s the sand-dunes to the important native town of
Mejdel, where there was a substantial bazaar doing a good trade in the
essentials for native existence, beans and cereals in plenty, fruit,
and tobacco of execrable quality. At Mejdel the six accepted the
surrender of a body of Turks guarding a substantial ammunition dump
and rejoined their units, satisfied with the day's adventure. The
Turks had retired a considerable distance during the day. The
principal body was moving up what is called the main road from Deir
Sineid, through Beit Jerjal to Julis, to get to Suafir esh Sherkiyeh,
Kustineh, and Junction Station, from which they could reach Latron by
a metalled road, or Ramleh by a hard mud track by the side of their
railway. They were clearly going to oppose us all the way or they
would lose the whole of their material, and their forces east and west
of the road were well handled in previously selected and partially
prepared positions.

They left behind them the unpleasant trail of a defeated army. Turks
had fallen by the way and the natives would not bury them. Our
aircraft had bombed the road, and the dead men, cattle and horses,
and smashed transport were ghastly sights and made the air offensive.
There they lay, one long line of dead men and animals, and if a London
fog had descended to blind the eyes of our Army the sense of smell
would still have carried a scout on the direct line of the Turkish
retreat.

I will break off the narrative of fighting at this point to describe a
scene which expressed more eloquently than anything else I witnessed
in Palestine how deeply engraved in the native mind was the conviction
that Britain stood for fair dealing and freedom. The inhabitants, like
the Arabs of the desert, do not allow their faces to betray their
feelings. They preserve a stolid exterior, and it is difficult to tell
from their demeanour whether they are friendly or indifferent to
you. But their actions speak aloud. Early on the morning after the
Lowlanders had entered Mejdel I was in the neighbourhood. Our guns
banging away to the north were a reminder that there was to be no
promenade over the Plain, and that we had yet to make good the
formidable obstacle of the wadi Sukereir, when I passed a curious
procession. People whom the Turks had turned out of Gaza and the
surrounding country were trekking back to the spots where they and
their forefathers had lived for countless generations. All their
worldly goods a