We were more than a little incensed to read a report in one of the British newspapers of one of the infrequent visits of an ENSA show. A female member was quoted as saying that "bacon and eggs are no luxury in Paiforce." Poor dear, she obviously had been a guest of the Officers' Mess and didn't know any better. Fairly near Al Musayyib was the ancient city of Ur of the Chaldees, the reputed birthplace of Abraham. It had been discovered and excavated in the 1920's by Sir Leonard Woolley; as with most deserted habitations in that land it first appeared to him as a Tel or hill, rising up above the surrounding flat land. I visited the site with a group led by our padre. Woolley excavated one half of the site down to below ground level, carefully preserving and documenting all he found; below ground level he found a layer of silt that he thought could only have been laid by water and thus he concluded that it was evidence of the biblical flood of Noah's time. I believe this theory has now been discounted. Below this silt layer were pieces of broken pottery and I picked one up. At that time it was quite a large part of the bottom of an unglazed earthenware urn but due to an unfortunate accident when my kitbag fell off a lorry I now have only a very small fragment. We wandered along the excavated streets that were bordered by low walls of sun baked plano-convex bricks and marvelled at the state of preservation. Although the Romans are generally credited with its introduction there was, dating back to a much earlier period, a semi-circular arch still existing. In places one could see, outlined by bricks, the formation of the rooms of houses. In the nearby museum were plans showing how the city was believed to have been laid out, dominated by the ziggurat.