a mo'!" he said, blowing a cloud of smoke in Geoff's direction. "What's that? Turkey in Europe! But Mesopotamia's Asia, isn't it? Here's a pencil, my boy, and here's a copy of to-day's 'orders'. Just you sketch out on the back of it the outline of Mesopotamia. I'm not such a fool that I can't follow a sketch when it's made for me."
A brother "sub" joined them at that moment, and as Geoff sketched diligently and drew in the outline of the Persian Gulf, of the Afghan frontier, and of Persia, another and yet another subaltern strolled up, till, quite unknown to him, a little group of officers were looking on over his shoulder. Then he suddenly became aware of their presence, and, colouring furiously, for the young fellow was essentially modest, he crumpled the paper up and threw it into a corner.
"No you don't, my boy! No you don't!" said a well-known voice from behind his shoulder. "We are all of us keen on knowing something more about the place we are bound for, and you are the only one amongst us who has ever been there. Take it as an order, Geoff. I'll guarantee that there shall be no larking, and I'm sure that every one of your brother officers wishes you to give us just a short lecture on the country called Mesopotamia."
Under the circumstances it was not to be expected that a junior officer, so junior indeed as Geoff, could refuse the request – the order if you like to call it, though it was given so pleasantly – of one of his seniors. It was the senior captain, in fact, who was leaning over his shoulder, and who patted his arm encouragingly.
"Fire ahead, Geoff," he told him. "It's not showing off! There's no swank about it! I'd like awfully to know all about this Mesopotamia. I'll admit the fact, before you young officers, that I'm just about as ignorant as I can be. Up to now I never imagined that there were any Turks to speak of in the neighbourhood of the Persian Gulf, so why on earth they should send an Expeditionary Force there from India is more than I can guess at. The Colonel says it's so that we shall protect the oil-supply which comes down from Persian territory to somewhere near the Gulf. Know it, Geoff?"
"Yes, sir! And if you really won't think it's swank – "
"Of course not. Now, here's a piece of paper, and get on with it."
To one who had visited the country, and, more than all, to one who had accompanied the studious Major Joseph Douglas, there was no difficulty in drawing a map which showed all the essential points in Mesopotamia. It was not exactly Geoff's fault that he knew a great deal about the country. Thanks to the tuition of his kindly guardian, and the long discussions which that officer had so frequently indulged in, Geoff had contrived to visit Mesopotamia and live there, not as an ordinary tourist might have done, but as an explorer. Brought into the closest contact with the Turk, the Persian, the Armenian, and the Jew, it was only natural that, with his guardian's help, he should have learnt something of the international situation as it concerned Turkey. A visit to Constantinople had shown him the more civilized side of the country, while the outbreak of the war between the Balkan Powers and Turkey, and the dissertations of Major Joe Douglas, had familiarized him more or less with the situation of Turkey in Europe.
"Of course, there is the 'pipe' line," he told his listeners, "and, going by what Major Douglas has always told me, it cannot fail to be of great importance to Britain. You see, numbers of our battleships now use oil fuel almost exclusively."
"Quite so! That's got it!" chimed in the senior officer. "You've hit the nail on the head, Geoff. Go ahead!"
"So an expedition to the head of the Persian Gulf may very well be for the sole purpose of protecting the oil-supply of the British Navy. As to why the Expedition should come from India rather than from England, I can say that anyone – any white man that is – who has been to Mesopotamia will know that it's a beast of a climate. As hot as India in the plains in the hot weather, and often enough, when the cold season comes along, bitterly cold and wet. But for the most part it is hot, and damp, and trying, so that native troops are far more suitable. There's the 'pipe' line," he told his listeners, sketching in a line from the southern border of Persia. "It strikes across the desert to the east of the River Karun, and joins up with the Shatt-el-Arab, close to a place called Mohammera. I ought to explain that the Rivers Tigris and Euphrates join up somewhere in the region of Kurnah and Basra, and then flow on, picking up the River Karun and opening into the Persian Gulf some twenty miles farther down. As to Turks, of course the bulk of them are up country, particularly in the neighbourhood of Bagdad. But there are fortified posts along both rivers and right down to the mouth of the Shatt-el-Arab. At Basra there are quite a considerable number of Europeans and Indians, and they tell me that an increasing trade is done from that port. If we land somewhere about there we are sure to be opposed, and if there weren't any Turks there are any number of Arabs, some of whom, at least, are likely to be unfriendly."
"So that there'll be fighting, eh?" asked the senior officer.
"Plenty of it, I imagine," Geoff told him. "Those Arabs are wily beggars to deal with."
"And where's Bagdad?" he was asked. "And how does it lie compared with Constantinople?"
"And what about Persia, and Russia, and Turkestan, and Turkey in Europe?" demanded Philip, anxious to improve the occasion.
Thus pressed, Geoff could not do other than sketch in the various positions, showing Persia to the east, and Russia where she abutted on Turkey in Asia, along the line of the Caucasus Mountains. Then, having shaded in the Black Sea, thus showing the southern shore of Russia and the Crimea, he sketched the Sea of Marmora and the Narrows, where, at the Dardanelles, the British fleet was so soon to be hammering.
A glance at the map will show better than any description the chief features of the situation, and only a few words are needed to explain the intrusion of Turkey into the gigantic war which had so recently arisen. If one looks for the cause of Turkey's joining with Germany and Austria against the Powers of the Entente, one is bound to confess that no adequate reason can be discovered. Turkey had nothing to fear from Great Britain or from her allies; yet, for years Germany had been secretly scheming to expand her sway over Turkey. It may be conceded that, whereas, exclusive of Russia, the whole of Europe was highly industrialized, and the greater part of the "middle East" that was easy to come at was already being busily developed by France or Great Britain, or others of the European nations, there yet remained the whole of Turkey in Asia and of Persia – a gigantic sweep of country – the natural riches of which were, still, not even tapped, and which, thanks to the listless idleness of the Turk, were likely to remain untapped until some European Power, with need for extending her commerce, swept upon the scene and took advantage of such golden opportunities.
Already Russia had brought a portion of Persia under her sway, while Great Britain had secured the other portion. No doubt, too, Russia had her eyes on the northern portion of Turkey in Asia, while Britain was not entirely ignorant of the riches lying undeveloped in Mesopotamia. What had once been, according to legend, the Garden of Eden, and, since the Turk had come upon the scene, had been utterly neglected, and had woefully depreciated till it had become hardly better than a barren desert, was capable of being coaxed back into its old condition. Riches, now hidden, might be won from the country by Western energy and resource, while the country, once firmly occupied by Germany or by any other nation, would open a way to the subjection of Persia and to an approach upon India by way of Afghanistan.
Let us say at once that Turkey had no adequate reason for joining in this vast struggle against Great Britain and her allies; but she was cajoled into that action. Perhaps her leaders were heavily bribed by the Germans, who themselves had reason enough in all conscience. The coming of Turkey into the conflict would of itself detain large forces both of Russia and of Great Britain; and then again, supposing France and Britain and Russia to have been defeated in Europe, Germany would have a clear field in the "middle East", with a prospect one day of even approaching India, and so of coming nearer to the consummation of that vastly ambitious scheme the Kaiser had set before him, of becoming the Ruler of the World.
But
