Almost as absurd as this general amnesty were the general arrests which now followed the ‘Salonica outrages.’ Not only was the Bulgarian community of Salonica put behind bars, but an attempt was made to extend the wholesale incarceration throughout Macedonia. This proved a failure for two reasons: the Turks could not catch the revolutionists, and they had not gaols enough to contain the unarmed Bulgars. When the gaols were filled with ‘suspected’ peasants extraordinary tribunals were created in the several consular towns to judge the prisoners. I visited one of these while ‘in session.’ The building was a shanty in the outskirts of the town; it had been whitewashed for this function. The usual cellar (an excavation under a Macedonian house) served to hold the prisoners in waiting. A score of them, manacled, were brought from the gaols every morning, and choked into this dark hole, whence, one at a time, they were unchained from their partners and sent up the ladder into the court. Three dreamy looking Turks and two corrupted Christians (a feature of the reforms) tried the peasants. There were no witnesses--at least not when I was present--and the case seemed to go for or against the prisoner as he himself could persuade the sleepy judges of his innocence. The judges never asked a question; the whole evidence, _pro_ and _con_, was drawn by one Turk in a shabby uniform, who stood before the handcuffed prisoner, questioned him, and then advised the judges--still sleeping--of his testimony. Judgment was by no means summary; it was not ‘Who are you?’--‘Ivan Ivanoff.’--‘Guilty!’ Every Bulgar had an hour or more to talk. So slow was the process of these courts that another amnesty took place before they had tried half the prisoners. Nevertheless, the number of condemned was large, and for many months the weekly steamer which conveys political prisoners into exile was crowded on touching at Salonica. [Illustration: EXILES, SHIPPED WEEKLY FROM SALONICA.]