Sher Alí came to India with five distinct objects in view. He desired, in the first place, a treaty. In the second place, he hoped for a fixed annual subsidy. In the third place, for assistance in arms or in men, to be given 'not when the British Government might think fit to grant, but when he might think it needful to solicit it.' In the fourth place, for a well-defined engagement, 'laying the British Government under an obligation to support the Afghán Government in any emergency; and not only that Government generally, but that Government as vested in himself and his direct descendants, and in no others.'[1] Finally, he cherished a desire that he might obtain some constructive act of recognition by the British Government in favour of his younger son, Abdullá Ján, whom he brought with him, and whom he wished to make his heir, to the exclusion of his elder son, Yákub Khán, who had helped him to win the throne.
[Footnote 1: Minute in Council, by the Hon. Sir John Strachey, G.C.S.I., sometime acting Governor-General, dated 30th April, 1872.]
{ 126} In not one of these objects was the Amír successful. The first four were distinctly negatived; the fifth was not, I believe, even permitted to enter into the discussions. Lord Mayo adhered to a programme which he had deliberately put in writing before he left Calcutta. Yet, by tact and by conciliatory firmness, he sent the Amír away satisfied, and deeply impressed with the advantage of being on good terms with the British Power. 'We have distinctly intimated to the Amír,' he wrote, 'that under no circumstances shall a British soldier cross his frontier to assist him in coercing his rebellious subjects. That no fixed subsidy or money allowance will be given for any named period. That no promise of assistance in other ways will be made. That no treaty will be entered into, obliging us under every circumstance to recognise him and his descendants as rulers of Afghánistán. Yet that, by the most open and absolute present recognition, and by every public evidence of friendly disposition, of respect for his character, and interest in his fortunes, we are prepared to give him all the moral support in our power; and that, in addition, we are willing to assist him with money, arms, ammunition, Native artificers, and in other ways, whenever we deem it desirable so to do.'