THE SOLEMN PALMS WERE RANGED ABOVE.".... THE SOLEMN PALMS WERE RANGED ABOVE, UNWOO'D OF SUMMER WIND."—Recollections of the Arabian Nights.
Now I do not expect the readers of some previous notes of my sketching escapades[1]to believe this. It isalmost too wonderful that a chronicler of travels in desperate need of some comic relief to save his book from dulness would be so lucky as to pick up such excellent copy as Brown, without previous intrigue. Nevertheless I do solemnly state that I had not the slightest idea where Brown was doing his bit in the war. I had last heard of him in France in the Naval Division. That we should both have travelled half across the world to meet with a crash in a backwater at Basra was one of the strangest freaks of fortune I have come across.
My two pirates were poling along quite merrily when we took a right angle turn in fine style. It is evident that the low foliage had hidden the side channel into which we shot, and they had not seen what became evident too late, a motor-boat at right angles across the creek, apparently stuck fast.
I had just time to observe two naval officers and the native coxswain struggling with poles to turn the boat round, or free it from its unserviceable position with regard to the bank when the prow of my bellam took a flying leap over the motor-boat, precipitating my two boatmen into the water, and sending me by means of a somersault into the launch. Somewhat stunned I lay gazing up at a piece of blue sky in which I could discern the green leaves of palm trees.
When in the midst of this blue dome above I beheld Brown perched on the top of a palm tree exhibiting with a look of blank astonishment on his face, waving an arm as ifin a kind of bewildered greeting, I gave up the struggle for existence and became resigned to my fate. Without doubt Brown, whom I had last heard of in France, had been killed and was now doing his best to welcome me into a happier and better world.
It would be quite like Brown to try and outdo the ordinarily accepted symbolism of bearing a palm branch by attempting to wave a whole palm tree, for this he seemed most undoubtedly to be doing, embracing its trunk and swaying from side to side.
Subsequently, when things had sorted themselves out in my mind, and when I found I was still in the land of the living I realized that he was attempting to descend to earth. He was no less astonished than I.
After baling out the bellam and restoring order in the launch we found that the casualties were nil, and proceeded to compare notes. Brown, it appeared, had joined the Naval Division, been to Antwerp, Gallipoli and France, and then been transferred for gunnery duties to the rivers of Mesopotamia, and was now Lieut. R.N.V.R. in theDalhousiestationed at Basra. His occupation, when I came across him in this unexpected way, was that of a leader of an expedition in a motor-boat with two R.N. victims to find a new route to somewhere or other which could not possibly be approached by water.
His enthusiasm had been so infectious that he had persuaded these gallant and guileless officers to go with him, and was, at the moment of my arrival, attempting toget a better geographical idea of the surrounding country by climbing a palm tree and shouting directions to the unfortunate occupants of the boat below, who were hopelessly stuck. The sudden impact of the bellam, uncomfortable as it was for all concerned, succeeded where they had failed, in getting them off the mud.
THE HOUSE OF SINBAD THE SAILOR, BASRA.THE HOUSE OF SINBAD THE SAILOR, BASRA
An old-world touch is given to the waters of Basra by the high-sterned dhows anchored in the river. Above Ashar Creek the scenery of the banks with its wharves and big steamers is not particularly characteristic of the East. Some of it might be by the Thames at Tilbury Docks. But by Khora Creek and in the lower reaches of the river at Basra, these old-world ships, with their quaint lines and steep, naked masts, are more in keeping with our recollections of Sinbad the Sailor, or perhaps of the days of the Merchant Venturers of our own Elizabethan days.
It is to be supposed that the type of ship that has survived in the East to the present day, like the mahaila and the goufa, is very much unchanged like everything else, and tells us faithfully what sort of ships there were in these waters some two thousand years ago or more. If this surmise be a correct one, then we can trace the poop tower of theGreat Harryand the square windows and super-imposed galleries of theVictory'sstern to this common ancestor. I wish I had been able to get an elevation of the details of one of these more ornate sterns. It would be interesting to compare the work with that in the ships of the Middle Ages and see if there is a definitedevelopment of type from East to West via the Mediterranean.
We passed down Ashar Creek just after sunset, and the house of Sinbad, with its picturesque surroundings, thoroughly looked the part. The tower of the mosque stood out against a lemon-coloured sky, and wandering wisps of purple smoke curled up from countless hearths.
Some giant mahailas, nearly obliterated the crooked little galleries that overlook the creek, and a few boats glided silently down towards the open river. Lights began to appear and stars studded the darkening sky. Faint sounds of chanting music floated across the water and all the world was still.
Dhows Basra.Dhows Basra
Monitor Moth at Basra.Monitor "Moth" at Basra.
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After a few days among the waterways of Mesopotamia one can get hardened against surprises. The most amazing and outrageous types of craft soon meet the eye as commonplaces of river life. Things that would make a Thames waterman sign the pledge proceed up and down without arousing any comment. Noah's ark, with its full complement, could ply for hire between Basra and Baghdad, and the lion's roaring wouldbe accepted as the necessary accompaniment of a somewhat old type of machinery resuscitated for the war.
I have seen boats jostling each other cheek by jowl that might have been taking part in a pageant entitled "Ships in All the Ages." There were Thornycroft motor-boats and Sennacharib goufas, mahailas and Thames steamboats, an oil-fuel gunboat and a stern paddler that could have come out of a woodcut of the first steamboat on the Clyde—and all these in the same reach. I travelled in this last extraordinary vessel for a short time. She was in charge of a sergeant of the Inland Water Transport, with an Indian pilot and miscellaneous crew, and my adventurous cruise called to mind both the travels of Ulysses and the Hunting of the Snark.
The sergeant could not speak Hindustani and the pilot could not speak a word of English. Mistakes of the most frantic nature were common, especially when we were being whirled round and round by the stream at a difficult corner. In the midst of controversy unrelieved by any glimmer of understanding on the part of anybody present we would slide gracefully into a state of rest on a mudbank or bump violently against the shore. Luckily, it seemed as easy to get off the mudbank as to get on it, and we finally got into positions we wanted to for making sketches of various points. The pantomimic violence of the sergeant, together with diagrams in my sketch-book, were ultimately successful.
A BEND IN THE NARROWS OF THE TIGRISA BEND IN "THE NARROWS" OF THE TIGRIS
Nearly all the Tigris steamers proceeding up river haveloaded lighters on each side of them. These act as fenders at the corners and take the bump whenever the bank is encountered. The progress is slow and there is often a good deal of waiting, for in the region between Ezra's tomb (above Kurna) and Amara there is not room for two steamers thus encumbered to pass with safety. These waters are known as the Narrows. Signal stations are placed at various intervals, and a signal is made to clear the way, generally for the down-river boat, the up-river craft, which, with the stream against them, will not have to turn round in stopping, tying up to the bank. This manœuvre is done in a few minutes. The steamer that is to stop runs alongside the bank and natives with stakes jump out and drive them into the marsh ground. She moors to these until the other vessel has passed downwards.
The sketch facingpage 30was done from a steamer bound up-river, which had tied up under these conditions. The paddler coming down has a lighter on each side of her as the one sketched onpage 38. She will come down toward the leading marks shown on the right-hand side of the picture, and then slide along the bank, using the lighter on the port side as a fender. Then she will leave the bank and shoot across to the other side of the river, taking the next turn with her starboard lighter.
This drawing will serve to show the general nature of most Mesopotamian river scenery, dead flat, with nothing or little to relieve the monotony, a great expanse of muddy waters and featureless dust, with just a suggestion in onedirection of a low line of blue—very faint. It tells of the far-away Persian mountains and of snow.
The great feature of the Narrows, however, and one which all our dwellers in Mesopotamia will remember vividly as long as they live, is the egg-sellers from the Marsh Arab villages on the banks. Although a steamer proceeding up-river may be kicking up a great fuss in the water and apparently thumping along at a great rate, it is, in reality, making only about four knots on the land. Consequently, when it sidles into the bank, with one of its lighters touching the marsh, the natives who are selling things can keep up, and a running—literally running—fire of bargaining is maintained between the ship's company and the Arabs.
They are all women who do the selling—weird figures in black carrying baskets of eggs and occasionally chicken. Gesticulating, shouting, shrieking, they rush along beside the up-going steamer and keep even with it. In the middle of a bargain the steamer may edge away until a great gulf is fixed between the bargainers. Sometimes it will slide along the other bank and a fresh company of yelling Amazons will try and open up negotiations for eggs while the frenzied and now almost demented sellers left behind rend their clothes and shout imprecations at their rivals. Another turn of the current, however, and the vessel again nears the shore of the original runners and the deal is finished.
The Sirens of the Narrows.The Sirens of the Narrows.
One girl kept up for miles and at last sold her basket of eggs. She got a very good price for them, but apparently she wanted her basket back again. The buyer insisted that the basket was included, and the seller shrieked frantically that it was not. She kept up with us for some miles, making imploring gestures, kneeling down with her arms outstretched as though she was begging for her life, and yelling at the top of her voice, tears streaming down her cheeks. The basket would be worth twopence or less and she had made many shillings on the deal. Finally, a soldier good-naturedly threw it to her and it fell in the water about three feet from the shore. She hurled herself upon it waist deep in the water and seized it, then waved her arms and leaped about in a dance of ecstatic triumph that would have made her fortune at the Hippodrome.
Another feature of the Narrows is the reed villages. This, of course, does not exclusively belong to this region, but it is here, when tied up to the bank, that the best opportunity of a close view is taken.
That houses can be built in practically no time and out of almost anything has been abundantly claimed at home by numerous enterprising firms by ocular demonstration at the Building Trades and Ideal Home Exhibitions. Cement guns and climbing scaffolding, we are assured, will raise crops of mansions at a prodigious pace, and the housing problem is all but solved. If we have not noticed many new houses it is not for want of inventors. Yet the best of these efforts is elaborately cumbersome compared with housing schemes on these flat lands borderingthe Tigris and Euphrates. Not only has the Marsh Arab evolved a style of dwelling that can be built in a night, but he can boast of a device still more alluring in its naivity and utility—thePortable Village!
A MARSH ARAB REED VILLAGEA MARSH ARAB REED VILLAGE
I once made a sketch of a Marsh Arabs' village at evening (reproduced facingpage 34), and on returning thither on the following morning to verify certain details, I found it had gone! I succeeded in tracking it down again by the afternoon, about ten miles from its former situation, and found the mayor (or whatever the Marsh-Mesopotamian equivalent may be) inspecting the finishing touches being made to the borough. Of course it is frightfully muddling, all this moving about of villages, to the stranger who is not keeping a sharp look-out and marking well such impromptu geographical activity.
Along the shores of the rivers of Mesopotamia and in the innumerable lagoons and backwaters that abound can be found large areas of tall reeds, ranging from quite slight rushes to canes twenty feet high. It is with such material the Marsh Arab builds. The long rods he bends into arches like croquet hoops. On this skeleton, not unlike the ribs of a boat turned upside down, he stretches large mats woven out of rushes. At the ends he builds up a straight wall of reed straw bound up in flat sheaves. An opening is left for an entrance, a mat, sometimes of coloured material, doing duty for a door.
So much for the principal and removable part of the village. However, the town planner will add to this byimprovising mud enclosures for animals, and an occasional wall and "tower." The mud is mixed with cut grass and reeds, quickly drying into a hard substance, and sufficiently permanent for anything that such a temporary village requires.
In the bright sunlight of the Mesopotamian plains, and probably also on account of their prominence at a distance over the flat land, some of these mud buildings look quite imposing. I remember once approaching a city with ramparts, towers, and formidable walls which, on close inspection, turned out to be a small mud enclosure of the most decrepit kind.
Great changes have been made in the rule of the waterways of Mesopotamia. Sinbad the Sailor has given place to Sinbad the Soldier, the Inland Water Transport.
We have learnt, as we were advised to do in regard to the things of Mesopotamia, to think amphibiously.
Noah's Ark, 1919.Noah's Ark, 1919.
Upward bound on the Tigris.Upward bound on the Tigris.
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The story of Mesopotamia is a story of irrigation. "It is not improbable," writes Sir William Willcocks, the great irrigationist, "that the wisdom of ancient Chaldea had its foundations in the necessity of a deep mastery of hydraulics and meteorology, to enable the ancient settlers to turn what was partially a desert and partially a swamp into fields of world-famed fertility." The civilizations of Babylon and Assyria owed their very life to the science of watering the land, and even in the later times of Haroun Alraschid their great systems had been well maintained. It is said of Maimûn, the sonand successor of this monarch, that he exclaimed, as he saw Egypt spread out before him, "Cursed be Pharaoh who said in his pride, 'Am I not Pharaoh, King of Egypt?' If he had seen Chaldea he would have said it with humility."
Allowing for a certain amount of patriotic exaggeration, the exclamation at least shows at what a high degree of excellence the irrigation system of Mesopotamia was maintained in the 10th centurya.d.Yet Mesopotamia is to-day a desert except for the regions in the immediate vicinity of the rivers. You can go westwards from Baghdad to the Euphrates, and every mile or so you will have to cross earthworks, not unlike irregular railway embankments, showing a vast system of irrigation channels both great and small. But there is not a drop of water near and not a tree and no sign of any life. How came the change and how can such a network of channels have ceased to work entirely?
The reason is to be found in some past neglect of the ancient dams that kept the water on a high level, so that it could flow by means of artificial canals at a greater height (and consequently at a slower rate) than the rivers themselves. The Tigris and Euphrates are rivers fed by the melting snow in the mountains of Armenia. The hotter the season and the more necessary a plentiful supply of water, the greater is the amount brought down. The rivers, however, when they reach the flat alluvial plain between the region round about Baghdad and the PersianGulf, when left to themselves are always bringing down a deposit and choking themselves up and then breaking out in a new direction, causing swamps and turning much of the land into useless marsh. Consequent also upon this silting-up process the banks of the rivers are higher than the surrounding country, and there is a gentle drop in the level of the land as it recedes from the river.
MUD HOUSES ON THE TIGRISMUD HOUSES ON THE TIGRIS
The object of the ancient irrigationists was to tap the rivers at the higher part of this plain, and then, by means of great canals, lead the water where they wanted it. Large reservoirs and lakes for storing surplus water were made, and thus the uneven delivery of water by the rivers was checked and a more regular and manageable supply maintained.
The greatest of these ancient channels was the Nahrwân. A regulator, the ruins which are still traceable in the bed of the Tigris, turned sufficient water into this high-level river at Dura. It stretched southwards for about 250 miles along the left bank of the Tigris. It was the neglect of this canal that led to a fearful catastrophe which must have been responsible for the death of millions; a catastrophe which turned some 20,000 square miles of fruitful land, teeming with populous cities, into a dismal swamp.
The intake from the Tigris of this and other canals evidently silted up, and thus enormous volumes of water, usually carried off by them in times of flood, helped to swell this river till, bursting its banks, it inundated thewhole country. The result remains to-day—a vast tract of swampy land, barren and almost useless, except to a few wandering tribes of Arabs.
And now the land which sent its Wise Men to the West is looking towards the West again for aid. If its ancient prosperity is to be restored, if Chaldea is again to be a granary to the world, it is to the West that it must turn. Science and machinery shall again make the waste places to be inhabited and the desert blossom as the rose. Thus shall the wise men return to them—the Wise Men of the West. In every important agricultural centre are to be found irrigation officers—the first-fruits of British occupation.
There was only one subject of conversation in Mesopotamia in the winter of 1918-1919, and that was the chances of getting back home. There was very little to do at Basra except watch steamers load up with the more fortunate candidates for demobilization and give them a send-off. Brown had no difficulty in getting three weeks' leave to accompany me in some of my expeditions to gather up such fragments as remained of naval subjects on the rivers. We determined on a voyage of discovery up the Euphrates in search of the famous "fly-boats" which had figured so vividly in the early days of naval river fighting, and which now were more or less peacefully employed. I had to make many sketches of them for further use, and succeeded in finding a whole "bag" at Dhibban.
A MAHAILA OF THE INLAND WATER TRANSPORTA MAHAILA OF THE INLAND WATER TRANSPORT
We embarked in an ancient-looking stern paddlernamedShushan. As we had to camp out in a somewhat rough-and-ready way, with not a little discomfort owing to a spell of very cold weather, Brown insisted on referring to her asShushan the Palace.
She had a tall funnel, like the tug in Turner'sFighting Témeraire,and kicked up a tremendous wash with her paddle, the whole effect being faintly reminiscent of a hay-making machine. She pushed her way along, slightly "down by the head," as if she had suddenly thought of something and was putting on a spurt to make up for lost time. I cannot lay hands on a sketch of her, but the one reproduced at the head of this chapter will give some idea of her character. Take away one funnel and place it amid-ships, reduce her tonnage a little, and you have theShushanto the life.
This gallant little curiosity is no late conscripted product of the war. She is one of the pukka ships of the Navy in Mesopotamia—one of the Old Contemptibles. Armed with a three-pounder which caused such havoc to her decks when fired that it is reported the ship had to be turned round after each round. Two shots in succession in the same direction would have wrecked the vessel.
A host of amusing stories of her exploits were told us by her C.O., who was an R.N.V.R. Lieutenant. Some practical joker produced a cylinder alleged to be in cuneiform writing. A translation of the inscription proved beyond doubt that theShushanwas used by Nebuchadnezzaras a royal yacht, and is the last surviving link with the Babylonian navy.
When the Turks had fled from Kurna and we were chasing them up the river with an amazing medley of craft, like a nightmare of Henley regatta suddenly mobilized, theShushanwas in the forefront of the battle. Led by the sloopsEspiègle,Clio, andOdin, the Stunt Armada came to Ezra's Tomb at twilight. The river was high and the land in between the great bends was a maze of rushes and lagoons. Hospital hulks like Noah's arks, little steamers, and loaded mahailas jostled each other in their endeavours to get up against the strong stream. The hulks and the barges were dropped at the bend shown in the sketch, facingpage 46, and theOdinanchored. We had captured already some Turkish barges, and prisoners had to be collected.
The rest pushed on. Across the bend, some two or three miles away, the Turkish gunboatMarmariswas putting on every ounce of fuel she had, and a mass of mahailas and tugs were doing their best to escape the Nemesis that awaited them. Then the sloops opened fire, and a desultory cannonade was kept up as it grew darker and darker. At last it was too dark to get any sort of aim, and firing ceased. TheMarmarishad been set alight by her crew, but we captured the whole of the enemy's flotilla.
EZRA'S TOMBEZRA'S TOMB
Ezra's Tomb is a splendid spot to look at. Mosquitoes at times makes it far from pleasant to live in. The blue-tiled dome surrounded by palms, one of which is bending down in a manner strange to such a straight-growing tree, is an oasis in a vast wilderness of nothing in particular.
The Euphrates from a scenic point of view might be described as more wooded than the Tigris. There are some delightful glimpses of waterside verdure and rush-covered shores. To the archæologist and the historian Mugheir is intensely interesting, for the great mound discloses the site of the ancient Ur—Ur of the Chaldees—from which Abraham set out towards Canaan.
Up till now, upon a map of the world in Abraham's time, the good littleShushanwould still be at sea. She would be approaching the coast at the mouth of the river Euphrates, the Tigris flowing-out some fifty miles further east. Dockyards and busy workshops would proclaim the vicinity of this capital, the greatest of all the cities of Chaldea.
Since these prosperous days the sea has receded about 150 miles, and left Ur a nondescript heap to be disputed over by professors.
At length, when we had said good-bye to theShushanand taken to a motor-boat, we arrived at Hillah, bent on finding the house of the irrigation officer. We landed on the wrong side of the river and rashly let the boat go back. Brown maintains now that this was my idea, but as a matter of fact it was one of his attempts at a picturesque approach—for my benefit. Brown has a vivid imagination, and sees so clearly in his mind how a placeoughtto be thathe really believes it is so. In this case he pictured us approaching Hillah and looking down upon miles and miles of fruitful gardens intersected with little waterways—a sort of landscape-garden Venice. This view could only be obtained from a high cliff, and as there was no cliff in lower Mesopotamia, except in Brown's imagination, it was natural that he would be disappointed.
A sudden white fog, moreover, took away any chance of a view of any kind, and we were soon hopelessly lost. Some soldiers we met on the way told us to keep straight on and then turn to the left by some palm trees. As we soon encountered some palm trees every few yards we wondered whether they intended to be humorous. I don't think they did, however. The optimism of you-can't-possibly-miss-it type is too general. The man who says "turn down by some trees" knows the place well, and can see certain trees in his mind's eye. He will turn when he sees the right trees, but you will probably get lost.
Needless to say, everything went wrong with our scheme of approaching the irrigation works from a picturesque angle. The dense fog thickened and shrouded the neighbourhood of the river in impenetrable mystery. We kept turning down by palm trees as directed, but to no purpose. We struck the river bank again after much wandering and kept to it, hoping the mist would clear. A man in a goufa appeared from nowhere and floated away out of sight into nowhere like a ghostly visitant from another world. The sun began to show through the fogand blue sky appeared overhead. Soon the steaming vapours dispersed, showing a view of buildings among palm trees and a bridge of boats.
Hillah.Hillah.
Here again we were held up while countless mahailas passed through, but we succeeded in getting over at last and eventually found the house of the Wise Men, the headquarters of the irrigation officers.
Had we been ambassadors on a diplomatic visit to Hillah, we could not have been more hospitably entertainedor given greater facilities for getting about in a most fascinating region of the world for any one who felt the glamour of history in this once highly civilized country.
Great buildings like Ctesiphon near Baghdad or traces of the vast irrigation works of the past are full of interest, but for romance and mystery there is no piece of the world more fraught with meaning than this site of the city of Nebuchadnezzar, nearly 200 square miles in extent, and now, but for the comparatively small tract of irrigated land, a desert.
"Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils."
Map of Persia
Ctesiphon.Ctesiphon.
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The irrigation officers at Hillah were ideal hosts, not only from the commonly accepted standpoint, but from that of an artist. They let me roam about and sketch whatIwanted, not whattheywanted. They gave me every means of transport, and such suggestions as they made as to possible subjects were excellent and offered with such tact that there was no difficulty in abstaining from sketching or going on with something else.
How often does the unfortunate painter suffer from the well-meaning host, who with an admiration for his calling,which is both extremely flattering and tremendously inconvenient, tries to do him well—especially if he dabbles a little in water-colour painting himself. An organized attack on all the real or supposed picturesque bits in the neighbourhood is planned and the members of his family outdo each other in praiseworthy endeavours to help on the great cause of Art. The campaign is prefaced by a violent discussion at G.H.Q. as to the best landscape within easy reach, and Millie, who has had lessons in pastelles, prevails over Mollie, who merely does pen painting. The wretched painter is then hauled triumphantly into a car surrounded by the artistic, who regard him with almost heathen veneration and feel thrilled by the fact that they, too, observe that the sky is blue and the trees are green. Arriving at the chosen scene and viewing it from the spot "from which they always take it," the unfortunate artist is stood or seated down, book in hand, complete with paintbox and water, and expected to begin.Hedoes not have any voice in the choosing of the view. It is high noon. The sun is right in front of him and everything is so hard that even Turner could make nothing of it. The worshippers at the shrine of art stand round in awed anticipation, waiting for the masterpiece.
It is useless for him to protest that the conditions are impossible. "After such kindness that would be a dismal thing to do." So he contrives to make some sort of a drawing which dims the lustre of his reputation in their eyes for many years to come.
ON THE EUPHRATES, EARLY MORNINGON THE EUPHRATES, EARLY MORNING
The major took us in his car to various points along the river and explained the means employed in irrigation. On the Euphrates there are two methods used for local irrigation apart from the system of canals flowing from the river. One is the water-wheel, a curious contrivance built out on stone piers. It consists of a huge paddle-wheel with buckets like those of a dredger, that fills a trough that runs down into the fields.
The other is a water-raising device that is worked by bullocks. A large leather skin is hauled up from the river by a rope over a wheel. This rope is harnessed to a bullock which walks backwards and forwards hauling up the water-skin and letting it down again. When the full skin reaches the top it hits against a bar and pours itself out into a trough. These two systems, as can be easily imagined, are good only for the land in the immediate vicinity of the river bank, as the supply of water is necessarily not large. Above Hit the frequency of the water-wheels with their stone piers causes so much obstruction that navigation for any large boats is impossible. In one place there are seven wheels abreast.
At last we arrived at an old bridge crossing one of the ancient canals, which branched off from the river in a westerly direction. I have sketched it onpage 57. It is extremely interesting as an example of the resuscitation of the old waterways of Babylonia. The banks of this channel here take almost a mountainous character for so flat a country. This piling up of mounds has been caused byclearing the silt from the entrance to the intake of the canal.
From the vantage point of this high ground we could see a goodly prospect, and on the one side the river, here called the Hindeyeh canal, with its green shore and on the other a belt of date palms and beyond the illimitable desert. Some five or six miles away there appeared a mound surmounted by a tower, a curious object alone in the great expanse of flat land.
"What is that thing," I asked, "that looks like a ruined castle on the Rhine?"
"The Tower of Babel," replied the major, "or rather that is its popular name. It is Birs Nimrûd on the map." Brown wanted to start straight away and "discover" it, but we persuaded him to assent to lunch first. The major was too busy for such an escapade, but he suggested lending us a Ford car which would do anything with the desert and which we could not break, so we returned to Hillah.
After lunch we set out on our expedition, Brown very silent and full, no doubt, of romantic projects, and arrived back again at the bridge where I made my sketch. It appears that the route was not direct as far as the car was concerned, owing to the crossing of some water channels, but that on foot we should be able to do it. I knew Brown was concocting something, and he soon let out what it was. His scheme was to send the car round to meet us at the Tower of Babel and we would walk. I think he rather liked the idea of saying "Tower of Babel" to the driverinstead of "home." I consented, rather against my better judgment, for I fear Brown's enthusiasm for dramatic settings. His pathetic belief that my next picture for the R.A. would be entitled "The Tower of Silence," and that I should achieve a masterpiece in depicting the blood-red ruin at sunset across the desert was somewhat disarming. He forgot in his enthusiasm that if the sundidset when we were in the required position we should be benighted on the plain without food or shelter, and not at all in the mood for painting pictures.
Ancient irrigation channel near Hillah.Ancient irrigation channel near Hillah.
Practical difficulties still existed, inasmuch as we were for a long time unable to explain to the native driver that he was to meet us at Birs Nimrûd, and feared, if we were not very explicit, he would return to Hillah and we might never be heard of again. Brown's pantomimic attempts at direction were obscure even to me, and I am sure the driver thought he had gone out of his mind. They consisted in his stooping down with his hand on the ground, then rising slowly, turning round and round, his hand describing a spiral curve, till it shot up straight over his head. Then he pointed to the car. There was evidently some implied connection between the spiral curve and the car. How long this would have gone on I do not know had I not tried the words "Birs Nimrûd." The driver understood this and I think we made it clear that whatever happened he was to be at Birs Nimrûd and wait for us. So we started off on foot.
BABYLON: THE EXCAVATIONS AT EL KASRBABYLON: THE EXCAVATIONS AT EL KASR
Tower of Babel (Fig. 1).Tower of Babel (Fig. 1).
When we were well under way, I asked Brown, whois a freemason, if he was endeavouring to reach the understanding of the native by means of some mystic Eastern ritual unknown to me. He was quite scornful of my want of intelligence and explained that his movements were intended to describe the tower that had been built from earth to reach up into heaven. It was perfectly clear, he maintained, that if he first indicated the Tower of Babel and then the Ford car, the driver would see, had he been reasonably intelligent, that he was to take the car to the tower.
The journey over the plain towards the mound and tower was not so eventful as we had expected it to be. Beyond jumping many small watercourses or negotiating muddy patches left by the recent rain, we found no difficulty in keeping a straight course. A herd of camelstrotted away as we approached and we started up a fox. Otherwise we came across no sign of life. As we advanced mile upon mile the mysterious tower seemed to get further away, an illusion possible in flat countries. I have often observed a similar phenomenon in Holland. Perhaps in this case mirage had something to do with it.
A mosque or tomb became visible and then, almost suddenly, we seemed to get to close quarters with everything. A ridge rose up from the flat land and from this point of vantage, known as the tomb of Abraham, we could look across a level zone a few hundred yards wide to the long, irregular hummock about a hundred feet high, although in this setting it looked a great deal more. The east side of this small range is scored with miniature wadies washed out by rain, and the crowning ruin appeared (as in sketch, Fig. 1), casting a long shadow down the slope of the hill.
Leaving the high ground we skirted the foot of the mound, going southwards and seeing it from the point of view indicated in Fig. 2, and then as at Fig. 3. A group of Arabs bargaining about coins and attempting to sell curios to two British officers, who had dismounted from their horses, made a tremendous hubbub and, as Brown noted, gave the right local colour as to the confusion of tongues.
I am ill-equipped with books of reference out here, but in one of Murray's handbooks I have unearthed the following note—all I can find about this place:—
Tower of Babel.Tower of Babel.
Tower of Babel (Fig. 2).Tower of Babel (Fig. 2).
"Birs Nimrûd, about 2½ hours from Hillah, is a vast ruin crowned apparently by the ruins of a tower rising to a height of 153½ ft. above the plain, and having a circumference of rather more than 2000 feet. The Birs, which was situated within the city of Borsippa, has been wrongly identified with the Tower of Babel. It is the temple of Nebo, called the 'Temple of the seven spheres of Heaven and Earth,' and was a sort of pyramid built in seven stages, the stairs being ornamented with the planetary colours, and on the seventh was an ark or tabernacle. The Birs was destroyed by Xerxes and restored by Antiochus Soter. The Tower of Babel was possibly the Esagila of the inscriptions, or the E-Temenanki—a tower not yet identified. Not far from Birs Nimrûd are the ruins of Hashemieh, the first residence of the Abbaside Khalifs."
Brown would have none of this. Anything is anathema to Brown which destroys topographical romance. He is a fierce enemy to "higher criticism," which does away with the whale in the book of Jonah or the snow-clad summit of Mount Ararat as the resting-place of the ark. It isquite exciting, he maintains, to picture the ark stuck on the perilous ice-peaks of a glacier, with Noah and his family endeavouring to get the elephants and giraffes safely down a ravine like the Mer de Glace to the more temperate regions of the plains below. How much better than thinking of it stuck fast on some wretched mound by the Euphrates, 30 feet high.