These men and women of the newer Orient reflect their changing ideas in their changing standards of living. Although this is most evident among the wealthier elements of the towns, it is perceptible in all classes of the population. Rich and poor, urban and rural, the Orientals are altering their living standards towards those of the West. And this involves social changes of the most far-reaching character, because few antitheses could be sharper than the living conditions prevailing respectively in the traditional East and in the modern Western world. This basic difference lies, not in wealth (the East, like the West, knows great riches as well as great poverty), but rather in _comfort_--using the word in its broad sense. The wealthy Oriental of the old school spends most of his money on Oriental luxuries, like fine raiment, jewels, women, horses, and a great retinue of attendants, and then hoards the rest. But of "comfort," in the Western sense, he knows virtually nothing, and it is safe to say that he lives under domestic conditions which a Western artisan would despise.[256] To-day, however, the Oriental is discovering "comfort." And, high or low, he likes it very well. All the myriad things which make our lives easier and more agreeable--lamps, electric light, sewing-machines, clocks, whisky, umbrellas, sanitary plumbing, and a thousand others: all these things, which to us are more or less matters of course, are to the Oriental so many delightful discoveries, of irresistible appeal. He wants them, and he gets them in ever-increasing quantities. But this produces some rather serious complications. His private economy is more or less thrown out of gear. This opening of a whole vista of new wants means a portentous rise in his standard of living. And where is he going to find the money to pay for it? If he be poor, he has to skimp on his bare necessities. If he be rich, he hates to forgo his traditional luxuries. The upshot is a universal growth of extravagance. And, in this connection, it is well to bear in mind that the peoples of the Near and Middle East, taken as a whole, have never been really thrifty. Poor the masses may have been, and thus obliged to live frugally, but they have always proved themselves "good spenders" when opportunity offers. The way in which a Turkish peasant or a Hindu ryot will squander his savings and run into debt over festivals, marriages, funerals, and other social events is astounding to Western observers.[257] Now add to all this the fact that in the Orient, as in the rest of the world, the cost of the basic necessaries of life--food, clothing, fuel, and shelter, has risen greatly during the past two decades, and we can realize the gravity of the problem which higher Oriental living-standards involves.[258]