We continued the bombardment on the night of the 11th and were in action

most of the day on the 12th, shelling the Turkish positions north of

Jeddah, which we had located by glass and the co-operation of friendly

fishing-craft who gave us the direction by signal. During the morning

the Hejazis made an abortive and aimless attack along the beach north of

Jeddah, and so masked our own supporting fire, while the Turks gave them

more than they wanted.

By this time the senior ship and others had joined us, and the S.N.O.

approved of my landing with a party of Indian signallers to maintain

closer touch with their operations, provided that Arab headquarters

would guarantee our safety as regards their own people. This they were

unable to do.

The bombardment grew more and more strenuous and searching as other

ships joined in and our knowledge of the Turkish positions became more

accurate. On the 15th it culminated with the arrival of a seaplane

carrier and heavy bombing of the Ottoman trenches which our

flat-trajectory naval guns could hardly reach. The white flag went up

before sunset, and next day there were _pourparlers_ which led to an

unconditional surrender on June 17, 1916.

Mecca had fallen just before, and Taif surrendered soon after, leaving

Medina as the only important town still held by the Turks in the Hejaz.

We began pouring food and munitions into Jeddah as soon as it changed

hands; for the rest of this cruise my ship was a sort of

parcels-delivery van, and when the parcel happens to be an Egyptian

mountain battery its delivery is an undertaking.

My personal contact with the Turks and their ill-omened _jihad_ ended

soon after, as I was invalided from service afloat, but I kept in touch

as an Intelligence-wallah on the beach and followed the rest of it with

interest.

They got Holy War with a vengeance. The Sharif's sons (more especially

the Emirs Feisal and Abdullah, who had been trained at the Stamboul

Military Academy), ably assisted by zealous and skilled British officers

as mine-planters and aerial bombers, harried outlying posts and the

Hejaz railway line north of Medina incessantly.

The Turkish positions at Wejh fell to the Red Sea flotilla, reinforced

by the flagship. I should like to have been there, if only to have seen

the Admiral sail in to the proceedings with a revolver in his fist and

the _elan_ of a sub-lieutenant. The Hejazis failed to synchronise, as

usual, so the Navy dispensed with their support.

On February 24, 1917, Kut was wrested from the Turks again; on March 11

they lost Baghdad; on November 7 their Beersheba-Gaza front was

shattered, and Jerusalem fell on December 9.

Early next year Jericho was captured (February 21), a British column

from Baghdad reached the Caspian in August, and after a final,

victorious British offensive in Palestine the unholy alliance of Turkish

pan-Islamism and German _Kultur_ got its death-blow when Emir Feisal

galloped into Damascus.

The Turks had drawn the blade of _jihad_ from its pan-Islamic scabbard

in vain; its German trade-mark was plainly stamped on it. There had been

widespread organisation against us, and the serpent's eggs of sedition

and revolt had been hatched in centres scattered all over the eastern

hemisphere, but their venomous progeny had been crushed before they

became formidable.

As a world-force this band of pan-Islamism had failed because it had

been invoked by the wrong people for a wrong purpose. Such a movement

should at least have as its driving power some great spiritual crisis:

this Turco-German manifestation of it had its origin in self-interest,

and if successful would have immolated Arabia on the demoniac altar of

_Weltpolitik_. Seyid Muhammed er-Rashid Ridha, a descendant of the

Prophet and one of the greatest Arab theologians living, has voiced the

verdict of Islam on this unscrupulous and self-seeking adventure in a

trenchant article published in September, 1916. He showed up Enver and

his Unionist party as an atheist among atheists who had deprived the

Sultan of his rightful power and Islam of its religious head, and

contrasted their conduct with that of the British, who exempted the

Hejaz from the blockade enforced against the rest of the Ottoman Empire

until it became quite clear that the Turks were benefiting chiefly by

that exemption, and who, out of respect for the holy places of Islam,

refrained from making that country a theatre of war.

True to the Teutonic tradition, the movement had been laboriously

organised, but lacked psychic insight, for the Turk is too much of a

Tartar and too little of a Moslem to appreciate the Arab mind, and the

German ignored it, rooting with eager, guttural grunts among the

carefully cultivated religious prejudices of Islam like a hog hunting

truffles until whacked out of it by the irate cultivators.

The following incident may serve to illustrate their crude tactics. Soon

after the Turks came into the war the mullah of the principal mosque at

Damascus was told to announce _jihad_ against the British from his

pulpit on the following Friday in accordance with an order from the

Grand Mufti at Stamboul. The poor man appears to have jibbed

considerably and sent his family over the Nejd border to be out of reach

of Turkish persecution. Finally he decided to conform, but when he

climbed the steps of his "minbar" and scanned his congregation he saw a

group of German officers wearing tarboushes with a look of almost

porcine complacency. His fear fell from him in a gust of rage and he

spoke somewhat as follows: "I am ordered to proclaim _jihad_. A _jihad_,

as you know, is a Holy War to protect our Holy Places against infidels.

This being so, what are these infidel _pigs_ doing in our mosque?"

There was a most unseemly scuffle; the Turco-German contingent tried to

seize the mullah; the Arab congregation defended him strenuously from

arrest. In the confusion that worthy man got clear away and joined his

family in Nejd. _Jihad_ is incumbent on all Moslems if against infidel

aggression. We stood on the defensive when the Turks first attacked us

on the Canal, and when we finally overran Palestine and Syria it was in

co-operation with the Arabs, who have more right there than the Turks.

Those who forged the blade of this counterfeit _jihad_ could not temper

it in the flame of religious fervour, and it shattered against the

shield of religious tolerance and good faith: we make mistakes, but can

honestly claim those two virtues.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote A: "The Land of Uz," Macmillan.]

CHAPTER III

ITS STRENGTH AND WEAKNESS

To gauge the strength or weakness of pan-Islam as a world-force we may

best compare it with its great militant rival, the Christian Church,

choosing common ground as the only sound basis of comparison, and

remembering that it is pan-Islam we are examining rather than Islam

itself--the tree, not the root; and though we cannot study the one

without considering the other, Islam has already been extensively

discussed by men better qualified than myself to deal with it: the

requirements of this work only call for comparison so far as the

driving-power of pan-Islam is concerned as a material force.

First of all we must discard common factors. I set the great Shiah

schism against the Catholic Church (omitting the word "Roman" as a

contradiction in terms) and cancel both for the purposes of comparison.

Catholicism, is not, of course, schismatic, otherwise there are points

of resemblance, such as observances of saints and shrines, which have

permeated the other sects to a certain extent; also the degree of

antagonism is about the same. Therefore we can ignore the Catholic

Church in this chapter, and when we are talking of pan-Islam we should

consider it a Sunnite (or Orthodox) movement, and count the Shiites out,

as they do not even recognise the same centre of pilgrimage.

Perhaps the strongest factor in pan-Islam as a political movement or a

world-wide fellowship is the Meccan pilgrimage. I have already alluded

to its cosmopolitan nature in the previous chapter, but never realised

it so much till after the surrender of Jeddah, when stately Bokhariots,

jabbering Javanese, Malays, Chinese, Russians, American citizens and

South Africans were among those who beset me as stranded pilgrims. This

implies a very wide sphere of influence, against which we can only set

the well-known immorality and greed which pilgrims complain of at Mecca;

a huge influx of cosmopolitan visitors to _any_ centre will generally

cause such abuses. On the feast of Arafat there are normally 100,000

pilgrims in the Meccan area who represent 100 million orthodox Moslems

throughout the world, while the actual population of the city is only

50,000.

The Arabic language is another strong bond of brotherhood in Islam. I do

not mean to say that it is generally "understanded of the people," any

more than Latin is throughout the Catholic world; but it is the language

of most Sunnites and is moderately understood in Somaliland, East

Africa, Java and the Malay peninsula as the language of the Koran; in

fact, it is the only written language in Somaliland, and Turkey uses the

script though not the tongue.

The daily observances of prayer, with their simple but obligatory

ceremonial, and the yearly fast for the month of Ramadhan unite Moslems

with the common ties of duty and hardship, as in the comradeship which

sailors and soldiers have for each other throughout the world.

Then, again, there is no colour-line in Islam; a negro may rise to place

and power (he often does), and usually enjoys the intimate confidence of

his master as not readily amenable to local intrigue. Difference of

nationality is not stressed except by the Young Turks, who have slighted

Semitic Moslems to their own undoing. Contrast this attitude with our

Church and estimate the precise amount of Christian brotherhood between

an Orthodox Greek, a Welsh Wesleyan, an Ethiopian priest, a Scotch

Presbyterian, and an Anglican bishop (since the Kikuyu heresy). Even

within the narrow limits of one sect there is nothing like the

fellowship one finds in secular societies. Which is the stronger appeal,

"Anglican communicant" or "Freemason"? Is a cross or the quadrant and

compasses the more potent charm?

Arabs credit us Christians with a much stronger bond of sympathy between

co-religionists than is actually the case. It is true that those who

come into any sort of contact with us realise that there is a distinct

difference in form of worship and sentiment between Catholics (whom they

call _Christyan_) and Protestants (or _Nasara_), but I shall not readily

forget the extraordinary conduct of a Hejazi who boarded us off Jeddah

with some of the effects belonging to the murdered Germans mentioned in

the previous chapter. He must have had the firm conviction that we

Christians would avenge the killing of other Christians by Moslems, for

he merely told me that he had in his possession certain property of the

_Allemani_, and I told him that he would be suitably rewarded on

producing it; I found out later that he had boasted to our ship's

interpreter (a Mussulman) that he was one of the slayers, and it

occurred to me that if that were the case he might be able to give me

further information, or perhaps produce papers of theirs which might

appear valueless to him but would be of interest to us. I interviewed

him on deck and suggested this, reminding him of what he had told the

interpreter, but laying no stress on the deed he had confessed, for it

was outside our jurisdiction and no concern of mine.

"Papers?" he said. "By all means, I will go and fetch them," and

breaking from my light hold of his sleeve he flickered over the rail and

dropped into the sea some thirty feet below. Two armed marines stepped

to the rail with a clatter of breech-bolts and looked inquiringly at me.

Meanwhile my bold murderer was calling on his God, for he wore a full

bandoleer, which was weighing him down. Out darted a fishing-canoe from

under our quarter and made for him, but its occupants took the hint I

conveyed through a megaphone and confined their efforts to saving him

for the duty-cutter to pick up.

He was brought before me dripping wet, with the fear of death in his

eyes. I thought this was due to the foolish risk he had taken, and spoke

in gentle reproof of his conduct, pointing out that if any boat had been

alongside where he leaped he would have met with a bad accident. To my

surprise he fell at my feet and scrabbled at my clean white shoes,

imploring me to spare his life. I put him down as somewhat mad, and

asked "Number One" to put a sentry over him to see that he did not

repeat his attempt to avoid our acquaintance. He clung to me like a

limpet and had to be removed by force, with despairing entreaties for

mercy, disregarding my still puzzled assurances as to his personal

safety. I learned afterwards his true reason for alarm; he thought that

after leaving my presence he would be quietly made away with in

traditional Eastern style.

Another very strong feature of pan-Islam is the consistency of the creed

from which it grows. I do not necessarily imply that Islam itself is

benefited thereby, for consistency sometimes means narrowness, and we

are not considering creeds; but there is no doubt about the dynamic

force of a movement based on a religion which is sure of itself. A

Moslem has one authorised version of the Koran, and only one; his simple

creed is contained in its first chapter and is as short as the Lord's

Prayer, which it somewhat resembles in style. Praising God as the Lord

of the worlds (not only of this world of ours), it attributes to Him

mercy and clemency with supreme power over the Day of Judgment and is an

avowal of worship and service. Its only petition is to be led in the way

of the righteous, avoiding errors that incur His wrath. Contrast this

with the many confusing aspects of Christianity. Perhaps diverse

opinions tend to purify and invigorate a creed, but they certainly do

not strengthen the cohesion of any secular movement based on it.

Then, again, the Moslem conception of God and the hereafter stiffens the

backbone of pan-Islam in adversity. They are taught to believe that He is

_really_ omnipotent and that His actions are beyond criticism--welfare

and affliction being alike acceptable as His will. We, on the other hand,

seem to be developing the theory of a finite God warring against, and

occasionally overcome by, evil, which includes (in this new thesis) human

suffering and sorrow as well as sin. There is a growing idea, pioneered

partly by Mr. H. G. Wells and apparently supported by many of the clergy,

that the acts of God must square with human ideals of mercy or justice,

and as many occurrences do not, the inference is that evil gets the best

of it sometimes. Now the Moslem slogan is "Allah Akbar" (God is Greatest),

and that seems to me a better battle-cry than, for example, "Gott mit

uns," as God will still be great and invincible to Moslems in their

victory or defeat; but the finite idea presumes, in disaster, that you

and your God have been defeated together. It is not my business to

criticise either conception from a religious point of view, but in

mundane affairs it is the former that will make for fighting force,

especially as we still insist that our God is a jealous God, visiting the

sins of the fathers, etc.: surely this is not a human ideal of justice;

the obvious deduction is that our modern Deity is stronger to punish than

protect--hardly an encouraging attribute.

Whether a religion is the better for an organised priesthood or not is

irrelevant to our subject, but the absence of it in Islam certainly

strengthens the pan-Islamic movement, as each Moslem may consider

himself a standard-bearer of his faith, while we are apt to leave too

much to our priests, thus engendering slackness on our part and

meticulous dogma on theirs; both undermine Christian brotherhood. The

fact that priestly stipends seem to the ordinary layman as in inverse

ratio to the duties performed also widens the breach between clergy and

laity, besides sapping clerical _moral_. This is not the particular

feature of any one sect--the reader can supply cases within his own

experience, but here is one that is probably outside it and showing how

widespread the system is. The rank and file of the Greek Orthodox clergy

are notoriously ill-paid. Yet their monastery at Jerusalem costs

LE.15,000 per annum to maintain and pays LE.40,000 annually in clerical

salaries to archbishops and clergy who control the spiritual affairs of

less than fifteen thousand people. It derives LE.30,000 from its

property in Russia, LE.25,000 from the property of the Holy Sepulchre,

and as much again from visitors and other sources; and this in a region

where the Founder of our faith was content to wander with less certainty

of shelter than the wild creatures of the countryside.

Incidentally, the monastery seems to have been unable to curtail its

expenditure during the War, for it has accumulated debts to the amount

of LE.600,000, most of its sources of income having ceased for the time.

I quote from current newspapers. Blame does not necessarily attach to

the monastery or its administrators, who may have done their best to

fulfill their obligations under adverse circumstances; I would merely

draw attention to the incongruity of the whole system as regards a

universal brotherhood based on Christian teaching. There are no such

exotic growths to impede the march of pan-Islam.

So much for the strength of the pan-Islamic movement. Now let us

consider its weak points.

To begin with, the gross abuse of pan-Islam by interested parties for

non-spiritual ends during the War has done the genuine movement harm.

That lying, political appeal to _jihad_ has made thinking Moslems

mistrust the infallibility of organised pan-Islam, of which the

culminating expression is Holy War, one of the most sacred Mussulman

duties if justly invoked. We Christians do not make such mistakes. When

Italy was fighting the Turks in Tripoli the Pope himself warned

Christian soldiers against regarding the campaign as a Crusade, and when

we took Jerusalem we took it side by side with our Mussulman allies and

forthwith placed an orthodox Moslem guard on Omar's mosque. In this

connection it may be of interest to note that the officer commanding a

mixed Christian guard at the Holy Sepulchre was a Jew.

Another source of weakness, so far as a united Moslem world is

concerned, may be found in the antagonistic points of view between

civilised and uncivilised Moslems (I use the attribute in its modern

sense). Uncivilised Moslems view with suspicion and, in fact, derision

the dress and customs of their civilised co-religionists, insisting that

European coats and trousers display the figure indecently and that their

Frankish luxuries and amusements are snares of Eblis. The enlightened

Moslem, on the other hand, regards the tribesman as a _jungliwala_, or

wild man of the woods, derides his illiteracy, and is revolted by the

harsh severity of the old Islamic penal code as practised still in

semi-barbaric Moslem States. Now we Christians are fairly lenient as

regards each other's customs, and still more so with regard to dress

(judging by the garb we tolerate), while we have quite outgrown our old

playful habits of boiling, burning, or torturing our fellow-men except

on the battle-fields of civilised warfare.

Civilisation (as we understand it) is a two-edged weapon and tool

smiting or serving pan-Islam and Christendom, but on the whole it serves

the latter rather than the former, as the superior resources of

Christendom can take fuller advantage of it as a tool or a weapon,

though both turn to scourges when used against each other in battle.

Also its handmaid, Education, though in itself a foe to no religion,

_does_ tend to tone down dogma and engender tolerance, thus minimising

the dynamic force of bigotry in pan-Islam, though consolidating the real

stability of religion on its own base. Moreover, some gifts of

civilisation can do a lot of harm if wrongly used; I refer more

especially to drink, drugs, and dress. Just as hereditary exposure to

the infection of certain diseases is said to confer, by survival of the

fittest, a certain immunity therefrom--for example, consumption among us

Europeans and typhoid among Asiatics--so moral ills seem to affect

humanity to a greater or less extent in inverse proportion to the

temptation in that particular respect which the individual and his

forebears have successfully resisted. The average European and his

ancestors have been accustomed to drink fermented liquor for many

centuries, and in moderation as judged by the standard of his time, but

he has always been taught to avoid opium and has not known the drug for

long. The oriental Moslem, on the other hand, has used opium as a remedy

and prophylactic against malaria for generations, but is strictly

ordered by his creed to consider the consumption, production, gift or

sale of alcohol a deadly sin. In consequence, the European can usually

take alcohol in moderation, but almost invariably slips into a pit of

his own digging when he tries to do the same with opium, while the

oriental Moslem can use opium in moderation (provided that he confines

himself to swallowing it and does not smoke it), but when he drinks,

usually drinks to excess because he has not learned to do otherwise. It

is a melancholy fact that hitherto in countries opened up by our Western

civilisation drink has got in long before education, unless

extraordinary precautions have been taken to prevent it; that is one

reason why Moslem States are so wary of civilised encroachment. As for

drugs other than opium (and far more dangerous), civilised Moslems,

especially in Egypt, are alarmed at the spread of hashish-smoking among

their co-religionists, while the cultured classes, including women-folk,

are taking to cocaine: the material for both vices is supplied from

European sources, mostly Greek. Dress, compared with the other two

demons, is merely a fantastic though mischievous sprite and can be quite

attractive, but it breaks up many a Moslem home when carried to excess

in the harem, as it frequently is in civilised circles, while the

younger men vie with each other in the more flagrant extravagances of

occidental garb: prayers and ablutions do not harmonise with

well-creased trousers and stylish boots any more than a veil does with a

divided skirt. The native Press is always attacking the above abuses,

but they are firmly rooted. All three undermine the pan-Islamic

structure by causing cleavage in public opinion. European dress has

already been mentioned as widening the gap between civilised and

uncivilised Moslems, but it also tends to disintegrate cultured Moslem

communities, for the older men are apt to regard it with suspicion or

downright condemnation. I once asked an eminent and learned Moslem

whether he thought modern European dress impeded regular observance of

prayers and ablutions. He replied, "Perhaps so, but those Moslems who

wear such clothes indicate by so doing that the observances of Islam

have little hold upon them."

All these defects, however, are mere cracks in the inner walls of the

pan-Islamic structure and can be repaired from within, but the Turkish

Government, which represented the Caliphate, and should have considered

the integrity of Islam as a sacred trust, has managed to split the outer

wall and divide the house against itself, just as the unity of

Christendom (such as it was) has been rent asunder by one of its most

prominent exponents. Pan-Islam has received the more serious damage

because the wreckers still hold the Caliphate and the prestige attached

thereto; it is for Moslems (and Moslems only) to decide what action to

take; but in any case, the breach is a serious one and has been much

widened by the action of Turkish troops at the Holy Places. They

actually shelled the Caaba at Mecca (luckily without doing material

damage), and their action in storing high explosives close to the

Prophet's tomb at Medina may have saved them bombardment, but has

certainly not improved their reputation as Moslems. Even before the War

I often heard Yamen Arabs talking of "Turks and Moslems"--a distinctly

damning discrimination--and the situation has not been improved by

Ottoman slackness in religious observances and their inconsistent

national movement.

At the same time, their rule in Arabia will be awkward to replace at

first. I described the Turks in the final chapter of a book[B] published

early in the War as pre-eminently fitted to govern Moslems by

birthright, creed, and temperament, summing them up as individually

gifted but collectively hopeless as administrators because they lacked a

stable and consistent central Government. They have proved the

indictment up to the hilt, but that does not dower any of us Christians

with their inherent qualifications as rulers in Islam. If any of us are

called upon to face fresh responsibilities in this direction, it would

take us all our time to make up for these qualities by tact, sound

administration, and strict observance of local religious prejudice. Even

then there is a Mussulman proverb to this effect: "A Moslem ruler though

he oppress me and not a _kafir_ though he work me weal"--it explains

much apparent ingratitude for benefits conferred.

The lesson we have to learn from pan-Islamic activities of the last

decade or two is that countries which are mainly Moslem should have

Moslem rulers, and that Christian rule, however enlightened and

benevolent, is only permissible where Islam is outnumbered by other

creeds. At the same time, in countries where Christian methods of

civilisation and European capital have been invited we have a right to

control and advise the Moslem ruler sufficiently to ensure the fair

treatment of our nationals and their interests. But with purely Moslem

countries which have expressed no readiness to assimilate the methods of

modern civilisation or to invite outside capital we have no right to

interfere beyond the following limit: if the local authorities allow

foreign traders to operate at their ports their interests should be

safeguarded, if important enough, by consular representation on the

spot, or, if not, by occasional visits of a man-of-war to keep nationals

in touch with their own Government, presuming that the place is too

small to justify any mail-carrying vessel calling there except at very

long intervals.

There should always be a definite understanding as to foreigners

proceeding or residing up-country for any purpose. If the local ruler

discourages but permits such procedure, all we should expect him to do

in case of untoward incidents is to take reasonable action to

investigate and punish, but if he has guaranteed the security of foreign

nationals concerned, he must redeem his pledge in an adequate manner or

take the consequences. There should seldom be occasion for an inland

punitive expedition; in these days, when many articles of seaborne trade

have become, from mere luxuries, almost indispensable adjuncts of native

life in the remotest regions, a maritime blockade strictly enforced

should soon exact the necessary satisfaction.

Such rulers should bear in mind that if they accept an enterprise of

foreign capital they must protect its legitimate operations, just as a

school which has accepted a Government grant has to conform to

stipulated conditions.

Where no such penetration has occurred, all we should concern ourselves

with is that internal trouble in such regions shall not slop over into

territory protected or occupied by us, and this is where our most

serious difficulties will occur in erstwhile Turkish Arabia.

The Turk, with all his faults, could grapple with a difficult situation

in native affairs by drastic methods which might be indefensible in

themselves, but were calculated to obtain definite results. At any rate,

we had a responsible central Government to deal with and one that we

could get at. Now we shall have to handle such situations ourselves or

rely on the local authorities doing so. The former method is costly and

dangerous, yielding the minimum of result to the maximum of effort and

expense, while involving possibilities of trouble which might compromise

our democratic yearnings considerably: the latter alternative

presupposes that we have succeeded in evolving out of the present

imbroglio responsible rulers who are well-disposed to us and prepared to

take adequate action on our representations.

In Syria and Mesopotamia, where communications are good and European

penetration an established fact, there should not be much difficulty,

but in Arabia proper the problem is a very prickly one.

Beginning with Arabia Felix, which includes Yamen, the Aden

protectorate, and the vague, sprawling province of Hadhramaut, we may be

permitted to hope that nothing worse can happen in the Aden protectorate

than has happened already; the remoter Hadhramaut has always looked

after its own affairs and can continue to do so; but Yamen bristles with

political problems which will have to be solved, and solved correctly,

if she is going to be a safe neighbour or a reliable customer to have

business dealings with. Hitherto none of her local rulers have inspired

any confidence in their capacity for initiative or independent action.

During the War the Idrisi, who had long been in revolt against the Turks

in northern Yamen, kept making half-hearted and abortive dabs at

Loheia--like a nervous child playing snapdragon--but his only success

(and temporary at that) was when he occupied the town after the Red Sea

Patrol had shelled the Turks out of it. As for the Imam, he has been

sitting on a very thorny fence ever since the Turks came into the War.

We have been in touch with him for a long time, but all he has done up

to date is to wobble on a precarious tripod supported by the opposing

strains of Turks, tribesmen, and British. Now one leg of the tripod has

been knocked away he has yet to show if he can maintain stability on his

own base, and, if so, over what area. The undeniable fighting qualities

of the Yamen Arab, which might be a useful factor in a stable

government, will merely prove a nuisance and a menace under a weak

_regime_, and tribal trouble will always be slopping over into our Aden

sphere of influence. Then the question will arise, What are we going to

do about it? We cannot bring the Yamenis to book by blockading their

coast and cutting off caravan traffic with Aden, because, in view of our

trade relations with the country by sea and land, we should only be

cutting our nose off to spite our face. Moreover, the punishment would

fall chiefly on the respectable community, traders, the cultured

classes, etc., to whom seaborne trade is essential, while it would

hardly affect the wild tribesmen, except as regards ammunition, and to

prevent them getting what they wanted through the Hejaz is outside the

sphere of practical politics.

In the Hejaz itself we can at least claim that authority is suitably

represented and accessible to us. Before the War we kept a British

consul at Jeddah with an Indian Moslem vice-consul who went up to Mecca

in the pilgrim season. A responsible consular agent (Moslem of course)

to reside at Medina, also another to understudy the Jeddah vice-consul

when he went to Mecca and to look after the Yenbo pilgrim traffic, would

safeguard the interests of our nationals, who enormously outnumber the

pilgrims of any other nation. Further interference with the Hejaz,

unless invited, would be unjustifiable.

Trouble for us does not lie in the Hejaz itself, but in its possible

expansion beyond its powers of absorption, or, in homely metaphor, if it

bites off more than it can chew. There is a certain tendency just now to

overrate Hejazi prowess in war and policy; in fact, King Husein is often

alluded to vaguely as the "King of Arabia," and there is a sporadic crop

of ill-informed articles on this and other Arabian affairs in the

English Press. One of the features of the War as regards this part of

the world is the extraordinary and fungus-like growth of "Arabian

experts" it has produced, most of whom have never set foot in Arabia

itself, while the few now living who have acquired real first-hand

knowledge of any part of the Arabian peninsula before the War may be

counted on the fingers of one hand. Yet the number of people who rush

into print with their opinions on the most complex Arabian affairs would

astonish even the Arabs if they permitted themselves to show surprise at

anything. These opinions differ widely, but have one attribute in

common--their emphatic "cock-sureness." Each one presents the one and

only solution of the whole Arabian problem according to the facet which

the writer has seen, and there are many facets. They are amusing and

even instructive occasionally, but there is a serious side to

them--their crass empiricism. Each writer presents (quite honestly,

perhaps) his point of view of one or two facets in the rough-cut,

many-sided and clouded crystal of Arabian politics without considering

its possible bearing on other parts of the peninsula or even other

factors in the district he knows or has read about. The net result is an

appallingly crude patchwork, no one piece harmonising with another,

and, in view of the habit Government has formed in these cases of

accepting empirical opinions if they are shouted loud enough or at close

range, there is more than a possibility that our Arabian policy may

resemble such a crazy quilt. If it does, we shall have to harvest a

thistle-crop of tribal and intertribal trouble throughout the Arabian

peninsula, and the seed-down of unrest will blow all over Syria and

Mesopotamia just at the most awkward time when reconstruction and sound

administration are struggling to establish themselves. Weeds grow

quicker and stronger than useful plants in any garden.

Empirical statements sound well and look well in print, but they are no

use whatever as sailing directions in the uncharted waters of Arabian

politics. Putting them aside, the following facts are worth bearing in

mind when the future of Arabia is discussed.

The Hejazi troops were ably led by the Sharifian Emirs and Syrian

officers of note, and had the co-operation of the Red Sea flotilla on

the coast and British officers of various corps inland to cut off

Medina, the last place of importance held by the Turks after the summer

of 1916. Yet the town held out until long after the armistice, and its

surrender had eventually to be brought about by putting pressure on the

Turkish Government at Stamboul. On the other hand, the two great

provinces which impinge upon the Hejaz, namely, Nejd and Yamen, have

given ample proof that they can hammer the Turks without outside

assistance. The Nejdis not only cleared their own country of Ottoman

rule, but drove the Turks out of Hasa a year or two before the War,

while the Yamenis have more than once hurled the Turks back on to the

coast, and the rebels of northern Yamen successfully withstood a Hejazi

and Turkish column from the north and another Turkish column from the

south. The inference is that if the limits of Hejazi rule are to be much

extended there had better be a clear understanding with their neighbours

and also some definite idea of the extent to which we are likely to be

involved in support of our _protege_.

I know that many otherwise intelligent people have been hypnotised by

the prophecy in "The White Prophet":

"The time is near when the long drama that has been played

between Arabs and Turks will end in the establishment of a vast

Arabic empire, extending from the Tigris and the Euphrates

valley to the Mediterranean and from the Indian Ocean to

Jerusalem, with Cairo as its Capital, the Khedive as its

Caliph, and England as its lord and protector."

While refraining from obvious and belated criticism of a prophecy which

the march of events has trodden out of shape, and which could never have

been intended as a serious contribution to our knowledge of Arabs and

their politics, we must admit that the basic idea of centralising

Arabian authority has taken strong hold of avowed statecraft in England.

It would, of course, simplify our relations with Arabia and the

collateral regions of Mesopotamia and Syria if such authority could

establish itself and be accepted by the other Arabian provinces to the

extent of enforcing its enactments as regards their foreign affairs,

_i.e._, relations with subjects (national or protected) of European

States.

If such authority could be maintained without assistance from us other

than a subsidy and the occasional supply, to responsible parties, of

arms and ammunition, it would satisfy all reasonable requirements, but

if we had to intervene with direct force we should find ourselves

defending an unpopular _protege_ against the united resentment of

Arabia.

I believe there is no one ruler or ruling clique in Arabia that could

wield such authority, and my reason for saying so is that the experiment

has been tried repeatedly on a small scale during the twenty years or so

that I have been connected with the country and has failed every time.

Toward the close of last century a sultan of Lahej who had always

claimed suzerainty over his turbulent neighbours, the Subaihi, had to

enter that vagabond tribeship to enforce one of his decrees, and got

held up with his "army" until extricated by Aden diplomacy at the price

of his suzerain sway. His successor still claimed a hold over an

adjacent clan of the Subaihi known as the Rigai, but when one of our

most promising political officers was murdered there, and the murderer

sheltered by the clan, he was unable to obtain redress or even assist us

adequately in attempting to do so. Early in this century Aden was

involved in a little expedition against Turks and Arabs because one of

her protected sultans (equipped with explosive and ammunition) could not

deal with a small Arab fort himself. This is the same sultanate which

let the Turks through against us in the summer of 1915 and whose ruler

was prominent in the sacking of Lahej. I have already alluded, in

Chapter II, to the inadequacy of the Lahej sultan on that occasion, yet

Aden had bolstered up his authority in every possible way and had relied

on him and his predecessor for years to act as semi-official suzerain

and go-between for other tribes--a withered stick which snapped the

first time it was leant upon. I could also point to the Imam of Yamen,

strong in opposition to the Turks as a rallying point of tribal revolt,

but weak and vacillating on the side of law and order. I might go on

giving instances _ad nauseam_, but here is one more to clinch the

argument, and it is typical of Arab politics. Aden had just cause of

offence against a certain reigning sultan of the Abd-ul-Wahid in her

eastern sphere of influence. He had intrigued with foreign States,

oppressed his subjects, persecuted native trade and played the dickens

generally. Therefore Aden rebuked him (by letter) and appointed a

relative of his to be sultan and receive his subsidy. The erring but

impenitent potentate reduced his relative to such submission that he

would sign monthly receipts for the subsidy and meekly hand over the

cash: these were his only official acts, as he retired into private life

in favour of Aden's _bete noir_, who flourished exceedingly until he

blackmailed caravans too freely and got the local tribesmen on his

track.

When we also consider how early in Islamic history the Caliphate split

as a temporal power, and the difficulty which even the early Caliphs

(with all their prestige) had to keep order in Arabia, it should

engender caution in experiments toward even partial centralisation of

control: apart from the fact that they might develop along lines

diverging from the recognised principles of self-determination in small

States, they could land us into a humiliating _impasse_ or an armed

expedition.

We parried the Turco-German efforts to turn pan-Islam against us, thanks

to our circumspect attitude with regard to Moslems, but a genuine

movement based on any apparent aggression of ours in Arabia proper might

be a more serious matter.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote B: "_Arabia Infelix_," Macmillan.]

CHAPTER IV

MOSLEM AND MISSIONARY

Having weighed the influence which pan-Islam can wield as a popular

movement, we will now consider the human factors which have built it up.

Just as we used Christendom as a test-gauge of pan-Islam, so now we will

compare the activities of Moslems (who do their own proselytising) with

those of Christian missionaries, grouping with them our laity so far as

their example may be placed in the scales for or against the influence

of Christendom.

To do this with the breadth of view which the question demands we will

examine these human factors throughout the world wherever they are

involved in opposition to each other. We shall thus avoid the confined

outlook which teaches Europeans in Asia Minor to look on Turks as

typical Moslems to the exclusion of all others, or makes Anglo-Egyptians

talk of country-folk in Egypt as Arabs and their language as the

standard of Arabic, or engenders the Anglo-Indian tendency of regarding

a scantily-dressed paramount chief from the Aden hinterland as an

obscure _jungliwala_ because, in civilised India, an eminent Moslem

dresses in accordance with our conception of the part.

We can leave the western hemisphere out of this inquiry, for though the

greatest missionary effort against Islam is engendered in the United

States, it manifests itself in the eastern hemisphere, and the Moslem

population in both the Americas is too small and quiescent to be

considered a factor.

We will begin with England and work eastward to the edge of the Moslem

world.

At first glance the idea of England as an arena where two great

religious forces meet seems rather far-fetched, but there is more Moslem

activity in some of our English towns than people imagine. Turning over

some files of the _Kibla_ (a Meccan newspaper), one comes across

passages like the following:--

"The honourable Cadi Abdulla living in London reports that six

noted English men and women have embraced the Moslem religion

in the cities of Oxford, Leicester, etc. The meritorious Abdul

Hay Arab has established a new centre in London for calling to

Islam, and the Mufti Muhammad Sadik has delivered a speech in

English in the mosque on 'the object of human life which can

only be attained through Moslem guidance.' Many English men and

women were present and put questions which were answered in a

conclusive manner. At the close of the meeting a young lady of

good family embraced Islam and was named Maimuna."

Then we have the scholarly and temperate addresses of Seyid Muhammad

Rauf and others before the Islamic Society in London; they are marked by

considerable shrewdness and breadth of view, and though their debatable

points may present a few fallacies, their effective controversion

requires unusual knowledge of affairs in Moslem countries.

It is not, however, the activities of Moslems in England which damage

the prestige of Christendom; it is the behaviour of English alleged

Christians themselves. Every missionary, political officer, tutor, or

even the importer of a native servant--in short, anyone who has been

responsible for an oriental in England--knows what I mean. I do not say

that London (for example) is any more vicious than Delhi or Cairo or

Cabul or Constantinople or any other large Moslem centre, but vice is

certainly more obvious in London to the casual observer, even allowing

for the fact that many comparatively harmless customs of ours (such as

women wearing low-necked dresses and dancing with men) are apt to shock

Moslems until they learn that occidental habit has created an atmosphere

of innocence in such cases which even bunny-hugging has failed to

vitiate.

The social life of London in all its grades and phases operates more

widely for good or ill on Christian prestige among Moslems than

Londoners can possibly imagine. From the young princeling of some native

State sauntering about Clubland with his bear-leader to the lascar off a

P. and O. boat, among East London drabs, or the middle-class Mohammedan

student who compares the civic achievements that surround him with the

dingy dining-room of a Bloomsbury boarding-house, all are apostles of

life in London as it seems to them. I have had the hospitality of

"family hotels" in the Euston Road portrayed to me in the crude but

vivid imagery of the East when spooring boar in Southern Morocco with a

native tracker who had been one of a troupe of Soosi jugglers earning

good pay at a West-end music-hall, and I once overheard a young

_effendi_ explaining to his _confreres_ in a Cairo cafe exactly the sort

of company that would board your hansom when leaving "Jimmy's" in days

of yore.

As for the news of London and its ways, as conveyed by its daily Press,

educated Egyptians were better posted therein than most Englishmen in

Cairo during the War, as their clubs and private organisations

subscribed largely to the London dailies, which entered Egypt free of

local censorship, while Anglo-Egyptian newspapers were more strictly

censored than their vernacular or continental contemporaries, as they

presented no linguistic difficulties, but could be dealt with direct and

not through an understrapper.

Missionaries would have us judge Islam by the open improprieties and

abuses which occur at Mecca, Kerbela, and other great Moslem centres.

How should we like Christianity to be judged by the public behaviour of

certain classes in London or other big towns? Remember, it is always the

scum which floats on top and the superficial vice or indecorum that

strike a foreign observer.

It is not my mission to preach--I am merely pointing out a flaw in our

harness which causes a lot of administrative trouble out East. It is

difficult to check the hashish habit in Egypt when the average educated

_effendi_ reads of drug-scandals in London with mischievous avidity, and

the endeavours of a well-meaning Education Department to implant ideals

of sturdy manhood are handicapped when the students batten on the weird

and unsavoury incidents which are dished up _in extenso_ by London

journalism from time to time. Such matters do no harm to a public with

a sense of proportion, but the _effendi_ is in the position of a

schoolboy who has caught his master tripping and means to make the most

of it. He assimilates and disseminates the idea that cocaine is as

easily procurable as a cocktail in London clubs, and that the Black Mass

is at least as common as the _danse de ventre_ in Cairo.

We can leave England for our Eastern tour with the conclusion that Islam

is welcome to any proselytes it makes there, but that the gravest slur

on Christian prestige is cast by our own conduct.

There is only one bone of contention between Moslems and missionaries in

Europe now that Turkey and Russia are knocked out of the ring of current

politics. Is St. Sophia to remain a mosque or revert to its original

purpose as a Christian church? Whatever may be Turkish opinion on the

subject, the tradition of Islam is definite enough. When the Caliph Omar

entered Jerusalem in triumph, after Khaled had defeated the hosts of

Heraclius east of Jordan, he withstood the importunate entreaties of his

followers to pray in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, saying that if he

did so the building would _de facto_ become a mosque, and such a wrong

to Christianity was against the ordinance and procedure of the Prophet.

It is worthy of note that Christians were not molested at Jerusalem

until after the Seljouk Turks wrested the Holy City from the moribund

Arabian Caliphate in 1076: their persecution and the desecration of

sacred places by the Turks brought about the first Crusade in 1096.

Again it was the Ottoman Turks who stormed Constantinople and turned

St. Sophia into a mosque. According to the orthodox tradition of Islam,

once a church always a church. When the ex-Khedive had the chance of

reacquiring the site of All Saints', Cairo, owing to the increasing

noise of traffic in the vicinity, he contemplated building a

cinema-theatre there (for he had a shrewd business mind), but he was

roundly told by Moslem legalists that it was out of the question. Even

if the Turks urge right of conquest, victorious Christendom can claim

that too, and if they allege length of tenure as a mosque in support of

their case they put themselves out of court, as St. Sophia has been a

church for more than nine centuries and a mosque for less than five.

If Turkey is allowed to remain in Europe at all it will be on

sufferance. Even in Asia Minor signs are not wanting that Turkish rule

will be pruned, clipped and trained considerably, as humanity will stand

its rampant luxuriance of blood and barbarity no longer. The Young

Turks were given every chance to consolidate their national aspirations

and have achieved national suicide. One may feel sorry for the patient,

sturdy peasantry and the non-political cultured classes who have been

coerced or cajoled into fighting desperately in a cause that meant

calamity for them whether they won or lost; but a nation gets the rulers

it deserves and must answer for their acts.

Asia Minor will probably be more accessible as a mission-field in due

course. The Moslem Turk is not amenable to conversion; in fact, during a

quarter of a century's wandering in the East I have never met a Turkish

convert. The American Protestant Mission will probably be well to the

fore in this area in view of its excellent work on behalf of the

Armenians and other distressed Christians during the War. Just as it has

concentrated its principal energies on the Copts in Egypt, so it may

with advantage devote itself to the education and "uplift" of the

Armenians, and if its activities are as successful as with the Copts,

even the Armenians cannot but approve, for the more enlightened

individuals of that harassed and harassing little nation admit that the

Armenian character could be considerably improved, and that, though

their hideous persecution is indefensibly damnable, their covetous

instincts and parasitic activities are an incentive to maltreatment.

One of the most difficult minor problems of reconstruction in Eastern

Europe and Asia Minor will be how to safeguard the interests and modify

the provocative activities of such subject-races as the Jews and the

Armenians where established among ill-controlled nations and numerically

inferior, though intellectually superior, to them. With their natural

gift for intrigue and finance, they repay public persecution and

oppression by undermining the administration and battening on the

resources of their unwilling foster-country until active dislike becomes

actual violence and outbursts of brutish rage yield ghastly results.

Deportation is not only tyrannically harsh but impracticable, for unless

they were dumped to die in the waste places of the earth, which is

unthinkable, some other nation must receive them, and even the most

philanthropic Government would hesitate to upset its economic conditions

by admitting unproductive hordes of sweated labour and skilled

exploiters. There are only two logical alternatives to such an

_impasse_. One is to treat such subject-races so well that they may be

trusted not to use their peculiar abilities against the interests of

their adoptive country, which would then be their interests too, and

the other is to exterminate them, which is inhuman. There is no middle

course.

It is a salutary but humiliating fact that we incur the worst human ills

by our lack of human charity. We starved and over-crowded our poor till

they bred consumption, and we enslaved negroes till they degenerated our

Anglo-Saxon sturdiness of character, then plunged a great nation into

civil war, and have finally become one of its most serious social

problems. So the Jews were debarred from liberal pursuits and privileges

until they concentrated on finance and commerce, being also persecuted

until they perfected their defensive organisation. The consequence is

that they are individually formidable in those activities and

collectively invincible. Similarly the Turks harried the Armenians to

their own undoing with even less excuse, for those ill-used people were

certainly not interlopers, and so far from ameliorating their condition

in the course of time, as we have done with the Jews, the Turks went

from bad to worse till they culminated in atrocities which no

provocation can palliate or humanity condone.

But to return to Asia Minor; there the Armenians were first on the

ground, and yet the Moslems of Armenia outnumber them by three to one.

Any sound form of government would have to give equal rights, but it

would have to be strong and farseeing to prevent the greedy exploitation

and savage reprisals which such conditions would otherwise evolve.

On entering Asia we shall find a somewhat similar problem confronting

the administration in Syria and Palestine. Here we have several mixed

races and at least three distinct creeds--Christianity, Islam, and

Judaism.

The Zionist movement looks promising, everyone concerned seems to be in

accord, and a Jew millennium looms large in the offing, but----. In

Palestine there are normally about 700,000 Moslems and Christians (the

latter a very small minority) to 150,000 Jews. The lure of the Promised

Land will presumably increase the Jewish population enormously, but they

will still be very much in the minority unless the country is

over-populated. The Zionist organisation will naturally try to select

for emigration agriculturists, mechanics, and craftsmen generally to

develop the resources of the country, but that is easier said than done.

If Palestine, in addition to the sentimental aspect, is to be a refuge

and asylum for the downtrodden and persecuted Jews of Eastern Europe,

there would be very few farmers among _that_ lot--except tax-farmers.

Even in England, where he labours under no landowning disability, the

Jew thinks that farming for a living is a mug's game and confines his

agricultural activities to week-ends in the autumn with a "hammerless

ejector" and a knickerbocker suit. As for mechanics and skilled labour

generally, such Jews as take to it usually excel in such work and do

very well where they are. The bulk of the immigrant population--unless

Palestine is going to be artificially colonised without regard for the

necessitous claims of the very people who should be drawn off

there--will be indigent artisans, small shopkeepers, shop assistants,

weedy unemployables, and a sprinkling of shrewd operators on the

look-out for prey. If the scheme is going to be run entirely on

philanthropic lines (and there are ample resources and charity at the

back of it to do so) the Zionists will be all right, and will, perhaps,

improve immensely in the next generation under the influence of an

open-air life--if they adopt it; but the resident majority of Moslems

and Christians will not take too kindly to their new compatriots, while

the Palestine Jews are already carping at the idea of so many trade

rivals and accusing them of not being orthodox. None of this ill-feeling

need matter in the long run with a firm but benevolent government, but

the authorities will have to evolve some legislation to check

profiteering and over-exploitation, or there will be trouble. It is not

only the new-comers who will want curbing, but the present population.

During the War the flagrant profiteering of Jew and Christian operators

in Palestine and Syria did much to accentuate the appalling distress and

was the more disgraceful compared with the magnificent efforts of the

American and Anglican Churches to relieve the situation. The Jews nearly

incurred a pogrom by their operations, which were only checked by a

wealthy Syrian in Egypt starting a co-operative venture of low-priced

foodstuffs and necessities with the support of the British authorities.

As for the local Syrians, some of them were even worse. French and

British officers speak of wealthy Syrians (presumably Christian,

certainly not Moslem) giving many and sumptuous balls at Beyrout, at

which they lapped Austrian champagne while their wives, blazing in

diamonds, whirled with Hunnish officers in the high-pressure,

double-action German waltz. And this with thousands of their compatriots

starving in the streets and little naked children banding together to

drive pariah dogs with stones from the street offal they were worrying,

if perchance it might yield a meal. Meanwhile decent Anglo-Saxon

Christendom was battling in that very town under adverse conditions to

succour human destitution which had been largely caused by the callous

operations of these soulless parasites. The Christians of Syria have no

monopoly of such scandals. Yet there are otherwise intelligent people

who speak of modern Christianity as an automatic promoter of ethics, and

have the effrontery to try to thrust it on the East as a moral panacea.

It is human ideals which make or mar a soul when once the seed of any

sound religion has been sown, and they depend upon environment and

climate more than our spiritual pastors admit; otherwise, why this

missionary activity among oriental Christians? If you try to grow garden

flowers in the rich, rank irrigation soil of the Nile valley they

flourish luxuriantly, but soon develop a marked tendency to revert to

their wild type, and it is permissible to suppose that human character

is even more sensitive to its mental and physical surroundings. Any

observant teacher of oriental youth will tell you that the promise of

their precocious ability is seldom fulfilled by their maturity. Even the

"country-born" children of British parents are considered precocious at

their preparatory school in England, and, if not sent home to be

educated, are apt to fall short of their parents' intellectual and

moral standard in later years. The Mamelukes knew what they were about

when they kidnapped hardy Albanian youths to carry on their rule in

Egypt and passed over their own progeny. Kingsley has shown us in

"Hypatia" what the Nile valley did for the Christian Church.

It is not a question of Jew, Christian, or Moslem that the

administrative authorities in Syria and Palestine will have to consider

beyond ensuring that each shall follow his religion unmolested. They

will have to defend the many from the machinations of the few and the

few from the violent reprisals of the many. It is statecraft that is

wanted, not politics or religious dogma.

In Mesopotamia there has not been much missionary effort hitherto, and

there is not a good case for exploiting it as a missionary field beyond

certain limits. The riparian townsfolk are respectable people of some

education and grasp of their own affairs, and the country-folk are a

harum-scarum set of scallywags who used to attack Turks or British

indifferently, whichever happened to be in difficulties for the moment.

They are best left to the secular arm for some time to come. Medical

missions, staffed by both sexes, could do good work at urban centres,

and a few river steamers, or even launches, would extend their efforts

considerably.

We now come to Arabia itself, "the Peninsula of the Arabs," where

orthodox Islam has its strongholds and missionary enterprise is not

encouraged.

Geographers differ somewhat as to what constitutes Arabia proper, but

for the purposes of modern practical politics it may be considered as

all the peninsula south of a line from the head of the Gulf of Akaba to

the head of the Persian Gulf, and consisting of Nejd, the Hejaz,[C]

Asir, Yamen, Aden protectorate, Hadhramaut and Oman. Each of these

divisions should be dealt with separately in considering Arabian

politics nowadays, and it will be well for the "mandatories" concerned

if further sub-divisions do not complicate matters; I omit the

sub-province of Hasa (once a dependency of the Turkish _pashalik_ at

Bussora) because, since the Nejdi _coup d'etat_ in 1912, the Emir ibn

Saoud will probably control its policy _vis-a-vis_ of missionaries and

Europeans generally, though the Sheikh of Koweit may expect to be

consulted.

Nejd comes first as we move southward: impinging as it does on Syria,

Mesopotamia, and the Hejaz, its politics are involved in theirs to a

certain extent and its affairs require careful handling. It is certainly

no field for unrestrained missionary effort, but there is no reason why

a medical mission should not be posted at Riadh if the Emir is willing.

There are two rival houses in Nejd--the ibn Saoud and ibn Rashid, the

former pro-British and the latter (hitherto) pro-Turk; Emir Saoud held

ascendancy before the War and should be able to maintain it now that

Turco-German influence is a thing of the past. He is an enlightened,

energetic man and was a close friend of our gallant "political," the

late Captain Shakespeare, who was killed there early in the War during

an engagement between the two rival houses. The question of missionary

enterprise in Nejd could well be put before the Emir for consideration

on its merits. Such procedure may seem weak to an out-and-out

missionary, but even he would hesitate to keep poultry in another man's

garden, even for economic purposes, without consulting him. Fowls and

missionaries are useful and even desirable in a suitable environment,

otherwise they can be a nuisance.

Next in order as we travel is the Hejaz, where Islam started on its

mission to harry exotic creeds and nations, until its conquering

progress was checked decisively by reinvigorated Christendom. In

missionary parlance, Arabia generally is referred to as "a Gibraltar of

fanaticism and pride which shuts out the messenger of Christ," and it

must be admitted that the Hejaz has hitherto justified this description

to a certain extent. Even at Jeddah Christians were only just tolerated

before the War, and I found it advisable, when exploring its tortuous

bazars, to wear a tarboosh, which earned me the respectful salutations

then accorded to a Turk. The indigenous townsfolk of Jeddah are the

"meanest" set of Moslems I have ever met--I use the epithet in its

American sense, as indicating a blend of currishness and crabbedness.

They cringed to the Turk when the braver Arabs of the south were

hammering the oppressor in Asir and Yamen, but, like pariahs, were ready

to fall on them and their women and children when they had surrendered

after a gallant struggle, overwhelmed by an intensive bombardment from

the sea. The alien Moslems resident in Jeddah--especially the

Indians--are not a bad lot, but there is an atmosphere of intolerance

brooding over the whole place which even affects Jeddah harbour. I

remember being shipmate in 1913 with some eight hundred pilgrims from

Aden and the southern ports of the Red Sea. As we were discharging them

off Jeddah, a plump and respectable Aden merchant whom I knew by sight,

but who did not know me in the guise I then wore, was gazing in rapt

enthusiasm at sun-scorched Jeddah, which, against the sterile country

beyond, looked like a stale bride-cake on a dust heap. "A sacred land,"

he crooned. "A blessed land where pigs and Christians cannot live."

Incidentally he made a very good living out of Christians and was

actually carrying his gear in a pigskin valise.

At the same time, it is absurd for missionaries to aver of Christians at

Jeddah that "even those who die in the city are buried on an island at

sea." The Christian cemetery lies to the south of the town (we had to

dislodge the Turks from it with shrapnel during the fighting), and the

only island is a small coral reef just big enough to support the ruins

of a nondescript tenement once used for quarantine. No one could be

buried there without the aid of dynamite and a cold chisel. Presumably

missionary report has confused Jeddah with the smaller pilgrim-port of

Yenbo, where there are an island and a sandy spit with a Sheikh's tomb

and a select burial-ground for certain privileged Moslems of the holy

man's family.

The worst indictment of Jeddah (and Mecca too, for that matter) is made

by the pilgrims themselves, though some of it may be exaggerated by men

smarting under the extortions of pilgrim-brokers.

A pious Moslem once averred in my presence that the pilgrim-brokers of

Jeddah were, in themselves, enough to bring a judgment on the place,

and that trenchant opinion is not without foundation. Even to the

unprejudiced eye of a travelled European they present themselves as a

class of blatant bounders battening on the earnest fervour of their

co-religionists and squandering the proceeds on dissipation. I have more

than once been shipmate with a gang of them, and it is at sea that they

cast off such restraint as the critical gaze of other Moslems might

impose. As sumptuous first-class passengers they lounge about the deck

in robes of tussore, rich silks and fancy waistcoats, though out of

deference to their religious prejudice and Christian table-manners they

usually mess by themselves. After dinner they play vociferous poker in

the saloon for cut-throat stakes, evading the captain's veto by using

tastefully designed little fish in translucent colours to represent

heavy cash, and these they invoke from time to time "for luck." As it is

usually sweltering weather, the occidental whiskey-and-soda and the

aromatic _mastic_ of the Levant are much in evidence, and thus three of

Islam's gravest injunctions are set at naught. Their chief fault, to a

broad-minded sportsman, is that they lack self-control, whatever their

luck may be. I have heard an ill-starred gambler bemoaning his losses

with the cries of a stricken animal, and they are still more offensive

as winners.

In Mecca such open breaches of the Islamic code are not tolerated, but

there are other lapses which neither Moslem nor Christian can condone.

It is unfair and out of date to quote Burton's indictment of Meccan

morals, nor have we any right to judge the city by its behaviour soon

after its freedom from the Turkish yoke, when it may have been suffering

from reaction after nervous tension; but, unless the bulk of respectable

Moslem opinion is at fault, there is still much in the administration of

Mecca which cries for reform. Harsh measures may have been necessary at

first, but to maintain a private prison like the _Kabu_ in the state it

is can redound to no ruler's credit, and for prominent officials to

cultivate an "alluring walk" and even practise it in the _tawaf_ or

circumambulation of the holy Caaba is beyond comment.

Also the mental standard of officialdom is low, since Syrians of

education and training do not seem to be attracted by the Hejaz service

for long, and local men of position and ability are said to have been

passed over as likely to be formidable as intriguers.

It may be reasonably urged that it is difficult to improvise a Civil

Service on the spur of the moment, and it is permissible to anticipate a

better state of affairs now that war conditions are being superseded. At

the same time it is no use blinking the fact that reform is indicated at

Mecca if that sacred city is to harmonise with its high mission as the

religious centre of the Islamic world, and this affects our numerous

Moslem fellow-countrymen; otherwise the domestic affairs of the Hejaz

are not our concern.

The Hejaz has been very much to the fore lately, and ill-informed or

biassed opinion has developed a tendency to credit it with a greater

part in Arabian and Syrian affairs than it has played, can play, or

should be encouraged to play. Its intolerant tone has, presumably, been

modified by co-operation with the civilised forces of militant

Christendom, but the new kingdom has got to regenerate itself a good

deal before it can cope with wider responsibilities. Emir Feisal is, no

doubt, an enlightened prince, but one swallow does not make a summer,

and Hejazi troops have not yet evolved enough _moral_ to dominate and

control a more formidable breed or be trusted with the peace and

welfare of a more civilised population, especially where there are large

non-Moslem communities. There has been a great deal of nonsense talked

and written about their invincible fighting prowess. They accompanied

the Egyptian Expeditionary Force in much the same way as the jackal is

said to accompany the lion, with a reversionary interest in his kill,

and their faint-hearted fumbling with the Turkish defences outside

Jeddah was obvious to any observer. They are what they have been since

the fiery self-sacrificing enthusiasm of early Islam died down and left

them with the half-warm embers of their racial greed to become

hereditary spoilers of the weak, instinctively shunning a doubtful

fight. In guerilla warfare, leavened by British officers, they have

shown an aptitude for taking advantage of a situation, but they cannot

stand punishment and will not face the prospect of it if they can help

it. Their own leaders knew that well enough when they refrained from

taking Medina by assault, bombardment being out of the question, as

buildings of the utmost sanctity would have been inevitably damaged or

destroyed.

Prince Feisal has, in a published interview with a representative of the

Press, disclaimed all imperialistic ambitions for the Hejaz, but merely

demanded Arab independence in what was once the Ottoman Empire. That

being assured, the new kingdom will be able to devote its energies to

internal affairs, and the excellent impression made by the Hejazi prince

in Europe should be a favourable augury of the future.

The missionary question should be left to the reigning house for

decision; it is not fair to hamper the Hejaz with unnecessary

complications, and to allow active missionary propaganda at a

pilgrim-port like Jeddah is asking for trouble, apart from the flagrant

violation of religious sentiment. Imagine Catholic feeling if an

enterprising Moslem mission were established at Lourdes. Tact and

expediency are just as necessary in religious as in secular affairs--at

least so St. Paul has taught us; but the modern missionary is too apt to

regard these qualities in Christianity as insincerity and the lack of

them in Islam as fanaticism.

South of the Hejaz lies that rather vague area known as Asir. For

geographical purposes we may consider it as the country between two

parallels of latitude drawn through the coastal towns of Lith and

Loheia, with the Red Sea on the west and an ill-defined inland border

merging eastward into the desert plateau of Southern Nejd. Politically,

it is that territory of Western Arabia between the Hejaz and Yamen in

which the Idrisi has more control than anyone since his successful

revolt against the Turks a year or two before the War. In all

probability its northern districts with Lith will go to the Hejaz, and

the southern ones with Loheia to the Idrisi; but Western diplomacy will

be well advised to leave those two rulers to settle it between

themselves and the local population, especially inland, as tribal

boundaries between semi-nomadic and pastoral people are not for

intelligent amateurs to trifle with. Nor should the missionary be

encouraged; Asir is not a suitable field for his activities, and the

trouble he would probably cause is out of all proportion to the good he

could possibly do. The Asiri is a frizzy-haired fanatic with a short

temper and a serious disposition, addicted to sword-play and the

indiscriminate use of firearms. I doubt if he would see the humour of

missionary logic. As for the Idrisi himself, he is a tall, well set up

man of negroid aspect (being of Moorish and Soudani descent), and has

shown shrewdness as an administrator, though his operations in the War

have lacked "punch." He is very orthodox, and from what I know of him I

should not say that religious tolerance was his strong point. His

capital is at Sabbia, in the maritime foot-hills, with a very trying

climate. Asir might suit the naturalist or explorer who could adapt

himself to his environment and respect local prejudice. No one has yet

entered the country in either capacity, but, from what has been told me

before the War by intelligent Turkish officers who campaigned there, I

think that the birds and smaller mammals would repay research, while the

great Dawasir valley and other geographical problems inland might be

investigated with advantage under the _aegis_ of local chiefs. All that

is required, besides the necessary scientific knowledge and Arabic, is a

certain amount of perseverance and resolution blended with a reasonable

regard for other people's convictions. Most Arabian expeditions fail

through lack of time spent in preliminary steps. I have tripped up in

that way myself, but it was owing to the restrictions of a paternal

Government, and not through lack of patience. Before I started serious

exploration in the Aden hinterland I spent a year on the littoral plain

getting in touch with the people and mastering the dialect. Any success

I may have had up-country was due to the foundation I laid in those

early days, and it was not until the Aden authorities closed their

sphere of influence against exploration in general and myself in

particular that my expeditions began to miss fire, as I had to land at

remote places along the coast and hasten up-country before their

fostering care could set the tribes on me. He who would explore Asir

should take a Khedivial mail steamer from Suez to Jeddah, and there show

his credentials and explain his purpose to his consul and the local

authorities. The Idrisi has an agent there, and it should not be

difficult to pick up an Asiri dhow returning down the coast to Gizan,

which is the port for Sabbia. He would have to stay there until he got

the Idrisi's permit and an escort, without which he would be held up to

a certainty. In any case, no such enterprise need be contemplated until

Asiri affairs have settled down a good deal.

In Yamen proper it should be feasible to travel again within certain

limits as soon as the Imam can come to an understanding with the tribal

chiefs. There is not much left for the explorer or naturalist to do,

unless he goes very far inland toward the great central desert, which

project is not likely to be encouraged by the local authorities. There

is, however, a possible field for the mineralogist and prospector east

and south-east of Sanaa, which area also contains Sabaean ruins and

inscriptions of interest to the archaeologist.

The northern boundary of Yamen may be said nowadays to trend north-east

from Loheia inland through highland country to the desert borders of

Nejran (once a Christian diocese). Its eastern border is very vague,

but may be said to coincide approximately with the 45th parallel of

longitude. Southward the limit has been clearly defined by the

Anglo-Turkish Boundary Commission of 1902-5 inland from the Bana valley,

about a hundred map-miles north of Aden, to the straits of

Bab-el-Mandeb.

Within these limits the two great divisions of Islam are represented in

force--the orthodox _Sunnis_ on the littoral plain and far inland along

the upland deserts, while the highlanders among the lofty fertile ranges

separating these two areas and forming the backbone of the country

follow the _Shiah_ schism, being Zeidis, which of all the schismatic

sects approaches most nearly to orthodox Islam and regards Mecca as its

pilgrim-centre. The feeling between these two religious divisions may be

compared with that existing between Anglicans and Catholics. They will

occasionally use each other's places of worship--more especially the

upper or governing classes--and seldom come to open loggerheads; when

they do, it is usually about politics, and not religion. At the same

time, if you, as a Christian traveller among both parties, want a

scathing opinion of a Zeidi, you will get it from an orthodox lowlander,

and the men of the mountains reciprocate with point and weight, for the

balance of religious culture and position is with them among the big

hill-centres; including Sanaa, the political capital where the Imam

holds, or should hold, his court as hereditary ruler spiritual and

temporal. This ecclesiastical potentate has backed the Turk in a

non-committal but flamboyant manner during the War up to the turning of

the tide against them, when he sat on the fence until his Turkish

subsidy ceased. He now looks to Western diplomacy in general and the

British Government in particular not only to continue but to enhance

this subsidy, in order that he may really govern in Yamen. His attitude

throughout is natural and, indeed, justifiable in the interests of

himself and his dynasty; at least occidental politicians cannot cavil at

his motives; but what they ought to ascertain is how far he can fill the

bill as a ruler in Yamen and the extent to which he should be backed.

Without a considerable subsidy his administrative powers (not hitherto

very marked) will not carry far even in the highlands.

Missionaries were allowed to enter Yamen before the War, but did not

establish themselves, even on the coast. Some of them went up-country

and stayed there some time without being molested. The average Yameni is

not fanatical by temperament; there is more bigotry among the urban Jew

colonies than in the whole Moslem countryside.

In the Aden protectorate there has been long established the Falconer

Medical Mission, which, though actually at Sheikh Othman, just inside

the British border, has done splendid work among natives of the

hinterland, who visit it from all parts. Its relations with the Arabs

have always been excellent, though the local ruffians looted the Mission

when the Turks held Sheikh Othman temporarily.

The province of Hadhramaut, politically, includes not only the vast

valley of that name with its tributaries, but the whole of the western

part of Southern Arabia outside the Aden protectorate from the Yamen

border to the confines of Oman near longitude 55. Mokalla is the capital

and principal port. Missionaries have been well received there by the

enlightened ruler--a member of the Kaaiti house with the local title of

Jemadar, inherited from an ancestor who soldiered in the Arab bodyguard

of a former Nizam at Haiderabad. The interior is not suited to

missionary enterprise.

Muscat, the capital of Oman, has already been occupied by missionaries.

The Sultan (at whose court there is a British Resident) is well-disposed,

but has lost most of his influence inland.

Further up the Persian Gulf missionaries have long been established on

the islands of Bahrein, which are under British protection.

Continuing our journey eastward, we can dismiss the Shiahs of Persia as

outside our pan-Islamic calculations, for their pilgrim-centre is at

Kerbela, some twenty odd miles west of the Euphrates and the site of

ancient Babylon. This centre has been visited by missionaries.

Afghanistan and Beluchistan both bar missionaries, but there are C.M.S.

frontier posts from Quetta, in British Beluchistan, to Peshawar, near

the Afghan border. They do good hospital work, otherwise their

evangelising activities over the border are confined to native

colporteurs and the circulation of vernacular Scriptures. There is a

fierce and barbarous Turcoman spirit in both countries which their

respective rulers (the Khan of Kelat and the Emir at Cabul) do their

best to keep within bounds, aided by British Residents. Missionaries

seem to think this spirit can be exorcised by their entrance into the

arena. You might as well throw squibs into a cage full of tigers.

On entering India (that vast hunting-ground of many sects and creeds),

Moslem and missionary are almost swamped in the flood of Hinduism. There

is no restriction on the activities of either within the four corners

of the King-Emperor's peace, and there is very little antagonism between

the two in so big a field, where both are doing good work. Although the

Moslems outnumber the Christians by seven to one, the honours of war go

to the missionaries. Their highly-organised medical and educational

missions do excellent work--the Zenana Mission is, in itself, a

justification of Christian mission work in India to any humanitarian

with some knowledge of _zenana_ conditions. The Moslems, on the other

hand, in spite of their high standard of education, in India show a

tendency among their less educated classes toward the caste prejudices

of Hinduism, which are dead against the teaching of Islam and a handicap

to any social organisation.

Few people realise what a huge proposition the Indian Empire is to solve

in its entirety, with its population of 315 millions, of whom over 90

per cent. are illiterate. Of the more or less educated residuum, not

quite 90 per cent. are Brahmins having little in common with the huge

uneducated bulk of the population, which is chiefly agricultural and, by

its patient toil, supplies most of the wealth of India. Yet it is the

cultured but unproductive Brahmin (organised by a brainy old lady) who

wants to control the native affairs of India--and probably will.

In Farther India the Brahmin is at a discount and the Buddhist is to the

fore, while Moslem and missionary are far too busy among the heathen to

bother about each other; as also in Malay, where there is field enough

and to spare for both of them.

The only other debatable field in Asia is that vast area which we call

China, comprising China proper, Manchuria, Mongolia, Tibet and Eastern

Turkestan. Moslem and missionary can hardly be said to meet face to

face, as missionary enterprise is chiefly in China itself, where the

great waterways have been of much assistance to Christian activities,

while Moslem efforts are concentrated on Chinese Turkestan. Here there

are two Christian missions, at Yarkand and Kashgar, under the protection

(as elsewhere in China) of the Chinese Government. Moslem propaganda is

spread by traders and others working from centres of Islamic learning

outside Chinese territory, such as Bokhara and Samarkand in Russian

Turkestan, and Cabul, the Afghan capital. In addition, there is a wave

of Chinese secular culture lapping in from the East, and missionaries

ask that existing missions be reinforced with funds to take a more

effective part in this battle for souls (as they express it). They

complain bitterly that the upper classes _will_ send their sons away to

places like Bokhara to be educated, and that they come back Moslems.

They also call for ample funds to attack Islam on its own ground in

Russian Turkestan, as it is permeating Christian Russia. This missionary

point of view is natural enough; how far it is justifiable is for the

contributing public to decide. To the ordinary mind Christian villages

which can become Moslem by the leavening influence of a few inhabitants

who have been to work in Moslem centres convey one of two impressions,

or both: either Christianity is not adapted to their requirements so

much as Islam, or they are too weak-kneed to be a credit to any faith,

and the one with the most virile methods may take them and make men of

them if it can. Moslem and missionary activities in Chinese Asia remind

one of cheese-mites gnawing away on opposite sides of a Double

Gloucester. They are very active, and if they keep at it may get through

some day; but meanwhile the cheese seems much the same as ever, apart

from its own internal changes which the mites cannot control or affect.

We will now turn to Africa, the main theatre of war between Moslem and

missionary, who battle with each other for pagan souls and each other's

proselytes.

We will first visit Morocco, the most westerly of Moslem countries.

Here there is not much missionary activity, either Protestant or

Catholic, but the French have been doing some excellent secular work

there, and under their tutelage the country is developing on lines of

moderate progress.

There is little antipathy shown to missionaries here, at any rate on the

coast, and medical missionaries have been welcomed inland. Education

does not flourish, but the country might be described by an unbiassed

observer as enlightened at least as far south as a line joining Mogador

and Morocco City (Marrakesh). In this northern area you will find an

industrious agricultural population of small farmers scattered about the

countryside, which consists of wide, open tracts of arable land under

millet, maize, and other cereals, dotted here and there with groves of

olive and orange and interspersed with large forests of _argan_ and

other small trees. Desert country encroaches more and more toward the

south, and in spite of several large streams draining into the Atlantic

from the snowcapped Atlas range, the country becomes very wild and

sterile the farther south you go from Mogador until it merges in the

Sahara, across which lies the great, bone-whitened highway that leads to

Timbuctoo.

Whatever the indigenous Berber of the Atlas may be, the northern Moor

has never been a mere barbarian, and Spain owes much to his culture and

industry. He certainly used to have a bizarre conception of

international amenities, and got himself very much disliked in the

Mediterranean and even northern waters in consequence. That phase,

however, has long since passed; the last corsair has rotted at its

moorings in Sallee harbour, and I am told that to put a wealthy Jew in a

thing like a giant trouser-press and extort money under pressure is

considered now an anachronism.