prosperous agricultural town on the Euphrates. Rail-head lies just beyond
at a place known as Tel El Dhubban--the "Hill of the Flies." From there on
supplies were brought forward by motor transport, or in Arab barges,
called shakturs. We crossed the river on a bridge of boats and continued
up along the bank to Ramadie. Here I stayed over, detailed to escort the
army commander on a tour of inspection.

The smaller towns along the Euphrates are far more attractive than those
on the Tigris. The country seems more developed, and most inviting
gardens surround the villages. Hit, which lies twenty miles up-stream of
Ramadie, is an exception. It is of ancient origin and built upon a hill,
with a lovely view of the river. It has not a vestige of green on it, but
stands out bleak and harsh in contrast to the palm-groves fringing the
bank. The bitumen wells near by have been worked for five thousand years
and are responsible for the town being a centre of boat manufacture. With
the bitumen, the gufas and mahelas are "pitched without and within," in
the identical manner in which we are told that the ark was built. The jars
in which the women of the town draw water from the river, instead of being
of copper or earthenware as elsewhere, are here made of pitched
wicker-work. The smell of the boiling bitumen and the sulphur springs is
trying to a stranger, although the natives regard it as salubrious, and
maintain that through it the town is saved from cholera epidemics. We had
captured Hit a few weeks previously, and the aeroplanes flying low over
the town had reported the disagreeable smell, attributing it to dirt and
filth. "Eyewitness," the official newspaper correspondent, mentioned this
in despatches, and when I was passing through, a proclamation of apology
was being prepared to soothe the outraged and slandered townsfolk.

[Illustration: A water-wheel on the Euphrates]