Note 54 — Chapter XXVIII

On the strength of Mazhar Osman Bey’s suggestion to learn Turkish I promptly ordered “a hundred books on the Turkish language,” and gave nobody any rest until I was provided with one (at my own expense, of course). It was Hagopian’s Conversation Grammar—a most excellent book. I had plenty of teachers—every patient in the hospital and most of the doctors were delighted to give me a lesson whenever I asked for one—and to the delight of Mazhar Osman Bey I made rapid strides in Turkish. Needless to say, a sane occupation of this sort was of the utmost value to me, and my only regret was that, as a madman, my study of this most interesting language had to be spasmodic and irregular. Still, I learned enough to become something of a “show patient,” and to gain from the Dutch Embassy at Constantinople, whose medical representatives visited us about July, the following quite unsolicited and rather amusing “testimonial.” It was sent as a “Report” by the Embassy, and reached my family through the India Office:—

“Haidar Pasha Hospital.—We found here Lieut. Henry Elias Jones, Artillery Battery (volunteer). The 10 of May, 1918, he was sent down from Yozgad with mental disturbance. He was quite content and we had a long talk with him. He wants to be a Turk, and mistrusts all English, and will not take anything if it comes from his parents or from England. He wants a Turkish uniform and will settle down in Turkey. Intelligent as he is, he learnt Turkish with an astonishing good accent in an exceedingly short time. He will probably be sent back to England with the first exchange.”