Baghdad Sep 27 Dearest Father. I have your letters of July 8 and 11, and of July 14 - with an exceedingly interesting account of your Paris journey. Today comes a letter of July 30 and each letter gives a better and better account of Mother, Heaven be praised! Letters from Elsa of July 17 and from Moll of Aug 1 are all cheering. I've felt so anxious, you understand. Well, now I hope that's over. That was a wonderful journey of yours through Amiens - I loved having your long account of it. The Country Lifes - or Lives - came too, and such a charming letter from Sir George to you. But as to the part of it which concerns me, I can't for the life of me think what I write that's so fine. Are you sure you are not getting someone else's letters?
My two items of news this week are that the hot weather has broken and that the Marlings have arrived, inclusif the Grand Duke. They arrived 36 hours before they were expected, having lost all their luggage and caught the influenza - except the Grand Duke. This was rather an upsetting beginning to their visit to the C. in C. and I can't honestly say that it has been a real success. If you will think of Sir Charles in a setting composed almost exclusively of Lieutenant and Major Generals, you will realize that it couldn't be. Moreover none of the party ever know their own minds, nor, when they make a plan, do they confide it to their host or his A.D.C. They are trying people, there's no doubt. They take no human interest in anything, but Sir Charles cares for and knows about antiquities and I've enjoyed showing him those of Baghdad. Last night they dined with us in the Political Office and stayed till midnight. We're busy people; Captain (now Colonel) Wilson had an hour and a half's telegrams to work at after they left, and I am still rather a poor thing and nearly died of weariness when called upon to sit up so late. But we hope they enjoyed themselves. Today they came to tea with me in my garden. I had an elegant selection of my colleagues to meet them, together with Generals Lubbock and Stuart Wortley. It was a nice party, if I may say. And TOMORROW we pack them all off, in charge of a Political Officer, on a tour to Babylon, Najaf [Najaf, An] and Karbala which will take them 3 days. The day after they come back they leave for Basrah [Basrah, Al (Basra)] by steamer.

I think in the back of our minds - I know it's the case with me - we are all rather sore over the Persian policy, which Sir Charles represents, in his insignificant way. If it were not for the Persian enterprize, which I frankly consider folly - and remember I've been and seen, which the War Office hasn't - we should now be launching our attack on Mosul [Mawsil, Al], as a pendant to Damascus [Dimashq (Esh Sham, Damas)]. We can't do Persia and Mosul for reasons connected with transport. But if we could have got up to Mosul we should have secured the great wheat bearing area of the ArBella plain, without which the provisioning of our big towns must still be a problem. I suppose in the end we could grow enough wheat lower down, but that kind of agricultural change takes time and Baghdad has always looked to Mosul for wheat. There are a number of other, smaller, political problems which would also have been settled to say nothing of the fact that a striking success both in Syria and here must, I think, have knocked the Turks out. Well, there it is. You might please send this letter to Domnul. I wrote last mail to Lord Hardinge, but what's the good? We got out of Baku without great loss which is more than anyone deserves who had part in planning that desperate adventure. General Dunsterville is now in Baghdad but I haven't seen him yet. I like him personally very much, but he's a Don Quixote and windmill strategy is not likely to lead to victory nowadays.

Now I'm going to tell you some funny stories - they really are funny. A certain number of our petitions come to us in English. It's a regular trade in the bazaar, the writing of petitions in English. I don't know the learned professors of it but one can often spot petitions from the same hand by a similarity of style. For instance there's one man who has a quite peculiar talent for bringing in the word atavism. It's he who translated a petition which began in this way: I am as per atavism a cultivator - i.e. by hereditary descent, you understand. Here's another, less florid but very delicious. There were some very bad people on the Euphrates who made the lives of all their neighbours a burden and finally when all other methods had failed, an aeroplane was sent to drop a few bombs on their village. Unfortunately the bombs fell on the next village. The end was attained because the malefactors were so frightened that they reformed their ways, but the innocent village sent in a protest, in English. They complained that we had killed three cows and spoilt two.

Finally here is the wail of a Baghdadi exiled, for misdemeanours, to Basrah. He says his eyes are weak and the heat of Basrah affects them. "In Baghdad" he continues "there are many cool coves. If I could return to Baghdad, my eyes would get better. Haunting the caves." The punctuation is his. The coves, respektif caves, are the underground rooms where people live here in the summer - at least that's our interpretation. Do you like those tales?

Will you please thank Hanagan for his long and delightful letter of July 8 and tell him the seeds have come. I was so very glad to hear from him. Dearest I do love you so much. Your daughter Gertrude

I am so sorry for this untidy letter but I can't rewrite it.

I spilt a bottle of medicine over this - it's not submarines.