THE PERSIAN GULF 163 



nadir and final resting place, for there is nothing for them any 

 further to the east. 



The officers spent their time at Basra in an orgy of buying 

 Persian rugs. This is a pleasing pastime, if somewhat expensive. 

 They sat for two or three hours in the cool high room of the 

 carpet shop, sipping the hot black coff^ee which burned the tip of 

 the tongue as the merchant and his assistants pulled down from 

 their shelves carpet after carpet which they unfolded upon the 

 ever-increasing pile. A small boy was constantly on the run to the 

 nearby coffee shop, hurrying with the small hot cups and the 

 glasses of iced water to go with them. 



Then there were the never to be forgotten duck shooting 

 expeditions in the boundless marshes around Hammer Lakes, 

 conducted by Mr. Angoorli, the King of Iraq's game warden, who 

 is well known to every naval officer addicted to this sport who has 

 served in the Persian Gulf. 



By May the weather had become too hot for surveying and 

 the ship moved to Cyprus. Then, after a refit at Gibraltar, she 

 returned in December, 1947, to continue the survey of the 

 Gulf. 



There had been a number of changes among the ship's com- 

 pany at Gibraltar, for by now many of the men who had been 

 called up for the war were being demobilised, with the result that 

 the disturbed post-war conditions were rendered even more 

 unsettled by constant changes throughout the Service; General 

 Gordon was once again in the ship, having relieved Trapper 

 Croome, and Charles Grattan had been invalided home. His relief 

 was Lieutenant-Comniander Bill Ashton, joining the ship for the 

 first time — bluff and jolly, this most likeable of fellows brought 

 life and good humour with him to the ship. 



The voyage was delayed at Aden, where the ship arrived on 4th 

 December, 1947, to find serious disturbances had broken out 

 ashore between the Arabs and the Jews following the partition of 

 Palestine. There were many Jewish merchants and shop-keepers 

 in Aden and their shops had been broken into and set on fire. 

 About 100 people altogether had been killed in the subsequent 

 riotinCT. 



H.M. destroyers Contest and Cockade had arrived the previous 



