nd education is
compulsory to the age of fifteen. All are taught to read and write
English. This is due, our man told me, to Alexandria being their
greatest mart.

We had coffee, real Turkish coffee, at another place, where we were
attracted by a curious advertisement. It was an oil painting of a
Scotch lassie in kilt and plaid, dancing with a jug of foaming beer
above her head, and alongside her it was announced that they sold
"tea, coffee, and milk". Stephen at once wished to buy it, but the
terms were exorbitant. To make Turkish coffee you put a teaspoonful of
ground coffee in a little pot with an equal quantity of sugar, then
run in about two ounces of boiling water, and push this into
smouldering charcoal until it boils. Along with this is served a large
tumbler of ice-cold water, which you sip time about with the coffee.

Before we could get Dickie away from Varos he insisted on being
photographed by Stephen, astride a huge cask in front of a shop, but
the cask refused to keep steady--so Dicky asserted, although to all
appearances it was most solidly fixed to a substantial stand. Plainly
Dickie was feeling weak after his long walk.

_July 31st._--Dickie much stronger to-day. I accompanied him to
H.M.M.P. "Aragon" to get some money from the army cashier. We lunched
on board and had a glorious meal, everything to eat good, excellent
cider with ice, and comfortable lounges in which to smoke. Such things
are almost unthinkable after our simple--very simple--fare on
Gallipoli. I sat between two New Zealanders who had come over from
Anzac last night. One of them said they were only 10 yards from the
Turks' trench in one part of their line. The other day a New Zealander
shouted across, "Do you want any jam this morning?" "Yes," said the
Turks from the depths of their trench. "How many of you are there?"
"Eight," was the reply. "All right, here's one pot of jam," and a pot
of real jam was thrown over. The next morning the same proceedings
were gone through, and the eight got together to get their jam. But
this time the pot was filled with nitroglycerine and the Turks were
blown to pieces. We are now using hand grenades from home, but till
just lately when we had to retaliate on the Turks, who took to using
deadly grenades, ours were made hurriedly of empty jam tins. These
were filled with nitroglycerine mixed with pieces of old iron, such as
shrapnel bullets and pieces of burst shells which we all
collected--and mos