EX-KING OF AFGHANISTAN

belief, for tests had proved that there existed mines of
gold, platinum, and other metals which, if developed,
could have reaped a rich harvest for the State. The
reports of those German engineers who did actually
inspect the seams of coal, almost inaccessible, in the
hills of the Hindu Kush, show that there is an abundance.
Whether their richness will ever justify their working,
is, of course, another matter.

At the moment, at any rate, there could be for
Amanullah no likelihood of replenishing the Treasury
by the wealth of the hills. The project languished and
collapsed, leaving many highly paid officers in Kabul,
finishing their contracts for the Afghan Government
and being paid now and then.

Already there were to be seen pretty young Russian
girls parading the avenues in the evening cool. They
were the employees of the various legations, the clerks
and the minor heads of departments in the great
block of offices maintained by the Russians, and junior
ranks of the secretariat in the Afghan Government
itself.

They were rouged and powdered. They wore short
skirts and high-heeled shoes. Women being women,
they had contrived to introduce the latest fashions into
the desert, and beguiled themselves into believing that
Kabul was very little different from Moscow or
Leningrad.

A caf 6 had sprung up for the use of the foreign popula-
tion. There was already an hotel. And Amanullah,
thorough, even if misguided, had sent down a score of
Afghan servants to the Taj Mahal Hotel, Bombay, for
education in European cooking and serving at European
tables.

Already the desert had been swept bare of rocks to

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