The streets were being watered to lay the terrible dust of three war-years’ lorry traffic. The crowds were slow and happy, and numbers of British troops were wandering in the town, unarmed. The telegraph was restored with Palestine, and with Beyrout, which the Arabs had occupied in the night. As long ago as Wejh I had warned them, when they took Damascus to leave Lebanon for sop to the French and take Tripoli instead; since as a port it outweighed Beyrout, and England would have played the honest broker for it on their behalf in the Peace Settlement. So I was grieved by their mistake, yet glad they felt grown-up enough to reject me.
Even the hospital was better. I had urged Chauvel to take it over, but he would not. At the time I thought he meant to overstrain us, to justify his taking away our government of the town. However, since, I have come to feel that the trouble between us was a delusion of the ragged nerves which were jangling me to distraction these days. Certainly Chauvel won the last round, and made me feel mean, for when he heard that I was leaving he drove round with Godwin and thanked me outright for my help in his difficulties. Still, the hospital was improving of itself. Fifty prisoners had cleaned the courtyard, burning the lousy rubbish. A second gang had dug another great grave-pit in the garden, and were zealously filling it as opportunity offered. Others had gone through the wards, washing every patient, putting them into cleaner shirts, and reversing their mattresses to have a tolerably decent side up. We had found food suitable for all but critical cases, and each ward had some Turkish-spoken orderly within hearing, if a sick man called. One room we had cleared, brushed out and disinfected, meaning to transfer into it the less ill cases, and do their room in turn.
At this rate three days would have seen things very fit, and I was proudly contemplating other benefits when a medical major strode up and asked me shortly if I spoke English. With a brow of disgust for my skirts and sandals he said ‘You're in charge?’ Modestly I smirked that in a way I was, and then he burst out, ‘Scandalous, disgraceful, outrageous, ought to be shot…’ At this onslaught I cackled out like a chicken, with the wild laughter of strain; it did feel extraordinarily funny to be so cursed just as I had been pluming myself on having bettered the apparently hopeless.
The major had not entered the charnel house of yesterday, nor smelt it, nor seen us burying those bodies of ultimate degradation, whose memory had started me up in bed, sweating and trembling, a few hours since. He glared at me, muttering ‘Bloody brute’. I hooted out again, and he smacked me over the face and stalked off, leaving me more ashamed than angry, for in my heart I felt he was right, and that anyone who pushed through to success a rebellion of the weak against their masters must come out of it so stained in estimation that afterward nothing in the world would make him feel clean. However, it was nearly over.
When I got back to the hotel crowds were besetting it, and at the door stood a grey Rolls-Royce, which I knew for Allenby's. I ran in and found him there with Clayton and Cornwallis and other noble people. In ten words he gave his approval to my having impertinently imposed Arab Governments, here and at Deraa, upon the chaos of victory. He confirmed the appointment of Ali Riza Rikabi as his Military Governor, under the orders of Feisal, his Army Commander, and regulated the Arab sphere and Chauvel's.
He agreed to take over my hospital and the working of the railway. In ten minutes all the maddening difficulties had slipped away. Mistily I realized that the harsh days of my solitary battling had passed. The lone hand had won against the world's odds, and I might let my limbs relax in this dreamlike confidence and decision and kindness which were Allenby.
Then we were told that Feisal's special train had just arrived from Deraa. A message was hurriedly sent him by Young's mouth, and we waited till he came, upon a tide of cheering which beat up against our windows. It was fitting the two chiefs should meet for the first time in the heart of their victory; with myself still acting as the interpreter between them.
Allenby gave me a telegram from the Foreign Office, recognizing to the Arabs the status of belligerents; and told me to translate it to the Emir: but none of us knew what it meant in English, let alone in Arabic: and Feisal, smiling through the tears which the welcome of his people had forced from him, put it aside to thank the Commander-in-Chief for the trust which had made him and his movement. They were a strange contrast: Feisal, large-eyed, colourless and worn, like a fine dagger; Allenby, gigantic and red and merry, fit representative of the Power which had thrown a girdle of humour and strong dealing round the world.
When Feisal had gone, I made to Allenby the last (and also I think the first) request I ever made him for myself — leave to go away. For a while he would not have it; but I reasoned, reminding him of his year-old promise, and pointing out how much easier the New Law would be if my spur were absent from the people. In the end he agreed; and then at once I knew how much I was sorry.
DAMASCUS had not seemed a sheath for my sword, when I landed in Arabia: but its capture disclosed the exhaustion of my main springs of action. The strongest motive throughout had been a personal one, not mentioned here, but present to me, I think, every hour of these two years. Active pains and joys might fling up, like towers, among my days: but, refluent as air, this hidden urge re-formed, to be the persisting element of life, till near the end. It was dead, before we reached Damascus.
Next in force had been a pugnacious wish to win the war: yoked to the conviction that without Arab help England could not pay the price of winning its Turkish sector. When Damascus fell, the Eastern war — probably the whole war — drew to an end.
Then I was moved by curiosity. ‘Super flumina Babylonis’, read as a boy, had left me longing to feel myself the node of a national movement. We took Damascus, and I feared. More than three arbitrary days would have quickened in me a root of authority.
There remained historical ambition, insubstantial as a motive by itself. I had dreamed, at the City School in Oxford, of hustling into form, while I lived, the new Asia which time was inexorably bringing upon us. Mecca was to lead to Damascus; Damascus to Anatolia, and afterwards to Bagdad; and then there was Yemen. Fantasies, these will seem, to such as are able to call my beginning an ordinary effort.
Caption
T. E. Lawrence
(a) The Wells at Wejh
(b) Ghadir Osman, on the return journey from Ais to Wejh
(a) Yenbo, with T. E. Lawrence's house on the right
(b) Sgt Perry, A.V.C., Captain Hornby, and Lt Wade, with Colonel Lawrence's Ghazala and foal
Caption
Emir Sherif Feisal, by James McBey
(a) Tribesmen. From Left to right: An unknown tribesman, Mohamed el Dheilan, Auda abu Tayi, and unknown with a moustache, Auda's young son mohamed, aged eleven, two unknown tribesmen
(b) Feisal and Ageyl bodyguard
(a) Lt-Col S. F. Newcombe, March 1917
(b) Lawrence in Arab dress
(a) General Sir Edmund Allenby, K.C.B., by James McBey
(b) Sir Ronald Storrs
(a) Remains of Lt Junor's B.E.12 aeroplane
(b) Rolls-Royce tender at Akaba, with Colonel Joyce in front seat and Corporal Lowe at the bonnet
APPENDIX I
NOMINAL ROLL:
HEJAZ ARMOURED CAR COMPANY
M.G.C.
Gilman
Dowsett
Grisenthwaite
Wade
Greenhill
D. M. Grant
E. Palmer
H. Comery
G. V. P. Kenknight
J. L. Pender
R. Fairgrave
G. S. Bond
W. Rowe
W. A. Holdsworth
F. J. Davies
H. M. Shackleton
V. Holden
A. Frost
A. Tunnicliffe
R. P. Jones
H. Mann
G. Westwater
D. M. Murray
D. Anderson
J. Wilson
R. McKenzie
G. Barton
J. Goodchild
H. E. Parker
T. W. Beaumont
H. Wareham
G. A. Pikett
H. W. Bailey
G. Williams
E. Stoller
G. A. Draper
H. J. Ingram
W. Thacker
A. Hancock
E. Featherstone
H. W. Twiner
J. H. Hurd
F. Wilson
F. Whitelegg
Jackson
W. Axup
A. Woodburn
E. Lowe
C. J. Bird
W. McDonald
F. Brander
R.A.S.C.
H. Monks
J. W. Ramsbottom
W. Hurst
A. Barnes
S. C. Rolls
W. W. Kidd
W. Coxon
T. R. Robinson
E. J. Keslake
A. Duff
J. O. Seddon
L. Matthews
S. Evans
J. E. Wadland
J. McKechnie
F. Garnett
A. Wainwright
W. Page
S. Haymes
R. B. Arnott
E. Rawcliffe
R. W. Hurst
G. Buckle
S. D. Ross
H. H. Helme
D. Dickson
J. E. Sanderson
A. Knowles
G. T. Elphick
C. W. Thomas
J. Mackay
J. E. Exton
W. E. Wells
O. McCarnen
H. R. Green
F. Mudd
H. Hosker
NOMINAL ROLL:
TEN-POUNDER TALBOT BATTERY
R.F.A.
Brodie
Pascoe
L. W. Parsonage
J. Black
T. Richardson
W. Bassett
A. Catley
C. W. Sorton
H. Iverson
H. E. Drewitt
J. Smail
H. B. Eccles
E. Garrett
R. Sneddon
W. Stanford
C. H. Hare
P. Stokes
J. Shaw
A. Lynn
A. Fawcett
R. Nicol
W. McInnes
J. Baxter
H. M. Palmer
R.A.S.C.
J. Bourne
A. Davies
R. Guthrie
M. Harper
Harrison
Draycuf
A. G. Frankis
A. Bentley
Puffer
J. Douglas
D. P. Quentin
J. W. Holyoak
W. Johnson
Heysed
APPENDIX II
The following table of our movements or position-at-night is from my skeleton diary. Accident, preoccupations, and prudence were responsible for gaps. My book follows the strict order of time: but leaves out many by-plays. The dates here do not altogether agree with its text. Memory sometimes assists me with moonlight, on a new-moon night: and I have preferred memory to the calendar. Arabic names are spelt anyhow, to prevent my appearing an adherent of one of the existing ‘systems of transliteration’.
1917
Jan. 1 Nahkl Mubarak
2 Nagb Dhifran
3 Yenbo
14 In Suva, etc.
17 Bir Waheidi
18 Semna
19 Harrat Gelib
20 Wadi Dhulm
21 Abu Zereibat
23 Kurna
24 Habban
25 Wejh
27 In Hardinge
28 Cairo, etc.
Feb. 1 Suez
4 In Arethusa
6 Wejh, etc.
20 In Arethusa
22 Cairo, etc.
Mar. 2 In Lama
3 Wejh, etc.
10 Seil Arja
11 Abu Zereibat
12 Wadi Kitan
13 Wadi Gara
14 Wadi Tleih
15 Abu Markha
26 Wadi Serum
27 Wadi Meseij
28 El Jurf
29 Aba el Naam
30 Wadi Turaa
31 Bir el Amri
Apr. 1 Abu Markha
3 Magrah el Semn
4 El Fershah
5 Km. 1121
6 El Fershah
7 Bir el Amri
8 Abu Markha
10 Wadi Geraia
11 Wadi Hamdh
14 Wejh
27 Magrah Raal
28 W. Hamdh
May 1 Mellaha, etc.
3 Wejh
6 Wadi Hamdh
7 Wejh
9 Kalaat el Zereib
10 El Kurr
12 Wadi Arnoua
13 Abu Saad
14 Abu Raga
17 El Shegg
18 Wadi Aish
19 Dizaad
20 Wadi Abu Arad
21 Bir Fejr
22 Khabrat Ajaj
23 El Jaala
24 Kaseim Arfaja
25 Arfaja
26 Maiseri
27 Isawiya
30 Abu Tarfeiyat
June 1 Wadi Bair
2 Ageila
3 Nebk, etc.
19 El Wagf
20 Bair
21 El Ghadaf
22 Wadi Mishnag
23 Hemme
24 Minifir
25 Ifdein
26 Dhaba
27 W. Maghara
28 Bair
29 Rijt el Herar
30 El Jefer
July 1 Km. 479
2 Fuweileh
3 Nagb el Shtar
4 Guweira
5 W. Yitm
6 Akaba
7 Bir Mohammed
8 Sudr Heidan
9 Suez
10 Cairo
12 Alexandria
13 Cairo, etc.
15 Alexandria
16 Cairo
17 In Dufferin
19 Jeida
20 In Dufferin
22 Jidda
Aug. 1 Jidda
2 In Hardinge
4 Wadi Itm, etc.
6 In Hardinge
7 Cairo
14 Alexandria
16 In Hardinge
17 Akaba, etc.
21 Kuntilla
22 Akaba, etc.
Sept. 7 Wadi Itm
8 Wadi Medeifein
9 Guweira
10 Hesma
11 Rumm
12 Akaba
13 Rumm, etc.
16 Wadi Dumma
17 Mudowwara
18 Km. 587
19 Mudowwara
20 Rumm
21 Itm el Imran
22 Akaba
26 Wadi Itm
27 Hawara
28 Rumm, etc.
Oct. 1 Wadi Hafir
2 Batra
3 Shedia
4 Km. 489
5 El Kasr
6 Imshash Hesma
7 Rumm
8 Wadi Itm
9 Akaba
11 Suez
12 Kelab
13 Ismailia
14 Suez
15 Akaba, etc.
24 Wadi Itm
25 Rumm
26 Wadi Hafir
27 Shedia
28 El Jefer, etc.
30 Shegg
31 Bair
Nov. 1 Wadi Dhirwa
2 Ammri
3 Ain el Beidha
4 Hamad
5 Kseir 'Hallabat
6 Ghadir Abyadh
Nov. 7 Tell el Shahab
8 Abu Sawana
9 Minifir
11 Abu Sawana
12 Azrak, etc.
23 Wadi Butm
24 Bair
25 Jefer
26 Akaba
30 Wadi Itm
Dec. 1 Wadi Hawara
2 Wadi Itm
3 Akaba
9 Gaza
10 Suafa
11 G.H.Q., etc.
12 Gaza
13 Cairo
21 Suez, etc.
25 Akaba
26 Guweira
27 Abu Sawana
28 Akaba
29 Guweira
30 Ramleh
31 Tell el Shahm
1918
Jan. 1 Abu Tarfeiya
2 Akaba, etc.
10 Wadi Itm
11 Guweira
15 Nagb Shtar
16 Aba el Lissan
18 Wadi Musa
19 Shobek
20 Tafileh, etc.
28 Mezra, etc.
Feb. 4 Odroh
5 Guweira
8 Khabr el Abid
9 Basta
10 Shobek
11 Tafileh, etc.
13 Buseira
14 Ghor el Sah
16 Wadi Dhahal
17 Seil Hesa
18 Hesban, etc.
19 Tafileh
Feb. 20 Wadi Araba
21 Beersheba
22 Ramleh, etc.
27 Jerusalem
28 Rafa
Mar. 1 Cairo
4 Akaba
6 In Borulos
8 Cairo
12 Suez
13 In Borulos
15 Akaba
16 Guweira
17 Akaba
18 Nagb Shtar
19 shobek
20 Sadaka
21 Akaba, etc.
30 Guweira
Apr. 1 Khabr el Abid
2 Aba el Lissan
3 Aneyza
Apr. 4 Wadi el Jinz
5 Wadi el Hafir
6 El Atara, etc.
11 Jurf el Derawish
12 Odroh
13 Guweira
14 Waheida
18 Retm
19 Shahm
Seven Pillars of Wisdom Page 75
