tic, was being chased from its home, chased out into an
unkind elemental world to beg its way. Then on a corner of a street a
hoarse woman calling repeatedly her price like a hawker at a market,
"_Chetiresta_! _Chetiresta_!" Quite a decent lady in Russia, the wife
of a bank-clerk or petty official, but now up against it, the great it
of revolution. Four crooked lanes go down to Petits Champs, all
a-jingle with Greek music and tinkling glasses and women's laughter.
The great glass-house cabaret below is refulgent with electric light,
and you see the figures swirl in a "_Grande Danse Moscouvite_." You
climb the mounting street to where dusky but handsome Punjabi soldiers
stand in front of the British Embassy, looking with sinless gaze on sin
passing by, and then to the hotel. You sleep in the office of the
hotel, between two safes, because there is no room to be had anywhere.
Your curtainless windows are right on the street, and the endless
razzle-dazzle of night-life goes on. In the disturbed after-hours of
midnight or early hours of morning you may see a dozen or so drunken
sailors pulling cabs and cabhorses on to the pavement, two sailors on
each horse, cuffing its flanks with their hats, shouting and
screeching, and evidently dreaming of the Wild West whence they come,
the Turkish cab-drivers absolutely placid and passive, however, and the
Turkish gendarmes unalarmed, whilst strapping fellows of the American
Naval Police with white bonnets on their heads, and neat blue jerkins,
rush in and literally fell the sailors one by one with their
truncheons, and fling them sprawling to the side-walk.

Next morning it is brilliantly and cruelly sunny, and on the way out of
the city the eyes rest on a young woman dressed in the fashions of
1917, but with burst boots and darned "tango" stockings, and rent,
shabby dress. The strong light betrays the disguises of a long-lived
hat and shines garishly on the powder and paint of a young-old face.
So Constantinople goes on.

What a contrast when you return to Sofia! It is a day's journey in the
express--a very short time, far too short to efface the vivid
impression on the senses made by Constantinople. Perhaps in one
respect Sofia resembles the great city, in that it is overcrowded.
Arriving at night, you are lucky to share a room with a Bulgarian
officer. The latter is lying in bed, and does not seem perturbed at a
civilian being put into his room. Perhaps he has been st