At last the _muezzin_ from the minaret of the mosque chanted the call of the faithful to prayer, and the procession, passing through the Palace gates, slowly proceeded down the steep road, between the troops, to the entrance of the mosque, the Sultan’s approach being announced by the blowing of a trumpet and the shouting by the soldiers “_Padishahim chok yasha!_” (“long live the Emperor!”). I need not describe the well-known scene; there were, as usual, the officers in gorgeous uniforms; high officials of the Palace and the Government, among whom one recognised some few of the old _régime_, but none of the notorious instruments of oppression and cruelty, or the corrupt advisers who had ruined their country (for, happily, all these had gone, some having fled from the people’s wrath to England, others living under close watch on the island of Prinkipo, and others prisoners in the Seraskeriat); the led saddle horses; the white-veiled Mohammedan ladies of the Palace in close carriages; the ungainly black eunuchs walking with folded arms, not so insolent as of old, and no doubt fearful as to what might happen to them under the new _régime_ which had done away with their mischievous influence; and lastly, escorted by mounted troops, in an open carriage, with the Grand Vizier facing him, came he who is the head of the Moslem world, the nominal ruler of the Ottoman Empire, the Sultan Abdul Hamid himself, his face imperturbable as he acknowledged the salute and trained acclamation of his legionaries. But it was a procession in which one seemed to be looking at the shadow of that from which Turkey has now delivered herself; one felt that all this pomp was but the empty shell of that which is now a dead thing. Then, in the afternoon, I visited the head-quarters of the Young Turk party in Stamboul. Having crossed the Golden Horn by the Galata Bridge, and traversed the intricate lanes of the Grand Bazaar, I came to a quiet street of somewhat mean appearance, and in an unpretentious house, almost bare of furniture, I found the temporary meeting-place of the Committee of Union and Progress, the virtual Government of the Ottoman Empire. Here there was no pomp or ceremony; one might have been in the offices of some struggling architect in a third-rate London suburb. There was a room in which members of the organisation met in an informal manner to discuss their plans, and to put forth those suggestions which had to be obeyed by the ministers. There were other rooms in which men awaited their turn to have interviews with members of the Committee, and chambers in which one might carry on long conversations, as I did on several occasions, with courteous Young Turks ready to impart all such information regarding this wonderful movement as it was not deemed inexpedient to divulge.