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EX-KING OF AFGHANISTAN

He reads of a contented peasantry and an amicable
Church. His old enemies, always regarded as the foes
of progress, are now pressing for faster and more regular
advance towards his own ideal of " emancipation."
He reads of the taxes flowing smoothly into the Treasury,
of an honest civil service, of a loyal army, and a gradually
growing educational system, which will raise the people
from the ignorance in which they have lived so long.

He knows the wireless masts in Kabul are crackling,
whereas he had dreamed of their chatter, had worked
desperately to ensure their future, and yet had never
been there to rejoice over this sure sign of modernisation.

The cinemas flick their messages to the people; the
telegraph poles are silent witnesses to progress and order;
the zoom of 'planes overhead tells of advance, success,
modernisation. In his brain they all grew. Yet he
never was able to drag the State from the financial mire
into which it had sunk. Another has translated his
inspirations into fact. Another rules in Kabul. Aman-
ullah, who never considered defeat, stares at failure.

Often enough he must think of those chill nights on
the hills, quiet eerie nights in the camp, when his dreams
ran away with his common sense. Days of sport, and
long hours of endeavour when he outpaced and exhausted
the finest men of the hills in his pursuit. Days of daring
and days of glorious adventure* Days of high hope.

Afghan mirage, seen once in the heat haze under the
noon sun; seen now in the smoke clouds, over a prosaic
Italian suburb, , „ .

Would Amanullah ever go back ?
Would he ever leave peace, security, suburbia, to
pursue once more the dream cities he saw in that vision ?
Amanullah, " Peace of God," is not the man to be

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