presided over by a king or
whether at this hour of our history we must accept the doctrine of the
divine rights of kings. The present government represents in no sense
the majority of the Greek people. We Liberals, in the course of a year
received the vote of the majority. At the last election, which was
nothing more than a burlesque on the free exercise of the right of
suffrage, we were not willing to participate in a farcical
formality.... Now it is even sought to deny us the right of free
speech. Our meetings were held within inclosed buildings. Those who
came to them were invited, but the police threw out our doorkeepers,
put in their own and let enter whomsoever they, the police, wanted to
be present at the meetings."

It was now evident that Venizelos had determined to fight the present
government to the bitter end.

On May 7, 1916, it was demonstrated that the contention of the king,
that the agitation in favor of Venizelos and the demonstrations in his
favor were largely artificial, was not true, in one electoral district
of Greece at least. Venizelos had been nominated candidate for deputy
to the National Assembly in Mytelene, and when the election took
place, on the above date, he was elected with practically no
opposition and amid a tremendous enthusiasm. On the following day, May
8, 1916, at a by-election in Kavalla, Eastern Macedonia, Constantine
Jourdanou, a candidate of the Venizelos Liberty party, was also
elected a deputy to the National Assembly by an 85 per cent majority
vote.

But these were merely demonstrations--meant merely as indications of
popular sentiment--for neither Venizelos nor the Kavalla
representative had any intention of taking their seats in the chamber,
which they considered illegally elected.

Meanwhile practically no military activity had been displayed. On
March 17, 1916, a dispatch was issued from Vienna to the effect that
the Austrian army had reached the vicinity of Avlona and had engaged
the Italians in pitched battle outside the town, into which they were
driving them. But apparently there was little truth in this report,
for some weeks later a body of Italian troops were reported to have
crossed the Greek frontier in Epirus, which caused an exchange of
notes between the Greek and Italian governments, by no means the best
of friends, on account of their conflicting ambitions in Albania.
Further encounters between both Austrians and Bulgarians and the
Italians in Avlona