The Greek temperament swings between the dead calm and passionless on the one hand, to the violent and maniacal on the other. The nation is still convalescent, its development is slow, and it is impossible to say how far new Greece will develop. But its strength lies in its serpentine stillness and ancient unforgotten craft, and its weakness in that absence of ideals and in the sudden violence of partizanship which suggest pathological decay. What Greece does is generally subtle and shrewd; what she says is often madness. She has little sense of humour, and takes offence where other nations would laugh. Thus she wins by statecraft and loses by politics. In thought, and in the spoken word, Greece is outmatched for instance by the Slavs; but in silent action and in administrative policy Greece more often excels her neighbours. You will always hear odious comparisons made in the Near East between Greek and Turk, to the disadvantage of the former. But it seems rather absurd. The Turk, at his best, is a child or a legendary hero--not one of ourselves--whereas the Greek is a serious European with a race-consciousness of civilization thousands of years old. Athens has quietened down after the political violence of the restoration of Constantine. One sees pictures of the King everywhere--a cavalry officer with high Greek military hat, bushy moustaches, and rather horse-like face. He has large strained eyes with a questioning, impatient expression. All these pictures were hidden during the King's exile, but on his return came forth to light again. Common also are posters of Constantine as St. George, and the Venizelist administration as a three-headed dragon of which Venizelos is the chief and certainly most loathly head. Venizelos has become violently distasteful to the people--though possibly he may return to power by as violent a reaction. The chief reason for his fall was that he offended Greek national pride by being the puppet of the Allies. The revolution which he accomplished at the instigation of the French was highly resented. And all the mortification of the French contempt for Greece was vented upon him. Although Greece won such a goodly share of the booty of the war, she was treated throughout the war with a brutal nonchalance. Venizelos had much respect, but Greece had none. A comparison is often made between the machinations of the Allies in Petrograd in 1917 for the deposing of the Tsar, and the intrigues which forced Constantine to flee. Venizelos nevertheless was one of the cleverest statesmen of Europe--granted one can be clever and not wise at the same time--clever and even stupid, his chief weakness being a crude violence of temperament which breaks out in his speeches: