AMANULLAH

been alleged against her private life. Yet later she was
to be cited in Kabul as the arch-transgressor against
the laws of the Prophet, and as a woman who had
offended against the Koran by exposing her undoubted
beauties to the gaze of the common populace of Rome,
Paris, London, and Moscow*

" The mystery of the East envelops her," wrote one
enthusiastic London journalist who saw her in European
clothes. u She has all the wisdom of the East in her
eyes, all the dignity of the East in her carriage, and yet
she has inculcated the West into her speech and her
manners*'*

Such was the woman whom Amanulluh picked to be
his second wife. It was an unusual selection, but once
again he proved his common sense and his judgment.
Souriya was one of the most loyal heroines of this age.
She followed the dictates of her husband even when
her life was threatened, and exposed herself to the
insults of the mob both on religious and moral grounds*

Soon after the wedding she bore him a son, a daughter
in 1919, a son, Rahmatulla Khan, in 1928, and two
more daughters, now aged ten and seven,

Amanullah had found a companion with whom he
could share his secret* He did not treat his wife with
the distant brutality common among his countrymen.
He actually made friends with her 1 Such a thing was
unknown. It was revolutionary. If he had known, old
Habibullah would have said that this policy was sapping
at the root of manhood. But he never knew.

The friendship did nothing but spur him on to further
dreams of emancipation for women* He had read of
the women- of the West, They were not chattels, but
companions. Even now, white women were in Kabul,
unveiled and free, taking part in the social life of the
city. Afghans who had been to Paris for their military

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