Every day we look out of our window to see what there is to see. This is no idle curiosity or idle waste of time—there is always some sight to be memorized, visualized, and tucked away in your mind for future reference. A little group of haggard, prematurely old women, with veils over their heads, and tall green or terra-cotta water-bottles on their bent shoulders, passes by. The women of the poor wear shabby black bloomers, shoes without stockings, gay-colored blouses open at the throat, and on their heads veils made of cheesecloth. One corner of the veil they hold in their teeth, so that but half of their hopelessly tired, haunting, unhappy faces can be seen. Only the children and the men look happy at all. Very early the lines of care and cruelty are indelibly penciled upon girl-faces. Half a dozen horses bravely struggle along under the weight of an odd-looking burden: the bakeries here burn in their ovens green branches of a kind of resinous bush that grows in the foot-hills and mountains. The bush is gathered and bound into rough bundles, and put in bulging loads on the groaning pack-saddles of uncomplaining horses. The horse is hidden in his leafy burden. A passing train looks like a moving forest. One could believe Shakespeare had been here to get the idea of the Burnham beeches moving to Dunsinane!
Childish voices call up hopefully: "Madama." I see sometimes as many as a dozen children holding out their hands. Some girls have tiny babies strapped to their backs. I go to the window armed with savory ammunition, and before I know it these fascinating young ones have charmed away all my store of dates and figs and candies from the last day in Mersina.
If you look higher than the street you see a sky-line that leads from flat grass-topped roofs, through the town, up to the foot-hills. Domes mean mosques, when flanked by minarets. The minarets are tall, slender and pointed at the top. Where the cone begins, a door opens to a small iron-railed ledge, and here it is that the muezzin walks when he sings the chant that calls the faithful to prayer. You know as you look at these minarets at the hour of prayer that men are lying prostrate before each of the mosques, and more men are grouped around the city fountains washing their feet in preparation for prayer. It is not pleasant to think of the curse against "infidels" in the call to prayer—even if the muezzin has a sweet voice that rings out over the houses and comes to you mingled with the sweeter voice of the muezzin in a more distant minaret.
Away to the left are the beloved Taurus mountains. They are never-failing—and we look at them with new eyes every day. As we go down to breakfast, we stop just a minute to see the color and outline of these old friends. We can distinguish the pass that leads to Namrun—and often in the moonlight we think of the lovely night last autumn when we rode into Tarsus while the deep rich bell of the clock-tower was ringing. The clock strikes the hour, then after a pause of two minutes repeats it. Splendid idea: for you can check up on your first count.
A whole letter could be written about what we see from the windows. Whatever I write, the culmination, the climax, must be the camels. They are the best of all "sights" to me. The first I saw were in Smyrna, or rather just outside of Smyrna, taking refuge under a clump of trees from the noon-day sun. It was a group of at least thirty, the most camels I had ever seen together in my life. I wanted then to stop, but we were en route for Polycarp's tomb, and had only a few hours ashore. Now I have camels to my heart's delight and satisfaction. But never enough! Our street is one of the roads to the market-place. During the autumn, when much wood and cotton was being transported, camels passed under my window every morning. About six o'clock they began. Train after train wound slowly along. The camels travel single file, fastened from saddle to saddle.
Until I came to Turkey, I had seen few camels outside of a Zoo. The only loose one I remember is the camel ridden in Paris by the beggar that used to haunt the Place Saint-Michel. No two camels are alike. In a hundred that pass, each is different from the one ahead, very different. Camels are just as different as people. They are dark brown, tawny brown, on and on through the various shades up to the palest tan. The colors run from that one gets from polishing russet shoes with the black shoe brush to that produced by whitewashing a dust-covered wall. The shades are the echoes of the blending shifting tones of desert sand. The wide cushioned foot speaks fervently of the silence and patience of the camel's journeyings to and fro. The camel's eye is sorrowful. His air is supercilious, as if his claim to aristocracy among animals was forever settled by the fact that he was the favorite of Mohammed.
FOOTNOTE:
[2] More than seven years have passed, and neither the Tarsus letter nor the Holy Land letter has yet been written. Our life moves so fast, in the midst of a great and changing drama, that the event at hand demands all there is of time and energy.