Having made these exceptions to the rule that holidays are holy days in Turkey, I now perceive I must make one more. It is almost as trifling as the last, however, for New Year’s is scarcely a holiday at all with the Turks. It is not a day of feasting, of visit-paying, or of present-giving. Persons of sufficiently exalted rank go to the palace to felicitate the Sultan or to inscribe their names in his register, and each receives a new gold piece—of no great denomination in these economical days. Ordinary mortals content themselves with exchanging good wishes and small change—lucky pennies, as it were. A penny is the luckier if it is obtained on some pretext, without mentioning the day. About this day is none of the monotonous invariability which distinguishes our own calendar. It is, indeed, the first day of the first month, Mouharrem, but of the old lunar year of Arabia. It therefore falls eleven days earlier every year, making the backward round of the seasons in a cycle of thirty-three years. A further element of latitude enters into its determination, and that of other strictly Mohammedan holidays, by the fact that the month is not supposed to begin until the new moon has been discovered by the naked eye. In the good old times this verification of the calendar gave rise to most refreshing divergences of opinion. New Year’s might be celebrated in different towns on a number of different days, according to the cloudiness of the sky; or, in case of a conflict of authorities, two days might even be celebrated in the same town. But the advent of the telegraph and a growing laxity in interpretations have brought it about that some one in the empire is pretty sure to see the new moon at the right hour. The day of the ascertaining of the new moon has a name of its own, _arifeh_. And mark that a Mohammedan, like a Hebrew day, begins and ends at sunset. The celebration of the eve of a holiday in Western countries is doubtless due to the old prevalence of the same usage.