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 we talked incessantly, and laughed exhaustingly, and neither one ever

knew what the other was driving at. But it was splendid. There were

twenty people in the set, and the dance was very lively and complicated.

It was complicated enough without me--with me it was more so. I threw in

a figure now and then that surprised those Russians. But I have never

ceased to think of that girl. I have written to her, but I can not

direct the epistle because her name is one of those nine-jointed Russian

affairs, and there are not letters enough in our alphabet to hold out.

466

The Innocents Abroad