“NEITHER drunk nor sunstruck,” said Dravot. “We have slept over the notion half a year, and require to see Books and Atlases, and we have decided that there is only one place now in the world that two strong men can Sar-a-whack.* They call it Kafiristan.* By my reckoning it’s the top right-hand corner of Afghanistan, not more than three hundred miles from Peshawur.* They have two and thirty heathen idols there, and we’ll be the thirty-third. It’s a mountaineous* country, and the women of those parts are very beautiful.”
“But that is provided against in the Contrack,” said Carnehan. “Neither Women nor Liquor, Daniel.”
“And that’s all we know, except that no one has gone there, and they fight, and in any place where they fight a man who knows how to drill men can always be a King. We shall go to those parts and say to any King we find — ‘D’you want to vanquish your foes?’ and we will show him how to drill men; for that we know better than anything else. Then we will subvert that King and seize his Throne and establish a Dy-nasty.”
* Dan has made a verb out of Sarawak, a region of Borneo Island, which he uses to mean ‘do what Sir James Brooke did’. In 1842, Sultan Omar Ali Saifuddien II ceded complete sovereignty of Sarawak to James Brooke (1803–1868), a former soldier in the East India Company’s militia and now a merchant adventurer in the Far East. Brooke was granted the title of Rajah of Sarawak in 1841 (formally proclaimed the following year) and remained in power until his death in 1868. Peachey and Dan dreamt of emulating Sir James’s extraordinary career as a ‘white rajah’.
* A real place in northwest Afghanistan, more or less where Nuristan Province now lies. Historically pagan, it was converted to Islam at the point of a sword in 1896, eight years after this story was written. Peachey and Dan’s proposed kingdom is remote and ‘mountaineous’, dry and rocky but relieved by green valleys and thickly forested slopes. Today’s ‘men who would be king’ in Afghanistan have found the land as difficult to subdue as did Peachey and Dan — “poor, poor Dan, that would never take advice” — and it remains largely under strict Islamic control by the Taliban.
* Peshawar lies in what is now Pakistan, and at that time was British India. It is Pakistan’s oldest and sixth-largest city. The northeast corner of Afghanistan’s Nuristan Province lies about 120 miles to the north of Peshawar — Dan admitted that his estimate of three hundred miles was generous. Dan and Peachey planned to go to Peshawar disguised as a priest and his servant, and then join a caravan bound for Kabul. They turned off at the difficult and dangerous Lataband Pass and set out northeast for Jalalabad, and beyond it Kafiristan.
* Dan mispronounces ‘mountainous’.
Précis
Danny and Peachey assure their host that they are quite sane and sober: indeed, they have a binding contract to touch neither liquor nor women, but to go to Kafiristan in northeast Afghanistan, and there use their drill-sergeant’s skills to win the confidence of local tribal leaders before they overthrow them, and create their own dynasty instead. (57 / 60 words)
Danny and Peachey assure their host that they are quite sane and sober: indeed, they have a binding contract to touch neither liquor nor women, but to go to Kafiristan in northeast Afghanistan, and there use their drill-sergeant’s skills to win the confidence of local tribal leaders before they overthrow them, and create their own dynasty instead.
Variations: 1.increase the length of this precis to exactly 60 words. 2.reduce the length of this precis to exactly 50 words. 3.introduce one of the following words into the precis: about, although, because, despite, if, not, otherwise, whereas.
Archive
Word Games
Jigsaws Based on this passage
Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.
Spinners Find in Think and Speak
For each group of words, compose a sentence that uses all three. You can use any form of the word: for example, cat → cats, go → went, or quick → quickly, though neigh → neighbour is stretching it a bit.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 Going. Have. Look.
2 But. Find. Too.
3 Therefore. Top. Touch.
Variations: 1. include direct and indirect speech 2. include one or more of these words: although, because, despite, either/or, if, unless, until, when, whether, which, who 3. use negatives (not, isn’t, neither/nor, never, nobody etc.)
Homophones Find in Think and Speak
In each group below, you will find words that sound the same, but differ in spelling and also in meaning. Compose your own sentences to bring out the differences between them.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
Add Vowels Find in Think and Speak
Make words by adding vowels to each group of consonants below. You may add as many vowels as you like before, between or after the consonants, but you may not add any consonants or change the order of those you have been given. See if you can beat our target of common words.
mntns (6+2)
maintains. mentions. monotonous. mountainous. mountains. munitions.
emanations. monotones.
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