Thurs March 16 [16 March 1911] Sami Pasha's Farukhy 2 relations
came to see me, Musa Chelabi Pachatchi [Arabic characters] and
Abdul Rahman Beg Jamil Ladeh, the former wearing riding clothes
and the latter a turban. The former has something to do with
inspectorship of schools but he held a much more important post
{from} which he resigned on account of persecution from Nazim.
They were most friendly. Then went to call on the Nakib who
received me with open arms and talked politics. He explained that
England was by far the greatest power because she was so wealthy
and cd hire soldiers as she did in Napoleon's time; Russia however
had a far bigger population and army. Germany is poor. He expects
England to undertake the Baghdad section. Meantime a fearful row
going on in the town, the people clamouring roung the Vali's house
that they wanted none other but he, the bazaars closed because of
the crowds, the custom house closed and telegrams sent off to C'ple
[Istanbul (Constantinople)] to beg that he might be left. It is said that
the head of the telegraph who is his enemy was asked from C'ple who
was sending the messages and replied "A few Jews and persons of
no account." The demonstrations carefully engineered largely by
'Abdul Kadir Pasha Khudeiri who is oddly enough a leading member
of the Committee. Nazim got round him by allowing him to export
grain when all others were forbidden to do so and he is said to have
betrayed to him the secrets of the committee. Sami's relations
complain bitterly of the men Nazim brought with him, chiefly of Eram,
an Armenian who was for a fortnight secretary of the Beyrout
[Beyrouth (Beirut)] vilayet and had to leave because he could talk no
Arabic and very bad French. Mr L. [Lorimer] confirms this, says the
Vali's men are a very bad lot, all except Riza Beg who is
commanding the expedition against the Shammar. In the afternoon all
the officers were summoned and asked to sign a vote of confidence
in the Vali; 2 refused to do so, saying it was contrary to discipline and
one of them asked for protection at the Residency (next day) if
necessary. Yusef Pasha who led a Muntefiq expedition and was
subsequently sent by Nazim to Kerkuk [Kirkuk] has appeared
suddenly in Baghdad and no one knows exactly what his business is
but it is suspected that he may have come to take over when the time
is ripe. The great grievance against Nazim is the reckless widening
of the streets; no notice is given to any one but suddenly your house
is about your ears. He is planning a whole new quarter inside the Bab
et Talisin - this is quite good if he had money to pay for it. He is also
making an immense dyke E of the town with forced labour from the
Arabs and he has built a huge military camp S of Baghdad also
entirely with forced labour and forced contributions. There are very
ugly stories against him personally. Chiefly about Sara Zenyinah, a
Christian heiress, whom he tried to marry to one of his underlings it
being well known that he wanted her himself. She had a narrow
escape but got off to Basrah [Basrah, Al (Basra)] and so with the help
of the Russian consul to Bombay. Mr L. thinks Nazim acts mainly on
the bad advice of his followers but he always keeps their counsel and
sticks to them firmly so that no one knows who is at the bottom of his
deeds. In the evening the office of the leading newspaper in
Baghdad was broken into by the Vali's orders, the whole issue of the
paper destroyed and the type broken up - worse than in the days of
'Abd ul Hamid said Musa Chelabi to me next day. After lunch I
telephotoed the Talesin and then to tea with the Lanzonis. She is Mr
Todd's sister (of Lynch's) he an officer of the international quarantine
board. He knows the Red Sea and the Yemen very intimately and is
now just going back to Kameran where his job is with the Mecca
[Makkah] pilgrims. They have some remarkably interesting pots with
Kufic inscriptions. We had a dinner party; Campbells (of the C....)
Viettes (French Consul, she is Catoni's daughter) Picards (he is on the
new commission of roads the first work of which is the Aleppo [Halab]
road which he has come out to inspect) Godard. Played Bridge and
Billiards after dinner. Post in at midnight.