awaited their attendance at the theatre.

"Most of the Provisional Government has come out to pay us a visit this
morning," said Madame A----, showing me to a blanket-roll seat at one
end of the mess table, "and we are lunching early so that it can get
back to Saloniki to take up the reins of State again. The General has
carried off the Admiral and the Foreign Minister, but I have managed to
keep the President for _our_ banquet. He has made the round of the
hospital and spoken to every man here--that is," she added with a catch
in her voice, "to all that could hear him. We've--we've lost three men
this morning just because there wasn't staff to operate quickly enough."

[Sidenote: A strange banquet at which the guests contribute.]

That was, I think, one of the strangest little "banquets" I ever sat
down to. Every one travels more or less "self-contained" in the Saloniki
area, and whenever a party is thrown together the joint supplies are
commandeered for the common good. The mess menu was a simple one of
soup, tinned salmon, rice, and cheese, but by the time M. Venizelos's
hamper had yielded a box of fresh figs, a can of the honey of Hymettus,
and a couple of bottles of Cretan wine, and the French officers had
"anted up" cognac, some tins of _flageolet_ for salad, and a tumbler of
_confiture_, and the English nurse had brought out the last of her
Christmas plum-cake, and I had thrown in a loaf of Italian _pan-forte_
and a can of chocolates, the little crazy-legged camp-table had assumed
a passing festal air.

[Sidenote: No one speaks of war at the feast.]

A number of toasts were proposed and drunk, but no one spoke of the
nearer or remoter progress of the war. M. Venizelos adverted several
times to the wonder of the spring flowers as he had seen them from the
road, especially the great fields of blood-red poppies, and I overheard
him telling Madame A---- some apparently amusing incidents of his early
life in Crete. But it was not until, the banquet over, he had settled
himself in his car for the ride to Saloniki that he alluded to any of
the things with which his mind must have been so engrossed all the time.

"So you thought that our troops had all the best of the enemy this
morning?" he said with a grave smile as he shook my hand.

"Incomparably the best of it," I answered.

[Sidenote: Why Venizelos is confident in the power of Greece.]

"Then perhaps you will understand why I felt so confident that the
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