Caught by the Turks Part 22

Of the maze of plot and counterplot in the city, of the death-throes of the old regime, and of our own small part in the history of that time, this record of moods and misadventures is not the place to write. My life as a prisoner was finished: my brief career as a minor diplomat, keeping his finger on the feverish pulse of Turkish politics, had only just begun, and the story of those crowded weeks would fill a volume.

Up to the last moment, the Government, in the person of Taalat Pasha, hoped to hold the real, if not the ostensible, reins of power. Until the flight of the Union and Progress triumvirate, the average Turk affected a certain lightheartedness about his country's losses. True, huge territories were lost to the Ottoman revenue, but on the other hand they had gained the Caucasus. So long as there was taxable territory, what did it matter whence the tribute came?

One night, when my newspaper work permitted, I visited a friend of Taalat Pasha, without disclosing my ident.i.ty.

"n.o.body but Taalat can possibly manage Turkey," he told me--"and the English, if they come, will be well advised to deal with him."

"It is not the English only," I suggested modestly, "but the whole world-set-free, that is coming to Constantinople."

"Then the world must deal with Taalat. His party has all the money, and all the brains and energy as well."

"Everything except imagination," I replied.

But I did not myself imagine that only thirty-six hours later Taalat, the fat telegraphist whom Fate caught in her toils, and Enver, with his peac.o.c.k-grace and peac.o.c.k-wits, and Djemal, with cruelty stamped on him like the brand of Cain, would pa.s.s disguised, and in darkness, and in fear of death, through the city they had ruled as kings.

Neither did I imagine that in another fortnight the streets of Pera would be decked with banners, and the capital of the Turks a playground for the peoples against whom they had lately been at war. Nor did I know that I should soon be listening to the strains of "Rule Britannia," at the Pera Palace Hotel, while an enthusiastic crowd showered confetti on the bald head of the Colonel who had just arrived as the first British representative. Nor did I know that I should telephone to the papers to stop their press, while I motored down with the first interview from our delegate. Nor, again, could I realise that the pomp of the Prussians would be so suddenly replaced by pipes and walking-sticks and dogs. Nor did I even dream that the fifty-sixty horse-power Mercedes car in which General Liman von Sanders was still racing through the streets would soon be my property, bought and paid for in gold, complete with all accessories, including even the chauffeur's diary, and that I should garage it in a garden where a performing bear stood guard against any attempt at theft by the disorderly and demoralised Germans. These things are another story.

BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD, ENGLAND

Telegrams: "Scholarly, London." 41 and 43 Maddox Street, Telephone: 1883 Mayfair. Bond Street, London, W. 1.

_October, 1919._

Mr. Edward Arnold's AUTUMN ANNOUNCEMENTS, 1919.

JOHN REDMOND'S LAST YEARS.

By STEPHEN GWYNN.

_With Portrait. 1 vol. Demy 8vo._ =16s. net.=

The "History of John Redmond's Last Years," by Stephen Gwynn, is in the first place an historical doc.u.ment of unusual importance. It is an account of Irish political events at their most exciting period, written by an active member of Mr. Redmond's party who was in the confidence of his chief. The preliminary story of the struggle with the House of Lords and the prolonged fight over Home Rule is described by a keen student of parliamentary action. For the period which began with the war Mr. Gwynn has had access to all Redmond's papers. He writes of Redmond's effort to lead Ireland into the war from the standpoint of a soldier as well as a member of parliament. The last chapter gives to the world, for the first time, a full account of the Irish Convention which sat for eight months behind closed doors, and in which Redmond's career reached its dramatic catastrophe.

The interlocking of varying chains of circ.u.mstance, the parliamentary struggle, the rise of the rival volunteer forces, the raising of Irish divisions, the rebellion and its sequel, and, finally, the effect of bringing Irishmen together into conference--all this is vividly pictured, with increasing detail as the book proceeds. In the opening, two short chapters recall the earlier history of the Irish party and Redmond's part in it.

But the main interest centres in the character of Redmond himself. Mr.

Gwynn does not work to display his leader as a hero without faults and incapable of mistakes. He shows the man as he knew him and worked under him, traces his career through its triumphs to reverses, and through gallant recovery to final defeat. A great man is made familiar to the reader, in his wisdom, his magnanimity, and his love of country. The tragic waste of great opportunities is portrayed in a story which has the quality of drama in it. Beside the picture of John Redmond himself there is sketched the gallant and sympathetic figure of his brother, who, after thirty-five years of parliamentary service, died with the foremost wave of his battalion at the battle of Messines.

A MEDLEY OF MEMORIES.

By the Rt. Rev. Sir DAVID HUNTER BLAIR, Bart.

_With Ill.u.s.trations. 1 vol. Demy 8vo._ =16s. net.=

Sir David Hunter Blair, late Abbot of Fort Augustus, in the first part of these fifty years' recollections, deals with his childhood and youth in Scotland, and gives a picture full of varied interest of Scottish country house life a generation or more ago. Very vivid, too, is the account of early days at what was then the most famous private school in England; and the chapter on Eton under Balston and Hornby gives thumbnail sketches of a great many Etonians, school-contemporaries of the writer's, and bearing names afterwards very well known for one reason or another. Eton was followed by Magdalen; and undergraduate life in the Oxford of 1872 is depicted with a light hand and many amusing touches. There was foreign travel after the Oxford days; and two of the most pleasantly descriptive chapters of the book deal with Rome in the reign of Pius IX. and Leo XIII., both of which Pontiffs the author served as Private Chamberlain. There is much also that is fresh and interesting in the section treating of the lives and personalities of some of the great English Catholic families of by-gone days.

Sir David entered the Benedictine Order at the age of twenty-five; and the latter half of the book is concerned with his life as co-founder, and member of the community of, the great Highland Abbey of Fort Augustus, of which he rose later to be the second abbot. The intimate account given in these pages of the life of a modern monk will be new to most readers, who will find it very interesting reading. The writer's monastic experiences embrace not only his own beautiful home in the Central Highlands, but Benedictine life and work in England, in Belgium, Germany and Portugal, and in South America. One of the most novel and attractive chapters in the book is that dealing with the work of the Order in the vast territory of Brazil.

The volume is ill.u.s.trated with an excellent portrait, and with some clever black-and-white drawings, the work of Mr. Richard Anson, one of the author's religious brethren, and a member of the Benedictine community at Caldey Abbey, in South Wales.

WITH THE PERSIAN EXPEDITION.

By Major M. H. DONOHOE, Army Intelligence Corps.

Special Correspondent of the "Daily Chronicle."

_With numerous Ill.u.s.trations and Map. Demy 8vo._ =16s. net.=

Among the many "side-shows" of the Great War, few are so difficult for the average reader to understand as the operations in Northern Persia, an offshoot of the Bagdhad venture, which had for their object the policing of the warlike tribes in an area almost unknown to Europeans, and included the various attempts to reach and hold Baku, and so get command of the Caspian and Caucasia.

The story of these operations--carried out by little, half-forgotten bodies of troops, mainly local levies who broke at the critical moment and left their British officers and N.C.O.'s to carry on alone--is one of the most amazing of the whole War, and comprises many episodes that recall the most stirring events of the Empire's pioneering days.

By happy chance, Major M. H. Donohoe, the famous War Correspondent, whose work for the _Daily Chronicle_ in all the wars of the past twenty years is well known, was in this part of the world as a Major on the Intelligence Staff, work for which his knowledge of men and languages off the beaten tract peculiarly fitted him. He has written the story of these operations as he saw them, chiefly as a member of the Staff of the Military Mission under General Byron, known officially as the "Baghdad Party," and unofficially as the "Hush-Hush Brigade," which set forth early in 1918 to join the Column under General Dunsterville. Though there is little of fighting in the story, the book gives an admirable picture of the Empire's work done faithfully under difficulties, and glimpses of places and peoples that are almost unknown even to the most venturesome traveller. Indeed, it is largely as a book about an unknown land that this volume will attract, together with its little pen-portraits of men and little pen-pictures of adventures, that Kipling would love.

A PHYSICIAN IN FRANCE.

By Major-General Sir WILMOT HERRINGHAM, K.C.M.G., C.B., Physician to St. Bartholomew's Hospital; Consulting Physician to the Forces Overseas.

_1 vol. Demy 8vo._ =15s. net.=

How the war, as seen at close quarters, struck a man eminent in another profession than that of arms is the distinguis.h.i.+ng feature of this volume of personal impressions. It is not, however, merely the outcome of a few weeks' sojourn or "trip to the trenches," with one eye on an expectant public, for the author has four times seen autumn fade into winter on the flat countryside of Flanders, and, when the war ended, was still at his post rendering invaluable services amidst unforgettable scenes. The author's comments on the day-to-day happenings are distinguished by a tone that is at once manly, reflective, and good-humoured. Medical questions are naturally prominent, but are dealt with largely in a manner that should interest the layman at the present time. Sir Wilmot was with Lord Roberts when he died. A very pleasing feature of the book is the constant revelation of the author's love of nature and sport, and his happy way of introducing such topics, together with descriptions of the country around him, makes a welcome contrast to the stern events which form the staple material of the book. There are some very amusing stories.

LONDON MEN IN PALESTINE.

By ROWLANDS COLDICOTT.

_With maps. 1 vol. Demy 8vo._ =12s. 6d. net.=

This book embraces so much more than the ordinary war story that we have a peculiar difficulty in describing it in a few chosen words.

The curtain lifts the day after the battle of Sheria, one of the minor fights in General Allenby's first campaign--those movements of troops which came only to a pause with the capture of Jerusalem. Gaza has just been taken. You are introduced to one of the companies of a London battalion serving in the East, of which company the author is commander.

The reading of a few lines, the pa.s.sing of a few moments, causes you (such is the power of right words) to be _attached_ to that company and to move in imagination with it across the dazzling plain. When you have tramped a few miles you begin to realise, perhaps for the first time, the heat and torment of a day's march in Philistia. It is not long before you feel that you, too, are adventuring with the toiling soldiers; with them you wonder where the halting place will be, what sort of bivouac you are likely to hit upon. By this time you will have met the officers--Temple, Trobus, Jackson--and are coming to have a nodding acquaintance with the men. Desire to compa.s.s the unknown, and sympathetic interest in the experiences of a company of your own country-men, Londoners footing it in a foreign land, now takes you irresistibly into the very heart of the tale, and you become one with the narrator. With him you wander among the ruins of Gaza, pa.s.s into southern Palestine, and come to the foot-hills of Judea. With him you slowly become conscious that the long series of marches is planned to culminate in an a.s.sault upon Jerusalem. Now you are part of a dusty column winding up into Judea by the Jerusalem road, looking hour by hour upon those natural phenomena that suggested the parables. "London Men in Palestine" brings all this home to you as if you were a pa.s.ser-by. Next, the ma.s.sing of troops about the Holy City is described, and you are given a distant view of the city itself. A chapter follows that describes the coming of the rains. Then you spend a night in an old rock-engendered fortress-village while troops pa.s.s through to the attack, the storm still at its height. A chapter follows that tells of a crowded day--too complex and full of incident here to be described. The book closes with an exciting description of a fight on the Mount of Olives.

MONS, ANZAC, AND KUT.

By an M.P.

_1 vol. Demy 8vo._ =14s. net.=

The writer of these remarkable memoirs, whose anonymity will not veil his ident.i.ty from his friends, is a man well known, not only in England, but also abroad, and the pages are full of the writer's charm, and gaiety of spirit, and "courage of a day that knows not death." Day by day, in the thick of the most stirring events in history, he jotted down his impressions at first hand, and although parts of the diary cannot yet be published, enough is given to the world to form a graphic and very human history.

Our author was present at the most critical part of the Retreat from Mons. He took part in the dramatic defence of Landrecies, and the stand at Compiegne. Wounded, and a prisoner, he describes his experiences in a German hospital and his subsequent recapture by the British during the Marne advance.

The scene then s.h.i.+fts to Gallipoli, where he was present at the immortal first landing, surely one of the n.o.blest pages of our history. He took part in the fierce fighting at Suvla Bay, and, owing to his knowledge of Turkish, he had amazing experiences during the Armistice arranged for the burial of the dead.

Later, the author was in Mesopotamia, where he accompanied the relieving force in their heroic attempt to save Kut. On several occasions he was sent out between the lines to conduct negociations between the Turks and ourselves.