'File 61/6 vol.4 (D 34) Bin Saud and Akwan Movement' [‎92v] (184/565)

53. A large wooden bowl of fresh camel's milk sent us. Bin Saud takes
this as only food at night. It is excellent to drink and very refreshing.
54i. Sunday, let Augusts loth Dhil Qaadah. —At dawn several-rifle
shots fired in front of the palace ^ Reason discovered later: a " Bashir "
(bearer of good news) has arrived with letters for the Imam stating the Akhwan
of Sufainahand Suwairaqiyah have captured the village Al-Harra near Medina.
My informer adds that the Akhwan have killed 400, i.e., nearly all the
inhabitants of that unhappy village, not sparing even women and children.
They were Bani Abdullah, a section of the numerous Mutair Arabs inhabiting
the borders of the Hejaz and Nejd and often changing sides with King Hussain
or Bin Saud, just as it suited them. Sufainah and Suwairiqiyah are instances
of Hejaz villages freshly gained by the Akhwan and pushed forward to make
Btill more conquests for militant Wahhabism. Nothing is nearer the Bedouin
heart than " Ghazu ** (raiding, plundering and rapine) and when this is sancti
fied by " Tadaiyun " (lit. becoming wholly religious : now signifying the
adoption of the new Akhwan creed) there can be no limit to the Badu cruelty
and ferocity in cases like the above. The Imam's brother, Abdullah, is credited
with an expression of adherence to have uttered in his Majlis, with many men
present, that these blind fanatics must one day be visited with the wrath of
God and be doomed to destruction. I wonder if Bin Saud shares such pious or
limited sentiments. Later, when I saw Bin Saud and asked him (after waiting
to see if he would mention it) about the firing, etc., he said it was an ordinary
event; nothing of importance : a man had brousrht news of some fighting and
so-called Akhwan success in a distant place on the borders of Nejd and asked
for a Dhulul (riding camel) as his own had died of fatigue on the road : he,
Bin Saud, would give the man one, as he was accustomed to do in such cases.
This was not telling the whole truth.
55. At noon wrote letters to Bahrein, then tried to sleep but could not
owing to heat and flies, the latter a great nuisance and seem to be over-growing.
Punkha and hand-fans are a great necessity and we employ both as much as
possible.
66. After(afternoon) prayers Bin Saud sent us horses and we rode
out and met him on his way to the Badu camp, outside Riyadh. Bin Saud wa«
riding a very fine mare, a thorough-bred Arab from Jabal Shammar, the
best that I have seen. His sons Saud and Faisal and brother Abdullah, several
cousins and about two dozen attendants accompanied on good mares. Bin
Saud talked on horses and pointed out various gardens and buildings on the
way. Reaching the camp, we sat in a big open tent in the centre of some 200
" Buyut Shaar " ( tents) scattered over a distance of 1J miles all around. The
host is one Salaihi (?), a nice old Badu who has charge of the Imam's camels.
Sat about three-quarters of an hour, had the three rounds of coffee, and all the
time Bin Saud talked of camels, their uses, kinds, diseases, etc., etc. There was
a bustle as hundreds of camels were; returning from the wadis after the day's
grazing, and were formed into batches and taken to w T ater on a large well close
by. There were over 200 white camels which were part of the recent booty
from Bin Rashid, of which the Imam's share alone is said to be 3,000. These
are distributed over several different places for convenience of grazing. Prayed
Maghrib with the Imam and party, and noticed a slight softening of Wahhabi .
(A.khwan) faces around ; perhaps we were, after all, regarded as somewhat
like themselves, pseudo-Moslems, if not Moslems.
57. Monday, 2ni August = 16th Dhil Qaadah. —"Wrote letters to Bahrein.
Bin Saud is again preparing to send a Ghazu against Bin Rashid. He told me
that the youthful Bin Rashid was only a puppet in the hands of his uncle,
Ibn Ajal, who was very anti-Bin Saud. His policy would prove suicidal.
Most of Shammar and townsmen of Hail hated Ibn Ajal, whose downfall was
only a question of time. The Sherif and Shaikh Salim both tried to incite and
help Bin Rashid. Salim and Bin Rashid had sent letters and presents to the
Sherif through a Kuweit merchant who has a branch in Bombay. Bin Saud
said his position was made difficult by the fact that he had to deal with a foreign
power. He was not free to do what he liked with those who troubled him. If
he were let alone by the English he could finish it up in no time with the
Sherif, with balim and Bin Eashid. He did not want conquest : he only
wanted rest and peace. If he had not been compelled by circumstances to pull
on, he would have left the country and gone to live in a distant island or some
unknown corner of the world and there worshipped God.