She looked across at the fat, white face of Christos's wife, at her slovenly habit and uncleanly hands. "Yet there are many strange things in the world," she said. "Make Michael his dinner, will you, little Mitsos?" Christos's wife stared with interest as Mitsos put gravy, bones, bread, and, lastly, a piece of meat in Michael's wooden bowl. "It is not right!" she cried, shrilly; "you must not feed a dog like a Christian." "I honor his name, cousin," said the Capsina, laughing. "His name! That is as unsuited to a dog as his food." "Therefore I honor him," said the Capsina; and the wife, making nothing of this, thought it more prudent to be silent; and Christos, equally puzzled, hushed her. "You do not understand," he said, which was true enough. Next day they set sail again for Nauplia; the blockading fleet was stationed outside the harbor, and, having anchored, the Capsina, with Kanaris and Mitsos, went off to the admiral's ship to make report. As the news spread from crew to crew, the shouting rose and redoubled, and Suleima, who had come down with the littlest one, on the news of their arrival, to the quay, could scarce get at Mitsos for the press, and for the time the two had to be content with letting their eyes seek and find each other from afar, saying that it was well with them. But the Capsina had gone back to her ship, and was alone. CHAPTER XVII The last days of the beleaguered town had begun, and it was only from fear of treachery--not, alas! unwarranted--on the part of the Greeks that the besieged still held out. The scenes at the capitulation of Navarin, not eighteen months old, the repetition of them at Athens, scarcely six months ago, had not encouraged the Turks to hope for honorable dealings with their enemies, or rather with the half-brigand chiefs, such as Kolocotrones and Poniropoulos, who commanded the forces. Hypsilantes, they had learned from the previous negotiations which were concluded by him and taken out of his hand by Kolocotrones, was no more than a cipher put first among other figures, and while there was still the faintest hope, they had determined not to surrender.