I have to preface this book with an apology - and, worse still, an excuse. The apology is for venturing to publish at the present time the record of a journey which (except for quite the last stage) took place in that almost prehistoric epoch before the war. My excuse is twofold: firstly, that fifteen months of enforced idleness drove me into writing it; and, secondly, that subsequent events have contrived to add a special interest which it could not otherwise have claimed. Although in no sense a "war-book," it deals with countries which have been the scene of two, if not three, campaigns in the present war, and on this fact I rely to justify my temerity.<br><br>The first of these campaigns - taking them in the order of our journey from South to North - is the British Expedition to Mesopotamia.