LAND AND ^\• A T E R 
November 13, 1915. 
tlioless still ranks high in the estimation of the oriental 
Moslem. Sii Mark Sykes regards the reign of Haroun el 
.Kasc-hid as the apogee of Bagdad's splendour ; but it is 
dear that verj' little of his architectural ombellish- 
inent has survived. It is probable that subsequent 
irruptions of Moguls and Tartars have destroyed its 
ancient buildings just as completely as they have effaced 
the i)lan of the original city ; but" the fact remains that 
there is hardl\- a building of importance now in Bagdad 
. excepting, perhaps, the palace in the north-west quarter, 
arid the Merjaniah mosque (both of which are com- 
^'. jiaratiyely modern) and the ancient tomb of Haroun's 
t favourite wife Zobeide. which has survived all vicissitudes 
i, on the right bank of the river. 
Sir .Mark thinks it probable that the Moslem 
Caliphs regarded the chronic war with the Greeks 
on their western frontier in " the light of a useful 
and amusing entertainment," and were imwilling to em- 
bark seriously on the conquest of .\sia Minor and the 
capture of Constantinople for fear of leaving Bagdad, 
which they regarded as the key of the .\bbasid Empire, 
and without which Persia and Khorasan would inevitably 
be lost . A wholesome respect for the difiiculties of a military 
invasion of .Asia .\[inor from the south may have been a 
more persuasive argument in favour of leaving that land 
of mountain barriers alone ; anyhow, thevgraduallv raised 
Bagdad into the position of the" Arab capital. Meanwhile, 
the mercantile trade of the East poured gold into Bagdad 
.and supplemented its enormous gains in loot derived 
from raids into Asia Minor, India and Tm-kcstan. Bagdad 
was the centre of a vast commercial traffic, and art, 
literature, philosophy and poetry were patronised anci 
encoiuaged. Thus the city became the centre of culture 
as of wealth ; and it still retains much of the ancient 
flavour of its mediaeval renown. 
of mountain ridges and ranges whicii form barriers to 
approach from the south and which are only to be turned 
from the north east, are not made sufficiently definite in 
these maps. The Taurus range and its geographical out- 
works, the Anti Taurus and .\manus. ha\-e been world- 
famous obstacles to illilitary movement through all time. 
They were never more important than now when tlu; narrow 
gateways to Syria and Cilicia may yet again be crowdxxl 
with advancing hosts. • None of the maps really illustrate 
these important features. This is, however, a criticism 
which may be met by the statement that the book is 
not a treatise on military geography. It is from any 
other point of view a most interesting and valuable work, 
especially appropriate to the present march of events. 
It is sure of a wide circulation. 
POETRY AND VERSE. 
In tlio new volume of pcems by Steplien I^hilli])s, Panyrma 
and ('/lift Poems. (John Lane, 4s. 6d. net) may be set aside 
en to Paris," " The Passing of Julian," " Pene'.opc to 
Helen 
Turks of Mesopotamia. 
The old Turks of Mesopotamia still talk of Bagdad 
as if it were one of the universities of the world. Un- 
doubtedly the occupation of that city would create a great 
impression on the whole Moslem world, but it would be an 
impression which carried little or no religious significance. 
Bagdad passed into Ottoman hands in the year 1534, 
when it was captured by Sulaiman the Magnificent ; 
who thus, according to Sir Mark, completed the eastward 
march of the . Ottoman limpire. This seems open to 
question. Bagdad was retaken after, this date by Shah 
Abbas: the Great, and was again besieged and captured 
byAmurath the Fourth in 1638 A.D. ; and it only then 
finally became an Ottoman possession. This was "nearly 
200 .years after the European , power of the Ottoman 
Turk had been consohdate'd' in Europe. 
.^_ The story of the dramatic rise "of an obscure Asiatic 
tnbe to the position of a great European power, and 
subsequently.to the sovereignty of a huge sUce of Asia, 
presents.no new historical features, but Sir Mark justly 
observes with regard to the present position of that 
power, that there, is no positive Turkey or, Turks, but 
an .Ottoman 'Empire ruled by a Turki.sh dynasty, which 
governs a population, of Moslems, Christians, .Jews and 
Pagans. The official language is Turkish— that is a 
corrupt dialect of the Turki talked on the Oxus, but not 
in itself an original language. 
The second part of the book under review is a record 
of travel m Asia Minor and Northern Mesopotamia, which 
was spread over many years. The easy style of the 
author renders these traveller's tales not merely good 
readmg, but most instructive literature, and it is not 
difficult to gather from them the nature of those in- 
fluences which render him so sympathetic with his subject 
when deahng with the infinite variety of oriental humanity 
to be foimd in the Near East. He lived amongst the 
people, and, so far as any European can plumb the depths 
of oriental mind and imagination, he has done so. Some 
excellent figure photographs illustrate this part of the 
hook ; but the mapping generally (of which there is a 
good deal) is not quite so satisfactory. Where it is a 
guide to the successive phases of international occupation 
of territory it is very useful, but where it is designed 
to illustrate the geographical features of Asia Minor 
as they affect the road from Northern Mesopotamia to 
Constantinople, it is hardly a success. 
In no part of the worid has geography influenced 
history so vitally as in the Near East. The seiried ranks 
Ulysses," and fragments of one or two other short jviems 
as to the rest, it is difficult to realise in it the life and vigom 
and gift of expression that made of Paolo and J'rancrsca 
more than mere versifying. The story of .Scmeic has been 
better told than here ; the legend of Gilbert and his Haideo 
has been more touchingly expressed in prose than in these 
ten brief cantos, and, to hark back to the beginning of the book, 
the conceit with regard to man joining the Atlantic and Pacific 
after God had set them asunder, and comparing this with the 
ritual of the marriage service, may be. quaint and even daring, 
but it bears no relation to poetry. 
' ■ Penelo]K', questing for the returned Ulysses to " clasp inc 
with the world, with^nothing less." and Helen, turning from 
Menelaus to Paris in the knowledge that she turns to jier soul's 
master, are presented with classic purity and force ; these 
two poems redeem the volume from the level of the common- 
place. Save for these and very few other exceptions, the 
volume bepscaks a mere laureate turning out verse to order, 
rather than a poet of such proved genius as Mr. Stephen 
Phillips has shown in earlier work. 
Half the emotions that men know, and more than half, 
are expressed in Dartmoor Prison Lyrics, by Oliver Davies 
(Erskine Macdonald, 2s. ()d. net). The author, as a member 
of the prison staff, had unique opportunities of learning convict 
ways of thought, and these he has reproduced in more than 
mere verse: Strength, pathos, humour, and the cunning of 
the born criminal are here expressed, and the volume is not 
lacking in real poetic feeling. 
In Poems by Tu<o Brothers, Richard and John Beresford 
(Erskine Macdonald, 2s. 6d. net), a finer and more delicate 
note is struck by Richard Beresford. Some of his South 
African poems, notably the verses " To D.M.B.," contain 
word-pictures that recall vividly the country they concern, 
and in reading one may see, mentally, " maiiy a little hill," 
whence " the snioke creeps down."" The following verses 
by John Beresford arc slighter, less virile in quality, and some- 
times almost banal. So many London-lovers have sung the 
praises of Kew Gardens and Wimbledon Woods, and there 
IS httle new to be said with regard to the power and nature 
of love. More of form than of spirit characterises the work 
which belongs to a species of literary youth. 
Half of Irish fantasy, and half of the spirit of childhood 
make up The Adventures of Seiimas Beg, by James Stephens 
(Macmillan and Co., 2s. 6d. net). Although these adventures 
are at times told far more in verse than in poetry, yet there is 
m them something so whimsical, so expressive of the dreams 
of a child, that the series is extremely entertaining. Thus— 
" The moon comes every night to peep 
Through the windows where I lie. 
And I pretend to be asleep . 
and in the reading, many into whose hands the volume falls 
vvill rernember how, they too, pretended. It may be that 
they will read some of these Celtic fancies to their children 
and in such a case the interest of the listeners will not fail ' 
Songs from the Trenches, by Captain Blackall, a shilling 
volume issued b,y:, Messrs. John Lane, is worth more than 
passing perusal, i fhe author, to adapt Kipling, has sun^; of 
the lit le things he knows about, and in such fashion has he 
sung that he transmits the emotions of the trenches to the 
Z H ^'F;"«'" " «i"^t^." " The Padre," and half a 
dozen other of the poems in the volume- for they are poems - 
are strong, g„od work, Kiplinj^ish in form, j^erhaps, but voicing 
the emotions of men in wnr time in such a way as to command 
attention and appreciation. The author makes us realise 
as he himself has realised, the wonderful pluck, endurance,' 
and unfailing cheerfulness of the men in the trenches, and 
in his unstudied verse he has embodied a good lesson for the 
many who " try to write poetry " 
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