This fringe or wreath of Greek colonies which extends toward the south as well as toward the north forms not only a strong economical force, but also a no less strong spiritual force. This is usually underestimated, as is too, in general, that idealistic element which is coexistent in the Greeks with that confessedly very prominent materialistic element, and this even in the times of its deepest national humiliation it has never lost. This idealistic element is rooted in a very strong national feeling, which has been nourished by the recollection of a great intellectual past and which finds its finest and most effectual expression in the fostering of Greek schools. This desire for schooling is implanted in the Greek nature from the times of late antiquity, and though it often savors rather strongly of scholasticism, it has prevented the Greeks from losing their national consciousness, as have the Jews and, to a certain degree, Armenians. Even the church is held so sacred by the Greeks only because she has been the bearer of national ideals in the times of slavery and has, at the same time, been a powerful political organ of administration, forming the only means in Turkey of putting through the national demands for schools. The relation of church and school is therefore, in the Greek Orient, quite different from that in Catholic or even Protestant Christian lands. The church regards itself not as the mistress of the school but rather as her servant and patron. This fact must be clearly understood in order rightly to estimate the relations now to be considered. If, for example, a Greek community wishes to establish a school on Turkish soil, the council of the community informs the bishop of the diocese of this desire and the latter communicates it to the superior bishop, who then acquaints the Greek Patriarchate in Constantinople with the matter. The latter is the religious head of the Greeks in Turkey and must therefore represent their educational interests. It is his task then to obtain the Sultan’s permission to establish the desired school, and in obtaining this, money plays a not unimportant rôle. The richer the community is, therefore, the more easily does it obtain the permission, and since the Greek communities of the coast of Asia Minor have always been, for the most part, very rich, they were able to proceed to establish their own schools at an early date. The oldest are those in Smyrna, Aïvali and Chesme, and those that first came into existence were not common schools but higher institutions of learning, corresponding to the development of the times and the aristocratic character of the Greek merchants. The oldest and most famous of these schools, and the only one which still exists, is the so-called Evangelical School in Smyrna. It goes back to 1708, but the year 1733 is really to be regarded as the year of its foundation. Existing under English protection since 1747,