FROM ATHENS

Europe, whither goest thou?--the poignant question of to-day. The pride of Christian culture, the greatest
human achievement in history, with, as we thought before 1914, the seal of immortality set upon her, is now
perhaps moving towards dissolution and death. Europe has begun a rapid decline, though no one dares to
think that she will continue in it downward until she reaches the chaos and misery and barbarity from which
she sprang. Affairs will presently take a turn for the better, Europe will recover her balance and resume the
road of progress which she left seven years ago--prompts Hope.
"Europe must die in order to be re-born as something better"; "all must be destroyed," say the theorists of
revolution. "She staggers and falls and falls and plunges," seem to say the facts with the inexorableness of
Fate.

Prophecy can be left to all men--it does not alter the course of events. The historian in the future will ask what
was the actual condition of Europe at this time, and it is possible to assume that he would grasp eagerly at an
account of a visit by an impartial observer to all the principal capitals of Europe in the year 1921. An effort to
record what Europe looks like now, a series of true reflections and verbal photographs of swirling humanity at
the great congregating places, the capitals, cannot but be of value. So with the motto: "See all: reserve your
judgment," let us proceed.
The winds of the mountains traverse the well-shod civilization of a great city. At the end of each of the long
streets rises a mountain, and on the mountain rest the clouds and the sky. You walk outwards, and climb the
nearest and most prominent of the heights to the Acropolis, to the mighty slabs of the marble of the Parthenon,
simple and pure in the mountain air, a point of view where it is always morning, and you look down from the
ancient Athens to the new. Your eyes rest on modern Athens all built in white stone, and extensive and
handsome in a setting of mountains and sea, but the heart refuses to travel with the eyes. The heart remains in
the ancient city, and there, somehow, is perfect happiness, and it is a place in which to abide.
Not without some sacred thought does one place one's feet upon the bare rock where walked the bright spirits
of ancient Athens. The morning sun of Europe, the dawning vision of all that we Europeans could be or mean,
dawns again in the soul. As an old or invalid man, or one at least who in middle years has sinned and gone
astray, one looks back to the innocence and promise of childhood. Here shone the light of our being
undimmed; here was kindled in Europe the faith of the ideal. Yonder is Mars Hill from which St. Paul showed
the new way when the light was growing dim. For Greece identified man in part with the Divine, but the new
religion gave forgetful humanity its altar of remembrance, affirming that we do not belong to the beasts that
perish but are affiliated to the Almighty. It is perhaps strange that to-day the city which was the cradle of the ideal is a city where there are no ideals at
all--either old or new, where Plato now means nothing, where even Bolshevism is not heard of. S----, who
took his bachelorate on divinity at Oxford, is writing a sympathetic treatise on Nietzsche and Christianity for
his doctorate at the University of Athens. But what a mistake! What an unfortunate choice of place and theme!
Who was Nietzsche? "I have changed my title to 'Nietzsche as the Devil'" says S----. "Ah, that's better," says
his professor, "that we can understand."
You come down from the heights into the modern city, and you behold the rising civilization of a new Greece.
Here without question is a most pleasant city, with acacia avenues and white houses and full-bosomed
abundant orange-trees hanging their golden fruits. Thus happily bowered, merchants and bankers pursue their
avocations, and shopkeepers display their wares in a pleasant array of modern shops. On the streets walk
leisurely an indolent and elegant people; the dark women are especially chic and it must be said refined and
restrained, and not so seductive in appearance as the South would suggest. You see also at the many open-air
cafés and in the street a very distinguished-looking type of man with finely cut features and plentiful iron-grey
hair. You surmise that you are looking upon the most indolent people in the world--not lazy like Russians or
Irish, but elegantly indolent, walking so slowly, playing meditatively with their beads--for nearly every man
carries his string of jet or amber beads, which he mechanically tells, though without a thought of prayer. They
walk with half-closed eyes, and whilst they seem to be thinking, they are but taking a passive pleasure in
existence. They sit down together at their cafés which debouch upon the streets, and sip the sweetest of coffee,
and light their cigarettes, and regard the world which passes slowly by. There are all manner of mendicants
and of musicians flitting to and fro in the sun, like shabby butterflies, and the elegant Greek says "No" to
them, not by sound of voice, but by the slightest elevation of the eyebrows and movement of the eye. He sits
and looks occasionally at the wonderful hills above him, so fresh, so virginal; but he does not, as an
Englishman might do, pay quickly and go out and go up. The modern Greek would never build so high as the
Acropolis.
You do not hear a good word said for the Greek by any race in Europe. Italians, French, Serbs, Bulgars,
Turks, and even British are all more or less anti-Greek. Whilst it seems true to say that you scarcely find any
nation that likes any other nation, yet the antipathy towards the Greek seems more marked than most others.
Whatever illfeeling or irritative may be in the air is readily vented upon the Greek. Despite all this, however,
the new Greeks are a slowly but steadily rising and prospering people. One hundred years ago they obtained
their liberation from the Turk. The Turkish mind was shown to be incapable of absorbing Europeanism. The
light of the nineteenth century scared the night-bird back to Asia, and there arose Serbs, and Bulgars, and
Roumanians as European nations, and Greece once more arose. Modern civilization suits the Greek much
more than it does the Turk. He can understand it and utilize it. Because of it he has risen and perchance will
rise. The Greeks are by far the cleverest people in the Balkans, and are perhaps the cleverest of the
Mediterranean nations as well.
The Greek temperament swings between the dead calm and passionless on the one hand, to the violent and
maniacal on the other. The nation is still convalescent, its development is slow, and it is impossible to say
how far new Greece will develop. But its strength lies in its serpentine stillness and ancient unforgotten craft,
and its weakness in that absence of ideals and in the sudden violence of partizanship which suggest
pathological decay. What Greece does is generally subtle and shrewd; what she says is often madness. She has
little sense of humour, and takes offence where other nations would laugh. Thus she wins by statecraft and
loses by politics. In thought, and in the spoken word, Greece is outmatched for instance by the Slavs; but in
silent action and in administrative policy Greece more often excels her neighbours. You will always hear
odious comparisons made in the Near East between Greek and Turk, to the disadvantage of the former. But it
seems rather absurd. The Turk, at his best, is a child or a legendary hero--not one of ourselves--whereas the
Greek is a serious European with a race-consciousness of civilization thousands of years old.
Athens has quietened down after the political violence of the restoration of Constantine. One sees pictures of
the King everywhere--a cavalry officer with high Greek military hat, bushy moustaches, and rather horse-like face. He has large strained eyes with a questioning, impatient expression. All these pictures were hidden
during the King's exile, but on his return came forth to light again. Common also are posters of Constantine as
St. George, and the Venizelist administration as a three-headed dragon of which Venizelos is the chief and
certainly most loathly head. Venizelos has become violently distasteful to the people--though possibly he may
return to power by as violent a reaction. The chief reason for his fall was that he offended Greek national
pride by being the puppet of the Allies. The revolution which he accomplished at the instigation of the French
was highly resented. And all the mortification of the French contempt for Greece was vented upon him.
Although Greece won such a goodly share of the booty of the war, she was treated throughout the war with a
brutal nonchalance. Venizelos had much respect, but Greece had none. A comparison is often made between
the machinations of the Allies in Petrograd in 1917 for the deposing of the Tsar, and the intrigues which
forced Constantine to flee. Venizelos nevertheless was one of the cleverest statesmen of Europe--granted one
can be clever and not wise at the same time--clever and even stupid, his chief weakness being a crude violence
of temperament which breaks out in his speeches:
On vient de vous dire, s'écria-t-il, qu'il n'y avait pas de germanophiles an Grèce. Cela est vrai pour le peuple,
pour les homines politiques de tous les partis en grande majorité. Moi-même je viens de l'attester à la
conference de Londres. Mais cela n'est vrai du roi, ni de son entourage. Ceux-la ne sont pas seulement
germanophiles. Ils sont Boches de la tête aux pieds! . . .
The good order, the low cost of living, the high value of the drachma, the excellent condition of the army, the
enhanced prestige of the Greek nation after the war, all testify to the ability of Venizelos. Venizelos won for
Hellas territory which extends from Salonica all the way to the Black Sea, and brought her almost to the gates
of Constantinople. The role of neutrality which King Constantine affected would have left Greece without the
coveted war-glory, and, of course, without the dangerous responsibility she has now. Thanks to Venizelos,
Greece is almost an empire. And the Greeks are glad to have this extra sway. No sentiment has stood in the
way of Constantine's Government retaining what its arch-enemy had won. "We may fall out in politics, but
where our material interests are concerned you will find complete solidarity," said an Athenian journalist. And
it seems true.
Not many signs of altruism are visible in Greece. There are few Germanophiles. "Do not fear for us," said M.
Kalogeropoulos, to the French. "Greece will not ally herself to a corpse"--meaning Germany. In fact, there is
among the Greeks only Graecophilism. If superlative and clamorous love of country is a virtue--they have it.
For Greece, when you are down, you are down. As for fallen Germany, so for Russia in her humiliation
Greece has no extra thought or care. Not a humanitarian and philanthropic nation! One wonders how a Greek
mind would interpret the "big-brother-love" of the Americans, which prompts the marvellous rescue-work
now being done by the United States in all the stricken countries of Europe. There, however, the indolence of
the Greek mind and the half-closed eye intervene. There is no curiosity about philanthropy. But it is a Greek
word by origin.
One longs to see some sort of love towards the neighbour. There is a mortal enmity towards the Bulgar, a cool
reciprocity of Italian dislike, a non-comprehension of the Serb, traditional hatred of the Turk--all these are
intensified by egoism. New Greece, with her hazardous northern frontier, needs to cultivate friendship, and
will have to employ all her strategy to gain any. Her mainstay is, of course, England. For us Greece has the
natural respect which a weak country pays to a strong friend, but she has also a curious covert regard for us as
one nation of sailors for another, a petty maritime State for a great one. Her weakness is in asking material
favours at the same time as she pays compliments. Greece is almost our ally in the Near East. French rivalry
has bound British and Greeks together. In our employ are Greeks; in the French employ, Turks. There is no
question but our employees are the cleverer and the more capable, but there is a continual clash on
psychological grounds. The Greeks make mistakes and the British are not ready to make allowances. The
Englishman demands that his friend shall be a "sportsman"--the Turk is, the Greek is not. Therefore we cannot
fit Greece into the jig-saw puzzle which we call the comity of nations. The question is, can Greece cut herself
to fit--ought she to?
It is strange to come into the martial display of Athens and find the old war still going on, see the numbers of
worn soldiers weighed down with all the impedimenta of "fighting order" coming home on leave or returning
to the front, to see the Turkish prisoners of war jobbing at the station and on the streets, to see the handsome
Evzones, the soldiers of the King's bodyguard, strutting together in fine style along the cobbled roadway. It is
impressive, and shows Greece in a new light. Then the Constituent Assembly with its new Turkish members
in their fezes rather takes the eye as a novel synthesis of political interest in the Near East. Athens is a great
capital where much that is vital in the future of Europe is at stake. It stands somewhat aside from the general
misery of Europe, and for that reason more perhaps can be seen.
Not that Greece has not its poor--its appalling beggars, its miserable war-cripples, its refugees. An extensive
strike was in progress in February; it had to be settled by a threat of mobilization. "Any workman not in his
place on Monday morning will be called up for the next draft to Asia Minor" proved an effectual way of
meeting demands for higher pay. Of the refugees, pity is first awakened for the Russians. Just outside the city
of Athens, in old barracks, lie the survivors of the tuberculosis hospitals evacuated from the Crimea--pale and
haggard as death--strange wisps of humanity, attended by devoted Russian doctors and nurses; but fed on the
scantiest of dry army rations, short of medicine and comfort of all kinds. One ward of dying women with
staring eyes, an unforgettable impression!
Whilst in Greece, every Englishman should visit our cemeteries in Macedonia, and realize that we planted
many thousands of our people like seeds of a kind in this Grecian soil--that a flower of freedom might grow.
On a wind-blown moor, in sight of Mt. Olympus and the sea, ranges one regular array of British crosses--now
of wood, but presently to be of marble, with a stone of remembrance in their midst. It will be done well, in the
British way. Even the dead might be pleased by what is being done. But here is a strange phenomenon which
seems to make a mockery of our sacrifice. Around this wonderful burying ground are growing up a miscellany
of alien crosses, of all shapes and sizes, stuck in ugly heaps of upturned earth. Every day a pit is dug and the
dead-cart arrives. There is no service, no ceremony. But forty or fifty nearly naked bodies of women and
children are shot into the pit and covered over hastily and a cross put over them. They are Russians, the
so-called Russian Greeks evacuated from the Caucasus last year, now stricken with typhus and almost
famished to death, some 12,000 of them in old army huts, living promiscuously together and attended by one
desperate doctor and a few devoted sisters. Europe is heaping her dead around us.
This truly is not near Athens, but above the ruined ramshackle port of Salonica, once a fair city, but now
facing the sea with almost a mile of fire-devastated streets. The refugees are confined to their huts, and are
under a sort of military control. All the people are proletariat, and ought never to have been taken on board
ships and brought to Greece. A few would have been killed by Bolsheviks, but not so many as will die here by
disease. They cannot help Russia outside of Russia, and it is beyond belief that little countries can look after
them indefinitely. It is pathetic to look into their huts, strung from wall to wall with crusts of bread, the floors
multitudinous with people and especially with children; every serious person engaged in the hopeless task of
destroying the lice. Even if these people were at once put on transports and taken to Russia half of their
number would be destined to death.
The Russian scenes and episodes in Greece foreshadow the immense tragedy to be witnessed in
Constantinople and on Gallipoli and at Lemnos. What touches the heart at Athens will ravage the whole being
at Constantinople. But of that anon. An episode at Athens on the day of arrival had a spice of novelty in it
which soon dulled on the palate in a rapidity of repetition:
It is Sunday afternoon, and on the pavement of a quiet street stands a mute and gloomy man with an armful of
what appears to be paper-money. He is holding it out in his two hands.
Impossible that it should be money!
But it is. He is holding about half a million roubles in his hands.
Yes, they are for sale. This for so much, this other for so much.
"I am sorry I have no Greek money, but please take five liras Italian and give it to your comrades. You must
be very poor."
A smile appeared on the man's face.
"But you'll take some roubles," said he.
"Well, if you like, just a small note for remembrance. It doesn't matter what."
"Here's ten thousand roubles!"
And he handed out a handsome new note for that amount. It fluttered from his hand to the pavement and was
caught on the wind.
"Pick it up quickly! It's ten thousand roubles," one wished to cry anxiously to the passer-by.
Only ten thousand! And for something less than sixpence!
"Europe won't get right before the Russian business is straightened out," said an American commercial
traveller at the hotel. He, for his part, was engaged in the profitless task of disposing of large margins of goods
at fifty per cent below cost of production whilst the leisurely, crafty Greeks kept him waiting from day to day
in the expectation of getting another ten per cent reduction.
"The whole world's out of gear," said the American in disgust. "The war and the Russian revolution are the
cause. They have ruined the meaning of money."
I was to find his words true to this extent that at every capital the European problem proved to be inextricably
involved in the Russian problem also.