Albeit this is an annoying doctrine to the European at times, yet it certainly helps the Eastern woman to bear her troubles and trials, and it is good for her to have this at command, for she has nothing else to aid her. To sorrow, loss, bereavement, and all the ills that human nature is subject to, the Moslem answers always "Naseeb," or, "It is the will of God." Should their children die, or the locusts destroy the crop, it is "Naseeb." Is the weather hot or cold, dry or moist, the remark is always the same, "Naseeb." If the river water is filthy and they choose to drink it, thus contracting typhoid or one of the hundred other ills consequent on drinking such water, they have only to assure themselves that it is "Naseeb," and there remains nothing more to be said or done. It is easier to say "Naseeb" than to take the trouble to filter or boil the water for drinking. In a thousand ways this belief in fatalism is convenient to the lazy or careless ones, a help to the over-burdened and weary, who know no other succour or helper in time of need or sorrow, while it is, in some cases, a blasphemous libel on God, blaming Him for what is really a sin wilfully indulged in. As in Persia, so in Mosul, truth plays little part in the characters of some of the people. They have not yet learnt to value God's gift as expressed by the poet Browning-- "God's gift was that man should conceive of Truth And yearn to gain it." It is strange how even the most enlightened find it difficult to speak the truth always, and correspondingly easy to tell an untruth. A boy was once found out in a fault (quite a trivial one), but, when questioned, he absolutely denied all knowledge of it, until he was confronted by one who had been an eye-witness of the whole scene. Then only did he confess, adding, "I said with my lips I did not do it, but in my heart I confessed." What can be said to people whose mind is capable of evolving such ideas? We often had to complain of dishonesty amongst the hospital women servants, especially of the cook for petty thefts, such as eating the patients' food, thus causing them to go on short commons, unless I was there to see that each one had his or her proper quantity. One day I was crossing the compound before superintending the distribution of the evening meal to the in-patients, when, as I approached the kitchen, I distinctly saw the cook helping herself most liberally to the food out of the pot. On remonstrating with her, she indignantly denied that she had ever tasted a morsel, until I made her open her mouth and reveal to the amused onlookers proof positive of her lies. Even then she was not ashamed, but only laughed at the idea of the "khatoun" finding her out.