A sudden white fog, moreover, took away any chance of a view of any kind, and we were soon hopelessly lost.  Some soldiers we met on the way told us to keep straight on and then turn to the left by some palm trees.  As we soon encountered some palm trees every few yards we wondered whether they intended to be humorous.  I don’t think they did, however.  The optimism of you-can’t-possibly-miss-it type is too general.  The man who says “turn down by some trees” knows the place well, and can see certain trees in his mind’s eye.  He will turn when he sees the right trees, but you will probably get lost.

Needless to say, everything went wrong with our scheme of approaching the irrigation works from a picturesque angle.  The dense fog thickened and shrouded the neighbourhood of the river in impenetrable mystery.  We kept turning down by palm trees as directed, but to no purpose.  We struck the river bank again after much wandering and kept to it, hoping the mist would clear.  A man in a goufa appeared from nowhere and floated away out of sight into nowhere like a ghostly visitant from another world.  The sun began to show through the fog and blue sky appeared overhead.  Soon the steaming vapours dispersed, showing a view of buildings among palm trees and a bridge of boats.

[Illustration:  Hillah.]

Here again we were held up while countless mahailas passed through, but we succeeded in getting over at last and eventually found the house of the Wise Men, the headquarters of the irrigation officers.

Had we been ambassadors on a diplomatic visit to Hillah, we could not have been more hospitably entertained or given greater facilities for getting about in a most fascinating region of the world for any one who felt the glamour of history in this once highly civilized country.

Great buildings like Ctesiphon near Baghdad or traces of the vast irrigation works of the past are full of interest, but for romance and mystery there is no piece of the world more fraught with meaning than this site of the city of Nebuchadnezzar, nearly 200 square miles in extent, and now, but for the comparatively small tract of irrigated land, a desert.

“Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils.”

[Illustration]

V

BY THE WATERS OF BABYLON

[Illustration:  Ctesiphon.]

[Illustration]

BY THE WATERS OF BABYLON

The irrigation officers at Hillah were ideal hosts, not only from the commonly accepted standpoint, but from that of an artist.  They let me roam about and sketch what I wanted, not what they wanted.  They gave me every means of transport, and such suggestions as they made as to possible subjects were excellent and offered with such tact that there was no difficulty in abstaining from sketching or going on with something else.