One assembly of Easter week which still is to be seen in something of its pristine glory is the fair of Balîklî. This takes place on the Friday and lasts through Sunday. The scene of it is the monastery of Balîklî, outside the land walls of Stamboul. It is rather curious that the Turkish name of so ancient a place should have superseded even among the Greeks its original appellation. The Byzantine emperors had a villa there and several of them built churches in the vicinity. The name Balîklî, however, which might be translated as the Fishy Place, comes from the legend every one knows of the Greek monk who was frying fish when news was brought him that the Turks had taken the city. He refused to believe it, saying he would do so if his fish jumped out of the frying-pan—not into the fire, but into the spring beside him. Which they promptly did. Since when the life-giving spring, as it is called, has been populated by fish that look as if they were half fried. The thing on Balîklî day is to make a pilgrimage to the pool of these miraculous fish, to drink of the water in which they swim, to wash one’s hands and face and hair in it, and to take some of it away in a bottle. The spring is at one end of a dark chapel, half underground, into which the crowd squeezes in batches. After receiving the benefits of the holy water you kiss the icons in the chapel. A priest in an embroidered stole, who holds a small cross in his hand, will then make the holy sign with it upon your person and offer you the cross and his hand as well to kiss, in return for which you drop a coin into the slot of a big box beside him. Candles are also to be had for burning at the various icons. The greater number of these, however, are in the monastery church hard by. And so many candles burn before them that attendants go about every few minutes, blow out the candles, and throw them into a box, to make room for new candles. There are also priests to whom you tell your name, which they add to a long list, and in return for the coin you leave behind you they pray for blessing upon the name. All this is interesting to watch, by reason of the great variety of the pilgrims and the unconscious lingering of paganism in their faith. And, while there is a hard commercial side to it all, you must remember that a hospital and other charitable institutions largely profit thereby.