Shuja expected to be congratulated by the poet. But the grey-bearded Shaikh merely smiled and said ‘With untrained troops like yours, who mostly haven’t learned how to un-sheath their swords or handle a shield properly, who have never seen the face of war close-up on a modern battlefield, where human bodies scatter and shatter and fall with their livers blown out, you intend to confront the most experienced and disciplined army this country has ever seen? You ask my advice? I tell you it is a shameful folly, and it is hopeless to expect victory. The Firangis are past-masters at strategy … only
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