“Sir,” said Kas Mattai, “last year they took my bed, and that which was too worthless to carry away they broke and threw upon the fire. But if we resisted they would burn the village.”
We ran down through the oak woods and got into camp at four in the afternoon.
“God prolong your existence!” cried Fattûḥ. “Have you seen the ship of the Prophet Noah?”
“Oh Fattûḥ,” I replied, “prepare the tea. I have seen the ship of the Prophet Noah.” So it is that I subscribe in this matter to the wisdom of the Kurân: “And immediately the water abated and the decree was fulfilled and the Ark rested upon the mountain of Jûdî.”
Next morning the camp was sent straight to Jezîreh, which it reached after a six-hours’ march, but I, with Shim’ûn as guide, followed the line of the hills. We rode for two hours through the oak woods, and then crossed a gorge wherein lies the Moslem village of Evler. The incomparable beauty of these valleys passes belief. Evler was buried in a profusion of pomegranate and walnut, fig, almond and mulberry trees; the vines were wreathed from tree to tree, the ground beneath was deep in corn, and the banks of the stream aglow with oleander. An hour further we reached the Nestorian village of Shakh, where a ruined castle protects the entrance of the gorge. The walls climb up the hillside towards a citadel placed upon a high peak; above the village two deep valleys run up into the mountains, and each has been walled across, so that Shakh was guarded from attack on every side. I should judge these fortifications to be Kurdish, but there are traces of an older civilization on the rocks above them ([Fig. 183]). Of the four Assyrian reliefs that are reported to exist, I saw only three, the fourth being cut upon the face of the cliff and unapproachable except with ropes. Each of the three niches which I was shown (after an hour’s climb in the hottest part of the day) contained a single figure, like that of Ḥasanah; each had been covered with cuneiform inscriptions, but in two cases both the figure and the inscriptions had all but weathered away. We left Shakh at midday, stopped for half-an-hour to lunch by the stream, and reached Jezîret ibn ’Umar at four o’clock. The camp was pitched upon a high bank overhanging the Tigris, but the bridge of boats which should have connected us with the town was broken, and I crossed by a ferry on the following day.
Jezîret ibn ’Umar is built upon an island formed by the Tigris and a small loop canal. It is called after a certain Ḥassan ibn ’Umar of the tribe of Taghlib, who lived in the ninth century.[179] Upon the river’s edge stands a much-ruined
