After Edwardes came John Nicholson, who ruled with justice, swift severity, tremendous energy. Old greybeards to-day point with admiration to the tree under which he sat and administered righteous rule without partiality, favour, or affection. They tell how "his horse was everywhere." They never knew when he was coming or where he was going; but they did know that when he came the poor rejoiced and the guilty suffered.

It might be thought that, however right and expedient it might be to introduce law and order among a fierce and fanatical race of Moslems, yet the time could not come for many years when it would be safe to introduce the teaching of Christianity. Such, indeed, was the view of some of the earlier British rulers on the Frontier, as it has been in our own day in the Sudanat all events, until quite recently. Such, however, was not the view of Sir Sir H. Edwardes. At a meeting held at Peshawar in 1853, hebeing then Commissioner of the District-not only encour

aged the idea, but expressed himself on the subject in wise and eloquent terms, commending the establishment of a mission there independent of Government aid, but recognised and protected by the State as impartially as if it were a Hindu or Mohammedan establishment. To quote all he said would be impossible, but one paragraph alone may be taken as the keynote of the rest: "Sad instances of fanaticism have occurred under our eyes, and it might be feared, perhaps in human in judgment, that greater opposition would meet us here than elsewhere. But I do not anticipate it. The gospel of peace will bear its own fruit and justify its name. Experience, too, teaches us not to fear."

History has shown that in taking this step Edwardes was not alienating the respect of the Pathans. A few years after these words were spoken the Indian Mutiny broke out. The Punjab saved India. Peshawar was the key to the Punjab. Edwardes at Peshawar held N.W. India for the Empire, and the Pathans were true to him.

So Christian Missions were established on on the Frontier. Gradually it has come to be recognised that healing of the body is the surest way to win the trust of the Pathan, and a chain of medical missions has been established all along the Afghan frontier. Bannu was one of the last so to be established, and it was to Pennell that the task was confided.

There had been clerical missionaries there some years before. I did not know any of these personally. I believe they did good work in connection with translation, but this work did not interest the Pathan, who, as far as preaching was concerned, had plenty from his own mullahs, and was in no mood to have his cherished ideas disputed. So, when Pennell began to preach in the Bannu bazaar he soon found this out, being hustled, kicked, and buffeted in no gentle fashion. However, he came up smiling and went on with his work in the hospital, extracting bullets and sewing up sword-cuts with perfect friendliness.

Gradually the tribesmen on both sides of the border-line began to realise that there was among them a man of no ordinary skill, who, although he might have the most heterodox notions on the subject of religion, was at all events a most wonderful healer of disease. Moreover, he spoke their language admirably, wore the same dress as they did, and was always ready to go anywhere, even into the most dangerous places. This was evidently a person to be encouraged. What if the mullahs do rail against him? At all events he, too, is a "man of the Book" and no idolater, and his medicines, whatever their taste may be, are more efficacious than the mullah's charms. So they made friends with Pennell and invited him to all sorts of queer places. After he had been at Bannu

from the

a few years he was invited to attend the chief of a tribe that had given the Government not long before much trouble. The healing art was successfully applied, and the chief became a firm friend of the doctor. Very shortly afterwards the whole frontier, Malakand to the Tochi, was blazing with war. Punitive columns advanced, as we know, from every cantonment. Fierce fighting was going on everywhere-mullahs preaching a jehád in every direction. Scarcely any of the tribes remained quiet, but one whole section which did hold aloof was that with whose chief Pennell had made friends.

I met him at Bannu for the first time in 1901. It was a somewhat special occasion. The Mahsuds had been long filling the cup of their misdeeds to overflowing, and were therefore being subject to a blockade - a sort of boycotting on a large scale, whereby the tribe was supposed to be prevented from holding any intercourse with its neighbours. It was not supposed to be a campaign-that is to say, it was not an officially declared war, there were no special troops mobilised nor staff appointed. But in other respects-i.e., in matters of bloodshed and destruction— it was war. One of my survey parties (I was head of the engineering branch) had been cut up almost to a man, and the bill of casualties otherwise amounted to a considerable figure. So to accelerate matters two mobile columns had

to Bannu, mortally wounded, to be tended by Pennell with every care that surgery could devise, but he was beyond all human aid.

From him, however, I learned much about Pennell. He was working at Bannu entirely at his own expense. He was one of the most distinguished medical students of his year, a gold medallist of London University in science, in surgery, in medicine, and he had come to Bannu, accompanied by his mother, an old lady of great learning and character. He was her only child, and she had accompanied him to India when he first came out. Elderly English ladies in that country are "like angelvisits, few and far between," and the few that are in the country usually live in some pleasant hill station. Mrs Pennell, I believe, never left the Frontier once from the time she arrived there with her son till her death, a period of some sixteen years. His attention and devotion to her was one of the many remarkable traits in his character.

The courage of the man, too, was beginning to attract attention in a country where physical bravery is no uncommon virtue. To give one instance, I was told that he had gone alone and unarmed into a mountain village at night to rescue one of his adherents. This lad had become a Christian, to the wrath of his relatives; but as the man was of full age they could not legally remove him from the doctor's influence, though they tried "peaceful persuasion" to the fullest ex

tent in their power. Unsuccessful in this, they managed to force him one afternoon to come out with them, and hurried him off to their mountain home some miles away. The doctor came in late in the evening to find the lad had disappeared. Knowing that if he once allowed him to go, the result would be either death or recantation, the doctor started at once on his bicycle in the direction of the lad's home, in the hope that he might overtake the party, and, if possible, recall the young man. But night came on, and the doctor had to leave his bicycle and take to devious mountain tracks. Long after midnight he reached the village; it was a hot, moonlight night, and he could see three sheeted forms asleep near one of the houses, in the open air. He gently wakened the centre sleeper, who turned out to be the lad he was seeking, and the two quietly returned to Bannu. But if he had awakened the wrong man, or if either of the others, who were sleeping the sleep of the weary, had been disturbed, Pennell's life would not have been worth a minute's purchase, and he knew it.

I had often to go to Bannu after this on duty, and I saw the doctor frequently. I accepted his invitation to see the hospital. One must not imagine a splendid palace, such as many of our European hospitals are, with spotless wards, polished floors, snowy sheets, and admirable nurses. The buildings were simply rows of plain - built mud- walled