<<^<^te^<<^^C£^C^^(^?^<^<^ EX-KING OF AFGHANISTAN varied patterns. Their rifles were dirty and came from France, Russia, Italy, the country factories of the Khyber, and Persia. Their puttees were rolled on the principle of speed rather than accuracy. In many cases there were illustrations of how dishonest contractors can save for their old age, even in face of the new nationalism, the new patriotism, and the new ideals for Afghanistan imported from eleven capitals of the West* But they could all blow bugles. Buglers, lorry drivers, artillery men, Air Force cadets, and cavalry men, astride the lean-shanked ponies of the hills, blew bugles. They blew no tune, no note, no call to arms. They blew because this was holiday, and this was excitement. The children's party was in its heyday of anticipation. Never in Kabul had there been a day which, according to report, was going to mean so much to every man of them. I think they believed in it all. I believe every man there put trust in his own Allah to transform in a day the ranks of the primitive into the cohorts of civilisation. A haphazard history, mainly concerned with the shedding of blood, was to be guided at one stroke into the paths of peace. Allah was great, and so was the name of Amanullah ! Blow, then, your bugles ! Beside me, suddenly, was Signor Pierri. He wore his best suit. His trousers, sombre black of the boulevards, were creased with an edge not found outside the cities of elegant men. His shoes glinted with a polish never bestowed by the hands and energy of an Afghan serving boy. Frail shoes, ready for the evening stroll down the cool tree-lined roads to the favourite caf6. His gloved hands rested languidly on a silver-knobbed cane. His tie foamed from the whitest of linen collars, and swept into the curve of his waist. 461 think,'* said Signor Pierri, talking slowly and 159