Curious, too, was the information about the relations of Hunza with the Celestial Empire. Hunza people have for a long time back occupied valleys like that of the Oprang stream draining into the Yarkand' River ; and their continued occupation of these tracts, ' which plainly fall within the natural boundaries of Chinese Turkestan, is probably the reason why the further periodical transmission of presents to the Kashgar authorities has been acquiesced in even after the enforcement of British sovereign rights. On the other hand Hunza enjoys the benefit of Chinese return " presents" considerably in excess of those sent, an arrangement manifestly representing the blackmail which the Chinese had to pay to safeguard their territory between Sarikol and the Karakorum from Kanjuti raiding. On my enquiring after records of the relations with the Chinese authorities, the Wazir informed me that a quantity of documents, mostly Chinese, with Persian or Turki translations, had been removed from the Mir's residence at Baltit to Simla, after the occupation in 1891. It would be interesting to ascertain from these or from the Chinese archives, what official status was accorded by Chinese diplomacy to the Kanjuti chiefs.
Though British supremacy in Hunza, very different from Chinese fictions, is a thing of manifest reality, it is maintained without material force. The little fort built in the open fields of Aliabad is now mainly used as a commissariat " Godown," and guarded only by a few local levies raised among the neighbouring villagers. Yet these levies, of whom there are about one hundred and eighty in the state, proved useful during the Chitral campaign. As elsewhere along the North-West border, these local militia supply an excellent instrument for the political management of their own territory. Regular pay and easy service are effective in attaching them to the ruling order of things. The additional advantage which levies on the Afghan border offer for the safe employment of notoriously bad characters that would
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