I always supposed that the Japanese were the most suspicious people in the world until I went to Russia, where I discovered a brand of officials that was so much worse than the Japanese that there was no comparison. In fact, for years I had them marked in my mind as the criterion for entertaining doubts as to other people’s business, but the Turks can give the Russians cards and spades when it comes to having an evil mind for the intents of all strangers. As far as I can make out, every officer in Turkey, from the general down to the policemen, is firmly convinced that every foreigner who comes to their dismal country does so with the intention of “stalking” the Sultan, bombing the Premier, or starting a revolution. The unfortunate monarch is no doubt the ring-leader in this quaint idea. Anyway, he sits inside a fortified palace, surrounded by troops, and chatters his teeth from sunrise to sunset. The days he comes out of his hole, the reserve is called out and the foreigners have to have permits from the embassies to stand on a hill and watch him through a telescope as he scuttles from his palace to his carriage. Nobody can get into Turkey without a pass-port, nor can he get out of it without having it elaborately viséd. The _Ismalia_ anchored at sundown, but as it was two minutes after six, there was nothing doing! Allow us to land that night! The police who had boarded us to watch for a conspiracy before morning shivered at the idea, and at once viewed us as dangerous and suspicious characters, therefore it was nearly eight in the morning when, the sun being fairly under way, we pulled up our anchor and started for the mouth of the Bosphorus.