Chapter XII: Farther Afield--The Primitive People

Alas! I have stayed too long in the charming society of Fâtima. In my quiet Eastern existence I have not noticed the flight of time. I came for a week, and I have stayed over twelve. Soon, I believe, I should have taken Fâtima’s advice to send for my mother and stay here altogether.

And now winter has come. In my own country I had mapped out quite a different programme for myself. Constantinople, after all, is not Turkey. To know Turkey I must go right into the homes of the people of Anatolia, and the thought of spending my days on horseback and my nights sometimes in the homes of the primitive Turks, sometimes under the starlit sky, with the glorious Eastern moon to kiss me to sleep, gave me courage to break away for a while from my matter-of-fact grinding existence of the West. But I have been so completely under the spell of my new life that I have not even known the day of the month. When writing one of my letters I remember I questioned a friend as to the date. “Must you really put the date?” she asked. “It isn’t a matter of life and death,” I answered, “but one generally does so in my country.” “Well, my dear,” she went on, “you must wait till my husband returns, he, perhaps, will know; I haven’t the least idea.”

Ah, happy country, where one can forget even the date! Alas!--yes, I say alas!--its hour has come. It, too, will have to take on the uncomfortable yoke of civilization, and be a plain, matter-of-fact people, like the rest of Europe. I have felt all the while I stayed with Fâtima as if I were present at a beautiful sunset, and I must not lose the joy of drinking in every ray of light, for in a few moments night would be there. “How you notice every detail,” Fâtima said to me one day. “It is all so beautiful,” I replied, as I felt this was the end of the true “East” in the old sense of the word--the cook, who goes to sleep over his work, and serves the meals according to the sun, or a still more accurate timepiece--his own healthy appetite; the coachman, whose two great passions are his horses and the history of Turkey, which he has acquired from conversation only, since he can neither read nor write; Miss Chocolate, who in a month’s time will take her place as the wife of a coffee-skinned railway official. I had the feeling when I left my dear Fâtima this morning that when next I return to this country this charming picture will have passed into eternity.

And Fâtima herself! A true daughter of the East, and proud to be so. Dear little friend, with the blue-black hair, olive skin, and dark eyes!--such a striking contrast to myself. How, in the hurry and bustle of our life, I shall miss her soft, low voice, and the gentle touch of her hand, and the “Let us sit down quietly and rest, and I will explain our Eastern customs to you.” I have been with Fâtima in the hardest moments of her life. Where has that tiny little creature found in these moments of anguish--which would have crushed us Western women used to the tumble and rough of life--a strength of will to carry her dry-eyed through an ocean of suffering? These Turks have the pride of Emperors. How we have misjudged them! When the enemy was at their very door, when half their Fatherland was gone, Europe noticed how they listened to all the news with dry eyes and apparently resigned indifference. But this is not indifference--it is pride. When Fâtima was mourning the loss of her little baby girl she told me calmly her heart was broken, but never would she let me see the tears which soaked her pillow at night. Indifference, indeed! I never met any one who cared less for her own woes and more for the woes of others. Lady Mary Montagu was right when she said, “There is as much sense in asking the refugees of Greek-street to write about the Court of St. James’s as in asking the average woman to write about the women of Turkey.”

And now, although winter is here, I have come as far as Broussa and the neighbouring villages to take a peep into the lives of these primitive people of Asia Minor. The sea has been rough for days; so rough that the cautious captain has preferred to remain quietly in the sheltered harbour. But to-day, one might almost imagine the hospitable Turks had ordered the Bosphorus to spread itself out into a blue satin carpet all along the way, and the sun to give a special performance in my honour.

A comfortable cabin is reserved for me. I am accompanied by one of the most eloquent orators of the Young Turk party, N---- Bey, who in his turn is accompanied by a secretary. This man is a patriot to the core; nothing counts with him but his Fatherland. He would be a gentleman even were he in rags, and if he had to assassinate an enemy of his beloved Fatherland, at least he would set about it like a gentleman. The boat we travelled on was named after a favourite Sultana. The first thing that greeted my eye was the notice, “Private cabin.” Was everything on board, then, to be translated into English? My heart thumped with delight. Alas! things do not always go as quickly as one could wish, and the explanation of the English was nothing more poetical than the fact that the steamboat which now bears the name of a much-loved Sultana was a cast-off boat belonging to the Brighton and South Coast Railway Company.

On the little stretch of railway which extends from Modana to Broussa no one hurries. One station is called “The Persians,” and the next “The Jews,” and each time the train stops the kindly guard gives the _souje_ (water merchant) a chance of doing some business before the train moves on again. “If only you had come in the spring,” my companion tells me, as I give way to the enthusiasm I feel for all I see around me, “you, who love the flowers, what pleasure they would give you!” But I am content with small mercies. Everything, after all, is relative in this world. And when I think of London at this moment, shrouded in fog, whilst we are surrounded by a blue sky, a blue sea, trees in all their autumn glory, and the air which caresses my face like _iced velvet_, I am thankful for what Broussa can give me at present.

We had a long, cold drive from the station, but I do not mind this in the least, for the long way takes me by the tomb of Kara Kheuz and his partner, Hadgi Vadt. Two insignificant turban-topped stones, which time has almost laid horizontal, spring out of the bank on the side of the road. One gets so used in Turkey to seeing tombs springing out of places where they are least expected that unless one’s attention were particularly drawn to it one would never have noticed this insignificant, neglected burial-place of a great man. I say great man, because I am told that it is from Kara Kheuz that the great Molière took so much of his inspiration, and his well-known _que fait-il dans cette galère?_ comes straight from this source.

In the inn where we are staying there is no woman to attend to me. This does not trouble me in the very least, and men, after all, make excellent housemaids. They give me cheese for breakfast, rustic bread, and coffee _à la turque_, after which I rise early and dress, in order to see all there is to be seen whilst the daylight lasts. The inn is situated on a hill; there are sulphur and Turkish baths attached to it. Broussa is the happy possessor of springs, which for a European _Kurort_ would be a fortune; but where is the European who would come to a _kurort_ without a casino? Our inn is not in Broussa itself, but in the neighbouring village. Broussa lies at the foot of the hill, bathed in a pale blue mist, which looks from the distance like the sea, and there are lines of naked poplar trees jutting out of the wide blue expanse, and an horizon such as I love, for it never seems to end.

S---- Bey, the sympathetic principal of the Broussa Lycée for boys, is to be my guide whilst I am here. My guide from Constantinople is visiting his old friends, who are arranging a meeting-lecture at the town hall, for never is this charming politician allowed to leave a town without first speaking to the people. A lecture from N---- Bey! It is the event of the year! There is nothing whatsoever going on here after sunset. A handful of dimly lighted cafés, where a few resigned-looking Turks sit sipping a halfpenny cup of coffee, talking rarely, smoking generally, and occasionally humming a favourite ghazelle (a popular song which sounds to my Western ear like a dirge). But when N---- Bey speaks the cafés are deserted, and the proprietors themselves are amongst the audience.

It was a splendid meeting. A seething mass of 2,000 odd fezzes and turbans; old and young, rich--or rather, shall we say, the better class--and poor, workmen, hamals, and the Grand Vizier’s brother. The present Governor of Broussa, who was himself absent, was represented. The prefect and his officials came to the big entrance door to fetch me, and after a little speech of welcome conducted me into the _mayoral_ parlour, where I drank coffee and syrup before the meeting began. The prefect is one of those kind-faced Orientals who belong to the Turkey which is passing away. He has a little, withered-up, dark-skinned face, and big, brown, wondering eyes; he wears a long coat made of Persian embroidery, and lined with fur, and a big turban, which looks too heavy for his small head, and although he is the municipal head of the ancient capital of the Turks, he can neither read nor write.

And here, again, the inborn good manners of the Turks struck me. They had never before seen a woman at one of their meetings; they did not stare at me during the speech, they did not hang about the door to see the “curious monster” arrive and depart. When I took my seat beside the Prefect and his officials they rose respectfully; then I became one of themselves, and they paid no further attention to me.

I asked N---- Bey, when we travelled to Broussa, whether he prepared his speeches. “No,” said he, “I speak from my heart.” Although during the speech I understood no more than that his subject was the Fatherland, the sight of this man, who was ready to lay down his life for the Fatherland in danger, giving out the fire of his eloquence to stir the people to be ready, and this whole mass of people sobbing, moved me also to tears. That I should have wept without understanding a word sounds incomprehensible. I understood the sacred word “Fatherland.” That was enough. Now should all Western critics who spoke of the Turkish “indifference” come and see these tears--tears of old men and boys. Where were the fathers of these youths and the sons of the old men? I asked. The answer I knew--they had fallen for the Fatherland.

N---- Bey, explaining the reasons for the Turkish losses, found three principal causes: First, the absence of the clergy, if the Moslem holy men can be called by that name. “Ever since the beginning of Islam,” said he, “the clergy have been at the wars encouraging the soldiers when they grew faint-hearted, and helping to care for the sick. In this last war not one Hodja took part.” Secondly, he blamed the dynasty for not sending one of its members to lead the troops. Before the reign of Abdul-Hamid the Kalife of Islam always led the troops; the dynasty, like the clergy, had forgotten its duty. The third cause found was that the people had not obeyed the dictates of civilization. That is true. But on whom can the blame be laid? On the shoulders of that fallen tyrant who is eking out his days in a prison-palace on the shores of the Bosphorus. It is when one goes about this country and sees the extraordinary ignorance of this people that one realizes something of the hideous crime of the Sovereign, who for thirty-three years terrorized his people, and the extraordinary courage of the Young Turks who deposed him.

Civilization the Turks must have. Much as I have loved the reposeful nature of the quiet cities of Islam, much as I feel the sight of electric light and gas and electric trams offends my artistic soul, I know only too well that Turkey must “move on with the centuries.” And here again one recognizes the gigantic task the Young Turks have before them. Hamid is no longer on the throne, but Hamid’s work lives on. You cannot repair in five years the damage of thirty-three. You cannot in five years change the character of a people used to a régime of terror. I see in the faces of these poor old men a resignation which is the result of a crushing and brutalizing tyranny; they are like horses which have taken fright. What can Young Turkey do with them? “You cannot put new wine into old bottles,” says the Prophet of Nazareth. Young Turkey is wise in staking all its efforts on the coming generation, and giving power to a Minister not yet thirty years of age.

S---- Bey is determined I shall not leave Broussa till I have visited every stone it contains. It was the “woman’s day” at the Turkish baths this morning, and I went into all the steaming heat to see the women of the people spending, as it were, a holiday. They can stay there all day for 2_d._ if they like; so they take their food, and their children, and their children’s children, and make a day of it. Fat old ladies in gaudy-coloured tunics sit huddled up in corners singing contentedly, others walk about, dragging their clogs over the baking marble floors, whilst little girls and boys, with wine flasks tied round their waists in the place of lifebelts, swim about the fountains like little brown fishes.

We have been to the market-place and the old bazaar, which very much resembles the bazaar of Stamboul, except that one has Moslem merchants to deal with instead of Levantine Christians. What a charming difference! Yes, but these good-mannered men will never make successful merchants. I buy a piece of embroidery. “The price,” says the merchant, “is 12 francs.--2_d._ profit for me,” he adds. I offer 10_s._ for a blue stone. “I could not take more than 6_d._,” says the merchant; “it is only glass.”

I want to buy a couple of the charming blue bead necklaces which every quadruped here wears round his neck. It does not matter really whether his harness is worn almost to a thread, no harm can come to him if he has the bead necklaces round his neck. “This lady loves your country,” S---- Bey tells the merchant, and the merchant will not take a penny for his wares. I go to see the Broussa silks. “Is this the lady who loves my country?” asks the merchant. A pink silk dress is mine, but all attempts to get the bill have been in vain.

And, at the bazaar at Stamboul, who has not experienced the disagreeable bartering which takes place between the merchant and the customer? I went one day with Fâtima. The man tried to sell us imitation antique embroideries for the price of real antiques. Fortunately, Fâtima knew the difference, for I did not. Then the merchant showed us the real article. “Very beautiful,” commented he; “a beautiful price!” replied Fâtima. “But I never cheat Turks,” although he had tried, he assured us, “only English people,” for, naturally, he did not recognise through the thick veil I was wearing the features of a woman of that race “he always cheated when he could.”

The women in the villages here are not veiled, as are the women of Constantinople. Their hair and shoulders are covered with yellow embroideries, of which I was given a sample, and they sit astride their ponies, mules, or donkeys, as the case may be, often without saddles, and a well-worn cord only as bridle and reins. They carry a rather substantial twig of a tree for a whip, which they hold threateningly before the donkey’s eyes whilst mounting, but I never saw them use it.

Horseback, of course, is the only way of getting about this country. The horses are sure-footed, if not very active, and at each village travellers find a fairly steady pole, to which a horse is tied up and left. The kindly villagers feed him and water the horse, and the little, pantalooned children play with his tail and stroke his body--he is quite resigned. We rode over to Hamidlair, a village about two and a half hours away. On the verandah of the schoolhouse was placed a chair for me, which had been procured with very great difficulty. The schoolhouse itself could accommodate twenty children, ten little boys on one side, and ten little girls on the other, and the schoolmaster stands between the children and addresses first one sex and then the other. He, too, is a picturesque person, with the honest Eastern face and big, brown eyes. He wears a turban and long, brown coat. The schoolmaster’s salary is paid in corn, which means, of course, when the harvest is good, salary is high, and vice versa. It seems extraordinary to think that in this enlightened twentieth century wages can still be paid in corn.

I went to visit the wife of the schoolmaster. She lived in a two-storeyed house of four rooms, with a tiny garden, where a cow, a goat, and a lamb had space to walk about and remain great friends. The young wife was about seventeen, and lived with her mother and grandmother and little baby. They all came to the door to meet me, and, kissing the hem of my dress, they led me by the hand up a wooden staircase ladder to a room which was furnished with cushions all round--their chairs by day and their beds by night. The bare boards were scrupulously clean, and the cushions a welcome resting-place for my tired limbs. I wanted to take off my boots, like the other women, but my hostess refused to allow me. After having tucked me up amongst the cushions, with a queenly gesture she took off her ear-rings, her ring, and a jade bracelet, and gave them to me, but I naturally declined to accept them. This jewellery, together with a new pair of clove-ball silk pantaloons, were all the worldly goods this woman possessed, and she was ready to give them all to me, a stranger. Then the grandmother came, bringing for me a cup of milk warm from the goat, and the great-grandmother put in as a token of respect for the honoured guest seven lumps of sugar. And I had to drink it!

I loved being among that primitive household. They had bread to eat and milk to drink; their own vegetables they grew in the little patch of garden, where the animals walked about at leisure, but they never ate meat, nor did they feel the want of it--to have told them they were poor would have surprised them.