Lawrence and the Arabs

by Robert Graves

They were making their last preparations when an unexpected ally arrived, the chief Abd el Kader. He was an Algerian of a family that had been living in Damascus since his grandfather, the defender of Algiers against the French, had been deported from there thirty years before. Abd el Kader, quarrelsome, deaf and boorish, was a religious fanatic who, being recently sent by the Turks on secret political business to Mecca, had paid a dutiful call instead on Sherif Hussein and come away with a crimson banner and noble gifts, half-persuaded of the right of the Arab cause. Now he offered Feisal the help of his Algerian villagers, exiles like himself, living on the north bank of the Yarmuk, half-way between the two important bridges but close to others whose destruction might answer nearly as well. This seemed excellent. As the Algerians did not mix with their Arab neighbours, the destruction of the bridge or bridges could be arranged quietly without exciting the whole peasant countryside into revolt.

Suddenly a telegram came from the French Colonel to say that Abd el Kader was a spy in Turkish pay. This was disconcerting, but there was no proof, and the Colonel was not greatly liked himself since his letter to Abdulla about the English and his earlier intrigues at Jiddah. Probably he was annoyed at Abd el Kader’s private and public denunciations of the French. So Feisal asked Abd el Kader to ride with Lawrence and Ali ibn el Hussein, telling Lawrence privately: ‘I know he is mad, I think he is honest. Guard your heads and use him.’ He joined the party. Whether or not he was a spy, he was a great annoyance to the party: being a religious fanatic he resented Lawrence’s undisguised Christianity, and being ridiculously vain, resented being sent along with Ali whom the tribes treated as greater, and with Lawrence whom they treated as better than himself. Also his deafness was most inconvenient.

For his body-guard Lawrence took six Syrian recruits, chosen largely for their knowledge of the various districts through which he had to pass, with two Biasha tribesmen and the inseparable Farraj and Daud. These two were busy as usual at practical jokes and on the morning of October the twenty-fourth, the day of departure from Akaba, they completely disappeared. At noon came a message from fat Sheikh Yusuf, the Governor, to say that they were in prison and would Lawrence come and talk about it? Lawrence found Yusuf shaking between laughter and rage. His new cream-coloured riding-camel had strayed into the palm-garden where Lawrence’s Ageyl were encamped. Farraj and Daud, not suspecting that the camel was the Governor’s, had painted its body bright-red with henna and its legs blue with indigo before turning it loose. The camel caused an uproar in Akaba and when Yusuf with difficulty recognized the circus-like animal as his own, he hurried out his police to find the criminals. Farraj and Daud were found stained to their elbows with dye and though swearing innocence were soundly beaten and sent to prison in irons for a week. Lawrence arranged their release by lending the Governor a camel of his own until the dye had worn off the other, and promising that the Governor should beat the boys again after the expedition. So they joined the caravan singing, though they had to walk mile after mile because of a new kind of saddle-soreness which they called ‘Yusufitis.’

The expedition went by way of Rumm, crossing the railway line near Shedia, but it was not a compact or happy family. Abd el Kader was continually quarrelling with Ali ibn el Hussein, who prayed God to deliver him from the man’s bad manners, deafness, conceit. Wood was ill and the Indians, who proved to be very bad at loading and leading the baggage-camels, had to be helped with them by Lawrence’s body-guard, and lagged far behind: Lawrence was not much troubled by these difficulties, because on the first stage of the journey he had for companion Lloyd (now British High Commissioner in Egypt), who had originally come out with him from England. It was a great thing to have someone European-minded and well-read to talk to again after months with the Arabs. Lawrence’s Bedouin self wore off as he rode ahead with Lloyd, so engrossed in talk that they nearly lost touch with the Indians behind and, losing direction too, nearly ran into Shedia station. They turned in time and crossed the railway line in safety between two block-houses; contenting themselves merely with cutting the telegraph-wires. Ali and Abd el Kader were crossing the line farther north and soon came a rattle of machine-gun and rifle-fire: evidently they had not been lucky in their crossing. It turned out later that they had two men killed.

Lawrence’s first stop was Jefer, where he had been before on the ride to Akaba and had repaired the damaged well: he took his party safely across the silver plain of polished mud and salt, and near Jefer found Auda encamped with a few of his tribesmen, including Zaal and Mohammed el Dheilan. The old man was having a violent dispute over the distribution of wages which he drew in bulk for the whole tribe, and was ashamed to be found in such difficulties. However, Lawrence did what he could to smooth them over and by giving the Arabs something else to think about, made them smile; which was half the battle. He then went to Zaal and explained his plan to destroy the Yarmuk bridges. Zaal disliked it very much. He had been most successful that summer in his fighting with the Turks, and wealth made life precious to him. And the train-ambush at Mudowwara from which he had barely escaped with his life had tried his nerve; so now he said that he would only come if Lawrence insisted. Lawrence did not insist. Lloyd having to go home at this point, he was left despondent among the Arabs to unending talk of war and tribes and camels.

The first thing was to help Auda to settle the money disputes and to light again in the Howeitat the flame of enthusiasm now nearly extinct after months of hardship. At dark Lawrence sat by Auda’s camp-fire, an Arab once more, talking in the hot persuasive tones that he had caught from Feisal, gradually kindling them to remember their oath, their promise to put the war with the Turks before all disputes and jealousy. He won them over, man by man, addressing them by name, reminding them of their ancestral glories, of their own brave deeds, of Feisal’s bounty, of the baseness and the approaching collapse of the Turks. He was still at work near midnight when Auda held up his camel-stick for silence. They listened, wondering what the danger was, and after a while heard a rumble, a muttering like a very distant thunderstorm. Auda said: ‘The English guns.’ Allenby, a hundred miles north across the hills, was beginning the preparatory bombardment for his next day’s successful attack on Beersheba, with Gaza to fall five days later. This sound closed the argument. The Arabs were always convinced by heavy artillery. When Lawrence and his party left the camp the next day in a happier atmosphere than they had found it, Auda gratefully came up and embraced Lawrence with ‘Peace be with you.’ But he also took the opportunity of the embrace to whisper windily, while his rough beard brushed Lawrence’s ear: ‘Beware of Abd el Kader.’ He could not say more; there were too many people about.

They continued that day, the thirty-first of October, towards Bair. The winter was approaching; it was now a time of peaceful weather with misty dawns, mild sunlight and an evening chill. The Indians were such bad camel-masters that they could manage no more than thirty-five miles a day—fifty was the least that an Arab would think of doing on a long march—and had to stop to eat three meals a day. The midday halt brought an alarm. Men on horses and camels were seen riding up from the north and west and closing in on the party. Rifles were snatched up and the Indians ran to their machine-guns. In thirty seconds the defence was ready; Ali ibn el Hussein cried out, ‘Hold the fire until they come close.’ Then one of Lawrence’s body-guard, belonging to a despised clan of serfs, the Sherarat, but a devoted servant and brave fighter, sprang up laughing and waved his sleeve in the air as a signal of friendship. They fired at him, or perhaps over him. He lay down and fired back, one shot only over the head of the nearest man; that perplexed them, but after awhile they waved back in answer. Then he went forward, protected by the rifles of his party, to meet a man of the enemy, also advancing alone; it was a raiding party of Arabs of the Beni Sakhr tribe who pretended to be much surprised on hearing whom they had been about to attack, and rode in to apologize.

Ali ibn el Hussein was furious with the Beni Sakhr for their treacherous attack: they answered sullenly that it was their custom to shoot over the heads of strangers in the desert. ‘A good custom,’ said Ali, ‘for the desert. But to come on us suddenly from three sides at once seems to me more like a carefully prepared ambush.’ Border Arabs like the Beni Sakhr were always dangerous, being not villagers enough to have forgotten the Bedouin love of raiding, not Bedouin enough to keep the strict desert code of honour. (There is a Scottish proverb that I learned from Lawrence’s mother, who speaking of another Border, quoted: ‘The selvage is aye the warst part o’ the web.’) The Beni Sakhr raiders, ashamed, went forward to Bair to give warning of the approach of the party. Their chief thought it best to make up for the bad reception that such important men as Ali ibn el Hussein and Lawrence had been given, by preparing a great feast for them. First there was a public reception, every man and horse in the tribe turned out, and there were wild cheers of welcome, volleys in the air, gallopings and curvetings: and clouds of dust. ‘God give victory to our Sherif,’ they shouted to Ali, and to Lawrence, ‘Welcome, Aurans, forerunner of fighting!’

Abd el Kader grew jealous. He began to show off, climbing up on the high Moorish saddle of his mare, and with his seven Algerian servants behind him in a file began the same prancing and curveting, shouting out ‘Houp! Houp!’ and firing a pistol unsteadily in the air. The Beni Sakhr chief came up to Ali and Lawrence, saying, ‘Lords, please call off your servant. He cannot either shoot or ride, and if he hits someone, he will destroy our good luck of to-day.’ The chief did not know Abd el Kader’s family reputation for ‘accidental’ shootings in Damascus. His brother Mohammed Said had had three successive fatal accidents among his friends, so that Ali Riza, the Governor of Damascus and a secret pro-Arab, once said: ‘Three things are notably impossible. The first, that Turkey should win this war. The second, that the Mediterranean should become champagne. The third, that I should be found in the same room with Mohammed Said, and he to be armed.’

Ali had a little business to settle before dinner. A party of negro workmen had been sent by Feisal to re-line the blasted well from which Lawrence and Nasir had picked the gelignite on the way to Akaba. They had been here for months, living on the forced hospitality of the Beni Sakhr and doing no work. Feisal had asked Ali to see what was happening. Ali hurriedly held a court, tried them, found them guilty and had them beaten, out of sight, by his own negroes. They returned stiffly, kissed hands to show repentance and respect, and soon the whole party, including the masons, were kneeling down at the feast.