144 The National Geographic Magazine 



A Canal Scene — Busra 



Photo by Fairchild 



pies, the orchards of date palms, the 

 adobe houses with their latticed win- 

 dows, and the boatloads of peculiar pro- 

 duce make this old Busra canal a most 

 interesting sight. The few Europeans 

 who live in Busra manage in the summer 

 season to keep fairly cool by spending 

 as many of the hours of daylight as pos- 

 sible in the darkened lower quarters of 

 the Arab dwellings in which they live, 

 and at night they make themselves com- 

 fortable on the roofs of the houses. A 

 social club, with its outfit of tennis 

 courts, seems to be the only amusement 

 possible to those unfortunate enough to 

 be obliged to live in this out-of-the- 

 world place. The principal business is 

 that of date shipping, and in the autumn 

 season shipload after shipload of the 

 fruit of the surrounding palm trees is 

 dispatched to New York, if possible in 

 time for the Thanksgiving market. 



There are only two steamers plying 

 up and down the historic Tigris, and 

 possibly these might not be in existence 



were it not for the fact that the British 

 government, at the close of the Crimean 

 war, secured from Turkey the right to 

 maintain three gunboats on the Tigris. 

 One of these still remains and is to be 

 seen opposite the British consulate in 

 Bagdad. The other two have, with the 

 consent of the Sultan, been replaced by 

 side-wheel freight and passenger boats 

 similar to those on the Mississippi, which 

 are controlled by Lynch Brothers, of 

 London , who make a handsome profit out 

 of their almost complete monopoly of 

 the Tigris River trade. Five days are 

 necessary, with the best of success, to 

 stem the strong spring current of the 

 river from Busra to Bagdad. Its long 

 reaches, sharp turns, and shifting sand 

 banks make it a difficult river to navi- 

 gate, and we had the experience, which 

 is not unusual, of being turned com- 

 pletely around in our course by the 

 strong current, against which for hours 

 the feeble engine of the steamer made 

 absolutely no headway. Although I had 



