On the Road to Bagdad: A Story of Townshend's Gallant Advance on the Tigris

by F. S. Brereton

While Geoff and his friends are aboard that motor-vessel, on the point of attacking the Turks aboard the steam-launch which had so unexpectedly opposed their progress up the River Euphrates, let us for a moment turn aside to follow the fortunes of another individual who has already been introduced to our readers.

We have already recounted how Major Joseph Douglas, a "political" officer, said farewell to his friends in that frontier fortress far up amongst the hills of India, and how he disappeared, as indeed was his wont, on another of those long expeditions on which the Government of India employed him. We have said that he reached the Persian Gulf and made his way to Basra, and thence up country on a river steamer till the walls of Bagdad enclosed him. Then, having disappeared from the ken of his fellows entirely, and having contrived almost to reach the heart of Asiatic Turkey, the war—which was to drag so many nations into its toils—broke out, and saw the Kaiser's legions overwhelming Belgium, and invading France and Poland.

That Turkey should have been drawn into this conflict was perhaps as much a matter for astonishment to the Turks themselves as to other peoples, for they had, in fact, no grievance against Great Britain or her allies. Indeed, Britain has always befriended the Turk, and done what she could for him; yet late years—those years just prior to the outbreak of this vast war which now tears Europe into pieces—saw what may be termed a revolution in the country of the Sultan. The "Young Turk Party" arose, a party which grew in power—thanks, no doubt, to the scheming help of Germany—till it was able to dethrone the Sultan himself and capture the reins of Government. In the hands of German schemers—the agents of the Kaiser and his war lords—these ambitious young Turks were easily deluded, and, carried away by the successes they had already met with, listened eagerly to the words of the tempters. There was gold to be had in abundance, gold, if the Young Turk Party would but carry out the behests of the German War Lord, if they would but follow a plan which, they were told, would lead not only to their own wealth—for rewards and presents would be poured upon them—but to the greatness of Turkey. War was imminent, they no doubt were informed, and Germany had designs upon the conquest of all nations. Why should Turkey be unfriendly to the Germans? Why should the subjects of the new Sultan fight with the subjects of the Kaiser? There was no desire on the part of the War Lord of Berlin to conquer the dwellers by the Bosphorus, the Turks living in Europe or in Asia, but only the fervent wish to be friendly with them. Then here was the opportunity! Let Turkey side with Germany against France and Russia, and, if need be, against Great Britain; let her close the Dardanelles utterly, and so shut off the Russian enemy from the Mediterranean; and then let her but wait till Germany had broken the fighting forces of France and of the Tsar of Russia; then would come the turn of those Powers in the Balkans—once the subjects of Turkey. Serbia would be overridden, would be decimated, would be stamped out of existence; if need be, Bulgaria, the ancient enemy of Turkey, would be destroyed completely. And then see what would happen! The forces of Germany and of Austria would be linked up with those of the Sultan, and who could stay their progress? With millions of men under arms, with engineers to construct railways throughout Asiatic Turkey, Egypt would be wrested for the Turks from Great Britain—Egypt the heritage of Turkey; Persia could be gained; Afghanistan itself, and even India conquered. Look at the prospect! The eyes of the Young Turk Party were blinded by the brilliance of such a proposition; and for those who were more sagacious, who knew the German to be a schemer, there was gold—gold in abundance—with which to bribe them, gold with which to gild their doubt, and to make them unwilling friends of Germany.

Little wonder, perhaps, that the guileless and inexperienced, if unscrupulous, "Young Turk Party" listened to the crafty words of the Kaiser's agents, and decided to throw in their lot with them. Little wonder that, following upon the outbreak of the war, they welcomed the coming of the Goeben and the Breslau—two of Germany's most powerful vessels—and, having admitted them to the Bosphorus, closed the Dardanelles entirely. Now, see the result of such a movement! In the Black Sea itself the Turks were hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned by the vessels of the Russians—that is, prior to the coming of the Goeben and the Breslau; but now that those two vessels had reached the scene, there was not a vessel in the Tsar's navy capable of easily standing up to them. Those two, with the help of what Turkey could send from her dockyards, might very well clear the Black Sea of all Russian vessels, and make the transport of Turkish troops to Trebizond, and to the frontier lying between Turkey and Russia, along the Caucasus Mountains, a matter of ease and safety. Then the coming of those two powerful vessels would enable the Young Turk Party to reinforce their army in the Caucasus, and, perhaps, to strike a blow there which would cause heavy Russian losses. In any case, a force so disposed would necessitate the placing of Russian armies to oppose them, and Russian armies so withdrawn from the forces of the Tsar would weaken the troops needed to stem the tide of Germans and Austrians then pouring into Poland.

Looked at from every point of view, the coming of Turkey into the conflict was likely to be of enormous advantage to the Kaiser, and of signal disadvantage to Britain and her allies. That it was likely to improve the fortunes of the Turks was problematical only. Indeed, there is little doubt that if Germany had carried out to the full the first portion of her programme, and had shattered the forces of France and of Russia, Turkey would have become merely a puppet in the hands of the Hohenzollerns. Germans would—and may even yet—sweep into Asiatic Turkey, and, had they broken the power of their enemies elsewhere—as fortunately they have not done—the Turks would undoubtedly have become vassals of the Kaiser. As it is, they have thrown in their lot with the Germans, and it would appear as if they were to gain nothing but losses and privations.

But, in any case, they had become enemies of Britain and her allies, and, seeing that Major Joseph Douglas was most decidedly a Briton, they were enemies of his, and he was an alien in the midst of them. Such a well-known person as the Major—for let us say at once that if Major Joseph Douglas was known far and wide in India, a welcome guest in many an officers' mess and in a host of cantonments, he was, in a rather different way, just as well known in the heart of Mesopotamia—was now an alien, an enemy, and must needs look to his own safety.

Douglas Pasha had, in fact, a most uncanny way of eluding the Turkish governors of the various provinces he visited. He came openly to them, and often enough called upon them in the most friendly manner possible, receiving from them the warmest welcome. Yet, under the silken cloak of friendship, and beneath the welcome which every well-bred man extends to another—and your Turk is a gentleman, whatever else you may say of him—there existed always, when Douglas Pasha turned up upon the scene, a feeling of doubt, of hesitancy, almost of danger, in the minds of those Turkish governors. Crafty themselves, they knew well enough that he had come to investigate every feature of the country, to ascertain what Turkish forces were maintained, to map the roads, no doubt, to investigate the progress of such railways as Turkey possessed, and to unearth a hundred different matters. It followed, therefore, often enough, that Douglas Pasha's exit from the palace of a governor was followed, almost automatically, by the dogging of his footsteps. Spies followed him from place to place, spies who watched his every movement like a company of cats; spies whom the cheerful and cunning Douglas Pasha on every occasion managed to elude.

Thus, he was within a few days of the outbreak of war at Bagdad, where news of European matters had not yet reached the populace. Yet the governor knew that war was impending—that Turkish governor upon whom the Major had called that very afternoon, and who had bowed the gallant officer out of his palace, had smiled in such friendly fashion upon him, and who, once his back was turned, had snapped his fingers, had clapped his hands, and had set machinery in motion to have Douglas Pasha followed and watched. Yet, strange as it may seem, Geoff Keith's most excellent guardian was by no means the simpleton he seemed, and by no means ignorant of events then impending.

He strolled down the centre of the Bazaar, a likeable figure in his dust-coloured travelling-suit, a tall, active man, with the face and the bearing of a soldier. He stopped to converse with an Arab dealer in brass-ware, seated cross-legged upon his little stall, and chatted with him as if he were himself a native. Then he passed on to another stall, leaving the Arab, usually so uninterested in the affairs of this world, keenly curious as to the nationality of the stranger who had addressed him. A dozen yards higher up, there was an Armenian Jew selling jewellery, and with him, too, Douglas Pasha chatted in the most pleasant manner and in the Armenian tongue; and then he strolled on for a while, till, noticing the angular figure of a big-boned Jew seated upon another stall, with a mass of embroidery laid out before him, he turned back and strolled towards him.

"Many fine wares to sell, my friend?" he said, addressing him in the Armenian tongue. "Our brother yonder has jewellery beyond compare; but, in truth, these wares that you have to offer would delight the heart of a houri."