Page 604 - Belgrave Diaries(N)_Neat

take to it. His successor is one of the men from Irak who used to be Director General of the State Domains.
Shaikh Abdulla came in in the morning to discuss the matter of the Kadi who resigned, it appears he is now
ready to fall in with our orders and wants to come back. In the afternoon we went up to the palace, taking
James. When I went up into the big Meglis I found it absolutely crammed with Arabs, many of them with
hawks on their wrists sitting in two long lines and the Shaikh on his big sofa at the end with some visiting
shaikh, Ali bin Hussein was reading from a book of Arab poetry. This went on for over half an hour and then I
was able to get the Shaikh to come and be photographed, I had brought the Indian photographer with me for
the purpose. He is a bad sitter as he considers it unsuitable to laugh while being photographed and so always
looks very severe, lowering in fact. We want a good picture of him to be hung in the Law Courts and the
schools etc. He insisted in having one taken with he and I sitting together, I had not intended this. Went out
for a little drive later on and then home. M's tooth, at least the place it was in, very uncomfortable. In the
evening we had a dinner party, ten people. Rosenthal came and left afterwards for the boat en route for
India. He has only stayed a month here and has bought practically nothing. We played Bridge, I played with
the Jordans, he plays badly and holds bad cards so they always go down. He got very angry and was very
rude to her, makes it so unpleasant playing when people go on at eachother all the time. M's face very
swolen and very uncomfortable. I hope the photos of the Shaikh come out well, I am afraid he will look very
fierce. He had had his beard dyed that day. He has it done about every ten days and it always makes him ill,
gives him a sort of hay fever. We had quite a lot of flowers in the house in the evening, it looked very nice.
Rather a hot day, we needed the fans on all the time, it has become much hotter after a cold spell. We took
James to see the horses in the Shaikh's stable he was very interested by them though rather scared if they
came near him.

Monday 20th October 1930

Court. Sulman brought an invitation for dinner at the Shaikh's for tomorrow, there is evidently going to be a
series of these dinner parties to celebrate his return. Sulman asked me to ask, on behalf of the Shaikh, all the
Europeans who had not got wives, as the only one, not counting me, who has one here is Jordan. I expect he
will be offended. Court. M in bed with a very bad face, it is so swollen that she cant see out of one eye and
she has a temperature of 102. Taking out a tooth should not cause this. Gardened in the afternoon. Parke
and de Grenier came round in the evening and later the doctor came in again.

Tuesday [21 October]

Called on the Shaikh in the morning with the Agriculturist. He is a decent young fellow and looks far more
tough and atheletic than the usual run of Irakis, he is very tall and dresses like an European but with an Iraki
cap. The Shaikh had a very full Meglis when we arrived, both sides of the long room were lined with Arabs, a
few on chairs but most of them sitting on the ground and many had hawks on their arms, very picturesque.
Most of them went out soon except a few Persians and Khalil Moayad who stayed. The Shaikh talked for a
long time in a general way about nothing to the point, mainly praises of myself, which I really always dislike,
in public. It is so difficult to know what to say in reply. The Persians started talking about the question of the
Kadi who retired. The Shaikh gave them non commital answers and turned the conversation several times,