meager instruction was given in the Turkish language, and in consequence comparatively few of the Arabs took advantage of it. As early as 1918, just following British occupation, Arabic was substituted as the tongue to be used in the schools. This in itself will doubtless have a tendency to nationalize the Arab and give him a selfrespect and a self-reliance heretofore undeveloped.

Then, too, land courts were found essential to determine with some little measure of fairness the real ownership of land, in order that it might be farmed. The British and the Arab jurists worked side by side with a patience that seemed typical of the country where once Job dwelt. In all cases previous rights and customs have been recognized whenever they could be ascertained.

As a further step, every effort has been made to take advantage of local production. For instance, raw wool could not well be exported during the war, but large quantities of it were purchased, spun, and woven into blankets which the British army not only bought but used. As another illustration, there are over 10,000 acres of date gardens in the Bagdad villayet and an even greater acreage in Basra. The housewives of America perhaps have realized that, for the first two years of the war, exports of these dates were greatly curtailed, but in the fall of 1918, shortly after British occupation, sufficient transport was released from urgent war duty to move the entire crop.

All these things have been spoken of as British propaganda; certainly they are designed to win the good will and confidence of the native population, and likely they will serve as a foundation for English trade in wool and cotton. The English labor leaders have urged that the government abandon Mesopotamia, and use the several million pounds now being spent there annually to pay better wages to coal miners, but the government prefers to continue the constructive propaganda in order that English mills may run in years to come.

Not all of the five million acres of irrigable land is now irrigated nor has it been in recent times. Only a fringe along the rivers is watered by occasional small canals extending out like fingers into the desert. The diversion dams and intakes are mainly small and nonpermanent, while much of the water taken from the rivers is raised by bullock-power lifts. As the Turks withdrew from Mesopotamia, they destroyed as many of the pumps and lifts as possible, thus greatly handicapping the few thousand acres then being tilled. I spent some hours during September, 1918, with a British officer in charge of pumps on the Tigris River. Such a collection of discarded and reincarnated apparatus as the British had hastily installed is beyond description. Standardization had been an impossible ideal. Anything that had been worn out, or had been a failure in India, was sent to Mesopotamia. "Home-made" spares were the only possibility. The men who wrestled with that machinery through the summer heat where 110° maximum was cool, suffered as true pioneers. But vegetables must be grown to prevent scurvy in the army, dairy cows must be fed green grass, and first and foremost the native must be encouraged by example and precept to make his land produce.

The irrigation plans mapped out some years ago by Sir William Willcocks are very extensive, embracing practically the entire five million acres. The completion of the splendid concrete dam and intake at Hillah, by means of which some twenty-five thousand acres may be irrigated, marks one of the first steps toward the realization of a magnificent dream. While this is the largest single unit of the work so far undertaken, yet there has been a substantial improvement in the canal system near Amarah and also an enlargement of the Beled-ruz canal, which takes water from the Diyala River to the broad plains west and slightly north of Bagdad. It has been said that the irrigation schemes of Sir

William are to revive some day the old canal system that so extensively watered Mesopotamia; they do better than that, for they provide in numerous instances a more economical distribution of water and tend to guard more securely against the dangers resulting from excess seepage or poor drainage.

The completion of these plans calls for the expenditure of large sums of money. Mesopotamia, of herself, can neither engineer nor finance such undertakings. So soon as the world expresses the need for the textiles which Mesopotamian cotton will make, Britain will complete what she has begun. In the meantime she must train the people to make use of facilities later to be developed. The use that is now being made of the present developments bespeaks the British success in creating confidence among the population. Likely the development will be slow, for there is neither the demand nor the working force to justify haste.

The oil of Mesopotamia will play a large part in her future. That there is oil in Mesopotamia no one questions. How extensive the deposits are, no one knows. A little of it was used during the war, but essentially the fields are untouched, and to a large degree even unprospected. England and the world at large have always depended upon the United States for oil supply. Private capital of the United States now controls some 80 per cent of world production while Britain, including her Persian operations, produces less than 5 per cent. If Britain is left alone she may not develop the oil fields of the Pusht-i-Kuh Range until she needs the oil for her merchant marine, which is largely equivalent to saying, until the United States no longer cares to meet the demand. With the Doheny interests doubling their interests in Mexico,' and with the marked activities of the

2 Shortly after General Obregon became President of Mexico announcement was made of new leases to the Mexican Petroleum Company covering tracts of land said to be very rich in oil prospects and greater in extent than the total previous holdings of this company.

United States in South America, Britain may feel justified in holding these fields in reserve for some time to come. But the Arab, once relieved of the Turkish yoke, may surprise the world—or if not the Arab, possibly the Bagdad Jew. It is entirely conceivable that they will launch into industry as have the Parsees in Bombay or the Japanese in Osaka, in which case much of the oil will be consumed at home and sooner than is now anticipated. The only sure thing is that the oil will be developed; with human nature what it is, one may not say by whom or for what purpose.3

Persia presents many of the same possibilities and problems as Mesopotamia. At present there are less efficient modes of transportation, and the distance to markets will always be greater. Today Persia is essentially an agricultural country. It produces some of the finest fruits and vines and melons of the world. Cotton, wheat, and raisins can be increased in production almost ad libitum by the development of water supplies. Such projects as the bringing of the Lahr River into the Teheran Valley are entirely possible and may be compared to the turning of the Colorado River into the Imperial Valley, or better yet, to the tunnel through the Western Ghats in South India. There are opportunities for enough water storage and development practically to insure the country against famines. When one pictures a territory closely similar in extent, topography, latitude, climate, water supply, and range of mineral and agricultural possibilities, to our states of Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona, together with the Mexican states of Sonora and Chihuahua, and practically untouched so

3 The San Remo agreement provides that 25 per cent of all oil developed in Mesopotamia by British companies may be sold to France. Sir John Cadman, head of the Oil Resources Board of England, pointed out in a recent address before the Royal Society of Arts that there is nothing in this agreement or in any other order of the British Government to prevent long the development of oil in Mesopotamia by other than British companies. There is an order prohibiting oil development by British or other companies pending the determination of the exact status of the government, and there is an act of Parliament which prohibits foreign oil companies from operating within the British Empire.

far as engineering projects are concerned, imagination knows no bounds.

However, there are limits to the rate of profitable development of agriculture in Persia. It is a country surrounded by agricultural countries. The question of export markets is a serious one, at least until means of transportation are greatly improved. With the exception of dried fruits, there are practically no facilities for turning bulky raw products into the more easily transported manufactured articles. Only one who has been there can in this day imagine a country without modern modes of transportation-where the petrol to run the motor convoys is brought in by donkey caravan, and where at times the roads so nearly reach a vanishing point that Packard lorries are taken to pieces and returned to the starting point on camels. The shortage of established industries means, among other things, a lack of industrial families to consume the product of an increasing agriculture. A carefully planned policy to correlate the development of industry, transportation, and production is essential in such a country.

The British are in Persia, as well as in Mesopotamia, politically, but in a different capacity, as well as with a very different spirit. They have never officially "occupied" the country nor have they attempted to make the same progress with hospitals and schools and fair taxes and irrigation projects. They have treated the people fairly, but they have avoided unnecessary initiative because they have greatly hesitated to accept responsibility for Persia. This aversion has doubtless been mutual, which fact has only tended to increase the Briton's natural reticence. But conditions sometimes become intolerable. Persia, like Mesopotamia, had lost all hope of unaided self-government. The reasons are past history and need not be discussed. It is doubtful if anyone at this time can give proper valuation to the many conflicting causes. However that may be, all