§ MR. ASHMEAD-BARTLETTasked the Secretary of State for India, Whether it is true that an immediate evacuation of Kabul has been ordered; and, if so, what steps have been taken by Her Majesty's Government to secure Northern Afghanistan from anarchy and ruin, and to protect those Afghans who have favoured the British cause?
THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON, in reply, said, he had stated on Monday last, as fully as he was able, the general drift of the instructions which had been given to Lord Ripon on the subject of Afghanistan and the termination of the war there. Lord Ripon would, no doubt, lose no time in acting as far as possible on those instructions; but he had received no communication on the matter from him since his arrival at Simla. He had not, he might add, heard anything to confirm the statement which had appeared in some newspapers the day before, to the effect that the immediate evacuation or the evacuation by a certain day of Cabul had been ordered, and he did not think it likely that any order of the sort had been given irrespective of the progress of events or the position of affairs at the time.