plomat, but if I had stayed longer
in the Orient, I think I would have learned to be as tricky as Chinese
diplomacy.

We were given, by several of our Turkish friends, two or three rules
which should govern conduct when shopping in the Orient. One is to look
bored; the second, never to show interest in what pleases you; the
third, never to let your robber salesman have an idea of what you really
intend to buy. This comes hard at first, but after you have once learned
it, to go shopping is one of the most exciting experiences that I can
remember. I have always thought that burglary must be an exhilarating
profession, second only to that of the detective who traps him. In
shopping in the Orient, the bazaars are dens of thieves, and you, the
purchaser, are the detective. We found in Constantinople little
opportunity to exercise our new-found knowledge, because we were
accompanied by our Turkish friends, who saw to it that we made no
indiscreet purchases. On several occasions they made us send things back
because we had been overcharged, and they found us better articles at
less price. Of course we bought a fez, embroidered capes, bolero
jackets, embroidered curtains, and rugs, but we, ourselves, were waiting
to get to Smyrna for the real purchase of rugs, and it was there that I
personally first brought into play the guile that I had learned of the
Turks.

I remember Smyrna with particular delight. The quay curves in like a
giant horseshoe of white cement. The piers jut out into the sapphire
blue of this artificial bay, and are surrounded by myriads of tiny
rowing shells, in which you must trust yourself to get to land, as your
big ship anchors a mile or more from shore.

It was the brightest, most brilliant Mediterranean sunshine which
irradiated the scene the morning on which we arrived at Smyrna. A score
of gaily clad boatmen, whose very patches on their trousers were as
picturesque as the patches on Italian sails, held out their hands to
enable us to step from one cockle-shell to another, to reach the pier.
In the way the boats touch each other in the harbour at Smyrna, I was
reminded of the Thames in Henley week. We climbed through perhaps a
dozen of these boats before we landed on the pier, and in three minutes'
walk we were in the rug bazaars of Smyrna. Such treasures as we saw!

We were received by the smiling merchants as if we were long-lost
daughters suddenly restored, but we practised our newly acquired
di