Page 233 - Life of Gertrude Bell

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THE MANDATE 213
leased from captivity by the Indian Government and seeking sup­
port among the disaffected Iraqis in Syria. But there were others who
were destined to play an important part in the political life of the
region, among them Nuri Said Pasha, the leading figure in Faisal’s
army. She went through Syria to Damascus, then to Beirut and
on to Aleppo where she saw Fattuh for the first time since the war
started. Fie had fallen on hard times and she did her best to help
him by approaching the authorities and lending him money. ‘We
have had such happy times together —my poor Fattuh!’
On October 8th Wilson wrote to Captain Geoffrey Stephenson
who had been a Political Officer in Iraq and was now working at
the India Office: ‘I shall be interested to know what Miss Bell is
going to do when she comes here. She will take some handling.
I have abolished the Arab Bureau but I have no doubt she can ;
find a place ... some sort of outlet must be found for her energies,
and she is undoubtedly popular in Baghdad among the natives,
with whom she keeps in close touch, to her advantage, though it
is sometimes dangerous.’ Wilson need not have worried about
Gertrude’s employment. Fler first self-imposed task on arriving
back in Baghdad was to compose another of her long and very
readable essays, this time on the Syria she had just examined at
first hand. It began widi a conversation piece from an official
report of the Peace Conference which pre-empted a good deal of
argument about government in Arab countries:

ist Statesman: The country will be very badly governed.
2nd Statesman: Why should it not be badly governed?
3rd Statesman: It ought to be badly governed.

Entitled ‘Syria in October 1919’, it began: ‘The fortnight which
I spent in Syria (4th October to 20th October) fell at a time of
acute political uncertainty and apprehension.’ She went on to give
another of her masterly summaries of the problems—the dismay
caused by an agreement reached by the French and British Prime
Ministers and Lord Allenby on September 16th, and the possible
withdrawal of troops which that agreement foreshadowed; the
difficulties posed by the geographical boundaries of the adminis­
trative territories, roughly according to the Sykes-Picot agree­
ment, and a detailed account of the functions of the British and
French officers working within those boundaries. There was a
long section on the Zionist claim, concluding with the words:

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