The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1897-04-05
TIE GREEKS At HOME.
They Are at Once ShreWd and Child
like.
A Generally Favorable Impression
Created in the Hind OF an
English Observer.

The Greeks are among the most Gu
rious people of the world, and the most
difficult to understand. None OF the
chronological labels in common use can
be said to describe or even imply their
psychological characteristics. Ihey
have been successfully termed peo-
pie of lazy, lying and spendthrift pro-
pensites prone to quarrel, and reckless
of life and also a nation of labOrlouS
truthful thrifty men and women, ca
ger for peace, and scrupulous respect
ers of the property of their neighbOrs.
Neither statement is wholly in harmony
with the facts The Russians say of
themselves that you must eat forty
pounds of salt with them before you
can know them. But, then, the thing
is possible With the Greeks it is much
more difficult to become acquainted, for
the excellent reason that you cannot
eat any salt with them at all. They
will Hospitality entertain you at a no.
tel but not under their own rooftree.
1t is, of course, almost as easy to
strike up an acquaintance with a Hell
1ene as with a Frenchman. to exchange
ideas with him upon any topic he
knows, or think he knows, especially,
most a mere shop-door acquaintance,
however long it may last. He never
gives the most friendly stranger the
freedom of his house, and very seldom
invites him thither; and yet is by no
means inhospitable. An intimate friend
of mine, who has spent twenty years in
one of the chief cities of the kingdom,
tells me that neither he nor his wife
inc sense of the word, among the ma
tives, although they both speak the
language elegantly and fluently, and
have no end of friends in the conven-
tional meaning of this much abused
term. The Greeks, like most Orien-
tails, are extremely reserved toward
even the most friendly foreigners; and,
curiously enough, among other rea-
sons, because their ladies have a NOR
tai horror of inviting outsiders to par
take of food which might possibly be
open to criticism. The final outcome
of this state of things is that the
Greeks lose more than the foreigners
by this irrational shyness.
KINDLY AND WARM HEARTED.
AS a matter of fact, they are kindly,
warm hearted people, frugal to a de-
gree that justifies their kinship with
the ancient Spartans of black broth
fame eloquent in a way that reminds
you of the Demosthenes of your school
days, whose long winded orations
seemed endless and they are passion
ate just to the extent required by this
eloquence. Having but lately emerged
from barbarism and slavery they have
not yet succeeded in obliterating all its
traces, but in very many cases they
have covered them up with a veneer of
modern culture which, like avera sc
English ice, will not bear much press
ure The curious mixture of naivete
and shrewdness which results is I'M
paralleled among the peoples of Europe
or the world. To hear an educated
HELENE talk like Nestor and act like a
naughty child at one and the same time
is no uncommon experience. During
the present troubles in Crete I have
over and over again listened to a very
clever apercu of the political situa-
ton given by Athenians OF the Upper
Ten. who would then wind up with a
threat to spite the Great Powers by do
ing some incredible act which a school
boy of eight would unhesitatingly char
acterize as folly. No doubt the fever
ish excitement of the moment, and the
provocation they received are, in some
measure responsible for this loss of
mental equilibrium, but only in part.
To a great extent it is characteristic
and abiding.
1t is one of the curious apparent con-
tradictions of the country and the peo-
pie that whereas a large percentage of
the population can neither read nor
write, the bane of the nation is over
education. The university and high
schools act as magnets, attracting all
the clever or ambitious youth of the
country. large numbers of whom are
duly stamped every year with the ac-
ademic seal, and turned adrift with
larger demands on society than their
fathers ever had, and less means OF
satisfying them. Hence a considerable