began. During Shujá's long halt at Shikárpur no attempt had been made to store up supplies anywhere along a route of 170 miles, more than half of which crossed a virtual desert, sparsely dotted by villages, nearly waterless, and yielding little forage even of the poorest kind. Some twenty-six miles of the route lay through an absolute desert called the Pát. The heat was fearful, the water hardly drinkable, and bands of Biluchi robbers swooped down upon the long train of baggage animals, carrying off much plunder without fear of hindrance or pursuit. By the 10th of March Cotton found himself at Dádar with an army weakened by sickness, worn with long marching, and crippled by its heavy losses in camels, horses, and camp-followers.

After five days' rest the troops began their toilsome ascent of the stony gorges of the Bolán Pass, which wound for sixty miles through the rugged mountain-barrier that divides the plains of Sind from the highlands of Biluchistán. Hundreds of camels fell dead or death-stricken during the seven days that passed before the troops emerged from the Bolán into the welcome verdure of the Shál Valley. Biluchi marauders continually harassed the rear brigade, and lost no opportunity of plundering the baggage. On the 26th Cotton's force was encamped outside Quetta, at the