In the bazaar I bought white material, something like _piqué_. When I washed and ironed it, I cut out two oval pieces a little larger than the bottom of the basket, joined the two ovals with a band five inches wide, stuffed this with the cotton,--and behold a jolly little mattress! Lucky thing I am so attached to those two wee pillows I had at college. Lucky, too, that I bought a new set of pillow cases for them before I left home. After I find suitable material and make a pair of blankets, my cradle will be ready. When the Queen of Holland's baby comes, it won't find a better bed. We have been laughing at Daddy and Mother Christie. One night there was chicken for dinner, and by accident not quite enough to go around. Daddy fussed and made jokes, and we soon forgot all about it. Not so Daddy. He went to the bazaar, and came home with the announcement that he had bought one hundred chickens. Boys were hastily put to work to make a pen, and fenced off a run! The chickens arrived that same afternoon, and Daddy laid down the law to the two chaps who were to take care of them. He said his chickens would cost the school nothing. He was paying for them out of his Civil War pension. The chickens were photographed. Dr. Christie had a lot of prints made and sent to America. On the back of each photograph he wrote: "The lay workers of Tarsus." Now he has the laugh on all of us. The photographs and Daddy's inscription have already brought in much more money in gifts to the college than the chickens and photographs and postage cost. Typical! Such a darling he is. He looks like Carnegie. If he had Carnegie's fortune, we should have to call him Daddy Christmas. This is a great life. We may have evil-tasting fat made of melted-down sheep-tails, and no butter for our bread, but there are bowls of thirst-quenching bonny-clabber and rolled pats of buffalo cream. The rice may be half-cooked, and the bread may taste sour, but almost any day I can send to the kitchen where the students' food is prepared and get a plate of _bulgur_ made of coarse ground wheat. We have fresh figs stewed or raw and honeysweet, and oh, the oranges. I am guilty of one "notion." I eat quantities of these golden oranges, about fourteen a day. I may feel the limitations of life in Turkey in many ways, but until I outgrow them, I can put on my khaki riding things, swing into my Mexican saddle and at sunset ride like the wind across the Cilician Plain with the crying of jackals and the chant of the _muezzins_ in my ears. The law of compensation is a fact, my dear, and let me tell you this--don't feel sorry for missionaries. ROUND ABOUT TARSUS _April fourth, Nineteen-Nine._ Dearest Mother: