'Reports of administration for 1918 of divisions and districts of the occupied territories in Mesopotamia. Volume I' [‎177r] (358/470)

the subordinate positions are filled by Indians, then the very first step of advancement for the Arab
is removed already.
“ Finally, the Civil Surgeons should not remain in one station for more than a year. In this
monotonous country a change is essential, and it would also be better for the Arab; for if one Medical
Officer, who had talked to them every day for a year, telling them to wash their faces, was replaced
by another medical officer who said the same thing, then at the end of two or three years the Arab
might come to believe there was something in what the doctor said.”
APPENDIX C.
Irrigation and Agriculture.
(A)—The District Irrigation Officer has conducted certain surveys of especial interest. They
include a survey of the Majar canal, the Chahalah, the Musharrah, and a part of the Butairah. They
show how fertile these canals are in rice, and make two points clear : —
(a) That the shaikhs concerned get their muqata‘ahs very cheap :
(b) That the Butairah area has been hitherto a dark horse and is as rich as the Chahalah.
A copy of the D.I.O.’s reports and maps will be available at the office of the Director of
Irrigation in Baghdad and will show you the amount of valuable spade-work which has been
done by the Department in this Division under the guidance of the Deputy Director of
Irrigation and the District Irrigation Officer. The report makes clear the sphere in which the
future activities of the Department will be directed.
These can be summed up in the following :—
(1) The damming and diverting of the Duwairij, which will renovate the soil on the Shatt
al A‘mah and remove one of the main barriers to the utility of the Musharrah;
(2) The diverting of the Tib to the benefit of the Nahr Sa‘ad and Musharrah areas;
(3) The development of the Nahr Sa‘ad area;
(4) The dredging of the Musharrah;
(5) The dredging of the Mudailil and the bunding of the Dujailah canal, with the
possibility of digging the Dujailah canal and connecting its waters with a famous old canal in
the Jazirah called the Shatt-al-'Akhdhar :
(6) The remodelling of the Majar canal by means of an offtake from the Butairah which
will lead down to the Majar area from a much higher level than the Majar and enable the
Majar to be closed and so remove a considerable drain on the navigable water of the Tigris;
(7) The development of the tail ends of the Butairah on the Jazirah side.
This combination of schemes would add a large area of cultivation to the ‘Amarah Division.
(B) The report of the Agricultural Circle Officer is not yet to hand, but 1 have seen parts of it
in manuscript and found it to contain interesting details of the agricultural possibilities of the
Division. I am myself of opinion that the Arab, as a good and long experienced cultivator, has probed
the cultivated area to its limit, and that not only has what he has chosen to grow been grown in
quantities as great as the soil and the number of cultivators will permit, but that he has also grown
just those crops which the soil will most fruitfully bear. Hence I am inclined to be distrustful of the
experiments in wheat-growing. Actually a considerable portion of the wheat issued as seed by
Government both last year and this year was sold in the bazaar as soon as it was taken over by the
shaikhs and sirkals. If these districts had been capable of producing the excellent wheat that is
produced in Huwaizah, I think it would have produced it. As it is, barley and rice are the predommant
products, and the fact that these are encouraged more than anything else is probably a true indication
of the nature and value of the soil.
(C)—But the amounts of barley and rice actually produced are probably, m a year of good rain
and floods, far above what we estimate. This is important from a revenue point of view It is well
known that shaikhs are now rolling in wealth owing to the cheapness of their farm rents under our
administration. If this is a poor country, then it might be made richer by an increase m the farm
fees of the ‘Amarah muqata’ahs. It could probably be made richer m this way to the tune of, say
£T. 10,000 without creating any tribal disturbance m the Division. We have pursued ii policy of
generosity hitherto which has probably repaid us by inducing the shaikhs to help us to the best of
their ability. But where we reduce, the shaikhs do not always reduce for their sirkals and fallahs Arabic for ‘peasant’. It was used by British officials to refer to agricultural workers or to members of a social class employed primarily in agricultural labour. ,
and the day will come when muqata‘ahs are split up into smaller tenancies and each tenancy will
produce revenue more truly representative of its worth to Government The Chahalah, the Majar
and the Butairah might well suffer a 10 per cent, increase of farm fees. But there will be no
possibility of securing revenue reforms without tribal trouble until either the necessity ceases for
damming the Majar and Chahalah and possibly the Butairah canals, or a remodelling of these canals
takes place in a way which will help us to split up and revise the present holdings. The latter could
only be done by enlisting the sympathy of the sirkals and fallahs Arabic for ‘peasant’. It was used by British officials to refer to agricultural workers or to members of a social class employed primarily in agricultural labour. so as to weaken the power of the
shaikhs. As it has been our policy to strengthen the power of.the shaikhs and this policy has helped
us to keep peace in the districts, considerable care will have to be taken to win the sympathy of the
sirkals before any division of existing power can be made without imperilling the general peace of the
districts.
(D)—From this point of view the seeming problem of “ landless ” shaikhs may be of use. Every
Wll J Shaikh who has any claim to a following will, by virtue of his following, if he is ever given a