Mosul, drawn on a bank that had ceased to exist.

It seemed a good idea to call on the American Colony, at their
store near the Jaffa Gate, and it turned out to be a very clean
spot in a dirty city. I taxed their generosity, and sat for
hours on a ten-thousand-dollar pile of Asian rugs behind the
store; and, whatever I have missed and lost, or squandered, at
least I know their story and can keep it until the proper time.

Of course, you have to allow for point of view, just as the
mariner allows for variation and deviation; but when they
inferred that most of the constructive good that has come to the
Near East in the last fifty years has been American, they spoke
with the authority of men who have lived on the spot and watched
it happen.

"You see, the Americans who have come here haven't set up
governments. They've opened schools and colleges. They've
poured in education, and taken nothing. Then there are thousands
of Arabs, living in hovels because there's nothing better, who
have been to America and brought back memories with them. All
that accounts for the desire for an American mandate--which would
be a very bad thing, though, because the moment we set up a
government we would lose our chance to be disinterested. The
country is better off under any other mandate, provided it gives
Americans the right to teach without ruling. America's mission
is educational. There's an American, though, who might seem to
prove the contrary. Do you see him?"

There were two Arabs in the room, talking in low tones over by