The immortal poet’s words seem to me not only to synchronize with the pleasantly conversational style of your own narrative which has induced the somewhat novel method I have adopted of writing you a letter by way of an introduction—but they also express the spirit which will, I trust, animate us in our present and future relations with those nations and peoples of the Near East who unfortunately for themselves espoused our enemies’ cause in the Great War, but whose best interests lie—now and henceforth—in the friendship and goodwill of the Allies. Your chapters on the customs, superstitions and “fantasias” of the Siwans recall much that is similar amongst the Sudan tribes and peoples—especially those of the Moslem Faith—and your account of the “zikr” is particularly interesting. In the words of an Islamic writer, by means of this religious exercise “the whole world and all its attractions disappears from the vision of the faithful worshipper, and he is enabled to behold the excellence of the Most High. Nothing must be allowed to distract his attention from its performance, and ultimately he attains by its medium a proper conception of the Tauhid, or unity of God. . . . To enter Paradise one must say after every prayer ‘God is Holy’ ten times, ‘Praised be God’ ten times, and ‘God is great’ ten times.” If the age of miracles has not gone for ever then these Moslem devotees—the descendants of the ancient warriors of the Libyan Desert, side by side with their courageous and resourceful British helpers—may yet cause the great Oracle of Jupiter Ammon to reveal the secrets of that old-time sanctuary with which your book deals so interestingly. [Signature: Yours sincerely Reginald Wingate.] “On grassy slopes the twining vine boughs grew And hoary olives ’twixt far mountains blue, And many a green-necked bird sung to his mate Within the slim-leaved thorny pomegranate That flung its unstrung rubies on the grass.” “But a desert stretched and stricken left and right, left and right, Where the piled mirages thicken under white-hot light— A skull beneath a sandhill and a viper coiled inside— And a red wind out of Libya roaring ‘Run and hide.’” SIWA SIWA THE OASIS OF JUPITER AMMON CHAPTER I THE COAST “. . . Some strip of herbage strown That just divides the desert from the sown.”