Home life in Hellas, Greece and the Greeks - eBooks4Greeks.gr

TYPES AND TRAITS 139The Greek Church is dealt with elsewhere ; sufficeto say here that it is Oriental and apart fromthe West, and prides itself on being so. TheCalendar and the retention of the Old Style aredetails, but they are marks of distinctionthe Greek and the West.betweenOnly the other day thewriter was asked by a peasant boy of Kalavrytaif the year were 1910 with the Franks as with theHellenes.The status of women is the most salient Orientalcharacteristic. It is necessary to state here thatthese remarks embrace the Greek nation as awhole.Those who only know Athenian society,with its French salons and English governesses,know no more about the Greek people than onewhose experience is limited to advanced "YoungTurks " of Constantinople knows about the Turks.The noble efforts for the improvement of the conditionof women made by a few Athenian ladiesare spoken of elsewhere, and one of thebrightestfeatures of Athenian life is the excellent provisionmade for the education of girls, rich and poor.None the less, the Greek woman, generally speaking,is regarded as of slight importance comparedwith the man. The Mainote father announces thebirth of a son by firing a gun repeatedly, and thewelcome news is responded to in a similar mannerby his neighbours on the mountain-side. But nofeu dejoie heralds the advent of a daughter. Therewas a time when reading and writing were lookedupon as undesirable for women. There are prob-