ABSTRACT
Sir Alexander Burnes joined the East India Company Army at Bombay at the age of sixteen. He rapidly made a name for himself as a talented and ambitious officer, fluent in Persian and Hindustani and with an aptitude for exploration. An account of his successful mission to Lahore is presented in the excerpt from volume III. It was appended to the main body of his travel narrative, namely his subsequent journey to Bokhara and Persia via Afghanistan from 1831 to 1832. Burnes' account of his travels was published by John Murray in 1834 and became an immediate bestseller, selling 900 copies on the first day of its appearance in print. M. Court, as well as his brother officers, were formerly in the service of one of the Persian Princes, and travelled to India as a native, which gave him an opportunity of acquiring the best information regarding the intervening countries.
