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 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 companions 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 Pelasgians 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 Bosphorus. 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