Page 599 - Belgrave Diaries(N)_Neat

Saturday 4th [October]

I got Parke to take the court and had a whole morning with Shaikh Abdulla and the Inspector at school affairs.
Its a big business and difficult to deal with as people seem to get so excited about it. In the afternoon I put in
a lot of seeds in the garden and then we had people to tennis, all the Europeans except the Mission, we had
three tables of Bridge afterwards, a dozen people, quite unusual for this place. Really a very successful party,
the Frenchmen do somehow seem to make entertainments go off well, they are more lively than others. A
lot of Persian divers hung round the office most of yesterday and this morning trying to get off having to pay
passport fees on leaving Bahrain and going back to Persia. A lot of them went up to the Shaikh he gave
orders that the first batch, 15 men, were to be exempted but fortunately left for Sakhrir before the others,
about 200, got news of this so we were able to make them pay the proper amount. They argued that they
had made no money at all on the diving season and had not even enough for their fares home. I had said I
would go and call on Shaikh Mohamed in the morning but had no time to as Abdulla was in.

Sunday 5th [October]

Shaikh Abdulla came in again and we spent the whole morning on school business, we interviewed the boys
who were educated at Beyrout at Government expense for two years and found that they all refused to come
into the schools as masters unless paid enormous salaries. The scheme from beginning to end has been a
complete failure and one liable to lead to trouble, the thing was all done when I was on leave two years ago,
Barrett is responsible for it. The boys were very badly chosen, mostly sons of very mischievous parents and
not ones who should be encouraged. The result is now that we are landed with half a dozen half educated
youths, with an enormous opinion of themselves, who resent not being given huge pay by the Government
and are now actively against the Govt. I told Abdulla that the best thing for them would be to send them all
up to the Fort and give them a sound beating, unfortunately we couldnt do that. Called on the Kadi, Shaikh
Abdulla. We had a very successful meeting with him and Abdu Ali, at the Shia school, and made a regular
programme and scheme for the Shia schools. The Kadi is extremly helpful and had many valuable ideas, we
offered him the presidency of the Shia council but he refused it as he said he felt he could be more helpful
working from outside it. All this work takes a long time but I feel that we are getting a lot done. I am really
very angry about these insufferable young men from Beyrout, all the money that was spent on them is utterly
wasted. I should like to tell Barrett what I think of the whole affair. In the evening we motored out to see the
boring, still no water and have gone down about 300 feet, its an expensive business and I shall be
disappointed if they dont get any water. Shaikh Abdulla, as Minister of Education, seems to be even better
than he was before when only President of the Committee, I think it was a wise move of mine getting that
through.

Monday 6th October 1930

Court. The native newspapers in Egypt, Irak and Syria are all now a days full of news about Bahrain, and most
of them contain rude allusions to me, Shaikh Sulman brought in one which I had heard of but had not seen
with a little article about me by name saying that I was the "All in all" of Bahrain and any talk about the
independence of Bahrain was absurd when I ran it entirely as I liked; another paper said that I was
responsible for the oil concession and the Shaikh really didnt know anything about the terms of it. Finished