Photograph: LOOKING OUT THROUGH THE DOORWAY OF THE TEMPLE, IN THE DISTANCE WE SEE THE NARROW DEFILE THROUGH WHICH WE CAME IN ENTERING THE “LOST CITY”
Photograph: AN AMPHITHEATER HEWN OUT OF THE MOUNTAIN
But this brief enumeration of the other Europeans who played a part in the desert war would not be complete without reference to the French. Early in September, 1916, the French indicated their faith in the Arab cause by sending a mission to Jeddah under the leadership of a Colonel Bremond. The French were at a great disadvantage simply because their Government could not give them sufficient backing and the British had to furnish nearly everything for them. This made it difficult for them to get a strong hold over the Arabs, because the latter were aware of the circumstances. But Captain Pisani, who led a detachment of French Algerians throughout the campaign, had had unlimited experience in the Moroccan Desert and did splendid sporting work against the Turkish railway in 1917, and again in the final operations around Deraa in 1918.
The only other foreigners in the Hedjaz were some mixed Egyptian troops and a Mohammedan machine-gun section from India.
One of the finest sporting achievements during the war in the Near East was accomplished by a British civilian official, a Mr. H. St. John Philby, who played no part in the Hedjaz campaign, but who startled King Hussein one day by turning up in Bedouin costume at his summer capital of Taif. Philby had been sent on a secret mission to the court of Ibn Saud in the very heart of Central Arabia, and he had accomplished the remarkable feat of trekking right across Arabia from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea through a totally unknown region. Lawrence was so impressed with Philby’s achievement and his skill in dealing with the Bedouins, that after the war he was instrumental in having Philby appointed adviser to the sultan of Transjordania.
Perhaps the most genuine-looking brigand of all the Europeans who fought in the Arab rebellion was the Earl of Winterton. He wore a huge beard and an Arab head-cloth and rode a tall racing-camel bedecked with gorgeous trappings. Lord Winterton turned out to be as much of a fire-eater in the field as he was back home in the House of Commons when on one occasion a member from the Whitechapel district interrupted him while he was making a speech. The earl wheeled round, gave the disturber a withering look, and shouted, “Silence in the Ghetto,” and the House simply howled.