Page 601 - Belgrave Diaries(N)_Neat

the court quite early as many people are still out diving on the short season. I have now got rather an
amusing little private telephone exchange in my office with three lines, one to the Agency, one to the
Customs and one to the Municipal Offices. It is very useful but the office people dont yet understand it and it
rang for a quarter of an hour without stopping when I was out yesterday and quite disorganised the whole
office. Some difficulty over our domestic staff, the very good boy who we took from D.G. when he left, a
young Arab, refuses to go back to him as he dislikes his Persian cook so much, a dreadful person, notoriously
dishonest and bad, and the boy we got to replace him wont go there either for the same reason, eventually
we are going to keep both but one of them to work in the office as well. Went out to Senobis with James in
the afternoon and sat on the shore there, D.G. came in before dinner, Bienenfeld and his cousin came to
dinner, bridge. They were very pleasant, the cousin is quite young and very shy but didnt play bridge badly.

Tuesday [7 October]

Meeting of Manama Biladya. Shaikh Mohamed presided as Abdulla was only acting during his absence, he
was very trying and extremly dense. He has little intelligence and is very conceited and obstinate. They
turned down the scheme for subsidising electric light in houses and discussed the idea of getting a Municipal
doctor. Mohamed looked very sour when allusion was made to some of the things that had been changed
during his absence such as permitting coffee shops to play gramaphones and removing the ban on margarine
etc etc. At the meeting he gave me a letter from King Ibn Saoud, which had come to the Shaikh, sent in by
the shaikh for me to read and think about. I read it when I got back to the office. A most amazing affair, one
letter just ordinary compliments, and a postscript all about political matters saying more or less that if The
Shaikh of Bahrain wished to retain the friendship of the King he had better agree to various things that were
now being discussed, one of course being the reduction, or rather the abolition of the customs charge on
goods going across to the mainland, this would mean a severe loss of revenue to us. I took the letter across
to Guzdar at the Agency and he was very interested in it and inclined to believe that it was a forgery, at least
the postscript. Gardened in the afternoon, planted a lot of vegetable seeds and M went to tennis at the
mission, afterwards Parke and de Grenier came in and we dined at the Jordans, only Walker was there. Had
quite good Bridge. Cool day with a strong shamaal. It is now getting quite cool and we dont use the fans
except for James in the nursery. The Shaikh sent message to say he was coming in tomorrow and I was to
meet him at the palace, to discuss the letter. James has begun to walk, he suddenly took to it and is now
quite uncontrolable as he gets about all over the house when one is not looking, generally seeking the
kitchen.

Wednesday [8 October]

The Kozaibis came to see me about some land, as usual they are trying to "jump" some Govt land and
pretend that it is theirs. Then de Grenier came and we had a long talk for a couple of hours about finance, I
told him he must cut down expenses and get in every bit of revenue that he can. Things are very bad and I
am afraid we shall be down on the Budget. Had a talk with the Inspector of Schools and went to the Agency
to discuss the Ibn Saoud letter, it is really an amazing letter for a sovereign ruler to write, he suggested
sending people to parley with the Shaikh, but according to treaty all such negociations much be done by the
British Government. In the afternoon we went out to the boring as I heard they had found water. There was
a flow, about four tins a minute, this is sixteen gallons a minute, but the water was very smelly and evidently