volume 2 - Robert Bedrosian's Armenian History Workshop

The Workmen Steal the Tablets. 267
heresies, and that he had strong leanings towards the
" freethinkers " among the Muslims. He had studied
the tenets of the Sufis also, and appeared to be well
versed in the works which treated of the attributes of
God, but my knowledge of these subjects was so little
that I could not benefit by the information about them
which he was always ready to give me. But though
his mind was apparently always occupied with things
of heaven, he managed to find a place in it for things
of earth, as the following incident shows :
Whilst we were talking one day he said to me,
" Hearken, my dear," and I hearkened. He then went
on to tell me that the men were finding more tablets
than they admitted, and some cylinder seals, and that
they were sending them into Baghdad to the dealers.
We had done our best to watch the men carefully when
tablets, etc., were coming to light, and I did not see
what more we could do. " Can you make any suggestion
? " I asked him. " Yes," said he, " go to Baghdad
from time to time and buy back the things which have
been stolen from you. It is the only thing to be done."
I therefore rode into Baghdad on several occasions,
and secured many tablets and small objects which I
felt certain came from Der. When the workmen found
that I did this regularly they thought they had better
treat with me on the spot, and save the percentage
they had been giving to the dealers, and in the end I
paid each man a piastre or two for every object he found,
over and above his wages, and it was profitable for them
to be honest. Of course, this was to compound a felony,
but it was the only practical way of obtaining the
tablets.
As soon as we got to work regularly I left Nimrud
to watch the diggings and rode about the neighbourhood
to look at the various mounds or hills that seemed to
contain ancient remains. I went with Hasan to Abu
Habbah several times, and always found men digging
there, and always finding tablets. On one occasion
Hasan brought to me two men who had been among
the gang that had carried on excavations at Der secretly,