It is of ancient origin and built upon a hill,
with a lovely view of the river. It has not a vestige of green on it, but
stands out bleak and harsh in contrast to the palm-groves fringing the
bank. The bitumen wells near by have been worked for five thousand years
and are responsible for the town being a centre of boat manufacture. With
the bitumen, the gufas and mahelas are "pitched without and within," in
the identical manner in which we are told that the ark was built. The jars
in which the women of the town draw water from the river, instead of being
of copper or earthenware as elsewhere, are here made of pitched
wicker-work. The smell of the boiling bitumen and the sulphur springs is
trying to a stranger, although the natives regard it as salubrious, and
maintain that through it the town is saved from cholera epidemics. We had
captured Hit a few weeks previously, and the aeroplanes flying low over
the town had reported the disagreeable smell, attributing it to dirt and
filth. "Eyewitness," the official newspaper correspondent, mentioned this
in despatches, and when I was passing through, a proclamation of apology
was being prepared to soothe the outraged and slandered townsfolk.

[Illustration: A water-wheel on the Euphrates]

After taking the army commander back to rail-head, we retraced our steps
with all speed to Hit, and thence the eight miles up-stream to Salahiyeh.
The road beyond Hit was in fearful shape, and the engineers were working
night and day to keep it open and in some way passable. In the proposed
attack we were to jump off from Salahiyeh, and it was here that the
armored cars were assembled. Our camp was close to a Turkish hospital.
There were two great crescents and stars laid out for a signal to warn our
aeroplanes not to drop bombs. One of the crescents was made of turf and
the other of limestone. The batteries took turns in making the
reconnaissances, in the course of which they would come in for a good deal
of shelling. The road was unpleasant, because the camels and transport
animals that had been killed during the Turkish retreat from Hit were by
now very high. For some unknown reason there were no jackals or vultures
to form a sanitary section. After reconnoitring the enemy positions and
noting the progress they were making in constructing their defenses, we
would make a long circuit back to camp.

One unoccupied morning I went over to an island on the river. Its cool,
restful look had att