[Un-numbered file] 'Diary of Colonel Hamilton's Visit to Nejd 1918' [‎63r] (125/206)

to spend in Aneyaah. The Ameer invited us all
to lunch and dinner. Our Bedouins ate enor
mously the food being excellent. The Ameer has
been very good to us. Feeling in Aneyzah is,
I thin, strongly for us.
After dinner at 5 p.m, this evening 1 e
walked in the bazaars. I saw nothing worth buyi
ing, but was again struck with the picturesque
and truly imposing architecture of the pala-
zzos of the great ones with their adjacent gar
dens all highly cultivated,the walls being
covered with vines,and surrounded by fig trees
pomegranates,peaches,etc. Some of the gardens
looked as though they would afford delightful
retreats in sultry weather. On the whole,Aney
zah is a place to rave about when you come in
from the desert. It is quite unspoilt by con
tact with modernism. I should say there were nc
paupers: I waw no signs of suqualor. The state
of civilization of Aneyzah shows that the Arab
even when left entirely to himself and almost
isolated from the world of progress does not
altogether let himself go,but retains some
ideals and aspirations. He does not become
brutalized or insensible to the amehities of
life and social intercourse or generally to
the softening influences of comfort and ele
gance. Some of the rooms of the houses I was
shown through w r ere beautiful, one, a coffee-
room of Abdulaziz,the retired Ameer, was
particularly artistic. It was about 18 ft.
broad and 30 ft.long. Hound the room were
open corridors and the room itself had gallery
with^i grille under the roof, a sort of prome
nade for the ladies whocome to see and hear
what goes on in the coffee hall below. Some
texts from the Koran were artistically painted
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