Page:Islam, Turkey, and Armenia, and How They Happened.djvu/142

136 are the man I was after for three weeks, and during this period a dozen telegrams were received about you. Get up, now, you dog giaour! You are a member of those secret societies which are plotting against the highest wealth" (government). By this time the whip is at work, and it will not stop unless one mejidieh or two is slipped into the officer's hand.

At the custom house the goods are roughly handled and spoiled. Photographic plates and drugs are exposed to light with the excuse of ascertaining whether there be any dynamite concealed in the case. Many watches, jewels, fountain pens, etc., find their way to the examiner's pockets, their empty cases being put back honestly in their original places. The eatables are freely consumed by the officers and sometimes carried to their dinner tables at home.

The government itself is robbed by its own officers. In one of the provinces the government had a bridge built at a certain town. The architect of the said bridge, an Armenian or a Greek, brought the bill of expenditure, which was 8,000 piasters. The mayor looked over it and with great anger tore it in pieces, to the surprise and terror of the architect, who was ordered to be taken to the prison. After some days a sub-officer came to the jail and talked with the architect and informed him confidentially about the secret of the mayor's indignation and the way to appease it. Soon another bill was prepared for 20,000 piasters, and everything was all right with the architect. The city clerk who recorded this sum had in the course of several years a position in the finance