One night the peasants from Lazistan gave an interesting performance. The music was furnished by an ordinary bagpipe with three stops, which emitted a mournful and monotonous refrain, but with perfect time, and the dancers kept step to it very much after the manner of the North American Lidian. They placed a child in the centre, a dozen or so of them clasped hands in a circle, alternately spreading out as far as their arms would reach and then coming together in a bunch, and in the meantime stamping their feet, bowing the knees, and bending the upper part of the body forward. Sometimes they would stoop to a squatting posture and hop along on one side and then on the other; then they would raise their arms as high as they could reach, revolving all the time to the left. It was a graceful movement and rather fascinating, and they seemed to enjoy it.
The third-class passengers who occupy the open deck, make themselves as comfortable as possible with big bundles of rugs and blankets and pillows, which they spread out wherever the boatswain will let them. They gave us a continuous performance abounding in life and a gorgeous riot of colour, entirely unconscious of their odd ways, their artistic poses, and the entertainment they were furnishing to the foreigners who could look down upon them from the afterdeck. The captain told me that there were doubtless thirty different races among the passengers upon that ship — Turks, Tartars, Mongols, Arabs, Armenians, Albanians, Circassians, Georgians, Greeks, Jews, Kurds, Lazis, Slavs, Syrians, Turkomans, Bokharoits, Wallachs, and Persians of various clans, which can be detected one from another by experts, because of the way they wear their clothes. Everybody except the women wore brilliant colours, and they were shut off from observation as much as possible by blankets pinned to the canvas awning so as to make screens.
Turks are very democratic. Islam recognizes no caste; there is no aristocracy or nobility or any divisions among the Turks except on an official basis and the inferiors show great respect to those who are above them. The ordinary
Turkish peasant is good-natured, honest, sober, patient, frugal, industrious, and capable of great endurance. He is not fanatical, but is kindly disposed toward everybody. His hospitality is unbounded and the exercise of charity is one of his