The Roman Catholic missionaries have not been idle. A number of Armenians no longer reverence the Patriarch in Constantinople, but look upon the Pope as the Head of their Church.
The Turks laugh in their sleeves at the discord in the ranks of the Christian community. They cannot understand why so much hatred and ill-feeling should exist between people who worship the same Messias.
This difference of opinion amongst the Christians is by no means displeasing to the Turkish authorities; it renders any union between the Armenians and Russia exceedingly difficult.
The following morning a servant brought a paper to my host for his signature. It was a loyal address from the principal people in Yuzgat thanking the Sultan for the Constitution. None of the Armenians believed in the reform. Most of them held the same opinion as the inhabitants of Angora, namely, that the projected Constitution was thrown out as a bait to catch some of the plenipotentiaries at the Conference, and that when the Conference was forgotten the Constitution would be numbered with the past.
Vankovitch now called. I walked with him to the market which he was constructing for the townspeople. It was not a large building, being about eighty yards long by thirty wide; the houses were each of them two stories high, built of hewn stone and with glass windows; the latter a great luxury for the natives, glass having to be brought all the way from Samsoun, a port on the Black Sea. The difficulties of transport were very great, half the glass arrived in a fractured state, this, and the extreme difficulty of carriage, added enormously to its cost price.
In the market there was literally nothing which would have attracted an observer's attention. Some of the Armenians sold dye, wood, and goat's hair; others traded in cotton stuffs and calicos, one or two American lamps to burn petroleum were in the window of a small shop which was kept by a Greek.
The engineer had experienced considerable difficulty in persuading the townspeople to let him construct a bazaar two stories high. "Our fathers have always been satisfied with one story," remarked the tradesmen, "then why should not we?"
In spite of the opposition, Vankovitch, with the Caimacan's assistance had managed to carry the day. The people who had grumbled the loudest about the new order of things, were the first to take apartments in the two-storied building.
We continued our walk through narrow lanes, and by the side of tumble-down hovels, till we arrived on the summit of a hill, the outskirts of the town. Some good-looking gipsy women with brown complexions, large dark eyes, and long black hair, were standing at the door of one of these habitations.
"These are the dancers," said Vankovitch; "Dr. Gasparini telegraphed from Angora to ask me to arrange a gipsy dance for you. Let us go and talk to one of the old women, and choose the girls who are to perform."