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 http://www.archive.org/details/childoforientOOvakarich 
 
A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
BT THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 SOME PAGES FROM THE LIVES 
 OF TURKISH WOMEN 
 
 IN THE SHADOW OF ISLAM 
 Etc. 
 
A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 BY DEMETRA VAKA 
 
 LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD 
 
 NEW YORK : JOHN LANE COMPANY 
 
 TORONTO: BELL AND COCKBURN. MCMXIV .,^ 
 
■^.^^^^ 
 
 ^A 
 
 Turnbull 6r» Spears^ Printers, Edinburj^k 
 
To 
 
 TRUMBULL WHITE 
 
 EDITOR AND FRIEND, WHOSE APPRECIATION 
 
 AND ENCOURAGEMENT 
 
 HELPED TO SMOOTH THE HARD ROAD 
 
 OF A BEGINNER 
 
 309236 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 I. 
 
 The Token . . . . 
 
 3 
 
 II. 
 
 Echoes of 182 i . . . . 
 
 8 
 
 III. 
 
 Other Faces, other Phases 
 
 15 
 
 IV. 
 
 DjIMLAH . . . . . 
 
 24 
 
 V. 
 
 We and They . . . . 
 
 30 
 
 VI. 
 
 Aunt Kalliroe . . . . 
 
 36 
 
 VII. 
 
 In the Hollow of Allah's Hand 
 
 46 
 
 VIII. 
 
 YlLDERIM . . . . . 
 
 60 
 
 IX. 
 
 I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN 
 
 73 
 
 X. 
 
 The Garden Goddess 
 
 85 
 
 XI. 
 
 Misdeeds .... 
 
 no 
 
 XII. 
 
 How I WAS Sold to St George . 
 
 118 
 
 XIII. 
 
 The Master of the Forest 
 
 133 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Ali Baba, my Caique-tchi 
 
 157 
 
 XV. 
 
 My Lady of the Fountain 
 
 166 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Chakend^, the Scorned . 
 
 193 
 
 XVII. 
 
 A Great Lady of Stamboul 
 
 212 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 The Inventiveness of Semmeya Hanoum 
 
 221 
 
 XIX. 
 
 The Chivalry of Arif Bey 
 
 233 
 
 XX. 
 
 In the Wake of Columbus 
 
 251 
 
 XXI. 
 
 In Real America . 
 
 266 
 
 XXII 
 
 Back to Turkey . 
 
 282 
 
 vU 
 
A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE TOKEN 
 
 ON the morning of my fifth birthday, 
 just as I awoke from sleep, my grand- 
 uncle came into my room, and, 
 standing over my bed, said with a seriousness 
 little befitting my age : 
 
 " To-day, despoinis, you are five years old. I 
 wish you many happy returns of the day." 
 
 He drew up a chair, and sat down by my bed. 
 Carefully unfolding a piece of paper, he brought 
 forth a small Greek flag. 
 
 " Do you know what this is ? " 
 
 I nodded. 
 
 '* Do you know what it stands for ? " 
 
 Before I could think of an adequate reply, he 
 leaned toward me and said earnestly, his fiery 
 black eyes holding mine : 
 
 " It stands for the highest civilization the world 
 has ever known. It stands for Greece, who has 
 taught the world. Take it and make your prayers 
 by it.- 
 
 I accepted it, and caressed it. Its silky texture 
 
 s 
 
4 A CttlLD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 pleased my toacli. Its heavenly blue colour 
 fascinated my eyes, while the white cross, emblem 
 of my religion as well as of my country, filled 
 my childish heart with a noble thrill. 
 
 My grand-uncle bent over nearer to me. 
 
 '* In your veins flows the blood of a wonderful 
 race ; yet you live, as I have lived, under an 
 alien yoke — a yoke Asiatic and uncivilized. The 
 people who rule here to-day in the place of your 
 people are barbarous and cruel, and worship a 
 false god. Remember all this — and hate them ! 
 You cannot carry this flag, because you are a 
 girl ; but you can bring up your sons to do the 
 work that remains for the Greeks to do." 
 
 He left his chair, and paced up and down the 
 room ; then came again and stood beside my 
 bed. 
 
 " Sixty-one years ago we rose. For nine con- 
 secutive years we fought, and to-day two million 
 Greeks are free — and Athens, with its Acropolis, 
 is protected by this flag. But the greater part 
 of the Greek land is still under the Mussulman 
 yoke, and St Sophia is profaned by the Moham- 
 medan creed. Grow up remembering that all 
 that once was Greece must again belong to 
 Greece ; for the Greek civiUzation cannot and 
 must not die.'' 
 
 He went away, leaving me with thoughts too 
 vast for a child of five years, too big for a child 
 who was not even strong. Yet even at that age 
 
THE TOKEN 5 
 
 I knew a great deal about the past of Greece, and 
 better yet did I know of the fight of those nine 
 years, which had made the Httle flag I was caress- 
 ing again a flag among free nations. I folded and 
 unfolded the miniature flag, which my sons must 
 some day carry forward. 
 
 It was the last day of February. Outside a 
 storm was raging. I could hear the angry Sea 
 of Marmora beating violently against the coast, 
 as if it would fain annihilate with its liquid force 
 the solidness of the earth. And the rain, imitat- 
 ing the sea, was beating mightily against the 
 window-panes, while the wind was forcing the 
 tall, stalwart pines, to bend humbly to the earth. 
 Half of the elements were doing violence to the 
 other half — as if they were Greeks destroying 
 the Turks, or Turks oppressing the Greeks. 
 
 It was a gloomy birthday, yet an exaltation 
 possessed me. I kept on stroking the little flag. 
 I loved it, and with all the fervour of my five 
 years I vowed to do my duty by it. 
 
 The door opened softly, and Kiamele, my 
 little Turkish attendant, came in. Quickly I 
 tucked away the tiny flag. 
 
 '' Good morning. Rose Petal.'' She kneeled by 
 my bed, and, putting her arms around me, 
 smothered me with kisses. '* So we are five years 
 old to-day — pretty old, I declare ! We shall be 
 looking for a husband very soon. And now show 
 me what the grand-uncle gave you." 
 
6 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Her face was droll and piquant. Her eyes pos- 
 sessed infinite capacity for expression. That I 
 loved her better than anyone else at the time was 
 undeniable. And only a few minutes ago I had 
 been told to hate her race. 
 
 I entwined my fingers with hers. " Do you 
 love me, Kiamele ? " I asked. 
 
 '' After Allah, I love none better." 
 
 '* I wish you did love me better than Allah," 
 I said, '' for then I could make you a Christian." 
 
 She shook her head drolly ; '' No, no, I Uke 
 Allah." 
 
 " But then," I protested, " if you like Allah, 
 you must hate me." 
 
 '' Hate you ! You, whom I love better than 
 my heart ! " 
 
 " YouVe got to ; for I am a Greek, and you 
 are a Turk." 
 
 She folded me in her arms. " What a funny 
 baby — and this on your birthday ! Now don't 
 talk foolishness. Show me your presents." 
 
 From under my pillow, where I had tucked it, 
 I produced the little flag. 
 
 She gazed at it, her head cocked on one side. 
 
 '' What's this ? " 
 
 " This," I said with emphasis, " is the flag of 
 my country — and my birthday present." 
 
 " What a funny present," she murmured. 
 " And is this all the grand old gentleman gave 
 you ? " 
 
THE TOKEN 7 
 
 I was disappointed at her reception of it, and 
 to save my little flag from feeling the mortifica- 
 tion I hugged it and kissed it. I wanted very 
 much to explain to Kiamele all that it stood for, 
 and how my sons some day must carry it 
 forward ; but how could I, since to show my 
 allegiance to that flag I must hate her, my 
 bestest of friends ? So I said nothing, and on 
 that, my fifth birthday, I began to see that 
 battles did not only exist between people, storms 
 did not only rage among the elements of nature, 
 but that heart and mind could be at such vari- 
 ance as to cause conflicts similar to those taking 
 place outside my window. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 ECHOES OF 182I 
 
 OWING to certain circumstances, I was 
 not living with my immediate family, 
 but was under the care of my father's 
 uncle. He and I lived on one of those islands 
 that rise high above the Sea of Marmora ; 
 and our near horizon was the Asiatic coast of 
 Turkey, which stretched itself in the blue waters 
 like a beautiful odalisk. We lived in an old 
 huge house, which belonged to him, and was 
 far away from any other habitation. The sea 
 was in front, the mountains behind, and thick 
 woodland on the other two sides. 
 
 From the time I could remember my uncle 
 conversed with me as if I were grown-up, yet I 
 felt that he held me in contempt because I was a 
 girl and could not carry arms. Life contained 
 nothing for him beyond the hope of waging war- 
 fare against the Turks. 
 
 He had been only a lad in 1821 when the 
 Greeks had risen in desperation to throw off the 
 Mussulman yoke. Enlisting among the first, he 
 had fought during the entire nine years. Sub- 
 sequently he fought in every one of the uprisings 
 
ECHOES OF 1821 9 
 
 of Crete. When not fighting, he was back in 
 Turkey, in his home, where he thought, studied, 
 and sometimes wrote inflammatory articles for 
 the Greek reviews. 
 
 At times he had tremendous physical suffering, 
 mementoes of his many battles. On those days 
 I did not see him. He possessed that noble and 
 rare quality of being ashamed of his bodily ail- 
 ments. But after my fifth birthday I was present 
 on many days when mental anguish possessed 
 him. On such days he would stride up and down 
 his vast gloomy rooms, talking of the Greek race 
 and of the yoke under which so large a part of it 
 was living. 
 
 He would stand by the window and tell me 
 about Crete, pointing, as if the island were 
 visible from where he stood — and I believe that 
 in spite of the distance, he actually saw it, for it 
 was ever present in his mind, and he knew every 
 corner of it. 
 
 '' There it lies," he would say, " lapped by the 
 waves of the Mediterranean ; but were the mighty 
 sea to pass over it, it could not wash away the 
 noble Cretan blood which drenches it. It is 
 soaked with it, and it will be blood-soaked until 
 the Mussulman yoke has been wrenched from it 
 — or till there is no more Cretan blood to shed." 
 
 Or he would cry out : " Don't you hear the 
 shrieks of the Cretan women as they leap into the 
 foaming sea, holding fast to their hearts their 
 
10 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 little ones ? Yes ! they would rather meet their 
 death in the merciless but clean sea, than fall, 
 living, into the hands of the vile Turkisk soldiery. 
 Oh ! my God — my Christian God — how can you 
 permit it ? '' 
 
 He would bow his head on his arms and remain 
 motionless, until the feeling which was choking 
 him had passed. Then, in a subdued tone, he 
 would resume : 
 
 '' Crete ! Crete ! brave, indomitable Crete — 
 always victorious, yet always handed back to the 
 Turks by Christian Europe. My beautiful Crete, 
 when shalt thou be free ? " 
 
 It was on such days that he exhorted me to 
 remember the little Greek flag he had given me, 
 and all that it stood for. On other days, when 
 he was calmer, he took me systematically with 
 him through the entire nine years of the Greek 
 revolution, and by him I was carried through all 
 its glorious battles. 
 
 He had fought first under the leadership of 
 Marco Bozaris, and he entertained for this heroic 
 chief an admiration amounting to worship. 
 
 *' We were only a handful, mostly lads, at 
 first,'' he would say, with a happy smile on his 
 saddened face. ** Yes, we were mostly lads, and 
 Marco himself a little over thirty. But how we 
 did obey him, and how we did fight ! " 
 
 Here he would lose himself in memory for 
 a while. 
 
ECHOES OF 1821 II 
 
 *' I can see Marco now, seated cross-legged on 
 the ground, a crude map of his own make before 
 him, we bending over him. ' Here, boys, he 
 would say, pointing to the map, here is where 
 we fight the Turks to-morrow, and by night time 
 we shall carry our holy flag farther along. We 
 do — or we die ! ' Then the handful of us would 
 kneel and kiss the flag, and swear by to-morrow 
 to carry it farther along — or to die. And we 
 always carried it farther along." 
 
 He described Marco Bozaris so vividly to me, 
 that when one day he showed me a picture which 
 he had smuggled into Turkey for my benefit, I 
 instantly cried : '* Why that is the great Bozaris 
 — your Marco ! " 
 
 I believe that I never pleased him more in my 
 life than by this. He actually kissed me. 
 
 Next to Bozaris, the man he admired and talked 
 of most was the intrepid mariner, Constantin 
 Kanaris. 
 
 " The Turkish fleet was blazing with lights," 
 he told me, '' for the Kabitan Pasha was cele- 
 brating. One of the warships was filled with 
 Greek maidens, ranging from twelve to eigh- 
 teen years. They had been carried off that 
 day without distinction of class or name. The 
 daughters of the great Greek chieftains and of 
 the commonest sailors had been herded together, 
 and brought on this battleship to be made the 
 victims of the night. 
 
12 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 '' Word of this had come to us. We sat gloomily 
 around a rude wooden table, saying not a word. 
 Then Constantin Kanaris spoke, his voice hoarse, 
 his face terrible to look at : 
 
 " ' Take them away we cannot — unless God 
 sends us ships from heaven at this minute. But 
 if we cannot take them away, we can at least 
 send them to God, pure as he has given them to 
 us.' 
 
 " We listened breathless, while he unfolded to 
 us his daring plan. He would go out in a small 
 row-boat to the battle-ship alone. ' Never fear ! 
 I may not come back — but the battle-ship will 
 be blown up.' 
 
 " He left us — so dumb with despair that for a 
 long, long time none of us spoke. Hours passed 
 since he had gone ; then a far distant boom made 
 the still air to tremble, and we, rushing to the 
 shore, saw the sky bathed in burning colours. 
 
 '* We lads were for shouting for joy, but at the 
 sight of the older men, whose heads hung low on 
 their breasts, we remembered that none yet knew 
 whose were the daughters just sent to God. Each 
 father there, maybe, had a child to mourn.'' 
 
 My uncle's friendship lasted as long as Kanaris 
 lived, and at times he went to see him in Greece. 
 Once he reproached me bitterly for having been 
 bom a few years too late to be taken to the home 
 of Kanaris, to behold the great chieftain and to 
 be blessed by him. 
 
ECHOES OF 1821 13 
 
 After the untimely death of Marco Bozaris at 
 Karpenissi, my grand-uncle fought under other 
 great leaders, until in turn, in the last three years 
 of the revolution, he himself became a leader. 
 
 Of his own exploits he never spoke. He en- 
 trusted this task to posterity. It was of this and 
 that other leader he loved to speak, and as his 
 narrative progressed all the names which have 
 immortalized the modern history of Greece passed 
 before me — passed before me not as names from 
 a book, but as men of flesh and blood, in their 
 everyday aspects as well as in their heroic 
 moments. 
 
 And I, seated on my little stool, with the big 
 book I had brought him to read me still unopened 
 on my lap, would listen enthralled, wishing that 
 I might have lived when my uncle had, and might 
 with him have kneeled in front of Marco Bozaris, 
 to kiss the Greek flag, and to swear that I would 
 do or die. 
 
 One day when he was more violent than usual 
 against the Turks — when he almost wept at the 
 thought of living under the Turkish yoke — an 
 inspiration came to me. 
 
 " Uncle ! " I cried, " why do we live here ? 
 Why don't we go to live where the Greek flag 
 flies ? " 
 
 Abruptly he stopped in his walk before me, his 
 tall, thin figure erect, his eyes aflame. 
 
 " Go away from here ? '' he cried. " Go away 
 
14 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 from here, and be a traitor ? Yes, that is what 
 so many thousands did in 1453. They abandoned 
 their hearths and the graves of their ancestors. 
 They abandoned their lands and their schools, 
 and above all they abandoned St Sophia. To go 
 away from here is to forsake our country — for ever 
 to relinquish it to the conqueror. We must stay 
 here ! " he thundered, '* and bear with our patrida 
 the yoke of slavery, till the day shall come, when 
 again strong, we shall rise to break that yoke, 
 and hear again a Christian priest in St Sophia ! " 
 
 I was seven years old when he died ; yet I felt 
 almost as old as he. Having never seen other 
 children, and therefore having never shared in 
 childish frolics, my world consisted of the woes 
 of Greece. 
 
 His death was a terrible shock to me, and yet 
 I cannot say that I quite understood what death 
 meant. For days and days I pondered as to 
 where he was, and whether he were comfortable 
 or not. I saw his body, wrapped in a huge Greek 
 flag, the icon of his patron saint clasped in his 
 cold hands, lowered to rest beside the men of his 
 family, who, like him, had lived and died under 
 the Turkish yoke. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES 
 
 MY uncle was now gone — gone, let us 
 hope, to where he was to find rest 
 from racial hatred, rest from national 
 ambition. 
 
 Gone though he was, his influence over my life 
 was never to go entirely — in spite of radical 
 modifications. He had enriched my childhood 
 with things beyond my age, yet things which I 
 would not give up for the most normal and 
 sweetest of childhoods. He had taught me the 
 Greek Revolution as no book could ever have 
 done ; and he had given me an idea of the big 
 things expected of men. He had given me a 
 worship for my race amounting to superstition, 
 and bequeathed to me a hatred for the Turks 
 which would have warped my intelligence, had I 
 not been blessed almost from my infancy with a 
 power of observing for myself, and also had not 
 good fortune given me little Turkish Kiamele as 
 a constant companion. 
 
 In the abstract, the Turks, from the deeds they 
 had done, had taken their place in my mind as 
 the cruellest of races ; yet in the concrete that 
 
 IS 
 
i6 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 race was represented by dark-eyed, pretty little 
 Kiamele, the sweetest and brightest memory of 
 an otherwise bleak infancy. 
 
 Alongside the deeds of the Greeks, and the 
 bloodshed of the Greek Revolution, I had from 
 her '' The Arabian Nights/' She told them to me 
 in her picturesque, dramatic way, becoming a 
 horse when a horse had to come into the tale, and 
 any other animal when that animal appeared ; 
 and she imitated them with so great an ingenuity 
 that she suggested the very presence of the 
 animal, with little tax on my imagination. She 
 talked with a thick voice, when a fat man spoke, 
 and a terribly funny piping voice when a thin 
 one spoke. She draped herself exquisitely with 
 her veil, when a princess came into the tale ; and 
 her face assumed the queerest look when the ev- 
 sahibSy or supernatural sprites, appeared. Had 
 it not been for her and her *' Arabian Nights," I 
 should never have laughed, or known there was 
 a funny side to life ; for I had little enough 
 occasion for laughter with my uncle. Even to 
 this day, when I am amused, I laugh in the 
 oriental way of my little Kiamele. 
 
 After the death of my uncle, the course of my 
 life was changed. I made the acquaintance of 
 my own family, who now came to live on the 
 island, in the same old house where he and I had 
 lived. It took me a long time to adjust myself 
 to the new life, so different from the old, and 
 
OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES 17 
 
 especially to meet children, and to try to talk 
 with them. I had known that other children 
 existed, but I thought that each one was brought 
 up alone on an island with a grand-uncle, who 
 taught it the history of its race. 
 
 My father and I quickly became friends, and I 
 soon began to talk with him in the grown-up way 
 I had talked with my uncle, much to his amuse- 
 ment, I could see. 
 
 One day when I was sitting in his lap, with 
 my arms encircling his neck, I said to him : 
 *' Father, do you feel the Turkish yoke ? " 
 He gave a start. *' What are you talking 
 about, child ? " 
 
 It was then I told him what I knew of our 
 past, and of our obligations toward the future ; 
 how some day we must rise and throw off that 
 yoke, and hear the holy liturgy again chanted in 
 St Sophia. 
 
 He listened, interested, yet a flush of anger 
 overspread his face. He patted me, and mur- 
 mured to himself : '' And we thought she would 
 grow stronger living in the country.*' 
 
 He bent down and kissed me. ''I would not 
 bother much, just now, about these things," he 
 said. *' I'd play and grow strong.'' 
 
 " But, father," I protested, " uncle told me 
 never to forget those things — not even for a day ; 
 to remember them constantly, and to bring up 
 my sons to carry forward the flag." 
 
i8 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " You see," my father replied, very seriously, 
 '* you are not eight yet, and I do not believe in 
 early marriages ; so you have twelve years before 
 you are married and thirteen before you have a 
 son. During those years there are a lot of nice 
 and funny things to think about — and, above all, 
 you must grow strong physically." 
 
 I must say I was quite disappointed at the way 
 he took things. I was quite miserable about it, 
 and might have become morbid — for I liked to 
 cling to the big dreams of the future — had it not 
 been for my half-brother. He was fourteen 
 years older than I, and he, too, like my uncle 
 lived in the past. His past, however, went 
 beyond my uncle's past ; and from him I was to 
 learn, not of the woes of Greece, but of the glory 
 of Greece, of her golden age, and of the time when 
 she, Queen of the World, was first in civilization. 
 
 My horizon was gilded also by the Greek 
 mythology — that wonderful Greek mythology, 
 which to my brother was living, not dead. He 
 spoke one day in such a way of Olympus that I 
 exclaimed : 
 
 " You talk as if Olympus really existed, and 
 were not only mythology." 
 
 '' Of course, it exists," he replied. " I used to 
 live there myself, until they punished me by 
 sending me down here. I cannot tell you all the 
 particulars, because, when Zeus is about to exile 
 one, one is given a potion which puts him to 
 
OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES 19 
 
 sleep, and while asleep he is carried beyond the 
 limits of the Olympian realm, and is left outside 
 to live the life of a man. But though he forgets 
 a great deal — as, for example, how to find his 
 way back — he is left with the memory of his 
 former existence. That is his punishment. After 
 his death, however, he is forgiven and returns to 
 Olympus again.'' 
 
 I stared at my brother, but his calm assurance, 
 and the faith I had in him, made me implicitly 
 believe him — and to-day I think he really more 
 than half believed it himself. 
 
 After this I was not surprised to have him tell 
 me that the gods of Greece were not dead, but 
 forced to retire on the mountains of Olympus, 
 because Christianity had to come first. *' You 
 see, little one, you will presently learn the Old 
 Testament, as you are now being taught the New 
 — and as I am teaching you Mythology. You 
 will find out, as you grow older, that you need 
 all three to balance things up.'' 
 
 From him I heard not only the names of the 
 great Greek writers, but he read to me by the 
 hour from them. At first they were very hard 
 to understand, since the Greek we speak is so 
 much simpler than the Greek of Aristophanes 
 and Sophocles ; but since, after all, it is the same 
 language, I learned to recite it pretty well before 
 even I knew how to read and write. 
 
 It was from my brother, too, that I learned to 
 
20 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 know the Greek Revolution as our great modern 
 poets sang of it ; and before the year was over I 
 could recite the *' Chani of Gravia " and other 
 celebrated poems, as American children recite 
 " Mother Goose." 
 
 One day there came into our garden, where my 
 brother and I sat, a handsome young man, saying : 
 " They told me you were in the garden, so I came 
 to find you." He sat down by us and plunged 
 into a conversation about a certain game they 
 were getting up, and of which my brother was the 
 captain. We escorted him to the gate, when he 
 left us, and after he was out of ear-shot I asked 
 my brother who he was, as he had forgotten to 
 introduce us. 
 
 *' It is Arif Bey," he replied rather curtly. 
 
 *' You don't mean a real Turk ? " I cried. 
 
 " Why, yes." 
 
 " But you seemed so friendly with him ! " 
 
 " Why not ? I like him first rate." 
 
 " How can you be friends with a Turk ? " 
 
 " He's an awfully good fellow." 
 
 " But ought we to like them, and treat them as 
 if they were our equals ? " 
 
 " Well, what can we do, sister ? They are the 
 masters here, and we belong to the Turkish ofiicial- 
 dom. We have got to be friendly with them." 
 
 " But we ought to hate them just the same, 
 since we must kill them. Wouldn't you kill him, 
 if you could ? " 
 
OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES 21 
 
 '* I don't think I hate Arif Bey — and as for 
 killing him, I hope I shall never have to/' 
 
 '* But if we are not to kill them, how are we 
 going to be free again, and how can the Greek 
 flag fly over the Galata Tower ? " 
 
 " Look here, baby, what you need is to play 
 more and not think so much. Now come, and 
 ril teach you to climb trees, and for every tree 
 you climb yourself FU tell you a tale about the 
 time when I lived on Mount Olympus/' 
 
 I was agile by nature, in spite of being frail, 
 and in no time I learned to climb even the tallest 
 trees on our place, an occupation which delighted 
 me as much as anything I had ever done. 
 
 Arif Bey I saw again and again, for I became 
 the constant companion of either my father or 
 my brother, and I could not find it in my heart 
 to hate him. A few years older than my brother, 
 he was taller and his shoulders were broader, and 
 he carried himself with a dash worthy of the old 
 demi-gods of Greece. As for his eyes they were 
 as kind and good to look into as those of my 
 brother. What is more I was never afraid in his 
 presence, and one day he spoke so tenderly of his 
 sick mother that I pretty much changed my mind 
 about the delight of seeing him killed. It was 
 then that I talked very eulogistically about 
 him to my brother ; but one never can tell 
 what grown-ups will do — they are the most 
 inconsistent of human beings. 
 
22 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 '* Look here, baby " — he interrupted my praises 
 of Arif Bey — " Arif is handsome and a nice chap, 
 and I can trust him up to a certain point ; but 
 don't get to thinking he is as good as we are. A 
 Turk never is. They have enough Greek blood 
 in them to look decent, but they have enough 
 Turkish left to be Asiatics, and don't forget that. 
 An Asiatic is something inferior at best. Look 
 at Arif Bey himself, for example. He is about 
 the best of them, and yet, barely twenty-seven, 
 he has two wives already. There is Asia for 
 you ! - 
 
 I was quite perplexed in regard to the proper 
 attitude of mind toward the Turks. The only 
 girl I knew was Kiamele — and I adored her. 
 The only man was Arif Bey — and he got so mixed 
 up in my mind with the demi-gods that I did not 
 even mind his two wives. My uncle had been 
 dead for almost a year, and I had no one to incite 
 me against them. The old Greek writers and the 
 beautiful mythology was beginning to make me 
 tolerant toward everybody. I began to lose the 
 feeling of the yoke, since Greece had once been 
 the greatest of great countries. When one has a 
 past achievement to be proud of, one bears a 
 temporary humiliation better — and there was so 
 much in the Greek past that the weight of the 
 yoke lifted perceptibly from my neck. It is 
 true I kept the little flag nailed under the icono- 
 stasis, before which I said my prayers every 
 
OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES 23 
 
 night, and when I felt that I was not quite as 
 loyal to it as I ought to be, I used to pray to the 
 Christian gods to help me to remember it. I say 
 " gods,'' because to my mind God and Christ, 
 and St Nicholas, and St George, and the rest of 
 the saints were much the same sort of a group as 
 the old Greek gods, now in seclusion on Mount 
 Olympus. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 DJIMLAH 
 
 ON the day of Beiram my father was 
 about to set out for a call on a Turkish 
 pasha. 
 '' Take me with you, father/' I begged, 
 thinking of the pleasure of being with him 
 more than of going into a Turkish home. He 
 acceded to my request, actuated by the same 
 motive as mine. 
 
 The old pasha was receiving his guests in his 
 superb garden, and I, after eating all the sweets 
 my father would permit me to, and becoming 
 tired of their talk, which happened not to interest 
 me, slipped away. I wandered about in the 
 garden, and presently came across a little girl, 
 older than myself, yet not so old as to form a 
 barrier between us. It is true that we came very 
 near fighting, at first, over the bravery of our 
 respective races, but we ended, thanks to the 
 courtesy of my little hostess, by becoming 
 friends. 
 
 Taking my hand in hers we ran all the way 
 to where the pasha and my father were seated. 
 She interrupted their conversation without cere- 
 
 24 
 
DJIMLAH 25 
 
 mony, and perching herself on her grandfather's 
 knees, she demanded that he should borrow me 
 for her from my father. 
 
 I stood listening, confident that my father 
 would never, never consent to such a terrible 
 thing. When my father consented — reluctantly 
 it is true ; yet he did consent — cold shivers ran 
 up and down my back, and my eyelids fell heavily 
 over my eyes. I felt abandoned — abandoned by 
 the one human being for whom I entertained the 
 greatest confidence. Sheer will-power kept me 
 from throwing myself on my father's knees and 
 imploring him to save me from the Turks. Had 
 I not been bragging to the little girl but a few 
 minutes before that I was a Greek, and conse- 
 quently an extremely brave person, I am sure 
 I should have broken into sobs. As it was, I let 
 myself be led away by the little girl without 
 even kissing my father good-bye ; for that would 
 have broken down my self-control. That, I felt, 
 was more than even Greek blood could do. I 
 resigned myself to my dreadful fate, but my legs 
 felt like ripe cucumbers. 
 
 Little Djimlah enveloped me in a long caress. 
 " You are my very own baby," she said. '' I 
 never had one before, and I shall love you vastly, 
 and give you all I have." 
 
 Holding my hand in hers she began to run as 
 fast as she could, pulling me along down the long 
 avenue of trees, leading to the house. At the 
 
26 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 door she did not knock. It opened as by magic 
 of its own accord. 
 
 My first glimpse of the interior corresponded 
 exactly with the pictures of my imagination ; for 
 in 1885 Turkish homes still preserved all their 
 oriental customs. The hall was large, dark, and 
 gloomy ; and the eunuch, who had opened the 
 door by pulling his rope, added to its terrors. 
 And since that was a great festival day, and 
 many ladies were calling, the hall was lined with 
 these sinister black men, the whites of whose eyes 
 glistened in the darkness. 
 
 Still hand in hand, Djimlah and I mounted a 
 flight of dark, carpetless stairs and came to a 
 landing screened by very much the same kind of a 
 curtain as those that hang outside the doors of 
 the Catholic churches on the Continent. 
 
 " Open ! " Djimlah cried, and silently two 
 eunuchs drew aside the curtains, and we passed 
 to another flight of bare stairs, now full of light 
 and sunshine. With the sun a peal of laughter 
 greeted us, and when we reached the upper hall 
 I felt a trifle less afraid. 
 
 Scrambling about on rugs were what seemed 
 to me at first to be a thousand young women, 
 very much like my Kiamele, dressed in as many 
 colours as there were heads, barefooted and bare- 
 armed. They were having the greatest frolics, 
 and laughing like a pack of children. 
 
 " Hullo, there ! " cried Djimlah. 
 
DJIMLAH 27 
 
 They stopped their romping, some of them 
 rising up on their knees to see us the better. 
 
 '' Why, Djimlah Hanoum, what have you 
 there ? '' 
 
 Djimlah surveyed me with eyes full of that 
 humour which is so strong a characteristic of the 
 Turkish people, and replied seriously : " It looks 
 to me like a Christian child/' 
 
 *' And where did you find it ? " they cried. 
 
 *' I borrowed it from the effendi, her father, 
 who is out in the garden talking to grandfather. 
 She will be here a long, long time, as my own 
 baby/' 
 
 *' Really ? '* They became quite excited 
 about this. 
 
 '* Yes. And she can understand us, and talk 
 the way we do,'' Djimlah announced proudly, as 
 if she had imparted to me a knowledge of her 
 language in the short time she had been holding 
 my hand. 
 
 '* Os-geldil os-geldi I " then they cried to me 
 in welcome. 
 
 *' Now let's go to grandmother," said Djimlah. 
 
 This bevy of women were the slaves of the 
 house and the slaves of the ladies who were with 
 the great lady within. We passed through 
 several rooms, filled with the outdoor garments 
 of the visiting ladies, and then came into the 
 divan-khan^, or principal reception room, where 
 the hostess was entertaining her guests. 
 
28 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Djimlah, placing both her Httle hands on the 
 floor, salaamed, and then walked up to her 
 grandmother, who, magnificently attired in her 
 orientalism, sat cross-legged on a hard sofa, 
 which ran around three sides of the room. 
 
 " Here, grandmother, here is a Christian child. 
 The effendi, her father, is out with grandfather, 
 and he has lent her to me." 
 
 I stood still, quite uncertain what was the 
 proper thing for me to do. I had never before 
 come so near to a Turkish lady ; and this one, 
 with her deeply dyed finger-nails, and her indoor 
 veils, and her hundreds of diamonds, distracted 
 all my previous education in decorum. I merely 
 stared. 
 
 " Welcome, little hanoum" she said, after she, 
 too, had stared at me. *' We shall do our best 
 to make your stay among us seem like a happy 
 minute.'' 
 
 I picked up my little skirts and made her a 
 European curtsy. She was childishly delighted 
 with it, and I was made to repeat it before every 
 lady in the room, who sat in her magnificence, 
 cross-legged on the divan. 
 
 There were many, and by the time I 
 finished my curtsies, and told my name and my 
 age, and how I had learned Turkish, and where 
 I lived, I felt quite at home, and when the 
 old lady made us sit by her, and gave us such 
 quantities of candy as I had never been permitted 
 
DJIMLAH 29 
 
 to eat in an entire year, I did not think once of 
 the little flag that my sons were to carry. 
 
 They talked before us as if we were not there, 
 and told a lot of funny stories at which we were 
 permitted to j oin in the laugh. 
 
 The audience over, the ladies rose and salaamed. 
 Djimlah and I rose, too, and as Djimlah now 
 kissed the hems of the ladies' dresses, so did I ; 
 and I was pleased to do so, for the ladies were 
 reeking with strong perfumes, a thing I had been 
 taught to consider ill-bred, but which I secretly 
 thought lovely. We escorted the guests out to 
 the ante-rooms, where their attendants wrapped 
 them in their black wraps and heavy white gauze 
 head-gear, and there we bade them good-bye. 
 
 Some of them took me in their arms and kissed 
 me, and their perfume stayed with me even in 
 bed that night. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 WE AND THEY 
 
 IT was a pa triarchal iiome. this first harem 
 into which I entered. It consisted of the 
 old hanoum, who was the first wife, and 
 head of the women's part of the household, 
 six other wives, whom she called her sisters, 
 several married daughters, the wives of some of 
 the sons, and two married grand-daughters. 
 Among them they were the mothers of numerous 
 babies — indeed, there were babies all over the 
 house ; and since each lady had several slaves 
 there must have been at least a hundred women 
 and children. 
 
 Djimlah happened to be the only child of 
 her age. They were all sorry for her, and said 
 so constantly while doing their best to amuse her. 
 
 There was little furniture in the house, just 
 rugs and hard sofas, and small tables upon which 
 were always sorbets or sweets, and cushions of all 
 colours piled up on the rugs, where babies or 
 grown-ups were always lying slumbering. Various 
 small musical instruments were also among the 
 cushions, and at any time some person would 
 pick one of these up to play and sing, so that 
 
WE AND THEY 31 
 
 most of the time, on the floor, there were both 
 people slumbering, and people playing and sing- 
 ing. And since the long, curtainless windows 
 were latticed, and the upper part entirely hidden 
 by creeping vines growing from pots, the whole 
 place seemed to me like a play-box, transformed 
 into a fairy house, from which discipline, like a 
 wicked fairy, was banished. 
 
 All the cooking was done in the men's part of 
 the house, and brought in by eunuchs. At meal- 
 times we sat around small, low tables, on cushions, 
 and ate most of the things with our fingers, 
 except rice and soup, which we ate with pretty 
 wooden spoons. 
 
 The amount they permitted me to eat was 
 incredible. Even to this day I wonder what 
 prevented me from becoming ill. 
 
 Djimlah and I practically owned the house. 
 We slid on the banisters ; we climbed on the backs 
 of the slaves, who, at any time, were ready to 
 play horse with us ; and we ate candy whenever 
 and in whatever quantities we pleased. 
 
 No one said '' No '' to us, whatever we did, and 
 the old hanoum let us ruffle her beautiful clothes 
 and disturb her even when she was asleep. We 
 slept on a little bed, made up at the foot of hers, 
 in her own room, and it was she who said our 
 prayer, which we repeated, and then kissed us 
 good-night. 
 
 The day had passed so rapidly, and had been 
 
 \ 
 
32 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 so crowded with events and candy that I had had 
 no time to think. Once in bed, after Djimlah 
 put her arms around me and kissed me and then 
 sweetly fell asleep, I had plenty of time to review 
 the day. It seemed preposterous that I, my 
 uncle's grand-niece, should be here in a Turkish 
 household, and in the same bed with a Turkish 
 little girl — a little girl I liked and should hate to 
 kill. Yet my uncle's teachings were strongly 
 with me and his dark, fiery eyes seemed to pierce 
 my heart. I tried to focus my mind on the bad 
 side of this household. There was the fact of the 
 several wives, and if it was bad for Arif Bey to 
 have two wives, it must be terribly bad to have 
 seven, as had Djimlah's grandfather, who did 
 not even have the excuse, to my thinking, of 
 being young, handsome and Olympian. On the 
 other hand, the old hanoum liked those other 
 wives, and called them Sister, and Djimlah 
 spoke of them lovingly. Impelled by my uncle's 
 eyes I tried to dislike the Turks. I felt disloyal 
 to him, whom I could feel very close that night ; 
 but when I fell asleep at last, my rest was not 
 troubled, and on awakening again Djimlah was 
 leaning over me, cooing and laughing, and I began 
 to laugh too. 
 
 The tears, which I had had the courage not to 
 shed when my|father said that I might stay with 
 Djimlah, flowed copiously when the time came to 
 leave her. I cried hard and loud, and so did 
 
WE AND THEY 33 
 
 Djimlah and because we two cried some of the 
 slaves joined in, and then the old hanoum 
 said : 
 
 " Now, young hanoum, that you have come 
 once, you will like to come again, and prove to 
 us that we have made your stay happy." 
 
 " Fm ready to come this minute,'' I sobbed. 
 At this she laughed, and we began to laugh, too ; 
 and thus I bade them good-bye. 
 
 The first words I said on reaching my own home 
 were that the Turks were the nicest people in the 
 world. My father was amused, but my mother 
 was horrified, and had she had her way I believe 
 my first would have been my only visit. As it 
 was, eight days later I was again with Djimlah ; 
 and thus it came about that from that early age 
 I became a constant visitor not only to Djimlah's 
 home, but also to that of other little girls whom I 
 met through her, and otherwise. 
 
 As I grew older, the vast contrast between my 
 race and theirs became more and more clear to 
 me ; and I had the distinct feeling of partaking 
 of two worlds, mine and theirs. 
 
 In my home there were duties for me from my 
 babyhood, duties which had rigidly to be per- 
 formed ; and things to be learned, remembered, 
 and to be guided by. The words duty and obliga- 
 tion played a great role in my Greek home, and 
 these two words, so stem, so irreconcilable with 
 pleasure, were absent from the Turkish homes. 
 
34 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 For me there was a tremendous Greek history 
 to be learned and understood ; and the more one 
 studied it, the more one had to suffer because of 
 the present ; for in my home we Hved with the 
 past, we talked of the past, and of the obligations 
 which the past imposed upon our present and 
 future. 
 
 In the Turkish homes there was no history to 
 be learned. All they seemed to know was that 
 they were a great conquering race, that they had 
 come from Asia and had conquered all Europe, 
 because they were brave and the Europeans were 
 cowards. There was no past or future in their 
 lives. Everything was ephemeral, resting on the 
 pleasure of the day, or better yet, on the pleasure 
 of the moment ; unconscious of the morrow, and 
 indifferent to the moment after the present. 
 
 In entering a Turkish home, especially as I 
 grew older, I felt as if I were leaving my own life 
 outside. They were different from us, these 
 women, these children of the Turks. They were 
 so different, indeed, that I rarely spoke to them 
 of the things I felt or thought about at home. I 
 came to them ready to enjoy them, and to enjoy 
 life with them ; and yet, as the years went by, 
 deep down in my heart I felt glad to be a Greek 
 child, even though I belonged to the conquered 
 race ; and I began to return to my home with 
 greater satisfaction than I had at first, and to 
 put into my studies a fervour and a willingness 
 
WE AND THEY 35 
 
 which might have been less, had I not been a 
 visitor to these Turkish households. 
 
 Yet curiously, too, as I grew older, I liked the 
 Turks more and more, though in my liking there 
 was a certain amount of protective feeling, such 
 as one might feel for wayward children, rather 
 than for equals. 
 
 I learned to see what was noble, charming, and 
 poetical in their lives ; but I also became con- 
 scious that in spite of the faults of my race, in 
 spite of the limitations of our religion, our 
 civilization was better than theirs, because it con- 
 tained such words as discipline, duty, and obliga- 
 tion. And dimly I felt that we were a race that 
 had come to the world to stay and to help, while 
 theirs was perhaps some day to vanish utterly. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 AUNT KALLIROE 
 
 THERE is no use pretending that there 
 has ever existed the least sense of 
 fraternity between the Greeks and the 
 Turks. They had their quarters and we had ours. 
 They brought their customs and traditions from 
 the East, and we held fast to our own. The 
 two races had nothing to give each other. They 
 ignored us totally, and we only remembered 
 them to hate them and to make ready some 
 day to throw off their dominion. 
 
 I have never heard a good word for the Turks 
 from such of my people as have not crossed their 
 thresholds. It is almost unbelievable that for 
 upward of four hundred years we should have 
 lived side by side, ignorant of each other's history, 
 and positively refusing to learn of each other's 
 good qualities. With entire sincerity the Greeks 
 daily relate to each other awful deeds of the 
 Turks — deeds which are mere rumour and here- 
 say, and contain only a grain of truth, or none 
 at all. 
 
 Each side did its best to keep the other as far 
 away as possible. They had their resorts and 
 
AUNT KALLIROE 37 
 
 we had ours. They had their tekM and we had 
 our schools ; they had their mosques and we had 
 our churches ; they had their Punch and Judy 
 shows and we had our theatres ; they had their 
 music and we had our own ; they had their 
 language and we clung jealously to ours. Our 
 own differences we did not bring before the 
 Turkish law, but before our own Church. Neither 
 in sorrow nor in pleasure did we mingle. Turkey 
 is the only country in the world where one may 
 travel for months without using the language of 
 the country, with such great tenacity do the con- 
 quered races cling to their own. Indeed, in order 
 to live comfortably in Constantinople, one must 
 know Greek, not Turkish. 
 
 After I had played with Turkish girls for two 
 years, had been in and out of their homes as a 
 friend, and liked them, one morning my grand- 
 aunt Kalliroe came to our house in a great state 
 of excitement and worry. 
 
 *' Go fetch your father, dear," she cried to me, 
 " and tell him that it is of the utmost importance 
 — of the utmost national importance." 
 
 Aunt Kalliroe was an old lady, and the last 
 of her type I remember. She was of an old 
 Phanariot family, and to her the traditions of 
 Phanar — the Greek portion of Constantinople — 
 were as important as her religious duties. She 
 always dressed in the old fashion of Phanar, 
 wearing black lace, turban-like, on her head, a 
 
38 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 dress in one piece, with ample skirts, and a shawl 
 which she let hang gracefully over her shoulders. 
 She was tall and imposing, with the sharp features 
 of the Greeks of Phanar, which perhaps were 
 sharpened during their first two hundred years 
 under Turkish rule. Even in her old age her eyes 
 were as piercing and clear as a hawk's. She 
 carried a cane, and wore silk mittens made by 
 hand ; and whenever she met a Turk in the 
 street she muttered exorcizing words, as if he 
 were an evil spirit. 
 
 Upon her marriage she had at first gone to live 
 in another community, where the Greek tradi- 
 tions were not so rigidly adhered to. At once 
 she decided that her marriage was providential, 
 and that God had meant her to go to this place 
 to revive the Greek spirit. She undertook her 
 task with a fervour at once patriotic and religious ; 
 and she succeeded in her mission, for she made 
 these wayward sheep return rigorously to the 
 fold. 
 
 " Go, child ! " she now admonished me im- 
 patiently. " Don't stand there and stare at me 
 — go fetch your father." 
 
 I knew my father did not like to be disturbed 
 in the morning, but I knew also that there was 
 not a human being who did not obey Aunt 
 Kalliroe, so I went and fetched my father. 
 
 " Nephew ! " she cried, without any greeting, 
 as soon as she saw him, " I will not countenance 
 
AUNT KALLIROE 39 
 
 it — I will not tolerate it ! He must be made to 
 understand the impossibility of his desire." 
 
 My father sat down by her, took her silk- 
 mittened hand, and kissed the fingers. 
 
 " Now just tell me who is ' he.' " 
 
 Aunt Kalliroe looked at my father with dis- 
 gusted surprise. 
 
 " Nephew, are you living at the North Pole, 
 and not in Turkey ? Baky Pasha, of course." 
 
 She flung the name as if it were a bomb, and 
 waited for it to explode. My father took the 
 matter calmly. 
 
 " What has he done ? " he inquired. 
 
 " Nephew, what is the matter with you ? Don't 
 you know ? " 
 
 My father shook his head. " Tell me," he 
 begged. 
 
 "He is proposing to buy the Spathary home- 
 stead ! The — Spathary — homestead ! Why the 
 man didn't leave it to the Church I can't under- 
 stand ; but I suppose the stroke prevented him 
 from putting his affairs in order. Well, his only 
 heirs live in Roumania, and they want to sell 
 the house, not to rent it, and what is more they 
 are asking a ridiculous price. The house has 
 been vacant for two years ; and now Baky Pasha, 
 the Asiatic brute and murderer, proposes to buy 
 it, to buy a Christian home, which contains a 
 niche for our saints in every bed-chamber — a 
 home which has been blessed by our priests. 
 
40 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 and in which many a Christian child has been 
 baptized ! " 
 
 She threw up her hands in despair. 
 
 *' Christian God, are you going to try your 
 children much more ? You have sent these 
 Asiatic hordes to come and conquer us ; you have 
 allowed your great church to be polluted by their 
 profane creed ; and now are you going to try 
 your children further by permitting these beasts 
 to buy Christian homes to lead their improper 
 lives in ? '* 
 
 My father waited till her outburst came to an 
 end, and then said gently : *' You know, Aunt 
 Kalliroe, Baky is a very nice fellow, and what is 
 more he has never murdered anybody; or is 
 hkely to/' 
 
 My grand-aunt stared at my father ; then asked 
 stiffly : " And what is his nationality, please ? " 
 
 " He is a Turk, of course " 
 
 " A Turk — and not a murderer ? " She lifted 
 her eyes to the ceiling. " Christian God, what 
 are we coming to ? Is 1453 so far away that 
 your children have forgotten it ? A Turk — and 
 not a murderer ! But I am not here to discuss 
 the Turks with you, nephew ; for are you not 
 a Turkish official, do you not consort daily with 
 these barbarians, and do they not even say that 
 you permit your innocent babe to sleep under the 
 roof where Turks keep their women ? Christian 
 God, give grace to your children." 
 
AUNT KALLIROE 41 
 
 She joined her hands, and her lips moved in 
 silent prayer. 
 
 " Just tell me what I can do for you ? " my 
 father begged. 
 
 " You can speak for me to that Turk, and tell 
 him that the Spathary homestead is Greek, and 
 that it is in the midst of a Greek community, 
 where he is not wanted. If he offers so much 
 money that it will be sold to him, well, it shall be 
 burned to the ground before he moves into it, 
 that is all." 
 
 My father opened his cigarette case, and offered 
 her a cigarette, for all the women of her genera- 
 tion smoked. 
 
 She selected one, and examined it closely. " I 
 am gratified at least to see that you smoke what 
 is made by your countrymen, and not Turkish 
 cigarettes." 
 
 My father laughed. '* Why, auntie, there is 
 not a Turkish cigarette-maker in all Turkey. 
 All the Turkish cigarettes are made by Greeks." 
 
 Aunt Kalliroe took a puff or two ; then, for 
 once, on the defensive, she observed : " All 
 decent things are made by Greeks — ^isn't that 
 so?" 
 
 " I suppose so." 
 
 " You ought not to ' suppose so,' " she cried, 
 again on the offensive ; " you ought to be certain. 
 Christian God, what are we coming to ? Is this 
 the patriotism to be expected of the men who 
 
42 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 must try to free your great church from the 
 Mussulman profaning ? " 
 
 " Tell me, how do you propose to settle the 
 Spathary matter ? " my father asked, reverting 
 to the less dangerous topic. " If Baky shouldn't 
 buy it, how would you keep off other Turks 
 who might wish to buy ? Your community 
 is an old-fashioned one. The younger genera- 
 tion of Greeks is moving away from it ; and 
 only rich Turks will buy the big old Greek 
 homesteads." 
 
 *' I propose to buy it myself," she thundered, 
 " and move into it, and sell my own house to the 
 Bishop of Heraclea, who wants it." 
 
 " How much does he offer for your house ? " 
 
 " Four thousand pounds." 
 
 " And what do the Spathary heirs ask ? " 
 
 " Those Roumanian Greeks have no more idea 
 of value than they have of patriotism — they are 
 asking five thousand, and what is more I shall 
 have to pay it." 
 
 " Then you will sell the home of your husband's 
 forefathers, and pay a thousand pounds more for 
 an inferior one ? " 
 
 She banged her stick on the floor in exaspera- 
 tion. " I am not driving a money bargain : I 
 am keeping a Turk from coming among us. 
 Great Christian God, am I to permit an infidel to 
 pass daily by my door, and to walk the street 
 where Christian virgins dwell ? " 
 
AUNT KALLIROE 43 
 
 " Why doesn't the Bishop buy the Spathary 
 homestead ? " my father suggested. 
 
 '* It isn't big enough. It hasn't enough 
 ground. And it's farther from the landing. 
 Now, are you going to carry my message to 
 that brutal Turk ? " 
 
 *' Yes, certainly. And I know that he will not 
 be willing to buy where he is not wanted. But I 
 am sorry that you are going to lose your own 
 home, and pay a thousand pounds over." 
 
 '* Needn't worry ! I have enough to live on, 
 and, as you know, all my money goes to the 
 Educational Fund, so that I might just as well 
 use a thousand pounds now to keep a Turk away 
 from Christians." 
 
 The next time we visited Aunt Kalliroe she 
 was installed in the Spathary homestead. Just 
 within the front door stood a small table, covered 
 with a white linen table-cloth, such as orthodox 
 Greek women spun themselves for the purpose of 
 putting on the tables where the ikons were laid — 
 table-cloths always washed by the mistress her- 
 self in a basin kept apart from the other dishes. 
 On the table lay a Greek ikon, a brass candle- 
 stick holding three candles, all burning, and a 
 brass incense-burner, from which a column of 
 blue smoke was rising, filling the house with the 
 odour of incense. 
 
 " Why, it isn't Easter and it isn't Christmas," 
 
44 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 I cried. " It isn't even a great saint's day. 
 Why are you burning the candles and the incense, 
 Aunt Kalliroe ? " 
 
 " They have been burning since I moved into 
 this house, and they shall burn for thrice forty 
 days, to cleanse it from Turkish pollution." 
 
 " But since Baky Pasha never bought it, and 
 never lived in it " 
 
 '' No, but a Turk has coveted it, and that is 
 enough to pollute a Christian home." 
 
 This incident is one of many. It illustrates the 
 feeling which existed in the hearts of the orthodox 
 Greeks for the people who conquered them and 
 brought, to the very capital of their former 
 empire, their religion and their customs. We 
 disliked them and feared them ; and our fear 
 partook both of the real and of the unreal, be- 
 cause we ascribed to them not only the deeds 
 which they had done, but also a great many 
 that they were incapable of doing, and had not 
 even considered the possibility of doing. 
 
 I wonder now what would have been the out- 
 come had the Greeks and the Turks mingled more 
 together ; had they come to know each other and 
 to recognize each other's good qualities, and had 
 they been able to profit by the good which is in 
 each nation. Had the Turks, for example, bor- 
 rowed from the light of Greek civilization and 
 culture ; and had the Greeks profited by the 
 calm contemplative spirit, which is the keynote 
 
AUNT KALLIROE 45 
 
 of the Turkish character, when not in war. I 
 wonder always what would have been the out- 
 come, and perhaps that is one more reason why 
 I try to show what is best in the Turks — ^to save 
 the gold from the dross, and to disentangle from 
 the bad what was divine and immortal in them. 
 
 We Greeks have never been able to learn from 
 them and to give something in exchange ; but 
 why let it be lost to the whole world ? And since 
 we call ourselves Christians, why should we not 
 be able to say — when the sick shall be dead — 
 even as Christ said of the dead dog : " Yes, he is 
 a dead dog — ^but his teeth are beautiful." 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH*S HAND 
 
 MY visits to Djimlah continued, and 
 her daring spirit was a continual 
 delight to me. I had never seen 
 her afraid of anything, and she did pretty much 
 as she chose. One day when I was visiting her, 
 a tremendous thunder-storm broke out, and I 
 said to her : 
 
 " Oh, Djimlah, let us go out in your grounds 
 and watch the storm. They never let me do 
 that at home, and I do so want to find its roots." 
 
 She did not accept the proposal with alacrity. 
 " It will rain hard in a minute/' she objected, 
 " and we shall get wet. I hate to look like a rat 
 — and all the curl will come out of my hair." 
 
 " I believe you are afraid, like the other 
 women," I mocked her. " Maybe if you had a 
 European bed in your home you would go and 
 hide under it." 
 
 She rose majestically : " Come, we will go and 
 see whether I am afraid." 
 
 We went out, bent on finding the beginning of 
 the storm. I always thought that a storm must 
 have a beginning ; and from the windows of my 
 
 46 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 47 
 
 nursery, where I watched the storms, it looked 
 as if it were just around the corner. In vain, 
 however, on that day did we wander around many 
 corners, on Djimlah's grounds : we could find no 
 beginning. 
 
 The storm grew fiercer and fiercer. The whole 
 sky was dark lead-coloured, and black clouds 
 rushed along as if a tremendous force were push- 
 ing them from behind. The lightning, like a 
 vicious snake, was zigzagging over the sky. Then 
 there came a bang ! and a crash of thunder. By 
 that time we were far from the house, and on 
 the cliffs. Djimlah put her arm within mine. 
 
 " I am possessed with fear," she gasped ; "for 
 Allah is wrathful." 
 
 Her tone was full of awe, and it subdued me. 
 " Let us go back," I said. 
 
 " No, it will overtake us, and crush us," 
 Djimlah answered. " I don't want to die — not 
 just yet. We must hide somewhere." 
 
 At this time I was being taught my Bible, and 
 felt that I knew a great deal about religious 
 subjects. 
 
 " We can't hide from God," I explained. 
 " He sees us everywhere — even in the darkest 
 corner of a dark closet." 
 
 " I don't want to hide from God," Djimlah 
 corrected, " I want to hide from the thunder. 
 Come ! I know where we can go — to the Hollow 
 of Allah's Hand." 
 
48 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Hand in hand we ran as fast as we could 
 against the hard, beating rain, the fierce wind 
 blowing against us, bending even big trees, and 
 mercilessly breaking off their branches. With 
 the agility of children we managed to reach a 
 high chff partly concealed by pines. It re- 
 sembled a gigantic hand, rising up, the fingers 
 curving over and forming a protected hollow. 
 Into this we crept and sat down, high above the 
 Sea of Marmora, with miles and miles of horizon 
 in front of us. 
 
 In our little shelter the rain could not get at 
 us, but we were already wet, and our clothes 
 clung to us uncomfortably. 
 
 " Let us take our coats off,'!^ suggested Djimlah, 
 " for the under layer must be less wet than the 
 upper one. And also let us take off our shoes 
 and stockings. We shall be more comfortable 
 without them." 
 
 We divested ourselves of some of our clothing, 
 and as the hollow where we sat had sand, we 
 stretched our coats in front of us to dry, curled 
 our feet under us, and snuggled very close to 
 each other. ' 
 
 The storm was still raging, but we now looked 
 upon it with the renewed interest and pleasure 
 derived from our safety. 
 
 " We didn't find its roots after all," Djimlah 
 bbserved. *' I believe it begins at the feet 
 of Allah and ends there, and since we are 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 49 
 
 sitting in the hollow of his hand it can't 
 hurt us." 
 
 It struck me as curious that she should be 
 talking of God so familiarly. In my ignorance 
 of their religious side, I considered the Turks as 
 infidels and without religion. 
 
 " I didn't know that God had any hands," I 
 remarked. *' I thought He was only an eye — at 
 least that is the way He is painted on the ceiling 
 of our church." 
 
 Djimlah shook her head. " How can He be 
 only an eye ? Have you ever seen a person 
 being only an eye ? " 
 
 " He isn't a person," I retorted. " He is God, 
 which is very different from being a person," and 
 yet as I spoke the words, something I had just 
 learned popped into my head, that man was 
 created in the image of God. Magnanimously I 
 mentioned this to Djimlah. 
 
 " I always knew that," she agreed, " and I 
 know whom He looks like, too. He looks like 
 grandfather at his best." 
 
 " Your grandfather is old," I protested. " God 
 isn't an old man." 
 
 Djimlah pondered this. " Well, He has lived 
 ever since the beginning of the world — and 
 grandfather is only sixty." She looked at me 
 puzzled. " That's funny. I never thought much 
 about His age." 
 
 '* Yes," I put in more perplexed still, " and His 
 
50 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Son, if He had lived, would have been almost 
 nineteen hundred years old/' 
 
 She turned abruptly, and her face in the little 
 hollow was very near mine. 
 
 " What son ? '* she inquired with interest. 
 
 '* Jesus Christ, our Lord,'' I answered. 
 
 " Your prophet ? Why, He wasn't His Son. 
 Allah never married/' and again the words 
 flashed into my mind that there was neither 
 giving nor taking in marriage in heaven. Yet I 
 stood by my orthodoxy. 
 
 " Christ is the Son of God," I maintained. 
 
 Djimlah, too, stood by her belief. '' Allah 
 had no children of the flesh. Christ was only a 
 prophet — and He was second to Mohammed." 
 
 A brilliant idea came to me. " You know, 
 Djimlah," I explained, " I am not talking of 
 Allah, I am talking of God." 
 
 " They are all the same," she asserted. " There 
 is but one Heaven and one Earth, and one Sun and 
 one Moon. Therefore there is but one God, and 
 that is Allah, and we are His children." 
 
 I was staggered by her confident tone. Djimlah 
 with her words had made of me a Mohammedan 
 and an infidel — something religiously unclean and 
 unspeakable. And, what is more, she was un- 
 conscious of the enormity of her speech : she was 
 excitedly watching the lightning, now making all 
 sorts of arabesques on the sky. 
 
 " Watch, darling, watch ! " she cried. " I 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 51 
 
 know now what the storm is. It is fireworks, 
 Allah's fireworks ! " 
 
 " Fireworks — foolishness ! " I exclaimed peev- 
 ishly ; for I was sorely hurt at the idea of her 
 being on equal terms with me before God. 
 " God is not frivolous — He does not want any 
 fireworks. He is vastly busy watching the world, 
 and guiding the destinies of the human race." 
 
 " Why should He watch and guide ? " Djimlah 
 said proudly. " He knows everything from the 
 beginning ; for He writes it on the foreheads of 
 people. My destiny is written here/' she pointed 
 to her forehead, " and yours is written there." 
 She tapped my forehead. 
 
 I hated her, and crossly pushed her finger from 
 my forehead. 
 
 " He doesn't," I cried, " for He leaves us free 
 to choose whether we shall be brave or cowardly, 
 whether we shall do good or evil." 
 
 She laughed derisively. " A nice kind of a 
 father you would make of Him — ^taking no more 
 care of us than that. But do stop arguing and 
 watch the storm. Isn't it glorious ? " 
 
 Indeed the lightning over the Asiatic side of 
 Turkey was wonderful. The storm had worked 
 its way over there, and the rain had followed, 
 leaving our side of the coast clear. Right above 
 us a yellowish cloud tore open and disclosed the 
 sun. Djimlah greeted him with delight. She 
 extended her little arms up toward him, crying : 
 
52 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Come out. Sun Effendi, come out 1 You are 
 so golden and warm, and I am so cold." 
 
 She shook her little body and rose, jumping up 
 and down to get warm. 
 
 As if to oblige her the sun's rays grew stronger 
 and stronger, and we began to feel better under 
 their warmth. We could hear the storm growling 
 miles away now, and see only bits of lightning. 
 
 '* It's working its way back to Allah," said 
 Djimlah, '* so let's go home, and get dry clothes 
 and something to eat. But I am glad we came 
 out, for now you know that it has no roots." She 
 put her arm around me. " I used to be afraid 
 of the noise," she confessed sheepishly. " I used 
 to hide my head in some one's lap. I never knew 
 it was so beautiful. You made me see that." 
 
 This deference pleased me, yet it did not take 
 away the smart from which I was suffering. In- 
 deed, the calm assertion of Djimlah that we were 
 all in the same way children of God hurt me more 
 than any abstract proposition has since been able 
 to. Had she intimated that the Turks and the 
 Greeks were alike, I could have proved to her by 
 actual facts that the Greeks were superior to the 
 Turks, because they had attained to the noblest 
 civilization, the most beautiful architecture, and 
 the greatest literature in the world ; but how was 
 I to prove my position of superiority before 
 God? 
 The afternoon passed in various games, in 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 53 
 
 which I took only a half-hearted interest. Then 
 came supper and bedtime. I was spending the 
 night there, and by the time I was to go to bed 
 my smart, instead of being lessened, had grown 
 tremendously. I undressed silently. 
 
 The old hanoum came in to hear us say our 
 prayers. Up to this time I had not minded 
 praying with Djimlah to Allah. I was sure it did 
 not matter, because when I was tucked in bed, 
 I crossed myself three times, and implored the 
 Virgin Mary to watch over me and over those I 
 loved. To-night it was different. If I were to 
 show Djimlah that I did not believe in her words, 
 I must stop praying to her god ; so I said : 
 
 '* I shall not pray to Allah to-night." 
 
 " Oh, but you must/* Djimlah declared. " You 
 wouldn't like to disappoint him, would you ? " 
 
 " I don't belong to him," I asserted passionately. 
 " I don't belong to him. I belong to God, so I 
 don't care whether I disappoint Allah or not." 
 
 " Djimlah," interposed her grandmother, *' you 
 must let the little hanoum do as she likes. You 
 and I can pray alone." 
 
 Djimlah stood before her grandmother, her 
 face tilted upward, her hands outstretched, palms 
 upward. 
 
 " Allah, the only true god of heaven and earth, 
 be praised ! There is no other God but God, the 
 great, the wonderful, the just. Allah be 
 praised ! " 
 
54 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 She kissed her grandmother and me, and the 
 old lady kissed us both, and put us to bed. No 
 sooner was she out of the room than Djimlah 
 said : 
 
 " Baby mine, I believe the storm has upset 
 you. You have been so quiet all the afternoon 
 — and now you don't even pray." 
 
 " I am upset," I replied. *' But it isn't the 
 storm — ^it's you." 
 
 She sat up in bed. *' Now what have I done 
 to offend you, when you are under my roof ? " 
 
 ** It wasn't under your roof. It was when we 
 were in the open, during the storm." 
 
 " That part of the heavenly roof being over 
 grandfather's land is our roof," she corrected me. 
 
 " Well, I don't care what you call it, you have 
 offended me." 
 
 " But, darling," she cried, " how did I do it ? I 
 don't remember it." 
 
 " I can't quite explain it ; but, although I have 
 been very fond of you, I don't like you to say 
 that you and I are the children of God in the same 
 way, and " 
 
 She interrupted me — and it was a pity, too ; 
 for at the moment I was getting it quite clear 
 how she was not my equal before God, and after- 
 wards I could not quite get it again. 
 
 " But, yavroum, much loved by the stars and 
 the rivers, are we not Allah's children, you and 
 I?" 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 55 
 
 " No ! '' I cried bitterly, " I have nothing to 
 do with Allah. He is a cruel, beastly god, who 
 tells people to kill — and you know you have killed 
 thousands of us — and little babies, too ! " 
 
 To my surprise I found myself hating the Turks 
 with a hatred I never thought I could feel since I 
 had come to know them. And I was miserable 
 because I was in the same bed with Djimlah. 
 
 Her eyes glistened in the semi-darkness. Our 
 little bed faced the windows, where there were 
 no curtains, and the light undisturbed was pour- 
 ing in from the stars above, which we could see 
 twinkling at us. 
 
 " Funny ! funny ! funny ! '* she kept saying 
 to herself. " I thought you liked us — ^and oh ! 
 I do adore you so ! I felt as if truly you were 
 my own baby.'' 
 
 She had on a night-dress made of light brown 
 cambric, with yellow and red flowers on it. Her 
 hair was tied at the top of her head with a yellow 
 ribbon, from which was dangling a charm 
 against the evil eye. It came over me how unlike 
 a Greek child she was, and how very Turkish. 
 
 " Djimlah ! " I cried, " you are not, and you 
 shall not be my equal before God." 
 
 She crossed her hands on her breast and be- 
 came lost in meditation. After awhile she said : 
 
 ** There is no other God but God — and we are 
 all His children. So they told me and I believe 
 it, don't you ? " 
 
56 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 I shook my head. " There is Allah, and there 
 is God," I replied. *' And I am a Greek, and you 
 are a Turk — and the Turks are very cruel people." 
 
 *' Have we been cruel to you, all this long time 
 you have come to see us ? " 
 
 *' No," I had to admit, " but you are cruel just 
 the same. If you will read history you will know 
 how cruel you are ; for when you took Constanti- 
 nople, for days and nights you were killing our 
 people and burning our homes." I was ready to 
 weep over our past wrongs, and my blood was 
 boiling. " I don't love you any more — and God 
 doesn't love you either." 
 
 Djimlah's eyes opened wide open. " I don't 
 understand. Let's go to grandmother : she will 
 explain things to us." 
 
 " I don't want them explained. I shall go 
 home to-morrow, and never, never, so long as I 
 live, shall I again speak to you, or to any Turkish 
 child." 
 
 At this Djimlah began to cry : at first softly, 
 then yelling at the top of her lungs. This brought 
 not only the old hanoum but a bevy of the younger 
 ones. 
 
 It took some time to pacify Djimlah, who 
 managed to convey between her sobs that I, her 
 own baby, " her own flesh and blood," as she put 
 it, was no longer coming to see her, because she 
 was a Turkish child and because Constantinople 
 had been burned. 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 57 
 
 The old hanoum sent the younger women out 
 of the room, put Djimlah on the hard sofa by 
 the window and wrapped her in a shawl. Then 
 she came to me, tucked me in a blanket, and 
 carried me near to Djimlah. After that she 
 fetched two enormous Turkish delights with nuts 
 in them, and two glasses of water. 
 
 " Both of you, eat and drink." 
 
 When this operation was over, she said quietly : 
 " Now tell me all about it." 
 
 As well as I could I told her of what 
 Djimlah had said, and of my feelings on the 
 subject. 
 
 " I don't want to be equal with her before 
 God," I protested. " It isn't right ; for she is a 
 Turk, and I am a Greek." 
 
 " Well, my sweet yavroum, you are all mixed 
 up about just where you stand before God. At 
 present you stand nowhere, because you are only 
 babies. As you grow older your place will be 
 determined by your usefulness in the world, your 
 kindness and gentleness, by the way you treat 
 your husband's mother and his other wives, and 
 how healthy and well brought up his children 
 are. As to your being a Greek and Djimlah a 
 Turk, that is only geography," she explained 
 vaguely. " When we shall die and go to God, 
 we shall be that which we have made of 
 ourselves." 
 
 " She says that we are wicked and brutal, and 
 
58 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 burned Constantinople, and killed the people/' 
 Djimlah moaned. 
 
 *' That was because Allah willed it. Nothing 
 happens without the will of Allah, and his word 
 must be carried by the sword. We like you and 
 love 370U, and could no more harm you than we 
 could harm Djimlah." She leaned over and took 
 me on her lap. *' Now, yavroum, remember that 
 Allah is father to you all, and he loves you equally 
 well ; and all you have to do is to love each other 
 and be good and go to sleep, and that will please 
 him.'' 
 
 She kissed me, and drew Djimlah to us, and 
 made us kiss each other. 
 
 A latent sense of justice made me recognize 
 how good she was ; and although I did not re- 
 linquish my nationality as a bit of geography, I 
 recognized that there was something in what she 
 said. So I kissed the old hanoum, and kissed 
 Djimlah, and obediently was led away to bed. 
 Then she sat by us and sang us a little lullaby. 
 
 After she had left us Djimlah put her arms 
 around me and whispered : '' Do you love me 
 again ? For I love you just the same, and when 
 we grow up let us marry the same effendi, and 
 never be separated." 
 
 I did not go away the next day because Djimlah 
 would not listen to it. She was afraid lest I 
 should keep to my first intention, and never 
 return. She wanted to talk over everything 
 
IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH'S HAND 59 
 
 with me, which we did ; and with the help of the 
 old hanoum, her light and her kindness, I saw 
 things a little better. 
 
 Just as my idea of the ferocity of the Turks 
 in their homes had long ago vanished, so what 
 they believed and taught God to be appealed to 
 me ; and, although I retained my own idea of the 
 relative importance of the two races in this world, 
 I could not help feeling that perhaps the old 
 hanoum was right, and that our position before 
 God was less a matter of creed and belief than of 
 how we lived our lives. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 YILDERIM 
 
 AS I look back on those years of close 
 intimacy with Turkish children, and 
 our various discussions and squabbles, 
 I cannot but feel thankful for opportunities 
 denied most children. And I can see now 
 that a great deal of the hatred which sepa- 
 rates the different creeds and nationalities is 
 inculcated in our hearts before we are capable 
 of judging, by those who do their best to teach 
 us brotherly love. 
 
 During the first year of our friendship, Djimlah 
 and I played mostly alone. It is true that when- 
 ever other harems came to visit Djimlah's, and 
 brought along girls of our age, we had to accept 
 their presence — either with alacrity or reluctance, 
 depending on what we had afoot. There were 
 days when Djimlah and I were about to enact 
 some chapter of " The Arabian Nights," and then 
 we little cared to be disturbed by outsiders ; but 
 oriental politeness forced Djimlah to play the 
 hostess. 
 
 I rarely invited her to my house. First, be- 
 cause my mother positively objected to Turks ; 
 
YILDERIM 6i 
 
 and secondly because I had so little to offer her. 
 She would have to share my life, as I shared hers, 
 and my life meant lessons, duties, and discipline ; 
 so I preferred to go to her, and on Saturday nights 
 I usually slept there. 
 
 We were quite happy by ourselves, because we 
 made a very good team. Though we both liked 
 to be generals, we alternated the generalship. 
 One time Djimlah led, the next she obeyed orders. 
 Our generalship consisted in planning what sort 
 of characters we were to be ; and I am forced to 
 confess that on the days of Djimlah's generalship 
 things moved much the best. Indeed I had to 
 spend half my time as general in explaining to 
 her the Greek mythology, in order that she might 
 understand the characters we were to represent, 
 while on her days I knew " The Arabian Nights '' 
 as well as she. 
 
 Before the year was over, we admitted to our 
 circle a third, little Chakende, whose father was 
 a subaltern of Djimlah's grandfather. Chakende's 
 home was not far from ours, yet we met her first 
 by accident, and ever so far away from home. 
 
 It was on a hot August evening, when I was 
 spending the night with Djimlah. The heat was 
 so great that even at seven o'clock the rooms were 
 yet hot. The old hanoum said it was not neces- 
 sary for us to go to bed until it became cool, and 
 we were playing in the garden. We were up in a 
 tall tree ; for I had taught Djimlah to climb — a 
 
62 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 thing she took to much more naturally than 
 learning Greek mythology. The tree was very 
 tall, and its branches hung over the high garden 
 wall which protected the haremlik from the 
 world's eyes. 
 
 Presently a little urchin came and stood in the 
 street below. Like a bird about to sing, he threw 
 his head back, and in a clear, loud voice half 
 chanted : 
 
 " Bou axan kathri kav^shind^, ei karagiuzlar, 
 kim istersin bouyour sun/' which meant, " This 
 evening at the cafe of Kairi there is to be a good 
 show of Punch and Judy, and who wishes to come 
 is welcome." 
 
 Having delivered his announcement, he walked 
 a block farther on, and chanted it again. By the 
 time he was out of ear-shot we had the words letter 
 perfect, and began to chant it ourselves from the 
 top of our tree. We were so pleased with our 
 accomplishment that we scrambled down to earth 
 and proceeded to deliver it before each of the 
 groups of women lying on rugs in the immense 
 garden, waiting for the heat to lessen. 
 
 Then, with the privilege of our age, we pene- 
 trated into the selamlik, the men's quarters, and 
 proceeded to the dining-room, where the old 
 pasha, his sons, sons-in-law, and guests were 
 dining. We mounted on the sofa, and hand in 
 hand burst forth, imitating the street urchin as 
 best we were able. 
 
YILDERIM 63 
 
 The men laughed till the tears came into their 
 eyes ; then the old pasha bade us come to him, 
 and taking one of us on each knee, he asked : 
 
 *' So the young hanoums wish to go, do they ? ** 
 
 '' Go where ? '' we inquired. 
 
 *' To the show of Punch and Judy." 
 
 " Can we ? '' we cried simultaneously. 
 
 " I believe so,'' the grandfather replied. 
 
 " Go now — this minute ? '' 
 
 The old man nodded. 
 
 It was a case of speechless delight with us. 
 The old pasha turned to his company. '* I am 
 going to take the little hanoums to the show, and 
 who wishes to come is welcome." 
 
 We dashed back to the haremlik and made 
 ready in the greatest excitement. Our excite- 
 ment was shared by all the women. They came 
 in to see us made ready, and told us to be sure 
 to remember everything in the show to repeat to 
 them. 
 
 The show was given in a common garden cafe, 
 such as the small bureaucracy and proletariat of 
 Turkish masculinity frequents ; but the Turks are 
 essentially democratic, and our party did not 
 mind this in the least. 
 
 The limits of the cafe were indicated by canvas 
 hung on ropes to screen the show from the unpay- 
 ing eye. Within were seats at twopence apiece, 
 and seats at a penny. Djimlah and I were in- 
 stalled in special chairs at threepence, placed in 
 
64 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 front of the first row, which the men of our party 
 occupied — and then the show opened. 
 
 It took place behind a piece of white cheese 
 cloth, lighted by oil lamps, and a few wooden 
 puppets acted the play. A great deal of swearing, 
 beating, killing and dying took place in the most 
 picturesque Turkish. The audience laughed to 
 hysterics. As for Djimlah and me, we were 
 simply delirious with joy. Nor did our pleasure 
 end with that evening. We learned a lot of the 
 vernacular of the piece, and the next day acted 
 it for the delectation of the entire harem, who 
 made us repeat it several times, Djimlah being 
 half the characters, and I the other half. 
 
 When I tried to repeat my histrionic success 
 at home — ^being all the characters — I saw my 
 father give a glance at my mother, who, not 
 knowing a word of Turkish, sat unperturbed, 
 while our two men guests were doing their best 
 to suppress their laughter. As I wanted my 
 mother to enjoy it too, I began to explain the 
 whole thing to her, but, by one of those cabal- 
 istic signs which existed between my father and 
 myself, I understood that I had better not ex- 
 plain ; and after we were alone my father said 
 to me : 
 
 " You know mamma does not like Turkish 
 things, and you had better never explain them to 
 her. As a rule I would rather have you tell them 
 to me when we are all alone. ^And I shouldn't 
 
YILDERIM 65 
 
 like you to repeat this piece again ; for, although 
 it may be right for the actors to say all the things 
 they did, it is better for little girls not to repeat 
 them." 
 
 " But, father," I protested, frightfully dis- 
 appointed, " Djimlah and I acted it all before her 
 grandmother and the ladies of her household, 
 and they made us repeat it several times." 
 
 " That is because they are Turks. We are 
 Greeks, and that makes a very big difference." 
 
 It was at this Punch and Judy Show that we 
 met the little girl who was to become our constant 
 companion. During an intermission her father 
 came up to salute the old pasha, and brought little 
 Chakende with him. Immediately Djimlah's 
 grandfather ordered an extra chair for the little 
 girl, and told her to sit down beside us. She was 
 very sweet looking, about the age of Djimlah. 
 We liked her so much that we asked her where 
 she lived, and on hearing that it was not far from 
 us, we invited her to come the next day to 
 Djimlah's house. 
 
 This she did, and we liked her even better ; for 
 she submitted to us very gracefully. She never 
 wavered in this attitude, but it was far from 
 being a cowardly submission. 
 
 She was then engaged to be married to a boy 
 in Anatolia, whose father had been a lifelong 
 friend of her father's. The engagement had 
 taken place when Chakende was an hour old, and 
 
 £ 
 
66 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 the lad seven years old. By blood I considered 
 Chakende superior to Djimlah ; for Djimlah's 
 forefathers, for hundreds of years, had been 
 officials, while Chakende's had been warriors. 
 They had been followers of the great Tartar ruler 
 Timur-Lang, with whose people the Turks had 
 been in constant warfare for centuries — now one 
 side and then the other being victorious. It was 
 this Timur-Lang, who, early in the fifteenth 
 century, defeated the Turks, in the great battle 
 of Angora, and took Sultan Bayazet captive, 
 and kept him prisoner in a cage till he 
 died. 
 
 Chakende was very proud of this descent, and 
 although she was now half full of Turkish blood, 
 yet she clung to her Tartar ancestry, and when 
 she told me about the battles her eyes lighted 
 up and she was very pretty. 
 
 The lad to whom she was engaged, and whom 
 she had not yet seen, was also of the same clan, 
 and she already entertained for him much affec- 
 tion, and often spoke of him in such terms as, 
 " my noble Bey,*' " my proud betrothed.'* 
 
 The more we saw of her the better we liked her, 
 not only because she submitted to us, but because 
 she fitted so well into all the parts we gave her 
 to play, and we generally gave her such parts as 
 we did not ourselves like to do. Whenever there 
 was any J&ghting to do she was ordered to do it, 
 because she could give such a terrific yell — the 
 
YILDERIM 67 
 
 yell of the Timur-Lang Clan, she said — and be- 
 came so wild, and made the fighting seem so real 
 that we liked to watch her. And she was really 
 brave ; for she never minded worms — which made 
 Djimlah and me wriggle like one. 
 
 Chakende did not speak with dislike of the 
 Turks to me. She looked upon them entirely as 
 her people. *' We have become one race," she 
 said. " They are full of our blood, and we are 
 full of theirs. Besides, we are of the same faith.'' 
 
 I could see, in spite of Djimlah 's affection 
 for me, and the old hanoum's kindness and 
 tolerance, and of the politeness of all the Turks 
 toward us, that they held a Christian to be 
 inferior to a Mohammedan. They did not say 
 much about it, but I felt that they considered 
 themselves a superior race, by virtue of their 
 origin and religion. As I grew older, I no longer 
 entered into national or religious discussions. I 
 did not even mind their feeling superior, since I 
 knew that this feeling was all they had, and that 
 the real superiority lay with us, and if they did not 
 have this mistaken conceit they would be very 
 sorry for themselves. And, in spite of my kindly 
 feelings toward them, I was always aware that 
 deep down in my heart was planted the seed of 
 hatred toward them — a seed which was never to 
 wither and die, even if it were not to grow very 
 large. 
 
 I wonder if there will ever come a time when 
 
68 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 little children will be spared the planting of these 
 seeds, when they will be brought up in the teach- 
 ing that there is but one God and one nationality 
 — or that the God and the nationality of other 
 little children is as good as our own : that we are 
 all brothers and sisters, linked together by Nature 
 to carry out her work, and to give to each other 
 the best that is in us ? I wonder whether we 
 shall ever be trained so as not to care whether our 
 particular nation is big and powerful, but whether 
 every human being is receiving the chance to 
 develop the best in him, in order that he may 
 give that best to the rest of the world ? 
 
 The bond which existed between Djimlah and 
 Chakende often gave me food for thought. For 
 centuries their people fought each other. Then 
 they amalgamated and made one, loved each 
 other, and shared each other's destiny. My 
 people had fought their people, and they had 
 conquered us — yet there was no amalgamation. 
 My civilization stood on one side, and theirs on 
 the other, and in that dividing line stood Christ 
 and Mohammed, insurmountable barriers. I 
 loved Djimlah, I loved Chakende ; but, if any 
 question arose, I was fore-most a Greek, and 
 they were Turks. They were Turks having the 
 upper hand over us — a hand armed with a 
 scourge. And if they kept that hand behind 
 their back, and I could not see it, I knew that it 
 held the whip, and that at times they used it 
 
YILDERIM 69 
 
 both heavily and unjustly. And I felt that my 
 race must watch its opportunity to get hold of 
 that whip. 
 
 The arrival of Chakende, and later of Nashan 
 and Semmaya, brought into my friendship with 
 Djimlah a feeling which did not exist before. It 
 is true that, on the first day we met, Djimlah and 
 I almost fought over the bravery of our respective 
 nations, and her assumption of equality before 
 God had almost ended our friendship ; yet never 
 by word or sign did she do anything to rouse our 
 racial antagonism. But when the two of us grew 
 into a group, and of that group I remained the 
 only Greek, they sometimes forgot, and spoke 
 unguardedly. 
 
 One day, for example, when Djimlah's grand- 
 father had given each of us some money to spend, 
 we were waiting for the afternoon vendor to pass 
 in order to buy candy. We waited for a long time 
 — ^unendurably long, we thought — before the still- 
 ness of the afternoon vibrated with the words : 
 
 " Sekefy sekerji ! " 
 
 We rushed to the door, pennies in hand, and 
 stamped impatiently for the white-clad figure to 
 come near. Then Chakende exclaimed peevishly : 
 
 " Oh, it isn't Ali. It's the Christian dog. Let's 
 not buy of him — let's wait for Ali." 
 
 In an instant I was transformed. I was wholly 
 
 ^ the child of my uncle, wearing the Turkish yoke. 
 
 I got hold of Chakende's two long braids, and 
 
70 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 pulled and kicked — for when it came to real, not 
 make-believe, fighting I was more than her equal. 
 
 Djimlah's courtesy and tact alone saved 
 the situation. She immediately called to the 
 Christian sekerji, and told us she was going to 
 treat us with all her pennies. Moreover, she ad- 
 dressed herself most politely to the vendor, ap- 
 proved of his wares, and even praised his com- 
 plexion to him. 
 
 Occurrences similar to this arose from time to 
 time. If not often, still they did arise, and they 
 served as water and air and sunshine to the little 
 seed planted years before. I used to become so 
 angry, and to strike them so hard and so quickly 
 that they nicknamed ' me *' yilderim/* which 
 means thunder-storm. 
 
 Djimlah had a little boy cousin, Mechmet, who 
 lived a short distance from her, and who some- 
 times came to play with her. He was nice and 
 generous, and gave us imgrudgingly of whatever 
 he had. He was particularly nice to me, and I 
 liked him because he had large blue eyes and 
 light golden hair. 
 
 One day when we were playing together he 
 said to me : "I like you ever so much, and when 
 we grow up we can be married." 
 
 I shook my head : '* That can't be, bcause you 
 are a Turk and I am a Greek." 
 
 " That doesn't matter. I shall make you my 
 wife just the same," he answered confidently. 
 
YILDERIM 71 
 
 From a remote past there arose memories in 
 me, memories perhaps acquired through reading, 
 or lived in former existences ; and pictures came 
 before me of Greek parents weeping because a 
 little girl was born to them — a little girl who, if 
 she grew up to be pretty, would be mercilessly 
 snatched from them and taken to a Turkish 
 selamlik. And as picture succeeded picture, I 
 became again entirely the child of my uncle, with 
 a hatred for the Turks as ungovernable as it 
 seemed holy. 
 
 Wild now, like a fierce little brute, I struck 
 Mechmet, and struck and struck again ; and at 
 the sight of the blood flowing from his nose an 
 exaltation possessed me. I was a girl, I could 
 not carry arms — ^but with my own hands I could 
 kill a Turkish boy, and be able to say to my uncle 
 when we met again in the other world : '* Uncle, 
 girl though I am, I have killed a Turk ! " 
 
 Djimlah, after vainly imploring us to stop 
 fighting, ran to the cistern and drew a bucket of 
 cold water. In our battle we had fallen down, 
 and Djimlah drenched us with water, and the 
 icy shower stopped our battle. 
 
 In our room she was very severe with me. 
 " Baby mine, I believe sometimes you are mad ! 
 Why, you ought only to be glad if a boy says he 
 will marry you. What are girls for, but to be 
 given to men and to bear them children ? " 
 
 " Did I kill him ? " I asked anxiously. 
 
72 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 She thought I was frightened, and came over 
 and smoothed my hair. '* Of course you didn't 
 kill him ; but he is much the worse for the beat- 
 ing you gave him." 
 
 Then I wept bitterly in utter contempt for my- 
 self at having failed in such a small task as killing 
 just a little Turkish boy. Years afterwards, when 
 I accidentally found myself in the midst of the 
 Armenian massacres, I could appreciate pro- 
 bably better than most spectators the feeling of 
 racial antipathy which gloried in the shedding of 
 blood. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN 
 
 THE little girl who made the fourth of 
 our group was Nashan, whom I met 
 under peculiar circumstances. 
 
 My father was in the habit of taking me with 
 him whenever he went for a long walk. Gener- 
 ally other men went with us, and their con- 
 versation consisted of politics, a subject which 
 delighted me especially, though I could but half 
 understand it. 
 
 On one such day, we were walking on the St 
 Nicholas Road, which was long and wide, with 
 the hills on one side, scattered cypress trees and 
 the sea on the other. The sun was setting, the 
 heat of the day was calming ; and the Sea of 
 Marmora, roused by the breeze, was rythmically 
 lapping the shore, and adding freshness to the 
 hour. 
 
 My father as usual was discussing politics with 
 another Greek, and I, my hoop over my shoulder, 
 was holding fast to one of his long fingers, while 
 my little feet heroically tried to keep step with 
 the big feet beside them. 
 
 At a turn in the road we came upon a group 
 
 73 
 
74 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 of Turks, preceded by a little girl, seated astride 
 a richly caparisoned donkey whose head was 
 covered with blue beads. She herself fairly out- 
 shone the donkey in gorgeousness. I knew her 
 by sight, as children know each other, and she 
 always aroused the liveliest interest in me on 
 account of her costumes. I never wore any 
 thing myself except simple white linen, with 
 an English sailor hat, my sole gold adornment 
 the name of her majesty's dreadnought on its 
 ribbon. 
 
 The first time I encountered her, I had almost 
 yelled at her, thinking she was dressed up for 
 fun, but the calm dignity with which she had 
 worn her ridiculous attire had convinced me that 
 these were indeed her usual clothes. 
 
 To-day she had on a red velvet gown, trimmed 
 with gold lace, and made in the latest Parisian 
 fashion for grown-up women. Her silk-mittened 
 hands, bejewelled with rings and bracelets, held 
 a crop with a golden head, from which floated 
 yards and yards of pale blue ribbon. On her 
 head perched a pink silk hat, adorned with large 
 white ostrich plumes. 
 
 Quite in contrast to all this, a lock of hair hung 
 down the middle of her forehead, to which were 
 tied pieces of garlick and various other charms 
 to ward off the evil eye. 
 
 The men of her group saluted the men of mine. 
 The little girl eyed me, and I frankly stared at 
 
I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN 75 
 
 her. When the men's temenas were ended, she 
 piped up : 
 
 '* Father, this is the little girl I was telling you 
 of — ^the one that always dresses in sheeting." 
 
 To think of a person dressed as she was criti- 
 cizing my clothes. I rose on the points of my 
 little white shoes, and extended an accusing 
 finger at her : 
 
 " And you are dressed like a saltimbanque ! " I 
 said. A circus-rider was the only person with 
 whom I felt I could properly compare her. 
 
 " Oh ! it is not true," the little giri wailed. " I 
 am dressed like a great lady." 
 
 The pasha, her father, smiled at my father. 
 ** Zarar yok Effedim ! They will some day be 
 women." 
 
 My father saluted, and apologized for me, and 
 we went on our way, A few minutes later, al- 
 though I knew it had not been his intention, we 
 mounted the stone steps which led to a rustic, 
 open-air cafe. 
 
 He chose a table apart from the others, and 
 gave an order to the waiter. He said no word 
 either to his companion or to me, but I knew that 
 he was worried. After the waiter had filled his 
 order and gone, he spoke : 
 
 " My daughter, you have just insulted that 
 child." 
 
 " But, father," I protested, " she insulted me 
 first." 
 
76 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " She did not. Are you not dressed in the 
 material of which sheets are made ? " 
 
 " And is she not dressed like a saltimbanque ? " 
 I argued. 
 
 '* That is an insult ; for she thinks she is cor- 
 rectly dressed. Moreover, my child, we are the 
 conquered race, and they are the masters here. 
 So long as we are the conquered race we must 
 accept insults, but we are not in a position to 
 return them. When you become a woman, 
 teach this bitter truth to your sons, and may 
 be some day we shall no longer need to accept 
 insults." 
 
 This was the first time my father had referred 
 to my sons and what I ought to teach them, since 
 the day he had asked me not to think about them 
 but to get well and strong. He remained silent 
 for some time after this, and so did his companion. 
 When we had finished our refreshments my father 
 rose. 
 
 " We had better go home now. I fear that 
 something may come of this." 
 
 " I fear so, too," the other man said. 
 
 The first thing my father asked, at home, was 
 whether a message had come from Saad Pasha. 
 
 None had. 
 
 He sent me to my room without my customary 
 kiss, and a vague terror brooded over me during 
 the whole restless night. 
 
 The next morning when I went to my father's 
 
I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN jj 
 
 study and wished him good morning, he only 
 nodded to me, and kept on reading his paper. I 
 retreated to the window, where I occupied my- 
 self with breathing on the panes and tracing 
 figures on them with the point of my forefinger. 
 It was only a pretence of occupation, and I was 
 alert for every movement of my father's, hoping 
 he would relent and make friends again. 
 
 Presently the door of our garden opened, and 
 admitted a Turkish slave, followed by another, 
 carrying a much beribboned and beflowered 
 basket on his head. I greatly wished to impart 
 this news to my father ; but glancing at him I 
 decided that if I wished to remain in the room I 
 had better stay quiet. 
 
 But what could be in the basket ? I might 
 have gone to inquire, except that I feared if I 
 left the study its doors might close behind me. 
 Besides, if the basket were for my father it would 
 be presently brought in ; perhaps I should be 
 permitted to open it, and — From experience 
 I knew that such baskets often contained the 
 sweetest of sweets. So I waited quietly. 
 
 The door opened. Instead of a basket, my 
 mother entered, a perplexed frown on her fore- 
 head, a letter in her hand. 
 
 " What is it ? " my father asked, rising. 
 
 " Here is a letter which came with a basket 
 from Saad Pasha. I cannot read it. It is in 
 Turkish." 
 
78 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 My father took the letter and read it, and as 
 he did so an expression of relief came into his 
 face. 
 
 '* His wife invites you to go to her at once." 
 
 " What ! " my mother cried, " I go to her ? 
 / / And pray why ? " 
 
 My father pointed to me. " This is the why," 
 and in a few words he related the incident of the 
 previous evening. 
 
 " I will not go ! " My mother stamped her 
 foot. *' I have never crossed a Turk's threshold, 
 and I hope to die without doing so." 
 
 My father walked up and down the room twice. 
 At length he said slowly : 
 
 " There is the choice of crossing this Turkish 
 threshold — because you are bidden to — or all of 
 us may have to cross the frontier, leaving home 
 and comfort behind us. Saad Pasha is a power- 
 ful man — at the present moment the favourite 
 in the palace — and our child has insulted his. 
 
 Both my parents remained silent for a minute, 
 and my childish heart burned with hatred for 
 these Turks, who were our masters. It seemed 
 as if I could never live a month without having 
 to hate them anew. 
 
 '' I cannot speak their dreadful language," my 
 mother protested, half yielding. 
 
 " Take this child with you," my father said, 
 pointing again at me. It was dreadful to be called 
 " this child." 
 
I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN 79 
 
 Half an hour later I was driving by my mother's 
 side to the koniak of the powerful pasha. 
 
 My mother had said the truth. She had never 
 crossed the threshold of a haremlik ; and to her 
 all Turks, be they men, women or children, were 
 pestiferous beings. She hated them as loyally 
 and as fervently as she worshipped her Christian 
 God, and adored her own flag. She was a Greek 
 of the old blood, who could believe nothing 
 good of those who, four hundred years before, 
 had conquered her people, and beheaded her 
 patriarch. 
 
 And now, because of her daughter's mis- 
 behaviour, she was forced to obey the summons 
 of a Turkish woman. It was cruel and humiliat- 
 ing, and, child though I was, I felt this. 
 
 The large doors of the koniak were thrown open, 
 as soon as our carriage stopped before them. The 
 immense hall within was filled with women, in 
 many coloured garments and beflowered head- 
 dresses. And, as they salaamed to the floor, they 
 looked like huge flowers bending before the wind. 
 A number of times they rose and fell, rhythmic- 
 ally. Then a lovely lady, in the old Anatolian 
 costume, advanced and greeted us. 
 
 There is no language in the world which lends 
 itself so prettily to yards and yards of welcoming 
 words as Turkish. I translated the phrases, full 
 of perfume and flowers, which formed such a 
 harmony with the ladies and the home we were 
 
8o A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 in, until even my mother was touched by the 
 pomp with which we were received ; and the 
 words full of exotic charm and courtesy did much 
 to assuage her bitterness. 
 
 I could see that she was even beginning to 
 take an interest in this life so entirely new to her. 
 When the Turkish lady went on to say that she 
 was a stranger in this land ; that she had come 
 from far-away Anatolia because her Lord-Master 
 and Giver of Life was now near the Shadow of 
 Allah on Earth, and that she wished guidance, 
 my mother relented considerably. She had ex- 
 pected to be treated de haut en has : instead she 
 was received not only as an equal, but as one 
 possessing superior knowledge. 
 
 With the same pomp and ceremony we were 
 escorted upstairs, where we were served with 
 sweetmeats and coffee ; and again sweetmeats 
 and sorbets. Then water was poured from brass 
 pitchers into brass bowls ; we rinsed our hands 
 and wiped them on embroidered napkins. 
 
 The sweet-faced lady spoke again, and I 
 translated. 
 
 She wished to know whether her little Nashan 
 was dressed like a great lady, or like — whatever 
 the word was. 
 
 '* My mother has never seen Nashan," I 
 volunteered. 
 
 Thereupon Nashan was brought in, clad in a 
 pale green satin gown, low-necked and short- 
 
I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN 8i 
 
 sleeved, in perfect fashion for a European lady 
 going to a ball. 
 
 My mother surveyed her doubtfully. 
 
 " Is she dressed like a great lady ? ** the 
 hanoum asked. 
 
 My mother pronounced her dressed like a lady. 
 
 The hanoum scrutinized my mother's coun- 
 tenance. 
 
 " Ask your mother why she does not dress you 
 the same way ? '* she said. 
 
 The reply was that I was too little for such a 
 gown. 
 
 " How old are you ? " the hanoum inquired. 
 
 " I am nine " — and I should have added some 
 remarks of my own about Nashan's dress, had 
 not the memory of the results of recent observa- 
 tions of mine been still too fresh. 
 
 " My little Nashan is eleven. Ask your mother 
 whether she will dress yon like my Nashan the 
 year after next.'' 
 
 " No," was the reply. 
 
 " Why not ? Is it because you have not so 
 much money as we have, and because your father 
 is not so powerful as my lord ? " 
 
 That was not the reason. 
 
 Again the hanoum scrutinized my mother, 
 from her hat to her boots, and back again. 
 
 " Why is your mother dressed so sombrely ? 
 Is she a sad woman, or is her master a stingy 
 man ? " 
 
82 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 In very polite words my mother conveyed to 
 her that European women did not wear gaudy 
 clothes in the streets. And little by little, with 
 the help of a child's interpretation, the woman 
 from the remote district of Anatolia compre- 
 hended that her child was not dressed as a well- 
 bred European child would be. 
 
 Tears of mortification came into her eyes. 
 
 " To think," she wailed, '' that I, who love my 
 only baby so dearly and who have made for her 
 a gown for every day of the month, should only 
 have contrived to make her ridiculous ! " 
 
 " Oh, mother ! " cried Nashan, '* am I then 
 dressed like a saltimbanque, and not like a great 
 lady ? " 
 
 The mother folded her little one in her arms, 
 kissed away her tears, and tried to comfort her. 
 
 " My little Rose Petal, thy mother has made a 
 mistake. She begs thee. Seed of Glorious Roses, 
 to forgive her. Say so, my little one ; say that 
 thou forgivest thy ignorant mother." 
 
 " I love my mother ! " the child sobbed. " I 
 love my mother ! " 
 
 " Then dry thy tears, my little Petal ; for the 
 lady here will help us." 
 
 With a humility perhaps only to be found 
 among Turkish women, a humility which yet was 
 self-respecting and proud, the wife of the power- 
 ful pasha placed herself entirely under the guid- 
 ance of the wife of a Greek. 
 
I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN 83 
 
 This was the beginning of my friendship with 
 Nashan. Thenceforth she dressed in " sheeting," 
 and was educated in a scrupulously European 
 manner. Masters were engaged to teach her 
 French and music. The hanoum accepted every 
 bit of advice my mother gave her, save one : 
 she would not consent to a resident foreign 
 governess. 
 
 *' No," she said, in her humble yet determined 
 way, " I will not give up my child entirely to a 
 foreign woman. Her character belongs to me, 
 and by me alone it shall be moulded." 
 
 Naturally I saw a great deal of Nashan, and we 
 came to love each other dearly. She had brought 
 from Anatolia, along with her adorable little 
 face, something of the character of her untamed 
 mountains. As we grew from year to year, we 
 used, child-like, to talk of many things we little 
 understood ; and once she said to me : "I am 
 sure of the existence of Allah ; for at times he 
 manifests himself to me so quickly that I believe 
 he lives within me." 
 
 At such moments as these I believe the real 
 Nashan was uppermost. Usually, I am sorry to 
 say, she more and more lost her native simplicity, 
 with her acquirement of European culture, and 
 more openly despised the customs of her own 
 country. 
 
 Her early velvet and satin gowns were given us 
 to play with ; and many a rainy day we spent in 
 
84 A CHILD OF IHE ORIENT 
 
 adorning ourselves with her former gorgeousness. 
 Then Nashan would stand before me and humor- 
 ously demand : 
 
 " Am I a great lady, or am I a saliini' 
 banque ? *' 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 THE GARDEN GODDESS 
 
 IT was natural that I should bring Nashan 
 to Djimlah, and that she should become the 
 fourth of our group. Mechmet and his 
 brother Shaadi also often came to spend the day 
 at Djimlah's, and joined in our games. 
 
 Djimlah's grandmother was desirous that we 
 four girls should have some of our lessons together, 
 and my mother, from the distance, could only 
 acquiesce in this. Thus I saw them daily ; and 
 the more frequent contact brought forth more 
 frequent causes for warfare between us. When 
 they were all together, the fact of their being 
 Turks became more emphasized, and within 
 me there burned the desire to dazzle them with 
 what the Greeks really had been in the world. 
 
 The way to do this came to me one night when 
 sleep deserted me, and in its stead Inspiration 
 sat by my pillow. Since they knew absolutely 
 nothing of Greek History, I would tell it to them 
 as a story. Feverishly I sketched it all out in 
 my head. I would begin at the very beginning, 
 showing them how Prometheus stole the divine 
 fire to create the Greeks. The Turks should 
 
 85 
 
86 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 come into the tale under the name of Pelasgians — 
 yes, I would call them Pelasgians, while the Greeks 
 should be called Prometheans. I could tell a 
 story very well, at the time, and I hugged my 
 pillow fervently at the thought of my three com- 
 panions breathlessly listening to the recital of the 
 great deeds of the Greeks — and loathing the 
 Turks for all their misdoings. And when I had 
 them properly moved, I should explain to them 
 that this was not a story, but real history : that 
 the Prometheans were the Greeks, and the Pelas- 
 gians were the Turks. And I should conclude : 
 " You may call yourselves the proud Osmanlis, 
 and you may think that you are the chosen people 
 of Allah, but this is what history thinks of you — 
 that's what you are to the world." 
 
 I was so excited to begin my work that I slept 
 no more that night. Yet on the very next day 
 I learned that my most inconsiderate parents 
 had decided to go for a few months to the Bos- 
 phorus. It always struck me as the worst side 
 of grown-ups that they never considered the 
 plans of the little ones. They will teach you, " It 
 is not polite to interrupt papa or mamma with 
 your affairs when they are busy " — while papa or 
 mamma are only talking silly, uninteresting stuff 
 which might very well be interrupted. Yet how 
 often, when I was intently watching a cloud 
 teaching me his art of transforming himself from a 
 chariot to an immense forest or from a tiger to a 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 87 
 
 bevy of birds, mamma would interrupt without 
 even apologizing ; and were I to say to her, " Just 
 wait a minute," as mamma thousands of times 
 said to me, I should be called a rude little girl. 
 
 Thus it happened that, when my life's work was 
 unfolded before my eyes by an inspiration, I was 
 snatched away to that outlandish place, the 
 Bosphorus. 
 
 And there, about a quarter of a mile from the 
 house we took, with nothing between us but 
 fields and gardens, lived a Turkish general and his 
 family. I do not recall his name, for every one 
 spoke of him as the Damlaly Pasha, which means 
 '* the pasha who has had a stroke." 
 
 His was a modest house, surrounded by a 
 garden, the wall of which had tumbled down in 
 one place, offering a possible means of ingress to 
 a small child of my activity. Some day I meant 
 to avoid the vigilance of the elders and to pene- 
 trate into the heart of that unknown garden ; for 
 the opening was for ever beckoning to me. But, 
 though I had not yet been able to do so, I had 
 already managed to peep into it ; and had seen a 
 young woman who seemed to me the embodiment 
 of a fairy queen picking flowers there. 
 
 Every Friday morning the general went over 
 to Constantinople, to ride in the Sultan's proces- 
 sion, as I afterwards learned. He wore his best 
 uniform, and his breast was covered with medals. 
 A eunuch and a little girl always accompanied 
 
88 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 him to the landing, and their way led past our 
 house. 
 
 Being lonely at the time, I took a great interest 
 in the happenings on our road, and I learned to 
 wait every Friday morning for the queer trio : 
 the gorgeously uniformed and bemedalled old 
 general, painfully trailing his left foot ; the old, 
 bent eunuch, in a frock coat as old and worn- 
 out as himself, and the fresh little girl, with all 
 her skirts stuffed into a tight-fitting pair of 
 trousers. 
 
 I thought her quite pretty, in spite of the 
 ridiculous trousers. Her hair was light, as is the 
 colour of ripe wheat, and her eyes were as blue 
 as if God had made them from a bit of his blue 
 sky. I nicknamed her Sitanthy, and used to 
 make up stories about her, and was always 
 wondering what her relationship was to the old 
 general. Once I heard her call him father, but 
 I felt sure he could not be that. To my way of 
 thinking a father was a tall, slim, good-looking 
 person. The other species of men were either 
 uncles, or grandfathers, or, worse yet, bore no 
 relationship to little girls, but were just so many 
 stray men. 
 
 I never contemplated talking to the little girl — 
 she was to me almost a fictitious character, like 
 one of the people I knew and consorted with in 
 our Greek Mythology — ^until fate brought us 
 together. , 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 89 
 
 One wonderful, mysterious, summer evening 
 thousands of fireflies were peopling the atmos- 
 phere. I had never seen so many before, and 
 wanted to stay up and play with them. But the 
 tyranny of the elders decreed that I should be 
 put to bed at the customary hour, as if it had 
 been any ordinary night. 
 
 I believe few of the elders retain the powers of 
 childhood — which see far beyond the confines of 
 the seen world — else why should they have in- 
 sisted on my leaving this romantic world out- 
 side, which was beckoning me to join its revels ? 
 
 However, they did put me to bed, and as usual 
 told me to shut my eyes tight and go to sleep. 
 But shutting one's eyes does not make one go 
 to sleep. On the contrary one sees many more 
 things than before. The beauty of the night had 
 intoxicated me. I was a part of nature, and she 
 was claiming me for her own. There was a pond 
 in our garden where frogs lived. They, too, 
 must have felt the power of to-night's beauty ; 
 for they were far more loquacious than usual. I 
 listened to them for a long time — and presently 
 I understood that they were talking to me. 
 
 " Get up, little girl ! " they were saying. " Get 
 up, little girl ! " 
 
 For hours and hours they kept this up, now 
 softly and insinuatingly, then swelling into loud 
 command. 
 
 They ended by persuading me. I crept from 
 
90 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 my bed, put on my slippers, threw over my nighty 
 the pink little wrap with its silk-lined hood, and 
 went out on the balcony outside of my window. 
 From there I slid down one of the columns, 
 and, before I knew it, was on the ground. 
 
 Supreme moment of happiness ! I was free — 
 free to revel in the wonders of the night, free 
 from vigilance and from orders. Clasping my 
 wrap closely around me, I first went to the 
 pond, and told the frogs that I was up. 
 
 '* That's right, little girl ! ** they answered me. 
 " That's right, little girl ! " But that was all 
 they had to say to me, so I left them and gave 
 myself up to the deliciousness of being out of 
 bed at an hour when all well-regulated children 
 should be in bed — according to the laws of the 
 elders. 
 
 The fireflies laughed and danced with me, 
 twinkling in and out of the darkness. They 
 seemed like thousands of little stars, who, tired 
 of contemplating the world from heights above, 
 like me had escaped vigilance, and, deserting the 
 firmament, had slid down to the earth to play. 
 
 What a lot they had to say to me, these cheer- 
 ful little sparks. On and on we wandered to- 
 gether. They always surrounded me — almost 
 lifting me from the ground ; and occasionally I 
 succeeded in catching one and sticking it on 
 my forehead, till I had quite a cluster, so 
 close together that I must have looked like 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 91 
 
 a Cyclops, with one fiery eye in the middle of my 
 forehead. 
 
 We came into the fields where the daisies and 
 poppies were sleeping together, and passing 
 through still another field, we arrived at the 
 place where the Damlaly Pasha lived. Then 
 I knew that the opening in the wall and 
 the goddess had invited me to call on them that 
 night. 
 
 Climbing over the opening was not an easy 
 task, for my bedroom slippers were soft, and 
 the stones of the tumble-down wall were hard 
 and sharp; but I accomplished it. As for the 
 fireflies, they had no difficulty : they flew over 
 the wall as if it were not there at all. 
 
 Inside, the sense of real exploration came over 
 me. The garden was old-fashioned, where the 
 flowers grew in disorder, as they generally do 
 in Turkish gardens. How delicious was the 
 perfume of the flowers. I felt sure that, like me 
 and the fireflies and the frogs and the nightin- 
 gales, the flowers here were awake — and not like 
 the daisies and poppies, who are sleepy-heads. 
 But in vain did I look for my goddess. She was 
 not there. 
 
 Presently another little form came moving 
 along through the bushes. We met in the shrub- 
 bery. I pushed aside the branches, put my face 
 through, and in Turkish I said : 
 " Hullo, Sitanthy 1 " 
 
92 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Hullo ! " she answered, " What did you 
 call me ? " 
 
 " Sitanthy," I replied. " That's your name. 
 I gave it to you. It is the blue flower in the 
 wheat — because you look like one of them." 
 
 " That's pretty," Sitanthy commented. " And 
 what is your name ? " 
 
 I told her. 
 
 " I know who you are," she went on. " You 
 are the solitary child, who lives on the road to 
 the landing, and who never plays " 
 
 " I do play ! " I cried. 
 
 " How can you ? You are always sitting 
 still." 
 
 " I play most when I am most still." 
 
 " Yours must be a funny game," she observed 
 " for when / sit still I go to sleep." 
 
 Across the bushes we leaned and kissed each 
 other. With her fingers Sitanthy took hold of 
 my cheeks and told me that she loved me. 
 
 " I have loved you ever since we came to live 
 here," I said, " because you are so pretty." 
 
 '* Are you pretty ? " she inquired politely. 
 " You have the largest eyes of anyone in the 
 world." 
 
 '* They are not really so large," I corrected her. 
 " They only look so, because my face is little. 
 I know it for a fact, because one day I measured 
 with a thread those of my father, and they were 
 every bit as large as mine." 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 93 
 
 We linked arms and walked about the garden. 
 She still wore her ridiculous trousers. 
 
 " Didn't they put you to bed ? " I asked. 
 
 " No. I didn't want to go — and I don't go 
 unless I want to." 
 
 I stared at her in amazement. " And do the 
 elders let you ? " 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " They put me to bed every night — at the same 
 hour," I confided, with great pity for myself. 
 
 She put her arm around me and kissed me, and 
 though she said nothing I knew that she felt the 
 tragedy of this. 
 
 We plucked dew-soaked flowers together, talk- 
 ing all the time of those things which belong to 
 childhood alone ; for children are nearer to the 
 world from which they have come, and when 
 they meet, they naturally talk of the things they 
 remember, which the elders have forgotten — and 
 because they have forgotten, call unreal. 
 
 We caught some fireflies for her forehead, too, 
 and thus we were two cyclopses instead of one. 
 I had to tell Sitanthy about them, for she being 
 a Turkish child knew nothing of them. Then 
 I inquired about the goddess of the garden ; but 
 Sitanthy only said that there was no young 
 woman in their house except their halatc. ' 
 
 When I was ready to go, she let me out of the 
 gate, and I started back to my home. I was a 
 little cold. A heavy dew was falling, and my 
 
94 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 nighty was wet, and so was the flimsy pink 
 wrapper. As for my sHppers, they became so 
 soaked through that I discarded them in one of 
 the fields. 
 
 I meant to return to my bed as quietly as I had 
 come out, but on reaching our garden I knew 
 that my escape had been discovered. A light 
 was burning in my bedroom, and other lights 
 were moving to and fro in the house, and there 
 were lanterns in the garden. 
 
 I walked up to the nearest lantern. Happily 
 it was in the hands of my father. 
 
 To scare him I imitated the croak of a frog. 
 
 " Oh, baby ! " he cried. " Oh, baby, where 
 have you been ? " 
 
 I confided my whole adventure to him, because 
 of all the elders I have known — except my 
 brother, who was one of the immortals of Olympus 
 — my father seemed, if not to remember, at least 
 to understand. 
 
 That night I was not scolded. The wet clothes 
 were replaced by warm ones, and I was only 
 made to drink a disagreeable tisane. And 
 since, in spite of the tisane, I did catch cold 
 and for two days was feverish, I escaped even a 
 remonstrance. 
 
 Yet my escapade had one lasting good result. 
 It led to my friendship with Sitanthy — and finally 
 to the goddess of the garden. 
 
 On the following Friday, although I was still 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 95 
 
 not quite well, I begged to be permitted to sit 
 by the window. 
 
 The trio for whom I was waiting came, but 
 sooner than their customary hour. From afar 
 Sitanthy waved her little hand to me. Then 
 instead of passing by, as usual, all three came up 
 to our house, and the old general ceremoniously 
 delivered a letter addressed to my father, who 
 at once came out, and accompanied them to the 
 gate. 
 
 When my father returned, he said that on her 
 way back the little girl was to stay and play 
 with me. 
 
 On this first visit, Sitanthy told me her history. 
 She was the only child of the only son of the old 
 general and his hanoum. Her father was killed 
 in one of those wars, unrecorded by history, which 
 the sultan wages against his unruly subjects in 
 remote, unmapped comers of Asia. But, if these 
 wars are not recorded by history, their record is 
 written with indelible ink in the hearts of the 
 Turkish women ; for every one means the loss 
 of brothers, fathers, husbands, and sons, whose 
 deaths are reported, if at all, long after they have 
 been laid away in unknown graves. 
 
 Sitanthy's mother died from a broken heart, 
 and thus my little friend was all that remained 
 to the old couple. 
 
 " I wear those trousers," she explained, " to 
 afford pleasure to my grandparents. '' You see 
 
96 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Fm only a girl, and it must break their hearts to 
 have a boyless home, so I saved all my pennies 
 and bought these trousers to give the household 
 an air of possessing a boy." 
 
 I hugged her, and never again thought of her 
 trousers as ridiculous. 
 
 In the simple way Turkish children have, she 
 also told me the affairs of her home. The house- 
 hold consisted of her grandfather, her grand- 
 mother, the old eunuch, a cook older than the 
 eunuch, and a young slave — the halaic. 
 
 A halazc is a slave who is plain, and conse- 
 quently cannot be given in marriage to a rich 
 husband ; nor is she clever enough to become a 
 teacher ; nor does she possess that grace and 
 suppleness which might make of her a dancing 
 girl. Having thus neither mental nor physical 
 attributes, she becomes a menial. 
 
 She does all the coarsest work ; and after seven 
 years of servitude, if she belongs to a generous 
 master, she is either freed, with a minimum 
 dowry of two hundred and fifty dollars, or is 
 given in marriage, with a larger dowry, to one 
 of the men servants in the retinue of the house- 
 hold. 
 
 It is said that sometimes, if her master be 
 either poor or cruel, he sells her before her 
 time expires, and thus she passes from house to 
 house — a beast of burden, because Allah has 
 given her neither cleverness, nor bodily beauty 
 
 " 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 97 
 
 nor grace ; and men cheat her of her freedom 
 and youth. 
 
 Thus, knowing exactly what a halatc was, I 
 laughed at Sitanthy when, in answer to my 
 question about the goddess of her garden, she 
 replied : "It must be our halatc — she is the only 
 young woman in our household.'' 
 
 After I was entirely well again, I was permitted 
 to go with Sitanthy to play in her garden. I 
 went with great expectations ; for I hoped that 
 by daylight and with all the afternoon before 
 me I could find out something about my goddess. 
 
 On entering the garden, the first person I 
 encountered was she — and what I saw stabbed 
 my heart. My goddess was harnessed to the old- 
 fashioned wooden water-wheel at the well, and 
 with eyes shut was walking round and round it, 
 drawing up water. 
 
 We had a similar arrangement in our own 
 garden, but it was a blindfolded donkey who did 
 the work — ^not a goddess. 
 
 She was dressed in a loose, many-coloured bright 
 garment, held in at the waist by a wide brass 
 belt. A yellow veil was thrown over her head ; 
 her bare arms were crossed on her breast, and 
 bathed in the light of that summer day, with 
 eyes closed, she was doing this dreadful work, 
 without apparent shame, without mortification. 
 
 On the contrary, she seemed unaware of the 
 degradation of her work. She could not have 
 
98 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 looked more majestic or more beautiful had she 
 been a queen in the act of receiving a foreign 
 ambassador. But I, who loved her and called 
 her my goddess, felt the shame and tears of rage 
 sprang to my eyes. 
 
 Saturated as I was with Greek mythology, there 
 came to my mind the thought of Danae, daughter 
 of Acrisius, King of Argos, and mother of Perseus. 
 Because she refused to listen to the love-words 
 of the king who received her, after her father 
 exiled her, she was condemned to similar work. 
 
 A great excitement seized me. I thought that 
 the story I had read did not belong to the past — 
 that it was being enacted in that very place, at 
 that very hour, and before my own eyes. Nay, 
 more ! / was a Greek runner, ordered by the 
 gods of Olympus to announce to her the return 
 of her son. 
 
 Possessed by the conviction, I rushed up to 
 her, and stopped her in her work. 
 
 '* Hail to thee, Danae ! " I cried. " Perseus, 
 your son, is coming, bringing the head of Medusa, 
 and with it he will turn into stone those who are 
 ill-treating you." 
 
 She opened her eyes and gazed at me with a 
 puzzled expression. 
 
 I repeated my words, my enthusiasm a trifle 
 damped by her reception of them. 
 
 When I had explained everything to her, and 
 had given her every detail of Danae's life and her 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 99 
 
 son's achievements a smile broke over her face. 
 Of all our visible signs, the soul comes nearest to 
 speaking in the smile. When the hala'tc smiled 
 it was as if God were peeping through the clouds. 
 
 " You adorable baby ! You adorable Greek 
 baby ! *' she laughed. 
 
 She unharnessed herself, and took me in her 
 arms, holding me there as a nest must hold a 
 little bird. How comfy, how motherly her arms 
 were. She sat down on a stump and cuddled 
 me in her lap ; and I, pushing aside her dress at 
 the throat, kissed her where she was the prettiest. 
 
 " Why are you a hala'tc ? " I moaned. " Why 
 do you have to be a donkey — you who are beauti- 
 ful as a Greek nymph ? " 
 
 Her face softened, her eyes became misty, and 
 her lips quivered, yet remained wreathed in 
 smiles. Silently she patted me, and I spoke 
 again of the cruelty of her position. 
 
 " Well, well, yavroum, you see the old people 
 are very poor. They have no money this month 
 to engage a donkey, and the men on this place 
 are too old for such hard work. I am young 
 and strong, so I do it.'' 
 
 " But why are you a halaz'c ? " I repeated. 
 
 She laughed. *' I am not exactly a halaz'c, for 
 I am a free woman. I may go if I please — only 
 I please to stay. The old hanoum brought me 
 up. I love her. She is old and poor. She needs 
 me, and I stay." 
 
100 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Just then Sitanthy came out of the house, and 
 claimed a part of the lap that I was occupying, 
 and there we both sat for awhile. But the halatc 
 had much to do, and presently we were sent off 
 to play. 
 
 I questioned Sitanthy about her. 
 
 *' She will pine away some day and die," 
 Sitanthy said. 
 
 My eyes grew larger. '' Never ! '* I cried. 
 '* She is immortal.'' 
 
 Sitanthy shook her head. " Oh, yes, she will ; 
 for her ailment is incurable. Her heart is buried 
 in a grave.'' 
 
 In vain I begged for more explanations. With 
 maddening precision Sitanthy reiterated the same 
 words. She had heard her grandmother say this, 
 and being a child of her race she accepted it as 
 final. Her mind received without stimulating 
 her imagination. But I was a Greek child, 
 with a mind as alert, an imagination as fertile 
 as hers were placid and apathetic. 
 
 The halatc became the heroine of my day- 
 dreams. There was not a tale which my brain 
 remembered or concocted in which she did not 
 figure. My soul thirsted for knowledge of her 
 affairs. They beckoned to me as forcibly as had 
 the tumble-down wall, and I meant some day to 
 penetrate her secrets. 
 
 She had said that the old hanoum had brought 
 her up, and that the old hanoum was very poor. 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS: ::;;};r<ix; 
 
 That was one more reason why she should have 
 been given a great marriage. Any rich Turk 
 would have been willing to pay a fortune for such 
 as she. In the East, we talk of these things 
 openly, as common occurrences ; and since my 
 intimacy with Djimlah I had unconsciously 
 learned a great deal about Turkish customs. 
 
 The affairs of the halat'c quite absorbed me. I 
 watched her carefully. She never looked sad, 
 or even tired. She performed her menial duties 
 as if they were pleasant tasks, like arranging 
 flowers in vases. She did everything, from being 
 the donkey of the well to beating the rugs, 
 washing the linen, and scrubbing the floors. 
 
 In the early fall, toward sunset one day, I met 
 her for the first time outside the garden wall. I 
 was being taken home to supper, and she was 
 mounting a hill leading to the forest of Belgrade. 
 She passed me without seeing me, her eyes on the 
 horizon, a mysterious smile on her lips. 
 
 My heart leaped at the radiance of her appear- 
 ance. She was like the embodiment of all the 
 Greek heroines of myth and history. The won- 
 drous expression on her face so moved me that 
 I had to sit down to keep my heart from leaping 
 from my breast. 
 
 " Come now, mademoiselle," said the elder 
 who was with me, " you know you are already 
 late for your supper." 
 
 On any other occasion I should have kicked my 
 
im A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 governess, but the face of the hala'ic had sobered 
 me. Obediently I walked home, but I did not 
 eat much supper. 
 
 The next time I saw Sitanthy, I told her of my 
 meeting with the halaic. 
 
 Sitanthy nodded. *' She was going to her hour 
 of happiness. She lives for that hour. She has 
 it from time to time." 
 
 In vain I begged for more particulars. Sitanthy 
 was the most Asiatic of all the Turkish children 
 I have known. She could tell me stories of her 
 world ; but her world appeared to her as matter- 
 of-fact and unromantic as the world of the elders. 
 
 Whenever I saw the halatc she was lovely to 
 me. She smothered me with kisses, and she 
 scolded me kindly whenever I needed it, which 
 was pretty often. But there was a patrician 
 reserve about her which kept me from questioning 
 her. 
 
 She was tender, but at times cruel. She would 
 laugh at things which choked my throat with a 
 big lump. Damlaly Pasha's household was poor. 
 They lived on his pension, which was generally 
 in arrears ; for the Oriental knows no fixed time, 
 and the Turkish government is the most oriental 
 factor in their oriental lives. 
 
 There came days when the exchequer of the 
 household was reduced to small coins, which the 
 hanoum kept tied in a knot in one of the corners 
 of her indoor veil. She always gave us a penny. 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 103 
 
 when I visited there ; and Sitanthy and I would 
 call the simitzi, passing by with his wares on his 
 head, and we would buy four of his delectable 
 simit, big enough to wear as bracelets — until we 
 had eaten them. 
 
 Then came afternoons when we were given only 
 a halfpenny, and each of us had only one simit ; 
 and then there was a time when the hanoum had 
 not even a halfpenny, and she wept because she 
 could not buy us simit. That was the day that 
 the halazc was cruel. She laughed at the sorrow 
 of her mistress, and derided her ; and the old 
 hanoum was so mortified that she stopped crying 
 at once. 
 
 It happened that one day I was taken suddenly 
 ill while playing with Sitanthy ; and the old 
 hanoum sent word to my home, begging leave to 
 keep me in her house, in order that I should not 
 be moved, and imploring to be trusted. 
 
 It was the halazc who took care of me. She 
 made up two little beds, and slept herself between 
 them. The old hanoum brought a brazier into 
 the room, filled with lighted charcoal, and on it 
 she heated olive oil in a tin saucer. When it was 
 very hot they took off my nightgown, sprinkled 
 dried camomiles all over me ; and the halazc, 
 dipping her hands into the scorching oil, began 
 to rub me. She rubbed and rubbed, till I 
 screamed, and was limp as a rag. But I fell into 
 refreshing slumber immediately afterwards. 
 
104 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 When I awoke, dripping with perspiration, the 
 halatc was changing my nightgown. Then she 
 put me into the other Httle bed, which was warm 
 and dry. 
 
 Some hours later, I again awoke, and saw the 
 halatc moving about the room on tiptoe. She 
 threw a cloak over her shoulders, and, with the 
 caution of a cat about to lap forbidden milk, 
 stole out of the room. 
 
 I sat up in my bed and wondered what she was 
 doing. Then I arose and went to the window. 
 The last quarter of the moon lighted the garden, 
 and distinctly I saw the halatc disappearing into 
 a group of cypresses. 
 
 In an instant I wrapped a shawl around me, 
 and went down after her. When I next caught 
 sight of her she did not move like a cat any more. 
 She held in each hand a lighted candle, home- 
 made and aromatic, and she was going in and 
 out among the trees, as if she were playing a 
 game, and all the time mumbling something that 
 seemed to be a rhyme. 
 
 Then she crouched low on the ground and ex- 
 horted Allah to be merciful and forgive her her — . 
 It was a word I did not understand, and the 
 next day I had forgotten it. 
 
 After a time she rose, put the ends of the lighted 
 candles between her lips, went to the well, and 
 drew water from it with a small tin cup tied to a 
 string. 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 105 
 
 She watered all the trees of this clump, count- 
 ing the drops as they fell : " Bir, iki, utch, dort, 
 besh, alti, yedi.'' On the seventh she always 
 stopped, and went on to the next tree. She did 
 all the counting without dropping the lighted 
 candles from her mouth — which was very hard, 
 for I tried it a few days later. 
 
 After the watering was ended, she blew out the 
 candles, fell prone on the earth, and begged 
 Allah, the Powerful, Allah, the Almighty, to for- 
 give her. She wailed and wept, and told Allah over 
 and over that she was doing everything according 
 to his bidding, for the sake of his forgiveness. 
 
 Hidden in the shrubbery close by, I wondered 
 what could be the crime of that radiant crea- 
 ture, who had enthralled and captivated my 
 imagination. 
 
 At length she rose, and danced a weird dance 
 to the mouse-eaten looking moon, in turn be- 
 seeching her : 
 
 '* Queen of the Night, Guardian of Womanly 
 Secrets, Mother of Silent Hours — ^intercede for me 
 — help me ! " 
 
 She danced on and on, till she was quite worn 
 out, and fell on the ground weeping. 
 
 I could endure no more ; besides my teeth 
 were chattering, and all the aches that were so 
 especially my own took possession of my frail 
 body again. I came out of my hiding-place to 
 where the halatc lay. 
 
io6 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 She looked up at me bewildered. Then she 
 rose on her knees, and touched me with her 
 fingers, as if to ascertain that I were a living child. 
 She peered into my face through the tears in her 
 eyes — and I, quite afraid now, said not a word. 
 
 At length she broke the silence. 
 
 " Is that you, Greek baby ? " 
 
 '* Yes,'' I answered. 
 
 '* Who sent you here ? " 
 
 " Nobody. I came." 
 
 She extended her palms upward. Her face 
 took on one of her mystic smiles. 
 
 " Allah," she said softly. " Allah, thou for- 
 givest me, the unworthy." 
 
 For a long time she prayed to that power whom 
 she called Allah, and I knew to be God. When 
 her prayers were at an end, she gathered me to 
 her heart, and kissed me with love and fervent 
 exaltation ; and thus carried me into the house. 
 
 Again she rubbed me with hot oil, and in order 
 to warm me better she took me into her bed, and 
 I slept, held fast in her arms. 
 
 The next day I must have been quite ill, and 
 she never left me ; for every time I opened my 
 eyes she was there, crouching by me, wearing her 
 radiant smile, which would have coaxed any 
 truant soul to return to earth. At any rate it 
 coaxed mine, which came again, though reluc- 
 tantly, to inhabit my poor little body. 
 
 On the first day that I really felt better and 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 107 
 
 could sit up, I took advantage of her devoted 
 attendance to question her. 
 
 " What have you done so monstrous and 
 wicked, which Allah must forgive you ? " 
 
 After a moment's thought, she answered me, 
 simply and directly. 
 
 " I gave not myself to a man, as Allah ordains 
 that every woman should do, and I have given 
 no children to multiply the world." 
 
 For hours I puzzled over these words ; but in 
 the end I did get at their meaning. New vistas, 
 new horizons opened to my brain. What she 
 meant, of course, was that she was not married. 
 
 In the middle of that night I awoke — and I 
 woke her too. I sat up in bed, determined to 
 ask, till all was told to me. 
 
 *' Then why don't you marry ? " I demanded 
 peremptorily. 
 
 " Now, yavrounty you go to sleep. You are 
 only a baby, and you cannot understand." 
 
 " Fm not a baby ! " I cried. " I know heaps 
 and heaps of things, and if you don't tell me, I 
 shall not go to sleep — and what is more I shall 
 uncover myself and catch my death of cold. So 
 please tell me why you don't marry." 
 
 " I don't want to." 
 
 " Why not ? " 
 
 " Because he whose children I should have 
 been happy to bear is for ever buried, beyond 
 that hill, in the forest of Belgrade." 
 
io8 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 *' That cannot be/' I said sceptically, /' there 
 is no cemetery there." 
 
 " No, yavroum," she said softly, " but he lies 
 there ; for I buried him/' 
 
 Through the curtainless windows the stars 
 were lending us light. The face of the halaic 
 shone sweet and tender, full of womanly charm 
 and loveliness. My little hand slipped into hers. 
 Who shall deny that we have lived before, that 
 each little girl has been a woman before ? Else 
 why should I, a mere child, have understood this 
 grown-up woman ; and why should she, a woman, 
 have thus spoken to me ? 
 
 There we sat, our mattresses on the floor, as 
 near to each other as possible, holding each other's 
 hands while the stars were helping us to see — 
 and perhaps to understand. 
 
 " Like you, he was a Greek, and like you he 
 said things about nymphs and goddesses. He 
 said that I was one of them, and he loved me. 
 Some day soon I was to be his. But in our 
 household then there was another man who 
 vowed that no infidel should possess me. We 
 were living at the time over the hill, in the out- 
 skirts of the forest of Belgrade. One night when 
 the moon was at its waning, like the night you 
 saw me in the garden, that man killed my lover. 
 I buried him myself — in the forest of Belgrade — 
 and, have tended his grave for these seven years. 
 I do everything to please Allah, and I never com- 
 
THE GARDEN GODDESS 109 
 
 plain. To avert the punishment which is allotted 
 in the other world to the women who have not 
 done his will, I exhort him, according to the pre- 
 scribed magics. It is said that if during these 
 rites, some time, a child should come, it is Allah 
 himself who sends it, to show that he understands 
 and forgives — and you came, yavroum, the other 
 night." 
 
 She bent over and kissed me gratefully. 
 
 '' I shall work all my life for nothing, doing 
 everything to help others, in the hope that when 
 I die, I shall be made very young and very 
 beautiful and shall be given to the lord, my lover. 
 And maybe, yavroum," she added, almost in a 
 whisper, '' I may have a baby like you — for you 
 are a Greek baby, and he was a Greek." 
 
 I cuddled very close to her and kissed her, my 
 arms wound around her neck, and went to sleep. 
 
 After that I no longer minded her being a halai'c, 
 and even at times being the donkey. For wher- 
 ever I saw her, and in whatever occupation, her 
 background was always the Elysian fields. There 
 she walked in the glory of her beauty, and in 
 company with her Greek lover. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 MISDEEDS 
 
 I DID miss Djimlah and Chakende and 
 Nashan, yet the halatc made up for a great 
 deal, and what is more, knowing now that 
 some day she would go to heaven and meet her 
 Greek lover, I was telling her the Greek history, 
 or rather that part of the Greek history where 
 the Greeks were intermarrying with the gods. 
 
 It is a pity that the world should be so large, 
 and that we should have to go from place to 
 place, leaving behind those we have learned to 
 love. When the time arrived for me to go back 
 to the island, I wept copiously. I did so mind 
 leaving behind Sitanthy and especially the halatc. 
 She, however, in spite of the sorrow she felt at 
 bidding me good-bye, kept on saying : '' Think, 
 yavroum, you might never have come, and that 
 would have been far worse. Besides we must 
 submit to Allah's will gladly, and not weep and 
 show him our unwillingness to obey.*' 
 
 It is three hours from the Bosphorus to the 
 islands, by going from the Bosphorus to Constanti- 
 nople, and from Constantinople to the islands. 
 Tears kept on coming to my eyes from time to 
 
 no 
 
MISDEEDS III 
 
 time, while the boat was steaming on ; yet no 
 sooner did I get a gHmpse of our own island and 
 our own pine trees than I forgot the halatc and 
 Sitanthy and my sorrow, and in spite of the 
 people on the boat I burst forth into a loud song 
 of joy. I was never any good at tune, and there 
 was little difference between my singing and the 
 miauling of a cat ; yet whenever I was particu- 
 larly happy I had to express it by song, and only 
 a peremptory order would stop me. And while 
 I sang, looking at the island, I was only thinking 
 of the three playmates I was to see, and the 
 halatc and Sitanthy were forgotten, as if they had 
 never existed. My thoughts were on the three, 
 and on the pleasure they would experience 
 when they saw me returning to them — as indeed 
 they did. 
 
 That year was a memorable one in our lives, 
 because it was the last in which my three play- 
 mates would be permitted to go uncovered, and 
 play with children of both sexes. They were 
 now nearing the age at which little Turkish girls 
 become women, must don the tchir-chaff and 
 yashmak, hide themselves from the world and 
 prepare for their womanhood. I was, of course, 
 always to continue seeing them and visiting them, 
 but they could no longer enjoy the freedom they 
 had enjoyed up to now — now that they were to 
 become women. 
 
 I found all three deep in the study of foreign 
 
112 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 languages. In the spring of that year Djimlah*s 
 grandmother decided that it would be very good 
 for the three Turkish girls to go twice a week and 
 spend the morning at Nizam, where all the 
 European children congregated. She wanted 
 Djimlah to see as much of the European world 
 as possible before she was secluded. It was thus 
 that we all four, accompanied by our French 
 teacher, went to the pine forest of Nizam. We 
 did not like this as much as staying at home and 
 playing by ourselves ; but the old hanoum was 
 quite insistent, and for the first time made us do 
 what she thought best. 
 
 It interfered greatly with my scheme of intro- 
 ducing my companions to the wonders of Greek 
 history, because now that I was a little older my 
 mother refused to let me spend the nights with 
 Djimlah, and since our time was quite filled with 
 studies the only hours we had for story-telling 
 were those in which we had to mingle with other 
 children. 
 
 However, it was interesting, and the different 
 acquaintances we made taught us a lot of games 
 we should never have thought of by ourselves. 
 I cannot say that we liked our new acquaintances 
 particularly, at any rate we did not love any of 
 them. They were mostly silly, we thought, and 
 the English girls were stiff and we did not care 
 for the way they spoke French. Besides most 
 of them had large protruding teeth, which we 
 
MISDEEDS 113 
 
 thought very unbecoming to girls. We used to 
 call them Teeth. 
 
 It was there in the pines that we met Semmeya 
 Hanoum. She was much older than any of us, 
 and she ought to, have been wearing the tchir- 
 chaff, and to have been living in the seclusion of 
 the haremlik ; but her people were not very 
 orthodox, and Semmeya had a way of her own of 
 getting what she wanted, and what she wanted 
 just then was not to be secluded. 
 
 We never quite made up our minds about her. 
 We had days when we knew we did not like her, 
 for we did not consider her honourable. She 
 would rather cheat at games than play fair, and 
 she would always tell a fib to get out of a dis- 
 agreeable predicament. Again there were days 
 when we almost loved her for she was very 
 fascinating. 
 
 That year we were particularly unfortunate 
 in doing things we ought not to have done. 
 In many of these — until Semmeya brought 
 her clever mind to bear — we seemed hopelessly 
 entangled. For example, when we stole grapes 
 from a vendor who had fallen asleep. We did 
 not mean to steal : we only thought of how 
 wonderfully exciting it was to walk up on 
 tip-toe, reach the grapes, get a bunch, and 
 slip away without awakening the vendor. Sem- 
 meya and Djimlah and Chakende and I ac- 
 complished it successfully. As Nashan was 
 
114 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 reaching for a bunch she shpped — and the 
 man awoke ! 
 
 We did not know what would have happened 
 to us — as we talked it over afterwards — we 
 thought we should probably have been taken to 
 prison to spend our young lives there, without 
 light or air. We were only saved from that 
 dreadful fate by Semmeya's inventiveness. 
 
 Nashan stood there, petrified, staring at the 
 vendor. Djimlah hid her face on my shoulder ; 
 I was trying to hide behind Chakende ; and 
 Chakende was trembling all over. 
 
 Semmeya walked straight up to the man and 
 said to him proudly : 
 
 " A vendor who has something to sell must 
 never go to sleep. We wanted some grapes, and 
 of course we had to have them, and naturally we 
 took them. Now, how much do we owe you, 
 vendor ? " 
 
 The man was entirely apologetic, and begged 
 to be forgiven. He said, since we were four, it 
 would make about an oka of grapes, and he would 
 let us have them for four paras, I knew he was 
 cheating us in asking four pennies. By no possi- 
 bility could we have taken an oka. 
 
 Having paid him we walked away with our 
 heads high, but I trembled, and I know Djimlah 
 did, too, for her arm in mine was shaking. 
 
 We spoke then of our feelings and of the awful 
 thing that happened to our hearts when the 
 
MISDEEDS 115 
 
 man opened his eyes. Djimlah wept at the 
 thought of being caught as a thief. " Why did 
 we do it, yavroum ? '' she kept on waihng to me ; 
 " why did we do it ? " 
 
 *' I don't know why we did it," I repHed, nor 
 did I know then why we kept on getting into 
 scrapes, from the consequences of which Semmeya 
 always saved us. I know now that every bit of 
 devilry we perpetrated was at her instigation. 
 
 While we were not conscious of her evil influ- 
 ence, and were fully grateful to her for saving us, 
 yet we always mistrusted her ; and once in 
 despair we came together and debated how to 
 tell her that we did not care to have her for a 
 friend any more. 
 
 Nashan then gravely remarked : " We must 
 remember that without her several times we 
 should have been compelled to die.*' 
 
 This we acknowledged to be true, and resolved 
 still to bear with her. Moreover, Semmeya was 
 a remarkable story-teller, and on rainy days, when 
 we could not play outdoors, we would congregate 
 in one house and Semmeya would hold us en- 
 thralled with a fabrication of her imagination. 
 She could thrill us or make us laugh, at will, and 
 was the undisputed queen of rainy days. 
 
 Just the same, we never felt that she was quite 
 one of us — even I who was much more under her 
 spell than the others. We came to know that 
 whenever she wanted anything she was going 
 
ii6 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 to get it, and that some one else would pay 
 for it. 
 
 " It is her Greek blood that makes her so," 
 Chakende said one noon ; then looked up at me 
 in fear ; but at these words Djimlah declared 
 that it was time to pray, and they all fell on their 
 knees, facing Mecca. They knew I would not 
 attack them while they were praying, and they 
 made their devotions long enough for my anger 
 to cool somewhat. 
 
 The legend about her Greek blood was that her 
 grandmother had been taken from the island of 
 Cyprus, when a baby, and sold into a haremlik. 
 Semmeya told us that only after she was married 
 and had children did her grandmother learn that 
 she was a Greek ; and then she hanged herself 
 from despair. Perhaps this matter of the Greek 
 grandmother helped to make Semmeya dear to 
 me, although now, as I look back upon it all, I 
 think it was because instinctively I understood 
 a little of the curse of temperament, and poor 
 Semmeya had a large share of it. 
 
 The following year Semmeya was married, and 
 three days before her wedding we were invited to 
 see her trousseau, and to be feasted and pre- 
 sented with gifts. We had reached the age when 
 we began to talk of love and marriage in tones of 
 awe, with the ignorance of children and the half- 
 
MISDEEDS 117 
 
 awakened knowledge of womanhood. And, after 
 we came away from her, we put our heads to- 
 gether and whispered our hope that her husband 
 would never find out what we knew about her 
 character. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 
 
 SHORTLY after Semmeya's wedding an 
 epidemic of typhoid fever swept over 
 Constantinople. Owing to our unsani- 
 tary drainage conditions such epidemics were not 
 rare. All four of us had the fever. With me 
 it was so acute, and lasted so long, that the 
 doctors gave me up as a sickly child who 
 had not the strength to battle for health. My 
 lengthy illness left me alive, it is true, but 
 as a fire leaves standing a structure which it 
 has completely destroyed within. Apparently 
 there remained nothing solid to build on. The 
 doctors intimated as much when they said I 
 might eat and do what pleased me — and went 
 away. 
 
 To them I was only a hopeless patient. It was 
 different with my mother : she would not give 
 up the fight. 
 
 In her despair, and when science failed her, 
 she turned to what in reality she always had 
 more faith in — her religion, and particularly her 
 favourite saint, St George of the Bells. Him she 
 had inherited from the paternal side of her family, 
 
 118 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 119 
 
 of which he had been — shall I say — the idol, for 
 more than two hundred years. 
 
 I did not share her predilection. My own par- 
 ticular saint was St Nicholas, even then when I 
 was beginning to take pride in my critical atti- 
 tude toward religion. Looking back, and raising 
 the veil from my once ardent devotion, I must 
 admit that my partiality originated in a life-size 
 icon, painted by a celebrated Russian, and pre- 
 sented by the Russian church to the monastery 
 of St Nicholas, where I used to go for my de- 
 votions. I was only four years old when the 
 icon was sent, but I fell an immediate victim to 
 its beauty. Had it represented St Gregory or 
 St Aloysius, my devotion would have been the 
 same. It is always thus with us : scratch a 
 Greek and you will find a pagan. 
 
 However, when my mother told me that she 
 was going to send for St George of the Bells, I 
 raised no objection. I knew enough of his deeds 
 to have a respectful fear of him. Among the 
 orthodox Greeks, especially among those who, 
 like us, lived on the sea of Marmora, to send for 
 a saint is an awe-inspiring act. One does not 
 have recourse to it except as a last resort. It is, 
 moreover, an expense that few can afford, though 
 I have known poor Greek families to sell even 
 their household effects to have the saint brought 
 to them. 
 
 From the moment that it was decided the saint 
 
120 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 should be sent for, our house was in a tumult of 
 cleaning. My room especially was made im- 
 maculate, and I was put into my finest night- 
 gown. No coquette was ever more carefully 
 arrayed for the visit of a handsome young doctor 
 than I was for the saint. A large table, covered 
 with a new white cloth, was placed near my bed. 
 On it was an incense-burner, flowers, and a bowl 
 of water — to be blessed, and used to bathe my 
 face so long as it should last. 
 
 Two men, for their strength and size called 
 pallikaria, had gone for the icon. St George of 
 the Bells, though on the same island with us, had 
 his monastery up on the highest summit of the 
 mountains, several miles from our house. In 
 order to receive the saint with proper ceremony 
 my mother sent for the parish priests. They 
 arrived shortly before the icon, dressed in their 
 most festive robes of silver thread, and with their 
 long curls floating over their shoulders. 
 
 The pallikaria arrived, bearing the saint, and 
 preceded by a monk from his monastery. When 
 they brought him into my room, though I was 
 very weak, I was raised from my bed and placed 
 at the foot of the icon. It was quite large, and 
 painted on wood. The face alone was visible : 
 all the rest had been covered with gold and silver, 
 tokens of gratitude from those whom the saint 
 had cured. Rings, ear-rings, bracelets, and other 
 jewellery were also hanging from the icon, while 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 121 
 
 hundreds of gold and silver bells were festooned 
 about it. 
 
 My room was filled with the members of my 
 family, and a few of the most intimate and pious 
 of our friends. Candles were lighted, and mass 
 was solemnly sung. Afterwards everybody went 
 away, and I was left to the care of St George 
 of the Bells. 
 
 Owing to the distance, the icon and the monk 
 could not return to the monastery the same day, 
 and were to spend the night at our house. I was 
 then twelve years old, and as I have said, begin- 
 ning to be sceptical of the religious superstitions 
 about me. Yet the ceremony had impressed me 
 deeply ; and in the solemn hours of the night, 
 with only the light of the kandilla burning before 
 the icon, a certain mysticism took possession of 
 me. I was shaken out of my apathy, and believed 
 that St George could save me, if he wanted to, and 
 if I prayed to him — and pray I did, too, most 
 fervently, though I should have been ashamed to 
 confess it after the daylight brought back to me 
 my juvenile pride in being a sceptic. 
 
 In the morning, when the pallikaria came 
 to fetch the icon, one of the powerfully built 
 creatures, a man whose hair was already grow- 
 ing white about the temples, approached my 
 bedside and said with great solemnity : 
 
 " Kyria, mou, he means to cure you. I have 
 not carried him for twenty years without learning 
 
122 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 his ways. Why, when we went to take him from 
 his place he fairly flew to our arms. I know what 
 that means. You will get well, for he wanted 
 to come to you. Sometimes he is so heavy that 
 we can hardly carry him a mile an hour — and I 
 have known him to refuse to be moved at all.'' 
 
 The old pallikari was right. St George did 
 cure me. In a few months I was stronger than 
 I had ever been in my life. It was then that my 
 mother — ^partly out of gratitude, partly in order 
 that he might continue to look after me — resolved 
 to sell me to St George. 
 
 For three days she and I fasted. Early on the 
 morning of the fourth day we started, bare- 
 footed, for the mountains and St George's 
 monastery, carrying wax torches nearly as tall 
 as I. At first I was ashamed to meet people in 
 my bare feet, until I noticed with elation that 
 they all reverently uncovered their heads as we 
 passed. 
 
 It was a long, weary walk. Up the mountains 
 it seemed as if we were climbing for heaven. 
 The road zigzagged steeply upward, now reveal- 
 ing, now hiding the monastery from our eyes. 
 At last we reached the huge rocks that sur- 
 rounded it like a rampart. 
 
 Everything was ready for our arrival. The 
 HegoumenoSy the head monk, received us. I 
 was taken to a little shrine, bathed in holy water, 
 and put to bed, after receiving some soupe-maigre ; 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 123 
 
 for I was to fast three days longer. My little 
 bed was made up on the marble floor of the 
 church. At night, another was arranged beside 
 it for my mother, since I could not be induced 
 to sleep alone in the church. 
 
 During the three days spent in the mountains 
 I forgot completely that I was a person holding 
 advanced ideas, and that I did not believe in 
 superstitions. There was something in the atmo- 
 sphere of the place which forbade analysis and 
 called only for devotion. 
 
 My mother and I were the only persons who 
 slept in the church. There were a number of 
 insane patients in the monastery itself. St 
 George of the Bells is renowned for the number of 
 cures of insanity which he effects. The head 
 monk, as a rule, is a man of considerable educa- 
 tion and shrewdness, with no mean knowledge of 
 medicine. The insane patients are under his 
 care for forty days, with the grace of St George. 
 They practically live out of doors, take cold baths, 
 dress lightly, and eat food of the simplest. In 
 addition to this they received mystic shocks to 
 help on their recovery, and, I believe, usually 
 regain their mental equilibrium. 
 
 While I was staying at the monastery a young 
 man was brought there from Greece. He was a 
 great student of literature, and very dissipated. 
 The two combined had sent him to St George. 
 He was a handsome fellow, with long white 
 
124 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 hands, and a girlish mouth. He was permitted 
 to go about free, and I met him under the arcade 
 of the monastery, declaiming a passage from 
 Homer. When his eyes met mine, he stopped 
 and addressed me. 
 
 " I am coming from Persia, and my land is 
 Ithaca. I am Ulysses, the king of Ithaca.'' 
 Then he threw out his hands toward me and 
 screamed, " Penelope ! " 
 
 One may imagine that I was frightened, but 
 before I had time to answer, he burst into a peal 
 of laughter, and exclaimed : 
 
 '* Why, you are Achilles, dressed in girl's 
 clothes. But you will come with us to fight, will 
 you not ? " 
 
 Much to my relief a monk came up and said, 
 '* Don't stay here and listen to him. It only 
 excites him." 
 
 I became quite interested in the young man 
 after this, and later learned that when his forty 
 days were at an end, by a sign St George inti- 
 mated that he was to remain longer ; and a few 
 months later the young man returned to his 
 country entirely cured. 
 
 There was one of the monks. Father Arsenius, 
 who was as devout as my mother. To him I 
 really owe all my pleasure while in the monastery. 
 He was an old man, but strong and active. He 
 took me every day for rambles about the 
 mountains, and never would let me walk uphill. 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 125 
 
 He would pick me up and set me on his shoulder, 
 as if I were a pitcher of water, and then, chanting 
 his Gregorian chants, we would make the ascents. 
 One day we were sitting on one of the big rocks 
 surrounding the monastery. Miles below we 
 could see the blue waters of the Marmora, and 
 far beyond it the Asiatic coast of Turkey. The 
 air was filled with the smell of the pine forest 
 below. Father Arsenius had been telling me of 
 the miracles performed by St George. 
 
 " It is curious. Father Arsenius," I com- 
 mented, " that they should have built the 
 monastery so high up. It is so difficult to get 
 to, especially when one comes on foot, the way 
 we did. How did they think of building it up 
 here ? " 
 
 " No one thought of it. The saint himself 
 chose this spot. Don't you know about it, little 
 one ? " 
 
 I shook my head. 
 
 Father Arsenius's face changed, and there came 
 into it the light which made him look almost 
 holy. In a rapt tone he began : "It was years 
 ago, in the fifteenth century, when a dream came 
 to one of our monks, a holy man, chosen by the 
 saint to do his bidding." 
 
 He crossed himself three times, raised his eyes 
 to the blue above, and for some seconds was lost 
 in his dreams. 
 
 " The saint appeared to our holy monk and 
 
126 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 said : ' Arise and follow me, by the sound of a 
 bell, over land and sea, till the bell shall cease to 
 ring. There dig in the earth till you find my 
 icon ; and on that spot build a chapel, and spend 
 your life in worshipping me/ 
 
 " Three times the vision came to the monk ; 
 then he arose, went to his superior, and with his 
 permission started on his pilgrimage. As soon 
 as he left the monastery he heard the sound of 
 the bell, and following it he travelled for months, 
 over land and sea, until he came to this island. 
 Here the sound of the bell became louder, until 
 finally it stopped. On that spot he began to 
 dig " 
 
 " On what spot ? *' I interrupted. 
 
 " Down by the little chapel, where now the 
 holy spring oozes forth. There the monk found 
 the icon, and with it in his arms went about 
 begging for money to build the chapel.'' 
 
 " He must have been a very powerful man if 
 he carried that icon about,'' I commented, '' for 
 now it takes two pallikaria to lift it." 
 
 Father Arsenius smiled his kind, fatherly smile. 
 " My little one, when our saint wants to, he can 
 make himself as light as a feather. After the 
 monk had collected sufficient money he went to 
 the Turkish authorities and asked permission to 
 build his chapel. The Turks had just conquered 
 Constantinople, and we had to ask permission 
 for everything at that time. The pasha to whom 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 127 
 
 the monk applied refused him, saying that there 
 were already churches enough/' 
 
 Father Arsenius' face, as he spoke, was no 
 longer holy. He looked a Greek, boiling for a 
 fight. Gradually his features regained their calm 
 and he smiled at me, as he continued : 
 
 '' That night St George came to the monk in 
 his dreams and bade him start building without 
 permission of the Turks. In the morning the 
 monk climbed the mountain, and with the help 
 of two other monks began his work. Ah ! but 
 I should like to have been that monk,'* Father 
 Arsenius cried — but he would not permit his 
 soul even the envy of a holy deed, and humbly 
 added : " Thy will be done, saint.'* 
 
 " Didn't the Turks interfere any more ? " I 
 asked. 
 
 '' Yes, they did, my little one. While the work 
 was in progress they heard of it, and sent word to 
 the monk to stop it. He replied that he obeyed 
 higher orders than theirs. The pasha was furious, 
 and set out himself for the island, swearing he 
 would hang the monk from his own scaffolding. 
 
 '' But he reckoned without St George. At that 
 time there were no roads on the island, not even 
 a path leading up here. The pasha and his 
 followers became lost in the woods, and had to 
 spend the night, hungry and thirsty, under the 
 pine trees. In the middle of the night the pasha 
 woke up, struggling in the grip of St George. He 
 
128 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 cried out to his companions. They were tied to 
 the trees. St George beat the pasha with the 
 flat of his sword until he was tired. Then he 
 commanded him to fall on his knees and promise 
 to permit the chapel to be built. The terrified 
 Turk did as he was ordered, and, of his own 
 accord, promised to give money to build a large 
 monastery, and he kept his word." 
 
 Father Arsenius looked at me with a humorous 
 twinkle in his eyes, and I laughed aloud to hear 
 how the Greek saint had got the better of the 
 Turkish pasha. 
 
 " I have been here for fifty years now/' Father 
 Arsenius went on presently ; " and my wish is 
 to die in the service of my saint." 
 
 " Do you think that when I am sold to him, he 
 will take care of me ? " I asked. 
 
 " I do not think so — I know so. His power 
 is omnipotent ; and his kindness to people is 
 wonderful. When there is any mortal disease 
 among them, he leaves here, goes out and fights 
 for them." 
 
 " How do you know that ? " 
 
 " Because I hear him go, and come back." 
 
 I was overwhelmed. No trace of scepticism 
 or unbelief remained in me. 
 
 " Is he here now ? " I asked, in the same 
 mystic tone as the monk. 
 
 He shook his head. '' He left here just before 
 the cholera broke out in Constantinople." 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 129 
 
 " But the cholera is over now." 
 
 " Yes, I am expecting him back at any minute." 
 
 " How do you hear him come and go ? " I 
 asked, unwonted fear of the supernatural con- 
 quering me. 
 
 '' You will hear him, too, if he returns before 
 you go. Everything in the church moves and 
 shakes when he leaves it or re-enters it." 
 
 " But if he should not come back while I am 
 here, how can I be sold to him ? " 
 
 " That does not matter," Father Arsenius re- 
 assured me. He will know of it when he comes 
 back — ^though I think that sometimes when 
 people are not cured, it is because he is far away, 
 and his grace does not reach them." He bowed 
 his head. '* I have given my heart to him, and 
 he has purified it. I am his slave, and shall be 
 so for life." 
 
 " I will be his slave, too," I put in eagerly. 
 Had I been asked at that moment to become a 
 nun, I should have done so gladly, such was the 
 influence Father Arsenius had over me. 
 
 He rose. *' Come, little one, let us go." 
 
 I put my little hand into his big, hard one — 
 he was also the gardener of the monastery — 
 and together we walked through the koumaries 
 with which the mountain was covered. These 
 are evergreen bushes, which at a certain season 
 bear fruit like cherries, which have an intoxi- 
 cating effect. Strangers, not understanding this. 
 
130 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 are sometimes found helpless beneath the lovely 
 bushes. 
 
 As we came near the monastery Father Arsenius 
 shaded his eyes with his hand and gazed over 
 toward the mountain ridge beyond. 
 
 " The wind is rising. It will be very high to- 
 night/' he said. 
 
 The conversation with the monk had put me 
 into a deep religious fervour. I fell asleep that 
 night in the church, and dreamed of the monk 
 who had travelled over land and sea, following 
 the sound of a bell. 
 
 How long I slept I cannot tell when I awoke 
 in terror. I sat up and peered around by the dim 
 light of the kandillas burning before the icons of 
 the various saints. The large glass candelabra 
 hanging from the ceiling were swaying to and fro, 
 jingling their crystals, producing a ghastly sound. 
 The bells on St George's icon were tinkling ; two 
 or three windows slammed, and there was a rush- 
 ing sound through the church. It all lasted only 
 a short time, and then quietness returned. 
 
 My mother awoke, though she was not so light 
 a sleeper as I. '' What is it ? " she asked startled. 
 
 '' It is St George coming back," I answered. 
 
 We both fell to praying, and I did not sleep 
 any more that night. And my heart was 
 filled with pride that I had heard the coming of 
 the saint. 
 
 At the end of my three days' fast, mass was 
 
HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE 131 
 
 celebrated, and then my mother presented me to 
 the Hegoumenos. 
 
 " I wish my daughter to become the saint's 
 'slave/' she said. 
 
 " For ever ? '' he asked. '' If so, she cannot 
 marry." 
 
 " No ; until her marriage. Yearly I will pay 
 the saint a pigskin full of oil and a torch as tall 
 as she is. At her marriage I will ransom her with 
 five times this, and with five medjedi^s in 
 addition." 
 
 The monk took me in his arms and raised me 
 up so that I could kiss the icon. Then he cried, 
 in a voice so full of emotion that it made my 
 devout mother weep : 
 
 " My Saint, unto thee I give the keeping of 
 this child 1 " 
 
 From the icon he took a silver chain, from 
 which hung a little bell, and placed it round 
 my neck. 
 
 '' You are now St George's slave," he con- 
 tinued. " Until you return and hang this 
 with your own hands on the icon it must never 
 leave you." 
 
 I kissed his hand, and the ceremony was over. 
 We paid what we owed, and left the monastery 
 and good Father Arsenius with the assurance that 
 a power from above was having especial watch 
 over me. 
 
 From that time on my mother gave her yearly 
 
132 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 tribute, and the saint kept his word to look after 
 me. 
 
 Although when I was married I was in America 
 and my mother was in Russia, she did not fail 
 to pay the ransom which made it possible for me 
 to change masters without angering the saint. 
 In place of the little silver chain and bell, which 
 I could not return personally, she gave a gold 
 one. 
 
 As I write I can see the badge of my former 
 slavery where it hangs around a little old Byzan- 
 tine icon in my room. I have never been sepa- 
 rated from it. During the whole of my girlhood 
 I wore it ; and when I was in a convent school 
 in Paris it gave me a certain distinction among 
 my mystified companions, who could hear it 
 tinkle whenever I moved. 
 
 Asked about it, I only said that it was 
 the badge of my slavery. This gave rise to 
 a variety of stories, invented by their Gallic 
 imaginations, in which I, with my bell, was the 
 heroine. 
 
 As I look at it now, it reminds me of the three 
 days spent with St George — the three days during 
 which sensuous mysticism completely clouded 
 my awakening intelligence. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 
 
 ON our return from the monastery we 
 had the great joy of finding my brother 
 at home, back that very day from 
 Europe. I was so dehghted I could hardly sit 
 still. My happiness was dashed to the ground, 
 when, in the course of the next half hour, he re- 
 marked that he must leave us in a few days to 
 see the Bishop of Xanthy. I was speechless with 
 disappointment until my mother said : 
 
 '' Oh ! that is lucky. The little one needs a 
 complete change to become quite herself again. 
 She can go with you.'' 
 
 Thus it was quickly settled, and a few days 
 later we set off. The first part of the journey was 
 like any other. We went to Constantinople and 
 took a train, which, after due deliberation, 
 started, and in due time again — or rather, not in 
 due time — reached Koumourtzina. There began 
 what seemed to me our real journey, for we were 
 now to travel entirely on animal-back. 
 
 We started on mules, in the afternoon, and rode 
 for three hours at a smart trot. In front of us 
 lay the forest of Koumourtzina. Geography has 
 
 133 
 
134 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 always been a closed science to me, so I have no 
 idea where this is, except that it is somewhere in 
 Turkish territory, and on the way to Xanthy. 
 
 It was near nightfall. We took a short rest 
 at a small village, ate a hearty meal, exchanged 
 the mules we had been riding for horses, and 
 started out to cross the forest. There was a 
 silvery moonlight over all the landscape, and the 
 lantern [which our guide carried, as he walked 
 in front of the horses, blinded us more than 
 it helped us. We asked to have the light put 
 out, but the kouroudji, who was also the owner 
 of the horses we were riding, insisted on the 
 lighted lantern as part of the convention of the 
 forest. 
 
 My saddle was made of camel-bags, filled with 
 blankets and clothes, and the motion of the horse 
 was smooth and soporific. I became drowsy 
 from the long day's ride, and now and then 
 stretched myself in the saddle. 
 
 In the very heart of the forest my horse reared 
 so unexpectedly that had it not been for the 
 vast pillowy saddle I should have been thrown to 
 the ground. My brother's horse not only reared 
 but whirled about like a leaf in a storm. The 
 kouYoudji seized the bridle of my horse and patted 
 and spoke to him, while my brother, who was a 
 very good horseman, managed to calm his own 
 mount somewhat, and to keep him headed in the 
 direction we wished to go. 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 135 
 
 " What is it ? '' I asked the kouroudji. " Why 
 are they behaving Hke this ? '' 
 
 The Turk turned to my brother. " The effendi 
 knows ? " 
 
 '' I'm afraid I do. They smell blood." 
 
 " So they do, Bey Effendi. It is not the first 
 time this accursed forest has been the grave of 
 men. Allah kerim ! " 
 
 He took hold of the bridles of both horses, 
 and spoke to them in endearing terms. There is 
 an understanding between Turks and horses as 
 touching as the friendship between them and dogs. 
 
 From a monotonous and tedious journey, our 
 ride, of a sudden, had become most exciting. 
 Although the horses now followed the kouroudji 
 obediently, they whinnied from time to time, 
 and shivered. 
 
 '* Don't be frightened,'' said my brother to 
 me, '' and whatever happens keep your head, 
 and don't scream. Screaming will do no good, 
 and it may lead to mishandling." 
 
 " But can't we go back, Mano ? " I asked. 
 
 " We shall gain nothing by trying to. If a 
 murder has been committed, we may come upon 
 the corpse. If it is something else, we are already 
 in the trap." 
 
 Before I had time to ask him what he meant 
 by this, a shot was fired over our heads, and, 
 simultaneously, a number of forms emerged from 
 the forest. 
 
136 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 We were surrounded, and several dark lanterns 
 flashed upon us. 
 
 '' Halt ! Hands up ! '' 
 
 *' All right ! " said my brother. 
 
 Five men glided close to us, and I saw three 
 pistols pointing at us. I could now see our 
 captors distinctly. They had on the Greek 
 foustanella, white, accordion-pleated skirts, stiff- 
 starched, reaching to the knees. Below they 
 wore gaiters ending in the tsarouchia, or soft- 
 pointed shoes. Their graceful little jackets were 
 worn like capes, with the empty sleeves flapping. 
 The Greek fez with its long black tassel completed 
 their picturesque costume. 
 
 I do not know whether Greek brigands are 
 really any better than Bulgarian or Turkish ones, 
 but the sight of their Hellenic costume lessened 
 my fears considerably. It sounds very silly, but 
 my warm and uncritical patriotism embraced 
 all Greeks — even brigands. Impulsively I cried 
 out : 
 
 " Yassas, pallikaria I " (Health to you, men !) 
 
 The brigand next me, whose large brown hand 
 was on the neck of my horse, laughed. 
 
 '' YassUy her a mou I " (Health to thee, my 
 lady !) 
 
 '' What is it all about, pallikaria ? '' my brother 
 asked. 
 
 *' The master of the forest, hearing of your 
 passing through, claims his privilege of making 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 137 
 
 you his guest awhile/' The man laughed at his 
 own pleasantry. *' Will you dismount of your 
 own accord, or shall we lend you our assistance ? '' 
 
 " Considering that you are five, and we are 
 only two, and a half — " My brother had a 
 philosophic way of accepting the inevitable. 
 
 " We are more than five," remarked one of the 
 men, pointing behind him into the forest with 
 his thumb. 
 
 '' You are plenty, in any case," returned my 
 brother, dismounting. He helped me from my 
 horse. In French he said : 
 
 " There is a mistake. It is a long time since 
 you and I possessed enough to attract these 
 gentlemen ; but be polite and friendly to them. 
 
 The brigands ordered the kouroudji — who also 
 accepted the whole occurrence with philosophic 
 calm — ^to proceed to Xanthy and report that his 
 charges were captured by brigands, who would 
 shortly communicate with their relatives. 
 
 *' Will he really travel for two days, just to 
 carry that message ? " my brother asked with 
 curiosity. 
 
 " Crossing this forest is his business. He knows 
 that, if he does not do as we say, this forest will 
 become his grave." 
 
 Paying the kouroudji, my brother bade him 
 good-bye, and two of the brigands conducted 
 him off. 
 
 They had told us the truth when they said 
 
138 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 there were others in the woods, for presently 
 many more came up, and, with somewhat sar- 
 donic humour, bade us welcome. 
 
 '' We are sorry to have to blindfold you,*' said 
 one, and took a big red pocket-handkerchief from 
 his pocket, which he began to fold on the bias, 
 for my eyes. 
 
 " Please, pallikari, do you mind using my 
 handkerchief ? " I asked. 
 
 *' If it will please you, kera mou.** 
 
 I handed him my handkerchief. 
 
 " Ma I that's too small.'' 
 
 " Can't you use two together ? " I asked, giv- 
 ing him another. 
 
 He took them and tied the ends together, then 
 slipped the bandage over my eyes, while another 
 held up the lantern for him to see by. 
 
 '' Empross I " (Forward ! ) they said. 
 
 I felt a big rough hand take mine, and we 
 started off into the thick woods. We were 
 mounting gradually, and the underbrush became 
 thicker. Presently I tripped and fell. 
 
 " More Mitso ! " my guide called to some one 
 ahead. " Come back and make a chair with me 
 to carry the little girl. She is stumbling." 
 
 The other returned ; they joined their hands 
 together, and I took my seat on them, placing 
 my arms around the men's necks. I was neither 
 frightened for the present nor apprehensive for 
 the future : I was merely excited and enjoying 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 139 
 
 the situation. My love of adventure was being 
 gratified to the full, and for once the knowledge 
 that we were poor was a satisfaction. As my 
 brother had said, the days in which we had 
 money were so long left behind that even we 
 ourselves had forgotten them. 
 
 I felt sure that as soon as the brigands dis- 
 covered their mistake they would let us go, the 
 customs of the brigands being as well known as 
 those of any other members of the community. 
 Besides, had not my brother said it was all a 
 mistake — and at the time my brother represented 
 to me the knowledge of the world. I only hoped 
 that the brigands would not realize it before we 
 reached their lair. 
 
 Up, and ever up we went, the men sure-footed 
 in spite of the underbrush. They halted at last, 
 and set me down. 
 
 One of them whistled. 
 
 We waited a full minute, and he whistled again. 
 Then one of them sang in a rich baritone the first 
 lines of the Greek national hymn — 
 
 " Oh, Freedom ! thou comest out of the holy bones of the 
 Hellenes — oh, Freedom ! " 
 
 From somewhere in the vicinity another voice 
 took up the refrain, and shortly afterwards there 
 came a crash and a rattle of chains. 
 
 Some one took my hand again, and I felt that 
 we passed through an opening. Now we were 
 descending ; and gradually the coolness of the 
 
140 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 night air changed to warmth, and the smell of 
 food came to our nostrils. 
 
 We stopped, and our bandages were removed. 
 
 I blinked and rubbed my eyes. We were in a 
 large low room, the floor of which was partially 
 covered with sheep-skins. A fire was burning, 
 inside a ring of stones, in the middle of the floor, 
 which was the bare earth, and a man was sitting 
 by it, cross-legged, cooking. 
 
 '' Kali spera sas kai kalos orisete ! " (Good 
 evening and welcome !) he said to us. '' The 
 master will be in shortly. Pray be seated." 
 
 We sat down on some sheep-skins, and I looked 
 about me with interest. The longer I looked the 
 larger the room grew. Its shadowy ends seemed 
 to stretch off indefinitely. The ceiling was 
 roughly vaulted, and I judged that it must be a 
 cave, of which there are many in the mountains. 
 Numerous weapons lay on the ground or hung 
 on the walls, but there was nothing terrifying 
 about the place. 
 
 Very soon the leader came in. He was a man 
 of about forty, dressed in European clothes and 
 unmistakably a dandy. He was tall and well- 
 built, and his black hair was parted in the middle, 
 and carefully combed into two large curly waves. 
 His long black moustache was martially turned 
 up at the ends. 
 
 He bowed to us as if he were a diplomat, and 
 we his distinguished guests. 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 141 
 
 " Welcome to our mountainous abode. I am 
 very glad to meet you." 
 
 He shook hands with us warmly. 
 
 *' We, too, are very glad to meet you,'' said my 
 brother ; " but I cannot understand why you are 
 taking all this trouble. What we could afford to 
 give you would not keep you in cigarettes a week." 
 
 " Are you quite sure, Mr Spiropoulo ? " 
 
 " Good gracious, my dear sir," Mano cried, 
 " you don't mean to say you take us for the 
 Spiropouli ? " 
 
 The chief smiled a most attractive smile it 
 appeared to me ; though my brother afterwards 
 described it as fatuous. 
 
 *' I hope you did not find the ascent too diffi- 
 cult," the leader inquired solicitously. 
 
 " Two of the pallikaria made a skamnaki for 
 me," I put in. '' It was very nice of them." 
 
 I have always spoken my mother tongue with 
 considerable foreign accent, not having learned 
 it until after I spoke French, German and 
 Turkish, and this accent at once attracted the 
 attention of our host. Gravely he asked : 
 
 '' Did you acquire this French accent, made- 
 moiselle, in the short time you have been study- 
 ing the French language. Let me see, it is three 
 months now since you passed through the forest 
 before. That was the first time you left Anatolia, 
 I believe — and one does not acquire a French 
 accent in Anatolia." 
 
142 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 From Mano's face I knew that he was troubled, 
 therefore I refrained from being impertinent in 
 answer to our host's impertinence about my 
 accent. The latter went on lazily : 
 
 " We were sorry to miss you before. We fully 
 intended offering you our hospitality then — only 
 you changed your plans so suddenly, and arrived 
 a week before you had intended to. I am glad 
 we were fortunate enough to secure you this time. 
 One pines for social intercourse in the mountains." 
 
 The leader's Greek was excellent. It was easy 
 to see that he must have been well born, or at 
 least well educated. He stretched himself on a 
 sheep-skin near, and called to the cook : 
 
 " A whole one, boys ! " Then, turning to us : 
 " No one will be able to say that we did not kill 
 the fatted lamb for you." 
 
 The cook, squatting by the fire, rose, walked 
 over to an opening at one side of the cave, and 
 called : 
 
 " A whole one, Steryio ! " 
 
 Returning to the middle of the room, he lifted 
 up a trap-door, which disclosed a large, bricked- 
 up cavity, and began shovelling live coals and 
 brands into it from the fire. 
 
 Mano opened his cigarette case, and offered it 
 to the chief. 
 
 The latter accepted it, and examined its con- 
 tents critically. 
 
 " They are good, Mr Spiropoulo," he said with 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 143 
 
 condescension, " but I believe you will find mine 
 better/' 
 
 From his pocket he drew his own case, and 
 passed it to my brother. 
 
 *' Excellent ! '' exclaimed Mano. " I know the 
 brand/' 
 
 " They were a present from his Holiness, the 
 Bishop of Xanthy/' 
 
 *' Do you still give the church five per cent, of 
 your — your revenues ? '' my brother inquired. 
 " I heard his Holiness mention this devotion of 
 yours to the church.'' 
 
 Our host laughed pleasantly. " So his Holiness 
 said that, did he ? " 
 
 Two men came into the room carrying a lamb 
 made ready for roasting. They held it while a 
 third impaled it on a long iron bar. Then the 
 bar was laid across two iron projections, over the 
 bed of embers, and a handle was fitted to the end 
 of the bar. One of the brigands squatted down 
 and began slowly turning the spit, and the others 
 shovelled more embers into the cavity under- 
 neath the lamb. We could feel the heat even 
 where we sat. 
 
 We all watched with interest the man rhythmi- 
 cally turning the lamb over the fire. Gradually 
 he began to hum a song in time to his turning. 
 It was one of the folk songs about the Armateloi 
 and Kleftai, those patriotic bandits who waged 
 a guerrilla warfare against the Turks for years 
 
144 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 before the Revolution broke out in 1821. It is a 
 period dear to the hearts of all Greeks ; for it 
 prepared and trained the men who, during the 
 terrible nine years of the Revolution, were to 
 stand up against and defeat the enormous armies 
 of Turkey. 
 
 It is a period unique in the history of any nation, 
 a period full of grandeur of individual achieve- 
 ment, and it has been immortalized in Lazk poetry. 
 I do not believe that there is a Greek to-day who 
 does not know at least some of these long poems, 
 composed by the Armateloi themselves, put to 
 music by themselves, and transmitted to us by 
 word of mouth, from father to son. 
 
 As the brigand at the spit went on with his 
 song, it was taken up like an anthem by others, 
 \vho began to swarm out of little cubby-holes in 
 the sides of the cave, which were hidden from view 
 by hanging sheep-skins. They squatted around 
 the roasting lamb, or stretched themselves on the 
 ground, and snatched at the song, here, there, 
 anywhere ; and the fumes of the meat mingled 
 with the song, and the song became part of the 
 meat ; and all blended with the vaulted room, 
 and the glorious white fustanella gleaming in the 
 firelight. 
 
 One must be born under an alien yoke to 
 understand what the love of one's fatherland 
 is. Until the last year the Greeks may have 
 gained little in the estimation of the world. 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 145 
 
 since a small portion of them wrenched them- 
 selves free from the Turkish yoke. But those 
 who condemn them must remember that since 
 the time of Alexander the Great, the Greeks 
 have passed from one conqueror to another — 
 escaping annihilation only by rendering their 
 conquerors themselves Greeks in literature and 
 thought. At last they fell under the yoke of a 
 race which neither could learn their language nor 
 cared for their civilization, and for four hundred 
 years they dwelled under this Asiatic dominion. 
 
 On this night, in the brigands' cave, I under- 
 stood the power Greece had over her sons. These 
 men were nothing but cut-throats. They would 
 kill or mutilate a man for money : yet as they 
 sang the songs of those other, more glorious 
 brigands, who had striven for years in desperate 
 fighting against the conquerors of their race, they 
 seemed to be touched by something ennobling. 
 Their faces shone with that light which comes 
 from the holiest of loves — patriotism. 
 
 They sang with fervour, and when they 
 came to the parts relating victories over the 
 Turks, they clapped their hands and shouted, 
 " So I so I " 
 
 From one song they passed to another, while the 
 lamb ever turned in time to the music, and men 
 brought chestnuts, potatoes, and onions, and 
 roasted them in the edge of the smaller fire — 
 always singing. 
 
146 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Of a sudden one man broke into a gay little 
 song of the monasteries : 
 
 *' How they rubbed the pepper, those deviUsh monks ! " 
 
 To the giddy words and the infectious tune, a 
 dozen men sprang to their feet. They held out 
 their handkerchiefs to each other, and instantly 
 there was a garland of dancing brigands about 
 the fire. It was our national dance, the Syrto, 
 and they went through it with gusto and passion. 
 
 By the time that was over, the lamb was 
 cooked. We were invited to sit round in a circle ; 
 the meat was torn apart with the hands, and a 
 piece dealt to each person. 
 
 Each brigand crossed himself three times, and 
 then fell to, ravenously. I enjoyed my dinner as 
 much as they. My poor brother pretended to. 
 As I learned afterwards, he was afraid that the 
 brigands would kill us from mere annoyance, 
 when they discovered that we were not the rich 
 pair they believed they had in their possession. 
 
 The meal over, the brigands crossed them- 
 selves again devoutly, and thanked God, and His 
 Son Christ, for the protection they had hither- 
 to extended to them. Then they began to talk 
 of their exploits. Far from being conscience- 
 stricken, or in any way ashamed of their pro- 
 fession, they gloried in it ; and being in constant 
 warfare with the Turkish soldiery, thy felt a 
 really patriotic pride in their manner of life. 
 
 They told of running a certain Turkish officer 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 147 
 
 through the heart without the sHghtest pity for 
 the man, or shame of the deed. Was he not a 
 Turk, their arch enemy, and the enemy of their 
 race ? Their point of view on the ethics of Hfe 
 was quite original to me, and as they boasted 
 of the things they had done, something bar- 
 baric in me responded to their recitals. I loved 
 them, and as for their leader, he was a real 
 hero to me. 
 
 Again they passed from themselves to the 
 heroic period of the Armateloi and Kleftai, when 
 brigandage attained its apotheosis. 
 
 After the fall of Constantinople, the Greeks 
 were powerless against the Turks. The other 
 powers of Europe, during two hundred years, 
 were too frightened to think of more than saving 
 their own skins ; and when, later, they did inter- 
 fere in behalf of the Christians under the Ottoman 
 yoke, they did so only as an excuse for their 
 personal gain. 
 
 Thus the Greeks had to depend on themselves, 
 and in time the flower of Greek manhood took to 
 the mountains. Then the wrongs done by the 
 Turks, to their weak and defenceless fellow- 
 countrymen, were fiercely and brutally punished 
 by these brigands. It was these Armateloi and 
 Kleftai who put an end to the human tax which 
 the Greeks had been forced to pay the conqueror. 
 If a little girl was taken by force from a Greek 
 home, the brigands would fall upon a Turkish 
 
148 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 village, and avenge the wrong on the women and 
 children of the Turks. 
 
 It was a very rough form of justice ; but 
 gradually the Turks began to fear the brigands, 
 and in this fear they became more considerate 
 toward the Greeks. 
 
 That period, with all its ferocity and unspeak- 
 able brutality, was the period of modern Greek 
 chivalry ; for those men did not attack for 
 money. They levied on the people merely for 
 enough to live ; but when they descended on 
 them as avengers of their countrymen's wrongs 
 they were merciless — and they did rob the 
 Turkish garrisons. In the Revolution of 1821, 
 much of the powder used by the Greeks was 
 Turkish powder, and many a Turk died by a gun 
 he once had carried. 
 
 My brigands knew every one of the ballads of 
 that time. They snatched them from each 
 other's mouths, and recited them with no little 
 talent and dramatic power. They passed on to 
 the Revolution itself, and to the poetry which 
 followed afterward. It was then Mano and I 
 joined in. At that time I knew the poetry of the 
 Revolution better than I have ever known any 
 other subject since. Mano and I recited to them 
 the poems of Zalakosta and of Soutzo, of Papar- 
 ighopoulo, and of the other great poets who 
 were inspired by the exploits of the Greeks from 
 1821 to 1829. 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 149 
 
 The enthusiasm of the brigands became tre- 
 mendous. These poems, unHke those of the 
 Armateloi and Kleftai, are written in pure 
 Greek, not in the Lazk language, and naturally 
 they belong to the educated classes rather than 
 to the people. My brother egged me on to 
 recite, in a way foreign to his nature. 
 
 1' Tell them the ' Chani of Gravia,' " he cried. 
 
 This poem is one of the finest of modem Greek 
 poems. It relates a fight which took place in an 
 inn, during the Revolution, between a handful of 
 Greeks and a Turkish army. In the middle of 
 the night, during a lull in the fighting, the leader 
 tells his men that death is certain, and that the 
 only thing left them is to cover death with glory. 
 It describes how, each seizing his arms, they 
 burst forth upon their sleeping foes, and by 
 the miracle that sometimes attends on noble 
 courage cut their way through, and every man 
 escaped. 
 
 In part, the poem may be apocryphal, but it 
 is founded on fact, and thrills us to the marrow 
 of our bones. It substantiates our claim to be 
 descendants of the old, heroic Greeks. As I 
 recited to them the '' Chani of Gravia,*' the 
 brigands fell under its spell ; and some of the 
 love they felt for that glorious fight fell upon 
 me too. I became a small part of that poem 
 into which I was initiating them. 
 
 After I had finished, one of them called hoarsely : 
 
150 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Say it again ! " 
 
 I repeated it again, from beginning to end. 
 
 When the last Une was ended, some of the men 
 were weeping. 
 
 " We shall yet drive out the Turks — by the 
 help of God, we shall ! " 
 
 They were still deeply moved by the poem 
 when my brother spoke to them. 
 
 " Pallikariay you have just heard the little girl 
 reciting to you what can only be learned in an 
 educated home." He turned to the leader : 
 *' You cannot now believe that the child's un- 
 fortunate accent is an affectation, acquired in 
 the last few months. Pallikaria, you cannot for 
 a moment think that my little sister is the 
 Spiropoulo girl, coming out of a parvenu home, 
 with money the only tradition." 
 
 Again he turned to the leader : 
 
 " I take it that you speak French. Speak to 
 her and to me in it, and satisfy yourself that 
 we know it. Some of your men here are from 
 Albania, and undoubtedly they know Italian. 
 She can talk with them in that language. Will 
 not all this prove to you that she has lived out 
 of Anatolia all her short life ? " 
 
 " Who are you then ? " cried the leader, but 
 before we could answer he ordered us to remain 
 quiet. He disappeared behind a sheep-skin, and 
 returned with a paper and pencil, which he handed 
 to my brother. '* Write here your name and 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 151 
 
 that of the little girl. Write also from where you 
 come, and whither you are going/' 
 
 My brother wrote all he was asked to, and 
 returned the paper to the leader. 
 
 The latter read it, surprise and anger mingling 
 on his face. He turned to me : 
 
 " Your name ? " 
 
 I gave it. 
 
 " Your brother's ? " 
 
 I gave that, too. 
 
 " Where have you come from ? " 
 
 I told him. 
 
 " And where are you going ? " 
 
 Again I told him. 
 
 He tore the paper into bits, in a fury. 
 
 '* Anathema on your heads, you idiot palli- 
 karia \" he cried. " You have captured the 
 wrong people, while the others are now escap- 
 ing us.'' 
 
 " I happen to have read in the paper," put 
 in Mano, " that Spiropoulo and his sister are 
 going by boat to Myrsina, and thence to their 
 homes." 
 
 There was consternation among the bandits. 
 
 " We have very little," my brother continued. 
 " Take what we have, and let us go." 
 
 " Oh, please ! please ! " I implored, " do not 
 take my ring. It is the only piece of jewellery 
 left to me." 
 
 " Here ! here ! " one of the men exclaimed ; 
 
152 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " we are not in the habit of sheering lambs — it's 
 sheep's wool we are after, eh, captain ? " 
 
 The leader did not reply to him. He was re- 
 garding us, more in sorrow than in anger. 
 
 *' When I shook hands with you to-night," he 
 remarked, " I felt as if I were shaking hands with 
 thousands of golden pounds. And now " 
 
 He wagged his head, like a good man upon 
 whom Fate has played a scurvy trick. 
 
 *' We shall get Spiropoulo yet," said one of the 
 men hopefully. *' He has entirely too much 
 money, and we have too little. Our motto is 
 ' Equal Division.' " 
 
 " You're right, pallikari," another assented, 
 and the two shook hands. 
 
 By this time it was the small hours of the 
 morning, and the party began to break up. 
 
 Some of the men rose to their feet, put on their 
 kosocks, saluted the leader, and started off on their 
 business. By the entrance was a large icon of 
 St George, their patron saint. Each brigand, 
 before going out, halted in front of the icon, made 
 the sign of the cross, and reverently kissed the 
 hand of the saint. 
 
 " Come with me, my holy Saint," each implored. 
 
 I almost giggled at the idea of St George going 
 with them and assisting in the capture of harm- 
 less men. 
 
 Then the lanterns in the cave were put out ; 
 but first two small oil lamps were lighted, one to 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 153 
 
 be placed in front of the icon of St George, and 
 the other in front of an icon of the Virgin Mary, 
 which stood in the depth of the cave ; for no 
 pious Greek will leave the icon of a saint in 
 darkness, and many poor persons will go without 
 food in order to buy the necessary ''oil of 
 kandilla " for their icons. 
 
 All of the remaining brigands, before lying down 
 on their sheep-skins, stood for a minute in front 
 of the icon of the Virgin silently saying their 
 prayers ; and then I heard them saying aloud, 
 after kissing the feet of Mary : 
 
 '* Guard us and keep us healthy and strong, 
 our dear little mother; and now good night, 
 little mistress of heaven/' 
 
 They crossed themselves with a piety befitting 
 monks, and I had to stuff my handkerchief into 
 my mouth to keep from betraying myself. 
 
 Then slumber descended upon the cave. The 
 fire had died down, and only the dim rays of the 
 two little oil lamps illumined the great room. 
 
 It was harder for us to go to sleep than it 
 was for the brigands. In the first place, the 
 sheep-skins they had given us were alive with 
 fleas. Mano lay close to me, keeping his arm 
 around me. 
 
 The events of the day had excited me tre- 
 mendously, and my brain would not rest. When 
 we alone seemed to be awake, I whispered : 
 
 " What was that blood which frightened our 
 
154 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 horses ? Had the brigands already killed some 
 one ? " 
 
 '' No, I believe it was only the blood of some 
 animal. They often sprinkle the road with it 
 in order to terrorize the horses and assist in cap- 
 turing the travellers. But now you must go to 
 sleep." 
 
 I was young ; I had ridden many long hours ; 
 and fleas or no fleas, brigands or no brigands, I 
 fell asleep. 
 
 The strong smell of coffee wakened me in the 
 morning. My brother already held a cup of it. 
 
 '* Did you sleep well ? " he asked. 
 
 '' I must have — but look at my hands ! " 
 They were dotted with red bites. 
 
 The cave had lost something of its romantic 
 appearance of the night. There were only three 
 brigands in the room, and they were busy pre- 
 paring food. One of them got a towel, or what 
 served for one, put a few drops of water on the 
 end of it — water seemed to be very scarce with 
 them — and brought it to me to wash my face 
 and hands. He was a very kind young brigand. 
 He brought me some food, and a cup of the 
 strongest coffee I ever tasted. 
 
 He watched me eat as if he had been my nurse, 
 and when I was finished, asked a trifle sheepishly : 
 
 '' How did you learn so much poetry ? " 
 
 " Out of books/' I replied. 
 
 '' Then you can write, too ? " 
 
THE MASTER OF THE FOREST 155 
 
 '* Very well/' I asserted complacently. 
 
 He became visibly embarrassed. Finally he 
 blurted out : 
 
 '* Just write out for me the ' Chani of 
 Gravia.' Write it twice — no, three times, for 
 I shall always want to read it two or three 
 times." 
 
 I not only wrote it twice for him, but taught 
 him to spell it out — or rather to memorize it ; for 
 his scholarship was very rudimentary, while his 
 memory was excellent. I spent most of the time 
 in this occupation. 
 
 During the course of the day we were told, 
 quite unsensationally, that in the evening we 
 might continue our journey. 
 
 At nightfall we parted from the brigands with 
 cordial expressions of friendship on both sides. 
 They shook hands with us, and many of them 
 assured us they had enjoyed our stay very much, 
 and were sorry to see us go. Only the leader 
 was sulky in his manner. " I thought you two 
 were worth thousands of pounds," he repeated 
 grudgingly. 
 
 '' The ' Chani of Gravia ' was worth all the 
 trouble we took," my pupil hastened to say, as 
 if he feared we might be hurt by the lack of 
 cordiality in his chief. 
 
 We were again blindfolded, and two of the 
 men led us out of the cave and back to the place 
 where they had captured us. 
 
156 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 How they had obtained horses, I cannot 
 imagine, but we found horses waiting for us. 
 
 I rode away with an exhilaration I could not 
 calm. 
 
 " If I were a man,'' I said emphatically to my 
 brother, " I should become a brigand. It is a 
 beautiful life." 
 
 For the leader, with his curling hair and his 
 black moustache, I felt an especial admiration, 
 in spite of his stand-offishness. He was long my 
 ideal of a hero ; and it was one of the bitterest 
 disappointments of my girlhood when, some years 
 later, in a fight between his band and an over- 
 whelming number of Turkish soldiers, he alone 
 of all his men put up a pitiful fight, and died like 
 a coward. 
 
 I wept when I read about it, not for him, but 
 for my lost ideal — for the trust and admiration I 
 had placed on a man not worthy to be a leader of 
 Greek brigands. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 ALI BABA, MY CAIQUE-TCHI 
 
 OUR return journey to Constantinople 
 was uneventful. There we found our 
 mother, who had decided to spend the 
 winter in the town and not on the island. I was 
 not supposed to be well enough yet to resume 
 my studies seriously. My brother left us shortly 
 for Europe again. 
 
 It would have been a dreary and miserable 
 winter for me, away from my home and the 
 country, separated from my playmates and 
 cooped up in small city rooms, with only build- 
 ings to look at on all sides, had it not been 
 for a discovery I made. By accident I stumbled 
 upon a big volume of Byzantine history, a history, 
 till then, practically unknown to me. 
 
 As page after page gave forth its treasures, 
 my interest in the people of which it wrote 
 increased, and loneliness and boredom departed, 
 not to return again that winter. After I 
 finished the book it came over me that all 
 these marvellous things I had been reading 
 about had taken place yonder, at Stamboul, 
 half an hour from where I sat. Instantly the 
 
 157 
 
158 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 desire took possession of me to re-read that history, 
 chapter by chapter, then cross over to Stamboul 
 and find the actual places mentioned. 
 
 This was not so easy to accomplish as one might 
 think; for I had to reckon with the elders, who would 
 have a thousand and one objections to my going 
 over to the Turkish city. I went immediately to 
 my mother, and without any preamble — which I 
 knew to be the best way, in order to take her 
 breath away — told her of my project, speaking 
 of it casually as if it were as simple as drinking 
 a glass of water. 
 
 She gave me the puzzled look with which she 
 often regarded my little person. I believe that 
 every time I came before her she wondered anew 
 how I happened to be her child ; for she was tall 
 and beautiful, and very conventional in her 
 desires, and I was small and elfish, and my desires 
 were usually for things she could not imagine any 
 person wanting. After I had finished speaking, 
 she replied quietly : 
 
 *' What you ask is out of the question ; for we 
 have no one, you know, who can waste so much 
 time every week accompanying you.'' 
 
 " I don't want anyone," I replied. '' I would 
 much rather go alone.'" 
 
 The puzzled expression in her eyes deepened. 
 " Go alone — over there ? But I have never been 
 there alone in all my life." 
 
 '' I know that, mamma, but you know per- 
 
ALI BABA, MY CAIQUE-TCHI 159 
 
 fectly well that there are a great many things you 
 never did, or will ever bring yourself to do, which 
 I have already done. Besides,'' I pleaded, " my 
 father is dead now ; my brother is away ; you 
 took me from my home and brought me to this 
 horrid town, and you don't even let me go to 
 school on account of my weak lungs — and what 
 is there left for me to do ? " 
 
 " Well, well," my mother compromised, " you 
 had better let me think it over, child." 
 
 The result of her thinking culminated in my 
 being accompanied to the former capital of the 
 great Byzantine Empire by an uninterested and 
 unsympathetic female elder. 
 
 It was an utter failure, this my first attempt at 
 archaeological research. The elder, besides being 
 unsympathetic, had a supercilious way of talking, 
 and prided herself on her ignorance. Before the 
 afternoon was at an end she became tired and 
 cross, and then coaxed me, saying : '' Why don't 
 we go and see the lovely jewels and silks 
 in the market, and there I shall treat you to a 
 plate of taouk-okshu/* 
 
 I agreed at once, not because I was willing 
 to sell my Byzantine interests for a plate of 
 sweets, but because her presence spoiled my 
 pleasure. 
 
 That evening my mother and I had a conversa- 
 tion of an animated nature, a conversation which 
 was continued the next day and yet the next, 
 
i6o A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 and grew more animated with each session, until 
 on my side it reached stormy heights — and my 
 mother's nature abhorred storms ; so I obtained 
 the coveted permission of going alone to the 
 city of Byzantium. 
 
 '' Mind though, baby," she cautioned, " don't 
 ever cross the Golden Horn in a boat. You must 
 always go by the bridge." 
 
 It had not occurred to me to take the boat, 
 but once the suggestion was made, it took pos- 
 session of my brain, and tormented it to such 
 an extent that on arriving at the Galata Bridge 
 my feet turned straight to the quay where the 
 Turkish boatmen were squatted, contemplatively 
 "drinking" their narghiles. 
 
 " A boat ! " I commanded, imitating as far as 
 possible my mother's manner. 
 
 The first man of the row put aside his narghile 
 and rose quietly. Unlike all the other nation- 
 alities in Turkey, the Turks alone never jostle 
 each other for a fare. They have a system of 
 their own which they scrupulously adhere to. 
 
 The catque-tchi who approached at my sum- 
 mons was an old man. He was dressed in full 
 baggy trousers, and wore a white turban on his 
 head. He must have been already old when 
 Sultan Medjid, thirty years previously, had sub- 
 stituted the fez for the turban, and he had not 
 cared to adopt the new head-dress. 
 
 " What does the little hanoum wish ? " 
 
ALI BABA, MY CAIQUE-TCHI i6i 
 
 *' To cross," I replied, with the same haughty 
 manner as before. 
 
 He bent down, unfastened the rope with 
 which his slender, graceful little caique was tied, 
 and I stepped into it and settled myself bliss- 
 fully among the cushions in the bottom. 
 
 Before he had rowed me half-way over I 
 remembered that I had forgotten to strike a 
 bargain with him. " By the way," I said 
 casually ,*' what is your fare ? " 
 
 ''A kourous and a half" (threepence) he said 
 promptly. 
 
 '* What ! *' 1 cried. " If you are not ready to 
 accept half that, you may just as well take me 
 back." 
 
 He stopped rowing. " Take you back ! But 
 where would be the profit ? " 
 
 " I don't know," I replied, " but that's the 
 answer the dead philosopher made to Charon." 
 
 *' If he were dead, how could he make an 
 answer ? " h€ asked. 
 
 Thereupon I found myself in my most favourite 
 pastime — initiating somebody into the Greek 
 writings ; and as I explained to him Lucian's 
 " Dialogues of the Dead," the old Turk listened 
 intently, paddling very slowly, slightly bending 
 toward me, his kind eyes twinkling, his face 
 wreathed in smiles — looking very much like a 
 nice, big, red apple, shrivelled by the frost and 
 sun. 
 
i62 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 By the time I had finished the story of the 
 philosopher, we were approaching the other side 
 of the Golden Horn. 
 
 '* You see," I concluded, " you get more than 
 Charon did out of the transaction ; and besides, 
 since I am going over there three times a week, 
 you may become my regular boatman, and if you 
 are over here with a fare at sunset you may wait 
 for me, and take me back, too — only then I shall 
 pay you one para less." 
 
 It was not because I was of a miserly disposi- 
 tion that I was bargaining so hard ; but I had 
 only one medjedie a month, and the elders in- 
 variably borrowed a part of it back from me, so 
 that I was always in straitened circumstances. 
 
 '* Why are you going over there so often ? " 
 he asked kindly. 
 
 I liked his baggy bloomers, of the colour of the 
 stained glass windows one sees in the old cathe- 
 drals ; I liked his being faithful to the turban, 
 and I fell in love with his kind, beaming old face. 
 Besides, the way he enjoyed the story of the 
 philosopher and Charon convinced me that he 
 was not like most of the dreadful elders — so I 
 told him the reason. 
 
 His oars again became suspended in the air, 
 and he listened with intent interest. 
 
 " Is it in the Koran you read all those things ? " 
 
 " Oh, no," I said, " in a book bigger than the 
 Koran." 
 
ALI BABA, MY CAIQUE-TCHl 163 
 
 " How can that be ? '' he asked incredulously. 
 
 Then I amphfied, and told him of Constantine 
 the Great, of how he left Rome to build a new 
 city, hundreds and hundreds of years before the 
 Turks had even thought of leaving Asia and in- 
 vading Europe. 
 
 His attention to my words delighted me. I 
 had not been so happy for ever so long ; for next 
 to reading books I loved to impart them, since 
 in the telling I tasted them better. They became 
 clearer to me. Besides, sharing things from books 
 is a joy to which there is nothing comparable. 
 
 '' You can read all this ? " he exclaimed 
 admiringly, " you, who are no bigger than my 
 thumb ! But then your people could always 
 read, though they were no kind of fighters and 
 we beat them.'' 
 
 He did not mean to be rude, I knew. It was 
 his direct, oriental way of stating a fact, and I 
 did not resent it. But I did explain to him that 
 in the past we had been very great fighters — 
 though I kindly abstained from telling him how 
 we had fought them in the Revolution, and how 
 we beat them. 
 
 That he was genuinely interested he proved to 
 me when we landed. 
 
 '* Benim kuchouk, hanoum (my little lady) I 
 should love to be your catque-tchi, both ways, 
 and I shall charge you only two paras for each 
 crossing, if you will only tell me what you are 
 
i64 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 going to see every day, and whether you found 
 it over yonder." 
 
 I extended my microscopic hand, and he took 
 it solemnly in his big, horny brown one. 
 
 ** You are a dear, Ali Baba," I cried. I did 
 not know what his name was, but Father Ali 
 seemed to suit him. 
 
 Byzantine history, combined with my search 
 in old Byzantium, and Ali Baba's rapt attention 
 to my expounding of it, made that winter a very 
 happy one. I generally returned when the city 
 was bathed in the sunset light ; and these hours 
 with Ali Baba, listening, his oars poised over the 
 waters of the Golden Horn — truly golden at this 
 hour — were hours of enchantment for me. How 
 could we help becoming fast friends, sharing as 
 we did such magical moments together. I liked 
 him so much that I began to economize and 
 make him presents I thought he needed, such as 
 a new shirt, a new pair of stockings, a new cloth 
 for his turban ; and it almost broke my heart 
 when one evening, as he was landing me on the 
 Constantinople side, he, too, made me a present. 
 It was a very gaudy red and blue handkerchief, 
 filled with raisins and leblebia—3. delectable grain 
 only to be found in Turkey. 
 
 I accepted these, apparently delighted, yet 
 wondering what I was to do with them. It 
 would have been impossible to enter the house 
 and go to my room without having to explain the 
 
ALI BABA, MY CAJQUE-TCHI 165 
 
 handkerchief and its contents — and the hand- 
 kerchief would mean telling about the crossings 
 in the boat, and I did not wish to contemplate 
 what would follow that disclosure. 
 
 With a great deal of heart-aching I had to dis- 
 pose of the sweets. I gave them to some urchins 
 in the street, and my ache in a measure was 
 relieved by the joy they manifested. 
 
 Although this was the only winter I travelled 
 with Ali Baba, I never forgot him. Indeed the 
 bond between us was too great lightly to forget ; 
 and when I came to town I always managed to 
 save a half hour for him. I would go directly 
 to the quay, and if he were not there I would 
 wait for him till he came back from the other 
 side. If he were there, he always rose quickly, 
 unfastened his little caique, and off we were ; 
 only to stop in mid-stream, his oars poised in the 
 air, his kind eyes twinkling, his mouth half- 
 opened with a smile, listening to the things I had 
 to say of books and of travels. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 
 MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 
 
 THE following year I was sent to Paris 
 for my studies, where I was to remain 
 three whole years, without returning 
 home; yet on my first summer holidays my 
 mother changed her mind and sent for me. 
 That summer, too, we were not to spend at 
 our home on the island, but in Pantich, an 
 adorable, sleepy, little Turkish village, on the 
 Asiatic shore of the Marmora. 
 
 Pantich is as far behind the rest of Turkey as the 
 rest of Turkey is behind Europe. Its traditions are 
 those of the Byzantine period, when Constanti- 
 nople was the capital of the Greek Empire. The 
 Turkish quarters cluster around the Tzami, 
 which is built in a square of plantain trees, with 
 a fountain in the middle. The Greek houses 
 make a belt around their little Orthodox Church, 
 with a school on its right and a cemetery on 
 its left. 
 
 And though the Turks and the Greeks are 
 divided like the goats and the sheep, all men 
 wear the fez, and all women veil their faces. 
 
 Only one event ever happened in Pantich : 
 
 16« 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 167 
 
 the coining of the railroad through it. Small 
 wonder that, when the trains began to run, the 
 inhabitants brought their luncheons and sat all 
 day long close to the rails, waiting to see the 
 wonderful thing pass, which ran of its own 
 accord, with a speed beyond the dreams of the 
 fastest horse. Small wonder, too, that the 
 rents of the houses near the track began to 
 go up like speculative stocks in a Wall Street 
 boom. 
 
 The house we took belonged to a Turkish lady, 
 who became at once the great interest of my life, 
 although she was never to be seen. We heard 
 that she was the former wife of dashing young 
 Nouri Pasha, whom we knew on the island of 
 Prinkipo, and who was famous for his looks, his 
 riches, and his many beautiful wives. We trans- 
 acted our business with her through one of her 
 slaves. The lady herself had never been seen 
 since the day she left her husband, eight years 
 before, and came to bury herself in her maternal 
 property here. 
 
 Our house was surrounded by a very large 
 gg.rden and an orchard, the trees of which were 
 so old and so patched that I was never surprised 
 on climbing a cherry tree to find plums growing 
 there, or at the top of a plum tree to discover 
 dzidzifa. It became a game with me to climb 
 the highest trees, to see what would grow on the 
 top branches. These trees were grafted with the 
 
i68 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 greatest ingenuity, not for the fruit, but for the 
 colour scheme in blossom time. 
 
 At the end of our orchard there was a drop of 
 about eight feet, and there began the garden 
 surrounding the house where our proprietess 
 lived. It must have comprised a hundred acres, 
 and ended at the sea. It was not cultivated, 
 like the other properties, but was mostly wood- 
 land, with flowers in the clearings. What I could 
 see of it fascinated and attracted me. I had an 
 idea that if I could penetrate into that garden I 
 should surprise the spirits of the flowers and trees, 
 who, thinking themselves protected from human 
 intrusion, must come forth from their earthly 
 shells to parade under their own shadow. 
 
 We had been in our new, old house for two 
 weeks, and when I was neither reading nor climb- 
 ing the trees I was scheming how to get into the 
 garden. In all my reconnoitring I had never 
 seen or heard a human being in that garden 
 below, and if I had not known that people 
 lived there I should have thought the property 
 abandoned. 
 
 My mother went away for the week-end. It 
 was early afternoon, and the entire universe was 
 at siesta. I chose that hour to make a still 
 closer search for a means of getting down those 
 eight feet, to roam the beckoning garden. If 
 discovered, of course, I should have to pretend 
 that I had fallen in accidentally. 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 169 
 
 I came as near to the edge as I could, and before 
 I knew it, down went the stones under my feet, 
 and down went I, followed by more stones. In 
 falling my teeth cut my lip, and made it bleed. 
 
 I lay partially stunned, but certain I was not 
 badly hurt ; for all my limbs had answered to 
 the call of my little brain. Then I heard the 
 pit-pat of running feet, and waited to see what 
 would happen. 
 
 A young woman came and bent over me. 
 
 '* Yavroum, are you hurt ? *' she asked. 
 
 " No '' I answered. 
 
 " But you are bleeding ! " she exclaimed in a 
 horrified tone. 
 
 She was joined by another woman, somewhat 
 older, who was out of breath from running. 
 
 " Is she dead ? " she cried. 
 
 " It will take more than this to kill me," I 
 declared, and moved to get up. 
 
 " No ! no ! Be still. We will carry you to 
 our mistress," they commanded. 
 
 Willingly I obeyed. One took hold of my 
 shoulders, and the other of my feet, and they 
 carried me to a small summer-house, in a grove 
 of cypresses. A tall slender woman dressed in 
 the green of the grass half rose from a couch. 
 
 " Is she hurt, Leila ? " she asked, and it was 
 as if I were a little bird fallen from its nest, 
 so remote and impersonal was the interest 
 manifested in her voice. If at the time I 
 
170 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 had been familiar with Maeterhnck, I should 
 have thought that I was a minor actor in one 
 of his unreal plays, and the lady in green the 
 leading character. 
 
 " She's bleeding, mistress." 
 
 " Then you had better carry her into the 
 house." 
 
 She rose and preceded us. Her walk, like her 
 speech, seemed remote from common earth, and 
 to my half-closed eyes she seemed to float along, 
 not to proceed step by step, as do common 
 mortals. 
 
 They carried me into the vast hall of her house, 
 paved with cement, and ending in a balcony 
 overhanging the sea of Marmora, and laid me on 
 a couch. The mistress of the house sat by me, and 
 touched my cheek lightly with one of her fingers. 
 
 " Get some fresh water, Leila," she commanded. 
 
 The younger of the two slaves lifted an iron 
 cover in the middle of the hall, and dropped down 
 an old black iron bucket, which, after a long 
 minute, touched water in the depths of the earth. 
 The water she brought me was icy cold. They 
 bathed my mouth, and put a wet towel on my 
 head. Inwardly I was laughing at all this atten- 
 tion ; but I was quite content. 
 
 When the bleeding stopped, the lady ordered 
 a sherbet. It was made of fresh cherries, cool 
 and sweet, and I ate it with great relish. Then 
 the lady in her soft, remote voice crooned : 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 171 
 
 " You are the baby of my new tenants, are 
 you not ? " 
 
 " I am not a baby/' I answered, insulted. " I'm 
 quite grown up, only I'm undersized — and all my 
 frocks are three years old. But because they are 
 in good condition, and I can't outgrow them 
 enough, I must keep on wearing them." 
 
 She laughed. " I have been watching you 
 since you came here, and it seems to me wonder- 
 ful that you haven't been killed several times. 
 Why do you keep on climbing those trees ? " 
 
 '' To get my afternoon tea up there," I 
 answered. *' Besides which it keeps me thin." 
 
 The light of amusement danced in her eyes, 
 but she did not laugh again. 
 
 '' I can see what you think in your eyes," I 
 said. *' You think that what I need is fattening. 
 My family takes care of that ; for I am made to 
 swallow everything from vin de quinquina to any 
 other drug they may see advertised, with or 
 without the consent of the doctor. And if I 
 were to get fat they would then start on the 
 opposite drugs." 
 
 At this she burst forth into peals of laughter, 
 and in the midst of her laughing she said : "I 
 do believe you are older than you look." 
 
 I gave a jump and sat upright. The two 
 slaves, who were standing over me with their 
 arms crossed, exclaimed in unison : " She must 
 not move, mistress, she must not move ! " 
 
172 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Now lie down, like a little dear, and tell me 
 how old you are." 
 
 " To show you how old I am/' I said proudly 
 and priggishly, " I may tell you that I have 
 finished my Greek studies, and have been a year 
 in Paris. I return there again in September." 
 
 " In Paris ! You have been in Paris ? " she 
 asked reverently, losing some of the remote- 
 ness in her voice. 
 
 I was pleased to notice the interest I was 
 arousing in her. 
 
 " Oh, I have been there several times before, 
 only now I am there as a student." 
 
 " I am going to send word to your mother that 
 you fell into my garden, that you are a little 
 hurt, and that I shall keep you all the afternoon." 
 
 " You needn't trouble yourself," I said, *' for 
 there's nobody at home but the maids. I shall 
 be all alone for two days now." 
 
 " Indeed ! " Her eyes shone with pleasure. 
 " Then perhaps you would like to spend those 
 two days with me ? " 
 
 " I should love to," I cried, " but I must first 
 make a little confession." 
 
 She leaned over me and forced me to lie down. 
 She was still quite Maeterlinckian. 
 
 " What is your confession ? " 
 
 " The reason I fell into your garden," I 
 proceeded very quickly, " was because I was 
 reconnoitring how to manage to fall into it. I 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 173 
 
 wanted very much to see your garden — and 
 you." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 ** For many reasons," I answered diplomatically. 
 
 " Give them to me." 
 
 *' W-e-1-1, you have lived here for years now, 
 without ever leaving the place." 
 
 " I don't know of anyone in Pantich who ever 
 does leave it." 
 
 " Y-e-s, I know ; but you are different." 
 
 She leaned over me with the look of a severe 
 fairy in her large dark eyes. 
 
 ** You just tell me why you wished to see me." 
 
 " All the truth ? " I asked. 
 
 " All the truth." 
 
 " Well, for the romance which surrounds you. 
 You left Nouri Pasha and his beautiful houses to 
 come and live here, in this very old house, in a 
 place where nothing ever happens. Besides I 
 imagined you to be very beautiful." 
 
 *' And do you find me as beautiful as you 
 thought me ? " 
 
 *' I don't know. All I can think of when I 
 look at you is — a fountain " 
 
 *' To call me a fountain is almost like a wicked 
 jest," she interrupted. "A fountain gives con- 
 stantly forth the riches of its waters." 
 
 " But the fountain you remind me of had no 
 waters. It was a big fountain, in the middle of 
 which sat a bronze lady looking exactly like you. 
 
174 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 The waters were to pour forth from her two 
 extended hands — but none came. The gardener 
 told me they had lost the key, and they had 
 never been able to unlock it. And, as there were 
 many more fountains in the place, they did not 
 bother." 
 
 A cloud passed over her face. 
 
 " Then I am like your fountain.'* 
 
 She sat drooping, her hands clasped in her lap, 
 gazing before her with that gaze which sees not 
 the seen world. At length she shook off this 
 mood and turned to the slave : 
 
 " Leila, go to the little bird's home, and say 
 she is with us, and that I shall keep her till her 
 mother returns. And you, Mihri, can go and 
 make the room next to mine ready for this 
 little child." 
 
 " Please don't call me ' little child,' " I ex- 
 claimed. *' I am fourteen years old, and at my 
 age my great-grandmother was married and had 
 
 a son." 
 
 She paid no heed to my words, seeming to be 
 lost in her own thoughts. 
 
 " When you go to Paris somebody accompanies 
 you, of course." 
 
 " Not always. I know all the captains of the 
 Fabre Line, and all the officers. I am placed in 
 their care, and at Marseilles I take the train, and 
 reach Paris the same day, where I am met. Any- 
 way, I could go to the end of the world by myself." 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 175 
 
 The word Paris seemed to possess the power to 
 give her whatever semblance to Ufe she could 
 acquire. 
 
 *' But sometimes somebody may go with you 
 as a companion — yes ? " 
 
 " Yes," I assented. 
 
 She rose, and crossing the vast hall, stood on 
 the balcony overhanging the sea. When she 
 came back to me her eyes seemed changed. They 
 were larger, deeper, and full of mystery. She 
 was more than ever like the Lady of the Locked 
 Fountain. 
 
 "I am very glad you fell to-day into my 
 garden. I think — I — shall like you." She sat 
 down comfortably by me, cross-legged, her long 
 string of amber beads held in her clasped hands. 
 " Tell me, what do you do with the books you 
 are so interested in when you are not trying to 
 dig your grave by climbing the trees ? " 
 
 " I read them," I answered puzzled. 
 
 " Read ? Read what ? " 
 
 " Just read," I answered again. *' Don't you 
 read ? " 
 
 She shook her head. 
 
 '* Don't you ever read anything ? " I exclaimed, 
 for my own life was made up of books. Then 
 the suspicion came to me that perhaps she 
 did not know how. " Can't you read ? " I 
 asked. 
 
 " I learned when I was a child ; and I can still 
 
176 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 read the Koran, where I know it pretty well, and 
 some poetry." 
 
 " Then you do read poetry ? " 
 
 " Not now ; for I know my poems by heart." 
 
 " I stared at her in amazement. You don't 
 know by heart all the poems in the world, do 
 you ? " 
 
 '* No, unless all the poems in the world are 
 ten," she answered smiling. 
 
 I pondered a minute over her state of mind. 
 " I think I should go mad unless I had books to 
 read," I observed. 
 
 " What is in them ? " she asked, more simply 
 than I had ever asked about anything in my life. 
 At that moment she was a pure Asiatic, descended 
 from a thousand Asiatic ancestors, from whom 
 the books have kept their secrets. *' What is in 
 them ? " she repeated. *' Aren't they all alike ? " 
 
 " Each book is the history of a human being, 
 or of a whole race ; and sometimes it takes books 
 and books to tell you about the one or the other." 
 
 *' How many have you read in all ? " 
 
 '* Thousands," I answered vaingloriously. 
 
 ** And do you love them all ? " 
 
 I shook my head. " No, there are horrid 
 books, as there are horrid people ; but most of 
 them are beautiful, full of the lives and stories 
 of people who have lived and dreamed and done 
 things in the world." 
 
 ** Tell me some of them." 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 177 
 
 She bent her head and Hstened, while I told 
 her some of my favourite tales ; and as I talked 
 she became excited, and laughed when the 
 stories were funny, and cried if they were sad. 
 
 During the two days I spent with her, I re- 
 lated many of the books I had read ; and at the 
 end of my stay we were close friends, for if I was 
 a child in years she was one in experience. And 
 she was so delightfully simple, with a simplicity 
 which must have made God glad to have created 
 human beings. 
 
 If she was ignorant of books, she was curiously 
 full of ideas concerning things she had observed. 
 Because she lived in solitude and watched the 
 sky, she knew all the stars — not by their 
 scientific names, but by ones she invented for 
 herself. As we sat on the balcony over the 
 water she told me that at certain seasons of the 
 year a large luminous star kept watch over the 
 opposite side of the Marmora. She called it the 
 Heavenly Lily, and knew the exact hour it ap- 
 peared every night, and how long it would stay. 
 She told me that the coming of certain stars had 
 to do with the growth of certain flowers and 
 crops. She spoke of them not as stars, but as 
 heavenly watchers, whose earthly worshippers 
 were the flowers. The water she referred to as 
 the earth's milk. She disliked the winds, but she 
 loved the storms, '' because they proved that 
 Allah could lose his temper. It is nice," she 
 
 M 
 
178 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 added in a very low tone, as if afraid that he 
 might hear her, " it's nice to feel that Allah him- 
 self has failings." 
 
 But if she were ready to talk of her thoughts, 
 there was a certain aloofness about her which 
 exempted her personal affairs from discussion. 
 Indeed I still had the impression of talking with 
 the bronze lady of the fountain. This attitude 
 of hers several times arrested on the tip of my 
 tongue the sentence : " Why did you leave 
 handsome Nouri Pasha ? " 
 
 Just before I went away, she asked, a propos 
 of nothing, '' When do you leave for Paris ? " 
 
 " At the end of September, or may be the first 
 week in October." 
 
 '' It is a very long way off," she murmured, 
 half to herself. 
 
 '' It will pass quickly enough." 
 
 She remained silent, in that silence which is 
 full of whispers. One felt the talking of her 
 thoughts. 
 
 After this first visit it became a habit of hers 
 to send for me often to spend entire afternoons 
 with her. She let me climb her trees and gather 
 fruit for our afternoon meal, while the slaves 
 drew cool water from the well. 
 
 When our friendship was a few weeks old I 
 asked her : "Do you like living here all alone in 
 this old house ? Nouri Pasha has so many other 
 houses, both on the island and on the Bosphorus, 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 179 
 
 which are ever so much nicer than this old one. 
 Why don't you take one of those ? " 
 
 " This is not Nouri Pasha's house," she cor- 
 rected me. " This is my own house. I was 
 bom here, and I love it. You mustn't call it old, 
 otherwise it will be offended, and its shadow will 
 grow dark when you come into it." 
 
 I did not say anything for a while, and it was 
 she who spoke again. 
 
 " You know Nouri Pasha then ? " 
 
 " Oh, yes. He lives near us on the island, and 
 I love the horses he rides. They are so large and 
 shiny ; and I can tell it is his carriage from very 
 far off, because he has so many unnecessary 
 chains on the harness, which dangle and make 
 a fuss." 
 
 She laughed like a child at this description, and 
 I, encouraged by the laugh, asked boldly : 
 
 " Did you love him very much ? " 
 
 " I think so," she replied simply. 
 
 " Frightfully ? " 
 
 The girlish adverb amused her. 
 
 " Perhaps — even so." 
 
 As she said the last words her voice became 
 remote, her eyes took on their unhuman expres- 
 sion, and she turned again into the Lady of the 
 Fountain. Yet her lips opened, and she said : 
 
 " Tell me a story, fairy child, a story about 
 Paris." 
 
 And because Alexander Dumas pere has lived 
 
i8o A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 and written, I could tell her of France in dazzling 
 colours, and in dazzling deeds. In the midst of 
 my story she broke in : 
 
 *' Have you ever seen — '* She stopped 
 abruptly. " Go on, go on, dear. Forgive me 
 for interrupting.'* 
 
 " Have I ever seen what ? '' I insisted. 
 
 A forbidding look made me continue my story. 
 
 She became a regular part of my life. I even 
 was obedient at home, for fear that as a punish- 
 ment I might be kept from her. As soon as 
 luncheon was over, I would lie down for my hour 
 of rest, then dress quickly and go to the place 
 where I had first fallen into her garden. There 
 we now had two ropes fastened, for me to slide 
 down. Sometimes she would even be there, 
 ready to catch me before I touched the ground. 
 
 We were fast friends, yet our friendship par- 
 took of the unreal, since she never gave me any- 
 thing except her impersonal thoughts. Of her 
 past life she never spoke, and her heart was as 
 withheld from me as the waters of the fountain 
 to which I had compared her. 
 
 Again one day she began : " Have you ever 
 seen — *' and again broke off, and insisted that she 
 had meant to say nothing, and apologized for 
 not knowing what she wanted to say. 
 
 I pondered a good deal over the unfinished 
 phrase, and finally thought I had found the end 
 of it. So one afternoon when she began for the 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN i8i 
 
 third time, '' Have you ever seen — *' and stopped, 
 I added — " Nouri Pasha's other three wives ? 
 Yes, I have seen them, and if I were a man I'd 
 gladly give all three of them to get you." 
 
 She turned squarely upon me, a look of amaze- 
 ment in her deep brown eyes, which at the 
 moment were full of the light of the sun and 
 appeared golden. Then she exploded into 
 laughter. Peal followed peal, and I was cross at 
 her for making me appear stupid when I had 
 thought myself so clever. 
 
 '* Just what made you think this ? " 
 
 Out of my anger, I answered brutally : " Well, 
 it is quite natural that you should want to know 
 about the women who have supplanted you." 
 
 The instant the words were uttered I repented of 
 them, and I should have tried to gain her pardon, 
 except that she did not even seem to have noticed 
 my brutality. 
 
 " I know how they look," she said calmly : 
 " and men would not agree with you about the 
 exchange. Besides they are all younger than I, 
 the youngest is only three years older than you 
 — only as old as I was when I was married." 
 
 Her voice had been growing colder and colder, 
 and the chill of November frost was on the last 
 word. Fortunately Leila came in with her zither 
 to sing and play. When the time came for me 
 to go away, my friend kissed and patted me for 
 a long time, and said : 
 
i82 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " When the hanoum, your mother, goes away 
 again, will she not let you come and stay with 
 me, if I send word I will be responsible for your 
 neck ? " 
 
 Thus it came about that whenever my mother 
 went off for a week-end, I found myself the guest 
 of my Lady of the Fountain, and slept in the little 
 room off hers. During one of these visits, she 
 came in at night, and sat down near my bed. 
 
 "" When you go to Paris this time, some one 
 will accompany you," she said. 
 
 *' No, I am going alone." 
 
 She shook her head. *' No, no, you will have 
 some one with you, for I am going with you." 
 
 I was amazed to the point of speechlessness. 
 When I regained my tongue I exclaimed : 
 
 " You know perfectly well that the govern- 
 ment will never permit it." 
 
 " Yes. That is why I shall not ask the govern- 
 ment. I have always wanted to see the world, 
 and especially Paris. I never saw how I could 
 do it till you fell into my garden — and I know 
 that I can trust you." 
 
 " But how will you manage it ? " 
 
 *' I shall be your companion." 
 
 ** You can't, you speak neither Greek nor 
 French, Every one will guess you are Turkish." 
 
 *' I can be an Armenian, and as for French I 
 am going to leam it. We have time. You can 
 teach me." 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 183 
 
 Nothing delighted me more than an adventure 
 — and such an uncommon one. Until late into 
 the night we talked about her trip, studying it in 
 its various aspects. We decided that I should first 
 write to the convent where I stayed in Paris to 
 ask if they would take an Armenian lady. Later 
 I was to write to the Compagnie Fabre and 
 engage her stateroom. " But the passport," I 
 cried suddenly. '* You must have a passport, 
 you know, to leave Turkey." 
 
 " Oh, that I have thought of, and I have it all 
 arranged. You know Sourpouy, the Armenian 
 girl, the lace-vendor of the village ? She is tall 
 like me, with brown hair and brown eyes. I shall 
 ask her to go to Athens for me, to buy me some 
 laces there. I shall pay her expenses, and a 
 good commission. She must, of course, have a 
 tesker^ — yes ? " 
 
 " Naturally." 
 
 " Well, she will get it. She will bring it here. 
 I will examine it, and so will Leila. While she 
 examines it, she smokes; but Leila is very 
 awkward — the paper comes near her match, and 
 it burns. You see ? " 
 
 " I see, only " 
 
 " Only what burns is not the passport. I am 
 very angry. I scold Leila, and then Leila says : 
 * It is an omen for you not to send poor Sourpouy, 
 because it means that Sourpouy is going to 
 drown.' And that makes Sourpouy very super- 
 
i84 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 stitious. She will not get another passport, even 
 when I promise more commission — and in this 
 manner, you see, I am left with my passport." 
 
 We laughed happily over her plans, and she 
 astonished me with her common sense and 
 practical knowledge. And she, who had done no 
 studying since she was a little girl, applied her- 
 self to learning French like a poor but ambitious 
 student. 
 
 She arranged the twenty-four letters of the 
 French alphabet in three rows, on a large sheet 
 of paper, and learned them all in two days. Then 
 she cut a hole in another sheet of paper just large 
 enough to permit a single letter to show through, 
 and slipped this about over the alphabet at 
 random, in order to make sure she knew the 
 different letters without regard to their relative 
 positions. In two weeks she was reading fluently 
 in a child's book of stories I had brought her. 
 Of course she did not understand all she was 
 reading, but her progress, nevertheless, was mar- 
 vellous. Since then I have taught many persons 
 French, but never one who learned it so quickly, 
 and her melodious Turkish accent made the 
 French very sweet to hear. 
 
 A dressmaker was engaged to make her some 
 European clothes. This would arouse no sus- 
 picion, since Turkish women often amused them- 
 selves by having a European dress or two made 
 for indoor use. And I was to buy her a hat and 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 185 
 
 a veil. *' If it is not becoming to me, I can buy 
 another in Athens when the boat stops there," 
 she said. 
 
 Our plan was for her to stay all the winter in 
 Paris, and return with me in the spring ; or, if she 
 got tired of Paris, to return with me at Christmas. 
 Her slaves were devoted to her. Leila was her 
 foster-sister, and a childless widow, and knew of 
 no other happiness than to serve her mistress ; 
 and Mihri, who was the elder sister of Leila, 
 knew of no other happiness than to serve the 
 two younger women. The two sisters were to 
 stay at home and pretend that their mistress was 
 ailing, and since she hardly ever went out of the 
 house, or received anyone, it would be an easy 
 matter to hide from the world that the former 
 wife of Nouri Pasha was away from home. 
 
 Our talks now were entirely about our journey. 
 Yet there were times when, with her fingers 
 clasped, and watching the ships on the far 
 horizon, she would lose herself in reverie. Then 
 she seemed to be suddenly inexplicably sad. 
 Once when I was spending a week-end with her, 
 she passed the entire afternoon gazing at the sea, 
 her face immobile and lifeless. 
 
 After I had gone to bed that night, she came 
 to me as was her custom, and kneeled by me to 
 kiss me good night. Of a sudden she put her 
 arms around me, and said quickly, as if she were 
 afraid of her own words : 
 
i86 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " YavroufHy have you ever seen Nouri Pasha's 
 children ? " 
 
 " Yes," I answered, " I have seen them all : 
 the three little girls, and the tiny Httle boy." 
 
 '* Tell me about them." 
 
 I told her all I knew, and especially of the little 
 man who was less than a year old. I had seen 
 him just before we came to spend the summer in 
 Pantich. His mother had been ill ever since his 
 birth and could not nurse him, and thus he had a 
 French nounou, who wore yards and yards of 
 ribbon on her bonnet. 
 
 That night was the first time that my Lady 
 of the Fountain was pathetically human. She 
 thirsted for every scrap of news I was able to 
 give her about these children who were not hers, 
 but the man's who had put her aside. When 
 she left me she did not go to her own room, but 
 downstairs, and I heard her opening the door 
 leading out on the terrace below. Thinking about 
 her I fell asleep, and when, several hours later, I 
 awoke again, the pathos of her life was magnified 
 to me by the darkness and stillness of the night. 
 I rose from my bed, and went to her room, to 
 tell her how much / at least loved her. 
 
 She was not there, and her bed was undisturbed. 
 
 Where could she be ? I crept cautiously down- 
 stairs, and through the open doorway out on the 
 terrace. 
 
 She sat huddled in a comer, watching the sea, 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 187 
 
 in the same attitude which had been hers all that 
 day. Quietly I sat down beside her, my arms 
 stealing around her. She did not speak to me at 
 once, and when she did her voice was unsteady, 
 and shaking with unshed tears. 
 
 " Everything has a purpose in life — even the 
 stars so high and remote — and I alone am pur- 
 poseless. Just because I lost my husband's 
 savage love, I left him, without a word, without 
 an explanation, as if the brutal side of life were 
 all that existed between man and woman. If I 
 had stayed, in spite of the second wife, I might 
 have been of use to him, for I had a good influ- 
 ence over him — and Allah might then have given 
 me a child." She buried her face in her hands. 
 " Allah ! I am so useless — so useless ! " she 
 moaned. 
 
 The silence of the night alone answered her, 
 and I, having no words to comfort her grief, took 
 one of her jasmine-scented hands and kissed it. 
 
 Next morning my Lady of the Fountain had 
 quite recovered her con|posure, and even talked 
 of her coming Paris escapade, but she was pale 
 and worn out, like a battered ship which has met 
 with a storm. 
 
 A few days later I came to bid her good-bye, 
 for this time I was going with my mother on a 
 visit to the island. She put her arms around me 
 as if she did not wish to let me go. Wistfully she 
 said : 
 
i88 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " When you are on the island, could you go to 
 Nouri Pasha's house ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 ** Then go and see the little boy. Kiss him, 
 and bring me a kiss from him. Will you ? *' 
 
 On the day after my arrival on the island I 
 went to the pines, where all the children are 
 taken, but the little fellow was not there. The 
 nurses of his sisters told me that his mother was 
 worse, and wished him kept in the garden so that 
 she could see him from the window. 
 
 Thereupon I went to Nouri Pasha's house. 
 The Breton nurse in all her finery was seated 
 under an awning, the baby on her lap. I talked 
 with her awhile, and begged her to let me hold 
 the baby, which she did. It was a sweet baby, 
 and strong. 
 
 " Is his mother better ? " I asked. 
 
 '* She will never be better, I fear." 
 
 Just then a bell rang out of a window above us, 
 and the nurse got up and took the baby from 
 me, saying : 
 
 " That is for me to bring him to his mother." 
 
 After she had gone I picked up a rattle the 
 baby had dropped to give it to some one. I 
 could find no one about, and the idea came to 
 me to keep it and take it to my Lady of the 
 Fountain. 
 
 Two days later when I entered her apartment 
 and presented it to her, saying it was a present 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN 189 
 
 I had brought her from the island, she took it 
 and examined it with a puzzled expression. 
 Being a European rattle she did not know what 
 it was. 
 
 " What am I to do with it ? " she asked. 
 
 " To play with it," and seeing her more 
 puzzled still I explained to her what it was, and 
 how I had got it. 
 
 She patted it affectionately. " Pretty little 
 toy ! " she murmured ; '* pretty little toy ! I 
 believe it is warm yet from the baby touch." 
 
 Our French lessons made great progress, and 
 her preparations for Paris were completed. The 
 scheme for obtaining a passport worked without 
 a hitch, and word had come from the convent 
 that the lady could be accommodated. 
 
 At last September was with us, and its coming 
 that year was cold and dreary. The tramontana 
 blew daily, the flowers lost their colour and per- 
 fume, and the grass turned pale. Already under 
 the eaves one could hear the bustling swallows, 
 and on a particularly cold day news came, some- 
 how, that Nouri Pasha's youngest wife was 
 dead. 
 
 My Lady of the Fountain wept as if the girl 
 had been her only child ; and between her tears 
 and sobs she kept saying : 
 
 " She was only seventeen — ^and beloved — and 
 the mother of a boy. And now she is dead, 
 
igo A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 leaving the little one motherless. How cruel ! 
 How cruel ! And yet Allah nfiust be just." 
 
 After this event a great change came over her. 
 She was not sad, since it is forbidden Turkish 
 women to continue their sadness for more than 
 a day or two ; yet she was not herself. She was 
 constantly thinking, and her thoughts were not 
 restful. I felt that she did not wish me, and 
 stayed away. 
 
 Then she sent for me. I found her in her own 
 room, writing, the floor littered with torn paper. 
 
 " Oh, yavroum ! " she exclaimed, " I am trying 
 to compose a letter, but it does not come. I 
 have never composed one before. How do you 
 do it ? " 
 
 " You simply say what you have to say." 
 
 " And if what you have to say is that for which 
 your heart cries, how do you say it ? " 
 
 " You say it in the words your heart uses." 
 
 She pondered my advice. 
 
 " Yes, yes, you are right. Make no phrases. 
 Just sit down, yavroum,** She wrote feverishly, 
 and in a few minutes gave a sigh. " It is done ! " 
 
 She folded the paper and put it in her bosom. 
 She was very nice to me, but said nothing further 
 of the letter, and refused to read any French. 
 
 Leila came and played to her, and I went home 
 without learning anything more about it. As it 
 was now the middle of September, and we were 
 to go in ten days, I had my own preparations to 
 
MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN! 191 
 
 make, and did not see my friend for a few 
 days. 
 
 It was again she who sent for me. I found her 
 flushed and excited. She took me in her arms 
 and kissed me with unwonted tenderness. 
 
 '* You have not been here for so long, yavroum, 
 and I have news to tell you. Nouri Pasha will 
 give me the little boy. The French woman will 
 be dismissed, and I shall bring him up like an 
 Osmanli boy." 
 
 " Aren't you going to Paris with me ? " I cried. 
 
 " Oh, no ! no ! I am going to stay here. Come 
 into the house. Come and see how ready we have 
 made the rooms — ready for the young lion, who 
 will be here soon." 
 
 We went all over the house. It had been 
 scrubbed and cleaned as if for a bridegroom. 
 Her own rooms had new curtains, new chintz 
 covers, and was beautifully scented. 
 
 " He will live right here with me — see ! " She 
 pointed to a cradle placed beside her bed. Her 
 face flushed. With one hand she touched the 
 cradle timidly, with the other she pressed her 
 heart, as if to keep it from beating too fast. 
 
 On the boy's arrival, the house was wreathed 
 and decorated. All the flowers of the garden 
 were made into garlands, and festooned outside 
 the house from window to window. The two 
 slaves i wore new gowns. 
 
 Leila received me. " Evvet, evvet, hanoum 
 
192 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 effendi, the young lion has come. He's upstairs 
 with his mother — and she is good to look at." 
 
 I climbed the much beribboned stairs ; for all 
 the old brocades and rare Anatolian shawls were 
 draped over the banisters ; and went to my 
 Lady's room. I found her seated on a couch, 
 all clad in white satin, holding Nouri Pasha's son 
 fast in her arms. 
 
 " Come ! come ! yavroum, come to see him. 
 Isn't he wonderful, and isn't Allah good to me ? " 
 
 "He is a nice baby ; but because you have 
 him you will not go to Paris with me, and you 
 will never, never see the world." 
 
 She gazed up at me as if we had never talked 
 of Paris. '' Oh, yes, Paris," she murmured 
 dreamily. '* That was for my selfish pleasure. 
 But now," she continued with a thrill in her 
 voice, " now I am doing something for the 
 world." 
 
 Her face shone with the light which must be 
 lighted from the divine spark within us, when 
 the self is effaced. She looked more than ever 
 like the Lady of the Fountain — but a fountain 
 unlocked, and giving to the world from its 
 abundant waters. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 
 CHAKENDE, THE SCORNED 
 
 IT was dreary going away to Paris without 
 my Lady of the Fountain, especially since 
 I had made up my mind to have her with 
 me ; but it was a well - deserved punishment 
 for attaching importance to the word of an 
 elder. 
 
 The following two years were years of little to 
 tell. They were filled with studies and books, 
 and books and studies. Black clouds were 
 already thickening on my young horizon, and I 
 knew that sooner or later I should have to en- 
 counter the storm. I had a thousand and one 
 projects for my life. Above all I wanted to 
 become a doctor in order to minister to the 
 Turkish women, who at the time would rather 
 die than see a man doctor. I lived in that dream 
 of wonderful usefulness which was to be mine, 
 and which was to save me from the martyrdom 
 of the women of my race. 
 
 The usual fate of a Greek girl, who has to sit 
 and wait until a marriage is arranged for her, 
 seemed to me the worst thing that could befall 
 me. And if the fate of the Greek girl with 
 
 N 193 
 
194 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 money was terrible, what could I think of a girl 
 like me, who had no dowry ? 
 
 It would mean a ceaseless plotting of all my 
 female relatives to capture a suitable parti. 
 And a man would be a suitable parti if he had 
 money and position, irrespective of any other 
 qualifications. 
 
 For a long time I had secretly resolved to work 
 and fit myself to lead my own life, and be spared 
 the humiliation of being delivered over by my 
 family to some man who would condescend to 
 receive me without being paid for it. Thus these 
 two years in Paris were years of hard work and 
 application. I had moments of intense longing 
 for Turkey and for my old life, which I had 
 to brush aside, and to keep on working. Now 
 and then, enclosed in my mother's letters, came 
 epistles from Djimlah and Nashan, but I never 
 heard from Chakende. 
 
 At the end of two years my mother sent for 
 me again. Since I was now sixteen years old, 
 this did not presage well for me. I knew that, 
 as a penniless girl, I had to be disposed of as soon 
 as possible. The older I grew, the more difficult 
 it would be for my female relatives to make a 
 match for me. 
 
 This was the sword of Damocles hanging over 
 me. It was not that I was averse to being 
 married. On the contrary, in my most adventu- 
 rous schemes I never saw myself an old maid. I 
 
CHAKENDlfe, THE SCORNED 195 
 
 had the inherent hatred of the Greeks for that 
 word. But I wanted to make my own marriage. 
 I considered for some time, before returning to 
 Constantinople. I seriously contemplated dis- 
 obeying the maternal summons and escaping to 
 America ; for America always rose up in my 
 dreams as the land of salvation. Ultimately, I 
 knew that I must go there, if I were to earn my 
 own living ; but I decided to return to Constanti- 
 nople. The longing to see it again was strong 
 upon me, and besides my brother happened to be 
 there at this time ; and as long as he was there 
 I hoped that I should not be handed over, like 
 bargain counter goods, to any man. 
 
 " Ashadnan na Mahomet Rasoul Allah / 
 Bismallah ! 
 Allah-hu-akbar I " 
 
 These were the words chanted, from a minaret 
 near by, in the shrill sweet voice of a young 
 muezzin, as I emerged from my compartment 
 of the Oriental Express, in Constantinople, two 
 days later. 
 
 My soul answered to this call of the East. I felt 
 as if I should like to throw myself on a prayer- 
 rug, face Mecca, and cry with the young muezzin, 
 '' Allah-hu-akbar ! '' 
 
 I had left the West behind — I was again in the 
 East, the enchanting, poetical East. 
 
 This feeling was strengthened when, on reach- 
 ing my hotel, I found a letter from my mother 
 
196 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 telling me not to come to our home on the island 
 that day, because it was Tuesday, as ill-omened a 
 day with the Greeks as Friday is with the rest of 
 Europe. 
 
 Indeed this was the East again — the East with 
 its cry to Allah, and its predominating super- 
 stitions. But I could not yet feel the proper 
 respect for ancestral superstitions. I had the 
 arrogant self-confidence of youth in full, and, as 
 youth feels, I felt that the right lay with my 
 own inclinations. It was a hot and oppressive 
 summer day in town, and in disregard of maternal 
 displeasure I decided to go on immediately by 
 the morning boat. 
 
 In spite of the heat and of a strange feeling of 
 oppression in the atmosphere, I went on foot to 
 the Bridge of Galata, in order that I might revel 
 again in the crooked streets of Constantinople, 
 hear the merchants cry out their wares, be fol- 
 lowed by some of the stray dogs, salute my old 
 friend Ali Baba, the boatman, and thus assure 
 myself that I really was again in my beloved city 
 on the Golden Horn. 
 
 By the time I had bought my ticket for the 
 steamer, Paris was as far from my spirit as it 
 was from my flesh — and the superstitions of my 
 mother no longer seemed unworthy of attention, 
 even though I still persisted in pleasing my 
 selfish self. The idea of a happy compromise 
 suggested itself : I would take the boat to the 
 
CHAKEND6, THE SCORNED 197 
 
 island, but instead of going home I would spend 
 the day at my cousin's, at the other end of the 
 island, and arrive home on the following day, 
 as my mother had requested. 
 
 Thereupon, in pursuit of this comfortable 
 arrangement, on entering the boat, instead of 
 making my way to the first class deck, where men 
 and Christian women sit together, I betook my- 
 self to one of those private little rooms which 
 exist on the Mahshousettes boats exclusively for 
 the convenience of aristocratic Turkish ladies. 
 By secluding myself in one of these I effectually 
 avoided the risk of recognition and report. 
 
 I opened the door of one. The cabin was in 
 semi-obscurity, and occupied by three veiled 
 ladies. However, as the place could accom- 
 modate four, I entered. It was their privilege 
 to ask me to depart, if they did not care for 
 the company of an unbeliever. I sat down and 
 waited to see if they would use their preroga- 
 tive. To my surprise a lithe young woman rose 
 hastily and stood before me. Her two slender 
 and tightly gloved hands grasped my shoulders, 
 and a pair of fine eyes peered into mine. 
 
 " Why, little Thunderstorm ! " 
 
 A feredje enveloped me and my lips came into 
 close contact with the filmly yashmak of Chakende 
 of the Timur-Lang. It was indeed delightful to 
 fall in thus with her. We had before us an hour 
 and a half's sail with no one to disturb us ; for 
 
igS A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 the other two women were her attendants and 
 sat without saying a word. We spent the time 
 in the happiest of talk about the years during 
 which we had not seen each other, and during 
 which we had left behind our girlhood, and crossed 
 the threshold of womanhood ; for in the East we 
 become women at an early age. 
 
 After I had told her all about myself, at her 
 insistence — she being the elder, and I having 
 therefore to tell my story first — I said : 
 
 *' You are married now, I suppose. I remember 
 you were to belong to a young man in Anatolia, 
 to whom you were betrothed when you were an 
 hour old, while he boasted of the great age of 
 seven." 
 
 She sighed. " No, I am not — not yet — 
 although I am getting on in years." 
 
 " Why are you waiting ? " I inquired. All my 
 French manners and training had gone. I 
 was again delightfully Oriental, asking personal 
 questions in the most direct way, as I had 
 answered all that had been put to me. 
 
 " It is quite a story, and we are nearly there. 
 Since you are not going home, why not come to 
 my house till to-morrow, where I can tell you all 
 about it ? " 
 
 " I cannot," I answered. " I must go to my 
 relatives, or there will be too much rumpus, if I 
 am discovered." 
 
 " Very well, then, drive with me first to my 
 
CHAKEND6, THE SCORNED 199 
 
 house ; I will leave the attendants there, tell my 
 naother where I am going, and come with you. 
 In this way we shall have the whole afternoon 
 together. My attendants can call for me in the 
 evening.'' 
 
 That is how it happened that on reaching the 
 island I drove in a closed carriage with three 
 veiled ladies to the haremlik of Djamal Pasha, 
 and afterwards, with only one, arrived at my 
 cousin's house. 
 
 To my cousin I explained my plight and intro- 
 duced Chakende Hanoum. There was no one at 
 home except my cousin and her children. After 
 luncheon Chakende and I went into the guest- 
 room, where we made ourselves comfortable in 
 loose garments. She braided her long, thick hair 
 in two braids, and put a string of pearls, like a 
 ribbon, over her head. She had clad her slim, 
 young figure in a loose, white pembezar, made 
 quite in French fashion. Cut a little low at the 
 neck, it displayed, besides another string of 
 pearls, a throat full and white, beautiful in shape 
 and in its youthful freshness. She was so good 
 to look upon that I again bethought me of the 
 man for whom she had been destined. 
 
 *' Now tell me why you are not married," I 
 said. 
 
 She laughed, and sighed again. 
 
 " Because he will not have me." 
 
 " He, who ? " I queried. 
 
200 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " The man I was engaged to when I was a 
 baby/' 
 
 '' Upon my word ! " I cried with indignation. 
 
 *' Now, Thunderstorm, you need not go ahead 
 and blame him. His reasons are excellent, as his 
 face is kind and his figure straight — like a cypress 
 tree." 
 
 " You have seen him then ? '' 
 
 '' Yes, he has been in Constantinople for the 
 past two years, and I have seen him several times 
 through the lattices of my window.'* 
 
 " And he refuses to marry you ? " 
 
 " He does." 
 
 " On the ground " 
 
 '* That he does not know me. You see, he is 
 tainted with European culture, and he thinks a 
 man ought to choose his own wife. I was chosen 
 for him : therefore he does not wish to marry 
 me." 
 
 *' Why don't you give him up and marry some 
 one else ? There are plenty who would be glad 
 to have you." 
 
 She shook her head. "It so happens that I 
 want him and no one else. And what is more," 
 she added illogically, " I respect his reasons. He 
 says that he does not wish to be married to a 
 woman he has not seen, and of whose character 
 he knows nothing." 
 
 *' Very well," I remarked. *' Since you respect 
 his reasons, and since you are modern enough 
 
CHAKEND^, THE SCORNED 201 
 
 yourself, why don't you try to meet him unveiled 
 somewhere and have a chat with him ? " 
 
 Dubiously she shook her head again. *' I don't 
 know how to manage it. He does not go to the 
 Christian houses to which I go. Besides none of 
 my Greek friends would care to take the risk of 
 arranging a meeting.'' 
 
 " I'll do it," I declared. 
 
 Her face flushed with pleasure. '* You are 
 just the same madcap as ever. Paris hasn't 
 robbed you of any of your spirit. How often I 
 have wished you were here — only I did not know 
 whether you had become so wise that you would 
 not do foolish things any more." 
 
 For some time w^e discussed the matter, though 
 without arriving at any feasible plan. At length 
 I left her, radiantly cheerful, and went into the 
 nursery to lie down, in order to leave the guest- 
 room entirely to her. My little cousins, three in 
 number, were already on their beds, and I 
 stretched myself out on the divan. 
 
 Instead of being cooler on the island, the op- 
 pression of the atmosphere was more intense. 
 There seemed something ominous in the heavy 
 stillness of the air, only broken by the noise of 
 the yelling dogs in the distance. 
 
 I was just beginning to dose off, when my 
 couch swung to and fro like a hammock. 
 
 My little eight year old cousin raised her head 
 from her bed and stared at me across the room. 
 
202 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Alkmeny ! '' I said crossly, '' don't shake 
 your bed, child. It shakes the room most 
 unpleasantly. 
 
 " I thought it was you shaking the room," the 
 child replied. 
 
 Then it occurred to me that it would take a 
 giant to shake the huge room. It was the second 
 story of a rock house, with two foot thick walls. 
 
 The room shook again, so violently that I bit 
 the end of my tongue, and for the moment 
 thought of nothing except the pain of it. Then 
 it grew dark, like dusk, and there was a noise as if 
 hundreds of baskets of walnuts were being poured 
 down the staircase. In the thick stone walls 
 cracks a foot wide appeared ; the edges trembled, 
 as if uncertain whether to fall inside or out, and 
 with a crash came together again. 
 
 The children were thrown out of their beds, and 
 I gazed at them passively. At this instant did 
 some past incarnation of mine say the word 
 " earthquake ! " or was the word really called 
 by some one outside ? All I know is that 
 " seismos ! " rang in my ears, and with it every- 
 thing I had ever heard about earthquakes flashed 
 into my mind. '* Don't walk — crawl ! " was the 
 first thing, and obeying it I dropped to the floor, 
 caught up the youngest child in my arms, and 
 told the other two to cling to my gown. Then 
 in a sitting position I worked my way out of the 
 room and down the stairs. 
 
CHAKEND^, THE SCORNED 203 
 
 The floor was waving up and down, but we 
 managed to get down the short flight of steps. 
 The noise meanwhile was deafening, and the 
 darkness in the house complete. When we 
 reached the front door and were about to go out, 
 one of the maids pushed me violently aside and 
 dashed out herself. A part of the falling chimney 
 struck her on the head, and she fell to the ground, 
 quite dead. I climbed over her body, still crawl- 
 ing, with the child in my arms. My white 
 nSglig^ was covered with the maid's blood, but 
 this did not effect me at the time in the least. I 
 crawled on and on, while the terrific noises and 
 the shaking continued, always remembering that 
 the safest place was the middle of the lawn — as 
 far from the house as possible. The children were 
 holding tightly to my dressing-gown, and they, 
 too, were covered with the dead woman's blood. 
 
 As we were scuttling along the ground, little 
 four year old Chrysoula cried out : *' Cousin, my 
 foot is caught ! " One of the cracks in the earth 
 — which was opening and shutting — had her little 
 foot imprisoned ; but in a second it opened again 
 and her foot was free. 
 
 Fortunately, the house was surrounded by a 
 large open lawn, otherwise we might have been 
 killed by the falling trees. In the middle of the 
 lawn we lay still, fascinated and bewildered. It 
 was lighter out here in the open, so that we could 
 see what was taking place. I was not consciously 
 
204 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 afraid. A kind of exaltation possessed me that 
 I should be there to see the wonderful, ghastly 
 spectacle. 
 
 The Turks say that during an earthquake devils 
 with fiery eyes fly about the sky. And surely we 
 saw them, only they must have been huge stones, 
 hurled into the air, which clashed together, giving 
 forth sparks that, for the fraction of a second, 
 illumined their dark petrine bodies. One of 
 those devils fell with a crash on the stable. It 
 went through the roof, and in a few minutes the 
 entire building was ablaze. 
 
 After this the earthquake proper ceased, but 
 the earth still trembled, so that the oldest child 
 fell over on my lap two or three times ; and 
 Chrysoula, who was sitting comically tilted back 
 with her feet in the air — her one thought being 
 to keep them from catching again in the earth- 
 cracks — ^would tip over, and then scramble back 
 into her undignified position. 
 
 From the stable, now burning like a bonfire, 
 a horse dashed madly out. He was making 
 directly for us when he fell, and lay where he fell. 
 He had stepped into an earth-crack and broken 
 his leg, and had to be shot afterwards. 
 
 Meanwhile the noises gradually lessened ; but 
 the air was filling with smoke and the smell 
 of the fires. My cousin's house still stood, 
 apparently unhurt, except for the chimneys ; 
 but what a devastation there was of those around 
 
CHAKEND6, THE SCORNED 205 
 
 us ! They were mostly modern with new anti- 
 seismic devices, such as iron bands around them. 
 All these were lying in ruins, the irons twisted 
 and warped, the walls shapeless heaps of stones, 
 beneath which were buried many of those who 
 had loved them and called them home. The old- 
 fashioned houses, without the irons, withstood the 
 shocks better. When afterwards I went into my 
 cousin's house, I found that most of the furniture 
 was broken, the plastering had all fallen, the 
 pictures were down, and the cracks in the walls 
 had not come together smoothly. 
 
 During the earthquake we saw no one, except 
 the maid that had been killed. After an interval 
 Chakende, whom I had entirely forgotten, came 
 out of the house, her left arm bandaged and in a 
 sling. 
 
 *' I am hurt,'* she said quietly, sitting down 
 beside me ; '* but I have bandaged it up and it is 
 all right. I am troubled, though, about my 
 people, and it will be some time before it will 
 be possible for me to go to them, I suppose." 
 
 Her manner was subdued, her face white, her 
 eyes still frightened. 
 
 What seemed a very long time passed before 
 the people began to come out of the ruins of the 
 houses. My cousin appeared, crying hysterically. 
 On seeing her children she stopped crying. '' My 
 God ! '' she screamed, *' I have children ! '' She 
 had totally forgotten about them. 
 
2o6 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 A few hours later my cousin's husband arrived 
 from Constantinople. The boats, fortunately, 
 had not been injured and were all running. He 
 was an official and brought out with him three 
 young men, his subordinates, two Greeks and a 
 Turk. They told us that the damage in the town 
 was even worse than on the islands, so that we 
 could expect to receive no tents from the govern- 
 ment that night. 
 
 The heat of the day had changed to cold, which, 
 in our nervous condition, we felt severely, and the 
 two Greeks set about building a fire and preparing 
 something for us to eat. 
 
 Chakende went up to the young Turk and spoke 
 to him ; then she came to me. 
 
 " This young man is going to help me bury the 
 maid,'' she said. Both to me and to the Turk 
 she spoke in French, but it was not a day to 
 think of such trifles. '' We have already carried 
 her into the laundry-house, and now we are going 
 to dig a grave." 
 
 Chakende and the Turk went off to bury the 
 Christian maid. It was an odd fact that during 
 this whole earthquake, while all other nationalities 
 were thinking of the living, it was the Turks 
 mostly who thought of the dead. 
 
 When they came back to me, who still had the 
 care of the children, for both my cousin and the 
 maids were too hysterical to attend to them, 
 Chakende said : 
 
CHAKEND6, THE SCORNED 207 
 
 " We are thinking that if we can get several 
 rugs we can put up some kind of tents for the 
 children and the rest of us to sleep under." 
 
 " It is Mademoiselle who thought of that/' the 
 young Turk said with admiration, and I realized 
 then, that he was far from guessing that she was 
 a Mussulman girl ; for Chakende, having nothing 
 to cover her face with, went about like a 
 European. 
 
 '* That's a good idea," I assented, " but who is 
 going to get the rugs ? It will be difficult to 
 make anyone go into the house." 
 
 *' I will go," Chakende said. 
 
 ** Oh, no, mademoiselle ! " the Turk pro- 
 tested. *'This is a man's work, not a woman's. 
 It is a dangerous task, and besides rugs are 
 heavy." 
 
 She smiled. '* But I shall go too. Come, 
 monsieur, don't lose any time. The earth is 
 quiet for the present." 
 
 They left me, and on their return he was carry- 
 ing a heavy pile of rugs, while Chakende had all 
 the sheets and pillows she could manage with 
 her uninjured arm. The two of them proved re- 
 markable tent-makers. One could see that they 
 came of a race which for centuries had lived in 
 tents. Not only did they put up one for my 
 cousin's family, but a little one for Chakende 
 and myself. They disappeared again, and re- 
 turned with blankets. They made several trips 
 
2o8 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 into the house, until they had us all fully supplied 
 with bedding. 
 
 For one reared amid the seclusion of a harem 
 she really was wonderful. Her presence of mind, 
 her fearlessness, and her resourcefulness astonished 
 me, engrossed though I was. 
 
 After we had had something to eat, and put 
 the children to bed, Chakende, the young Turk 
 and I went and sat down at a little distance, 
 and talked over the events of the day. None of 
 us had any desire for sleep, although it was late. 
 The earth was still groaning occasionally, and it 
 was unpleasant to lie down, since one could hear 
 hideous rumblings and tremblings which gave one 
 a curious feeling of sea-sickness. 
 
 " What a day ! " Chakende exclaimed, after a 
 long silence. There was a certain exhilaration 
 both in the voice and in the manner of the girl. 
 She seemed detached from the awfulness of it all, 
 in spite of the bloody wrappings on her arm. 
 
 The Turk hardly took his eyes from her and 
 there was no mistaking his condition. He had 
 met the woman he was to remember till he died, 
 whether he ever saw her again or not. 
 
 Chakende did not look in his direction. She 
 sat erect, her head held proudly above her lovely 
 throat. She was even prettier than she had been 
 in the daytime. 
 
 Presently the young man spoke, addressing 
 himself to her : 
 
CHAKEND]^, THE SCORNED 209 
 
 " Mademoiselle, we have worked together 
 to-day, as companions — as friends. I should 
 like you to give me something to keep for the 
 rest of my life." 
 
 '* Monsieur only asks," she replied, without 
 looking at him, *' he does not offer to give any- 
 thing to be remembered by." 
 
 It was a weird night, one of those nights when 
 people cannot be conventional. In my place I 
 made myself very small, trying to forget I was 
 present, as the two seemed to forget me. 
 
 "I, mademoiselle ? " repeated the man, in a 
 voice full of emotion. '' I have given you to-day 
 all that is best in me. And whatever my life 
 may become that best will always belong to you." 
 
 " And in exchange. Monsieur asks ? " Chakende 
 said, still not turning toward him. 
 
 '* I only ask your name, mademoiselle. I 
 should like to repeat it daily — to have it be the 
 nectar of my soul." 
 
 " Since Monsieur asks so little, it would be 
 cruel to deny him." 
 
 She turned slowly around till her eyes met his. 
 Distinctly she said : 
 
 " My name is Chakende, and I am known as 
 the only daughter of Djamal Pasha." 
 
 The young man gave a start. " You are — ? 
 You are ? " 
 
 She nodded. '* The woman you have scorned 
 
 for the past two years." She turned away, and 
 o 
 
210 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 gazed out into the darkness. In a minute she 
 rose. " Come, Thunderstorm/' she said to me, 
 " I think we might as well go to our tent/' 
 
 The young Turk rose, too, and barred her way 
 respectfully. 
 
 " Hanoum Effendi,*' he said, speaking in 
 Turkish now, *' I love you — will you be my 
 wife ? " 
 
 '' Does the effendi think it would be so great 
 an honour ? " she asked, with a little catch in 
 her voice. 
 
 "It would be an honour for me ; it would give 
 me the privilege of worshipping you, of protecting 
 you, of taking away all thorns from your path, 
 and of strewing it with roses. I ask to be allowed 
 to be your servant, as you are the mistress of 
 my soul.'' 
 
 '* The effendi speaks very beautifully/' she 
 commented. 
 
 " I love you ! " he cried. " I love you ! " 
 
 She gave him her right hand, and he, bending 
 as a worshipper, touched it with his lips ; then 
 as a man he drew her to him, and covered 
 her hair and her eyes and her lips with his 
 kisses. 
 
 When Chakende and I retreated to the little 
 tent arranged for us, the young Turk lay down 
 on the ground outside, across the doorway. 
 Chakende on her rug prayed to Allah, her un- 
 injured arm upstretched with the palm toward 
 
CHAKEND6, THE SCORNED 211 
 
 heaven. After she had finished she turned to 
 me. 
 
 *' Dear little Thunderstorm/' she said, " it has 
 been a horrible day, a devastating day, a life- 
 taking day, but ah ! — to me it has been the most 
 wonderful day of my life.*' 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL 
 
 THE earthquake subsided, and little by 
 little people began to forget its terrors. 
 Some who had old-fashioned houses 
 plucked up courage to enter them, then to 
 abandon their tents and stay in them. One day 
 some young people laughed, and others echoed 
 their laughter. Gradually the older people began 
 to laugh, too ; and the terrible shock which had 
 killed so many thousands and unnerved so many 
 more began to lose its hold upon the imagination 
 of the people. 
 
 Before the month was over life became nor- 
 mal, and we talked of ordinary, everyday things. 
 One day as I was sitting by my mother, making 
 lace, she casually remarked : 
 
 *' Nashan is going to be married, you know." 
 Of all my Turkish friends Nashan was the one 
 my mother liked best. Perhaps this was because 
 she felt she had a share in her bringing up, since 
 the day on which she had been summoned by 
 Nashan's mother to pass judgment on the little 
 girFs clothes — the little girl whose raiment I 
 
 had compared to that of a saltimbanque, when 
 2ia 
 
A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL 213 
 
 she had thought that she was dressed Hke a 
 great lady. 
 
 " Oh, is she ? " I cried, a trifle hurt. " She 
 has not even written to me that she is engaged. 
 I am afraid she cannot care for her marriage." 
 
 I hastened to call on her. She received me in 
 her French boudoir, faultlessly dressed in a 
 Parisian gown, her hair done in the fashion 
 prevalent in Europe at the time. We were so 
 glad to see each other that at first we forgot about 
 the marriage. Finally I asked about it. 
 
 Boundless became her indignation. "He is 
 an Asiatic ! '' she cried, with undisguised horror. 
 " They are giving me to a man who cannot under- 
 stand a word of French, to a man who is an 
 arridre — who believes in the subjection of women ! 
 They are handing me over to an unknown, who 
 has not touched my heart — merely because our 
 fathers decided that we should become husband 
 and wife. And this Anatolian — this man who 
 has lived all his life in an uncivilized country — 
 has come to claim me — me, as his wife." 
 
 Since her indignation could rise no higher, it 
 toppled over in a torrent of tears. She laid her 
 blonde head in my lap, and wept. And I wept 
 with her, because she was eighteen and I was 
 sixteen, and life seemed so full of tragedy. How 
 dreadful the world looked to us in that hour — 
 and how we hated our elders. 
 
 She had lost her mother, her only support, as. 
 
214 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 long ago, I had lost my father. We had an orgy 
 of tears, which cleared the atmosphere, and helped 
 the barometer to rise. The courage of youth 
 returned to us. 
 
 *' What do you intend to do ? '' I asked. 
 
 ** I thougl t of dying,'' she said simply, 
 but " I don't want to. I hate to die. Life 
 is so interesting, and I am so healthy." 
 Inconsequently she added : " Come and see my 
 trousseau." 
 
 No French girl could have had a Frenchier 
 one. No Parisian a more Parisian one. If the 
 father was imposing an Anatolian husband upon 
 her, he was generous in his supply of European 
 accessories. She and I forgot our troubles in 
 admiring and gloating over the creations just 
 arrived from Paris. 
 
 " And now look ! " she cried, in a tone of 
 loathing. She opened a closet and drew forth a 
 chest, richly inlaid. From its heart she took 
 several garments : they were Anatolian — even 
 more Oriental than if they had been Turkish. 
 She threw them on the floor, and stamped upon 
 them. '* His grandmother is insulting me with 
 these. She thinks that is the way / dress — I, a 
 European to my finger-tips." 
 
 I picked up the despised garments and ex- 
 amined them with curiosity mingled with admira- 
 tion. The straight, stiff tunics of home-spun 
 silks, the jackets reaching below the knees, spun 
 
A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL 215 
 
 by hand and fantastically embroidered in a riot 
 of colour were full of oriental poetry 
 
 '' But they are truly lovely/' I cried. '' They're 
 better than your French clothes. Any woman 
 would look adorable in them. I wish you would 
 wear them.'' 
 
 Nashan only snatched them from my hands 
 and stamped on them again. 
 
 As the date of her marriage drew near, I heard 
 that there were scenes of rebellion and tears of 
 helplessness, but her father held fast to his pur- 
 pose, and the marriage took place. I did not go 
 to it. I was engrossed with my own troubles at 
 the time, and besides I did not wish to be present 
 at what I considered the immolation of a woman. 
 
 Two days after the wedding, a note reached me 
 from her saying : '* Will you come and spend the 
 day with me ? " 
 
 I went to her new home in Stamboul — fortun- 
 ately free from his relatives since these all lived in 
 Anatolia. She was seated in a vast, bare, oriental 
 room which contrasted strangely with her French 
 gown and Parisian coiffure. There were no 
 traces of tears on her face such as I had expected 
 to find ; her pupils only seemed larger, and her 
 eyes were shining with a combativeness which 
 I had felt was in her, but which I had not 
 encountered before. 
 
 Silently we embraced each other. 
 
 '* Is he dreadful ? " I whispered. 
 
2i6 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " I don't even know how he looks/' she repUed. 
 " I have not favoured him with a glance. He 
 has not been able to make me speak to him, and 
 you know that according to our laws, so long as 
 I remain silent, he has no rights over me." 
 
 " Do you mean to keep it up till he becomes 
 discouraged and divorces you ? " 
 
 Before she had time to answer, one of her 
 slaves came in. 
 
 *' The tchelehi [master] is asking if he may 
 see you." 
 
 I rose to leave the room. 
 
 " Don't go," she begged. 
 
 I sat down, a very uncomfortable little person. 
 Nashan crossed her slender hands on her lap and 
 waited. Her eyes were firmly fixed on the floor ; 
 her lips compressed, as for eternal silence. 
 
 He came in. I do not know why I expected 
 to see a grown-up man, with man's tyrannical 
 power stamped on his brutal features. What 
 entered was a boy, a timid moustache sprouting 
 on his lip. He was tall and good-looking, but 
 almost paralysed with shyness. 
 
 He looked at nothing except his wife, and his 
 face shone with all the love he felt for her, with 
 all the dreams he must have made about this 
 one woman, whom he had never seen till the 
 day of his wedding. 
 
 We are apt to think only of the woman's side, 
 and few of us ever give a thought to what may 
 
A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL 217 
 
 be the man's disappointment, the man's crushed 
 ideals in his marriage. Because he bears it Hke 
 a man, because he makes the best of what fate 
 has allotted him, often without a word of com- 
 plaint, we think that the tragedy of marriage is 
 entirely one-sided. 
 
 That day, as the young fellow came in, shy 
 and awkward, carrying a small bundle in his 
 hand, prejudiced though I was against him, I 
 somehow felt that there was his side, too. Per- 
 haps it was his extreme youth, his good looks, 
 which touched me ; or perhaps it was the ex- 
 pression of misery on his face. Poets and writers 
 have written about the woman's heart-break, but 
 it is the sorrow of the strong which contains the 
 most pathos. 
 
 He timidly took his seat at a distance from her, 
 and fingered the little parcel on his knee. 
 
 An oppressive silence fell upon us, I furtively 
 watching the youth, he longingly gazing at his 
 bride. Finally he began to undo his parcel, and 
 his movements were so like those of a little boy 
 that I was ready to weep for him. 
 
 The parcel disclosed a beautifully embroidered 
 pair of Turkish slippers. I suppose they were 
 the prettiest he could buy, but even at a glance 
 I knew that they were far too large for Nashan. 
 
 He rose and advanced timidly, his offering in 
 his hand. 
 
 '* I brought you these," he said pleadingly. 
 
2i8 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 He looked at the slippers and then at her. " They 
 were so lovely I could not help buying them for 
 
 you.- 
 
 He sat down on the floor at her feet, and tried 
 to bring the slippers within her notice. 
 
 " Let me put them on your pretty feet/' he 
 begged. 
 
 She neither replied, nor by the slightest move- 
 ment betrayed that she was aware of his exist- 
 ence. She was sitting on a chair, like a European. 
 Her knees were crossed, and one foot dangled 
 before him, as if inviting the new slippers. 
 
 By a tremendous effort he summoned up 
 courage to slip the Turkish slipper on her foot, 
 over the French shoe, and even then it was too 
 large. It hung suspended for a minute from her 
 unresponsive toe, and fell to the floor. 
 
 I laughed more from nervousness than from 
 mirth. 
 
 He turned a troubled, inquiring countenance 
 toward me, and then back to his wife. 
 
 *' Why is she mocking me ? Have I done any- 
 thing ridiculous ? '' 
 
 He appeared more than ever like a frightened 
 little boy. He leaned toward her as if he wished 
 to hide behind her skirt, every movement seeming 
 to beg for protection. 
 
 The stony expression left Nashan's face. She 
 no longer ignored his existence. What was fine, 
 womanly, maternal in her character became alive. 
 
A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL 219 
 
 She put her arm round his shoulder. 
 
 " Why are you laughing ? ** she denaanded 
 quietly of me in French. " If he were a Christian 
 dog he would have known many women, and he 
 would be aware of the sizes of their feet. But 
 he is only a clean Osmanli boy, and, as you see, 
 I am the first woman he has ever seen, besides 
 his mother." 
 
 It was a new Nashan : not the europeanized 
 Nashan, with her foreign veneer, but a real 
 woman, the one who had once said to me : "I 
 am sure of the existence of Allah, because he 
 manifests himself so quickly in me.'* Unmis- 
 takably at that moment God was manifesting 
 Himself in her. 
 
 I rose to go. She rose, too, and so did the man, 
 who had picked up his slippers and held them 
 fast to his heart. He had not understood a word 
 of the French that had passed between us. 
 
 '* I bought you these because I thought may- 
 be you would like them,'' he repeated. 
 
 " I like them very much indeed," she said, 
 taking them from him. 
 
 *' They are not so pretty, perhaps, as the ones 
 you have on ; but they are exactly like those my 
 dead mother used to wear, when I was a little boy 
 and played on her lap." 
 
 She listened to him attentively, deferentially, 
 her eyes raised to his. Then she turned to me, 
 who was already going. 
 
220 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Don't go just yet, dear. I beg of you to 
 remain a few minutes." To her husband : *' My 
 lord, will you make my friend feel at home, while 
 I am gone a little while ? I have just been hard 
 to her, because she was rude to you ; but I do 
 not think she meant to be." 
 
 Nashan was gone from the room only a short 
 time, yet I hardly recognized her on her return. 
 She was dressed in one of the oriental gowns his 
 grandmother had sent her, and which she had 
 despised and trampled upon. Her French coiffure 
 had disappeared. A Turkish veil was arranged 
 on her head, in the strict oriental fashion for in- 
 doors, and on her feet, somehow, she had fastened 
 his slippers. 
 
 She bowed low before her husband. 
 
 '' These, my master, are the garments your 
 honourable grandmother sent me. I hope you 
 like me in them." 
 
 He could not speak, nor was there any need ; 
 for his face was a worshipful prayer. 
 
 She turned to me with a proud little toss of 
 her head. 
 
 " Am I a great lady ? " she asked as of 
 old, with whimsical seriousness, ** or am I a 
 saltimbanque ? " 
 
 " You are indeed a great lady," I said — and I 
 meant it. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 THE INVENTIVENESS OF SEMMEYA HANOUM 
 
 IT was from curiosity rather than from 
 friendship that I accepted Semmeya 
 Hanoum's pressing invitation to spend 
 a few days with her, shortly after Nashan's 
 wedding. As I said in a previous chapter, we 
 had never looked on Semmeya as one of us. We 
 did not trust her, and where there is no trust how 
 can there be friendship ? Still, since I was burn- 
 ing to know what sort of a wife she had made, I 
 replied to her pressing invitation with alacrity. 
 
 I did not have to wait very long before I knew 
 that Semmeya Hanoum was the same as ever — 
 that she would rather cheat than play fair. She 
 was the mother of a dear, little boy ; and it was 
 easy to see that Sendi Bey was the slave of his 
 wife. At the same time it required no cleverness 
 on my part to discover that he did not trust her, 
 and did not believe her word. 
 
 I have always wondered, and I suppose that I 
 shall continue to wonder till I die, and learn the 
 explanation of many riddles, how it is that a 
 good, upright man can remain in love with a 
 woman whom he cannot trust. On the contrary, 
 
 221 
 
222 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 it often seems as if the less confidence a man has 
 in his wife, the more in love he remains with 
 her. 
 
 On the second morning of my arrival, nature 
 outside was making herself beautiful as if to pose 
 for her portrait. We had finished our breakfast, 
 and were sitting on a couch together when her 
 husband came in, a dark cloud on his forehead. 
 He gave his wife a severe look, which Semmeya 
 met with the candour of an angel. 
 
 *' I am delighted to see you so early, my Bey 
 Effendi,'* she said sweetly. '* I hope you have 
 slept well,*' and as he remained standing, she 
 continued : '* Won't you sit down by us, my 
 Effendi ? " 
 
 '' Beauty ! " thundered the man, '' why did you 
 misbehave yesterday afternoon while you were 
 out driving ? " 
 
 An expression of utter amazement overspread 
 her features. 
 
 " Don't trouble yourself to deny it — you know 
 that it is true,'' the husband continued, striving 
 to master his anger. 
 
 She shrugged her slim shoulders, and the im- 
 pertinent movement was attractive. Intrinsic- 
 ally she was not a beautiful woman, but she had 
 charm, and the man speaking to her was in love 
 with her. And she knew it. 
 
 *' You know you did it," he persisted. 
 
 Impatiently she tapped the floor with her satin- 
 
SEMMEYA HANOUM 223 
 
 clad foot. I hate to witness marital disagree- 
 ments, so I rose to go ; but Semmeya caught my 
 dress and imperiously pulled me back into my 
 seat. 
 
 " Beauty," the man reiterated, with rising 
 anger, '' you know you did it.'' 
 
 She continued to look out of the latticed 
 window, down on the waters of the Golden Horn. 
 Her profile was turned to her husband. This 
 was the prettiest view of her, and the one she 
 always presented to him when she wished to 
 dominate him — she told me so herself. Her 
 wavy hair was loosely combed back on her neck, 
 and a red rose was carelessly placed a little below 
 her pretty ear. She was dressed in a soft green 
 silk garment, the diaphanous sleeves displaying 
 her well-shaped arms. Her slim but well-rounded 
 neck was bare, and one could see that she was in 
 a temper by the way the veins stood out on her 
 throat. 
 
 '* You did it, Beauty," the man persisted in an 
 even monotone that sounded like the approach 
 of the storm. 
 
 I rose for the second time to go, but the hand, 
 more imperious than before, pulled me down 
 again ; then the owner of the hand snapped out : 
 
 '' Since you believe the word of the eunuch 
 against mine, and you are so certain I did it, why 
 do you wish me to verify it ? Begone, man, 
 begone ! " 
 
224 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " But I want you to tell me why you threw 
 the flowers at the Englishman/' her husband 
 demanded. He turned to me and asked, " Do 
 you think it is nice for a woman to throw flowers 
 at a strange man ? " 
 
 Before I could reply, she calmly said, ''It is 
 not true/' 
 
 " That you threw flowers at a man ? " 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 " Did she or did she not ? " he asked me. 
 
 " She did,'' I answered. 
 
 " You wretch ! " Semmeya Hanoum cried. '' I 
 only threw a rose, and a rose is singular, not 
 plural. Besides, how do you know that I threw 
 it at the man ? I might have just thrown it 
 away — and it might have happened to strike his 
 face by accident." 
 
 " I suppose you happened to kiss the rose by 
 accident, too ? " Sendi Bey inquired grimly. 
 
 " Why not ? I often kiss roses." She looked 
 at him with laughing defiance. " And now what 
 will you do, my lord ? " 
 
 " I should like to give you a good thrashing." 
 
 " You can't. It is forbidden by the Koran." 
 
 " I know it, and I am very sorry. But, Beauty, 
 your actions are getting unbearable ; and I am 
 going to put a stop to them. For a month you 
 are not to leave this house without my permis- 
 sion." With these words he marched out of the 
 room. 
 
SEMMEYA HANOUM 225 
 
 She turned to me. *' I should like to find out 
 whether he will really give orders that I am not 
 to leave the house. Make ready to go out, and 
 we shall see." 
 
 She was waiting for me with a slave when I 
 came to her room, and together we went down 
 the hall. There stood the eunuch with his back 
 to the door, looking determined to die at his post, 
 if necessary. 
 
 '* Silly, come with us. We are going out for 
 a walk,'' Semmeya said casually. 
 
 He salaamed to the floor, but did not stir She 
 spoke to him more sharply, and again he salaamed. 
 No matter what she said, he salaamed. 
 
 Ignominiously at last she retreated to her room. 
 She sat down and pondered over the situation 
 earnestly. For once, I thought, she would have 
 to acknowledge herself beaten. 
 
 At length she sprang to her feet, and I looked 
 up expectantly, but she only told me to take off 
 my wraps, since we should be unable to go out. 
 She stepped out of the room, and I heard her 
 whispering to her slave outside. Presently she 
 re-entered the room briskly. 
 
 '* When the eunuch comes up, tell him to wait 
 a minute, if I am not here. And meanwhile 
 make yourself as comfortable as you can." 
 
 I took a French novel from the table, became 
 interested in it, and had quite forgotten our state 
 of siege when the eunuch spoke to me. 
 
226 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 " Wait a minute/' I answered, hardly hearing 
 what he said. " Semmeya Hanoum will be back 
 in a minute." 
 
 He took up his station in the doorway, com- 
 manding both the room and the hall, and waited, 
 listening intently. After a long while he went 
 downstairs. 
 
 Again I was absorbed in my book when the 
 eunuch returned, panting and frightened. 
 
 " My mistress ! My mistress ! " he shouted. 
 
 '* What is it, stupid ? What has happened to 
 your mistress ? '' 
 
 *' She has gone ! '* 
 
 " Gone where ? " 
 
 " Away ! Out of the house ! *' he wailed. 
 " She has outwitted both of us — myself and 
 Yussuf at the gate of the garden. He was called 
 away for a minute, and when he came back, 
 my mistress had disappeared. Ai ! ai ! it was 
 magic." 
 
 " Well, don't stand there wailing ; run and tell 
 your master," I said impatiently. 
 
 He looked at me in abject terror. " My 
 master ! I dare not. He would kill me." 
 
 *' Then send for him, and I will tell him." 
 
 *' And you will tell him that I faithfully obeyed 
 his orders," he implored, " and that she did not 
 escape through any negligence on my part ? " 
 
 Even after I had reassured him on these points 
 he departed trembling, and I went down to the 
 
SEMMEYA HANOUM 227 
 
 parlour to await Sendi Bey. In a few minutes 
 he came, and I told him what had happened. He 
 cross-examined me, became convinced that I 
 knew nothing of his wife's movements, and sent 
 for the unhappy man at the gate, Yussuf. 
 
 *' Why did you not run after your mistress ? " 
 he demanded sternly. 
 
 *' I did, your Excellency, but she was nowhere 
 to be seen. There was not a house where she 
 could have entered, or a place where she could 
 have hidden ; but she was not in sight. I do 
 not see how she could have run so fast. It is 
 magic ! '' 
 
 Sendi Bey dismissed the man, then called the 
 slaves and the eunuch, and ordered them to search 
 the house, which they did without result. Then 
 he gave orders that no one was to enter or leave 
 the house without his permission, and that when 
 the mistress returned she was to wait at the gate 
 till he had spoken to her. 
 
 After we were alone together again, he ex- 
 claimed gleefully : ** For once she has put her- 
 self in my power. On her return I shall go to 
 the gate and make my conditions, and if she 
 does not agree to them, she cannot come in.'' 
 
 '' But suppose she does not agree to them, and 
 prefers not to come in ? " I asked. 
 
 He laughed. '' For once," he repeated, " she 
 has put herself in my power. If she does not 
 agree, she will lose all her rights over her boy, 
 
228 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 since she left the house against my orders. She 
 loves the boy, and she will agree. Now is the 
 time to put an end to her coquettishness." 
 
 Whatever satisfaction Sendi Bey and the 
 absent, rebellious Semmeya Hanoum might find 
 in the situation, for me it was rather uncomfort- 
 able. I was not able to go even into the garden, 
 and ate a solitary luncheon and then dinner, all 
 the slaves being at their posts to prevent any 
 entry or egress. After finishing my novel, I was 
 just preparing to go to bed when a slave came 
 to me. 
 
 *' My master would like to see you downstairs 
 if you will be so good,'' she said. 
 
 There was no one in the parlour when I arrived 
 there, but presently the master came in from the 
 selamlik. 
 
 '' What can I do for you ? " he asked. 
 
 '* Why, nothing,'' I replied. " I am perfectly 
 comfortable, although the situation is not." 
 
 He looked at me with a puzzled air. 
 
 " Why did you send for me ? " 
 
 " I didn't. I was told that you wished to see 
 me." 
 
 '' There must be some mistake," he said, and 
 pulled the velvet rope of the bell. As if in answer 
 to the ring, in sauntered Semmeya Hanoum, as 
 cool as a cucumber, cigarette in hand, and ap- 
 parently just back from her expedition, since she 
 was still in outdoor dress. 
 
SEMMEYA HANOUM 229 
 
 We both stared at her in amazement. 
 
 " Hullo, Blossom," she said to me. '' Sorry 
 to have left you alone all day." 
 
 She elaborately ignored her husband. After 
 an instant's stupefaction he strode across the 
 room, took her chin in his hand, and lifted her 
 face. 
 
 " Where have you been ? " he demanded. 
 
 She snatched her head away from his hand, 
 and dropped him an extravagant French curtsy. 
 '' Where I pleased, my master." 
 
 The man was shaking with anger. 
 
 " How did you get in ? " 
 
 She waved her gloved hand towards the hall. 
 *' Ring the bell — call in your servants — find out." 
 
 " To make a bigger fool of myself ? " 
 
 " Why not, since you were willing to belittle 
 me before them, by your silly orders this morning ? 
 You told the eunuch not to let me go out, and 
 when I returned, I had to use a ruse to enter my 
 own home, where my baby boy is. You are 
 a brute and a jealous fiend, and I am the most 
 unhappy of wives," and thereupon she burst 
 into the most pathetic sobbing, and threw herself 
 upon me, holding me fast to her. 
 
 '' Why, Beauty," he expostulated in tender 
 tones, '* you know I have never been unkind to 
 you, and this is the first time I have even thought 
 of punishing you." 
 
 She continued to sob without abatement. He 
 
230 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 came near us, and timidly tried to take her in 
 his arms. To my surprise she went to him Uke 
 a lamb, kissing him and crying, and I slipped out 
 of the room, once more convinced that men were 
 mere babes in the hands of designing women. 
 
 That night I waited in vain for her to come and 
 tell me where she had been, and while waiting I 
 fell asleep. After breakfast the next morning she 
 came to my room, beaming, and looking prettier 
 than ever. 
 
 '' Siege is raised,'* she cried, sitting down cross- 
 legged on the rug. " Blossom of the almond-tree, 
 we can go for a picnic to any cemetery we like, 
 and I am to have a pair of horses all my own, and 
 the loveliest low victoria that France can manu- 
 facture." She put her finger-tips together, and 
 looked up at me enjoying the effect of her words, 
 and continued : "I am also going to have a 
 bigger allowance, and when I have a little girl, 
 I may give her a French name. In exchange, I 
 shall not throw kissed roses to anyone, and I am 
 not going to fib for a long, long time.'' 
 
 She swayed forward till her forehead touched 
 the floor, and giggled so dehghtedly that I had 
 to join her. 
 
 " The poor dear ! " she went on, after her 
 laughter had subsided. " If I told him the truth 
 for a week, he would cease to find me interesting. 
 I should be a tame creature — not the woman he 
 is in love with. Oh, dear ! all men are alike." 
 
SEMMEYA HANOUM 231 
 
 " You don't know so very many men/' I 
 suggested. 
 
 '* Not actually, Blossom mine, not actually ; 
 but a woman retains the knowledge of her pre- 
 vious existences far better than a man. That is 
 what her intuition is. I have been a wife for 
 thousands of years. Think of the husbands I 
 have had ! I know all about men. Why, some- 
 times I can write down Sendi's words before they 
 leave his lips ; and, as for his actions, I know 
 them before he even conceives them." 
 
 " But what I want to know is how you got out 
 of the house yesterday, and then how you got 
 in again." 
 
 She looked at me with amused pity. 
 
 '* Blossom, you are just about as stupid as a 
 man — just about. I never left the house ; I - 
 couldn't." 
 
 I stared. *' But they searched high and 
 low " 
 
 " Not very low, my dear, not very low ; for 
 if they had, they would have found us down in 
 the cistern, in the baskets we keep the things 
 cool in. We almost touched the water — and we 
 were cool, I can tell you." And she went into 
 peals of infectious laughter that carried me 
 along with her. 
 
 *' Did you tell him ? " I asked when our amuse- 
 ment had subsided. 
 
 " Oh, what a goose you are, dear ! Of course 
 
232 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 I did not. He will have that riddle in the depths 
 of his heart to torment him — until I give him a 
 fresh one." 
 
 I attetnpted to lecture her, but she closed my 
 lips with a kiss and adjured me not to be a simple- 
 ton until nature turned me into a man. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 
 
 UP to now I have only spoken of the 
 women of Turkey, because such are 
 the conditions there that men and 
 women do not mingle freely. 
 
 By the Western world Turkish men are held in 
 low estimation : it may be with reason, and it 
 may be merely out of ignorance. One of the 
 episodes of my life deals with a Turkish man, the 
 Arif Bey who used to come to our house as my 
 brother's friend, when I was a little girl, and who 
 for awhile got mixed in my head with the Greek 
 demi-gods. I had not seen him for years. Once 
 I had asked my brother about him. He had 
 only told me that he was now a pasha, and then 
 changed the conversation. 
 
 My brother and I were invited to spend a week 
 in Constantinople with some friends, the Kaller- 
 ghis. Our host was a charming, dashing man of 
 over forty, one of the few remaining members of 
 a formerly rich and powerful Greek family. He 
 was a Turkish official, and the only support of 
 a bedridden mother, to whom he was so devoted 
 that on her account he remained a bachelor. 
 
 233 
 
234 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 He was very fond of talking, perhaps because 
 he told a story so well, or perhaps because, being 
 of an adventurous disposition, he had been in 
 many a scrape. One night, he told us of his ex- 
 perience when, in disguise, he had managed to 
 penetrate into the tekhe of the dervishes of 
 Stamboul and witness one of their secret cere- 
 monies. It was one to which the most orthodox 
 Mussulmans alone were admitted, and a Christian 
 took his life in his hand if he tried to be present. 
 He described the ceremony as something weird 
 but not unpleasant, as something worth seeing. 
 
 There are people in the world who add splen- 
 dour to whatever they describe, a splendour 
 which is in their hearts and minds and not in the 
 seen thing. Such a man was Damon Kallerghis. 
 
 In the silence that followed his words, the 
 tapping of the hour by the hektchi, on his nightly 
 rounds, came to us from sleeping Constantinople 
 outside. 
 
 " And how often do the ceremonies occur ? *' 
 I asked, breathless with the interest he had 
 aroused. 
 
 " Twice a year. The next one will be in six 
 weeks.'' 
 
 That night I could not sleep for the haunting 
 remembrance of the uncanny wonders to which 
 I had listened. I did not even go to bed. Sitting 
 by the window I looked at the white minarets, 
 faintly gleaming against the dark blue oriental 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 235 
 
 sky. Yonder was Stamboul with its mysteries 
 and its charm. Which of all those graceful peaks 
 reared itself above the mosque of the dervishes ? 
 My desire to see that of which I had heard grew 
 ever stronger as the hours passed, until I could 
 stay quiet no longer. 
 
 My brother's room was next to mine. To it 
 I went, and with the unscrupulous cruelty of my 
 age, I woke him. 
 
 He jumped up, rubbing his eyes. " What is 
 it, child ? Are you ill ? " 
 
 " No/' I said, settling myself on the foot of 
 his bed. " Brother, I want to go to the der- 
 vishes' dance next month." 
 
 " Upon my word ! " he exclaimed. " Go back 
 to bed at once, or I shall think you have gone 
 crazy." 
 
 '* Brother, you have got to say that you are 
 going to take me there." 
 
 My brother was thoroughly awake by this 
 time. He looked at me with a kind of despair. 
 
 " But didn't you hear how dangerous it was — 
 even for Damon Kallerghis ? As for your going, 
 you might as well prance off to prison at once." 
 
 '' I don't mind going to prison, if I can see 
 the dervishes first," I persisted. 
 
 My brother, as I have said, was fourteen years 
 older than I. He had been my playfellow and 
 my instructor, and was now my guardian. Un- 
 fortunately, he was neither stem with me nor 
 
236 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 prudent himself. I knew that I could make him 
 grant me this wish if I only stuck to it long 
 enough ; and when I returned to my room, an 
 hour later, I went to sleep delighted with the 
 thought of the extracted promise. 
 
 The next six weeks passed slowly, although we 
 were busy with a number of preparations. We 
 had, of course, to be provided with Turkish 
 clothes, correct in every particular ; and since, 
 according to Osmanli custom, a lady never goes 
 abroad alone, at least two other women, on whose 
 courage and discretion we could count, had to be 
 enlisted. It was not difficult to find men to ac- 
 company us. Any enterprise, the aim of which 
 was to outwit the Turks, could not but appeal 
 to Greeks. The two young men whom we chose 
 were both government officials, but this did not 
 in the least abate their enthusiasm for the 
 enterprise. 
 
 At last the night of nights arrived. We met 
 at the Kallerghis house, dressed there, and stole 
 down the back way to two carriages awaiting 
 us. These took us to the Galata Bridge, whence 
 we proceeded on foot. A faithful manservant, 
 dressed in the Anatolian salvhar, headed the pro- 
 cession, carrying a lantern. We women came 
 next, and our escorts followed a little way behind, 
 since Turkish women never walk in company 
 with men. 
 
 Stamboul in the daytime is clamorous and 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 237 
 
 overcrowded. The hundred and one cries of its 
 pedlars and shopkeepers come at one from all 
 quarters, and in half the languages of the earth, 
 while one can hardly move about for the conges- 
 tion of people. At night it is as silent and dark 
 as the tomb. As we hurried along the narrow, 
 crooked streets, we heard the occasional tramp 
 of the night patrol, the sharp yelps of the dogs 
 at their scavenger work, and that was all. I had 
 never before seen Stamboul at night, and I doubt 
 whether I shall ever wish to see it again. 
 
 I began to realize the enormity of our enter- 
 prise, and to appreciate that, had my brother been 
 of a less adventurous temperament or a more 
 careful guardian, we should never have been 
 where we were at that hour. As we stumbled 
 along over ill-paved alleys, which little deserved 
 to be called streets, the bravery with which I had 
 confronted the idea of possible dangers oozed out 
 of me. Nursery tales of the ferocity of the Turks 
 recurred to a mind which the consciousness of 
 doing wrong made susceptible to fear. We were 
 on our way to steal into a mosque, the door of 
 which was strictly closed against us. We were 
 dressed in Turkish clothes, and Christian women 
 were forbidden under a heavy penalty to dress as 
 Turks, except in the company of Turkish women. 
 We were all Greeks, and the Turks had been our 
 hereditary enemies since 1453. Had I had the 
 courage at this juncture to demand that we 
 
238 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 returned, as I had insisted on coming, I should 
 have been spared one of the most terrifying 
 nights of my Hfe ; but I lacked this, and my 
 shaky legs marched on through the unnamed 
 and unnumbered streets to our destination. 
 
 The man who had been the primary cause of 
 our risky enterprise awaited us at the arched 
 gateway of the tekhe. He signalled us to follow 
 him, and we entered an ill-lighted outer court- 
 yard. Thence we went down a steep staircase 
 to an inner one that must have been considerably 
 below the street level. My recollections of our 
 movements for the next few minutes are hazy. 
 We walked through one crooked corridor after 
 another till we came to what looked like an 
 impasse. A young dervish was standing so flat 
 against the wall that I did not notice him until 
 Damon Kallerghis made a sign to him, to 
 which he responded. He lifted the heavy leather 
 portiere, which I had taken to be the solid wall, 
 and permitted us to pass under it, and, as it 
 seemed to me, beyond any human protection. 
 Up to this moment it was still possible for us to 
 turn back ; but when that leather portiere closed 
 behind us, we were in the dark tekhe itself. 
 
 An insane fear seized me. What if our guide 
 had entrapped us here to our destruction ? I did 
 not stop to reflect how much persuasion it had 
 required to get him to conduct us on this hair- 
 brained escapade : I was simply afraid, and my 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 239 
 
 fear robbed me of every vestige of common sense. 
 Fortunately, beyond trembling till my teeth 
 chattered, I attempted nothing. 
 
 A few yards farther over the stone floor, and 
 we were pushed into a stall, and another leather 
 portiere closed us in. This was the end of our 
 journey. The front of the stall was covered with 
 lattice-work, and through its holes we could look 
 down into a cavernous square arena, dark, save 
 for a big charcoal fire smouldering in the middle. 
 Around the arena ran an arcade, and under it 
 we presently made out the reclining forms of 
 many dervishes of different orders, and numerous 
 Mohammedan pilgrims, quietly smoking. The 
 stall on our right and left must also have been 
 occupied, for we heard the scuffling of feet on 
 the floor, and then silence. 
 
 I really cannot say how long we sat on our low 
 stools, looking down on the weird scene beneath 
 us, before the oppressive silence was broken 
 by a fearfully plaintive sound which seemed to 
 come from far away, and which, for lack of a 
 better word, I shall have to call music. On and 
 on it went, rising and falling, monotonous, dull, 
 and melancholy. It penetrated the whole place, 
 seeming to drug the atmosphere, tfll one felt as 
 if any phantasmagoria of the brain might be 
 real. 
 
 It had another effect, this dreadful, insistent 
 sound. After a few minutes a desire to shriek, 
 
240 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 even to bite, came over me, and I began rhythmic- 
 ally to tear my feredj^ in time to the music. 
 
 From this condition I was roused by a strident 
 yell, and looked through the lattice with renewed 
 attention. The arena was beginning to fill with 
 long-cloaked dervishes carrying lighted torches. 
 A mat was spread near the charcoal fire, and 
 on this the sheik, or abbot, of the brotherhood 
 took his place, cross-legged. The nerve-racking 
 music ceased while he offered a short prayer. 
 
 When this was over, other dervishes came into 
 the arena, received torches, and ranged them- 
 selves under the archw^ays, like caryatides. The 
 maddening music started again, and the der- 
 vishes, joining hands, made the round of the 
 enclosure in a slow, dancing step, somewhat like 
 the step of a dancing bear, gradually increasing 
 the violence of their movements. Then each one 
 took off his taj, or head-dress, kissed it and passed 
 it over to the sheik. The music grew faster, but 
 lower in tone, and more infuriating. The der- 
 vishes, with heads bowed and shoulders bent, 
 danced more wildly about the smouldering fire. 
 The long cloaks were thrown aside, and the men 
 appeared, naked, except for the band around their 
 waists, from which hung long knives. They 
 threw out their arms, as if in supplication, and 
 bent back their heads in terrible contortions. 
 Yells of " Ya Hou ! " and " Ya Allah ! " mingled 
 with the music. 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 241 
 
 Little by little the men lost every vestige 
 of resemblance to human beings. They were 
 creatures possessed by a demoniac madness. 
 They shrieked and yelled inarticulately, their 
 voices blending curiously well with the hellish 
 music. When their frenzy reached its climax, 
 they drew their knives from their belts and 
 began stabbing themselves. The blood trickled 
 down over their bodies, and added to the 
 sinister aspect of the scene. After a while 
 some of them threw themselves into the fire, 
 and then with ferocious yelps jumped out of it. 
 Others, as if they were hungry wolves, and the 
 fire their prey, fell upon it and ate the lighted 
 charcoal. The smell of burning flesh was added 
 to the smell of sweat and blood, and made the 
 close air almost unbearable. 
 
 When at last they could whirl no more, yell 
 no more, stab themselves and eat fire no more, 
 one by one they fell to the ground. The music 
 became ever faster and fainter, as if it were 
 agonizing with the men who danced to it, until, 
 as the last man collapsed, it, too, ceased. The 
 sheik then rose from his mat and went from one 
 prostrate form to another, breathing into their 
 faces, and ministering to their wounds. He who 
 died on such a night, it was said, would become 
 a saint. 
 
 Dazed and shaken, we left our stall and 
 stumbled along the corridors until we reached the 
 Q 
 
242 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 entrance. There were other people, and I was 
 vaguely aware of cries and sobs, but heeded 
 nothing. I wished to get out of the tekhe as if 
 my salvation depended on it. At the outer door 
 I gave a great sigh of relief, and ran on after our 
 Anatolian with his lantern. 
 
 I was by no means myself yet, but a feeling of 
 relief came upon me when the cold, damp air of 
 the night struck my face. I was trying to get 
 away from the music, which still clung to my 
 nerves. For a considerable time I walked on 
 until a hand touched my shoulder. Startled, I 
 turned, and by the light of the moon, which had 
 risen, looked into the eyes of a veiled woman 
 who was a stranger to me. Other veiled forms 
 surrounded me, none of whom I knew. 
 
 " Hanoum effendim," said the one who had 
 touched me, smiling, '* I am afraid you have lost 
 your party, and by mistake have come with 
 ours." 
 
 Her words were like a cold but revivifying bath. 
 
 " I must have done so," I replied, trying to 
 avoid much conversation. '' I will go back." 
 
 " Come with us for the night," she suggested. 
 
 Thanking her, I took to my heels. I had not 
 paid much attention to the crooked streets tra- 
 versed thus far, and as I absolutely lack the sense 
 of location I must now have gone in some other 
 direction than that of the tekhe ; for after long 
 running back and forth, and hiding in the 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 243 
 
 by-streets whenever I heard anyone approaching, 
 I came to the awful conclusion that I could not 
 find the tekhe, and, alone and unprotected, was 
 lost in the streets of Stamboul. I wondered, 
 too, what the others were doing. Afterward I 
 learned that, when they got to the entrance, one 
 of the women of our party had fainted, and, to 
 avoid danger, they had hidden in a dark 
 passage while waiting for her to come to her 
 senses. In their excitement they did not notice 
 my disappearance, and when they found it out 
 they searched everywhere, finally deciding that 
 the others should go home while my brother and 
 one of the men hid near the tekhe, thinking that 
 sooner or later I should turn up there. It was 
 only in the early morning that they went away, 
 hoping that by some lucky chance I had returned 
 to the house. 
 
 Meanwhile I was roaming far from the tekhe, 
 exposed to all kinds of dangers. I grew desperate. 
 Horrible stories of the Greek Revolution recurred 
 to my mind : how our women were tortured to 
 death by the Turks, and how others, to avoid 
 shame and torture, had thrown themselves into 
 the sea. If I could only reach the water ! With 
 that idea in my mind I ran in the direction in 
 which I thought the sea lay. Fragments of 
 prayer taught me in childhood, and long forgotten 
 for lack of use, came back to me, and I began to 
 pray. I was glad for the many saints in the 
 
244 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Greek Faith to whom I could appeal. I tried to 
 remember where in the church was the parti- 
 cular niche of each of the saints. It took my 
 mind from my danger, and gave it a definite 
 object, as I hurried on. 
 
 Into the intensity of my prayers there broke 
 the muffled sound of leather boots. The night 
 patrol was on its rounds. I stood still. To all 
 appearances I was a Turkish woman, alone in the 
 streets. The patrol would arrest me. What if I 
 threw away the feredjS and the yashmak ? Though 
 as a Turkish woman I should be taken to prison, 
 what my fate would be as a Christian I did not 
 know, and the unknown fate was the more terri- 
 fying. The Turkish garb was my danger, but also 
 my momentary protection. 
 
 I drew the black silk about me. While waiting 
 for the approach of the night patrol, my mind 
 worked quickly. I must belong to some man's 
 harem, either as lady or slave. I was afraid that 
 I might not act meekly enough for a slave ; then 
 it must be as somebody's wife. Whose should it 
 be ? The tall, stalwart figure of Arif Bey flashed 
 across my mind's eye. He had had two wives 
 when I knew him : he probably had more now — 
 and besides I knew where his town house was. 
 
 By the time the patrol came near me I felt 
 quite safe in the thought of the dashing figure 
 and handsome face of the man I had chosen as 
 my husband. I walked up to the patrol, though 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 245 
 
 I was swallowing hard, and told them that I was 
 lost, and wished them to take me to the police 
 station and send for Arif Pasha, my husband. I 
 addressed myself to the man who appeared to be 
 the officer of the small band, and spoke very low, 
 in order that he might not detect any hesitancy 
 in my Turkish. 
 
 He saluted in military fashion, divided his few 
 men into two groups, and between them escorted 
 me to the police-station. There a consultation 
 took place between him and his superior, and the 
 latter asked me where I had been, and how I had 
 happened to lose my party. 
 
 I smiled sweetly at him. *' I shall tell that to 
 my husband, and he will tell you, if he thinks 
 best." 
 
 This was so admirable a wifely sentiment that 
 it left my inquisitor bereft of questions. 
 
 '' It is a long way to your house,'' he remarked. 
 " It may take some hours for your husband to 
 come here." 
 
 '' That does not matter, if you will only send 
 for him." 
 
 He took me to a large room and locked me 
 inside. I had no means of knowing whether he 
 would send for Arif Pasha or not, but I argued to 
 myself that the name was too big for a policeman 
 to trifle with. It remained to be seen whether 
 the pasha would come at the summons, or would 
 first go into his haremlik to find out whether one 
 
246 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 of his wives were really missing. And if he had 
 several homes, as rich Turks often have, would 
 he be at the address I gave, or would he be with 
 another wife at another house, or possibly not 
 even in the town ? 
 
 My thoughts were far from pleasant. I sat on 
 my stool praying to my Maker as I have never 
 done before or since. I thought that after this 
 experience I should become a very wise and 
 careful woman. Alas ! 
 
 The night grew older, and the greyish light 
 gradually pierced the darkness, as I disconsolately 
 wondered what would happen to me. 
 
 There were steps outside, the key turned, and 
 Arif Pasha entered the room, and shut the door 
 behind him. 
 
 My father used to say : '* Don't be humble 
 with the Turks. Ask them what you want, and 
 ask it as your right." 
 
 '* Please be seated, Arif Pasha,'' I said, " and 
 I will tell you all about it." 
 
 " And, pray, who are you ? " he asked. 
 
 " I will tell you that also," I answered, with as 
 confident a manner as I was able to assume. 
 
 He drew up a stool and sat down opposite me. 
 Then I told him the whole adventure, adding that 
 I had sent for him to get me out of the scrape. 
 
 When I had finished, he threw back his head 
 and laughed heartily. '* So you are my wife, are 
 you ? " he exclaimed. 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 247 
 
 I laughed, too, tremendously relieved that he 
 was not angry with me. 
 
 *' I remember you well now," he went on, " and, 
 if you are not any better disciplined than you 
 were a few years ago, you will make a trouble- 
 some handful of a wife,'' and again he roared. 
 " I told your precious brother once that, if he 
 didn't use more discretion in bringing you up, 
 you would keep him pretty busy. And now what 
 do you think I can do for you ? " 
 
 " Why, you will just get me out of here, and 
 drive me to the Kallerghis, where I am staying." 
 
 Arif Pasha looked at me with a kind of puzzled 
 exasperation. '' How old are you ? " he asked. 
 
 " Sixteen." 
 
 " Well, can't you see that if I drove you there 
 at this hour your reputation would be ruined ? " 
 
 " Oh ! " I exclaimed blankly. " Then what 
 must we do ? " I was quite willing to leave it 
 all to him. 
 
 A fresh access of merriment overcame the Turk. 
 He laughed till the tears came into his eyes. I 
 stood by, inclined to join in with him, yet not 
 quite sure whether it was directed against me or 
 not. In truth, there was a sardonic humour in 
 the situation which I did not understand until 
 some hours later. 
 
 " Did ever a man find himself in such a posi- 
 tion ! " he gasped, wiping his eyes. " Here I am 
 routed out of bed at an unearthly hour, and 
 
248 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 dragged across Stamboul to a police-station, to 
 discover myself possessed of a Greek wife I never 
 knew I had — and to get her out of jail ! " 
 
 He went to the door and clapped his hands. 
 To the soldier who responded to the signal he 
 said a few words, and then returned to me. 
 
 " I have sent for coffee and something to eat.'' 
 
 " But I don't want anything to eat. I only 
 want to get out of here," I said petulantly. 
 
 *' Pardon me," he said with severity, '' but I 
 am not accustomed to speak twice to my wives. 
 They do what I say without objections." 
 
 '' But I am not your wife," I retorted, nettled 
 at his lofty tone. 
 
 " No ? I thought you said you were," and 
 again his laugh filled the room. 
 
 When the coffee and galetas were brought in, I 
 ate meekly, and they tasted good. The hot 
 coffee, especially, warmed me, and made things 
 seem more cheerful than they had. 
 
 When we had finished eating, he said to me : 
 " Now, mademoiselle, my carriage is downstairs, 
 but I have explained to you why I cannot drive 
 you direct to the Kallerghis." 
 
 " Suppose you take me to your home, and tell 
 your favourite wife about it," I suggested. 
 
 His dark-blue eyes danced. " You think she 
 will believe me, mademoiselle ? " 
 
 " Why not ? " 
 
 He shook his head. *' When you are a woman, 
 
THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY 249 
 
 you will understand many things you do not 
 now, and I hope you will still have cause to trust 
 men as you do now. But, mademoiselle, they 
 are not all trustworthy, and women are right not 
 to believe what they say/' 
 
 He caressed his clean-shaven chin and became 
 lost in thought. Presently he unfolded his plan, 
 and, even in my youth and impatience, I began 
 to see that the sole object of his precautions was 
 to get me into the house in such a way as to save 
 me from any breath of scandal. 
 
 The sooner we left the station-house the better 
 it would be. He spoke a few words to the police- 
 officers, and then told me to follow him. There 
 was a closed coupe awaiting us, and when we 
 were in it he pulled down both curtains. '' We 
 are going on a long drive until it becomes respect- 
 able daylight. Then we shall go to your house, 
 as if I were bringing you back from a visit to one 
 of my wives.'' 
 
 It was after nine o'clock when we reached the 
 Kallerghis house. 
 
 '' Now," he said, '' arrange the yashmak so 
 that it will look like a European scarf, and hold 
 your feredje as if it were a silk cloak, and don't 
 look frightened. I will get out and ring the bell, 
 and stay here talking and laughing with you 
 for a minute. If you see people whom you know, 
 bow cordially to them, and do not act as if there 
 were anything unusual in the situation." 
 
250 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 When the servant answered the bell, I got out 
 of the carriage, and Arif Pasha, bending over my 
 hand, said : 
 
 *' Mademoiselle, tell your brother that I shall 
 forget ever having seen you to-night." 
 
 " Thank you," I said. 
 
 Of the man who opened the door I asked : 
 ** Is my brother or Kyrios Kallerghis in ? " 
 
 " No, mademoiselle. They have been here 
 several times this morning, but are out now. 
 They seem to be in some kind of trouble." 
 
 " As soon as they come in, tell them I should 
 like to see them." 
 
 It was a haggard and miserable brother who 
 came to my room an hour or so later. 
 
 After telling him all my adventure, I repeated 
 Arif Pasha's message. 
 
 My brother gave me a long, thoughtful look. 
 
 " Do you know," he said at last, '' that Arif 
 and I have been deadly enemies for the last 
 three years ? " 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 
 
 THIS night of terrors proved my last 
 adventure in Turkey. Soon afterwards 
 events began to force me to feel that 
 in order to live my own life, as seemed right to me, 
 I must flee from all I knew and loved to an un- 
 known, alien land. It is a hard fate : it involves 
 sacrifices and brings heartaches. After all, what 
 gives to life sweetness and charm is the orderli- 
 ness with which one develops. To grow on the 
 home soil, and quietly to reach full bloom there, 
 gives poise to one's life. It may be argued that 
 this orderly growth rarely produces great and 
 dazzling results ; still it is more worth while. 
 People with restless dispositions, people to whom 
 constant transplanting seems necessary, even if 
 they attain great development, are rather to be 
 pitied than to be envied ; and, when the trans- 
 planting produces only mediocre results, there 
 is nothing to mitigate the pity. 
 
 By nature I was a social revolutionist, and I 
 liked neither the attitude of the men towards 
 the women nor of the women towards life, among 
 the people of my race. I have learned better 
 
 261 
 
252 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 since, and know now that social laws exist be- 
 cause society has found them to be wise, and 
 that little madcaps like me are better off if they 
 respect them. But at that time I had more 
 daring than wisdom, and longed to go where 
 people lived their lives both with more freedom 
 and with more intensity. Moreover, I wanted 
 to " do something ** — like so many feather-brained 
 girls all the world over — just what, I did not know, 
 for I had no especial talents. 
 
 With a fairly accurate idea of my own worth, 
 I knew that I was intelligent, but I was fully 
 aware that I was the possessor of no gifts that 
 would place me among the privileged few and 
 outside the ranks of ordinary mortals. Brought 
 up on books and nourished on dreams, I had a 
 poor preparation with which to fight the battle 
 of life, particularly in a foreign country, where 
 everything was different, and difficult both to 
 grasp and to manipulate. The only factor in 
 my favour was my Greek blood, synonymous 
 with money-making ability ; for we Greeks have 
 always been merchants, even when we wore 
 chlamidas and reclined in the agora, declaiming 
 odes to the gods, talking philosophy, or specu- 
 lating on the immortality of our souls. 
 
 Knowing my race as I did, and aware that it 
 succeeded in making money in climates and under 
 conditions where other races failed, I was con- 
 fident that I could earn my own living. There 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 253 
 
 is something in us which justifies the tale of 
 Prometheus. Even before I was fifteen I was 
 quietly planning to leave Turkey, to go and 
 seek what fortunes awaited me in new and 
 strange lands — a course which my imagination 
 painted very attractively. America beckoned to 
 me more than any other country, perhaps because 
 I thought there were no classes there, and that 
 every one met on an equal footing and worked 
 out his own salvation. 
 
 We are all the possessors of two kinds of know- 
 ledge : one absorbed from experience, books, 
 and hearsay, which we call facts ; the other, 
 a knowledge that comes to us through our own 
 immortal selves. This last it is impossible to 
 analyse, since it partakes of the unseen and the 
 untranslatable. We feel it, that is all. This 
 subconscious knowledge — to which many of us 
 attach far greater importance than we do to 
 cold facts — is usually as remote as a distant 
 sound, though at times it may be so clear as to 
 be almost palpable. This secondary knowledge 
 told me I must go to America — America that 
 rose so luminous, so full of hope and promise 
 on the never-ending horizon of my young life. 
 
 I had not the remotest idea of how my dream 
 of going there could be realized ; but I believe 
 that if one keeps on dreaming a dream hard 
 enough, it will eventually become a reality. And 
 so did mine. A Greek I knew was appointed 
 
254 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 consul to New York, and was shortly to sail with 
 his family to the United States. I had a secret 
 conference with them, offering to accompany 
 them as an unpaid governess, and to stay with 
 them as long as they stayed in America. They 
 accepted my offer. 
 
 This I regarded merely as a means of getting 
 away from home. After I left them my real 
 career would begin. That I was prepared for 
 no particular vocation, that I did not even know 
 a single word of English, disconcerted me not 
 at all. Accustomed to having my own way, I 
 was convinced that the supreme right of every 
 person was to lead his life as he chose. I do 
 not think so any longer. On the contrary, I 
 believe that the supreme duty of every individual 
 is to consider the greatest good of the greatest 
 number. That I succeeded in my rash enter- 
 prize is more due to the kindness of Providence 
 than to any personal worth of mine. 
 
 Of America actually I knew almost nothing, 
 and what I thought I knew was all topsy-turvy. 
 The story of Pocohontas and Captain John 
 Smith had fallen into my hands when I was 
 twelve years old. I wept over it and surmised 
 that the great continent beyond the seas was 
 peopled by the descendents of Indian princesses 
 and adventurers. My second piece of infor- 
 mation was gathered from a French novel, I 
 believe, in which a black sheep was referred to 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 255 
 
 as having gone to America " where all black 
 sheep gravitate/' And my third source of in- 
 formation was " Uncle Tom's Cabin," the book 
 which makes European children form a distorted 
 idea of the American people, and sentimentalize 
 over a race hardly worth it. 
 
 This made up my encyclopaedia of American 
 facts. That all those who emigrated thither 
 succeeded easily, and amassed untold wealth, 
 I ascribed to the fact that being Europeans they 
 were vastly superior to the Americans, who at 
 best were only half-breeds. You who read this 
 may think that I was singularly ignorant ; yet 
 I can assure you that to-day I meet many people 
 on my travels in Europe who are not only as 
 ignorant as I was, but who have even lower ideas 
 about the Americans. 
 
 We landed in New York in winter, and went 
 directly to Hotel Martin, at that time still in its 
 old site near Washington Square. 
 
 What did I think of America at first ? This 
 indeed is the most difficult question to answer. 
 I was so puzzled that I remained without thoughts. 
 To begin with, the people, for half-breeds, were 
 extremely presentable. The redskin ancestral 
 side was quite obliterated. Then the houses, 
 the streets, the whole appearance of the city 
 was on a par with Paris. What appalled us all 
 was the deamess of things. I remember the day 
 when we gave a Greek street vendor one cent 
 
256 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 for some fruit, and he handed us one little apple. 
 " Only this for a cent ? '' we cried ; and so in- 
 dignant were we that we reclaimed our cent 
 and returned him his apple. 
 
 We managed to do ridiculous things daily. 
 At our first evening meal at the hotel, a tall glass 
 vase stood in the middle of the table filled with 
 such strange flowers as we had never seen before. 
 They were pale greenish white, with streaks of 
 yellow. We thought it very kind of the pro- 
 prietor to furnish them for us, and each of us 
 took one and fastened it on our dress. 
 
 The waiters glanced at us in surprise, but it 
 was nothing to the sensation we created when we 
 rose to go out of the dining-room. People nudged 
 each other and stared at us. Of the French 
 maid who came to unfasten my dress I asked t 
 
 " Do we seem very foreign ? " 
 
 " No, indeed,*' she replied, '' I should have 
 taken Mademoiselle for a French girl, except 
 that she wears her hair loose on her back.'' 
 
 " Then why did the people in the dining-room 
 stare at us so ? " 
 
 She suppressed a giggle. *' Yes, I know. Made- 
 moiselle, I have heard about it. It is the flower 
 Mademoiselle is wearing." 
 
 " What is the matter with it ? " 
 
 " Nothing, except that it is not a flower — it 
 is a vegetable, called celery." 
 
 I do not know how many more absurd things 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 257 
 
 we did during the three weeks we stayed at the 
 hotel. Then we took a flat near Riverside Driver 
 the rent of which staggered us, but when it came 
 to the servants we almost wept. Four pounds 
 a month to slovenly girls who were only half- 
 trained, who made a noise when they walked, 
 and who slammed the doors every other minute. 
 
 I was anxious to start my English studies at 
 once, for as yet I could only say '' All right," a 
 phrase which everybody used, a propos of noth- 
 ing, it seemed to me. I went to the Normal 
 College to inquire about the conditions for enter- 
 ing it. The president received me. He was the 
 first American man with whom I talked. He 
 had lovely white hair, and a kind, fatherly face. 
 He spoke no French, and sent for a student who 
 did ; and when she translated to him what I 
 wanted, he explained that I could not enter 
 college until I knew English and could pass 
 my entrance examinations. The young girl who 
 translated offered to teach me English for a sum, 
 which, to me, coming from the East and cheap 
 labour and possessor of small financial resources, 
 seemed preposterous. Still I liked her eyes : 
 they were dark blue, and green, and grey, all at 
 once, with long and pretty lashes ; so I accepted 
 her offer. That very evening she gave me my 
 first lesson, and proposed that instead of paying 
 her I should improve her French in exchange 
 for her English lessons, an offer that I was 
 
258 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 very glad to accept. She was my first American 
 friend, and remains among my very best. 
 
 We had only been a few months in New York 
 when my Greek friends were obliged to return 
 to Turkey. I resolved to remain behind. I 
 must confess at once that I did so out of pride 
 alone. New York had frightened me more than 
 the capture by the brigands, the earthquake, 
 and an Armenian massacre in which I once 
 found myself, all put together. Yet to go back 
 was to admit that I had failed, that the world 
 had beaten me, and after only a very few months. 
 
 I had just sixty dollars, and my courage — 
 robbed a little of its effervescence. Since I had had 
 only two English lessons a week, and no practice 
 whatever, because all the people we met spoke 
 French to us, my vocabulary was very limited, 
 but I managed to get about pretty well. Once 
 in a shop I asked for '' half past three sho-es," 
 and obtained them without trouble. 
 
 Before my friends left New York for Con- 
 stantinople they gave me a certificate saying 
 that I was qualified to be a governess — for which 
 I was really as qualified as to drive an engine. 
 Since I had had no chance to modify my opinion 
 about the origin of Americans, I still looked upon 
 them as inferiors, and considered myself quite 
 good enough for them. Taking a small room 
 in a small hotel, I applied to an agency for a 
 position. It did not prove quite so easy to 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 259 
 
 obtain as I had thought it would. In the first 
 place, I was not French bom ; secondly, I was 
 ridiculously young looking ; and then of course 
 I had to admit that I had been a governess in 
 a way only. 
 
 How amusing it was to be presented as a 
 governess ! Most of the ladies spoke such 
 comical French, and asked questions which I 
 thought even funnier than their French. I could 
 have found a place at once, if I had been will- 
 ing to accept twenty-five dollars a month as a 
 nursery governess, and eat with the servants. 
 
 Meanwhile most of my money was spent, and 
 to economize I walked miles and miles rather 
 than take the street cars ; and then came the 
 time when all my money was gone, and I was in 
 arrears with my rent, and had no money for food. 
 
 I do not wish anyone to suppose that I was 
 miserable. On the contrary, I liked it : I was 
 at last living the life I had so often read about. 
 I was one of the great mass of toilers of the earth, 
 whom in my ignorance I held far superior to the 
 better classes. I had romantic notions about 
 being a working girl, and my imagination was 
 a fairy's wand which transfigured everything. 
 Besides, I was a heroine to myself. Those who 
 have even for one short hour been heroes to 
 themselves can understand the exaltation in 
 which I lived, and can share with me in the glory 
 of those days. 
 
26o A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 At this time I happened to apply to the Greek 
 newspaper for a position, not because I thought 
 there was any chance for me, but because it was 
 so interesting to apply for work. Every time 
 I applied to a new person, it was a new adventure ; 
 and I had applied so many times, and been re- 
 jected so often, that I did not mind it any more. 
 I knew that if the worst came to the worst I 
 could for a time become a servant. I was well 
 trained in domestic work and could cook pretty 
 well ; for, when we Greek girls are not at school, 
 a competent person is engaged to come into the 
 house and train us systematically in all branches 
 of housekeeping. The idea of becoming a ser- 
 vant, of entering an American home and obtain- 
 ing a nearer view of my half-breeds within their 
 own walls appealed to me. What I objected 
 to, was being hired as a governess and treated 
 as a servant. 
 
 To my surprise, the Greek newspaper, a weekly 
 then, took me at once on its staff. I was 
 delirious with joy, not so much because I was 
 going to earn money as at the idea of working 
 on a newspaper. It seemed so glorious, so at 
 the top of everything. 
 
 Just at this time — at the agency, I think — 
 I heard of a French home, far out on the 
 West Side in the vicinity of Twenty-third Street, 
 where French working girls stayed while seeking 
 positions. I went there, and made arrangements 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 261 
 
 to stay a few months ; and from there sought 
 my hotel proprietor. I told him that the Greek 
 newspaper had engaged me at a salary which 
 did not permit me to live at his hotel, and what 
 was more that I could not at the moment pay 
 him what I owed him — three weeks' rent, I 
 believe — but that I would pay him as soon as 
 possible. He was very nice about the matter, 
 and said it would be " all right,'' though I doubt 
 very much if he ever expected to see his money. 
 
 My work on the newspaper was hard and 
 tedious. I am a bad speller, and can write a 
 word in five different ways on one page without 
 discovering it. On account of this failing I was 
 often taken to task by the editor in chief, who 
 was the proprietor, and had some black moments 
 over it, until one of the type-setters quietly 
 suggested to me that I should pass over my stuff 
 to him and he would correct the spelling before 
 the editor saw it, which I did ever after, and 
 was very thankful to him. 
 
 My newspaper work was not only of long, 
 long hours, but it absorbed all my time, as well 
 as my energy and strength, and shortly after 
 undertaking it I had to give up my English 
 studies. I was too worn out physically and 
 mentally to continue them. 
 
 It was not so bad during the cold weather, 
 but suddenly, without the slightest warning, 
 the cold gave place to burning heat. There was 
 
262 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 no spring. That lovely transition period in which 
 all is soft, both in air and in colours, did not exist 
 in that American year. The summer burst 
 fiercely over the city and scorched it in a few days. 
 It grilled the pavements ; it grilled the houses ; 
 it multiplied and magnified the noises of horse 
 and elevated cars, of street-hawkers and yelling 
 children — and these noises in turn seemed to 
 accentuate the heat. Every morning I took the 
 Sixth Avenue elevated train at Twenty-Third 
 Street, and all the way to the Battery there was 
 hardly a tree or a blade of grass to meet the tired 
 eye, to sooth the over-wrought nerves, nothing 
 but ugly buildings — ^ugly and dirty. And as 
 the train whizzed along, the glimpses I had of 
 the people inside these buildings were even more 
 disheartening than the ugliness and dirtiness of 
 the buildings themselves. 
 
 And this was my America, the country of the 
 promised land. It seemed to me then as if my 
 golden dream had turned into a hideous night- 
 mare of fact — a nightmare which threatened to 
 engulf me and cast me into that unrecognizable 
 mass continually forming by the failures of life. 
 That I did not sink down into it was, because, 
 in spite of the hideous reality, I remained a 
 dreamer, and those who live in dreams are rarely 
 quelled by reality. In that fearful, hot. New 
 York summer I began to dream another dream 
 which made the heat more tolerable. Daily, as 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 263 
 
 the elevated train noised its way to the Battery, 
 I imagined myself having succeeded, having 
 amassed wealth, from which I made gifts to the 
 thousands of toilers in that scorched city. I 
 planted trees for them everywhere, along the 
 streets, along the avenues ; and wherever there 
 was a little vacant plot of land I converted it 
 into a tiny park. There I saw the people sitting 
 under the shade of my trees, and so real did my 
 dream become that I began actually to live it, 
 and suffered less from the heat myself ; for I 
 was constantly on the look out for new spots 
 where I could plant more trees. 
 
 At luncheon time I used to go out for a little 
 stroll on the Battery, and there I used to see 
 immigrant women, dressed partially in their 
 native costumes, and surrounded by numbers 
 of their little ones, jabbering in their own lingo. 
 One day I sat down near a solitary woman, un- 
 mistakably an Italian peasant. 
 
 " Hot to-day, isn't it ? '' I said in her own 
 tongue. 
 
 From the sea, slowly she raised her eyes to me. 
 I smiled at her, but received no response. 
 
 " You look very tired,*' I said, " and so am I. 
 I suppose you are thinking of your own country, 
 of fields and trees, are vou not ? " 
 
 *' How did you know ? '' she demanded 
 sullenly. 
 
 " Because I do the same myself. I also am 
 
264 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 an immigrant. You look across the sea with 
 the same yearning in your eyes as is in my heart, 
 for we are both homesick/' 
 
 She was no longer cross, after this, and because 
 another woman was sharing in her misery that 
 misery became lighter. She began to tell me of 
 her sorrow. She had buried her second baby 
 in two weeks, because of the heat. Her lap was 
 now empty. She spat viciously on the water. 
 " That is what I have in my heart for America 
 — that ! " and again she spat. 
 
 I volunteered an account of my own dis- 
 illusionment about America ; and there we sat 
 at the edge of the Battery, two sad immigrants, 
 telling each other of the beauties we had left 
 behind, and of the difficulties we had to fight in 
 the present. If I had then known a little of the 
 history of America, I might have told her of the 
 first immigrants, of how much they had to suffer 
 and endure, and for what the present Thanks- 
 giving Day stood. I might have told her more 
 of their hardships, and how they had had to 
 plant corn on the graves of their dear ones, so 
 that the Indians should not find out how many 
 of them had died — but I was as ignorant as she, 
 and we only knew of our own homesickness and 
 misery. 
 
 The heat had started early in May, and it kept 
 on getting hotter and hotter, with only sudden 
 and savage thunderstorms, which passed over 
 
IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS 265 
 
 the city like outraged spirits, and deluged it for 
 a few hours with rain that became steam as soon 
 as it touched the scorched pavements. Occasion- 
 ally some fresh wind would penetrate into the 
 city, as if bent on missionary work ; but it was 
 soon conquered by the demons of heat. It grew 
 hotter and hotter. It seemed as if the city would 
 perish in its own heat — and then came the 
 month of August ! 
 
 I shall never forget that August. Even now, 
 wherever I am during that month, my spirit 
 goes back to that desolate city to share in the 
 sufferings of its poor people who have to work 
 long hours in hot offices, and then at night try 
 to sleep in small, still hotter rooms, with the 
 fiendish noise of the city outside. And it is 
 then again that my dream comes back to me, 
 to give trees all along the streets and all along 
 the avenues, and shady open spaces to breathe in. 
 
XXI 
 
 IN REAL AMERICA 
 
 IT was in meeting again the hotel proprietor, 
 when I went back to pay him my debt, 
 that I first realized what a summer in the 
 land of promise had done for me. He did not 
 know me at all. Thinking it quite natural he 
 should not remember one among the thousands 
 he saw yearly, I tried to recall myself to his 
 memory. 
 
 " You don't mean to say," he cried, " that 
 you are the child who was here a few months 
 ago ! Have you been ill ? " 
 
 ''No/' 
 
 " Then what have you done to yourself ? " 
 
 I had not done anything to myself, but the 
 work and the heat had robbed me of all my 
 colour, of half my hair, and of pounds of weight. 
 
 At the French home my fellow-inmates were 
 mostly of the servant class. They were very 
 kind to me : they made my bed, swept my room, 
 washed my hair, did my little mending, and even 
 brought me sweets. They expressed the hope 
 that I should meet some nice American who 
 would offer me marriage, yet they confessed 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 267 
 
 that American people were singularly devoid of 
 sentiment. 
 
 Several months after I was on the staff of the 
 newspaper, an American scholar, who was writing 
 a book on the Greek language, came to the office 
 to see if he could find some one to work with 
 him, and the proprietor recommended me. At 
 his house I met his wife, who at once took an 
 interest in me. Since she spoke very little 
 French and I no more English, our progress was 
 slow ; but both of them were very kind to me. 
 The husband became my regular pupil, paying 
 me for one hour's Greek lesson every day more 
 than I was receiving from the newspaper for all 
 my time. So I decided to give up my position 
 with the latter, where there was really no chance 
 for advancement, and devote myself to teaching 
 and studying. 
 
 It was necessary for me at this time to change 
 quarters. I could not keep on living in a place 
 where I had no companionship ; so my Greek 
 pupil put an advertisement in the newspaper 
 for me, saying that I was an educated young 
 Greek girl, who would exchange French or Greek 
 lessons for a home. 
 
 From the replies to my advertisement he chose 
 a school, and I went to see the principal. She, 
 too, had blue eyes, which had become the symbol 
 of kindness to me. She knew French, and we 
 were able to speak together. She wished me to 
 
268 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 coach a girl in Greek, to pass her entrance ex- 
 aminations, and for this she was wilHng not only 
 to give me my room and board but my laundry. 
 I at once moved to the school, and here ended 
 the first chapter of my American life. 
 
 I was now living in an American school, sur- 
 rounded by Americans. I was to see them live 
 their American lives. One may imagine how 
 interested I was. The school had about a 
 himdred day scholars, ranging from four to 
 twenty years of age ; and twenty boarders, re- 
 presenting almost as many States, and who — 
 even to my untrained ears — spoke in almost as 
 many different ways. 
 
 As a teacher of Greek I failed utterly. My 
 pupil read a Greek I could not follow, even 
 with the text-book in my hand. My beautiful, 
 musical mother-tongue was massacred in the 
 mouth of that girl, and she understood me not 
 at all. A living, thrilling language, with a litera- 
 ture to-day on a par with the best of Europe's, 
 and spoken by over ten million people, had to 
 be considered as dead, and pronounced in a 
 barbaric and ridiculous manner. The girl was 
 very angry at me when I told her she did not 
 pronounce it correctly. She informed me that 
 the ancient Greeks pronounced Greek as she 
 did, and that I, the lineal descendent of this 
 people whose language had been handed down 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 269 
 
 without a break from father to son, and who 
 used the very words of Plato every day, did not 
 know how to pronounce it. With what dehght 
 I should have boxed her ears, only I had to 
 remember that I was no longer I, but a teacher, 
 exchanging lessons for my living. 
 
 After several lessons together she went to the 
 principal and told her that I was quite unfitted 
 to teach her, and that she was only wasting her 
 time. 
 
 The principal and I had a conference. " I 
 can't teach her,'' I admitted, " unless I learn to 
 pronounce my own language in the execrable 
 way she does." 
 
 So far then as the school was concerned I had 
 failed. I was a Greek — but could not teach 
 Greek ! The thought of leaving the school hurt 
 me, because I had become very fond of the 
 principal, who even used to come to my room 
 sometimes and kiss me good night. 
 
 She offered me an alternative. " Wouldn't 
 you like to teach the little girls French, talk 
 French with the boarders, take them to church 
 and out for their walks ? " 
 
 I was delighted to accept this proposal. Not 
 being permitted to speak any English with the 
 pupils materially impeded my own progress ; 
 but there was a girl in the school who lived there 
 without being a pupil, and who, although she 
 spoke French fluently, often talked English with 
 
270 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 me, to give me practice. We became very good 
 friends : she said I was to be her daughter, and 
 she would be my mother. To her I owe a great 
 deal of the pleasure I had during my first few 
 years in America. 
 
 The principal of the school also took the greatest 
 pains with my English. It is true, she did not 
 permit me to speak it with the girls, but she her- 
 self spoke it constantly with me. I could have 
 had no better person to take as a pattern, for 
 she had a lovely accent, the best to be found 
 among Anglo-Saxons anywhere. She chose the 
 books I was to read, and told me the phrases to 
 use, as if I were her most expensive pupil. 
 
 My general impression of America now was 
 kindness. It was given to me with the lavish- 
 ness which is one of the chief characteristics 
 of the Americans. Yet because they were so 
 different from the people I was accustomed to, 
 I could not understand them at all, and mis- 
 understanding them I could not exactly love 
 them. In spite of their kindness they had a 
 certain crudity of manner, which constantly 
 hurt me. Besides, they seemed to me to live 
 their lives in blazing lights. I missed the twi- 
 lights and starlights, the poetry and charm of our 
 life at home — just as I missed the spring in their 
 calendar. 
 
 It will perhaps surprise Americans to hear 
 that, in spite of the excellent table at the school, 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 271 
 
 I was almost starved before I could learn to 
 eat American food. It seemed to me painfully 
 tasteless : the beef and mutton were so tough, 
 compared to the meat in Turkey, and all the 
 vegetables were cooked in water — while as for 
 the potatoes I had never seen such quantities 
 in my life. We had them for breakfast, for 
 luncheon, and for dinner, in some form or other. 
 Just before we sat down to table the principal 
 said grace, in which were the words, " Bless 
 that of which we are about to partake." To 
 my untrained ear " partake " and " potatoes " 
 sounded exactly alike, and I wrote home that 
 the Americans not only ate potatoes morning, 
 noon, and night, but that they even prayed to 
 the Lord to keep them supplied with potatoes, 
 instead of daily bread. 
 
 My Greek pupil and his wife, and also 
 my first American friend of the Normal College 
 found me pupils, so that I now earned consider- 
 able money. My outside pupils, mostly married 
 women, were very nice to me ; but I felt that 
 they did not quite know how to take me. I 
 had a terribly direct way of speaking ; and, 
 being still under the impression that as a nation 
 they were my inferiors, my attitude must have 
 displayed something of that feeling. 
 
 I began to be asked out to luncheons and 
 dinners — ^partly as a freak, I am afraid — and at 
 one of these dinners I became the victim of 
 
272 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 American humour. Happening to mention that 
 I was surprised at not seeing any real Americans 
 in New York, I was asked what I meant. I 
 explained that I meant pure-blooded Indians. 
 Thereupon my host very soberly told me that 
 I could see them any day at five o'clock, on 
 Broadway, at the corner where now stands the 
 beautiful Flatiron building. He cautioned me 
 to be there at five exactly. 
 
 The very first day I was free I went to the 
 designated corner. I arrived at half-past four, 
 and waited there till almost six, without seeing 
 one Indian. Fearing that I had made a mis- 
 take in the comer, I went into a shop and, in my 
 broken English, made inquiries. Two or three 
 clerks gathered together and discussed the pro- 
 blem, and then one of them, repressing a smile, 
 said to me : ''I am afraid some one has played 
 a joke on you. There are no Indians to be seen 
 anywhere in New York, except in shows.'' 
 
 That evening at school I told the whole story 
 at table, feeling highly indignant, and believing 
 that my hearers would share my indignation. 
 To my amazement every one burst out laughing, 
 and declared it to be the best joke they had 
 heard for a long time. Some of the girls even 
 said they should write home and tell it, because 
 it was so '' terribly funny." 
 
 Their attitude was a revelation to me. My 
 host had deceived me, and had wasted two hours 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 273 
 
 of my time and my strength, by giving me a 
 piece of information that he knew to be false ; 
 yet every one thought it delightfully humorous. 
 The only excuse I could find for this conduct was 
 that they were a nation of half-breeds, and did 
 not know any better. Indeed, as time went on, 
 American humour was to me the most disagree- 
 able part of Americans. It lacked finesse : it 
 was not funny to me — only undeveloped and 
 childish. Daily I was told that I had no sense 
 of humour, and that, like an Englishman, I 
 needed a surgical operation to appreciate what 
 was so highly appreciable. 
 
 Finally, I got very tired of being told I had no 
 humour and could not understand an American 
 joke ; so I determined to prove to them that I 
 not only understood their silly jokes but could 
 play them myself, if I chose. Now to me the 
 essence of an American joke was a lie, told with 
 a sober face, and in an earnest voice. I played 
 one on a girl boarder. To my surprise, the girl, 
 instead of laughing, began to cry and sob, and 
 almost went into hysterics. It made a great rumpus 
 in the school, and the principal sent for me. 
 
 '' My dear, is what you said true ? '* she asked, 
 with the greatest concern. 
 
 " No, not a word of it,'' I replied. 
 
 " Then why did you say it to the poor girl ? " 
 
 " To deceive her, and play an American joke 
 on her.'* 
 
274 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 The principal stared at me an instant, and 
 then burst into immoderate laughter. She called 
 the victim and the other older girls to her 
 and explained my joke, and they all went into 
 peels of laughter. In spite of its inauspicious 
 beginning my American joke was a huge success ; 
 and I could not understand why both the prin- 
 cipal and my '' mother '' united — after their 
 amusement had subsided — in cautioning me to 
 make no more American jokes. 
 
 For one year I stayed at the school ; then, 
 having saved some money from my private 
 lessons, and having enough pupils assured me 
 for the coming year, I decided to leave the school 
 and go into a private family, for the sake of my 
 English, and also in order to see American home 
 life. I still felt very ignorant about the American 
 people : in their own way they were so complex, 
 and they could not be judged by European 
 standards. 
 
 Almost with stupefaction do I read the inter- 
 views reported by the newspapers with dis- 
 tinguished and undistinguished foreigners, who, 
 after a few days' sojourn in the United States, 
 and a bird's-eye view of the country, give 
 out their comprehensive and eulogistic opinions. 
 They fill me with amazement, and I wonder 
 whether these other foreigners are so much 
 cleverer than I, or whether they are playing an 
 American joke on the American people. 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 275 
 
 The family with whom I went to live turned 
 out to be a Danish husband with a German wife. 
 Their children, however, were born and brought 
 up in America, so that I did mingle with Americans 
 of the first generation. That year away from 
 school enabled me to poke around a lot, in all 
 sorts of corners and by-corners of New York. 
 I took my luncheon daily in a different place, 
 and spoke to all sorts of people, and heard what 
 they had to say. The papers I read faithfully, 
 and every free evening I would attend some 
 public meeting, from a spiritualistic seance to 
 any sort of a lecture. I also spent one entire 
 night in the streets of New York. All the after- 
 noon I slept. At seven o'clock I dressed and 
 went to dinner alone in one of the so-called best 
 restaurants of Broadway, and then to the play. 
 The time between half-past eleven and five in 
 the morning I spent in walking in Broadway 
 and in Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Avenues. I 
 took the elevated train to the Battery, then up 
 to Harlem, and down again by another line. 
 New York at night is very different from New 
 York in the daytime. It seemed to me that 
 even the types which inhabited it were different, 
 and I saw a great deal which was not pleasant 
 to see ; but no one bothered me, either by word 
 or look. 
 
 Before this year I used to think that to be 
 absolutely free, to go and come as I pleased, 
 
276 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 would be the acme of happiness ; to have no one 
 to question my actions, to be responsible only 
 to myself would be the koryphe of freedom. Yet 
 this year, when I was free to go and come as I 
 pleased, and had no one to whom I had to give 
 any account of my actions, I found to be the 
 most desolate of my life, and my freedom weighed 
 on me far more than ever restraint had at home. 
 I came to realize that though an individual I 
 was part of a whole, and must remain a part of 
 that whole in order to enjoy life. 
 
 That year humanized me, so to speak, and 
 made me understand the reason for much that 
 I used to laugh at before — such, for example, 
 as the spinster's devotion to her rector, to settle- 
 ment work, or even to a parrot, a cat, or a dog. 
 Whenever now I see a woman in a carriage with 
 a dog on her lap, I may join with those who 
 laugh at her ; but at the same time I wonder 
 if it may not be poverty and loneliness of life 
 which make that woman, rich in mc jy, lavish 
 the treasures of her heart on a dumb creature. 
 
 At the end of the year I returned to the school, 
 and willingly placed myself again in harness. 
 During this year I made the acquaintance of 
 John Fisk's books, and discovered the error of 
 my preconceived notions about the American 
 people and their origin. He taught me who 
 the early settlers really were, whence, and why 
 they had come. I read of their privations and 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 277 
 
 struggles, and of their ultimate success. For 
 the first time I looked upon this continent as 
 peopled by the white race, and the shame I 
 felt for my past ignorance was only mitigated 
 by my desire to atone for it. I mapped out a 
 thorough course of reading, and all the spare 
 time of that year and the next was devoted to 
 systematic study of American history, literature 
 and poetry. 
 
 And, as I read American history, it came over 
 me how different the beginning of this race was 
 from the beginning of all the other civilized 
 nations of the world. Whereas the others all 
 started by a strong barbaric race descending 
 upon a weaker people and seizing their cattle 
 and their lands by brute force, America alone 
 started with the great middle classes of all civi- 
 lized races, who came to the new world, not with 
 brute force as their weapon, but with the desire 
 to carry out in a wild and virgin country the 
 spiritual and social development they craved. 
 What a marvellous, unprecedented beginning ! 
 What a heritage for their sons ! I am afraid 
 many of them do not appreciate the greatness 
 of that beginning, otherwise why should they 
 try to go beyond those early settlers and seek to 
 establish their descent from William the Con- 
 queror, or some little sprig of nobility, and make 
 themselves ridiculous where they ought to be 
 sublime ? 
 
278 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 By temperament I am afraid I am something 
 of an extremist. My barely tolerant attitude 
 toward my new country changed into a wholly 
 reverential one. I desired to become an American 
 myself, considering it a great honour, as in the 
 olden days people came from all over the world 
 to Greece, to become that country's citizens. I 
 started my Americanism by adopting its brusque- 
 ness — it is an unfortunate fact that one is as 
 likely to imitate the faults of those one admires 
 as the virtues — but brusqueness which is so 
 characteristic of America is mitigated by its 
 young blood and by its buoyancy, and we of the 
 old bloods can very little afford that trait. It 
 must have made a poor combination in me, and 
 many people must have found it hard to tolerate. 
 The principal of the school told me, during my 
 third year with her, that I had so completely 
 changed in manners as to be hardly recognizable. 
 When I first came to live with her, she said, I 
 had had exquisite and charming manners ; now, 
 I had become as brusque as any raw western 
 girl. She little understood that she was attack- 
 ing my new garb of Americanism. 
 
 The school year began in October and ended 
 in May, leaving me four months to my own 
 devices. Two vacations I spent in a fashionable 
 summer resort, not far from New York, where 
 I not only had pupils enough to pay my expenses 
 but ample time to read English and American 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 279 
 
 books, and also opportunity to study the attitude 
 of rich Americans toward a girl earning her own 
 living — an attitude not very different from ours 
 in the Old World. One summer I spent in a 
 working girl's vacation home, where all the girls 
 were shop girls, and where I met the proletariat 
 of the New World on an equal footing. And 
 once I spent the entire four months visiting in 
 the mountains of North Carolina, where I learned 
 how much more American money is needed for 
 schools there than in Constantinople, where it 
 goes, not to civilize the Turks but to educate at 
 the least possible expense to themselves the 
 children of well-to-do Bulgarians, Greeks, and 
 Armenians — especially the first. And the recent 
 actions of the Bulgarians have proved eloquently 
 how little American education helps them ; for 
 American civilization must be sought — it cannot 
 be imposed from without. 
 
 My third year at school, the head French 
 teacher left it, and the principal offered me her 
 place ; and so, four years after I landed in the 
 new world I was at the head of the French depart- 
 ment of one of the best private schools in New 
 York City. I had many good friends, was making 
 considerable money outside the school, and was 
 studying at the University of New York. To 
 all appearance I had succeeded ; yet truth 
 compels me to confess that, so far as my inner 
 self was concerned, I was a total failure. 
 
28o A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 I had thought that if I were to join the great 
 army of the world's workers, and lead my life 
 as seemed to me worthy ; if I were to cut 
 loose from the conventions and traditions which 
 hampered my development in the old world, 
 happiness would come to me. Far from it ! 
 I realized then that I was only one of the victims 
 of that terrible disease, Restlessness, which has 
 taken hold of women the world over. We are 
 dissatisfied with the lines of development and 
 action imposed by our sex, and the causes of 
 our dissatisfaction are so many that I shall not 
 even try to enumerate them. The terrible fact 
 remains that in our discontent we rush from 
 this to that remedy, hoping vainly that each 
 new one will lead to peace. We have even come 
 to believe that political equality is the remedy 
 for our disease. Very soon, let us hope, we shall 
 possess that nostrum, too. When we find our- 
 selves politically equal with men, and on a par 
 with them in the arena of economics, we may 
 discover that these extraneous changes are not 
 what we need. We may then, by looking deep 
 down into our own hearts see whether, as women, 
 we have really done the best we could by our- 
 selves. We may then find out the real cause 
 for our discontent, and deliberately and with 
 our own hands draw the line of demarcation 
 again between men and women, and devote 
 ourselves to developing that greater efficiency 
 
IN REAL AMERICA 281 
 
 in ourselves along our own lines, which is the 
 only remedy for our present restlessness. 
 
 I believe that only then shall we find content- 
 ment and a better equality than the one for which 
 to-day some of us are even committing lawlessness. 
 
CHAPTER XXII 
 
 BACK TO TURKEY 
 
 YET after I had come to believe that 
 these conclusions of mine were the 
 right ones — and at the present moment 
 I still believe them to be so — I did not rise, 
 pack my trunk and return to my home. On 
 the contrary, disillusioned though I was, I 
 meant to stay in America. My little self felt 
 pledged to the onward fight, into which evolution 
 has plunged us. My generation belongs to that 
 advance guard which will live to see the fight 
 ended in America, and I must be present, after 
 the great victory is won, to see how we shall 
 face the reconstruction period. This was the 
 reason why, when my mother, about to undergo 
 a serious operation, sent for me to be with her, 
 I bought my return ticket before leaving America, 
 and kept it always with me — ready for use at a 
 moment's notice. 
 
 The love of our native land forms an indelible 
 part of our souls. A mad joy possessed me all 
 the way from New York to Genoa ; a delirium 
 from Genoa to the Dardanelles ; and from the 
 straits to the harbour I was speechless with 
 
 282 
 
BACK TO TURKEY 283 
 
 emotion. How wonderful my empress city 
 looked, when the mist gradually lifted and dis- 
 closed her to my homesick eyes. Up to that 
 moment I had thought never to see her enchant- 
 ing face again ; yet there I was, standing on the 
 promenade deck of a commonplace steamer, while 
 she was giving me — me, her runaway child — all 
 her smiles and all her glory. 
 
 We must be very strong, that we do not some- 
 times die of joy. 
 
 When the little tender docked at the quay of 
 Galata, how I should have loved to have escaped 
 the customs bother, the many and one greetings, 
 and the hundred and several more stupid words 
 one has to say on disembarking. Yet having 
 acquired a little wisdom, I was patient with the 
 custom-house men, and polite to the people who 
 had been sent to meet me. Obediently even I 
 entered the carriage which was to take me up, 
 up on the seven hills where we Christians live. 
 
 Not till several days afterwards was I free to 
 start on my pilgrimage ; and as I walked up 
 and down the main streets, and in and out of 
 the narrow, crooked, dirt}/ lanes, which lead 
 one enticingly onward — often to nowhere — I was 
 aware that my pilgrimage had a double aim. 
 First, I wanted to recognize my old haunts, and 
 second, to find that part of myself which had 
 once lived within those quarters. Alas ! if the 
 streets were the same, I was not. Where was 
 
284 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 the girl, full of enthusiasm and dreams, who had 
 trod these same streets ? Something within me 
 had changed. Was it my faith in mankind, or 
 my faith in life itself ? 
 
 As I walked on, unconsciously I was picturing 
 these same streets, clean, full of life and bustle, 
 were Turkey to belong to America. I could see 
 the trolleys they would have here, the terraces 
 they would build there, the magnificent build- 
 ings they would erect, and all the civilized things 
 they would bring to my mother country. My 
 eyes, Americanized by the progress of the new 
 world, kept seeing things that ought to be done, 
 and were left undone, for no other reason than 
 that they had been left undone for hundreds of 
 years. The saddest of all sad things is when one 
 begins to see the faults and failings of one's own 
 beloved, be it a person or a country. I hated 
 myself for finding fault with Turkey because she 
 was clad in a poor, unkempt garb. 
 
 Before the Galata Tower, just where the streets 
 form a cross, I turned to the left, and walked to 
 the next street. At its entrance the leader of a 
 band of dogs rose from his slumbers and barked 
 at me angrily. I started, and then stood still. 
 This was a street where once I had lived, and 
 the canine leader barking at me was the same 
 as six years ago, only older, more unkempt, and 
 filthier. It hurt me to have him bark at me. 
 It meant that he did not know me — or did he 
 
BACK TO TURKEY 285 
 
 with his doggish intuition feel that I was dis- 
 loyal in my heart to the old regime ? 
 
 " Why, Giaour ! " I cried, " don't you know 
 me ? We used to be friends, you and I." 
 
 He stood rigidly on his old legs, his band alert 
 to follow his lead. These dogs, which were 
 anathema to the stranger, had a double duty to 
 perform in their unhappy city. They were not 
 only scavengers, but the defenders of her de- 
 fenceless quarters. The stranger only saw their 
 scarred bodies and ugly appearance ; but we 
 who were born in Constantinople knew how they 
 formed their bands, and how they protected us. 
 Each quarter had some twenty dogs, and they 
 guarded it both against other dogs, and against 
 strangers. The young ones, as they grew up, 
 had to win their spurs, and their position was 
 determined by their bravery and skill, both in 
 fighting and in commanding. I had seen Giaour 
 win his leadership, a month or so before I 
 left Constantinople. He had been nicknamed 
 Giaour by a Turkish kapoudji, because he had 
 a white cross plainly marked on his face. 
 
 To my entreaties he only stood growling. 
 '' Come, Giaour," I begged, '' I have changed, 
 I know, but I am still enough myself for you 
 not to bark at me." 
 
 He listened, mistrustfully watching every 
 movement I made, and because of this I 
 perpetrated a shameful deed. I retreated to 
 
286 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 Galderim Gedjesi, bought a loaf at the baker's, 
 and with the bribe in my hand returned. The 
 band was now lying down, but Giaour was still 
 standing, his pantallettes shaking in a ruffled 
 and disturbed fashion. In his heart, perhaps, 
 he was not pleased with himself for having 
 barked at me. 
 
 I approached him, the bread in my hand. 
 After all, is not Turkey the land of bribes ? 
 
 " Come, Giaour ! '' I went and sat down on 
 a door-step. Slowly and with dignity he followed. 
 *' Here is some bread from the baker's for you, 
 and please try to remember me ! It is more than 
 I can bear to have you bark at me. Giaour.'' 
 
 He sniffed at the piece of bread I offered him ; 
 then ate it, and then another piece, and another. 
 When he had finished the entire loaf he placed 
 both his paws on my lap and studied my face 
 intently. 
 
 " Giaour, you know me now, don't you ? " I 
 begged. " I used to live here six years ago, 
 though it seems like ages." 
 
 From across the way an Englishman came out 
 of a house and approached me, where I sat with 
 Giaour's paws in my lap. '' I beg your pardon," 
 he said shyly, lifting his hat, " but you are a 
 stranger here, and those fellows are dangerous. 
 Besides they are unhealthy." 
 
 This was the last straw : he took me for a 
 foreigner. 
 
BACK TO TURKEY 287 
 
 " Thank you/' I replied, '' but I am not afraid. 
 The fact is, we are of the same kennel, Giaour 
 and ir 
 
 " Kennel— h'm ! '' 
 
 '' Oh, I know Giaour has never seen a kennel, 
 as you understand it in England ; but he has a 
 fine doggish soul, just the same/' 
 
 " H'm ! " the Englishman sniffed again, " per- 
 haps he has,*' and lifting his hat, he went away. 
 
 It is a curious fact that unless an Englishman 
 in England knows you, he would rather perish 
 than speak to you first ; on the Continent he 
 would rather be rude to you than decent ; but 
 in Turkey his nature seems to change, and he is 
 really a nice human being. As I watched the 
 man go away I was thinking that if England 
 were governing Turkey how delightful every- 
 thing would be. Yes, England would be the one 
 nation to succeed with Turkey. America was 
 too bustling, after all, and had too little ex- 
 perience. Germany had too much paternalism 
 and discipline ; Austria-Hungary lacked funda- 
 mental honesty ; while as for Russia — that ought 
 never to be. Russian bureaucracy, grafted on 
 the corrupt Turkish stem would only make 
 matters worse. But England, with her love of 
 order and decency, and with just enough dis- 
 cipline to put matters to rights — ^how delightful 
 it would be, and how the Turks would enjoy 
 stopping whatever they were doing, at four 
 
288 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 o'clock, to have tea ! Alas ! between Mr Glad- 
 stone's indiscreet utterances, and Sir Elliot's bad 
 management, England let her hour slip by, and 
 Turkey was deprived of her one chance to be 
 regenerated. 
 
 Giaour threw back his head and emitted a 
 howl. It was strident and harsh, the howl of 
 the plains of Asia ; for Giaour was of the blood 
 of the once monarchs of the East, though now 
 he was a ragged, diseased dog — scavenger, and 
 soldier of fortune. 
 
 Lovingly my hand patted his old head. " Ah, 
 Giaour, my boy, these are hard days for thee and 
 thy race, and even I am recreant in my heart to 
 thee. Forgive me ! Perhaps the Powers, in not 
 agreeing among themselves, have reached the 
 only possible agreement at present — the Turk 
 in Constantinople. 
 
 I took his paws and put them down. " Don't 
 bark at me again, old boy." 
 
 He waved his stump of a tail, just a tiny bit. 
 He had eaten my bread, he had looked into my 
 eyes, yet he was not quite certain of me. Per- 
 haps he, too, had lost faith in life and in 
 mankind. 
 
 On leaving Giaour, I plunged into that tangle 
 of streets through which one may deviously find 
 one's way to Kara-keuy. To a stranger it is a 
 veritable labyrinth ; but though I have little 
 sense of locality I could still find my way through 
 
BACK TO TURKEY 289 
 
 it. It is one of the few thoroughly oriental 
 quarters left on this side of the Galata Bridge. 
 
 Arrived at Kara-Keuy I stopped happily, 
 watching the life about me. How delightfully 
 — how terribly — everything was the same. From 
 afar I heard a cry — " Varda I *' and then saw the 
 half-clad figure of the runner, who, waving a red 
 flag to right and to left, was warning pedestrians 
 that the street-car was coming. Ah ! this was 
 indeed my Constantinople, disdained by pro- 
 gress, forgotten by time. How emblematic was 
 this runner before the street-car. He reminded 
 me of the cynical words of the crafty Russian 
 statesman, Ignatief, who once exclaimed : " They 
 talk of regenerating Turkey — as if that were pos- 
 sible even to the Almighty above." 
 
 My dear, dear Turkey ! She may start over 
 again in Asia, but be regenerated in Europe ? 
 
 For a little while I walked on, and then enter- 
 ing a small confectioner's shop, frequented only 
 by Turks, and squatting like them on a low stool, 
 I ordered a kourous worth of boughatcha, I 
 ate it with my fingers, like the others. Near me 
 sat two young students of theology, talking 
 politics. Their tone as much as their words 
 made me see bloodshed. In some ways the 
 Turks are one of the finest races, but they have 
 been losing ground for the last two hundred 
 years and it hurts them, and in their heart they 
 see red. No wonder they make others see it, 
 
 T 
 
290 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 too. The conversation of the young softas was 
 full of the sanguine colour. This was shortly 
 after 1897. Turkey had just defeated Greece, 
 and the old feeling of arrogance was uppermost 
 in the breasts of Mahomet's followers. 
 
 '' Fork them out ! Fork them out, the giaours/' 
 cried the younger of the two. " They are only 
 fit for fodder, those Christian dogs." 
 
 I should have liked to linger over my boug- 
 hatcha, but the tension of the tone betrayed a 
 heat above the normal. I paid my kourous, and 
 left the shop, praying both to the Christian God 
 and to the Mohammedan one that they might 
 let these misguided children see stretches of 
 peaceful green, instead of always red. 
 
 Slowly, slowly, now, I walked to the Galata 
 Bridge, and turned to the right, just behind the 
 karakol which houses the main body of the Galata 
 police. I was on my way to hunt up old All 
 Baba, my boatman, him with whom years ago 
 I had shared the raptures of the Byzantine 
 History. My heart was beating fast. Would 
 Turkey play me false this once ? Would the 
 one living landmark of my past be chosen as 
 the one to mark a change in that changeless 
 country ? 
 
 Hastening, I yet found myself lingering in my 
 haste. If his place were to be empty, if he were 
 really gone, having himself been rowed over the 
 river Styx, would it not be better for me not to 
 
BACK TO TURKEY 291 
 
 go there, but always to remember his place filled 
 by his kindly presence ? 
 
 Though reasoning thus, my feet still took me 
 onward to where he used to be, and there, at his 
 accustomed place, sat Ali Baba, his face looking 
 like a nice red apple, wrinkled by the sun and 
 rain. 
 
 I went and stood before him. " Ali Baba ! " 
 I said, tears in my voice. 
 
 He rose, a trifle less quickly than he used to, 
 and looked at me incredulously. 
 
 " Benim kuchouk, hanoum** he said slowly, 
 rubbing his eyes. 
 
 " Oh ! it is I !" I cried. " It is I," and gave 
 him both my hands. 
 
 We walked toward the little caique, where he 
 took some time to unfasten the rope. We did 
 not speak until he had rowed again mid-way, 
 under the bridge. 
 
 " Where have you been all these many, many 
 years ? " he asked reproachfully. 
 
 " I have been to America," I replied, " the 
 newest and biggest of all countries " — and as of 
 old I was talking, and he was listening ; only 
 this time it was not of the past, and of the people, 
 who, having done their work, were dead and for- 
 gotten, but of a country of a great present, and a 
 still greater future. And as of old his old face 
 was full of interest and kindness. 
 
 Presently he asked, " But my little lady, what 
 
292 A CHILD OF THE ORIENT 
 
 have you done with the roses of your face ? You 
 are pale and worn out." 
 
 *' One has to work hard in America," I replied. 
 " It is a country which requires of your best, of 
 your utmost, if you are to succeed." And again 
 I went on to tell him of the fast trains which go 
 sixty miles an hour, of the elevated trains, flying 
 above the middle of the streets, and of the pre- 
 parations for the subways, which were to burrow 
 in the depths of the city. 
 
 " But why are they working so hard and pre- 
 paring so much ? " he asked, a bit bewildered. 
 " After all they will have to die, and when they 
 are dead they can only have a grave like any- 
 body else." 
 
 I shook my head. "They are making away 
 with the graves, my Ali Baba. They have in- 
 vented a quicker and more expedient way of 
 getting rid of the body. They place it on a table 
 in a special room, and within two hours all that 
 is left of it is a simple white strip of clean 
 ashes." 
 
 He gasped. " They have done that ? " he 
 cried in horror. " They have done that ! Allah, 
 can'st thou forgive them ? " He leaned towards 
 me, earnestness and entreaty in his kind face. 
 " Don't go back there, my little one, don't go 
 back there again. It is an accursed country 
 which steals the peace from the living, their 
 bodies from the dead, and robs a child of her 
 
BACK TO TURKEY 293 
 
 roses. Say that you are not going back, my 
 little one." 
 
 Again I shook my head. " When I left there, 
 my Ali Baba, I bought my return-ticket. I wear 
 it like an amulet around my neck. I am going 
 back as soon as my presence is no longer needed 
 here." 
 
 He let his oars drop. " You are going back ? " 
 he asked with awe. '* But why ? " 
 
 I looked at him, and beyond him at old 
 Byzantium — once Greek, now full of minarets 
 and mosques and all they stood for. A red 
 Turkish flag floated idly against the indigo sky. 
 
 Why was I going back to that vast new country 
 so diametrically different from his own ? Could 
 I explain to him ? 
 
 No, I could not, any more than I could have 
 explained, years ago, to my little Turkish Kiamel6 
 the meaning of my grand-uncle's gift on my fifth 
 birthday. 
 
 " Why are you going back ? " Ali Baba 
 insisted. 
 
 No, I could not tell him : he could not 
 understand. 
 
 His flag was the Crescent, mine was the Cross. 
 
THE SOUL OF A TURK 
 
 BY 
 
 VICTORIA DE BUNSEN 
 
 With 8 Illustrations 
 Demy 8vo, 10s, 6(1. net 
 
 Morning Post. — " The most delightful books are those which 
 either depict the characters of men and women, or those 
 which reveal the personality of the writer. Mrs De Bunsen's 
 account of her travels in the Near East combines both these 
 charms." 
 
 Westminster Gazette. — ***The Soul of a Turk' is an interest- 
 ing, well-written book." 
 
 Evening Standard. — "Mrs De Bunsen's volume must have 
 a niche all to itself in the great library built up by travellers 
 in Turkey. It does actually fulfil the promise of its title." 
 
 Daily Telegraph. — "It is an admirable and suggestive piece 
 of portraiture." 
 
 Spectator. — "For insight and sympathy with the Oriental 
 mind, we have not read anything better than these pages for 
 a long time. We thoroughly commend this book to every 
 one who enjoys following the travels of a plucky, entertaining, 
 and exceptionally intelligent woman." 
 
 AthencBum. — "This delightful book is no mere collection of 
 * ritual acts.' It is full of shrewd observations on the people." 
 
 Observer. — "Mrs De Bunsen's book is no ordinary book of 
 travel, but really a very suggestive and thoughtful treatise 
 on the faiths and customs of the Eastern Turks, illuminated 
 with a woman's sympathy." 
 
BOOKS BY STEPHEN GRAHAM 
 
 CHANGING RUSSIA 
 
 A TRAMP ALONG THE BLACK SEA SHORE AND 
 IN THE URALS 
 
 With 15 Illustrations and a Map. Demy 8vo, 7s, 6d, net 
 
 Pall Mall Gazette. — " A beautifully written book which reveals the 
 Russian people with a sympathy and a delicacy of perception that 
 are unsurpassed probably even in the work of the most gifted Russian 
 writers of to-day." 
 
 UNDISCOVERED RUSSIA 
 
 With 16 Illustrations, Demy 8vo, 1 2s. 6d. net 
 
 The Spectator. — " Mr Graham writes so well that the aspects of his 
 subject tend to transfigure themselves under the spell of a style whose 
 delicate phrasing and soft melancholy often remind one of Loti's 
 subtle-hued visions of men and things seen from beneath the half- 
 closed eyelids of artist and dreamer. Certainly there is in Mr Graham's 
 mood and expression some elusively un-English element that makes 
 his work read at times like perfectly translated French. Still, his sad- 
 ness has its source, not in the passive weariness of Loti, surfeited with 
 civilisation and experience, but in the mysticism of a born wanderer." 
 
 A VAGABOND IN THE 
 CAUCASUS 
 
 WITH SOME NOTES OF HIS EXPERIENCES 
 AMONG THE RUSSIANS 
 
 With 16 Illustrations. Demy 8vo, 12s. 6d. net 
 
 Country Life. — "With awaterproof sleeping- sack across his shoulders, 
 and a strong infusion of Carlyle, Swinburne, and Nietzsche in his head, 
 the author of this wholly delightful book set out to wander in the 
 Caucasus. It was the spirit of Lavengro, however, that supplied the 
 real driving power, for in his veins, clearly, the sweet passion of earth 
 runs side by side with a strong savour of humanity. Youth, spon- 
 taneity, and enthusiasm colour these striking Caucasian pictures, for 
 the vagabond was also a poet. You follow his adventures with the ' 
 same interest you follow an engrossing novel, because you see the 
 man and feel something of his passion." 
 
 LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD 
 
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