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Gradually the official power came into her hands. Uthman Pasha was often called away to attend to affairs.... Lady
Adela built a new prison, and instituted a court of justice of which she was president, and so consolidated her own
power, that the Pasha, when he was at Halabja, spent his time smoking a water pipe, building new baths, and carrying
out local improvements, while his wife ruled....
The first glance told her pure Kurdish origin. A narrow, oval face, rather large mouth, small black and shining eyes, a narrow, slightly aquiline hooked nose, were the signs of it; and her thinness in perfect keeping with the habit of the Kurdish form, which never grows fat.... Her tones were peculiar, not those of a woman, and though not deep, were clear and decisive, and abrupt. E. B. Soane, To Mesopotamia and Kurdistan, in Disguise, 1912 |