ath not been faithful unto death, and behold her
crown of life is vanished from her head. Verily, these things be
astonishing!"

Such things have a bad influence. They provoke worldly men into using
light conversation concerning sacred subjects. Thick-headed commentators
upon the Bible, and stupid preachers and teachers, work more damage to
religion than sensible, cool-brained clergymen can fight away again, toil
as they may. It is not good judgment to fit a crown of life upon a city
which has been destroyed six times. That other class of wiseacres who
twist prophecy in such a manner as to make it promise the destruction and
desolation of the same city, use judgment just as bad, since the city is
in a very flourishing condition now, unhappily for them. These things
put arguments into the mouth of infidelity.

A portion of the city is pretty exclusively Turkish; the Jews have a
quarter to themselves; the Franks another quarter; so, also, with the
Armenians. The Armenians, of course, are Christians. Their houses are
large, clean, airy, handsomely paved with black and white squares of
marble, and in the centre of many of them is a square court, which has in
it a luxuriant flower-garden and a sparkling fountain; the doors of all
the rooms open on this. A very wide hall leads to the street door, and
in this the women sit, the most of the day. In the cool of the evening
they dress up in their best raiment and show themselves at the door.
They are all comely of countenance, and exceedingly neat and cleanly;
they look as if they were just out of a band-box. Some of the young
ladies--many of them, I may say--are even very beautiful; they average a
shade better than American girls--which treasonable words I pray may be
forgiven me. They are very sociable, and will smile back when a stranger
smiles at them, bow back when he bows, and talk back if he speaks to
them. No introduction is required. An hour's chat at the door with a
pretty girl one never saw before, is easily obtained, and is very
pleasant. I have tried it. I could not talk anything but English, and
the girl knew nothing but Greek, or Armenian, or some such barbarous
tongue, but we got along very well. I find that in cases like these, the
fact that you can not comprehend each other isn't much of a drawback.
In that Russia n town of Yalta I danced an astonishing sort of dance an
hour long, and one I had not heard of before, with a very pretty girl,
and