en almost in despair at
our non-appearance, hailed us with the welcome news that he had engaged a
caique, and that our baggage was already embarked. We only needed the
vises of the authorities, in order to leave. He took our teskeres to get
them, and we went upon the balcony of a coffee-house overhanging the sea,
and smoked a narghileh.

But here there was another history. The teskeres had not been properly
vised at Brousa, and the Governor at first decided to send us back. Taking
Francois, however, for a Turk, and finding that we had regularly passed
quarantine, he signed them after a delay of an hour and a half, and we
left the shore, weary, impatient, and wolfish with twelve hours' fasting.
A cup of Brousan beer and a piece of bread brought us into a better mood,
and I, who began to feel sick from the rolling of the caique, lay down on
my bed, which was spread at the bottom, and found a kind of uneasy sleep.
The sail was hoisted at first, to get us across the mouth of the Gulf, but
soon the Greeks took to their oars. They were silent, however, and though
I only slept by fits, the night wore away rapidly. As the dawn was
deepening, we ran into a little bight in the northern side of a
promontory, where a picturesque Greek village stood at the foot of the
mountains. The houses were of wood, with balconies overgrown with
grape-vines, and there was a fountain of cold, excellent water on the very
beach. Some Greek boatmen were smoking in the portico of a cafe on shore,
and two fishermen, who had been out before dawn to catch sardines, were
emptying their nets of the spoil. Our men kindled a fire on the sand, and
roasted us a dish of the fish. Some of the last night's hunger remained,
and the meal had enough of that seasoning to be delicious.

After giving our men an hour's rest, we set off for the Princes' Islands,
which now appeared to the north, over the glassy plain of the sea. The
Gulf of Iskmid, or Nicomedia, opened away to the east, between two
mountain headlands. The morning was intensely hot and sultry, and but for
the protection of an umbrella, we should have suffered greatly. There was
a fiery blue vapor on the sea, and a thunder-cloud hid the shores of
Thrace. Now and then came a light puff of wind, whereupon the men would
ship the little mast, and crowd on an enormous quantity of sail. So,
sailing and rowing, we neared the islands with the storm, but it advanced
slowly enough to allow a sight of the mosques of