MODERN CITY
[Illustration]
Athens lies in a long and narrow plain between two rocky mountain ridges
that run down from the north. The plain to-day is neither interesting
nor particularly fertile, although it is still tilled with some success.
Once when it was better watered by the Cephissus and Ilissus rivers,
whose courses are still visible though in the main dry and rocky, it was
doubtless better able to support the local population; but to-day it is
rather a bare and unattractive intervale between mountains quite as
bare—gray, rocky heights, covered with little vegetation save the sparse
gorse and thyme. At that point in the plain where a lofty, isolated, and
nearly oblong rock, with precipitous sides, invited the foundation of a
citadel, Athens sprang into being. And there she stands to-day, having
pivoted around the hoary Acropolis crag for centuries, first south, then
west, then north, until the latter has become the final abiding place of
the modern town, while the older sites to the southward and westward lie
almost deserted save for the activities of the archæologists and
students, who have found them rich and interesting ground for
exploration. Always, however, the Acropolis was the fulcrum or focus,
and it was on this unique rock that Poseidon and Athena waged their
immortal contest for the possession of the Attic plain. Tradition says
that Poseidon smote with his trident and a salt spring gushed forth from
the cleft rock, thus proving his power; but that the judgment of the
gods was in favor of Athena, who made to spring up from the ground an
olive tree. Wherefore the land was allotted to her, and from her the
city took its name. Under the northern side of the towering rock and
around to the east of it runs the thriving city of to-day, thence
spreading off for perhaps two miles to the northward along the plain,
first closely congested, then widening into more open modernized
streets, and finally dwindling into scattered suburbs out in the
countryside.
The growth of Athens has left its marks of progress in well-defined
strata. The narrow, squalid, slummy streets of the quarter nearest the
Acropolis belong to the older or Turkish period of the city’s renascent
life. Beyond these one meets newer and broader highways, lined in many
cases with neat modern shops, called into life by the city’s remarkable
growth of the past two decades, which have raised Athens from the rank
of a dirty village to a clean and attractive metropolis—in the better
sense of that much abused word. Still farther away are seen the natural
products of the overflow of a thriving modern town—suburbs clustering
around isolated mills or wine-presses. The present population is not far
from a hundred thousand persons, so that Athens to-day is not an
inconsiderable place. The population is chiefly the native Greek,
modified no doubt by long submission to Turkish rule and mingled with a
good deal of Turkish blood, but still preserving the language, names,
and traditions that bespeak a glorious past. Despite the persistence of
such names as Aristeides, Miltiades, Themistocles, Socrates, and the
like among the modern Athenians, it would no doubt be rashly
unreasonable to expect to find in a population that was to all intents
and purposes so long enslaved by Turkey very much that savors of the
traditional Greek character as it stood in the days of Pericles. But
there have not been wanting eminent scholars, who have insisted that our
exalted ideas of the ancient Greeks are really derived from a
comparatively few exceptional and shining examples, and that the ancient
population may have resembled the present citizens more than we are
prone to think, in traits and general ability.
On his native heath the modern Greek openly charges his own race with a
lack of industry and love of idling too much in the coffee-houses,
although it is an indictment which has never struck me as just, and one
which, if coming from a foreigner, would doubtless be resented. It is
true that the coffeehouses are seldom deserted, and the possession of an
extra drachma or two is generally enough to tempt one to abandon his
employ for the seclusion that the _kaffeneion_ grants, there to sip
slowly until the cups of syrupy coffee which the money will buy are
gone. Nevertheless, one should be slow to say that the race is indolent
by nature, especially in view of its climatic surroundings; for there
are too many thousand thrifty and hard-working Hellenes in Greece and in
America as well to refute any such accusation. The one vast trouble, no
doubt, is the lack of any spur to industrial ambition at home, or of any
very attractive or remunerative employment compared with the
opportunities offered by the cities of the newer world. The strong set
of the tide of emigration to American shores has tended largely to
depopulate Greece; but it is not unlikely that the return of the
natives, which is by no means uncommon, will in time work large benefit
to Hellas herself, and the attraction of her sons to foreign lands thus
prove a blessing rather than, as was once supposed, a curse.
This, however, is rather aside from any consideration of the modern city
of Athens. Let it be said at the outset that one may go freely anywhere
in the city and be quite unmolested either by malicious or mendicant
persons. It is not improbable, of course, that the increasing inundation
of Athens by foreign visitors will tend somewhat to increase the
tendency to begging, as it has elsewhere; but it is due the Greek race
to say that it is infinitely less lazy and infinitely less inclined to
proletarianism, or to seeking to live without work, than the Italian.
Small children, as in all countries, will be found occasionally begging
a penny, especially if they have gone out of their way to render a
fancied service, by ostentatiously opening a gate that already stood
ajar. But there are few of the lame, halt, and blind, such as infest
Naples and many smaller Mediterranean cities, seeking to extort money
from sheer pity of unsightliness. Here and there in Athens one may
indeed see a cripple patiently awaiting alms, but generally in a quiet
and unobtrusive way. Neither is the visitor bothered by the
importunities of carriage drivers, although the carriages are numerous
enough and anxious for fares—a contrast that is welcome indeed to one
newly come from Italy and fresh from the tireless pursuit of warring
Neapolitan cabbies. The offset to this welcome peace is the fact that
carriage fares in Athens are undoubtedly high compared with the
astonishingly low charges produced in Naples by active and incessant
competition of the vetturini. The sole dangers of Athenian streets are
those incident to the fast driving of carriages over the unpaved
roadways; for the pedestrian has his own way to make and his own safety
to guard, as is largely true in Paris, and it is incumbent on him to
stop, look, and listen before venturing into the highway.
The street venders of laces, sponges, flowers, and postal cards are
perhaps the nearest to an importunate class, though they generally await
invitation to the attack, and their efforts are invariably good-humored.
The region of the “Syntagma” square is generally full of them, lining
the curb and laden with their wares. Men will be seen with long strips
of fascinating island lace over their shoulders, baskets on baskets of
flowers, heaps of curiously shaped, marvelously attractive sponges,
fresh and white from the near-by ocean, or packets of well-executed
postal cards picturing the city’s classic remains, all offered for sale
to whomsoever will exhibit the faintest trace of interest. Needless to
say, the initial prices asked are inevitably excessive and yield to
treatment with surprising revelations of latitude.
Athens is a clean city. Its streets, while unpaved, are still fairly
hard. Its buildings are in the main of stone, covered with a stucco
finish and given a white color, or a tint of buff or light blue. The
prevailing tone is white, and in the glare of the brilliant sun it is
often rather trying to the eyes. To relieve the whiteness there is
always the feathery green of the pepper trees, and the contrast of the
clambering vines and flowers that in their season go far to make the
city so attractive. Most notable of all the contrasts in color is
unquestionably the rich purple of the bougainvillea blooms splashed in
great masses against the immaculate walls and porticoes of the more
pretentious houses. The gardens are numerous and run riot with roses,
iris, and hundreds of other fragrant and lovely blossoms. The sidewalks
are broad and smooth. It is an easy town in which to stroll about, for
the distances are not great and the street scenes are interesting and
frequently unusual to a high degree, while vistas are constantly opening
to give momentary views of the towering Acropolis. It is not a hilly
city, but rather built on rolling ground, the prevailing slope of which
is toward the west, gently down from the pointed Lycabettus to the
ancient course of the Cephissus, along which once spread the famous
grove of Academe. The lack of a sufficient water supply is unfortunate,
for one misses the gushing of fountains which makes Rome so delightful,
and the restricted volume available for domestic uses is sometimes far
from pleasant.
The Athenians had a prodigious mine to draw upon for the naming of their
streets, in the magnificent stretch of their history and in the fabulous
wealth of mythology. And it is a fact worth remarking that the
mythological gods and heroes appear to have decidedly the better of the
famous mortals in the selection of street names to do them honor. For
example, Pericles, the greatest Athenian in many ways, is recalled by
the name of a decidedly poor thoroughfare—hardly more than an alley;
while Pheidias, Pindar, Homer, Solon, and a score of others fare but
little better. On the contrary, the great gods of high Olympus, Hermes,
Athena, Æolus, and others, give their names to the finest, broadest,
most magnificent streets of this city that likes to call herself a
little Paris. The result of it all is a curious mental state, for by the
time one gets out of Athens and into the highlands of Delphi or of the
Peloponnesus, where every peak and vale is the scene of some godlike
encounter or amour, one is more than half ready to accept those ancient
deities as actually having lived and done the things that legend
ascribes to them. They become fully as real to the mind as William Tell
or Pocahontas. The same illusion is helped on by the classic names
affected for the engines of the Piræus-Athens-Peloponnesus Railroad, and
by the time one has ridden for a day behind the “Hermes” or the
“Hephaistos,” one is quite ready to expect to see Proteus rising from
the sea, or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
It is at first a trifle perplexing to one not versed in the Greek
language to find the streets all labeled in the genitive case, such as
ὁδὸς Ἑρμοῦ (othòs Ermoù), “street of Hermes.” This soon becomes a matter
of course, however. The main shopping district is confined to the
greater highways of Hermes, Æolus, and Athena, and to Stadium Street—the
latter so called because its length is about one kilometre, which is the
modern “stadion,” instead of the lesser classic length of approximately
six hundred feet. The name therefore has no reference to the magnificent
athletic field of the city, in which the so-called modern “Olympic”
games are occasionally held, and which in itself is a fine sight to see,
as it lies in its natural amphitheatre east of the city, and brilliant
in its newly built surfaces of purest marble. Stadium Street is perhaps
the most modern and up-to-date street in Athens, lined with handsome
stores, hotels, and cafés, thronged day and night, and perhaps even more
gay and Parisian-looking by night, with its many lights and teeming
life.
Athens at this writing has no system of trolley cars, but sticks
obstinately to an old-fashioned and quite inadequate horse-railway, the
several lines radiating from the Omonoia Square—pronounced much like
"Ammonia"—which, being interpreted, means the same as Place de la
Concorde. To master the intricacies of this tramway system requires a
considerable acquaintance with Athens, but it is vastly less involved a
problem than the omnibuses of London and Paris, and naturally so because
of the smaller size of the town. Odd little carriages plying between
stated points eke out the local transportation service, while the
third-rail, semi-underground line to the Piræus and the antiquated steam
tram to New Phalerum give a suburban service that is not to be despised.
In a very few years no doubt the trolley will invade Athens, for it
already has a foothold in Greece at the thriving port of Patras; and
when it does, one may whirl incongruously about the classic regions of
the Acropolis as one now whirls about the Forum at Rome.
The admirable Bædeker warns visitors to Hellas against assuming too
hastily that Greece is a tropical land, merely because it is a southern
Mediterranean country, and our own experiences have proved that even in
April Athens can be as cold as in mid-winter, with snow capping Hymettus
itself. But for the greater part of the year Athens is warm, and as in
most southern cities business is practically at a standstill between the
noon hour and two o'clock in the afternoon. In the summer months, which
in Athens means the interval between May and late fall, this cessation
is a practical necessity, owing to the heat and the glare of the
noontide sun on the white streets and buildings. But the comparative
compactness of the city makes it entirely possible to walk almost
anywhere, even on a warm day, for the coolness of shade as compared with
the heat of the sun is always noticeable. Thus the visitor who has
plenty of time for his stay in the city is practically independent of
cars and carriages. For those who find time pressing and who must cover
the sites, or, as Bædeker sometimes says, “overtake” the points of
interest in short order, the ingenious device once employed by a friend
similarly situated may not come amiss. Having limited facilities of
speech in the native tongue, and being practically without other means
of communication with the cabman, this resourceful traveler supplied
himself with a full set of picture post-cards dealing with the more
celebrated features of Athens, and by dint of showing these one after
another to his Jehu, he managed to “do” Athens in half a day—if one
could call it that. He was not the only one to see the ancient capital
in such short order, but it remains true that any such cavalier
disposition of so famous a place is unfortunate and wholly inadequate.
Athens is no place for the hasty “tripper,” for not only are the ancient
monuments worthy of long and thoughtful contemplation, but the modern
city itself is abundantly worthy of intimate acquaintance.
[Illustration: OLD CHURCH IN TURKISH QUARTER, ATHENS]
It has been spoken of as a noisy city, and it is especially so after
nightfall, when the streets are thronged with people until a late hour
and the coffee-houses and open-air restaurants are in full swing. Long
after the ordinary person has gone to bed, passing Athenians will be
heard shouting or singing in merry bands of from three to a dozen,
especially if it be election time. The Athenian takes his politics as he
takes his coffee—in deliberate sips, making a little go a long way. The
general election period usually extends over something like two weeks,
during which time the blank walls of the city blossom with the portraits
of candidates and the night is made vocal with the rallying cries of the
free-born. “Rallying” carriages are employed much as our own practical
politicians employ them, to convey the decrepit or the reluctant
able-bodied voters to the polls, with the difference that the Athenian
rallying conveyance is generally decorated with partisan banners and not
infrequently bears on its box, beside the driver, a musical outfit
consisting of a drum and penny whistle, with which imposing panoply the
proud voter progresses grandly through the streets to the ballot box,
attended by a shouting throng. Torchlight processions, which make up in
noise for their lack of numbers, are common every night during the
election. The Athenian, when he does make up his mind to shout for any
aspirant, shouts with his whole being, and with a vigor that recalls the
days of Stentor. Noisy enough at all times, Athens is more so than ever
in days of political excitement or on high festivals—notably on the
night before Easter, when the joy over the resurrection of the Lord is
manifested in a whole-hearted outpouring of the spirit, finding vent in
explosives, rockets, and other pyrotechnics. Religious anniversaries,
such as the birthday of a saint, or the Nativity, or the final triumph
of Jesus, are treated by the Greek with the same pomp and circumstance
that we accord to the Fourth of July; and, indeed, the same is true of
all Mediterranean countries. I have never experienced a night before
Easter in Athens, but I have been told that this, one of the most sacred
of the festivals of the Orthodox Church, is the one occasion when it is
at all dangerous or disagreeable to be abroad in the streets of the
capital, and it is so only because of the exuberant and genuine joy that
the native feels in the thought of his salvation, the idea of which
seems annually to be a perfectly new and hitherto unexpected one.
By day the chief tumult is from the ordinary press of traffic, with the
unintelligible street-cries of itinerant peddlers offering fish, eggs,
and divers vegetables, not to mention fire-wood. Nor should one omit the
newsboys, for the Athenian has abandoned not a whit of his traditional
eagerness to see or to hear some new thing, and has settled upon the
daily paper as the best vehicle for purveying to that taste. Athens
boasts perhaps half a dozen journals, fairly good though somewhat given
to exaggeration, and it is a poor citizen indeed who does not read two
or three of them as he drinks his coffee. Early morn and late evening
are filled with the cries of the paper boys ringing clear and distinct
over the general hubbub, and of all the street sounds their calls are by
far the easiest to understand.
Most fascinating of all to the foreign visitor must always be the
narrower and less ornate streets of the old quarter, leading off Hermes
and Æolus streets, and paramount in attractiveness the little narrow
lane of the red shoes, which is a perfect bazaar. It is a mere alley,
lined from end to end with small open booths, or shops, and devoted
almost exclusively to the sale of shoes, mostly of red leather and
provided with red pompons, though soft, white leather boots are also to
be had, and to the dealing in embroidered bags, coats, pouches, belts,
and the like. The stock in trade of each is very similar to that of
every neighbor, and the effect of the _tout ensemble_ is highly curious
and striking. To venture there once is to insure frequent visits, and
one is absolutely certain sooner or later to buy. The wares seem rather
Turkish than Greek in character. Of course, patience and tact are
needful to enable one to avoid outrageous extortion. Nothing would
surprise a shoe-lane dealer more, in all probability, than to find a
foreigner willing and ready to accept his initial price as final.
Chaffering is the order of the day, and after a sufficient amount of
advancing and retreating, the intending purchaser is sure to succumb and
return laden with souvenirs, from the inexpensive little embroidered
bags to the coats heavy with gold lace, which are the festal gear of the
peasant girls. The latter garments are mostly second-hand, and generally
show the blemishes due to actual use. They are sleeveless over-garments
made of heavy felt but gay with red and green cloth, on which, as a
border, gold braid and tracery have been lavished without stint until
they are splendid to see. Needless to say, they are the most expensive
things in shoe lane. The process of bargaining between one who speaks no
English and one who speaks no Greek is naturally largely a matter of
dumb show, although the ever-ready pad and pencil figure in it. Madame
looks inquiringly up from a handsome Greek coat, and is told by the pad
that the price is 50 drachmas. Her face falls; she says as plainly as
words could say it that she is very sorry, but it is out of the
question. She turns and approaches the door. “Madame! madame!” She turns
back, and the pad, bearing the legend 45, is shoved toward her. Again
the retreat, and once more the summons to return and see a new and still
lower price. Eventually the blank paper is passed to “madame,” and she
writes thereon a price of her own—inevitably too low. Finally, however,
the product of the extremes produces the Aristotelian golden mean, and
the title passes. Indeed, it sometimes happens that the merchant will
inform you of an outrageous price and add with shameless haste, “What
will you give?” Experience will soon teach the purchaser that the
easiest way to secure reasonable prices is to make a lump sum for
several articles at a single sale.
Shoe lane, for all its narrowness and business, is far from squalid, and
is remarkably clean and sweet. In this it differs from the market
district farther along, where vegetables, lambs, pigs, chickens, and
other viands are offered for sale. The sight is interesting, but its
olfactory appeal is stronger than the ocular. One need not venture
there, however, to see the wayside cook at his work of roasting a whole
sheep on the curb. Even the business streets up-town often show this
spectacle. The stove is a mere sheet-iron chest without a cover, and
containing a slow fire of charcoal. Over this on an iron spit, which is
thrust through the lamb from end to end, the roast is slowly turning,
legs, ribs, head, eyes, and all, the motive power being a little boy.
From this primitive establishment cooked meat may be bought, as in the
days of Socrates, either to be taken home, or to be eaten in some corner
by the Athenian quick-lunch devotee. Farther along in the old quarter,
not far from the Monastiri Station of the Piræus Line, is the street of
the coppersmiths, heralded from afar by the noise of its hammers. By all
the rules of appropriateness this should be the street of Hephaistos. In
the gathering dusk, especially, this is an interesting place to wander
through, for the forge fires in the dark little shops gleam brightly in
the increasing darkness, while the busy hammers ply far into the
evening. It is the tinkers’ chorus and the armorer’s song rolled into
one. Here one buys the coffee-mills and the coffee-pots used in
concocting the Turkish coffee peculiar to the East, and any visitor who
learns to like coffee thus made will do well to secure both utensils,
since the process is simple and the drink can easily be made at home.
The coffee-pots themselves are little brass or copper dippers, of
varying sizes; and the mills are cylinders of brass with arrangements
for pulverizing the coffee beans to a fine powder. This powder, in the
proportion of about a teaspoonful to a cup, is put into the dipper with
an equal quantity of sugar. Boiling water is added, and the mixture set
on the fire until it “boils up.” This is repeated three times before
pouring off into cups, the coffee being vigorously stirred or beaten to
a froth between the several boilings. At the end it is a thick and
syrup-like liquid, astonishingly devoid of the insomnia-producing
qualities commonly attributed to coffee by the makers of American
“substitutes.” In any event the long-handled copper pots and the mills
for grinding are quaint and interesting to possess. At the coffee-houses
the practice is generally to bring the coffee on in its little
individual pot, to be poured out by the patron himself. It is always
accompanied by a huge glass of rather dubious drinking water and often
by a bit of loukoumi, which the Greek esteems as furnishing a thirst, or
by a handful of salty pistachio nuts, equally efficacious for the same
purpose. The consumption of coffee by the Greek nation is stupendous.
Possibly it is harmful, too. But in any event it cheers without
inebriating, and a drunken Greek is a rare sight indeed.
Walking homeward in the dusk of evening after a sunset on the Acropolis,
one is sure to pass many out-of-door stoves set close to the entrances
of humbler houses and stuffed with light wood which is blazing cheerily
in preparation of the evening meal, the glow and the aromatic wood-smoke
adding to the charm of the scene. Small shops, in the windows of which
stand fresh-made bowls of giaourti (ya-oór-ti), are also to be seen,
calling attention to that favorite Athenian delicacy, very popular as a
dessert and not unlikely to please the palate of those not to the manner
born. The giaourti is a sort of “junket,” or thick curd of goat’s milk,
possessing a sour or acid taste. It is best eaten with an equal quantity
of sugar, which renders the taste far from disagreeable. As for the
other common foods of the natives, doubtless the lamb comes nearest to
being the chief national dish, while chickens and eggs are every-day
features of many a table. Unless one is far from the congested haunts of
men, the food problem is not a serious one. That a visitor would find it
rather hard to live long on the ordinary native cookery, however, is no
doubt true; but fortunately there is little need to make the experiment.
One other native dish deserves mention, in passing, and that is the
“pilaffi,” or “pilaff,” which is rice covered with a rich meat gravy,
and which almost any foreigner will appreciate as a palatable article of
food.
Of the ruins and museums of Athens, it is necessary to speak in detail
in another chapter. Of the modern city and its many oddities, it is
enough to deal here. Rambles through the town in any direction are sure
to prove delightful, not only in the older quarter which we have been
considering, but through the more pretentious modern streets as well,
with their excellent shops, their pseudo-classic architecture, and their
constant glimpses of gardens or of distant ruined temples. Occasionally
the classic style of building rises to something really fine, as in the
case of the university buildings, the polytechnic school, or the
national museum itself. The local churches are by no means beautiful,
however. Indeed the ordinary Greek church makes no pretension to outward
attractiveness, such as the cathedrals and minor churches of the Roman
faith possess. Perhaps the most striking of the Athenian houses of
worship is the little brown structure which has been allowed to remain
in the midst of Hermes Street, recalling the situation of St. Clement
Danes, or St. Mary le Strand in London. It is a squat Byzantine edifice,
not beautiful, but evidently old, and a familiar sight of the city.
Within, the Greek churches are quite different in arrangement from the
Roman. At the entrance to the altar space there is always a high screen,
pierced by a door leading to the altar itself, and used only by the
officiating priest. The altar screen, or “iconastasis,” is richly
adorned as a rule with embossed work, and the “icons,” or holy pictures,
are generally painted faces set in raised silver-gilt frames, which
supply the figure and robes of the saints, only the facial features
being in pigment. Images are not allowed in the Orthodox worship, but
the relief employed to embellish the faces in the icons goes far to
simulate imagery.
The residential architecture of the city finds its best exemplification
in the splendid marble mansions of the princes of the royal house, which
are really fine, and which are surrounded by attractive grounds and
gardens. The palace of the king is far less attractive, being a huge and
barn-like structure in the centre of the city, relieved from utter
barrenness only by a very good classic portico. But nothing could be
lovelier than the deep dells of the palace gardens, which form a
magnificent park well deserving the classic name of a παράδεισος, with
its jungle of flowers, shrubs, and magnificent trees—the latter a
welcome sight in treeless Attica.
One cannot pass from the subject of modern Athens without mentioning the
soldiery, for the soldiers are everywhere, in all degrees of rank and
magnificence of dress, from the humble private to the glittering and
altogether gorgeous generalissimo. The uniforms are of a variety that
would put to blush the variegated equipment of the famous Ancient and
Honorable Artillery Company of Boston. These manifold uniforms have
their proper signification, however, and they are undeniably handsome.
If the Greek soldiers could only fight as well as they look, what could
restrain the modern Athenian empire? The army clothes are admirably
designed with an eye to fit and color, and the men carry themselves with
admirable military hauteur. Most picturesque of all are the king’s
body-guard, with their magnificent physique and national dress. They are
big, erect fellows, clad in the short fustanella skirts of the ancient
régime, the tight-fitting leggings, the pomponed shoes, the dark
over-jacket, and the fez. These are the only troops that wear the
old-time garb of the Greek. But the dress is a familiar sight in the
outside country districts, often worn by well-to-do peasants, and still
regarded as the national dress despite the general prevalence of
ordinary European clothes.
It remains to speak briefly of the national money, for that is a subject
the visitor cannot avoid. The drachma, which corresponds to the franc,
is a peculiar thing. If one means the metal drachma, of silver, it is
simple enough. It circulates at par with the franc. But the paper
drachma varies in value from day to day at the behest of private
speculation, and is almost never at par. I have experienced variations
of it from a value of fourteen cents to eighteen. In small transactions,
when the paper drachma is high, the difference is negligible. When it is
low in value, or in large amounts, it is highly appreciable. The
fluctuation of this money is the reason for the pads and pencils in the
shops, for it is only by constant multiplication or division that the
merchant is able to translate prices from francs into drachmas or _vice
versa_, as occasion requires. Naturally when the drachma is worth only
fourteen cents, the unsuspecting visitor is liable to pay more than he
should, if assuming that a franc and a drachma are synonymous terms. In
such a case a paper bill requires a considerable addition of copper
lepta to make it equal the metal drachma or the French franc. The
difference in value from day to day may be learned from the newspapers.
Most bargains are made in francs, and the French money, both gold and
silver, is freely used. Nevertheless, the local paper money is very
useful, and it merely requires a little care in the use. Particularly is
it desirable to know the status of the drachma in securing cash on a
letter of credit or on a traveler’s cheque, in order that one may obtain
the proper amount and not content himself with an inferior sum in paper;
for although the principal banks may be relied upon as a rule to be
honest, individual clerks may not be proof against the temptation to
impose upon the ignorant and pocket the difference. I would advise the
use of the Ionian Bank as far as possible, rather than the tourist
agencies, for the latter often extort money quite without warrant, on
the plea of needful stamps or fees for “accommodation,” that the bank
does not require. Little trouble will be found to exist in the way of
false coin—far less than in Italy. The one difficulty is to follow the
paper drachma up and down, and not be mulcted to a greater or less
extent in the exchange of silver for paper. The copper coins, which are
either the five or ten lepta pieces, occasion no trouble, being like the
Italian centesimi or English pence and ha' pennies.
One not uncommon sight to be met with in Athenian streets is the funeral
procession—a sight which is liable at first to give the unaccustomed
witness a serious shock, because of the custom of carrying the dead
uncoffined through the city. The coffin and its cover are borne at the
head of the procession, as a rule, while the body of the deceased, in an
open hearse, rides joltingly along in the middle of the cortège. To
those not used to this method of honoring the dead, the exposure of the
face to the sight of every passer-by must seem incongruous and
revolting. But it is the custom of the place, and the passing of a
funeral causes no apparent concern to those who calmly view the passing
corpse from the chairs where they sip their coffee, or idly finger their
strings of beads. The beads which are to be seen in the hand of nearly
every native have no religious significance, as might be thought at
first sight, but are simply one of the innocuous things that the Hellene
finds for idle hands to do. They are large beads, of various colors,
though the strings are generally uniform in themselves, and their sole
function is to furnish something to toy with while talking, or while
doing nothing in particular. There is a sufficiency of loose string to
give some play to the beads, and they become a familiar sight.
Royalty in Greece is decidedly democratic in its attitude. King George
and his sons are frequently to be seen riding about town, much like
ordinary citizens. Quite characteristic was an encounter of recent date,
in which an American gentleman accosted one whom he found walking in the
palace gardens with the inquiry as to what hour would be the best for
seeing the royal children. The question elicited mutual interest and the
two conversed for some time, the American asking with much curiosity for
particulars of the household, with which his interlocutor professed to
be acquainted. “What of the queen?” he inquired. "She’s exceedingly well
beloved," was the reply. “She is a woman of high character and fills her
high station admirably.” “And the king?” "Oh, the king! I regret to say
that he is no good. He has done nothing for the country. He tries to
give no offense—but as a king the less said of him the better!" Needless
to say, this oracle was the king himself. Nobody else would have passed
so harsh a judgment. King George I has been reigning since 1863, when
the present government, with the sponsorship of the Christian powers,
was inaugurated. He came from Denmark, being a son of the late King
Christian, who furnished so many thrones of Europe with acceptable
rulers and queens from his numerous and excellent family, so that the
king is not himself a Greek at all. The years of successful rule have
proved him highly acceptable to the Athenians and their countrymen, who
have seen their land regain a large measure of its prosperity and their
chief city grow to considerable proportions under the new order. The
kingly office is hereditary, the crown prince reaching his majority at
eighteen years.
Prince Constantine, the heir to the throne, lives on the street behind
the palace gardens, and has a family of handsome children. Prince George
is commissioner in charge of Crete. The royal family has embraced the
faith of the Greek Orthodox Church.
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