a country.

II

BASRA

We reached Mesopotamia when the hot weather was beginning. The campaign
to relieve Kut was at its height, and the wounded and sick were coming
down river in thousands. Apart from these there were big reinforcement
camps on Makina Plain, and all around us the daily sick rate was rapidly
increasing, and men straight from England, unused to hot climates, were
being sent in big batches off the incoming transports. There was very
little ice to be had, and so far as we were concerned there were no
fans, electric or otherwise, with which to ventilate the sheds.

The urgency of the situation demanded that we should open what wards we
could for the reception of sick and wounded at once. We had no nurses,
partly because there was no accommodation for them. Four sheds alongside
the creek were got in order. Iron bedsteads draped in white, mosquito
nets resembling bridal veils, bedside tables, and cupboards arranged
themselves in rows. An immense hammering and shouting filled the
stifling air. The sheds began to look moderately inviting--neat and
clean, smelling faintly of antiseptics which smelt better than the
things in the creek. At first about fifty beds were put into each shed;
in a short time beds were crowded into every available corner of the
clearing. Fresh sheds were being erected by natives. Since the ground
was undermined by marsh, the sheds had to be built on piles driven six
feet into the spongy soil. There was only one pile driver, which
resembled a cross-section of a lamp post, and was worked by a fatigue
party of wild-haired Indian troops from Afghanistan regions. One would
have thought from their flashing eyes when the pile driver crashed home
that they played a secret game in which each imagined his bitterest
enemy was in the place of the pile.

The problem of water arose at once. There was no general water supply at
that time, and each unit had to solve its own problem. Our supply had to
come from the creek, which was thick and turbid and contained a
multitude of unsavoury things. At first it was sedimented with alum,
which precipitated the suspended matter in a gelatinous mass, and the
clear fluid was chlorinated with bleaching powder. There is only one
consolation in drinking well chlorinated water. You know that it
contains nothing except chlorine. With whisky it forms a mixture that
it is difficult to describe. After a time two tanks were put in order
and arranged on brick