LAWRENCE OF ARABIA

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 114, 11 February 1928, Page 24

LAWRENCE OF ARABIA

THE EXPLOITS OF A TWENTIETH CENTURY ELIZABETHAN

(for The Dominion by Charles Wilson.)

Probably no more romantic figure has been produced by the Great War than Colonel T. E. Lawrence, an Englishman, destined to be almost as famous for his adventurous experiences as any of those Elizabethans who made the very name of the race whence they sprang -so justly feared and hated by tile haughty Dons. The story of those wonderful adventures, when in Arab.a he led the Arab tribesmen, who under Feisal had revolted against Turkish rule, has recently been made available to the general public in a slightly abridged, and altered form from “The Seven Pillars of Wisdom,”'under which title the story was first given to a few dozen, if indeed so many readers. “The Revolt in the Desert” (Jonathan Cape) is destined, 1 feel certain, to rank among the classics of English literature of adventure, as a work of permanent value, and an assured source of pride to all the author’s fellow countrymen.

of twelve hundred bouncing camels of the bodyguard, packed as closely as they coulo move, the men in every variety of coloured clothes’and the camels nearly as brilliant in their trappings. We filled the valley to its banks with our flashing stream. One of the first Arab warriors to join in tne conflict on their side, ' was a much experienced fighter, hero ot a Hundred raids and robberies, Auda. This worthy had been given by the Turks a set of .artificial teetn. At his nrst meal in Feisal’s tent, the old warrior, sitting down to meat, suddenly sprang up, scrambled to Ins feet with a laud “God forbid,” and rushed away. When lie retur led he was without bis talse molars. ‘ Jemal Pasha gave them to me. 1 had forgotten.” “He had pounded bis Turkish, probably Germanmade teeth to pieces on a stone. It was long I am afraid, before he re-

Before the war Lawrence had wandered about Arabia, learning the language, seeing much of their Turkish masters, whom the young Englishman disliked probably just as much as he was sympathetically attached to the children of the soil. The war found him really anxious to do his bit, his special desire and ambition being to serve the Arabs and the Allies by active participation in and assistance of the tledjaz campaign against the hated rule of the Young Turks. It was largely owing to a singularly happy thought of Kitchener that Lawrence went out to Cairo to act as a junior- intelligence officer, and he was still almost in a dream when he had his first camel ride from Rabegh inland from Jeddah to Hie camp of tlie Emir Feisal, afterwards to be King of Irak. Of his first meeting with Feisal Lawrence writes:— Feisal looked very tall and pillar-like, very slender in his long white silk robes and his brown headcloth bound with a brilliant scarlet and gold cord. His eyelids were dropped; and his black beard and colourless face - were like a mask against the strange, still watchfulness of his body. His hands were crossed in. front of him on his dagger. He looked years older than thirty-one; and his dark, appealing eyes, set a little sloping in his face, were bloodshot, and’his hollow cheeks deeply lined and puckered with reflection. His nature grudged thinking, for it crippled hisspeed in action ; the labour of it shrivelled his features into swift lines of pain. There were no fewer than five leaders of the Arab revolt, Hussein and. his sons, but Lawrence soon saw that Feisal was essentially the leader to be trusted and supported. To Feisal, therefore, he pinned his faith, and of Feisal lie became, although apparently at first the Arab was noli over certain of his man, the personal friend. Very rapidly Lawrence merged into the Arab life, dressing, living as a Bedouin. Soon he was qualified to take up the role of leader of what was ever, although constant British training after a while was followed by more regard for discipline, largely a guerrilla force. To all intents and purposes Lawrence became an Arab, just as Burton had done ill his memorable journey to Mecca, and that other great Englishman, Doughty, had done in those years of wanderings—among the Bedouin which were to bear fruit in his famous book “Arabia Desert.” As to this early stage in his memorable adventure Lawrence writes:— The routine of our life in camp was simple. Just before daybreak the annv Imam used to utter an astounding call to prayer, and we were effectually roused, whether we prayed or cursed. As soon rs l>e ended, Feisal’s Imam cried gent? and nmsiicallv from just outside the .tent. In a minute or two one of Feisal’s five slaves came round with sweetened coffee. Sugar for the first cun in the chill of dawn was considered fit. An hour or so later the flap of Feisal’s sleeping tent would be thrown back ; liis invitation to callers from the household. Just eleven years ago on January 30, 1913, there commenced the first famous marches in which the Arabs were to strike terror into the hearts of the Turks, and pave the way for that triumphant progress to ancient Damascus, and which, opened up so new a period for Syria First rode Feisal in white, then Sharraf at his right in red headcloth and henna-dved tunic and cloak, myself on his left in white and scarlet, and behind us three banners o f faded crimson silk with gilt spikes, behind them the drummers playing a march, and behind them again the wild mass

ceived another set, this time from the English allies of his , people.” Auda, it. may here | be noted, found one of his greatest joys during the. campaign in witnessing the to him, novel and quite astonishing effects of dynamite. • How Lawrence, a bora, if not a specially trained guerrilla leader, threw iwmseo uno the fray, he himself tells wiv.i a becoming modesty winch, however, cannot veil the dangers to wnich he was subjected, or the marvellous feats of daring of himself and his men. He had some “bonny fighters” in his train and certain of their joint exploits were so audacious as to affright the war weary Turk. There were days of riding when dysentry had Lawrence in its toils. Time after time lie was injured by rocks and thorns, injured too as a sequel to .explosions. At one stage of his adventurous career, he actually received a hundred Turkish lashes, being left for dead. In course of time he became almost a legendary figure to the Arabs, being, notwithstanding, threatened with betrayal and being compelled to surround himself with a personal I -guard of some ninety men, mainly he admits, sheer ruffians, of whom many died in his service. He, like Doughty, never grew to really like the Bedouin. They (he savs) were odd people. For an Englishman, sojourning with them was unsatisfactory unless he had patience wide and deep as the sea. They were absolute slaves of their appetite, with no stamina of mind, drunkards for coffee, milk,, or water, -gluttons Mr stewed meat, shameless beggars of tobacco. They dreamed for weeks before and after their rare sexual exercises, and spent the intervening days titillating themselves and their hearers with bawdytales. Had the circumstances of their lives given them, opportunity they would have been sheer sensualists. But he had exposed the Arab cause and he was not the man to funk seeing it through. Of Turkish atrocities, Lawrence saw and recounts to make his readers, in places, almost sick, with disgust, the Turkish soldiers breaking their commanders plighted word with brutal cynicism, raping women and girls, massacring children and committing numberless almost unspeakable horrors. It is after reading of all these dreadful things that Lawrence’s account of howlie and his followers laid secret mines underneath a Turkish railway line, only to blow a whole train of soldiers and munitions when the right moment came, fails to strike the reader as anything save an act of most righteous revenge. Naturally the Arab soldiers only thought of loot when they got a chance, but it is good to read of Lawrence protecting the Turkish womenfolk. The Turk in warfare can be quite beastly in his brutality. At one point Lawrence writes:— The village lay stilly under its slow wreaths of white smoke, as we rode near, on our guard. Some greyheaps seemed to hide in the. long grass, embracing the ground in the close wav of corpses. A’e looked awav from these, knowing they were dead, but from cue a little figure tottered off. as if to escape us. It was a child, three or four-year-old, whose dirtv smock was stained red over one shoulder and side, with blood from a large half fibrous wound, perhaps a lance .thrust, just where neck and body joined. The child ran a few steps, then stood and cried to us in a tone of astonishing strength (all else being verv silent). "Don’t hit me Baba.” Abd el Aziz, choking out something—this was his village and she might be of his family—flung himself' off his camel, and stumbled, kneeling in tlie grass beside the child.

His suddenness frightened her, for she threw up her arms and tried to scream; but, instead, dropped in a little' heap, while the blood rushed out again over her clothes. Then, I heard, she died. Lawrence describes other things, for more horrible, which he saw in this vil lage, “whose loneliness we now knew meant death and horror,” but I cannot bring myself to transcribe what he records. No wonder the Arab had his moments of revenge. Even Lawrence himself, admits that there was one occasion—‘the only time in our war—when the order’ was given, "No prisoners!” It is good to see, however, that he says of the German and Austrian machine-gunners who were fighting with the Turks, that they fought magnificently and repulsed us time and again, despite our hardiness.” In the latet chapters of a more recent notable book, we find Lawrence telling in detail of the “crumpling up” of the Turkish power in Palestine, of the fine dash and gallantry of the Australians and Chaytor’s New Zealanders, of the Arab and Allied capture of Damascus, etc. . It is a. wonderful book, this “Revolt in Arabia,” a marvellous and vet, as I have said at the outset a quite modest record of one ol the most memorable campaigns of the war. Above all, it is a narrative which proves how splendid a spirit of courage and determination can be displaced hv an Englishman. The full page illustrations by Augustus John, Eric Kennington, and other famous artists are very fine. (3Gs.).