Leaving the ceremony the foreigner is beset by these beggars, especially the naked urchins. They follow one to the gate of the hotel. One brat is too large to go unclad, according to the requirements of decency regarded by the Turks, so his mother’s apron is tied around his waist. But he hopes to elicit a piastre by cutting capers, one of which is a somersault. As his arms and head go down the single garment drops over them, and the high half of his anatomy is exposed like the double-headed dolls in the Strand. But we give them nothing. We have seen these fellows count their day’s collection, and knowing the day’s wages of a field labourer in Turkey to be infinitely less, we give to the latter. The Tzigane maims a brat, and by its begging the family is supported. And it is the fool Christian who gives; it is a part of his religion to pay by ‘charity’ the way of deceased souls through the golden gates. A round and ragged brown urchin who blacks boots before the hotel and swallows the money he receives, bettered his position one day through the favour his funny face had found with the foreigners at the hotel. On calling for the bootblack one morning he appeared leading a blind beggar. But nobody patronised him now, and the two departed jabbering viciously. Next morning the brat was back again with his blacking-box, shining boots and swallowing small coins. There is a Tzigane quarter in every large town in Turkey, and it generally stands somewhere near the circle of graveyards. It is always the most squalid quarter, holes in old walls, shanties made of flattened petroleum tins, caves in hillsides, serving the gypsies as abodes. They are a filthy people, and a burden to the community. They seldom till the soil, object to work, and live for the most part by begging or stealing. They stand alone in the world as a people without a religion, and their primitive instincts lead them to follow the natural bent of man to prey upon others. They came into Europe on the heels of the Turk, and remained in some of the countries from which he has been compelled to recede. In one of the Balkan States they are exempt from military service, as they cannot be held to routine; in the others they are generally assigned to duty in the bands because of their talent for music.