“From opposite Torbela on the Indus, and from the boundary of our border on the right bank,” says Oliver, “the Gadun country extends right up to the crest of the Mahaban Mountain, or rather that cluster of peaks and ranges which, rising 7000 feet from the Indus, extend back as a great spur of the Morah or Ilum. A thoroughly classic ground; ‘the Great Forest’ of the early Aryans; the ‘Sinai’ of Sanskrit, where Arjuna wrestled with God, and, like the Jewish Jacob, though defeated, still won his irresistible weapon, ground that, if not identical with Alexander’s Aornos, is probably not very distant, that was famous for its numerous monasteries (Mahawana) when Hwen Tsang visited it in 630 A.D., and is studded with ruins to this day.”
The tribe has three clans—the Salar, Mansur and Hassazai—of which the last is unrepresented among the trans-frontier Gaduns, while the other two are continually at feud. The trans-frontier clans contain about 2000 fighting men; they do not enlist freely nor are they much in request, being considered to be of smaller fighting value than other Pathans. The trans-Indus Gaduns are bounded on the east by the Utmanzais, on the north by the Amazais, on the west by the Khudu Khels, and on the south by British territory. The tribesmen are all cultivators or cattle-owners. They can be coerced by blockade or by means of an expedition, and their country could be overrun without other tribes being molested or too closely approached.
_The Hindustani Fanatics._[24]—Something has already been mentioned about the colonies of religious adventurers which are found among the hills and valleys of this part of the border; and a more detailed description must now be given of the particular colony or colonies of Hindustani fanatics, who have been responsible for, and have taken so prominent a part in, most of the operations in which British troops have here been engaged.
It was in the year 1823 that one Saiyid Ahmad Shah, of Bareilly, a religious adventurer, made his appearance on the Yusafzai frontier. He had been at one time a friend of the notorious Amir Khan Pindari—himself a Pathan born in Buner, who had fled before James Skinner and his “Yellow Boys” from Bhurtpore to the Himalayas. Saiyid Ahmad studied Arabic at Delhi, and made a pilgrimage to Mecca via Calcutta, and it was at this time that his doctrines gave him an influence over Bengali Muhammadans, which led them thenceforth to supply with recruits the colony which he founded. His doctrines at that time, whatever they may have become thereafter, were those of the Wahabi sect, and inculcated the original tenets of Islam, repudiating commentaries on the Koran and the adoration of relics. In 1823 then he appeared upon the Yusafzai border of the Peshawar district with some forty Hindustani followers, having arrived there by way of Kandahar and Kabul.