The Kurds are in many respects as simple as European children of tender age. They had heard much about the wonderful flying machines of Faringistan, and, never having seen an aeroplane, were inclined to be sceptical, and to treat reputed aerial adventures as so many "travellers' tales." A Kurdish chief came to call on me one day seeking enlightenment. He had seen automobiles, and admitted that they puzzled his primitive brain. "Why," he asked honestly enough, "is the horse put inside the box, and why does this strange creature prefer petrol to barley by way of food?" It took a long time to knock into his head some primitive notion of motor traction. Then he inquired, "Is it true that in Faringistan, as currently reported, men make themselves into birds and soar in the air like eagles?" The reply, as they say in Parliament, was in the affirmative, but the Kurdish seeker for knowledge remained frankly incredulous. A few days after the conversation, a youthful Scottish aviator, who was {244} familiarly known as "Little Willie McKay," arrived by air from Hamadan in order to give Bijar and the Kurdistan hill-folk a taste of his quality. It was a day of days, and inaugurated a new era in the local Mohammedan calendar, for it marked the flight of the terror-stricken Faithful towards a place of safety away from the aerial monster that, appearing from out of a clear sunlight sky, swooped down on the town. The youthful McKay was a noted aerial stunt artist, and he executed an extensive and varied programme for the edification of those of the astonished onlookers who had steeled their courage to the point of sticking it out. The houses are flat-roofed, and here the spectators assembled to watch the show. As the aviator nose-dived occasionally, it was amusing to see the celerity with which they dropped flat on their faces, fearing lest they should be caught by the talons of the "man-bird" and carried off heaven knew where. Later on, at the local aerodrome, the people came, timidly enough at first, to peep at the monster; but they did their sightseeing cautiously from a respectful distance, and it was only necessary for the engine to throb once or twice fretfully, and for the propeller to revolve, to bring about an instantaneous stampede. Thenceforth no one ever doubted that the British were miracle workers, and had at their disposal an unlimited supply of magic to assist in the overthrowing of their enemies.