Page:A child of the Orient (IA childoforient00vakarich).pdf/91

 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 misbehaviour, she was forced to obey the summons of a Turkish woman. It was cruel and humiliating, 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, rhythmically. 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