Page 78 - Personal Column (Charles Belgrave)_Neat

which I had planted in Bahrain and when we built the terrace I was
bridges across the irrigation channels which were sometimes dangerously
determined to avoid cutting it down. In the evenings, when we sat and
insecure, through the date-gardens, or across open country to the Govern­
dined outside, the silver and glass and the big bowl of flowers on the
ment experimental garden at Budcya, where we usually ate largely of
roun d polished table made a very civilized picture. The pleasantest form
melons before coming back.
of relaxation after a long, busy day was to have two or three of our
But too often when I got home I found people waiting to sec me,
perhaps °a police officer with a report of some trouble in the town, it i friends to dinner on .‘the shelf’, then one could appreciate the words of
Longfellow’s poem:
might be about a European sailor off a ship who was ‘beating it up’ in
i
the bazaar, or I would find a messenger from the Shaikh with an im­
1 The cares that infest the day
portant letter which he wished me to see before he replied to it. I liked to
1 Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
go back to my office after dinner for night was the only time when I
And as silently steal away.
could work without interruption, but in the cold season this was rarely
possible. Night after night we dined out or had people to dinner or we
had guests staying in the house, which made it difficult for me to escape to
the office. Cocktail parties were incessant during the winter months. I
suppose most people enjoyed them but as I never drank more than one
glass of sherry I found them a tedious form of entertainment. The fact i
that I never drank anything except sherry or wine was well known. J
Once we were calling on some Americans at Awali whom we had not
met before. Their servant, who knew me, of his own accord came into
. the room with one glass of sherry on a tray which he handed to me. It
was quite an embarrassing occasion. Another time, in America, we dined
at a restaurant with some people who we met for the first time but who
knew all about us. Before dinner our host asked everyone what they
would drink. I said, ‘May I please have a sherry?1 The others asked for r
‘Scotch*. When we sat down there was a whispered conversation between
our host and the waiter. A bottle of sherry appeared and a little was
poured into our host’s glass, which completely mystified him, and
surprised me. A glass was then poured out for me and the bottle was
placed at my side. When my host saw that I was not making much head­
way he became very insistent that I should drink more—in fact, that I
should finish the bottle. I protested, but he said: ‘It is sherry wine. I heard
from Bahrain that you drink nothing but sherry wine. We expect you to
finish the bottle. Anyone can drink a bottle of wine.’ I did my best and
during the long evening I drank about half.
In warm weather we had dinner on ‘the shelf*, which was a terrace,
large enough to dance on, built out from the veranda, above the garden.
At night one could see, through the trees, the moonlight gleaming like a
long silver path on the smooth sea at the end of the garden. The branches
of a big tree, on which jasmine grew, overhung the terrace. The tree
trunk came through an opening in the floor; it was one of the first trees
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