without bothering about fine shades, and acts on them unquestioningly.
What is called altruism in the West seems artificial. It is not cynicism
exactly that the place breeds, and I never met anyone who was
sentimental in Mesopotamia, but it is a kind of descent that occurs to a
level of values that are coloured black and white, quite plain. A man
who expected to throw a spell over the country and act as a stimulant on
everyone would truly need to possess a prodigious character. "In the
tropics there is going on continually and unconsciously a tax on the
nervous system which is absent in temperate climates. The nervous
system, especially those parts which regulate the temperature of the
body, is always on the strain, and the result is that in time it suffers
from more or less exhaustion." The common effect of this is a
"deficient mental energy generally commencing with unnatural drowsiness
or loss of appetite and a yearning for stimulants which culminates in
that lowering of nerve potential which we know so well as neurasthenia."
Thus write the professors of medicine in India on the effects of
prolonged heat. I would add to it a large mental element, partly induced
by the lack of any kind of amusement, by the want of interest, and by
the peculiar effect of a landscape that is entirely flat and uniform. An
artificial mountain scenery, painted on canvas, such as one used to see
at Earl's Court, would have been a blessed relief. I think a London fog
would have been delightful. Towards the end of September, a few small,
fleecy clouds appeared one day in the sky and everyone ran out and
stared solemnly at them as if they were angels. But there is one phrase
that sums up the prolonged effects of heat better than any scientific
rigmarole. It takes the silk out of a man.

In Basra there was published daily a small, excellent newspaper which
gave the latest Reuters and printed selections from papers that came by
the mail. It was sorely missed when we went up river. I believe it was
edited by a lady. There was a club in Ashar where it was possible to sit
under electric fans. In old Basra there was an Arab theatre, containing
a few dancing girls and a cinematograph. But the arrival of the mails
was the great feature of life out there. They came roughly once a week,
and it is difficult to describe with what emotions they were received.
The whole district became revivified for a space under their influence.

Through the month of Ju