Just about the time when I was preparing for my final examination, the director of my college informed me that he had received a communication from the War Office to the effect that I was among the list of men for the year's conscription. This was a very disturbing piece of news to me, as I had just decided to adopt a new profession, and had left my _madrasseh_. The students in _madrassehs_, who have passed an examination in Arabic and other subjects taught them in that language, are exempted from serving in the army. Although our college was one of the educational institutions of the State, the students of which are also exempted under certain conditions from military service, this exemption had only been recently granted, and the military authorities did not know much about it. Those who knew of it did not view it with favour, as they are very anxious to force rigid conscription upon everyone. They will not argue on this point, and will dispose of all arguments with military brusqueness. It took several months to get the military authorities at the Constantinople War Office and the officers of the division at my birthplace in Anatolia to exempt me from serving in the army, and my dispute with them interfered very seriously with my last and most difficult examination in the college, and as a result I had to content myself with a second-class diploma only. It was not because I was afraid of a soldier's life that I wanted to escape it; cowardice is not one of an Osmanli's failings. Indeed, when I first came to Constantinople my wish had been to go to a military school to be trained as an officer, but my uncle ignored it and sent me to the theological _madrasseh_. Now, after several years, to be sent compulsorily into the army as a private would have ruined all my chances in the new career I had mapped out for myself, and there is but little chance of promotion from the ranks.