Chapter VIII (3)

I wonder how you are. It seems so strange not to know. We went to see Dr. and Mrs. Hill the other day. Such quiet interesting beautiful old people. They remind me of Quakers. They are beloved and respected by every one, Greek and English, poor and sick, and seem to be the only missionaries who have won the people’s hearts, by trying to get them to do better in the way their consciences told them. They are full of stories of all they have seen. They came after the battle of Navarino. The Turks were still here for two years after they came; but the protocols were signed, and the Greeks were preparing to return. They told us lovely loving little stories of the people they had known; of their first teacher, a Greek girl from Crete, who came to them as a child, and became like a daughter to them, and of many of their protegés; but all in the same honouring, affectionate way people speak, who have the power of drawing out what is good in those they meet. There has been the wildest excitement here about the change of ministry. M. Tricoupis has just succeeded M. Koumondouros. Mr. T. seems to be universally respected. The English say he is _the_ Greek they trust. The Greeks say he is before the age, too good for the time, &c. He is the son of a much respected Greek who was for years envoy in London; and he and his sister are supposed to owe much of their enlightenment to English influence; they are much attached to England. His main object is to abolish the payment of a tenth part of the agricultural produce to the Government, which is supposed to press heavily on the people. We hear that it was one _great_ cause of the War of Independence; but it has never yet been altered. He is also understood to be most anxious to alter the practice now in force here, according to which every Government employé, from post office clerks upwards, changes with the ministry. It seems there are £2,000,000 of uncollected taxes in Greece now, the arrears being largely due to the tax-collectors being unable to employ any compulsion, the debtors simply threatening not to vote for the party which enforces payment. There are 500 doctors and 500 lawyers trained here in the University every year; the doctors, they say, do very well, for they go off into the villages in Asia Minor and Turkey. They are trying to improve the education of the priests, and train many; but only five out of every one hundred remain priests. But it all sounds to me like the swift cultivation of a large number of educated men, who must help. It is clear that party feeling runs high, and it is difficult to be sure with what bias statements are made; but, various as are the views, the statement of facts is curiously unanimous; and one listens to the quiet people who sympathise and talk quietly, as well as to the bursts of indignation and scorn; and we seem to learn a good deal. As I say, the facts that all tell us are much the same. We were fortunate yesterday, in being taken to Mlle. Tricoupis. She was very kind; her brother, of course, was too busy to be seen, and she was very tired—she had been receiving till two o’clock the night before, all the Greeks calling to offer congratulations to the new Prime Minister; but she was very kind and talked some little time, tho’ not about any of these burning questions. We are to go again....

[Sidenote: UNVEILING ST. CHRISTOPHER]

Athens,
March 26th, 1880.

TO MIRANDA.

I shall be so glad if anything is managed in the way of a little ceremony in Bts. Crt. for St. Christopher. I see many difficulties, but I _should_ like it. I am specially glad if it leads to telling the people the story. Will the unveiler read one to the people, I wonder? And where? It seems a pity there is no space in the court where the people can gather. I had been wondering what could be devised in the way of a ceremony, and had thought of little medals with date and motto to be given to eldest and youngest child in each family resident there a given time, and their marching in procession thro’ St. Christopher’s room to receive them, with music and flowers and flags; but I think it would mean a great deal of labour. I think these common memories good for tenants and workers. I don’t much fear stone throwing; but one never quite knows how people will see things; one may throw a stone where _fifty_ look with interest. I hope and believe they will like the thing; but if anything does happen I am always ready for failure in preparing the hearts of people for any new thing; some one must pay the cost in disappointment. I am quite willing to do so.

Athens,
April 1st, 1880.

OCTAVIA TO HER MOTHER.

... We went up Pentelicus and had a lovely day. It is a splendid view from the top. One sees Eubœa with its long range of snow mountains and its narrow strait, and Helena and Andros and the mountain ranges of Parnes, Cithæron and Parnassus; and Hymettus, and Athens and its plain; below lies Marathon with its red soil and blue bay—indeed blue bays of the sea seem to be around one almost everywhere. Last evening we spent at the Hills’. Mrs. H. was saying that letters, when first they came here, were 7 months coming from America; that they could negotiate no bill of exchange here; when they wanted money Dr. H. used to have to go and fetch it from Smyrna, to which, of course, moreover, there were none but sailing ships. She said they never knew how long it would take, especially because of the quarantine. Plague raged at Constantinople and Jerusalem, so that vessels were often and often kept six weeks with passengers in quarantine. She says the last plague was in 1843.... We went to the House of Deputies to hear a debate, in the box of the Diplomatic Corps, and could see well, and could have heard had we known more Greek. It was very curiously interesting to see the House. The gallery is open to the public, and was quite densely packed with a crowd of the very poorest people, with earnest, eager eyes, watching and listening, with an intentness beyond what I ever saw at the play. Crowds outside, too, were standing, talking and waiting; and this goes on day after day. Mr. Darcy, the clergyman here, took us; and he knew all the members, and pointed them out to us and told us about them. I have been reading some very interesting statistics about Greece, published seven or eight years ago. Do you know that since the independence her population has doubled, and her revenue has increased 500 per cent.?—the children in school were between 6,000 and 7,000 and are now 81,000. I forget the increase of acres cultivated, but it is very large.

[Sidenote: THE GROWTH OF THE GREEK NATION]

Athens,
April 8th, 1880.

TO MIRANDA.

We went yesterday to Phyle, and saw the actual fortified place held by Thrasybulus against the 30 tyrants. The gigantic walls still stand. We went with Miss Muir, who is so friendly and delightful with all the people, it is beautiful to see. It reminds me of going about with Miss Cons. She always finds out all about the people and finds helpful things to do for them; and it makes one see all the gentle, helpful, friendly, hospitable side. It is so different from going about with guides. We had such a glorious day. We drove for 10 miles over a very bad road to a village called Chassia, quite up in a ravine of Parnes. There the road stopped, and I had a mule, and we went for 2½ hours into the folds of the mountain ravines, till we came to the great promontory-like rock. The utter solitude, the exquisite blue of the shadows on the gigantic cliff-like rocks, the clear sun-filled air, the fresh breeze, the far away look of plain or hill or bay alive with noble memories filled me with a strange awed joy. I am much touched with the nation. I am afraid I shall never tell you all that makes me feel towards them as I do. I am getting such a vivid impression of the people, its hopes and admirations, and capacities. It is _clearly_ growing. I have been reading a great many official statistics, which show the wonderful growth. I cannot but believe it has a great future. I sometimes think of Matthew Arnold’s ideas about Hellenism, and wonder whether in very deed the people may be destined to bring out that side of human nature he speaks of as so wanting in the “Hebrew”;—the sort of intellectual grasp and reverence for thought and intangible things. Yet the nation has hard work just now with its tangible things, and is working to get them into order. Also it has, in its suffering under the Turks, clung with tenacity to its Christian faith, which is more than life to it; and this feeling is intensified by the faith being connected with the _nation_, the early martyrs for national freedom being many of them bishops. We were present in the metropolitan church at the anniversary of Greek independence. The king and the children were there. It was strange to see the tremendous crowd, the solitary Lutheran king, the tiny children standing between him and the people crossing themselves, and the gorgeously dressed priests who seem so human and so near the people compared with the Catholic clergy. With respect to the national worship for an idea—THE families who are considered great here are those who have lost their all at Missolonghi, or in supplying ships from Hydra!

Athens,
April 8th, 1880.

TO HER MOTHER.

... How delighted you will be about the elections! Is it not really marvellous; I never expected it! It is strange sometimes how silent England is, and yet how her heart rings true! I am filled with prayerful, almost tremulous, hope that the new Government _will_ live up to a high standard. Oh! do you think it will? It is pathetic to see how happy the Greeks are about it, and how much they hope from England now. Sometimes I fear the Liberals will not have courage to tax to meet past expenditure quickly, as they ought; or to deal generously with the little struggling nationalities. Those _I_ shall feel the test questions for them, as to their consciences. I believe they will deal with the question of land, which will be good. The Barnetts are here, and Mr. B. very much interested about the elections in England.... Mr. B.’s whole heart is at home, and in talking of it....

[Sidenote: COURTESY OF GREEK WORKMEN]

Corinth,
Sunday, April 11th, 1880.

TO HER MOTHER.

We started on our travels again yesterday, and seem to have seen a great deal. We drove from Athens to Megara yesterday—we being Miss Yorke, Miss Muir, a very nice Swiss lady, and myself. We were received and entertained by a hand-loom weaver, who knew Miss Muir. They were so kind; they gave up to us a large room, their best, and all slept in their second room, which led thro’ ours. Our beds were spotlessly clean, but laid on the earthen floor, after we had all had supper together, father, mother, married son and his wife, and half the village looking on. I never saw more affectionate welcome, or more native courtesy than they all showed. The son and his young wife spent the afternoon taking us to call on their friends and relations. It was so touching and beautiful; the very poorest people receiving us with such a dignified bearing; and everywhere we had to take something. One old woman, the mother of 12 children, and quite poor, was quite distressed she had nothing but some figs and nuts to give us. She remembered the time of the Turks and the dreadful hardships. Our host had come out of Thessaly to be in “free Greece,” after it was known that Thessaly was not to belong to Greece. “Oh”! he said, “they brought the children away in boxes, or anything, to get them safe into Greece.”

Megara is a populous village, almost entirely composed of houses of one room only. The people wear the most lovely costume, and carry themselves magnificently, so that every group forms a picture. There was nothing pretty in the old houses, so I am glad to hear they were beginning to build themselves better ones. We saw more of their life than we _could_ have seen anyhow else, and heard more of their sayings. I shall just jot down a few, anyhow, to be sure to tell you. They never speak harm of anything, especially in the evening. They call the worst bit of a road Kali Scali, Kali meaning good; and in the evening they respectfully call vinegar “the little sweet thing.” Many of their expressions are formed from agricultural work. When Miss Muir’s glove was lost they were much distressed, and said someone must have “reaped” it. The bride and bridegroom are married in crowns which are framed and hung up; and when they die they are buried in them. The sons have to marry in regular order of age, and must not do so till their sisters are married off. The boys and girls—mere children—never stand together; the most eager crowds of lookers-on yesterday sorted themselves, the boys being on one side, and the girls on the other. They speak very freely to those above them in rank, our host kept addressing Miss Muir: “Oh, sister, what sayest thou?” tho’ the you is well distinguished from “thou.” There is no water in the village, but a large washing place outside it—great stone troughs by the spring; every girl, when she marries, has to receive one as part of her dowry. The unmarried girls wear a complete skull-cap made of half drachmas, about sixpence each; they never wear the cap after marriage, and never unthread it for use, unless in dire need. These people gave us food, lodging, and all their time, and turned out of their room, and would not hear of receiving anything. As we came along to-day, we met a flock of sheep with lambs; and Miss M. heard the muleteers tell the shepherd to wait till they came back, as they must take the Paschal lamb back for our host’s family. So we united to send the lamb back as a present. The people are all rigidly fasting; their Lent is not over. Not a man will touch any meat we offer him. At Easter every family buys a lamb, fattens and kills it. We had a sort of royal reception; the priest, the demarch, the schoolmaster, and all the people coming down. Here we four, utter strangers, rode up dusty and tired, sent in to the banker here a letter of introduction for Mr. Dufour, and all four were instantly received, lodged, and fed as a matter of course.

[Sidenote: GREEK EASTER FEASTS]

Patras,
April 12th, 1880.

We came on by the Greek steamer here yesterday. Mr. Barnett brought me from Athens your delightful letter and dear Miranda’s, and some newspapers.... We have seen the Consul and his wife—delightful people. They have recommended us a former servant of their own, who was with them for years, to drive us to Olympia. The same man lately took Mr. Newton, the chief man at the British Museum. It is a four days’ drive there and back, and Miss Muir and Mr. Dufour left us at Corinth, so we are thoroughly glad to have a trustworthy man. We are in high spirits, the weather glorious; and we are looking forward to going very much. Part of to-day’s drive is thro’ four hours of oak forest! I do not know if we told you about Olympia. The Germans are excavating there, and have found all the temples buried under sand brought down by the Alpheus, and some grand statues, one of Hermes, as fine as any of the world-famous statues. It is very fine of the German Government to take all the expense. They spent 10,000 francs annually on it till this year, when they are too poor; and the Emperor himself has given 5,000 that the work may not cease. Yet they are to have nothing for it except the right of taking casts. Everything they find is to belong to the Greek Government; only they stipulated that the Greeks should make them a road. Scientific Germans are there directing, with 500 Greek workmen. They say they are such splendid workmen, better than Germans—so the director says. We take all our food with us to-day, and sleep at a khan. At Olympia the director’s cook will take us in. It is all very funny. Here there is a very nice hotel. We find our Greek _most_ useful. I am so delighted about the English news of elections.

Pyrgos,
April 14th, 1880.

TO HER MOTHER.

[Sidenote: AN OAK WOOD IN GREECE]

I seem to have such a number of things to tell you, I hardly know how to begin. We left Patras at 6 o’clock on Monday morning, and drove on and on for miles, along the bright sea-shore, just on the beach; then we turned inland, along the roughest roads; no boundary road in a remote district in England could be worse. We had to go at a foot’s pace; but it was all lovely, great masses of asphodel in full bloom, bushes of broom one sheet of gold, crimson carpets of great cranesbill; olive, oak, and terebinth; and between, and over them, we saw the bright sea and the blue mountains. We drove thro’ countless streams, large and small, now fording rivers, now plunging down steep banks. Then we came to the oak forest thro’ which we drove, incessantly, over the smooth turf, or gravelly soil, for four hours. The oaks stand, not close together, but as in an English park, here and there, thicker or more scattered, on slopes, or spaces of turf. Many of the trees were old and knotted; some had suffered by fire; here and there were parts full of rich underwood; and then we came to smooth sheets of delicate blue with the tiny iris; the mountains were always in sight. There was hardly a trace of cultivation; hardly a house the whole day to be seen; and we drove incessantly till 6 at night. We stayed the night at a khan, they say one of the best in Greece; and the wall and beds were clean; but it is a strange kind of savage accommodation. The dogs barked so, and the wind howled over the great plain we had reached; I could not sleep much. Next day—yesterday—we started at 5 in the morning, having cooked and eaten our breakfast. The clouds, which had gathered over night, broke away before the sun; and we had a magnificent day. We drove on and on, thro’ uncultivated wastes rather like our heaths, thro’ water courses, and usually _off_ the road, it was so bad; but with the most splendid light, and a view of the sea, and Zante in the distance. At mid-day we dined here; and then drove on to Olympia in a sunlight I never shall forget. The road from here to Olympia is very good. It has been made by the Greek Government, that being the one condition the Germans made on undertaking the excavations. We excited the greatest amazement, as no ladies do anything alone here; it is very amusing. The country is much more cultivated near here; and, going to Olympia, we saw several villages; but still it was very strange to drive for 3½ hours up, as it were, into the heart of an untraversed country, and find the road stopping in the heart of a remote valley, where a handful of Germans had undertaken this curious great work. Five hundred Greek workmen were digging and carting and shovelling. Our coachman led us to a sort of foreman, who asked us if we spoke German or Greek. He spoke no English, but some Italian. We asked for a lodging, and he sent one of his men to take us to the cottage of the director’s cook, who has 3 spare rooms. We climbed a steep hill overlooking the excavations, on which stood one new, well-built house. We were led to such a cottage that I felt as if we hardly could sleep there. However the bed was clean, and the view something splendid. We ate our dinner laid on a board on the top of a stool; and we sat on the bed. We had not an atom of blind, nor a chair!—After that we got a man with a lantern; and, armed with one of Mrs. Coupland’s introductions, a visiting card, and the name of a Dr. and Mrs. Irvi, mentioned to us by the Consul at Patras, we went off to what the peasants call the “German house.”—I had hardly sent in my card with message of enquiry before Mrs. Irvi came out with kindest words and hurried us in to a room where sat, after their dinner, the little company of Germans, who are directing the work. She introduced us to Herr Kurtzius, who speaks English. Such a man! but I must tell you of him later. Mrs. I. was _so_ kind, would make us have coffee and stay, and _would_ go back with us to see where we were lodged. She laughed, saying, “Oh yes! its our _very_ best hotel here, you could not do better.” Three gentlemen friends of theirs were sleeping there too. The German house is quite full.—We breakfasted with the Irvis at 7 o’clock, and then Herr K. came with his plan, and for three hours shewed us over the excavations. He is such a man! [Sidenote: GERMAN EXCAVATIONS AT OLYMPIA] It has evidently been the dream of his life to do this thing; and now it is nearly done. You can see by the far away look of his great blue eyes, and the way he stumbles over the wood and stones in his path, that his thoughts are of the past and the future, or, at any rate, not of the earth, earthy. It was he who imagined doing this thing, mentioned it to the Crown Prince, who got the German Parliament to pay; and now they have excavated, at a depth of often 20 feet of gravel, the whole space on which the temples and their surrounding buildings stood. The space occupied is that bounded on the south by the Alpheus, just where a smaller river joins it. This triangular space lies at the foot of a small sand hill. But such a valley as it is! And between the mountains that bound it you can see the opening to the defiles leading south to Messina, north to Corinth, east to Sparta; and all round the wooded hills look down upon the sunny plain, and you can almost see the old Greeks trooping in from every quarter. The foundations of all the buildings are found, the bases of walls and pillars in their places, the steps, the entrances, the pedestals of the statues all in their places. Twenty-one statues (or the principal part of them) from the pediments have been found, besides the Hermes and Bacchus of Praxiteles, and numbers of Roman statues, and a lovely Greek figure of the Winged Victory descending. The Hermes is splendid. He carries the infant Bacchus on his arm, such a sweet child; the head was only found last week. The early statues from the pediment are very powerful, massive and expressive, but not so delicate nor so exquisitely true in artistic power. I almost think the whole scene impressed me most. The great temple of Zeus stands in the centre of the ground, its mighty pillars shattered by earthquake. One sees the pedestal of the gold figure of Zeus sixty feet high, which was taken from Byzantium; one sees all round the other temples. The one to Hera is one of the oldest. Pelops has a temple too; but, being a hero who died, not a god who lives always, its entrance is to the setting sun, not on the East like those of the rest. Then there is the Gymnasium, where the youths practised with the rough stones, that they might not slip in wrestling, and the smooth ones for their masters still lying in their places. Beyond are the eleven treasure houses, built by eleven of the Greek towns, each for their own votive offerings to the gods, which on great feast days were opened and their glories displayed. Then I was interested to see the one that belonged to Megara. There is a great arched passage, leading from the space where the altars were, thro’ which, after sacrificing to the gods, the judges and competitors in solemn procession walked, not being visible to the people assembled to see the games, till they came out of the passage. Two statues, one of Fortune and one of Nemesis, were found, which watched over this way—the one supposed to remind competitors how Fortune might favour or injure them, the other to warn the judges and competitors alike of the punishment which certainly overtakes any breach of fairness. We saw the stone from which the runners started; and, exactly 600 feet beyond, where they knew it ought to be, these Germans dug down twenty-one feet thro’ the gravel, and found the goal or opposite starting place. We saw the men washing tiny little bronze figures of animals about one and a half inches long, which they had just found, which are supposed to be votive offerings from the very poor to the god. They are green with age now.

[Sidenote: HERR KURTZIUS]

These Germans leave in a month or two; and the 500 men cease working. They will be dreadfully missed; for they have brought work and money, and civilisation and visitors, right up into the heart of the country. The place will be left—the Greek Pompeii—to the Greeks to take care of. They have to build a museum and arrange the treasures. Herr Kurtzius carries away all he has learned. He has sent to Berlin the casts and plans and maps; and there they are making models of the thing as he found it, and as he thinks it was of old. He takes, one may say—nothing; but one sees that to him to have done what enables him to _know_ is all. He doesn’t look as if he worked for fame, or for others, but to know and to see. As he showed us the things, now and then he flashed up, as if it were all before him, and spoke of the life that had been as if he _saw_, sometimes gently stroked the faces of the statues, pointing out how perfect they were; now and again his eyes looked out as to some further thought he did not tell.

We post this at Patras, where we arrived safely to-night (April 16th); to-morrow we go by steamer to Athens, where I hope to find news of you all.

Achmetaga, Eubœa,
April 24th, 1880.

OCTAVIA TO HER MOTHER.

... I must try to tell you something of all we have been seeing. We left Athens on Tuesday at five o’clock in the morning, having engaged a carriage to take us to Thebes. It was an exquisite morning, and we drove by Eleusis thro’ a pass of Cithæron, supposed to be that of Eleuthera. We saw the ruins of the fortress of the ancient Greeks guarding the Attic end of the pass. As we came down on the Bœotian side, a magnificent view of Parnassus opened on our left; the site of Platæa was in sight; but nothing remains to mark it, as seen from a distance; far away to the East we saw the grand snow-covered range of mountains in Eubœa, and the beautiful peak of Delphi (Delphi in Eubœa) rising highest in the chain. When we got to Thebes, which stands very picturesquely on a hill, we drove thro’ its main street, thro’ the savage barking of fierce dogs, and rather wild-looking people. Mr. Petousi, the deputy to whose care Mr. Noel had recommended us, was away; so we drove on to the house of Mrs. Theagenes, to whom Dr. Hill had given us an introduction. We were quite unexpected, but were at once received most kindly, and arrangements were made for us to stay all night. Mrs. Theagenes is the widow of the Colonel who tried to help about the freedom of those young Englishmen near Marathon, and who went to see the brigands about them. He felt the matter so deeply, that it is said to have caused his death.... He seems to have been a man of culture, and thought and principle, and a friend of General Church and the early Greek patriots. His books and pictures remain; and his widow and son and daughter were _most_ kind.... They took us out to see the town, which was dirty, and looked neglected. We did not come upon traces of any progress or life. Of course we may be wrong; and we were most touched by their kindness; but the town did not inspire one with hope. Next day we had a splendid drive across to Chalcis; the road, an excellent one, leads down in sight of the Euripus and Eubœan mountains. The fortifications at Chalcis are _very_ picturesque. [Sidenote: MR. NOEL’S HOUSE IN EUBŒA] We slept at Chalcis at the house of a Mr. Boudouris, whose sister was carried off by brigands many years ago from there, but very kindly treated, till ransomed.... From Chalcis we started next morning at daybreak, on mules, under the charge of a sort of head man of Mr. Noel’s, not the steward but another, and a second servant. It was a very impressive journey, and gave one an idea of remoteness. For eight hours we went steadily on over hills and along ravines, beyond all roads, with nothing but rough bridle paths. The forests were beautiful, the mountains grand, the sea fair and smooth as a lake in the distance, but _not_ a house, nor a trace of man did we pass for hours. We came along beside a lovely half stream, half river, in a deep ravine, set with fir and plane, and oak trees, and with great bushes of white heath. At last we came upon a sort of clearance in the forest, like an English village, only without any road to it, and in sight, and quite near, of mountains on three sides, one covered with snow. Here and there among the wooded hills there were cleared fields of corn, maize, and vine, well-built stone houses, very small, but with tiled roofs clustered at the foot of one wooded hill, on the slope of which, above the cottages but below the trees which crown it, stood the house we are now in, with its wide vine-covered trellised verandah, its walled garden and great well. We rode up and alighted in the great yard, round which the long stone houses for grain, the stables, and houses for oxen, and the wood-sheds are built. We were led into the drawing-room, and then into our bedroom, which looked like that in an English country house. We looked out on the park-like scenery and the busy village below, and felt what a work had been done. Here, forty-six years ago, came three young foreigners quite alone. Mr. Noel was but twenty. The place was all forest. The few people in straw huts had gone to the other side of the estate, fifty miles off, to be away from the road—this little bridle path—to get away from the Turks. They had built their doors low that the Turks mightn’t lead their horses in. Hardly could the peasants be persuaded to come back, so frightened were they. Fever seized first the brother-in-law, then Mr. Noel, who was lifted on to his horse by Mr. Müller, and taken to Chalcis. The brother-in-law died. Dr. Hill, then in Athens, heard there were two young men ill at Chalcis, took a boat, as there were no steamers, and came and fetched them, took them to his own house, and nursed Mr. Noel for a year. “No doubt he saved Noel’s life,” says Mr. Müller quietly, quite unconscious of the spiritedness of their own action. They returned, built, planted, encouraged, watched, and have made of this a little sort of oasis in the desert, in its life, like that gathered round an English landlord. And yet, oh how different! The life here reminds me very much of that led by Flora MacIvor and her brother. The same loyalty to Mr. Frank Noel appears to prevail among the people; the same distance from law makes him the judge among them; the same wild habits seem to prevail; the same virtues, and those only.... There is no road to this place; and when Mrs. F. Noel was married she wanted a piano. “How did you get it here?” I asked. “We had it brought in a small boat to the sea-shore, about three hours from here; and some fête day, when the men were not working, Mr. Noel went out among them and said that I wanted my piano, and which of them would go and carry it? Thirty-six of them sprang up to go, and they carried it for three hours over the open country in relays of twelve. [Sidenote: INFLUENCE OF THE NOELS] Mr. Noel and I, of course, went too. In the evening they came in, and we had a good supper, and I played to them. They would have been much hurt if we had offered to pay.” Another time Mr. Noel came in from seeing some of the tenants, and said, “—— has been to me to ask me to lend him one of my field guards to help him to carry off by force the girl he was engaged to, who has broken off the affair with her parents’ (consent). I told him it wouldn’t do, but that they must return the presents.” “And double them,” added Mr. Müller. “Certainly,” said Mr. Noel. “A girl has been waiting here all day to see you,” said Mr. Noel, “she has brought a large bottle for you to give her some medicine; the gendarmes came to take her husband; and her blood is quite cold ever since.” And this sort of thing goes on incessantly. One hears too of one man, who lost his presence of mind when one of the great forest fires surrounded the seventy villagers, and Mr. Noel, who had been three days and three nights trying to stop it. He lay on the ground, and would not stir; Mr. Noel raised him and dragged him on and on, and, as the man says, saved his life. It is beautiful to see young Mrs. Noel among them all, so gentle and brave and stately. It was such a picture last night, as she stood near the house door in the great yard. The great oxen were feeding or lying about; about twenty men and women, in the beautiful costume of the country, stood about listening to her, and watching her one little child, a girl of nearly two years old, who was carried about and petted, first by one and then another. It was near sunset; and the long sloping rays fell on the group. Mr. Noel was away for some days; and she and the tiny child were the only representatives of the race that rules here by education and gentleness. The rest just look, love, and obey.

Constantinople,
May 6th, 1880.

TO HER MOTHER.

I don’t know if it is my fault, or the strong preconceived impression, or the absence of sun; but this place feels to me like a cursed or doomed one, a city of corruption and decay. It doesn’t strike me as the least beautiful.

We went on Sunday, which was the Greek Easter Eve, to the midnight service here. We got capital places in the part railed off for the priests, where no ladies are allowed, nor the congregation. At midnight the old tradition says that fire comes down from heaven.

There seems to be no distinct belief in _that_, as a miracle, here; but it was a beautiful service. The priest came out at midnight with the light; and rapidly every single soul there lighted the taper he held, the light spreading from the priests with wonderful rapidity. The church was crowded with earnest, rather rugged looking men. They read the Gospel on Easter Sunday in eight languages. They go out at night to look for Christ, and come back saying, “He is risen.” There was a good deal of dress and ceremony, but a good deal of fervour.

[Sidenote: A TURKISH CEMETERY]

We have seen a great deal since I wrote to you,—the large silent mosques with their space and simplicity, the triple walls which surround the town, with ancient Greek inscriptions built into them. The Golden Gate in _them_, thro’ which the emperors made triumphal entry; the walled-up gate, so dealt with because the Turks believe the Christians will re-enter by that gate; wonderful old Christian churches now converted into mosques, with the crosses and Christian symbols mutilated—one, however, very beautiful, where the mosaics were preserved. Then we have seen the large vault underground, supported by 1001 columns in old times, built to supply Byzantium with water; the strange cemeteries of the Turks, the dismallest of places; the stones high and narrow are tumbling about in every direction like ninepins; the graves are in quite untold numbers by the road sides, on banks, in ditches, anywhere and everywhere, without fence, without protection, without reverence; even the cypress trees among them look forlorn, and the stones much more forlorn because of the vermilion and emerald green and cobalt and gold, which once made them gay. It was such a contrast to cross to Skutari, where the British dead, who fell in the Crimea, lie. The ground is enclosed with a well-built wall; it is quite bright with flowering trees and shrubs, and lies on the sunniest slope overlooking the blue sea. Comparatively few graves have any stone, or name, or record; but the greenest, brightest, sunniest, best cared-for turf covers them. The inscriptions suggest such stories; here the record of two brothers about 20, surviving one another 4 days; several erected by brother officers, one to a private by his companions, one by a young sister to her brother, who, she says, “cheerfully surrendered his life to his country”; nineteen, twenty, even eighteen once or twice, are frequent ages for the dead. The hospital, where Miss Nightingale worked, stands just above and looks so good, and solid, and in order. We went a ride yesterday round by the Sweet Waters of Europe, all round the Golden Horn. We came back thro’ the Greek quarter. It was such a comfort to see the windows clean and bright, and without the dismal wooden lattice work, which shuts in the Turkish houses, and the women with bright, uncovered faces sitting at the windows sewing.

I think so constantly of you all, tho’ I write nothing about it.

On the Danube, off Turn Severin,
May 13th, 1880.

TO HER MOTHER.

[Sidenote: IMPRESSIONS OF THE SERVIANS]

I am sitting on board one of the Danube steamers in the twilight writing to you. We are lying at Turn Severin for the night, because they want daylight to go thro’ the Iron Gates. We had a good passage from Constantinople to Varna; the Bosphorus was very beautiful as we sailed up. Just beyond Therapia the population on its shores seems almost suddenly to cease. It makes one feel how it is only the overflow from Constantinople. Beyond Therapia one sees little but Genoese castles, a light-house or two, and a _very_ few tiny villages, cliffs, bare heights and points. It is strange to see the fortified narrowest part, kept by such different nations, and a point where Byzantine and Turk of old looked at one another across the narrow water from their respective fortresses, and measured their respective strength. Varna has no good port; they say it is as far from the steamer as Jaffa, and the passage horrid in rough weather, because no mole is built; but happily it was calm, when we went on shore in a large boat with four rowers. I was interested to land in Bulgaria. One wonders what these young nations are going to be, somewhat as one does about children. The country looked strange and very uninhabited; but it was much more beautiful than I expected. We went by railway thro’ it to Rustchuk. First we went thro’ the flat bottom of a valley, bounded by low wooded hills. A river flowed thro’ it, which often spread into what looked like lakes, they might be floods. Further on, we seemed to mount and pass over hills—I suppose low spurs of the Balkans. There we saw miles and miles of the most exquisite spring-green woods, spreading over waves and waves of hill away to the far distance. We came to downs too, great stretches of swelling hills and hollows of green grass that had never been cultivated; on them here and there we saw herds of buffaloes and horses feeding. At Rustchuk we came upon this boat. We sailed between Roumania and Bulgaria first; then we came to Servia on the right bank of the river, and soon we shall come to Austria on the left. It has been exquisitely beautiful to watch the great stretches of river, with the sky reflected in them, to walk up and down the deck and watch the sun rise and set, to pass the willowy islands, and note the great tracts of uninhabited land, decreasing, I suppose, as we get higher up the river. Yesterday we passed numbers of wild-looking Servians. I never saw any people look so like savages. They were in funny boats just made of a trunk of a tree hollowed out, and cut short off at either end. They looked heavy and clumsy and very primitive; the men had little clumsy wooden paddles, and were dressed so strangely, and looked so poor and crushed down with labour. They were mostly fishing; those on the shore were dressed in something exactly the colour of the sandy banks. I wondered such people could exist on the shores of a great water highway like this. A gentleman on board told me they were “all robbers and murderers,” which made me very angry, for I don’t think he knew anything about them. I was glad to remember Miss Irby, and to be able to say a quiet word about knowing a lady who had worked among them for years; and that I did not believe she had found them such dreadful hardened people as he seemed to think. “Oh,” he said, “she probably lives in one of the towns, and has a dragoman to intervene between her and the people.” “No,” I replied, “I believe not; I think she has travelled all over the country, she is working about schools there, and, I fancy, knows the people.”

We pass by little villages with minarets, and red roofs, and then for miles not a house again, only the great river going on and on; sometimes we pass a funny raft, sometimes a Greek steamer or tug; always every change in sky or shore reflects itself in this great river.

Approaching Pesth,
May 16th.

[Sidenote: VIEWS FROM THE DANUBE]

The morning after I wrote this, I was up at 3 o’clock, because the steamer was said to start before the dawn, and I wanted to see the Iron Gates. I came up on deck, and all was very still; the stars reflected in the water. The shore of each bank was still quite flat; but, in front, one saw the hills. Just as the sun rose with its round globe out of the water, the boat started. In what seemed but a few minutes after we had been in the flat plain, the gates of the hills appeared just in front of us. The morning sun lighted the great cliffs on one side of the water-paved ravine, and left the other walls of rock in deep blue shadow, while just in the place where the rocks on either side looked as if they met and closed the passage, a wreath of rose-coloured morning mist lay, which, gently rising with the sun’s heat, spread itself in faint, thin, lovely streaks along the wooded hills, rising gradually and losing themselves in the blue sky. Everything was reflected in the sheet of smooth water. The river is almost at its fullest, I believe. This same large steamer can come from Rustchuk to Pesth. I believe the ice is melted, and had not yet reached the sea, as it were; so we saw less of the rapids than if it had been later in the year; but, here and there, the river was all churned into foam; and, in places, a great line of white breakers showed where a great ridge of rock ran right across the channel. Nothing could exceed the beauty of that sunrise scene; but the scenery is even grander further up, in what is called the Defile of Kasan. It was very interesting to see distinctly the remains of Trajan’s road. What a work to make a road thro’ such a defile, without gunpowder! One sees the strong hand of the Roman, as one watches the road cut on the buttresses of the great cliffs above the deep, wild water, and traces still the clear-cut holes in which wooden supports were placed; and there is the Latin inscription still on the rocks. After we had passed thro’ the wonderful defile we came where the Danube spreads out almost like a lake; and, since then, we have come on and on, up and up it, watching sunrise and sunset, and moonlight and thunderstorm; seeing the fortresses that guard it, the very few villages and towns on its banks, that is to say very few in comparison with the miles of uninhabited shore, lovely woods, of island after island covered with thick woods, of great plains over which the cloud shadows float. It has been a most interesting and most delightful life. Miss Y. took a private cabin, where we have all our things as comfortably about us as if we were at home, and can make our tea or lie down within view of the river; but mainly we use the higher deck as our sitting-room; there we have two easy chairs, and our work, our books, our writing by us. Or we pace the deck till the stars come out. We shall be quite sorry when it comes to an end. The tourists go by train now, the great bulk of them at least; a few come on board just to see the Iron Gates, but they leave at Orsova, and don’t even see the Defile of Kasan; nor can they realise anything of the great history of the river, how it lives till it reaches the Gates; of its course thro’ this great Hungarian plain, past the high sandy cliffs which protect its tiny villages on the one shore from the great floods which must break at times violently over its low left bank. They do not see its free towns, still exempt from military service, except in time of war; nor note the mouths of the Drave and the Theiss, and the thousands of streams that feed and swell the Danube. They do not see the floods out, and the people in their flat-bottomed boats sailing about over the meadows, nor the herds of grey cattle, nor the vineyards on the slopes, nor the reedy banks, nor the lonely stacks of wood in the forests, nor mount the paddle-box and see the country people on the fore part of the ship, Servians, and Hungarians and Bulgarians, the strange costumes, the funny German life; nor see the local fête, the fireworks from the boats on the flooded meadows, the corn-grinding mills in the middle of the river; they cannot watch these, with the free cool air blowing all round them, and the sun shining, and every mist and wreath and change of cloud visible all round in the whole space of sky. I wish we did not get to Pesth to-day. But we shall have some more of the Danube between Vienna and Linz. I do not the least know what we shall do beyond Dresden. I must write when we have fixed, with fresh directions about letters. I think of you so often, dear Mama, and wish you were here. I fancy you would enjoy the kind of thing so much.

We shall post this at Pesth. I suppose some day they will prevent the floods here. It is beautiful to see how much of the earth has still to be filled with happy home life; and, near lovely things, this is _not_ the impression one gets in England.

[Sidenote: IMPRESSIONS OF NUREMBERG]

Nuremberg,
May 24th, 1880.

TO HER MOTHER.

We saw the Rathhaus where the Imperial Diet met till 1806.... The town looks very comfortable and flourishing, as if the old things had been taken into use and would stay;—not like Italy and Constantinople, as if every breath of purer or more living thought would sweep away some of the beauty, and substitute hideous Paris or London models. Trees grow among the houses; and children play round them, and clean industrious women knit at their doors; and comfortable little shops are opened in them; and you see “Bürger Schule” put up over their doors; and yet they aren’t all torn down and replaced with rows of houses, like Camden Town, and shops like Oxford St.; and still these gardens for the people everywhere look reproach on me, when I think of England, and every tree and creeper and space of green grass in the town reminds me of our unconsumed smoke, and how it poisons our plants, and dims the colour of all things for us....

We hope to make a few useful outlines here for windows, &c., in possible future houses in London.

Harrogate,
August 25th, 1880.

TO MRS. SHAEN.

I have been very much delighted lately with some correspondence with some of my fellow-workers about the Artizans’ Dwellings Acts. We had a great blow about the work itself just as I left town,—one likely to create dissension and call up bad feeling; and somehow the correspondence about it has, instead, shown how nobly men respond, when they manage to find the right way to look at things. I often wonder how men manage to get into such messes, when human hearts ring so true if struck rightly. It has been really quite beautiful to see how men will put temptation and bad feeling (even when almost justified) under their feet, when reminded of the cause for which they should work. I don’t even know that it is a question of reminding. The good men see nobly and act accordingly. I am obliged to keep very much out of all (even thought of) work. The home claims are very strong just now, and my own strength not very great. It is very strange to have to put the old things so wholly second. I do not know, however, how to be entirely sad about it. I often think that now people want more to see how noble private life should be, and can be, than to take up public work,—at any rate exclusively.

Harrogate,
September 4th, 1880.

MRS. HILL TO MRS. EDMUND MAURICE.

If you were to spend all your time from now till Christmas in guessing what Octavia was doing last Friday afternoon you would never guess aright, so I will tell you. She was acting to a Harrogate audience the part of Piety in the MacDonald’s “Pilgrim’s Progress.” On Thursday we had spent the day at Harewood, and on our return found Lily and Bob here waiting to ask if she would act for poor Grace, then lying seriously ill of hæmorrhage, at Ilkley. The rooms for the performance were engaged, and it seemed impossible to postpone it. Octavia agreed and learned her part (eight pages) that night. I cannot tell you how beautiful she looked, and how lovely her voice sounded. It was _most_ pathetic to see the MacDonalds so brave and energetic; but all so pale and feeling-full. Poor Mr. Jamieson acted Mr. Brisk. MacDonald was so chivalrous and beautiful to his poor wife and to us,—forgot no tenderness to her, or politeness to Miss Yorke and to me.

[Sidenote: OCTAVIA IN THE “PILGRIM’S PROGRESS”]

September 20th, 1880.

TO MR. BLYTH.

I was grieved to hear of so much wrong in the court, and to think of you in the lovely autumn, trying to stem it. But, in one sense, one is never lonely in one’s efforts to stem wrong. So mighty is the Power that fights with us.