WE AND THEY
It was a patriarchal home, this first harem into which I entered. It
consisted of the old _hanoum_, who was the first wife, and head
of the women’s part of the household, six other wives, whom she called
her sisters, several married daughters, the wives of some of the sons,
and two married grand-daughters. Among them they were the mothers of
numerous babies--indeed, there were babies all over the house; and
since each lady had several slaves there must have been at least a
hundred women and children.
Djimlah happened to be the only child of her age. They were all sorry
for her, and said so constantly while doing their best to amuse her.
There was little furniture in the house, just rugs and hard sofas, and
small tables upon which were always sorbets or sweets, and cushions of
all colours piled up on the rugs, where babies or grown-ups were always
lying slumbering. Various small musical instruments were also among the
cushions, and at any time some person would pick one of these up to
play and sing, so that most of the time, on the floor, there were both
people slumbering, and people playing and singing. And since the long,
curtainless windows were latticed, and the upper part entirely hidden
by creeping vines growing from pots, the whole place seemed to me like
a play-box, transformed into a fairy house, from which discipline, like
a wicked fairy, was banished.
All the cooking was done in the men’s part of the house, and brought in
by eunuchs. At mealtimes we sat around small, low tables, on cushions,
and ate most of the things with our fingers, except rice and soup,
which we ate with pretty wooden spoons.
The amount they permitted me to eat was incredible. Even to this day I
wonder what prevented me from becoming ill.
Djimlah and I practically owned the house. We slid on the banisters;
we climbed on the backs of the slaves, who, at any time, were ready
to play horse with us; and we ate candy whenever and in whatever
quantities we pleased.
No one said “No” to us, whatever we did, and the old _hanoum_
let us ruffle her beautiful clothes and disturb her even when she was
asleep. We slept on a little bed, made up at the foot of hers, in her
own room, and it was she who said our prayer, which we repeated, and
then kissed us good-night.
The day had passed so rapidly, and had been so crowded with events and
candy that I had had no time to think. Once in bed, after Djimlah put
her arms around me and kissed me and then sweetly fell asleep, I had
plenty of time to review the day. It seemed preposterous that I, my
uncle’s grand-niece, should be here in a Turkish household, and in the
same bed with a Turkish little girl--a little girl I liked and should
hate to kill. Yet my uncle’s teachings were strongly with me and his
dark, fiery eyes seemed to pierce my heart. I tried to focus my mind
on the bad side of this household. There was the fact of the several
wives, and if it was bad for Arif Bey to have two wives, it must be
terribly bad to have seven, as had Djimlah’s grandfather, who did not
even have the excuse, to my thinking, of being young, handsome and
Olympian. On the other hand, the old _hanoum_ liked those other
wives, and called them Sister, and Djimlah spoke of them lovingly.
Impelled by my uncle’s eyes I tried to dislike the Turks. I felt
disloyal to him, whom I could feel very close that night; but when I
fell asleep at last, my rest was not troubled, and on awakening again
Djimlah was leaning over me, cooing and laughing, and I began to laugh
too.
The tears, which I had had the courage not to shed when my father said
that I might stay with Djimlah, flowed copiously when the time came to
leave her. I cried hard and loud, and so did Djimlah and because we
two cried some of the slaves joined in, and then the old _hanoum_
said:
“Now, young _hanoum_, that you have come once, you will like to
come again, and prove to us that we have made your stay happy.”
“I’m ready to come this minute,” I sobbed. At this she laughed, and we
began to laugh, too; and thus I bade them good-bye.
The first words I said on reaching my own home were that the Turks were
the nicest people in the world. My father was amused, but my mother was
horrified, and had she had her way I believe my first would have been
my only visit. As it was, eight days later I was again with Djimlah;
and thus it came about that from that early age I became a constant
visitor not only to Djimlah’s home, but also to that of other little
girls whom I met through her, and otherwise.
As I grew older, the vast contrast between my race and theirs became
more and more clear to me; and I had the distinct feeling of partaking
of two worlds, mine and theirs.
In my home there were duties for me from my babyhood, duties which had
rigidly to be performed; and things to be learned, remembered, and to
be guided by. The words duty and obligation played a great rôle in
my Greek home, and these two words, so stern, so irreconcilable with
pleasure, were absent from the Turkish homes.
For me there was a tremendous Greek history to be learned and
understood; and the more one studied it, the more one had to suffer
because of the present; for in my home we lived with the past, we
talked of the past, and of the obligations which the past imposed upon
our present and future.
In the Turkish homes there was no history to be learned. All they
seemed to know was that they were a great conquering race, that they
had come from Asia and had conquered all Europe, because they were
brave and the Europeans were cowards. There was no past or future in
their lives. Everything was ephemeral, resting on the pleasure of the
day, or better yet, on the pleasure of the moment; unconscious of the
morrow, and indifferent to the moment after the present.
In entering a Turkish home, especially as I grew older, I felt as if I
were leaving my own life outside. They were different from us, these
women, these children of the Turks. They were so different, indeed,
that I rarely spoke to them of the things I felt or thought about at
home. I came to them ready to enjoy them, and to enjoy life with them;
and yet, as the years went by, deep down in my heart I felt glad to
be a Greek child, even though I belonged to the conquered race; and
I began to return to my home with greater satisfaction than I had
at first, and to put into my studies a fervour and a willingness
which might have been less, had I not been a visitor to these Turkish
households.
Yet curiously, too, as I grew older, I liked the Turks more and more,
though in my liking there was a certain amount of protective feeling,
such as one might feel for wayward children, rather than for equals.
I learned to see what was noble, charming, and poetical in their lives;
but I also became conscious that in spite of the faults of my race, in
spite of the limitations of our religion, our civilization was better
than theirs, because it contained such words as discipline, duty, and
obligation. And dimly I felt that we were a race that had come to the
world to stay and to help, while theirs was perhaps some day to vanish
utterly.