As for my plans, I'm thinking of coming home for a couple of months towards the end of July, so as to have two peaceful months at Rounton. If I drop into the end of a London season, I rush about so and it's not very restful. So barring accidents, that is what is in my mind...
In the evening we were mainly engaged in canvassing the merits of a little black and white puppy which Col. Prescott had offered me. She ought to have been a spaniel but she has got mixed up with an Airedale and has the oddest little ugly pathetic face and very apologetic manners. I've got her so far on appro. She is singularly intelligent and already has a passion for me. The servants all call her Peter so I've called her Petra — my poor Peter!
We have been having odd weather — violent dust storms at the end of last week and on Sunday night a terrific thunderstorm and heavy rain which sent the temperature down with a bump. Very nice that was. J.M. and I had got permission from the AN.M. to go up to Kirkuk by air mail in order to see a little excavation which is being done there under the auspices of the Museum. We went yesterday morning and came back this morning — two and a half hours up and two hours down, with a following wind. I like flying. The only 'contretemps' was that they forgot to put my little valise into the plane and I arrived with nothing. However, my hostess, Mrs. Miller (Capt. Miller is Administrative Inspector) lent me brushes and combs and things, and once you have made up your mind that you have no luggage, it is rather an exhilarating feeling.
We got in about 10:30, saw some things in the town that we wanted to see and after lunch went out to the dig which is being very well done by a certain Dr. Chiera, an Italian professor of Assyriology at an American University. It's a villa, a house belonging to some wealthy private person who lived about 800 B.C. Chiera has found masses of tablets from which we hope that we shall ultimately piece together the story of the family. It's a comfortable house with a bathroom, hot and cold water laid on, so to speak (we found and traced the drain while we were there), nice big reception rooms, a paved court and all you could wish. It was very interesting and the country round Kirkuk looked so agreeable with scarlet ranunculus on the edges of the green barley fields. It was delightfully cold too...
The King has asked me to go out to his farm near Khanaqin for a couple of days during the holidays at the end of Ramadhan. They begin on Friday or Saturday but as H.M. wants to leave on Friday afternoon I expect they will continue to see the new moon on Thursday. I shall go, I think; a couple of days out of doors would be good and it doesn't look as if it would be too hot.
To H.B.
BAGDAD, April 29th, 1925.
We had some emotions as to the beginning of the Id. on Thursday night no one knew whether the moon had been seen nor whether there was an Id and a levee and a departure to the King's farm (for me) next day. At 11 p.m. the guns announced the Id, for they had managed to get the moon seen at sunset but it had taken the Qadhi all those hours to make sure that the witnesses had spoken true.
I hopped up at 6 to get Zaya and my baggage off to the station and at 8 behold me at the King's levee. I then in the course of an hour visited all the Ministers and the Naqib, went home and got into country clothes and at 10 was picked up by H.M. at the station near my house. We went up by trolley — the party was H.M., Naji Suwaidi, a Chamberlain and an A.D.C. The King's farm is a little to the N.W. of Khanaqin. We got to the nearest point to his tents at 2, having had an excellent lunch in the trolley, found horses waiting and rode up through the fields to the tents, about 20 minutes away. It was so heavenly to be riding through grass and flowers — gardens of purple salvia and blue borage and golden mullein, with scarlet ranunculus in between. After tea we went out for a walk through the crops, H.M. rejoicing over his splendid hemp and barley and wheat — they were splendid, I must say. And then we sat in the pleasant dark till dinner, after which we all went to bed. Zaya had arrived by this time and I had all my camp furniture in an enormous tent — unfortunately I shared it with innumerable sand flies. Petra had come with me; she enjoyed herself enormously and behaved not too badly for one so young. She is going to be a nice little dog...
We left after dinner, Iltyd, J.M. and I riding for half an hour to the station through black night on a path which played in and out of the irrigation canals. I had Petra on my saddle bow — she proved an excellent rider but it was fright rather than pleasure which kept her quiet I think. We succeeded in catching the train after missing our way several times and got safely to Bagdad next morning. It was a very nice Id.
Hilton Young has presented his report and gone. I read the report this morning. It's admirable. There are no miracles, just good sense — and helpful advice to both Governments, but if it is followed we ought to get on to our feet in a year or two...
To F.B.
BAGDAD, April 29th, 1925.
Your visit to Newtimber sounds delightful but it wasn't nicer than my visit to the King's farm last week...It was so delicious, grass and wild flowers everywhere; you can't think what that was like after the arid desert round Bagdad. The farm is just under the Persian hills with lovely views in all directions. On Saturday morning Iltyd Clayton arrived by train and on Sunday J. M Wilson, so we made a regular house- party. We walked and rode and motored, looked at all the crops, settled where the house is to be built (he is still in tents) and where the roads are to be made and we were very peaceful and happy. It is very delightful being with the King up there: he is a perfect host and he puts politics out of his head and becomes the country gentleman very contentedly. It is excellent for him that he should have a place of his own to go to and when the little house is built it will be even better. For though it is very pleasant to be in tents at this moment, in another week or so it will be too hot. Even to-day I had a fan in my office for the first time. We got back on Monday morning and were very sorry that it was over...
Now I must go up and see the Queen about her washing silk dresses. Those sent by Moll are a great success. I've written a long rambling letter to Father about the visit to the farm thinking it would beguile him on the ship and that's why this one to you is rather scrappy. I shall be glad when my parents are happily reunited! I daresay they will too.
To F.B.
BAGDAD, May 6th, 1925.
...Yes, I think clothes are frightful, or at least they offer vast opportunities for frightfulness...
To F.B.
BAGDAD, May 13th, 1925.
...There has been a nice, very young Guardsman here, Mr. Codrington. I have just been showing him some of the sights of the town...
To F.B.
BAGDAD, May 13th, 1925.
We have had a week of very disagreeable weather, not hot — not for us; it's rarely 100 — but south wind and cloud and heaviness and dust. It takes all the stiffening out of you. On Saturday night it suddenly became wonderful fresh for a few hours and we made the most of them by going out to the Karradah gardens and dining on Haji Naji's roof, Ken and Iltyd and Lionel and I. He gave us a very good dinner — roast fish and chicken and rice and all the different kinds of vegetables he grows on his farm, and fruit. After dinner we lay on his cushioned benches under the moon and talked to one another while Haji Naji and a friend bubbled with narghilehs...
To F.B.
BAGDAD, May 20th, 1925.
The chief news this week is that which you already know, namely that the Council of the League will not receive the report of the Frontier Commission till the Autumn session...
Last night just as night fell we were enveloped in a raging dust storm; the subsequent night was disgusting, the wind so hot that one couldn't sleep out of doors and the house so stuffy that one could scarcely sleep inside. Weather of this kind cannot be described; it must be experienced.
So far as heat goes, it has not been bad — only once over 100 I think- but south wind and dust storms have been unusually frequent and they take the stiffening out of you more than heat...
I'm not writing to father this week. It is a comfort he is coming nearer. Australia is dreadfully far awa
y isn't it. Thank heaven, I hear that Cook is opening an office here so that I shall no longer be the sole agent for tourists...
To H.B.
BAGDAD, June 10th, 1925.
We are in the thick of elections and so far the results are more than reasonably good. The electors choosing decent, solid men. I don't think the House will meet till the autumn; the budget is not ready and cannot be prepared until a decision on the Hilton Young report has been taken by both governments, so there's nothing for it to meet about...
Now I'm going to swim. Petra is a great swimming dog and loves it. She is a clever little thing but not as nice as Peter. Are you glad to be home and to see so many of your family?
You didn't say whether you saw Elsa in Ceylon this time.
To H.B.
BAGDAD, June 17th, 1925.
...On Monday the Queen asked me to come and take a stroll on the bank opposite the palace. I arrived about 5:15 and we spent half an hour in desultory talk. Then I suggested that we should cross over the river, but their launch was out of order so at 6 I insisted on going over in a boat. Mme. Jaudat, the Mistress of the Ceremonies had meantime arrived with her little boy, and we all went over, the two girls, Ghazi, Miss Fairley, H.M. and I. On the other bank I found that leisurely preparations for a large meal were going on, including a pile of fish waiting to be roasted ...and finally about 7 a sort of high tea was ready, sandwiches and roast fish and cakes. And as it was a very pleasantly cool evening it was agreeable to sit there and eat...
To H.B.
BAGDAD, June 24th, 1925.
It was very nice to get your letter home of June 11th and Mother's of June 10th in which she says she is suffering so from the heat. I know what will happen — by the time I get home it will be icy and will remain so for the two months of my leave. And probably rain all the time. However perhaps that will be a pleasant change.
I was cut to the heart about Anthony. [Brig. Gen. Hon. Anthony Henley, who had died suddenly in Roumania.] I hope you will give me some news of Sylvia.
An interesting man came to see me on Monday, one Pernot. He is editor of the Revue des Deux Mondes and is making an exhaustive enquiry for it and for the Débats into the state of Moslem feeling towards the West ...
Politically we are in full crisis ...On the whole the country is all in favour of stability. It's a pity that here as elsewhere the economic stringency presses ...so greatly. Trade is at a low ebb and a bad harvest has made things especially difficult.
Goodbye, dearest. There's a despatch waiting to be written for Sir Henry.
[Gertrude came on leave this year and arrived in London on July 17th. She was in a condition of great nervous fatigue, and appeared exhausted mentally and physically. Sir Thomas Parkinson, M.D., our old and valued friend as well as our doctor said that she was in a condition which required a great deal of care and that she ought not to return to the climate of Bagdad. Dr. Thomas Body, M.D., of Middlesbrough who saw her when she went north took the same view. On Gertrude's way through London she saw Mrs. W. L. Courtney, who came to dine one night at 95 Sloane Street with her and her father. She had a few minutes private talk with Mrs. Courtney and asked her to suggest something that she could do if she remained in England. Mrs. Courtney wrote a few days later suggesting that Gertrude should stand for Parliament. The following letter is the reply.]
To Mrs. W. L. COURTNEY.
ROUNTON GRANGE, NORTHALLERTON, Aug. 4
YOU DEAR AND BELOVED JANET.
No, I'm afraid you will never see me in the House. I have an invincible hatred of that kind of politics and if you knew how little I should be fitted for it you would not give it another thought — though it is delightful of you, all the same, to think of it. I have not, and I have never had the quickness of thought and speech which could fit the clash of parliament. I can do my own job in a way and explain why I think that the right way of doing it, but I don't cover a wide enough field and my natural desire is to slip back into the comfortable arena of archaeology and history and to take only an onlooker's interest in the contest over actual affairs. I know I could not enter the lists, apart from the fact that it would make me supremely miserable.
I shall hope to see you in London before I leave — that will be about the end of September. For I think I must certainly go back for this winter, though I privately very much doubt whether it won't be the last.
Goodbye, my dear, and don't forget that I'm ever your very affectionate Gertrude.
[Gertrude came to Rounton, for a while, much enjoying her own gardens, and grew gradually better there. She then went to stay in Scotland with Mr. and Mrs. Lionel Dugdale at their shooting box, where the affectionate solicitude with which they surrounded her went far to complete her cure.
We all felt after this last visit of Gertrude to England that she had never seemed more glad to be with us all, never more affectionate and delightful to all her Yorkshire surroundings. It was a solace to her when the time came for her return to Bagdad at the beginning of October to have the company of her cousin Sylvia (Hon. Mrs. Anthony Henley) for whom she cared very much.]
To F.D. October 2nd, 1925.
...You must think of us as very happy together — I can't be too glad that I've got Sylvia. She is an enchanting traveling companion. I read the Great Pandolfo in the train yesterday and began Black Oxen — both very good...
To H.B.
Monday. Oct. 5th, 1925.
...Sylvia's delight in everything has been such an added zest — she has never been on a sea voyage before and her interest culminated when Captain S. took us on to the bridge last night and showed us the stars through a sextant...
To H.B.
HAIFA, October 9th, 1925.
Here we are nearly at the end of a rather tiresome slow journey which would have been more than tiresome if it had not been for Sylvia's delight in all the places we touched at...
[They go on shore at Jaffa].
... We went on shore after breakfast and drove out to the new Jewish suburb, the inhabitants of which subsist I understand on taking in one another's washing. It looked a poorish place — on the outskirts gaunt new houses were being run up on the sand. These are let out room by room, at exorbitant rates, to Jewish immigrants. Gladly we drove back to Jaffa which is however, also submerged by Jews. At last we got out of them to a delightful little Palestinian hotel by the sea at the extreme southern end of the town — is to the north. We lunched happily on a balcony and on our way back walked through the old Arab town, a tiny medieval place with narrow streets, half arched over, climbing up and down a hill. It was the first really Eastern place which Sylvia had seen and she loved it. So did I. That night we played bridge with a brother and sister called Kennedy — he is in Posts and Telegraphs here. Before parting we arranged to meet on shore at 3 p.m. to-day so that he should take us in his car on to Mount Carmel. Accordingly we stayed on board till after lunch, but when we proposed to go on shore we found that we had not got the necessary documents for landing, the Customs Officer having disappeared before we were up. The policeman left in charge doggedly refused to allow our boat to put off — we were a long way from the shore. However, I cajoled the Arab boatmen and they took us away under the very eyes of the indignant policeman. On the pier we met the Kennedys and between us persuaded the English Customs House man to give us our permits and forgive our boatmen. We had a delightful drive on Carmel and from the top saw the heights of Gilead, across Jordan. On the way back we stopped at the Monastery and at that moment a Carmelite monk came out of the door. "That's Father Lamb," said Mr. Kennedy, "the Father-Superior." With that I went boldly up and said who I was — of course he had heard of me from the Carmelites at Bagdad. Our success was complete when Sylvia announced herself to be the niece of Monsignor Algernon [Stanley]. Nothing would satisfy Father Lamb but to take us all about himself, into Elijah's cave, into the garden (where Sylvia made him pose for a picture with the monastery behind him) and finally up to the guest rooms to give us a glass of Carmel liqueur. We p
arted in warm friendship and the Kennedys drove us back to the port where we found our boatmen waiting...
[They finally land at Beyrout].
BEYROUT, Oct. 10th. 1925.
The French C.G.S., Commandant Deutz, has telephone to ask if he may come and see me. I met him at Bagdad, a very intelligent, liberal-minded man. ...
We went to the American College — exquisite place. The Dodges were out, but I introduced myself to one of the professors and we ran to ground Sabah son of Nuri Pasha, who rushed to greet me as soon as he saw me and asked me to take a letter to his father. While I was waiting for the letter to be written Sylvia went to see the hospital. Several other Iraq boys came and greeted me — one the nephew of the Naqib. They all came over ten days ago and the road is quite safe.
Then we went to the Museum where I sent in my card to the Director. He came and showed us over and opened for us the safe which contains the famous golden treasure of Byblos — about 1300 B.C. Most interesting, but what interested me more were the sarcophagi with Phoenician inscriptions said to date from the 4th millennium B.C. That's as early as our earliest inscriptions from Ur...
Oh it's fun to be me when one gets to Asia — there's no doubt of it...
... Got to Bagdad at 1:30, in thick winter clothes with a temperature of 90. S. went straight off to the Residency and I home where I was greeted rapturously by my servants. Marie performed prodigies of unpacking and by one o'clock I had had a bath and got into a cotton gown...
This is very much potted news I have no time for more except to say that the Iraq and its government are being models of orderliness and wisdom and that Sir H. still hopes to get home on leave at Xmas.
To H.B.
BAGDAD, October 14th, 1925.
It has been so wonderful coming back here. For the first two days I could not do any work at all in the office, because of the uninterrupted streams of people who came to see me. "Light of our eyes," they said, "Light of our eyes," as they kissed my hands and made almost absurd demonstrations of delight and affection. It goes a little to the head, you know — I almost began to think I were a Person.
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