Europe in the Looking Glass

by Morris, Jan, Byron, Robert

  At length, after minutes of suffocating suspense, Diana’s hind wheels descended upon one of the lighter’s decks. Then, very slowly, in the manner of a dog reluctantly ceasing to beg a lump of sugar from an obdurate mistress, the front wheels were lowered also. By some miraculous good fortune they, too, landed on the lighter. Faithful to the end, the Germans clambered down with them, while we went off with luggage and coats in a rowing boat, leaving the spare tyres on board.

  Landing without having had our passports examined, we walked up to the customs house and presented the douanier with a letter from the Greek Minister in London. The effect was magical. Wreathed in smiles, the official waved our luggage past on the back of a remarkably active old woman, assuring us meanwhile that no difficulty would be made about the entry of the car into the country. There remained, however, to translate it to dry land. We marched in a procession down to the quay where the lighter was expected, the luggage on a hand-cart bringing up the rear.

  No sooner had we reached the quay, than the luggage, which we had placed in charge of a small, peaky interpreter, vanished. Simon went in search of it in one direction, I in another. Then David disappeared as well. After a second exploration, I came back to find the interpreter resurrected, having deposited the trunks at his office. David and Simon were nowhere to be seen. Then the lighter arrived. Other schooners had to be moved. Eventually three rough-hewn boards, cracked with age and flaking with decay, were flung casually from the shore to the car. The Germans heaved, their countenances contorted with righteous exaltation. A crowd of loafers, half naked beneath a fog of rags, pushed with them. Up over the parapet of the lighter the tyres moved, then slowly down the creaking bridge and on to dry land once more. David returned; the engine started; with one triumphant bound Diana leapt like a gazelle up on to the promenade; then stopped with a grunt, from lack of petrol. A large crowd collected, from the depths of which the chief stevedore and the shipping company’s agent clamoured for money. When petrol had been provided, we went off to the main hotel, which consisted superficially of no more than a door and a passage, and ordered breakfast in a café outside it.

  Patras is a town sloping up a hill from the sea, at right angles to the quay-side. The streets cross and re-cross also at right angles. The buildings are all of that indefinable age and style that pervades the modern East – ‘East’ inasmuch as the Greeks invariably refer to their partners in western civilization as ‘Europeans’, using the word as a term of distinction. The main streets are arcaded. The stucco peels, without conveying an impression of antiquity. Most of the houses are characterless boxes.

  As we waited for our breakfast, the sun gradually dispelled the early morning haze, and began to throw the shadows of the buildings upon the mud of the lately-watered roads. Looking down the main street to the harbour, the Gulf of Corinth was visible through a web of masts and rigging. The ships lay at anchor in hundreds, all brightly painted, in brilliant contrast to the piercing blue of the Grecian sea-blue into the depths, unlike the flat turquoise of the Italian waters. While beyond, rose the high range of mountains that embattle the further shore throughout the whole eighty miles of the Gulf, with wisps of misty cloud wreathing round their peaks like scattered thistledown.

  Even at this early hour the streets were full of people, picking their way through the slush created by the water-cart. The modern Greek is of less than ordinary height, delicately made, and, at first sight, undistinguished. Both men and women, though seldom repulsive, appear mediocre and perhaps dirty. Then, on second view, the traditional type of the ancient Greek statue is often apparent, beneath a thickly-plaited straw hat and a small black subaltern moustache. The girls, though for the most part commonplace, are sometimes of great beauty, with nose and forehead forming an unbroken line, smooth brown skins, sensitive plum-coloured lips, and proud, rounded chins. The priests seem to tower above their fellows, upright commanding figures with long chiselled Byzantine noses and dark eyes flashing beneath their black cylindrical hats, rimmed at the top, their beards flowing down to their pectoral crosses, and their hair neatly screwed into grizzled buns behind.

  The fustanella, despite its association with the Victorian geography book and the oft-told epics of pre-Victorian Liberty, is still commonly worn among the peasants. There is a certain unreality about any form of national dress, when seen for the first time in actual everyday wear. One recalls the meticulous horrors of some Turkish massacre, purchased by one’s great-great-aunt, from the Royal Academy of 1833. Or some faded photograph of a fancy dress ball in the seventies springs to the mind from out its gilt-bevelled cardboard archway. However, as we spread our tinned jam upon our rounds of dry bread, the dirt and squalor of the old men who passed by, their short tunic skirts either black or white, frilling out above their knees and their whole legs swathed in bulky white wrappings tied here and there like parcels of washing, belied any suggestion of self-conscious picturesqueness. There does exist, as a matter of fact a Society for the Preservation of National Costume. It has its representative in each town. But he struts about in full ceremonials, his white jacket elaborately embroidered in black, and a red fez seated on his head, from which depends a tassel that reaches to the small of the back. This has little connection with the ordinary utility dress. The shoes are large and flat, like barges, turning up at the toes, on which are perched immense black bobbles.

  Thus we sat at small rickety iron tables upon the pavement in Patras, a prey to the fact that we were in Greece, when up walked two persons. The first was Mr Constantinopoulos, born at Salford, in Devonshire, the secretary of the local British consulate. He was dressed in white linen, and long flowing white moustaches projected on either side of his burned, haggard face. Simon, before discovering his name, informed us that his pronunciation was lowland Scottish. His English was colloquially Edwardian. He assured us that not only was there no road from Patras to Athens, but not even so much as a path.

  The other newcomer was destined to play a larger part in our day. His name was Christian Teeling, and he had been born and educated at Dulwich. A small man, youngish and bald, with rimless pince-nez, he elbowed his way out of the crowd, and addressed himself to us in a voice of breeding and education.

  ‘I see that you are countrymen of mine,’ he said. ‘Believe me, I shall be only too gratified to render you any small assistance that may lie within my power.’

  He assured us that in these out-of-the-way parts a strange face, especially an English one, was always welcome. He was of the opinion that there might possibly be a road to Athens. He would fetch a naval survey of 1912, which would tell us for certain.

  Meanwhile we drank our coffee. The Germans were ravenous and swallowed all the milk out of the jugs. Some distance away, at the top of the street, stood a castle on a high hill. Opposite, across the road, the shell of the old cinema, burnt down in the exuberance of the April carnival, remained. Posters of six months ago, advertising ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’, clung sadly to their boards. Mr Teeling soon returned. After consultation with everyone of his acquaintance, he was forced to confirm the forebodings of Mr Constantinopoulos. The survey of 1912, which he had very kindly fetched, supported him. There literally did not exist a road from Patras to Athens. The mountains shelved straight into the sea and the railway ran along a ledge cut from their face. Could we drive along the railway? Unfortunately the ravines were only crossed by trestle bridges. Besides, what course should we pursue in the eventuality of a train coming in the opposite direction? From Corinth to the capital the road was excellent.

  Reluctantly, therefore, we decided to put the car on the train. The interpreter, in league with the hotel, discovered that we could not obtain a waggon that day. So we booked some bedrooms, brought out the Keatings, and with a ‘so long’ from Mr Teeling, who was a schoolmaster and had to be off to his class, set out to bathe.

  The sun was now blazing at its height. With the Germans in the back, we drove some five miles along the road to the west. Then, since it
turned off into the mountains, came back a little way. After some discussion we discovered a small strip of beach overspread with matted but sharp-leaved seaweed and screened from the drowsily-moving carts on the road by a row of maize. Why is it that maize is never grown in more than one row? The Germans produced red bathing dresses from their packs. Leaving our clothes in heaps upon the edge of the grass, we ran down into the water. After walking twenty yards over the tortuous weeds, the bottom suddenly went from under our feet, and we were swimming gaily about the spot where the battle of Lepanto was fought.

  There is a unique rapture about a Greek bathe. The mystery of Ancient Greece unfolds itself. Those petty wars, those city states! Those burdens of the classroom! And now, lying back and blinking at the sky, defying the sun from the cool shadows beneath the surface, the endless succession of mountain tops, the foothills, half brown, and the scrubby olive trees, rocks and patches of cultivation, all combined to reveal the enigma of that legendary country, where Europeanism evolved in miniature and for whose sake men of all ages, ranks and riches, have sacrificed their lives in gratitude for their inheritance. The very air inspires a feeling of nobility.

  We returned in time for lunch. I had trod on a sea urchin, and was obliged to assume a Byronic limp. Mr Teeling met us. The meal, which was served in a fly-blown restaurant with heavy, red plush curtains drooping round its windows, lasted from two to three hours. It was too hot to move. Mr Teeling informed us that, unfortunately, his wife was in the old country at the moment, else she could have entertained us. His quarters were limited owing to financial embarrassment resulting from his having started his career under the auspices of a Venizelist Government. Nevertheless could we bring ourselves to take tea with him? He had some roseleaf jam.

  We said that we should be very pleased. At three o’clock David drove up to the station to put the car on a railway waggon ready for the morning. Simon and I sat in the street. We bought an illustrated paper, called the Excelsior – EΞEΛΣIOΡ. Though published daily, its news photographs consisted entirely of portraits of international stage favourites and views of Japanese tea-gardens in spring. The letterpress we could not decipher. It is one of the fallacies most sedulously fostered by schoolmasters among their pupils, that modern Greek bears no relation to old. Both are precisely the same, though not unnaturally some of the more obscure grammatical forms have been dropped. I much regretted that owing to this deception, I had not attempted to preserve some remnant of a former culture.

  Eventually we laid the paper upon our table, whereat the newspaper boys tried to snatch it away, in order to resell it. To Simon’s annoyance, I tore it up, with cold-blooded deliberation, before their eyes. They then went away, but were replaced by a swarm of another genus armed with brushes and polish with which they were anxious to set about our feet. These in their turn, were followed by men carrying baskets of delicious-looking almonds, dispensed with the naked palm. At length, weary of the attentions of the populace, we went to tea.

  The roseleaf jam burst on our palates like the Pacific on Bilbao’s vision. Its taste was as rare as that of Tokay. David arrived before it was finished, hot, bruised and angry. The Germans and he had had to lift Diana bodily on to her truck, as the narrow gauge rolling-stock was only just long and broad enough to take the car at all; and the ends of the truck refused to let down. He finished the jam. Then we sat and talked. Mr Teeling said that his wife was enjoying her summer with the baby at Reigate. He offered us a bath, but as the water supply was limited, we declined to impose on his kindness too much.

  He occupied the ground floor of one house. The rooms were small but lofty, and decorated with highly-finished modern Greek pottery and Japanese landscapes of Fuji Yama rising from between storks and irises, painted on rush matting. Strips of brilliant-coloured native cloth patterned in black, blue, red and white diamonds, and a Medici print here and there, completed the effect. On a table an expensively-illustrated edition of Shakespeare and a very beautifully-bound Dante in illuminated vellum proved our host to be a citizen of the Republic of Letters. After looking through some photograph albums, we walked out to see the castle.

  The twilight was already deepening as we climbed the hill by a series of steps winding amidst a labyrinth of small houses, which gradually, as we rose higher, gave place to one-roomed mud boxes. Occasionally, as we picked our way, we would stumble over a strand of wire connecting two sticks, where someone had appropriated a piece of land – or more accurately a convenient shelf of hill – on which to build a home. Perhaps the materials were even in the making and the rectangular mud bricks lying out in rows to dry. It was at last possible to appreciate the embarrassment inflicted on the children of Israel by the absence of straw.

  At length we reached the castle, David and Simon panting with indignation at being thus dragged to any object of interest, Mr Teeling the while maintaining a flow of interesting conversation. It was almost night. Across the gulf the mountains were just visible. Somewhere in their midst lay Missolonghi. Below, the myriad roofs of the town stretched down to the harbour, now a blaze of twinkling lights duplicated and triplicated in the ripples. A streak of smoky orange gradually faded in the sky. Suddenly a gunshot sounded, boomed and echoed from hill to hill. It was the salute of departure to the first boat of the currant fleet bound for America.

  September is the busiest month of the year in Patras, when all the currants are brought down from the country and shipped to England and the United States so as to be in the shops by Christmas. When the first boat from each of the different fleets bound for the different countries sails, a gun celebrates the event. So rich is the land, that many of the currant exporters become drachma-millionaires simply by right of peasant proprietorship. Throughout Greece there is land awaiting ownership, though much has lately been alloted to refugees from Smyrna and Asia Minor. Still, If a man builds a house with a roof over it on unclaimed land, the land becomes his.

  The castle of Patras is Roman, Byzantine, Frankish, Saracenic and Venetian, thus epitomising the whole history of Greek dependence. Groping our way in the blackness, we examined the Roman aqueduct, carried across what had formerly been a moat. In the walls the white marble of ancient Greek capitals glistened at random from among the blocks of stone. The lintel posts of one doorway were inscribed with Gothic lettering, and the cross-piece of another with Turkish. A Roman well-head stood in a courtyard, to which a carved Byzantine archway gave entrance. And the whole length of the rampart exhibited a typical pattern of Venetian fortifications, resembling the inverted pelmet of a cardinal’s throne. The building is at present used as a convict prison; and the forms of sentries motionless and silent, gave an air of reality to the historic traditions. Mr Teeling dealt with them in suave and fluent Greek.

  We descended by the road. As there was a moon, the town was not lighted. Gas is too precious to waste. Since, however, the moon did not rise until after midnight, we were obliged to feel our way as best we could over the irregular surface of the road. We came eventually to an open square. On the opposite side of it rose the face of a substantial oblong building, punctuated by two tiers of barred and lighted windows, behind which black figures were moving in spasmodic groups. At a door in the centre, and at the lower windows, crowds of women were swarming and talking in low, even voices. This was the debtor’s prison, a subject for a modern Hogarth. There is no bankruptcy law for the poor in Greece.

  Mr Teeling then honoured us with his company at dinner – not upon the pavement but in the road. The Germans had taken advantage of our absence to write some postcards home – the first for months. We ordered a bottle of syrupy brown wine, named Malvasia, first manufactured at Monemvasia in Sparta. This wine, which we had also tasted at Ferrara, was the original Malmsey, exported to our then notoriously drunken island, in which the Duke of Clarence, whose bones now hang in a glass case on the walls of the crypt of Tewkesbury Abbey, met his unfortunate end. It is a strange coincidence that not only did the wine of Malmsey have its birthplace in Gr
eece, but also the Dukedom of Clarence. One of the oldest titles of the English monarchy takes its name from a small town on the West coast of the Peloponnese.

  Glarentza, as it is properly called, first assumed its position as a ducal appendage, in the peerage of the principality of Achaia, under the rule of Geoffrey de Villehardouin, the second of the Frankish princes of that province. Later it became the chief port of the Morea and the seat of the Achaian royal mint. By the marriage of Count Florence of Hainault with Isabella de Villehardouin, the title eventually descended to the counts of Hainault; and was arbitrarily revived by Edward III and his queen, Philippa of that family, in favour of their second son, Lionel. The town itself was destroyed in 1430 by order of the then Exarch of Mistra, Constantine Dragases, future and last Emperor of the East.

  As our dinner progressed, enough Malmsey to have drowned a hundred Dukes of Clarence seemed to disappear. Mr Teeling’s complexion assumed the tints of a duck’s egg, and he began to chortle out a series of naughty stories. I retired to bed early. The others sought adventure on the pier, where a jazz-band was playing, though no one would dance to it.

  On our way to dinner, an English youth of about our own age had come running up to ask if we would play tennis tomorrow. He had heard of our arrival. His name was Sullivan, and his family had lived in Patras for over a hundred years. He himself had rowed for London University, and his elder brothers were also familiar with the Henley course. We replied that, unfortunately, our game was football.