It was about nine o’clock when we started along the muddy roadway, in charge of one of the most happy-go-lucky coachmen it has ever been my good fortune to employ. He had ten animals of his own before the war, and, now the Greeks have taken them all, he is making a fresh start with the best he can hire from others. He _said_ that these were steady and sound, but I could not believe we should have known the difference, over these ploughed fields on the edge of the mountains, so caked with mud that our carriages frequently stuck fast. It was a wearisome business enough, the constant alighting to be dug out for fresh starts; but I was altogether beyond sharing the American’s alarm lest we should sink for ever in a bog! I was far more concerned about the difficulty of getting really comfortable, among my disordered rugs and shawls. As our coachman provides us with many evidences of Greek barbarity from the ruins of every village we pass, my companion’s indignation shows rapid signs of approach to fever heat. “We’ve not played ‘straight,’” he cried, “I am not pro-Greek nor pro-Turk, and, at the moment, I haven’t much use for Christians; but I don’t see myself keeping quiet about all this. You and I have to get quick and publish a little truth for a change.” I told him that I had been trying in vain to get something done, or at least known, about Angora; but that if ever an article of mine included a word about Greek atrocities, the editorial scissors promptly got busy, and the truth remained untold. Obviously the American belonged to that fine type, which abounds in young countries, who put all their dollars into the acquisition of knowledge, and who delight in using the knowledge they have acquired, backed by their own wealth, in the service of mankind. His keen inquiries about _my_ impressions of the sad people he had come so far to understand, were proof enough that no kind of vanity, or pursuit of self-glorification, lay behind his insatiable curiosity. I was much interested to find that he agreed with me in having noticed how strongly the “personal” element enters into all one’s relations with any Turk. If they do not like one, you might as well stay in England. If your personality attracts them, it will make no difference where you happen to have been born. “They are called ignorant and fanatical; but I find that even the most illiterate understand enough of our civilisation to make any honest Englishwoman heartily ashamed of our ignorance and insularity.” “Remember,” he said, “how little we Americans really know of you, or you of us.” “I _do_ remember how I shocked one of your compatriots by confessing that I had the most shaky idea of the occasion for your ‘Thanksgiving,’ but he afterwards admitted he had imagined till quite recently, that ‘Boxing Day’ was the annual event of our national sport!”