96 SPORT AND TRAVEL 



there ; indeed, so mild was the climate that the violets 

 were in full bloom, and some of the rose bushes were 

 already flowering in the open air. No breath of 

 spring, however, had yet reached Chivril, which lies at 

 an altitude of over three thousand feet above sea level. 

 As the train drew up at the railway terminus, and I 

 emerged from the comfortable carriage, and turned 

 my back on the last emblem of European civilisation 

 I was to see for some time, a bitter wind came howl- 

 ing across the surrounding dreary treeless plains, 

 penetrating through coat and vest to my very skin. 

 All the little pools, too, in the muddy roads round the 

 station were frozen into solid ice, whilst the mighty 

 mass of the Ak Dagh (White Mountain), although 

 some miles distant, stood out clearly in the bright 

 moonlight, its domes and peaks all buried beneath one 

 vast unbroken pall of new-fallen snow. 



The Greek station-master, who had lately built a 

 small hotel, soon provided me with an excellent din- 

 ner, and then gave me a comfortable bed in his 

 house, where I slept well and warmly until about six 

 o'clock the next morning, when I got up, as I wished 

 to make an early start. I had been accompanied from 

 Smyrna by two servants, Theodore, a Greek, who, 

 having lived for some years in America, spoke Eng- 

 lish well, and also a little Turkish, and who was there- 

 fore my interpreter as well as my cook; and Mustapha, 

 a Turk, who spoke Greek, as well as his own language, 

 a steady, reliable man, who acted as general servant 



