514 



The Review of Reviews. 



Xocember 1, 1906. 



They are 1320 — as the ladies of the old order are 

 called by the little hothouse-grown flowers of 

 modern Turkey. They admit only the dates of 

 Mahomet's Hegira, never using the European calen- 

 dar. 



A TURKISH BEIDE. 



The bride of to-morrow is at home, seated at her 

 desk, about to burn letters and other souvenirs of 

 her girlhood, lest they should fall into the hands of 

 the unknown young Bey in a few hours to be her 

 master. She would have locked herself in but that 

 Turkish women's rooms have no locks. And every 

 movement is watched, by servants, by eunuchs, 

 spying night and day, by duennas with cat-like 

 movements and hawk-like eyes. She burned them 

 all — these letters in Turkish, French, German, Eng- 

 lish, all full of revolt, and poisoned by that pes- 

 simism which is the scourge of Turkish harems to- 

 daj-. Like all Turkish girls, her time of unveiled 

 freedom ended at thirteen years. From then till 

 now — ten years nearly — she has studied ardently 

 literature, history and transcendental philosophy, 

 harmony and musical composition, until she was 

 remarkable for her attainments even among the 

 highly cultured young Turkish women of her ac- 

 quaintance, who quoted her opinions and copied 

 the costly elegance of her clothes. Above all, she 

 was the standard-bearer in the feminine revolt 

 against the severities of the harem. 



Her girlish journal she would not burn — that 

 journal which it pleased her to imagine she was 

 writing for Andre Lhery, and which he could never 

 read. 



Then partly through this journal, partly through 

 the narrative of Andre Lhery (for the arrangement 

 and style of this novel are wholly French), for we 

 are told how she tried to calm herself by music ; 

 then, her courage failing, sent for her two cousins 

 to spend with her the last night of her girlhood. 

 T/iey understood. That terrible wedding-day to- 

 morrow ! They could not sleep for thinking of its 

 long-drawn-out ordeal^frora nine in the morning 

 till eleven at night, seated hour after hour on a 

 throne, receiving compliments and being stared at. 

 . . . And they did not remember till late that it 

 was the night when they must pray for the dead : — 



It was one of the only religioiia customs of Islam wirch 

 the.v still faithfullr observed. Otherwise they were like 

 most Mussulman women of their generation and their 

 world— touched olasted by the breath of Darwin. Schopen- 

 hauer, and *;o man.v others. 



Worse than if they had been converted to Chris- 

 tianity, said their grandmother. 



A ItODERN TUEKISH MAEKIAGE. 



The four days' bride might have been a Parisienne 

 at home but for the barred windows and the texts 

 from the Koran. Yet to be treated as an odalisque, 

 as a luxurious doll, to be decked and tricked out — 

 for the delectation of her master ! Nothing hu- 

 miliated her so much. Yet the vouns Bev was a 



kind husband, as Turkish husbands go. He loved 

 his wife, as a Turkish husband understands love. 

 As time goes on there is another woman, Durdane. 

 Yet he cared nothing for her ; all the time it was- 

 Djenane, his wife, that he loved. But she had no 

 child, and Durdane had : the Bev must marry 

 Durdane ; and here was Djenane's chance. For 

 two months her stepmother had consented to hei 

 living apart from her husband ; but the two months 

 are over, and he claims her imperiously. 



And one day, in the room of her girlhood, we 

 see her again. A Paris dress of grey and silver, 

 with a long Court train, made her look slenderer 

 and lovelier than ever. She is going to the Palace, 

 to the Valide Sultana, the Sultan's mother, to beg 

 her intercession with the Sultan for a divorce. The 

 'Valide will understand. Her grandmother, all the 

 1320 women, understood nothing; two wives in one 

 house, or three or four, why not? That notion 

 about onlv having one had come, like other bad 

 things, from Europe. And the Valide does under- 

 stand ; the divorce is obtained. 



Meanwhile, what has happened to the two little 

 cousins, the graver Zeyneb, and the merry, birdlike 

 Melek ? Both are married ; both have returned to 

 their girlhood's home ; Melek, after months of tor- 

 ture, having at last divorced a cruel husband ; 

 Zeyneb mercifully delivered from hers by death : — 



Irreparably injured, almost at the same time, in the 

 flower of their youth, deflowered, weary, the very wreckage 

 of life, they had still, though utterly beaten down, been 

 able to resume their sisterly intimac.v. now closer than 

 ever. 



THE THREE LITTLE BLACK PHANTOMS. 



It is 1904. Andre Lhery has returned to Stam- 

 boul. One day a mysterious letter reaches him — - 

 from his Turkish correspondent of three years ago. 

 She will meet him at a certain hour, on the shores 

 of the Bosphorus. He knows how much she risks. 

 He keeps the appointment. A carriage drives up 

 at the appointed time and place. Three black phan- 

 toms, thickly veiled in triple veils, descend; — 



■ If yon only knew," said one, *' what deceptions we 

 have had to practise to get here! And what a number of 

 people — negroes and negresses — we have had to leave along 

 tho road!" 



Xever should he see their faces. For him they 

 are three little black shadows: — 



" Souls," corrects one of them. " Nothing but souls. . . . 

 Three poor troubled souls, who need your friendship." 



And the friendship thus begun is continued at ■ 

 infinite risks, and with ever-increasing audacity. 

 For a long time he does not even see one of their 

 faces, and not till the very last dues he see the face 

 of Djenane. They meet constantly, sometimes, at 

 first, in a cemetery, later on in a house, with still 

 more precautions. Thev bring their friends, other 

 black-veiled phantoms, all in revolt against black 

 veils, high walls, and iron bars. They suggest to 

 him, finally, the novel of modem Turkish women's 

 lives — " Les D^senchantees," as thev decide it shall 

 be called. Thev even allow photographs to be 



