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22 chapters
CHAPTER I THE TOKEN
CHAPTER I THE TOKEN
O N 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
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CHAPTER II ECHOES OF 1821
CHAPTER II ECHOES OF 1821
O WING 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
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CHAPTER III OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES
CHAPTER III OTHER FACES, OTHER PHASES
M Y 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
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CHAPTER IV DJIMLAH
CHAPTER IV DJIMLAH
O N 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
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CHAPTER V WE AND THEY
CHAPTER V WE AND THEY
I T was a patriarchal home, 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 child
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CHAPTER VI AUNT KALLIROË
CHAPTER VI AUNT KALLIROË
T HERE 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 cross
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CHAPTER VII IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH’S HAND
CHAPTER VII IN THE HOLLOW OF ALLAH’S HAND
M Y 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
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CHAPTER VIII YILDERIM
CHAPTER VIII YILDERIM
A S 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 separates 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
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CHAPTER IX I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN
CHAPTER IX I AM REMINDED OF MY SONS AGAIN
T HE 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. Generally other men went with us, and their conversation 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
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CHAPTER X THE GARDEN GODDESS
CHAPTER X THE GARDEN GODDESS
I T 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
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CHAPTER XI MISDEEDS
CHAPTER XI MISDEEDS
I DID miss Djimlah and Chakendé and Nashan, yet the halaïc 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 i
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CHAPTER XII HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE
CHAPTER XII HOW I WAS SOLD TO ST GEORGE
S HORTLY after Semmeya’s wedding an epidemic of typhoid fever swept over Constantinople. Owing to our unsanitary 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
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CHAPTER XIII THE MASTER OF THE FOREST
CHAPTER XIII THE MASTER OF THE FOREST
O N 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 delighted I could hardly sit still. My happiness was dashed to the ground, when, in the course of the next half hour, he remarked 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
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CHAPTER XIV ALI BABA, MY CAÏQUE-TCHI
CHAPTER XIV ALI BABA, MY CAÏQUE-TCHI
O UR 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 buildings to look at on all sides, had it not been for a discover
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CHAPTER XV MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN
CHAPTER XV MY LADY OF THE FOUNTAIN
T HE 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
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CHAPTER XVI CHAKENDÉ, THE SCORNED
CHAPTER XVI CHAKENDÉ, THE SCORNED
I T 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 encounter the storm. I had a thousand and one projects for
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CHAPTER XVII A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL
CHAPTER XVII A GREAT LADY OF STAMBOUL
T HE 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 norma
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CHAPTER XVIII THE INVENTIVENESS OF SEMMEYA HANOUM
CHAPTER XVIII THE INVENTIVENESS OF SEMMEYA HANOUM
I T 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 burning 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 Semm
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CHAPTER XIX THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY
CHAPTER XIX THE CHIVALRY OF ARIF BEY
U P 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
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CHAPTER XX IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS
CHAPTER XX IN THE WAKE OF COLUMBUS
T HIS 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 unknown, alien land. It is a hard fate: it involves sacrifices and brings heartaches. After all, what gives to life sweetness and charm is the orderliness 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 t
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CHAPTER XXI IN REAL AMERICA
CHAPTER XXI IN REAL AMERICA
I T 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 mys
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CHAPTER XXII BACK TO TURKEY
CHAPTER XXII BACK TO TURKEY
Y ET 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
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