On the morning of Tuesday, 19 December, two days after this unwelcome news had reached Kabul, Burnes and his assistants were looking out of their Bala Hisar residence, waiting for a messenger to bring in the latest despatches from India. Burnes had been hoping that Auckland would change his position on Afghanistan after he had read his long report, and he desperately wanted to be able to give Dost Mohammad some good news. The influence of his enemy, the newly arrived Persian envoy, was growing daily stronger since the news of the encirclement of Herat, and he knew he badly needed to boost
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