ABSTRACT
One of the last tasks Layard had to complete as he neared the end of the excavations at Nimrud in late Spring was to organise the shipment of as many of his finds as he could manage to send down the river to Baghdad. This demanded a great deal of sturdy rope and mats to protect the reliefs, and these had to be brought all the way from Aleppo in Syria. The theft of a shipment of these essential goods gave rise to one of Layard's more bizarre exploits. Having first turned to the Pasha in Mosul in order to have the thieves found and punished, he learnt that since they were Bedouin from the steppe there was no hope that they would be caught. He could not accept that. Instead, he activated his own intelligence system and after a couple of days learned which tribe was responsible. Together with two Turkish soldiers he rode into the desert and after a few hours' ride found the camp, which however was considerably larger than he had anticipated. He rode directly up to the tent of the sheikh and sat down.
