AMEER AND AMBASSADOR

Evening Star, Issue 11725, 7 April 1902, Page 5

AMEER AND AMBASSADOR

Lady Dufferin lias given us a glimpse of a famous wise man of the Easl winch is worth recalling, <ilr,boiij»h the yise man is no longer living. At. her fust, meeting with the late Ameer, tin: ruler o f Afghanistan spent throe hour*, arranging cut (lowers in forty vases! "Yet, this was the man," she wiote home, " who cuts of! heads and hangs people when ;■!. home, and who is hero ac cempanied by his executioner, who dresses m rerl velvet and wears his axe. and strangling rcpe." The Viceroy and the Ameer sat for three hours dircussing politico in a tent carefully guarded on al! sides. The Ameer took a great deal of snuff, and outside the pipebeartr waited in a carriage in case ins Sovereign should need his *' hubble-bubble.' But. what these two great men talked about, for these three hours only the two men knew. AH that Lady Dufferin heard from iier husband was contained in a sentence. After the Viceroy had explained the English intentions, and propounded tho British view of the Afghan situation, he asked Abdur Kallmann the. perfectly natural question: ''And now, what art- your proposals and opinions?" Tho Ameer had no words to waste. "I don't think that is a fair question," he said.