Mudir's orders were walked over

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Dec 9

We asked them if they could not bring us some saddles also, and this they did with much alacrity, and some chuckling at the way in which the Mudir's orders were walked over. Finally we mounted and got off. We had been besieged all the morning by the same people who had blockaded us the night before, or who appeared to be the same, their stories were so much alike.

We could do nothing but listen in pity to a few of them—for it would have taken all day to hear each separate tale of misery and suffering—and gave vague promises that we would do all in our power to relieve their misery upon our return to Constantinople. But diplomatic help is, alas ! very slow. While ambassadors are exchanging notes and compliments, inviting each other to dinner, making representations to the Porte, and obtaining promises which nobody believes in, these poor people are starving and dying.

Many of them decided to seize this opportunity and accompany us to Batak, to visit their ruined homes, and others caught our bridle reins, determined to make us listen to their stories before we should start. One woman caught my horse, and held it until she could show me where a bullet had traversed her arm, completely disabling her from work, and this was only the least of her woes Guided Istanbul Tours.

Husband killed

Husband killed, and little children depending on that broken arm for bread ; all of this told in a language so much like Russian that I could understand a great deal of it; so like Russian that I could easily have fancied myself amongst peasants of the Volga, or the denizens of the Gostinoidvor, Moscow. The resemblance is striking, and it is no wonder the Russians sympathies with these people.

You observe the same sort of family likeness about the eyes that may be always seen among brothers and sisters who are utterly unlike each other in features—tricks of countenance, movements of the hands, tones of the voice, even to that curious, uncertain expression of the face, which often in the Russian peasant makes it almost impossible to tell whether he is laughing or crying.