Tues Ap 11 [11 April 1911] At 5.30 Temp 52, Bar 28.25. 'Abud and I
with an Arab guide got off at 6.30. (The baggage was off about 1/2
hour later and got in 1 hr earlier.) We rode very fast and got to T.
Hayyat 7.10. A small village must have been here. 8 crossed small
dry ghadir, 8.15 Mosul [Mawsil, Al] road. We found some Shammar
moving camp, with chithib and howdaj and all sort of exciting Bedu
things at T. Gaur Wahsh which we reached at 8.45. It lies NNE from
Hudeil. We got to the ruined khan, going in about the same direction,
at 9.45 and stayed there till 10.40 photographing the dragons and
armed men on the door and talking to the Shammar. Note that
between the parallel barrel vaults are the small tubes at right angles
which I thought to be a false roof at Ukheidir [Ukhaydir]. Our guide
took us down to a caravan road N of the Mosul road and then left us.
We rode on, presently picking up a stray zaptieh, under the hills.
12.30-1 lunched. 1.35 Minnat N of us in the hills. Here we crossed the
Moyek Surrak, the first stream we had seen. The zaptieh told me it
was the main spring but was mostly taken off for irrigation. We
crossed quantities of irrigation streams. At 2.15 Tepe to the N of us; at
3 we got to Balad Sinjar [Sinjar] and found camp pitched below the
town. The weli of Pir Zeki below us among trees. It was very hot and
stuffy. The Kaimmakam and Shukri Effendi had gone off to 'Ain el
Ghazal but another pleasant young official came to see me and after
tea we went together to see the Yezidi sheikh 'Ali Agha, but he was
out. Then to the Mazar of Sitt Zeinab. It has been much pulled about
and restored but contains a fine dome and stucco mihrab (snakes) of
the Lulu time. I saw too fragments of the Mosul wood-like stone work.
So down to the old minaret which lies among the ruins of the old town.
Willows coming into leaf.