As the world grows older and its composition both physical and human becomes subject to ever-increasing scientific investigation, the close interdependence of its history and its geography becomes more and more definite. It is hardly too much to say that geography has so far shaped history that in unravelling some of the more obscure entanglements of historical record, we may safely appeal to our modern knowledge of the physical environment of the scene of action to decide on the actual course of events. Oriental scholars for many years past have been deeply interested in reshaping the map of Asia to suit their theories of the sequence of historical action in India and on its frontiers. They have identified the position of ancient cities in India, sometimes with marvellous precision, and have been able to assign definite niches in history to historical personages with whose story it would have been most difficult to deal were it not intertwined with marked features of geographical environment. But on the far frontiers of India, beyond the Indus, these geographical conditions have only been imperfectly known until recently. It is only within the last thirty years that the geography of the hinterland of India—Tibet, Afghanistan, and Baluchistan—have been in any sense brought under scientific examination, and at the best such examination has been partial and incomplete. It is unfortunate that recent years have added nothing to our knowledge of Afghanistan, and it seems hopeless to wait for detailed information as to some of the more remote (and most interesting) districts of that historic country. As, therefore, in the course of twenty years of official wanderings I have amassed certain notes which may help to throw some light on the ancient highways and cities of those trans-frontier regions which contain the landward gates of India, I have thought it better to make some use of these notes now, and to put together the various theories that I may have formed from time to time bearing on the past history of that country, whilst the opportunity lasts. I have endeavoured to present my own impressions at first hand as far as possible, unbiased by the views already expressed by far more eminent writers than myself, believing that there is a certain value in originality. I have also endeavoured to keep the descriptive geography of such districts as form the theatre of historical incidents on a level with the story itself, so that the one may illustrate the other.

Whilst investigating the methods of early explorers into the hinterland of India it has, of course, been necessary to appeal to the original narratives of the explorers themselves so far as possible. Consequently I am indebted to the assistance afforded by quite a host of authors for the basis of this compilation. And I may briefly recount the names of those to whom I am under special obligation. First and foremost are Mr. M'Crindle's admirable series of handy little volumes dealing with the Greek period of Indian history, the perusal of which first prompted an attempt to reconcile some of the apparent discrepancies between classical story and practical geography, with which may be included Sir A. Cunningham's Coins of Alexander's Successors in Kabul. For the Arab phase of commercial exploration I am indebted to Sir William Ouseley's translation, Oriental Geography of Ibn Haukel, and the GÉographie d'Edrisi; traduite par P. AimedÉe Joubert. For more modern records the official reports of Burnes, Lord, and Leech on Afghanistan; Burnes' Travels into Bokhara, etc.; Cabul, by the same author; Ferrier's Caravan Journeys; Wood's Journey to the Sources of the Oxus; Moorcroft's Travels in the Himalayan Provinces; Vigne's Ghazni, Kabul, and Afghanistan; Henry Pottinger's Travels in Baloochistan and Sinde; and last, but by no means least, Masson's Travels in Afghanistan, Beluchistan, the Panjab, and Kalat, all of which have been largely indented on. To this must be added Mr. Forrest's valuable compilation of Bombay records. It has been indeed one of the objects of this book to revive the records of past generations of explorers whose stories have a deep significance even in this day, but which are apt to be overlooked and forgotten as belonging to an ancient and superseded era of research. Because these investigators belong to a past generation it by no means follows that their work, their opinions, or their deductions from original observations are as dead as they are themselves. It is far too readily assumed that the work of the latest explorer must necessarily supersede that of his predecessors. In the difficult art of map compilation perhaps the most difficult problem with which the compiler has to deal is the relative value of evidence dating from different periods. Here, then, we have introduced a variety of opinions and views expressed by men of many minds (but all of one type as explorer), which may be balanced one against another with a fair prospect of eliminating what mathematicians call the "personal equation" and arriving at a sound "mean" value from combined evidence. I have said they are all of one type, regarded as explorers. There is only one word which fitly describes that type—magnificent. We may well ask have we any explorers like them in these days? We know well enough that we have the raw material in plenty for fashioning them, but alas! opportunity is wanting. Exploration in these days is becoming so professional and so scientific that modern methods hardly admit of the dare-devil, face-to-face intermixing with savage breeds and races that was such a distinctive feature in the work of these heroes of an older age. We get geographical results with a rapidity and a precision that were undreamt of in the early years (or even in the middle) of the last century. Our instruments are incomparably better, and our equipment is such that we can deal with the hostility of nature in her more savage moods with comparative facility. But we no longer live with the people about whom we set out to write books—we don't wear their clothes, eat their food, fraternize with them in their homes and in the field, learn their language and discuss with them their religion and politics. And the result is that we don't know them half as well, and the ratio of our knowledge (in India at least) is inverse to the official position towards them that we may happen to occupy. The missionary and the police officer may know something of the people; the high-placed political administrator knows less (he cannot help himself), and the parliamentary demagogue knows nothing at all. My excuse for giving so large a place to the American explorer Masson, for instance, is that he was first in the field at a critical period of Indian history. Apart from his extraordinary gifts and power of absorbing and collating information, history has proved that on the whole his judgment both as regards Afghan character and Indian political ineptitude was essentially sound. Of course he was not popular. He is as bitter and sarcastic in his unsparing criticisms of local political methods in Afghanistan as he is of the methods of the Indian Government behind them; and doubtless his bitterness and undisguised hostility to some extent discounts the value of his opinion. But he knew the Afghan, which we did not: and it is most instructive to note the extraordinary divergence of opinion that existed between him and Sir Alexander Burnes as regards some of the most marked idiosyncrasies of Afghan character. Burnes was as great an explorer as Masson, but whilst in Afghanistan he was the emissary of the Indian Government, and thus it immediately became worth while for the Afghan Sirdar to study his temper and his weaknesses and to make the best use of both. Thus arose Burnes' whole-hearted belief in the simplicity of Afghan methods, whilst Masson, who was more or less behind the scenes, was in no position to act as prompter to him. It was just preceding and during the momentous period of the first Afghan war (1839-41) that European explorers in Afghanistan and Baluchistan were most active. Long before then both countries had been an open book to the Ancients, and both may be said geographically to be an open book to us now. There are, however, certain pages which have not yet been properly read, and something will be said later on as to where these pages occur.