Halfway we stopped at a tchiflik (farm-house) to water the horses and try to buy eggs. Every farmer has half a dozen dogs—ugly fellows that give low growls. They hate you the way their Mohammedan masters hate you. After the tenant of the farm-house had driven back his dogs, he surprised us by showing unusual friendliness. We asked for eggs. He said he had none. This we knew was cheerful mendacity: so we pressed him further. Finally he brought us a whole basket of eggs, saying that he ought not to sell them, because he was supposed to send them all to the town to Pasha Somebody or Other. As we were leaving, we put a coin into his hand. He would not take it! Socrates gave it to a little girl who was apparently the child of the tenant. Some superstition made the father hesitate to take the money directly from us.
Farther along, a lone dead tree twisted itself above the masonry of a typical oriental well of ancient origin. As we stopped our carriage a moment, we saw a solitary owl sitting motionless on a loosened stone. When we drove on, the owl turned his head slowly following us, like a spirit of a forgotten century resenting with superb unconcern the investigating energy of modern times. A flock, no, I ought to call it a whole nation, of wild geese was quietly standing, undisturbed by our approach and arranged in little groups as if according to tribes, although all were facing the same way. They looked like the men of different counties in the same state—drawn up in military line and waiting for orders. Herbert and Socrates growled because they had no guns with them. I was glad that such perfect unity did not have to be broken up just to amuse us.
When we reached the sea the old gray horse wanted to have another roll in the sand. The last time he had seen the sand was the day he tried to roll with me on his back. Socrates unhitched the horses, and soon it was time for luncheon. We settled ourselves on steamer rugs and unpacked our provisions. We had tea made in my tea-basket and cold turkey, the remains of Sunday dinner. When lunch was finished, Herbert and I took a long walk on the beach. It was a blustery day when sunshine alternates with low swiftly-moving clouds. Ahead of us was the town of Mersina, a curved line of mingled flat roofs and slender minarets. A mile out to sea lay half a dozen ships, and we knew that there must be mail for us in Mersina.
After we turned back towards the place where our camp was, we could see beyond it a ramshackle structure, lonely and abandoned now—since the New Constitution. Here used to be stationed a guard—not a Life Saving Guard, such as we should have in a similar place—a guard whose whole duty it was to watch for Armenians, who chose this part of the seashore to escape in small boats. From here it was comparatively easy to get a ship and go away from Turkey forever. There was romance, as well as adventure, in these escapes. A young Armenian found means to go to America, and there made plenty of money. Back here on this Cilician Plain a girl was waiting. The man saved up enough to come back and get the girl. His friends smuggled her out to the ship, a missionary was pressed into service, and a wedding at sea took place. The bride and groom sailed away, returning to New York or Chicago, to live happily ever afterwards. You see the young man had become an American citizen. If he landed on Turkish soil, the new citizenship would have been lost. That is why his bride had to go out to the ship to be married. The guard-house must have frequently intercepted such weddings: for it is built where it commands the coast Mersina-wards.
On the way home we saw a great deal of black smoke. This meant some people were having fun driving wild boar out of the swamps. You get natives for "beaters," build fires through the canebrake, and then you wait patiently. There is sure to be a reward if your "beaters" don't take the stick or the shot before you get your spear or your gun ready. The last time we were visiting the British Consul in Mersina, the Doughty-Wylies took us pig-sticking. After making elaborate arrangements, with any number of native "beaters" in tow, the best shot of the day was lost just this way. The "beaters" did not remember that their job was to beat—not to steal shots they were paid to let slip.
It began to rain. But we didn't care. It was a slanting rain and fortunately dashed against the back of the carriage. We had rugs and coats: so the rain was an addition to the fun. We were careful to protect our driftwood, of which we had gathered enough to make two or three glorious fires. That evening we burned the driftwood, only to be disappointed. Of wonderful colors we got not one flicker. Is this another superstition disproved?
When Herbert writes the letter about Tarsus that he has long been talking about, but never gets down to, he will probably say much about the bazaars. But I am now going to anticipate him. Why not? I have only the typewriter to console me for having to give up my horse. Anyway, we may get away from here and into other things before Herbert tackles Tarsus. I am still waiting to see his letter on the trip he took to the Holy Land.[2]
There are very few women in the bazaars. None at all are engaged in selling. Turkish ladies never go. Rarely one sees Armenian and Fellahin women buying. When the time came to get Christmas gifts for Herbert, I did the markets with one of the Seniors. It is perfectly proper for me to go to the bazaars. Foreign women are a different order of beings, absolutely beyond the comprehension of the natives. They look at me as if I had dropped from Mars. I suppose they consider me a sexless being, resembling their women only in the lack of a soul. Menfolks in Turkey, you know, have a corner on souls. Herbert and I have a great deal of fun as we walk about Tarsus.
But I was telling you about my Christmas shopping. I took Harutun, my Senior, to the markets half a dozen times. You cannot go to a shop and select the thing you want, then ask the price and have it sent home. Oh, no! You go, and appear to be looking at something else, and let your attention be attracted to the thing you really want—by merest chance. Even then you do not mention this to the merchant. You simply say to your English-speaking boy: "See that little brass bowl in the opposite corner of the shop? I will give him eight piastres for it." Boy says: "Yes, Mrs. Gibbons," and you turn up your nose a little higher as the merchant urges upon you the purchase of some other thing you do not intend to buy. You draw yourself up to your full majestic height, incline your head backward the least little bit, raise your hand in a queenly waving aside, give a little click with your tongue, perhaps emphasizing it by exclaiming in good Turkish: "Yok" (which being interpreted means "nothing doing, old man"), and then you indifferently withdraw, followed by your boy. Next day Harutun sends another boy, who gets your brass bowl for about one-quarter the price you'd paid if you had insisted on buying it yourself. That is how shopping is done in the Orient. In this way I got Herbert a fine old copper tray and a queer pitcher-like thing to go with it. I found two coins whose owner did not appreciate them, and these I had made into a pair of cuff-links. A tiny silver cup, about an inch and a half in diameter, with the dearest little carved handle, was the best thing of all. We use it on our desk as a place to keep pens. I pursued a camel-train, and after a great deal of intrigue came into possession of several camel-bells. These are especially interesting to us because they were bought right off the camel. It reminded me of pig-tail days in the Engadine, when I followed a pretty cow home to her owner's chalet, and bought the bell on her neck.
Tarsus markets are cosmopolitan. You can find a dozen races rubbing elbows there. The predominating four are Turks, Arab Fellahin, Armenians and Greeks. There is a babel of these four tongues. One hears also Russian, Persian, Hindustani and Italian. We manage with French in Mersina, but it is little spoken in Tarsus. The Turkish language rules in inter-racial transactions. Armenians must use this language. Educated Armenians struggle valiantly to maintain the two surviving elements of national identity: the church and the language. But oddly enough the mother-tongue of the average Armenian is Turkish. Greek has a strong hold upon the Greeks here. It is something like the tenacious hold of the French language in Canada. The Fellahin speak a form of Arabic, but are too ignorant to care whether they make themselves understood or not. Some weeks ago Jeanne Imer and I were being carefully escorted through a Fellahin village by one of the students. Suddenly a little boy ran into the road. He took hold of my bridle, looked up at me with a winning smile, and said: "From where you come? From America?" Imagine my surprise. I was delighted to hear my own language away off here in the outskirts of the town. I reached into my coat pocket, pulled out an orange, and gave it to the little fellow. He said "Thank you" most politely. I found afterwards that there is a mission school in the quarter of Tarsus nearest where these people live. The child was evidently a pupil. But wasn't it cute of him to spot me for an American!