I wonder if he understood that the tears in my eyes were not from fear?
The same scene of the boatman was enacted at the Dardanelles. Later, however, all the harsh things were forgotten, as over a foreground of blue sea the dim outline of a city was seen through the mist of the morning.
No one can call Constantinople beautiful, but all must admit that it is the most interesting city in Europe. Unique in being situated in both Europe and Asia, the city is divided, like Gaul, into three parts—Stamboul and Galata-Pera, separated from each other by the Golden Horn, in Europe, and Skutari across the Bosporus, in Asia.
Galata is the modern business section containing the banks, steamship offices, commission houses and the like, while Pera is on the heights above it with the hotels, the embassies and the homes of the foreigners.
Stamboul, or Constantinople proper, is situated on seven hills, on one of which stood the ancient city of Byzantium. Here are the old seraglio and Santa Sophia,—Santa Sophia, with its altars of gold, mosaics of precious stones, pillars of rare marble, its wonderful history and its antiquity.
CONSTANTINOPLE
Between the mountain and the sea, in Skutari, nestles the cluster of buildings occupied by the American College for girls, the only college for women in the western Levant. When you learn through what vicissitudes I achieved my entrée to this cosmopolitan école, you will wonder that I write of it with any degree of composure, or that I am here to write of it at all.
Everything seemed so perfectly planned for a comfortable and safe little journey from the hotel in Pera to Skutari, that I followed the attendant without question. He placed me in a caique (ki-eek) putting me in charge of the caiquejee (ki-eek-gee), saying that in a few moments this man would land me at the place where my American friend was in waiting on the other side.