A peculiar method for recording the number of loaves of bread distributed in each house is that of the _tchetoula_, and consists in cutting a notch on a piece of stick for every loaf taken. The householder retains the stick, and receives a new one when the amount is paid. Another method is to make a chalk-mark on the door, and efface it on payment. With a community living from hand to mouth like the Eastern, it is difficult to know what they would do without the ubiquitous _bakal_. Besides making himself useful in the catering-line, he frequently is the only man in his village who can read, and is resorted to both for reading and writing letters. His correspondence is carried on in Turkish words, but with Greek characters, full of conventional signs and contractions, and is next to impossible to decipher. Stray newspapers sometimes reach him, and the news of the day is conveyed by him to clients; and should there be a Christian church in his village, he is sure to be one of its dignitaries, and as _psaltis_, or precentor, preside over the singing. Another curious product, if I may so call it, of the Greek market is a class of beggars known as the _Volitziani_. They come from villages in Thessaly, and are young women who put aside their best garments, and don an old black skirt and black jacket, so as to assume an air of abject poverty. When about to start they receive from their community a beggar's staff, as a badge or passport of their functions, and they proceed to Constantinople, or any other town where begging offers advantageous prospects. On their arrival they borrow or hire two or three children, one of which is an infant, and which they drug and cause to sleep on a handkerchief spread out in a corner of the street. The beggar sits beside it, putting on her most tearful looks, and when any likely passer-by approaches, she raises her voice in supplication, and sends the other children to pull at his coat-tails. These _Volitziani_ frequent the neighbourhood of churches, and their appeal is: "Give for the sake of the souls of the departed." The result is a plentiful harvest of coins, which enables them to return with a bagful to their country. The beggar's staff is then hung behind the door as a trophy. Should they desire to proceed on another begging expedition, a second staff is given them, and so on, and at each successive return the staff that has done service is deposited behind the door. Sometimes as many as seven make up the trophy. Young men desiring to find wives with money pry behind the door, and form an approximate idea of the fortune of the owner, the one with seven staffs taking, of course, the palm.