Item 04: Memoirs of a Colonial Boy by Robert Joseph Stewart, ca. 1971 - Page 303
Primary tabs
Transcription
[Page 303]
149
ing several hymns together, often being asked to nominate our favourite ones. An hour or so of very correct small talk followed and we were ushered out. It was a pleasant enough outing for us womenless men, though we never got a chance to get very friendly with the girls, however much their eyes told us they would welcome it. It so happened that in our military and works operations we were faced with the problem of having three Sabbaths in the week: Friday for the Mahomedan workmen and artisans (the great majority): Saturday for Jewish clerical staff and Sunday for the British personnel. It was decided that Friday should be the weekly rest-day, as it would cause the least dislocation of our work. This decision became known at the American Mission, and the next Sunday night Lt-Colonel Ricketts and I were invited to dine there. After a rather frigid reception and a dinner eaten almost in silence, the Principal very severely upbraided us for setting such a bad example to these poor Mahomedans she and her staff were working so hard to convert to Christianity. We made an abrupt departure and none of us was ever invited there again.
The Shah's Governor invited me one day to a private luncheon. He had been educated in Paris and I could converse with him in French. He told me that he had a number of felons in prison whom he was anxious to put to useful work improving the roads outside his palace. He asked me if I would take some levels and give him a sketch of what should be done. Naturally I said I would. On learning that I lived a celibate life in my quarters, he said that I really should have a concubine and would I like a virgin or a woman of some experience. I tactfully postponed any answer to this question. The Eastern mind found it hard to understand why a young and virile man should continue to live without access to women.
A week later the day of the Feast of Hussein arrived. With the Shiah sect of the Mahomedan religion it almost corresponds to the Christian Easter. Hussein, a very pious descendant of Mahomet's daughter Fatima, was one day set upon by robbers, dragged from his horse and murdered, during a holy pilgrimage