134 CHRISTIAN GREECE AND LIVING GREEK. public welfare and prosperity. Bikelas writes: "In the year 1204, when Villehardouin and his fellow-comrades came into contact with the East, their first emotion was one of amazement at the spectacle of such marvellous wealth and splen- dor, but since those days the Turks have been allowed to effect a complete change. The trav- ellers who visited the Turks at the end of the last or the beginning of this century are unanimous in recording with horror the wretchedness which was coextensive with the Ottoman Empire. The inhabitants had learned by experience not even to till the ground beyond what was neces- sary for the bare support of life." "They have no courage," says the French traveller Savary, " no spirit. And why should they attempt any- thing? If they took to sowing or planting, it would lead to the idea that they were rich, and so inevitably bring down the aga to devour whatever they possess." The cultivators of the soil and the manufacturers, all exposed to the extortions from public officers, lived in constant anxiety and fear. For this reason most fertile land, perhaps nine-tenths of all, remained uncul- tivated. Where the densest population might have lived in abundance, the smallest one had to contend with famine. There was no systematic
