October 1st.—Loud shouting and cheering and wild stampede towards the restaurant dining-room announced that another mail had come. We all go quite mad on these occasions, and charge past postas, knocking over chairs or each other, and crowd around the table while the letters are given out.
I have heard again from home, written before Kut fell. I wonder what sort of a time they picture me having. Kut still seems to have been kept dark from everybody, and especially so the trek; but I shall always remember the great thoughtfulness and affection of our friends reaching out to our lonely life across thousands of miles of sea and land. With these letters I am among the heath of Camberley, the hills of New Zealand, and the 'buses of London, once again.
The commandant or kaimakam (colonel) is a foolish and babyish fellow, and also a rogue; but I, for one, believe he has less vice in him than the other junior officer, Sheriff Bey, who is a dangerous and treacherous villain. The old kaimakam does rake up a smile when we try to be happy, and although the Tartar is often apparent, he has, on occasion, given us such a privilege as a special walk.
We are trying to erect some structure of habits wherein to dwell until God's good time allows us to get away from here. Thus we make cakes twice a week. This will last a little longer until prices become too outrageous. Which makes two events. Church and bazaar and Turkish bath make three more, total of five altogether, and these, scarcely incidents in another's life, but episodes in ours, punctuate the vacuum of time in which we roll. At 6.30 a.m. there is chota haziri, tea and toast, for which we have made private arrangements.
Then one smokes or sleeps again. At 9 we have breakfast of eggs and milk and butter and bread. With a posta at our heels we return to our own house, 150 yards away. Then some sleep, some play cards, some merely sit on a chair. Others of us write diaries or re-read an old book. We have lunch of fatty foods and smoke and sleep. We have tea (our own bandobast again) after which there may be a walk. We all set off under a guard, and are trying to get farther afield. Once a week a long walk is allowed. On returning some of us change, even if it is to put aside one torn shirt for another or a spare jacket. But in these times I jealously guard every conventional cable that anchors one to the decent life. There is a tendency to allow the coma to steal over one's personality. This, I think, one should combat. Dinner over, we have to wait in the mektub, a boresome hour. We attempt bridge or chess. Back again in our room we smoke awhile and sleep. It may read nicely, but in truth, it is a sorry existence. Still, day by day, the structure grows, and who knows, in a few months we may have a palace like the pleasure dome of Kubla Khan!
The extraordinary thing is that one is so secluded. One seems on the other side of creation's wall—in the backwash of the waters. But we all know it only seems so. The stream of Time flows on, sweeping along with it great events in the changing scene from which we here are far removed. I have ever been of a restless nature, and I am told this may operate as a rest cure. One hundred and fifty miles from the nearest railway, and that far from anywhere, locked in by mountains bordering the Black Sea, cut off from papers and books and news, in a town that but awakes and sleeps, with no public institutions or even a picture theatre, one has left for a hobby only the delivery of direct interrogatories to oneself, and the supplying of answers thereto. I believe this is a supreme test of character, and may prove a strength to some and a ruination to others.
Sometimes an event overtakes us. For instance, I have been placed in "gaol" for a short time, and the incident was so funny I must set it down.
One day, while I was filling in notes of this diary, I observed one of the flimsy untied curtains was ablaze. How it started I can only conjecture. Either it blew on to the hot cigarette ash tray, or a hot part of a cigarette must have fallen down near the bed and caught in the curtain. These local cigarettes are wretched things and burn furiously, the head often falling off so that it is a common thing to find one's clothes alight. I ripped the curtain down and stamped it out. The two beds had caught, and the room filled with smoke. I stamped out the fire and doused the bed with water. As it still smouldered I flung it out of the door. And then they came, Turks, choushs, postas, Sheriff Bey, the kaimakam himself, and I began to expect the Sultan. They were very angry, a fire having occurred in the Gurkhas' quarters a few days previously. They persisted in saying I tried to burn the house down and to set fire to Kastamuni. That afternoon a sort of court-martial was made of it, and I was arraigned before the Turkish Commandant, thinking it a delightful joke. Their serious faces amused me. I told them it was an accident, that I was sorry, that I would pay the damage, and after a debate of ordinary budget length, the kaimakam decided to let me off on my paying a lira. (The curtain would have cost about ten piastres, and the bed was only singed.) Then Sheriff Bey stormed and protested for more punishment, and I was sent under an escort after handing over all my smokes and matches, to a dirty iron-barred cellar room in a house used by the kaimakam as an office. It was full of paper, and there was no bed or chair. I had no supplies at all. When I was left in peace I took a copy of Robert Louis Stevenson's "Virginibus Puerisque" from my pocket, and sitting in a corner started to read. Presently I became aware of an eye watching me through the crack. In fact, I was just on the point of lighting up from a spare cigarette case and matches in my hip pocket. The eye changed. Still reading, I observed several peering and whispering, so taking a pencil and paper from my pocket I went through the form of writing a letter to our Foreign Minister via the American Ambassador, complaining of my treatment. Then pointing to the eye, I called for the interpreter, informing him that I wanted this letter to be shown to the kaimakam, and that even if he didn't send it I should take care that our Government took the matter up and dealt with those responsible when I was free. The result was he bolted from the room, and in ten minutes reappeared with a posta, and said I was free. Sheriff Bey met me at the top of the road, and proceeded to harangue me about wanting to frighten me only.
Bluff is the only thing, and their ignorance one's only chance. Since then, however, the kaimakam has treated me with extraordinary respect, so much so, that I have successfully refused to obey his order to pay for what I have not had, i.e. food in the mektub for all the time I was sick. The best way to treat these Turks is to be distantly polite. Much annoyance and trouble has been caused through some officers chumming up to them, plying them with drinks, and conducting them by the arm here and there. The next day there's a row about some point of pay or privilege, and the Turk thinks himself snubbed. The net result is that the Turk, being our captor, is in much the better position to hit back. This he does vigorously, with insulting titles and notices that make life a great burden. Some of their notices posted up in the mektub are screamingly funny. The following are actual samples, with spelling corrected—
1. "English imprisoned officers cannot only please themselves by disobeying the Turkish posta who have the order of them. Neither can they go past the posta or outside the door. In which case the posta can beat them with the stick or rough handle the officer or officers concerned."