To the extreme right of the drawing, at the foot of an immense mountain is the village, and across the valley are ranged the guns, twenty-five in number, of Dost Mahommed Khan, which were abandoned the night previously and afterwards secured by Major Cureton, who had been sent with his Lancers to take them. Dost Mahommed, who had, with great difficulty, persuaded his adherents, consisting of about twelve thousand fighting men of all sorts, to advance even as far as Urghundee had placed his guns in position, with the profoundest intention of vigorously coming to action, but no sooner were the guns so ranged in battle order than the Ameer, convinced that his safety consisted in flight, discarded them, blew up the powder and moved off precipitately across the mountains towards Bamian. Some of the guns were thrown from their carriages, thousands of balls lying in all directions, and the ground literally strewed with belts and cartouche-boxes, half consumed by the explosions that had evidently taken place. Two hundred gun-bullocks had been left behind and became a part of the prize property. The guns varied in size from three to nine pounders, the carriages of the clumsiest construction, so unskilfully put together, that a few rounds must have shattered them to pieces, and upon inspection it was found that each gun was loaded with three balls, so that the danger to the gunner would have been greater than to the enemy. Sketches in Afghanistan, Henry Graves & Co. and W.H. Allen & Co., London, 1842. Letterpress title printed in blue incorporating list of plates, tinted lithographic title, dedication leaf, 25 tinted plates by Louis and Charles Haghe. This is one of the earliest collections of views of Afghanistan. James Atkinson, the celebrated translator of Firdausi’s Shah Nameh and one of the first Europeans to explore Afghanistan, was on of the pioneers of oriental studies. The lithographers Louis and Charles Haghe were involved in a number of important publications in the 1840’s and 1850’s and are celebrated for the particular high quality of their work.