Fri. Ap 9. [9 April 1909] Strong wind. Off at 7 with Amin and drove out
through all the vaulted bazaars to the Mu'addam where El Hanafy is
buried. Then on to the Kazimein across the river. Amin took me to the
house where Sir Ikbal ed Dowla Gelt[?] brother of the king of Oudh is
buried and introduced me to the Wakil Mulla Khudr a friend of the
Blunts and a very cheerful person. He applauded my desire to see
everything saying we had but a short time to live: "Insan!" He then
abused the present Vali who, he said was no good at all; he was
majnun. I said he was better at books than at works. He said "That's
what I call majnun." All the officials are corrupt and the Govt won't
work for that reason. There is no money anywhere and the root of all
govt. is money. So we went onto the roof to photograph the mosque
and then into Ikbal ed Dowla's tomb. He said the great difficulty was
the fact that there was no union in the country - sects and towns each
one for itself. He then sent 2 servants to conduct me round the outside
of the mosque but they hurried me past the doors so that I cd scarcely
look into the Sahan. So back to the tomb of the Sitt Zobeida, recently
rebuilt but on the old scheme of squinches all the way up. Near it is
the mosque of Sheikh Ma'ruf and a big cemetery. So home. Col. R.
called me in to talk to Ra'ouf Effendi Chaderjizadeh son of a big
proprietor at Hille [Hillah, Al]. He used to be the public censor. He
says there is a Club here but the Committee is quite inactive. It was
reorganised at the beginning by a member from Salonica
[Thessaloniki (Saloniki)]. There are 6 members for Baghdad vilayet
5 Moslems and a Jew, a very distinguished man. The news from
C'ple [Istanbul (Constantinople)] is bad; the Parl. does nothing and is
not getting to work at all. He confidently expects that the revolution is
yet to come - with bloodshed. He does not think the present state of
things can work. There is no homogeneity in the country. The Arab
movement is beginning and is bound to grow in force. The Arabs will
want to have the big posts themselves in their own country. After lunch
went in the motor boat to see Mr Josiah Willcocks, the parson, who
has just surveyed the Tigris up to Samarra and gave me hints for my
journey. Saw too Mr Watts. There [sic] house is lovely - an old
palace with a harun[?]. Baghdad looks beautiful from the river. The
dead Euphrates channel thick with ruined towns. Mr W. says the
bridge is at the same place it was in Xenophon's time and consists of
the same number of boats. So back to rest for half an hour. Mr Watts
and Mr Tabor came to tea. Sat in the garden and wrote. Quite cool
all day. Long talk with Col. Ramsay about the Euphrates valley rly.
Below Nasriyyeh which is below where the Hindiyyeh [Shatt al
Hindiyah] comes in again in the Muntefik country the peasants pay no
taxes -all the higher officials are bribed by them. The country is
extremely fertile and highly cultivated - perhaps partly because the
cultivators pocket all they make. Col. R. saw a man with a flock of
sheep and a rifle. The tax collector with him said "If I ask him for his
aghnam (sheep tax) he wd point his rifle at me and say "Here's my
aghnam."