of the world," retains but little
trace of the races and civilizations that have succeeded each other in
ruling the land. When the Tigris was low at the end of the summer season,
we used to dig out from its bank great bricks eighteen inches square, on
which was still distinctly traced the seal of Nebuchadnezzar. These,
possibly the remnants of a quay, were all that remained of the times
before the advent of the caliphs.

II

THE TIGRIS FRONT

A few days after reaching Baghdad I left for Samarra, which was at that
time the Tigris front. I was attached to the Royal Engineers, and my
immediate commander was Major Morin, D.S.O., an able officer with an
enviable record in France and Mesopotamia. The advance army of the Tigris
was the Third Indian Army Corps, under the command of General Cobbe, a
possessor of the coveted, and invariably merited, Victoria Cross. The
Engineers were efficiently commanded by General Swiney. The seventy miles
of railroad from Baghdad to Samarra were built by the Germans, being the
only Mesopotamian portion of the much-talked-of Berlin-to-Baghdad Railway,
completed before the war. It was admirably constructed, with an excellent
road-bed, heavy rails and steel cross-ties made by Krupp. In their retreat
the Turks had been too hurried to accomplish much in the way of
destruction other than burning down a few stations and blowing up the
water-towers. The rolling-stock had been left largely intact. There were
no passenger-coaches, and you travelled either by flat or box car. Every
one followed the Indian custom of carrying with them their bedding-rolls,
and leather-covered wash-basin containing their washing-kit, as well as
one of the comfortable rhoorkhee chairs. In consequence, although for
travel by boat or train nothing was provided, there was no discomfort
entailed. The trains were fitted out with anti-aircraft guns, for the
Turkish aeroplanes occasionally tried to "lay eggs," a by no means easy
affair with a moving train as a target. Whatever the reason was, and I
never succeeded in discovering it, the trains invariably left Baghdad in
the wee small hours, and as the station was on the right bank across the
river from the main town, and the boat bridges were cut during the night,
we used generally, when returning to the front, to spend the first part of
the night sleeping on the station platform. Generals or exalted staff
officers could usually succeed in having a car assigned to them,