Macnaghten might avow himself convinced of the popularity of the Shah,
and believe or strive to believe that the Afghans had received the puppet
king `with feelings nearly amounting to adoration,' but he did not
venture to support the conviction he avowed by advocating that the Shah
should be abandoned to his adoring subjects. Lord Auckland's policy was
gravely and radically erroneous, but it had a definite object, and that
object certainly was not a futile march to Cabul and back, dropping
incidentally by the wayside the aspirant to a throne whom he had himself
put forward, and leaving him to take his chance among a truculent and
adverse population. Thus early, in all probability, Lord Auckland was
disillusioned of the expectation that the effective restoration of Shah
Soojah would be of light and easy accomplishment, but at least he could
not afford to have the enterprise a _coup manque_ when as yet it was
little beyond its inception.
The cost of the expedition was already, however, a strain, and the troops
engaged in it were needed in India. Lord Auckland intimated to Macnaghten
his expectation that a strong brigade would suffice to hold Afghanistan
in conjunction with the Shah's contingent, and his desire that the rest
of the army of the Indus should at once return to India. Macnaghten, on
the other hand, in spite of his avowal of the Shah's popularity, was
anxious to retain in Afghanistan a large body of troops.
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