JANUARY 31 



the patient animal's quarters, as he stands haunch- deep 

 in the river. It takes about half an hour to fill each pair 

 of hides in this archaic way : the loaded beast then climbs 

 painfully up to the town the water squirting freely from 

 rents and seams in the leather. It is on this primitive 

 method of supply that the entire town of some 10,000 in- 

 habitants depends, for the wells attached to private houses 

 have become deservedly suspect. The water of the Peneus 

 is said to be wholesome; but when, as we saw it, it is 

 swollen with winter floods and as yellow as the Tiber, it 

 was a comfort to reflect that Larissa has store of sound, 

 if not particularly palatable, wine. Moreover, it is hardly 

 reassuring to observe that a gigantic muck-heap, where 

 all the refuse of the town is cast the happy hunting- 

 ground of innumerable dogs, poultry, magpies, and pert 

 little Eastern jackdaws occupies about an acre and a half 

 of the river-bank immediately above where the water-skins 

 are filled. 



Pursue we then our way up the principal street, past 

 the bazaar and Turkish cafe, where dozens of wide- 

 breeched, be-fezzed, and be-slippered citizens are drinking 

 coffee, bolting sweetmeats, and sucking away at huge 

 hubble-bubbles. Once into the Turkish quarter and you 

 are back in the middle ages. No wheeled carriage may 

 venture on that fearsome pavement, for Turks always go 

 on horseback ; and though the roadway suffices for their 

 quick-footed barbs, you, on foot, must hop from pro- 

 montory to island, and from island to isthmus in the 

 ocean of filth. Still, you will be tempted to linger here 

 and there ; for although the house- walls facing the street 

 are, after oriental fashion, mostly without windows, here 

 and there an open door gives a glimpse into a sunny 



