The book consists of transcriptions and summary translations of two texts in, mostly, Ottoman Turkish, the first of which is the recently discovered second volume of the diary of the German orientalist Karl Sussheim, covering the years 1903-08 which he mostly spent in Istanbul. The second text is a printed memoir of a Young Turk officer called Isma'il Hakki, in which the latter discusses his life, political engagement and the resulting problems. Sussheim met Isma'il Hakki in Cairo in 1908 and kept in contact with him later. The texts offer a lively picture of Istanbul and Cairo in the early years of the 20th century, the repressive regime of Sultan Abdulhamid II and the heady days of the Young Turk revolution of July 1908.