I glanced in the direction he was pointing, and saw thirty or forty men with most woe-begone faces, and some of them in tears.
"Why are you crying?" I said to one of their party. "Are you afraid of being killed?"
"No, Effendi, we want to go with our brothers in the battalion and to fight by their side; but the major will not take us, he says that his battalion is complete. Do ask him to let us accompany him! Our hearts are full of sorrow at being left behind."
A captain in the regiment, a short, podgy-looking man, with very fat cheeks, now came to them, and tried to console the volunteers by saying that their turn would come soon, and that they should go with the next battalion.
It was a curious spectacle: the soldiers dressed in a neat dark blue serge uniform, and with their feet in sandals, surrounded by little knots of relatives clad in every kind of attire that can well be imagined; fathers embracing sons, brothers rubbing cheeks with brothers, and the sergeant and corporals vainly endeavouring to get their men into some sort of order; the fat captain in the background engaged in trying to console the rejected volunteers; and the younger portion of the crowd looking inquisitively at the new Martini-Peabody rifles which had only arrived from Samsoun the previous evening. Some of the soldiery were showing how quick their rifles could be loaded and fired. The rapidity of the system created great astonishment amidst the crowd.
"The giaours come from the country where these guns are made," said a bystander, pointing to Radford and myself.
"The giaours have more brain than we have," said another.
"If they help us, we shall eat the Russians!" exclaimed a third. We became the object of still more curiosity when a sergeant, coming to me, said that the Caimacan was in the major's room, drinking coffee, and hoped that I would join him there.
"He is going to drink coffee with the Governor—he is a great man!" said one of the bystanders. Some of the volunteers, rushing up, entreated me to intercede with the Caimacan, and perhaps he could induce the major of the battalion to take them with him to the war.
The major, and several other officers were squatted on a carpet in a small and rather dirty room overlooking the courtyard. The Caimacan was seated on a chair, a dervish sat by his side. The latter individual was a portly-looking man, wrapped up in a roll of brown cloth, and with a gigantic sugar-loaf hat on his head. The hat was made of grey cloth, and would have made the fortune of the leader of a nigger band. Several more officers now came into the room, amongst others the fat captain. They each in turn bent before the dervish, who placed his hands above their heads, and pronounced some sort of a blessing.