ADDRESSES 199 



tral Asia. Rising from the position of slave and subject to 

 that of master, they gradually fought their way down to 

 the shores of the Mediterranean and occupied the entire 

 territory. But the inherited instincts of so many genera- 

 tions have never been completely laid aside. As in their 

 warlike, migratory state, the tent was to them simply a 

 sleeping-place to which they retired for the night, so the 

 house has been to them ever since. Home, in our sense of the 

 word, with all its beautiful associations, has no answering 

 equivalent in their mind, and, in fact, there is no word in 

 their language which can convey such an idea. 



To add to the difficulty of giving any adequate idea of the 

 people of Turkey, is the fact that they do not form a single 

 race, amalgamated and blended into one, though made up 

 of different race-elements, but are composed of Turks, Jews, 

 Greeks, Armenians, wild tribes of Koords, Turcomans, 

 Kuzel Bash, and the Bulgarian, Croatian, and Slavonian 

 tribes of the Danubian principalities, each retaining its dis- 

 tinct nationality, its own religious rites, and its own peculiar 

 customs and ways. Of the population of eight millions in 

 round numbers in European Turkey, the Turks number 

 about 3,600,000, and the rest are Christian and Jews. In 

 Asiatic Turkey the proportion is about the same. Of these, 

 the Greeks and the Jews are the tradesmen; the Armenians 

 the artizans and bankers; the Bulgarians and Croats are 

 agricultural in their tastes, while the Koords and Turco- 

 mans live largely by plunder and by the produce of their 

 herds. In such an assemblage of races you would naturally 

 expect to find great differences; and yet, after all, certain 

 distinct features will be found peculiar to all, and certain 

 customs that are common to all. 



