Baghdad June 16 Darling Father. I'm being kept very busy but there seems to be a little lull of work so I will begin writing to you in the office. Your hope that the coal strike won't end quickly seems likely to be fulfilled. I am so glad your letter to the Times was commended. Thank you for letting me see Yyves Guyot's interesting article which I return. I agree with all you say about the lives of the rich and the poor - however they seem likely to be solved by our all being poor, if that were a possible solution. (I remember somebody's law, quoted by Sir E. Benn, which says it isn't.) You did not enclose your correspondence with Bertie Clayton. Iltyd is still under notice to quit from the War Office. My principal news you have seen in the papers - the Turkish treaty. It is almost too good to be true. Nuri (just back from Angora [Ankara (Ancyra)]) Ken and I and others dined together on Monday. Nuri was very interesting about Turkish conditions. He describes them as a reign of terror enforced by what are called the Independence Tribunals, peripatetic courts composed of scallywags which go about the country beheading everyone who is suspected of being anti-Govt. Everyone is spied on, all the newspapers are controlled by Govt, taxation is terrific, mainly for the army, and corruption far worse than it was before. The Turks were very polite to him. He was besieged with questions about the 'Iraq and the mandate. I came to the conclusion that Turkey really was worse than England! I had a nice little ceremony on Monday when the King opened the first room of the Museum. It was open to the public for the first time today and as I came away at 8.30 this morning, I saw some 15 or 20 ordinary Baghdadis going round it under the guidance of the old Arab curator - very gratifying. Everyone agrees that it looks like a museum. All the other rooms are still chaos, but S/L Harnett and I are forging ahead with the numbering and cataloguing and I actually hope to get a couple of small cases this week. But it is such a stupendous job that without the support of the admirable S/L Harnett, I should certainly succumb. Fortunately it is being quite comparatively cool. I foresee that I shall have to devote some afternoons to visiting the King's female relations who have arrived with troops of servants from 'Amman. Namely his grandmother, an unknown quantity of aunts, 'Ali's wife and 3 children. I don't know where or how they are all lodged and kept - at least all I know is that it's out of H.M.'s pocket that they are kept. He appears to support the whole family except his father and his brother 'Abdullah. I told you that the Syrian news is awful. The French commit unforgivable brutalities. The second bombardment of Damascus [Dimashq (Esh Sham, Damas)] has been hushed up, I gather but it has left a whole quarter of the town in ruins and all the homeless people have crowded into the other quarters. I have been personally much affected by the following terrible story. There was a man called Ahmad Muraiwid, a very wealthy landowner and an ardent nationalist. He was concerned in an attack on Gouraud (in 1922 I think) after which he fled first to Amman, then to Mecca [Makkah]. After Husain was ejected he came here and the King established him on his farm at Khanaqin - as far as possible from the Syrian frontier. The French asked no questions and the High Commissioner let sleeping dogs lie. I saw the man often at Khanaqin and I liked and respected him, as one would have liked and respected Garibaldi. He was a genuine patriot. Finally, to make a long story short, he slipped off and went back to Syria where he began to lead Druze bands. The French caught him and his brother and shot them, as they had every right to do. But then they took their bodies to Damascus, stripped them and paraded them for hours through the streets on the backs of donkeys. It is an act which would turn the mildest people into rabid nationalists - don't you agree? I know many other stories of the same sort only I don't happen to have known the victims personally. How can the Syrians ever forgive? Here come papers to sign so I must stop. I'll write to Mother this afternoon. Ever your very loving daughter Gertrude