how big a country Persia is: it began on Friday and goes right up into
Europe. On Saturday we reached the Straits of Ormuz and to-day
(Sunday) we are well inside the Gulf, as the mention of Fars doubtless
conveyed to you.

It is getting pronouncedly hotter every hour. It was a quarter to one
when I began this letter and is now half-past twelve, which is the
kind of thing that is continually happening. Anyway the bugle for
lunch has just gone, and it is 96° in my cabin. I have spent the
morning in alternate bouts of bridge and Illingworth on Divine
Immanence: I won Rs three at the former: but I feel my brain is hardly
capable of further coherent composition until nourishment has been
taken. So goodbye for the present. It will take ages for this to reach
you.

* * * * *


"P.S.S. KARADENIZ,"
BASRA.

_Friday, August 27th_, 1915.

TO HIS MOTHER.

I wrote to Papa from just outside the bar, which is a mud-bank across
the head of the Gulf, about seventeen miles outside Fao. We anchored
there to await high tide, and crossed on Tuesday morning.

Fao is about as unimpressive a place as I've seen. The river is over a