hat. On reaching his hotel again, much to his astonishment, a lady thanked him for his politeness! She had seen the action through a glass.

Even as we are enjoying the scene, a rocket indicates the safe arrival of the party at Les Grands Mulets on their descent, and is instantly replied to by another from the village. We learn that they are expected to reach Chamouni again by about three a.m.

People are astir early here, for those who want to make long excursions find it desirable to start soon after daybreak. Little need be said about our return journey, as we traverse the same road as in coming. Many

beautiful views open up before us which we missed before. The sturdy little children, not having had time to collect any wild strawberries for sale, devote themselves to running after the diligence, shouting, “S'il vous plaît, Madame. S'il vous plaît Madame," with an odd emphasis on the last syllable, occasioned, perhaps, by their being out of breath. That they are not in great want is sufficiently evidenced by the long time they can keep up with us. We amuse ourselves by trying to throw sweetmeats into their open mouths. Any one who has practised at a running target knows the aggravating difficulty of hitting it. We not only have a "running target," but are moving rapidly ourselves, and we find it almost impossible to make a "bull." As the road is now slightly on the descent, and we make no stoppage, except to change horses, all the way, it is still early in the afternoon when we enter Geneva again.

Six Months in the Balkans.

66

BY JOSEPH MASON.

PART II.

HE work of the farm went on steadily, and though individually the labourer was scarcely worthy of his hire, the rate of wages was low, and labour abundant, so that by the time Kerim's term expired, we had got nearly the whole of our twenty thousand trees well planted in a good stiff compost, and securely staked; and I had set a staff of men to prune the groves of native trees, many of which were most extensive, and had grown into an almost hopeless tangle.

"It was the morning of the day fixed for Kerim's departure, and having some packing to do, he did not accompany me on my morning ride to the scene of operations. Tempted by the beauty of the early winter morning-a very slight fall of snow, sufficient, however, to wrap the tall peaks behind us in dazzling masses of white, had been followed by brilliant sunshine-I extended my ride beyond its usual limits, and was going back along the upper ridge I have spoken of, when the idea struck me that I would go to the edge of the cliff, which there rose fully thirty feet above the level on which the farm buildings stood, and view the scene. I did so, my horse's hoofs falling almost noiselessly on the soft turf. When I came into full view of the space immediately below me, I stood astounded at the beauty and novelty of the sight which met my eyes. The main block was so constructed that it formed three sides of a square, the cliff itself forming the fourth. This enclosed an inner courtyard of about half an acre, the existence of which I was aware of, but which I had not seen.

It

was laid out as a pleasure garden. A grove of orange trees occupied the centre, from which the stonework of a fountain, apparently out of repair, was just visible; and vines, on some of which the ripe clusters still hung, were trained along the walls. But what attracted my attention chiefly was the figure of a young girl, dressed in the pretty costume of a Bulgarian peasant, and sitting on a low seat near a door, apparently engaged in preparing vegetables for the mid-day meal. My eyesight was better then than it is now, and I could see that she was about seventeen years of age, tall and slim, with jet black hair, and a rich olive complexion. The contour of her figure was very pleasing, and most favourably impressed me, though just then I was certainly admiring her at a distance. Long before my curiosity was satisfied, I observed a door, which apparently gave egress from the further side of the court, open slowly, and the face of my dragoman, Kerim, made itself visible. What he was doing there I could not imagine. He seemed intently occupied in gazing on the girl, who was as unconscious of his presence as of mine. Even at that distance I could distinguish on his face an expression of low-cunning and greedy triumph which I never forgot, though I little understood its full significance then. At that moment the girl raised her eyes and saw my figure on the scarp of the cliff standing out conspicuously against the morning sky. With a little shriek she darted through a door at her right hand, and I saw no more of her for some weeks. That afternoon, his engagement having expired, Kerim left me, and though I felt awkward at first, I was glad to see him go. I had not lost time, and having now to exert myself more than ever, I picked up the language with a facility which surprised me. In a month from my arrival I could make myself fairly understood, and before the end of the year Betto and myself got along very well together,

"At length Christmas Eve arrived, and though I knew that Christmas at home had come and gone, I was interested in the festival as observed amongst the Christians of the Greek church. Therefore I opened my heart to Betto-told him what a happy time Christmas was with us at home, and said how much I should like to share in its celebration with them. He hesitated, and then seeming to throw suspicion aside, he said

"I think I can trust you. We, too, love Christmas, and, when we can, we enjoy it. But these Turks—they are so envious and suspicious-we dare not let them know.'

'I

"You are quite safe with me, Betto,' I replied. am not particularly taken with the Turks-and even if I were, I am an Englishman, and I never betray the trust of a friend.'

"I believe you,' said Betto, and I will trust you. But ah! you Englishmen, why did you become friends of these wretched. Turks? You Englishmen ! You Christians spending the lives of so many of your brave men, and so much money for these Turks ;—bah ! they would spit in your faces and call you infidels-nay, they would cut your throats if they dared.'

66

"I endeavoured to explain the high principles of politics which had actuated our statesmen in preventing the Russians getting to Constantinople, but I feared that my effort was a failure.

and

"I cannot understand,' resumed Betto, 'why you should prefer these miserable Mahomedans, who are fuller of vice and blood-thirstiness than a grape is of juice, to the Russians, who are Christians as we are, would be our friends, and not our persecutors. We are told that Christians should love and help one another; but if it had not been for you English and the French, we should not have had a Turk left within sight of the Balkans.'

"But the Russians are our rivals in Asia, and to give them a footing in Turkey might be to afford them great temptation to interrupt our communications with India.'

666

Well, well, I am not learned in politics, and I cannot talk on those questions. Still, to my simple reasoning, it is strange that England, known all the world over as the land of the free, and the protector of the oppressed, should be foremost to protect the tyrannous and slave-holding Turk, whose heel is and has been for many generations on the necks of millions of your fellow-religionists in this and the neighbouring provinces, so heavily that it has converted an intelligent and high-spirited race into the miserable wretches you see around you. No wonder-for they have nothing they can call their own; not even the most sacred and tender relationships, not the purest virtue, not the most devoted religion, to say nothing of mere worldly goods, are safe from his horrid and polluting touch. It is not occasional outbursts of fury which are quenched in blood that do the mischief-though they make known to the world something of the system under which we live-but it is the daily, the hourly grinding down of every spark of manliness, every show of virtue, every effort to win comfort or competence, that tells so crushingly upon us and makes us what we are. Wait awhile till you have seen more of the way in which they deal with us, and your only wonder will be that a Christian lives, from the Danube to the Ægean, whilst a Turk remains.'

"I was destined, ere long, to have evidence enough and to spare of this grinding system Betto so bitterly described.

"He continued

"Can you wonder, then, that it is an astonishment to me, that the British Government, for the sake of a remotely possible, if not imaginary result, should shut its