Before the Vakeel quitted Simla he had to listen to a
truculent address from Lord Lytton, in the course of which Shere Ali's
position was genially likened to that of 'an earthen pipkin between two
iron pots.' Before Sir Lewis Pelly and the Ameer's representative met at
Peshawur in January 1877, Shere Ali had not unnaturally been perturbed by
the permanent occupation of Quetta, on the southern verge of his
dominions, as indicating, along with other military dispositions, an
intended invasion. The Peshawur conference, which from the first had
little promise, dragged on unsatisfactorily until terminated by the death
of the Ameer's representative, whereupon Sir Lewis Pelly was recalled by
Lord Lytton, notwithstanding the latter's cognisance that Shere Ali was
despatching to Peshawur a fresh Envoy authorised to assent to all the
British demands. The justification advanced by Lord Lytton for this
procedure was the discovery purported to have been made by Sir Lewis
Pelly that the Ameer was intriguing with General Kaufmann at Tashkend.
Since Shere Ali was an independent monarch, it was no crime on his part
to enter into negotiations with another power than Great Britain,
although if the worried and distracted man did so the charge of folly may
be laid to him, since the Russians were pretty certain to betray him
after having made a cat's-paw of him, and since in applying to them he
involved himself in the risk of hostile action on the part of the
British.
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