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At last, in the year 154 B.C., the censors had actually set about the building of a theatre, apparently of stone, when the reactionary Scipio Nasica, acting under the influence of a temporary anti-Greek movement, persuaded the senate to put a stop to this symptom of degeneracy, and to pass a decree that no seats were in future to be provided, "ut scilicet remissioni animorum standi virilitas propria Romanae gentis iuncta esset."
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.
The Kosnovian Ministry, of course, consisted of men of a much higher type than the rude peasantry that made up the bulk of the nation. But at heart they were anti-Greek, and some among them retained lively memories of Beliani's methods when he was in power a decade earlier. No one disputed his ability, yet none, save the King, had a good word for him.
The movement, which was started about the same time by the ennobled peasant, Tudor Vladimirescu, for the emancipation of the lower classes, soon acquired, therefore, an anti-Greek tendency.
After that, it is hardly worth mentioning that their social structure was largely based on slavery; that they lived in petty little towns, like so many wasps' nests, each at war with its next-door neighbour, and half of them at war with themselves! If our anti-Greek went further he would probably cease to speak the truth. We will stop him while we can still agree with him.
And to make this explanation complete I may add that I came back from the Balkans not a pro-Bulgarian in the sense that I was anti-Greek or anti-Servian or even anti-Turk; but with a feeling of general liking for all the peasant peoples whom a cruel fate has cast into the Balkans to fight out there national and racial issues, some of which are older than the Christian era.
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