Page 68 - Life of Gertrude Bell

5<> GERTRUDE BELL
cryptic observations. To Elsa: ‘Charlotte and 1 went down to the
Church of the Holy Sepulchre and 1 left her sketching while I
explored it griindlicb by the light of a taper which I bought from a
priest. He intended me, I fancy, to use the taper for other purposes
but I found it necessary as the church contains shrine within
shrine and many of them very dark. It is most curious, half a
dozen churches in one, of the most various dates. It is, you may
fairly say, a summary of the whole biblc ... all die sacred places
huddled together under one roof, most convenient for the
pilgrims. The people there are the most interesdng part— from
all countries and praying with every degree of fervour, with a
couple of Turkish soldiers on guard to keep them from belabour­
ing opposite sects!’
She called on the English consul Mr John Dickson and his
wife but otherwise spent most of the dme with the Rosens and her
Arabic teacher. Her days were carefully mapped out. Study in the
morning after being awakened by her befezzed housemaid, who
prepared her bath and looked after her with motherly concern;
then lunch with the Rosens, riding until live in the afternoon,
more work undl seven, and then dinner with the Rosens. ‘I aim
at being back by io to get another hour’s work but this doesn’t
always happen, especially now when Nina [Rosen] is very busy
preparing an Xmas tree and we spend our evenings tying up
presents and gilding walnuts, Dr R. reading to us ... ’ She started
to make headway with her Arabic under Khalil, ‘I learnt more
about pronunciation this morning than I have ever known’. Her
private lessons in Persian and Arabic, which she had begun three
years before at home in England and continued under Denison
Ross, are unlikely to have given her a native gift of pronunciation.
Her new teacher gave her some fascinating lessons. One of them
began: ‘The Arabs are the oldest race on earth; they date from
the Flood.’ Her conversations with her ‘housemaid’ were perhaps
more instructive, as a letter home suggests:
Comes my housemaid.
‘The hot water is ready for the Presence,’ says he. ‘Enter and
light the candle,’ say I. ‘On my head,’ he has replied—That
means it’s dressing time.

Christmas came and went in persistent rain and the century
turned its last leaf to the welcome accompaniment of sunshine.
Heil dir, Sonne ! she exclaimed to the Rosens. But her effervescent