The Days of a Man 1914 



and provided with a wooden spigot. The cheap iron 

 bedsteads had no bedding to speak of, what there 

 was being thoroughly infested with the dominant 

 insect of Macedonia. For meals we went to a Greek 

 cafe, not bad but adorned with bloodthirsty posters, 

 the worst I ever saw, in which " Konstantinos Boul- 

 garophagos" (Bulgar Eater) figured conspicuously. 

 The While we were there a long procession of camels 



don , k 7 laden with Turkish tobacco from the Bistritza came 

 up the winding street and crossed the high stone 

 bridge. Tied together in line, the string was led by a 

 gallant little donkey which, though undirected, 

 steered the proper course. A donkey has more 

 brains than a dozen camel-drudges; these, if left 

 alone, go straight ahead, paying no attention to roads 

 or hedges. 1 As to camels I have met, I recall Will 

 Thompson's caravan song : 



Orderly and dutiful, the little door of years 

 Opens up in Wonderland ! the camel train appears. 

 Who that knows the gorgeous East, their magic can 



withstand ? 

 Velvet-footed camels on the road to Samarkand! 



A mile behind the picturesque but dilapidated town 

 stands its station on the road connecting Constanti- 

 nople and Salonica. This had formerly done a large 

 business, running daily two first-class trains each way. 



*" If docile means stupid . . . the camel is the very model of docility. 

 But if the epithet . . . designates an animal that takes an interest in his 

 rider . . . the camel is by no means docile. He takes no heed of his rider . . . 

 walks straight on when set agoing, merely because he is too stupid to turn aside, 

 and then should some tempting thorn or green branch allure him out of the 

 path . . . he is too dull to turn back into the right road. . . . An undomes- 

 ticated and savage animal rendered serviceable by stupidity alone. . . . 

 Neither attachment nor even habit impresses him . . . never tame but never 

 wide-awake enough to be exactly wild." SIR F. PALGRAVE in Encyclopedia 

 Britannica 



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