Yenekeui—The Festival of Fire—Commemorative Observance—Fondness of the Orientals for Illumination—Frequency of Fires in Constantinople—Dangerous Customs—Fire Guard—The Seraskier’s Tower—Disagreeable Alarum—Namik Pasha—The Festival Localized—Veronica—Bonfires—Therapia and Buyukdèrè—Singular Effect of Light—The Armenian Heroine—A Wild Dream.
Shortlyafter our return from Broussa, we took possession of a house which we had rented for the summer at Yenekeui, and we had only been established there a few days when we had an opportunity of witnessing one of the most ancient of the Greek commemorative usages,—the “Festival of Fire”—instituted in memory of the second capture of Constantinople by the Cæsars.
Some years ago the Greek quarter of the city was illuminated on this anniversary, as well as the villages occupied principally by their nation: but the Turks no longer permit this demonstration of rejoicing, as well from jealousy of its subject, as from the danger attendant on all such manifestations in a city where fires are sofrequent, and the nature of the buildings so unfortunately calculated to encourage the evil.
For my own part, after having passed a few nights in Constantinople, both in Turkish and Greek houses, I was only surprised that the frightful conflagrations which so frequently occur do not take place every week instead of ten or twelve times a-year. Like the husbandman who plants his vines, and sows his grain at the base of a volcano, apparently unconscious or careless that the next eruption may lay waste his lands, and negative his labour, the inhabitants of Stamboul appear never to reflect that fire is one of their deadliest enemies, but wander over their wooden dwellings with their lighted chibouks, or their unsnuffed candles; as heedlessly as though both were innoxious: while their attendants traverse carpeted and curtained apartments, carrying fragments of live coal between their iron pincers to supply the pipes.
Nor is this all. The Tandour is a fire-conductor of the first class: the wooden frame that covers the charcoal ashes is frequently very slight, and the silken draperies which veil it are generally lined with cotton, and not infrequently wadded with the same inflammable material. The effect of the Tandour is highly soporific; and it consequently occurs that persons whofall asleep under its influence, by some sudden movement overturn the frame-work, when their own clothes as well as the coverings of the Tandour come in contact with the hidden fire: the chintz-covered sofas are ready to feed the flame, and the natural consequence ensues.
Still more dangerous is the system of drying linen during the winter, which is universal throughout the city. A frame, formed of wooden laths, about three feet high, and shaped like a beehive, is placed above a small brazier, filled with heated charcoal; and the linen is flung over this frame, one garment above another, where it gradually dries. But should the laundress omit to remove the lower portions of it directly that they are free from damp, they ignite, and the whole becomes one burning mass.
That in a country where fires are so frequent, such reckless usages should be persisted in by individuals, or permitted by the authorities, appears incredible; while they account if not satisfactorily, at least fully, for the constant recurrence of the evil. Nor can you, even should you desire to do so, remain in ignorance of the calamity whenever it occurs; for you are constantly awakened in the night by the heavy strokes of an iron-pointed pike upon the rough pavement of the streets, and you hear the deep voice ofthe fire-guard announce the quarter where the flames have broken out.
As there is a regular sentinel, relieved every second hour, on the look-out for fires in the upper gallery of the Seraskier’s Tower, which is like a glass lantern, having windows on all sides; every conflagration, however unimportant, is instantly announced by the patroles appointed to the different quarters of the city; and thus a week rarely passes in which you are not startled by the boding cry of the guard—“Fire at Scutari—a—” “Fire at Galata—a”—Up go all the windows of the neighbourhood; and, when the locality of the accident is ascertained, those who have property or connexions in the quarter hasten to the scene of action: while those who have no individual interest in the misfortune, close their casements, and creep back to bed, rejoicing that they have escaped for the present the dreaded catastrophe.
All the Pashas resident in the Capital or its immediate neighbourhood are obliged to attend every fire that occurs, and to assist in its extinction; so that they frequently have a very busy time of it; and Namik Pasha—the fêted and favoured Namik Pasha—probably from personal experience of the dangers attendant on the employment, has, since his return to Turkey, cited, as his two most admirable memories of England, her Pantomimes and her Fire-men!
The Greek “Festival of Fire” has now, in consequence of the prohibition to which I have alluded, become local in its celebration: and the villages of Buyukdèrè, Therapia, and Yenekeui, have the exclusive honour of commemorating the conquest of the Cæsars.
We embarked on board our caïque at dusk, and having with some difficulty made our way through the floating crowd that thronged the stream, we landed, and proceeded to the house of Veronica, the heroine of Mac Farlane’s Novel of the “Armenians.” From the windows, which commanded the little bay where the rejoicings were to take place, we had a full view of the whole ceremony, and a most extraordinary exhibition it was.
Two artificial islands had been formed in the bay, and heaped with dried wood, and other inflammable materials, and on that which was furthest from the shore, the pile was surmounted by a caïque: another line of fires was prepared for a considerable distance along the coast; and in every direction men were flitting about with paper lanterns, conducting the different parties of visiters from their boats to the residences of their friends. Therapia was concealed behind a point of land; but Buyukdèrè was visible in the distance, like a line of fire hemming in the glittering waters which reflected afar off the unusual brilliancy. The flames, as they roseand fell, flashed and faded upon the casements of the houses that skirted the shore, with an effect quite magical: while the sombre coast of Asia, without one glimmering light to relieve its stately outline, cut in dusky magnificence along the cloudless sky.
At a sudden signal the fires were ignited: and the condemned caïque was soon one graceful mass of flame. But the most extraordinary portion of the spectacle was the crowd of men, dressed only in wide cotton drawers, their partially shaven heads bare, and their arms tossed high in the air, who were wading up to their necks in the sea, and feeding the fires with shrieks and yells worthy of a chorus of demons. At intervals, they all rushed out of the water, and sprang across the flames of the huge fires which were burning along the coast, looking like infernal spirits celebrating their unholy orgies; and then, plunging once more into the stream, they danced round the lesser island in a circle, to the wild chanting of the spectators on the shore.
The effect of the whole scene was thrilling. The bright-barrelled firelock of the Turkish sentinel, who was posted at the battery above the village, flashed as he trod his beat, in the fierce light which fell upon it. The line of heights behind the houses was covered with spectators: the women seated on mats and cushions, andthe men standing in groups among them, all as distinctly visible as beneath a noon-day sun; while, in the opposite direction, the ripple of the Bosphorus ran shimmering along like liquid gold, and the caïques, wedged together as closely as though they had been one compact body, gleamed out gaily with their crimson rugs and gilded ornaments.
The same wild sports continued for two hours, gradually decreasing in violence, as the fatigue of the fierce and unremitted exertions of the actors made itself felt; when the Wallachian band, and an immense fire kindled beneath the windows of the house in which we were passing the evening, and which was formed of wicker baskets wedged one within the other, with a tall tree planted in the midst, that produced a very singular effect, gradually withdrew the crowd from the expiring glories of the coast; and as the last note of the Sultan’s March died away, the throng dispersed, and we were left to the undisturbed society of our friends.
Veronica could never have been handsome; the expression of her countenance is sweet and agreeable, but her features are neither regular nor fine; nor does she possess the low soft voice which is so great a charm in the Turkish women, and to which the coarse language of the Armenian nation does not lend itself. She is rather under the middle size, calm in her manner, and graceful in her carriage; and her sable dress and melancholy history invest her with an interest that mere beauty would fail to excite. As I conversed with the widowed wife, and saw her shrink beneath the night air like a withered flower, and fold her furred pelisse closer about her with her thin wasted hand, I could have wept over her faded youth and blighted feelings. It is painfully evident that the memory of her error and of her wrongs sits heavily upon her, and that it is a poisoned chain whose fetters can be flung off only in the grave. Even Time, the great physician of all moral ills, has no power over a grief like her’s.
Before we returned home, we rowed slowly towards Therapia; which, etched in fire, and loud with music, threw its bright shadow far along the waves. Caïques glided past us every instant with lights at their stern, whence the sounds of laughter or of song swept cheerily over the ripple; and more than once we narrowly escaped collision with a mirth-laden bark, whose conductors were pressing forward in all the heedless eagerness of hilarity.
It was near midnight ere we withdrew from the busy scene: and when I fell asleep, I dreamt that Veronica was the wife of one of the Cæsars; and that a young and dark-eyed Greek prince was leaping over the burning city of Constantinople, while a portly Armenian, who had beenof the evening party, was filling his unwieldy calpac with water, as he stood breast-high in the Bosphorus, and handing it to a set of wild Indians who were howling and dancing amid the flames.
Truly my sleeping visions produced a second “Festival of Fire.”
A Chapter on Caïques—The Sultan’s Barge—Princes and Pashas—The Pasha’s Wife—The Admiralty Barge—The Fruit Caïque—The Embassy Barge—The Omnibus Caïque—Turkish Boatmen—The Caïque of Azmè Bey—Pleasant Memories—The Chevalier Hassuna de Ghies—Natural Politeness of the Turks—Turkey and Russia—Sultan Mahmoud—Confusion of Tongues—Arif Bey—Imperial Present—The Fruit of Constantinople—The Two Banners—The Harem—Azimè Hanoum.
ShouldI ever have time, I murmured to myself as we darted down the Bosphorus in the caïque of Azmè Bey, with whom we were engaged to dine, and who had obligingly sent his boat and his Dragoman to facilitate our arrival at Dolma Batchè:—Should I ever have time, I will write a chapter on caïques.
A more graceful subject could scarcely be selected. From the gilded barges of the Sultan, to the common passage-boat that plies within the port, the caïques are all beauty; and, as they fly past you, their long and lofty prows dipping downward towards the current at every stroke of the oars, you are involuntarily reminded of some aquatic bird, moistening the plumage of its glistening breast in the clear ripple.
That bright mass of gilding and glitter which is flying over the water, shaped like a marine monster, and gleaming in the sunshine, is one of the Imperial barges. Mahmoud is returning from the mosque. Hark! to the booming of the loud cannon, which announces his departure from the coast of Europe, for his delicious summer-palace of Beglierbey; the most lovely (for that is the correct term)—the most lovely object on the Bosphorus—rising like the creation of a twilight dream beneath the shadow of an Asian mountain—a fanciful edifice, looking as though its model had been cut out of gold paper in an hour of luxurious indolence, and carried into execution during a fit of elegant caprice.
The long, dark, crescent-shaped caïque immediately in the wake of the Sultan, with its three gauze-clad rowers, and its flashing ornaments, carries a Pasha of the Imperial suite. He is hidden beneath the red umbrella which the attendant, who is squatted upon the raised stern of the boat, is holding carefully over him.
You may see a third bark, just creeping along under the land; a light, buoyant, glittering thing, with a crimson drapery fringed with gold flung over its side, and almost dipping into the water; a negress is seated behind her mistress, with a collection of yellow slippers strown about her; and at the bottom of the boat, reclining against a pile of cushions, and attended by two youngslaves, you may distinguish the closely-veiled Fatma or Leyla, whose dark eyes are seen flashing out beneath her pure white yashmac, and whose small, fair, delicately rounded, and gloveless hand draws yet closer together the heavy folds of her feridjhe as she remarks the approach of another caïque to her own. She is the wife of some Pasha—the favourite wife, it may be—musing as she darts along the water, with what new toy her next smile shall be bought. And now her light boat is lost to view, for it has shot beneath the arched entrance of the court of yonder stately harem; and you can only follow the fair Turk in thought to the cool, shady, spacious saloons of her prison-palace, where the envious yashmac is withdrawn in deference to the yet more jealous lattice; and where the heavy feridjhe is flung off to reveal the graceful antery, the gold-embroidered vest, and the hanging sleeves.
But what is this which is advancing towards us with a heavy plash, and flinging its long broad shadow far before it? It is the Admiralty Barge, manned with fourteen rowers, and freighted with His Excellency Achmet Pasha, bound on some mission to the fleet. The red caps and white jackets of the crew form a cheerful contrast from the dark mass at the stern of the barge, where the High Admiral,pro tempore, is seated, surrounded by a group of inferiorofficers. His chibouk-bearer is screening him from the sun; while his secretary, with a sheet of paper resting upon his knee, is writing from the dictation of the Minister. There is a great deal of business transacted on the Bosphorus; the Turks never require a table on which to write, and they are consequently but little inconvenienced by locality, when a necessity exists for profiting by the passing hour.
And this slowly-moving bark, rather dropping down with the current, than impelled by the efforts of its two Greek rowers, and which looks so cool and so pretty with all that pile of green leaves heaped upon its stern, is one of the fruit caïques for the supply of the houses overhanging the Bosphorus. The wild shrill cry of the fruiterers announcing the nature of their merchandize, swells upon the air; and, as you pass close beside the boat, the wind sporting among the fresh branches that are strewn over the baskets, blows aside the leaves, and the tempting fruit is revealed to you in all its cool ripe beauty.
And yonder flies the Union Jack of England! It is the splendid barge of the British Embassy, which is darting along with its seven rowers: the Ambassador is engaged with a newspaper: you may know him by his purplefèz, as well as by an aristocracy of bearing and demeanour which distinguishes him from all the foreignministers at the Ottoman Court; and which the Turks both feel and appreciate.
Very different both in form and freight is the dark, slow, people-laden passage-caïque, just coming round the point, and which is one of several that ply between Constantinople and Buyukdèrè; and carry passengers the whole length of the Bosphorus at the moderate charge of thirty paras a head, a sum scarcely equivalent to twopence English. These Omnibus-boats have their outside as well as their inside passengers: and the individuals who sit upon the gunwale, with their legs hanging over the side, and their feet resting upon the spar which is lashed on to it for their especial convenience, effect, by the occupation of this amphibious seat, the saving of ten paras upon a voyage of about four hours.
The Caïquejhes are, generally speaking, a very fine race of men. The Greeks are esteemed the best boatmen on the Bosphorus: but all the private caïques travel with a speed that it fatigues the eye to follow. Some of these men utter a disagreeable grunt as they ply their oars, which would induce a stranger to imagine that they suffered from the exertion; but the habit is induced by their having worked too hard in their youth, and thus injured their lungs; and it is considered so great an objection to them, that no individual who retains caïquejhesin his pay will willingly hire a man labouring under this infirmity.
But enough—or I shall be betrayed into really writing the chapter of which I dreamed in my delicious idleness, as the handsome caïque of the Bey shot along, while the dragoman named to us the owner of each painted palace near which we passed. What a confusion of Pashas and Beys—of Excellencies and Effendis! It was impossible to remember one half of them; and I have already dwelt so frequently upon the sea-washed palaces of the Bosphorus, that, instead of repeating an admiration which rather grew upon me than became weakened by frequent indulgence; an admiration which it is impossible not to feel, and equally impossible to excite by mere description; I will e’en run the caïque beside the little pier near the Imperial residence of Dolma Batchè, and follow the steps of the dragoman to the hospitable home of his master.
Few things afforded us more gratification, during our residence in the East, than the manner in which Azmè Bey spoke of, and felt towards, England. Sincerity is decidedly not a national characteristic of the Turks; but there are nevertheless many individuals among them who may fairly lay claim to this great social virtue; and I unhesitatingly rank Azmè Bey as one of these. His gracious and grateful memories of those who professed a friendship forhim during his European sojourn; his eagerness to repay by every exertion in his power the attention which is shewn to him; and his frank, unostentatious politeness, lent a charm to his manner, and a value to his kindness, which enhanced them tenfold; and I do not hesitate to affirm, that did all such of his countrymen as have resided in England, feel and act towards the English as Azmè Bey has done since his return, the sentiments of the Turkish people would be greatly changed with regard to them, both individually and as a nation.
We found the Bey at the head of the stairs waiting to receive us; and the first person whom I remarked in the saloon of the Salemliek was M. Hassuna de Ghies, whom I had known in London, and with whom I was delighted to renew my acquaintance. This talented and amiable man is now the editor of the Constantinopolitan Journal; and his acquirements and knowledge are justly appreciated by his Imperial master; who, besides other marks of his favour, has, since his return from Europe, been pleased, as an especial token of his regard, to change his name, which he considered to be too difficult of pronunciation, into Hussein Madzhar Effendi;4an alteration by no meanscalculated to diminish its difficulty to European lips. He was seated on the divan, smoking his chibouk, which he relinquished on our entrance; and, ere long, he was busily engaged in conversing with my father in English; while I was undergoing the ceremony of presentation to a Greek lady, who, with a delicacy which did him honour, Azmè Bey had invited, in order to relieve me from the restraint anddésagrémentof finding myself the only female of the party.
I mention the circumstance in order to prove to those who are inclined to treat the Turks as barbarians, and to speak of them as such, that there are many among them who may be both wronged and wounded by such an opinion, and who are capable of convincing them by their actions that it is unfounded. The Turks require only time, example, and a perfect confidence in their European allies, to become a polished as well as a civilized nation; they possess all the elements of civilization, but they are flung back by events—they are blinded by subtlety—they are hoodwinked by deception. Were they suffered to act upon their own untrammelled impressions, they would not long remain even in their present state of partial inertness: but Turkey is now in the position of a child, to whom its nurse, in order to cajole it into quiet, presents a mirror, which, viewed in one direction, widens the object that it reflects; and it has beentaught that this magnified mass represents its own strength and beauty; and when it has been suffered to sate itself with the false image that has thus been placed before it, the glass is reversed by its wily Mentor, and the shrunken, wasted, and almost shapeless thing that succeeds is made object of wonder and of pity, as the narrow and despicable policy which would fain persuade the Turks that they have need of counsel and of help. The more enlightened among them do not believe this; they are even convinced to the contrary: but the argument produces its effect upon the mass, and the arm of power is weakened and paralyzed by the weight of public opinion.
Turkey is like a stately forest-tree which has been cankered at the core, but which has shot forth young and vigorous branches after it had been condemned as on the eve of perishing. A weighty pressure has fallen upon the fresh green shoots; but let it only be removed, and once more the branches will stretch broadly and boldly forth, and cast their long shadows far across the earth.
Sultan Mahmoud would fain be the regenerator of his country; but he cannot resist, single-handed, an enemy more powerful, and, above all, more subtle than himself. The Turks are bad politicians—they do not hold the keys of their own citadel; and their game is overlooked on allsides. Had they sincere assistance, all Europe would soon be convinced of that to which she now appears blind—the great moral power of the Turkish people, and the incalculable advantages of their alliance.
I scarcely know how I have suffered myself to be deluded into this digression; and my only apology for its indulgence is the earnest interest which I have learnt to feel in the existence of a great and magnificent Empire, bowed beneath the smiling sophistries of its most dangerous enemy.
The shady saloon of Azmè Bey, with its many windows, all opening upon a delicious garden overhung with fruit trees, and forming a leafy screen amid which we caught here and there a blue bright glimpse of the Bosphorus, was half filled with guests, to whom we were presented with the ease and politeness of intuitive good breeding; and in a few minutes we were all engaged in an animated conversation, or rather set of conversations. The Greek lady was discussing the merits of the divan, in Italian, with a gentleman near her; M. de Ghies was still talking English with my father; and the Bey and myself were busy with Von Hammer’s work on the East, and communicating our opinions in French: nor was this all—for a party of the guests were murmuring out their soft, harmonious Turkish at the other extremity of theapartment; while the voices of the Arabs in the outer room came to us at intervals, as they passed and repassed the door of the saloon in which we sat.
The announcement of a new visitor at length summoned the Bey from the room; and he shortly afterwards returned, and presented to me Arif Bey, the Paymaster General of the Imperial Forces, who had done me the honour to desire my acquaintance; and, hearing that I was the guest of his friend, had taken this opportunity of making it. He was rather a heavy-looking young man, of about seven-and-twenty; with very small black eyes, as round and bright as jet beads, an extremely pale complexion, and who, as he did not speak a word of French, kept the dragoman in constant, and frequently very unprofitable employment, in translating nearly every sentence I uttered. He was very carefully dressed; and, in addition to the gold sword-belt about his waist, he wore white gloves and a black silk stock; articles of apparel which are generally dispensed with altogether by the Turks. He had just commenced studying French, under the auspices of Azmè Bey; and, meanwhile, he smoked with a perseverance which was perfectly amusing. The Sultan has lately done him the honour of selecting a wife for him; a boon which he, of course, received with all becoming gratitude at the Imperial hand; and he is now building a very handsome residence on the border of the Bosphorus, near the Palace of Beshiktash.
The dinner was served in the European style, and the table was remarkably well appointed. French wines were in abundance, and champagne and Edinburgh ale were not wanting; but the dessert was the charm of the repast. The fruit of Constantinople has a perfume that I never met with elsewhere; and, did the natives suffer it to ripen fully, which from their excessive fondness for it they very rarely do, much of it would probably be unrivalled for the delicacy of its flavour. Pyramids of this delicious fruit occupied the angles of the table, the most delicate pastry was ranged beside it, and the centre was occupied by a castellated tower, formed of sweetmeats, and surmounted by the British and Ottoman banners linked together. From this dish alone the Bey declined to serve his guests, lest he should disturb the union of the two flags, even symbolically; and many gracious things were said on the subject both by himself and his friends; nor had he neglected to turn the Banner of the Crescent towards the head of the table, at which he had requested me to preside; while the Union Jack of England floated over his own plate.
When we withdrew from table, I went, accompanied by the Greek lady whom I have alreadynamed, to pay a visit to the harem of the Bey. A door opened from the hall of the Salemliek into a second, or inner garden, to which we descended by a flight of steps; and after having traversed a covered walk, we found ourselves at the entrance of the harem, where a black slave, with extremely long hair, plaited in numerous braids which were looped about her shoulders, preceded us to the gallery opening into the women’s apartments; but, ere we had ascended the whole stair, we were met by the young wife of the Bey, who, taking my hand with the sweetest smile in the world, led me forward to her cool, pretty, English-looking parlour, where I found myself in the midst of chairs, sofas, and tables; and opposite to one of the loveliest women whom I had seen in the country.
The Bey followed us in the space of a few moments, and I could not refrain from expressing to him my admiration of his wife. She scarcely looked like an oriental woman, for her large black eyes, in lieu of the sleepy, dreamlike expression so general in the East, were full of brightness and intelligence; and her dark hair, instead of being concealed beneath the painted handkerchief, or cut straight across her forehead, hung in graceful curls about her fair young brow, which was as pure and smooth as marble.
She was just eighteen, and neither dye norpaint had ever sullied the purity of her complexion; while the faint tinge of red that relieved the snowy whiteness of her cheek, looked as though it nestled there almost unconsciously; and at times, as she conversed, it deepened into a blush that heightened the effect of her glowing beauty. Her dress, although of Turkish form, was partly of European arrangement; her purple silk vest was folded closely about her waist, and met beneath her long and graceful throat; her figure was beautiful; and the little foot that peeped out from under the black satin pantaloon, was covered by a stocking of snowy white. Her antery was of English bombazine, sprinkled with coloured flowers; she wore no henna on her hands; and when she had fastened the carnations which I presented to her, among her rich, dark hair, she was the very creature who would have inspired the gifted pencil of Pickersgill—so fair, so young, so exquisitely graceful, and so beautifully oriental.
I learnt without surprise that she belonged to one of the first families of Constantinople, and that she had received (for a Turkish female) an excellent education. She looked it all; and the books that were strown about her apartment, and the little inkstand that stood upon the table beside the chair on which she sat, appeared by no means displaced, even although I saw them in a Turkish harem.
The party was shortly augmented by the entrance of the Bey’s mother, who led by the hand a sweet little girl of ten or eleven years of age, his daughter by a former marriage, whose mother died previously to his residence in England; and they were followed by his aunt and his young sister, a child of about the same age as his own.
I lingered for upwards of two hours in the harem, where coffee was served by the fair wife of the Bey, with a smiling graciousness that convinced me of my welcome; and when, on my departure, she accompanied me to the foot of the stairs, and assured me, according to the oriental custom, that the house and all that it contained were at my disposal, she coupled the ceremony with a request that I would come and see her again; and so earnestly was it expressed, that I did not hesitate to assure her of the pleasure which I should derive from a repetition of my visit.
How I longed to take her by the hand, and lead her forth from her pretty prison, to “witch the world” with her young beauty—but alas! the door of the Salemliek closed behind me; and as the Bey came forward to conduct me into the saloon where my father was waiting for me to take our leave, I lost sight of the fair and graceful Azimè Hanoum.
The Bosphorus in Summer—The Tower of Galata—Mosque of Topphannè—Summer Palace of the Grand Vizier—Seraï of the Princess Salihè—Seraïs and Salemliks—Palace of Azmè Sultane—Turkish Music—Token Flowers—Palace of the Princess Mihirmàh—The Hill of the Thousand Nightingales—Turkish, Greek, and Armenian Houses—Cleanliness of the Orientals—The Armenians—Cemetery of Isari—The Castle of Europe—Mahomet and the Greeks—Village of Mirgheun—The Haunted Chapel of St. Nicholas—Palace of Prince Calimachi—Imperial Jealousy—Death of Calimachi—The Bosphorus by Moonlight—Love of the Orientals for Flowers—Depth of the Channel—An Imperial Brig—Turkish Justice—Fortunes of the Turkish Fleet—Sudden Transitions—Influence of Russian Sophistry—The Sultan’s Physicians—Naval Appointments—Rigid Discipline—The Penalty of Disobedience—The Death-Banquet—Tahir Pasha—Radical Remedy—Vice of the Turkish System of Government—Unkiar Skelessi—A Mill and a Manufactory—Pic Nics—Arabian Encampment—Bedouin Beauty—Poetical Locality.
Nothingcan be richer nor more various than the shores of the Bosphorus on a sunshiny day in summer; and many a delightful hour have I spent, in company with my father, in the contemplation of the glorious succession of pictures which they offer to the lover of the beautiful in nature. One delicious morning, when not a flitting cloud marred the clear lustre of the sky, when a gentle breeze murmured over the ripple, and the songof the birds swelled cheerily upon the wind, we resolved to enjoy them to their fullest extent; and, as our caïque darted along the European coast, a thousand interesting objects presented themselves.
THE SERAGLIO POINT, from the HEIGHT of PERA.Miss Pardoe del.Day & Haghe Lith.rsto the King.THE SERAGLIO POINT, from the HEIGHT of PERA.Henry Colburn, 13 G.tMarlborough St 1837.
The tower of Galata, rife with memories of the days when the dreaded Janissaries ruled the destinies of the Empire, crowned the height, which, clothed with houses and with verdure, swept downward to the port. The spiral minarets of the Imperial mosque of Topphannè were flaunting their golden glories in the light; the sounds of busy life were on the wind; and the port once past, the wide artillery-ground, and the stately barrack were succeeded by the summer palace of the Grand Vèzir, standing proudly against the current, as though, like the Emperor of old, it dared the wave to overwhelm it. The wide sweep of hilly country, gradually closing, and becoming more lofty in the rear of the buildings that fringe the stream, was clothed with trees of every tint; from among which the many-coloured houses peeped forth in the most picturesque irregularity. Here and there a gleaming minaret shot upwards into the clear Heaven from amid a cluster of plum-coloured Judas trees laden with blossom, or a clump of limes filling the air with perfume; and leaving the dark spiral cypresses far beneath it; as the spirit, soaring above the earth, outtravels the gloom and care from which it frees itself.
What a line of palaces stretched along the coast! And what a wilderness of gardens, climbing the steeps behind them, made the background of the picture no inapt representation of fairy-land; while at intervals a little bay formed a delicious nook occupied by country-houses, and terraced-coffee-shops, where the luxurious Osmanli smoked his pipe, and inhaled his tiny cup of mocha, amid sights and sounds to which the world can probably produce no parallel.
The stately serail of the Princess Salihè, and the modest palace of her less high-born husband, which is attached like an excrescence to the far-spreading edifice occupied by the harem of his Imperial partner, stands upon a spot where the stream widens, as if to reflect more perfectly the golden shores that hem it in.
There is something amusing enough to a foreigner in the one-sided dwellings of the Sultan’s sons-in-law. Without the palace as well as within, they are constantly reminded of the superiority of their Imperial spouses. As they glide along in their gilded caïques, they pass the harem, with its tall doors of bronze, and golden lattices; its far-stretching terraces, and guarded avenues; and they arrive before the small landing-place which gives ingress to their own diminutive salemliek, with its single entrance, and its window draperies of white cotton.
You cannot pass the Palace of Azmè Sultane, the elder sister of the Sultan, without being saluted by the sounds of music. The ladies of her harem are many of them consummate musicians, according to Turkish ideas of harmony; and the tinkle of the zebec, the long notes of the violin, the ringing rattle of the tambourine, and a chorus of female voices, are so constantly sweeping over the water through the closed lattices, that your boatmen universally slacken their pace as they reach the Seraïl. Oriental music requires distance to mellow it: and when it floats along the water, as though it rose from the ocean caves; and you suffer your imagination to dwell upon the white arms which are tossed in air as the silver wheels of the elastic tambourine ring out; and the delicate fingers that press the strings, and the rich red lips and large dark eyes that lend new grace to the wild and bounding melodies of the country—you are almost ready to fancy for the moment, that Apollo must have first swept his lyre in a Turkish harem.
While you look fixedly towards the lattices, as though to search for the embodiment of your romantic fancies, you may discover proofs that the community is not one vowed to the rosary, though it may wear the veil. Here it is an orangeattached by a lock of hair to the outer frame of the small centre window of the trellice-work; there it is a marigold suspended by a red ribbon; while, partially concealed, and twined amid the minute squares of the jealous screen, you may perhaps discover a small cluster of roses.
This is the very land of practical romance!
An arrow’s flight beyond the Palace of the elder Sultana, stands that of the Imperial bride of Saïd Pasha; a long, irregular, rose-coloured pile, pleasantly situated at the mouth of a lovely bay, whose shores are bright with groves and many-tinted villas; while in the distance, where the channel again narrows, the castles of Europe and Asia may be seen looming out against the pure blue of the sky. We loitered at this sweet spot for a brief space, and then, darting once more forward, soon arrived under the “Hill of the Thousand Nightingales.” Rightly is it named, for the mid-day air was vocal with their melody, and the dense foliage of the forest trees quivered with their song; while, as the melancholy music came to us along the water, its sadness was deepened by the aspect of a few scattered tombs gleaming out amid the rank underwood. The variety of timber which clothed the eminence formed such varying shades of green; from the bright soft tint of the water-willow, whose flexile branches swayed in the breeze like silken streamers, to the tall, dark,silent cypresses, that it was a study for a landscape painter.
Beyond this lovely hill, the shore is edged with Greek, Armenian, and Turkish houses; and here commences themoralinterest of the locality. The dwellings of the raïahs are, when of any extent, almost universally painted of two different colours on the outside, in order to give them the appearance of separate tenements, and thus deceive the passers-by; while those of the Turks themselves are perfectly illustrative of the momentary condition of their owners.
The Osmanli is the creature of the present; he never falls back upon the past; he has no glorious memories to wile him from himself; every page of his history is shadowed over by some gloomy recollection—nor dare he dwell upon the future, for he is the subject of a despotic government: the proud Pasha of to-day may be headless, or at best houseless to-morrow; and hence, the premature decay of three-fourths of the Turkish dwellings.
When an individual becomes possessed of power, he buys or builds a residence suited to his brightened fortunes: he lavishes his revenue—why should he hoard it? it can only excite the cupidity of the Sultan, and accelerate his disgrace; or awaken the jealousy of his rivals, and insure his ruin. He makes his house gay without, and convenient within; but all its accessories are ephemeral—the paint which he spreads over the surface remains fresh for a year, and that suffices him. Perchance it may outlast his favour; should it not do so, it is no unpleasant task to renew it; and if it should, he contents himself with the weather-stained walls of a more golden season. Once in disgrace, he repairs only just sufficiently to defy the weather, and troubles himself no further. And thus, after you have been a few months in the country, and have studied in some degree the nature and habits of the people, you may give a shrewd guess as you ride along, at the past and present position of the owner of every edifice that fringes the Bosphorus.
The courtier has raised a pile which looks as though it had been finished only yesterday; the walls are so bright, and the lattices are so perfect—the blue ripple chafes against the marble steps that lead to the columned portico; and the feathery acacias nestle among their blossoming boughs, gilded kiosks, and lordly terraces.
The slighted favourite has still servants lounging about his door, and a stately landing-place beside which his caïque dances on the wave; but a shade has past over the picture: the summer sun and the winter wind have deadened the bright blue or the soft olive of the edifice, and here and there a slender baris rent away from the discoloured lattices. The fair forest trees still wave along the covered terrace, but the steps are grass-grown, and the flower-vases are overthrown—they might be replaced; but it is better policy to let them suffer with their master.
The dwelling of the exile is still more distinguishable. The shutters are hanging loose and beating in the wind; the broken casements no longer exclude the weather; the lattices are wrenched away; the terrace-wall is falling inch by inch into the wave; the rank grass is forcing its way through the crevices of the marble floor; the garden kiosks are roofless; and the green fresh boughs are flaunting in the sunshine, mocking the desolation which they dominate.
Fathers do not, in Turkey, build, or plant, or purchase for their sons—their fathers did it not for them—it would entail the probable loss of both principle and interest.
The Armenian houses are peculiarly remarkable for their cleanliness. All the inhabitants of Constantinople in decent circumstances are scrupulously nice on this point, but the Armenians exceed all others: every respectable dwelling being scoured throughout once a week with soap and water. I have already, in speaking of this people, alluded to their utter deficiency in sentiment and ambition: their lives arefrittered away in inconsequent details; and hence the attention and interest are bestowed on comparatively insignificant objects, which render them remarkable to strangers.
Another striking object on the coast is the romantic and beautiful little cemetery of Isari, situated immediately beneath the Castle of Europe, by which it is dominated as by the eagle-eïrie of some feudal Baron. Rocks, rudely flung together, and in their perpendicular ascent impervious to vegetation, sustain the foundations of the fortress; while around and among them snatches of kindlier earth are covered with dense rich underwood, from amid which tall graceful trees spring up, and overshadow the gilded marble of many a columned gravestone.
The Castle of Europe, standing immediately opposite to the valley occupied by the castle on the other coast, is built after a singular fancy. Tradition tells that Mahomet, from his Asiatic mountains, contemplated with envy the lovely shores of Europe; and that, unable to restrain his desire of possessing at least a speck of the fair landscape, he entreated permission of the Greeks to be allowed to build a small fortress as a landing-place, on their territory. The favour was granted, the materials collected, and the present Castle of Europe completed in six days; the ground-plan forming the characters of the Prophet’s name.
Near the edge of the channel, a small arched door is pointed out to the curious, whence the Janissaries who had become obnoxious to the reigning Sultan, and whose especial prison it was, were ejected from the fortress after they had been bow-strung, in order to be flung into the Bosphorus; while, at the instant that the waters closed over them, a gun was fired from one of the towers, to intimate to the Imperial despot that justice had been done on his enemies.
This Castle, like the Fortresses of the Dardanelles, has been suffered to fall into partial decay, but an order was lately issued for their simultaneous restoration, and workmen are now busily employed in repairing the united ravages of time and neglect.
The little village of Mirgheun, about a mile higher up the channel, is one of the prettiest things on the Bosphorus. A long street, terminating at the water’s edge, stretches far into the distance, its centre being occupied by a Moorish fountain of white marble, overshadowed by limes and acacias, beneath which are coffee terraces; constantly thronged with Turks, sitting gravely in groups upon low stools not more than half a foot from the ground, and occupied with their chibouks and mocha.
A short distance beyond Mirgheun the channel widens into a little bay, one of whose extremitiesis occupied by a ruined house, standing in the midst of a garden. This house, which was formerly a chapel dedicated to St. Nicholas, is now the property of a Turk, but is never inhabited in consequence of a superstition so wild, and withal so fully credited by both Greeks and Musselmauns, that I must not pass it by unnoticed.
The chapel was desecrated during the Greek revolution; and taken possession of, under the Imperial sanction, by a Turk, who, hurling the effigy of the saint from the niche above the altar, converted the holy shrine into a dwelling-place for himself and his family; but on the very night on which he removed thither he was destined to pay the price of his sacrilege, for he was found in the morning dead in his bed; an event which so appalled his relatives that they immediately disposed of the house to a neighbour, whose only child fell a victim, in the same mysterious manner, to the vengeance of the outraged saint—a third purchaser lost his wife by the like means; and the spot became from that day the dread and horror of every True Believer; while it is an extraordinary fact that its Infidel owner sent for a Greek Papas to exorcise the evil spirit, or to conciliate the saint; and that a solemn sprinkling of holy water and chanting of hymns took place; but it is impossible to say with what success, as no tenant has subsequently beenfound for the dwelling, which is rapidly crumbling to decay.
As you approach Therapia, you come upon a long stretch of wall, pierced in one regular line with small square windows, and looking exactly like an ill-kept manufactory; while the fine stone terrace that runs along its whole façade, and the thickly-planted shrubberies which clothe the hill behind it, have something so lordly and imposing in their aspect, that your attention is irresistibly attracted, and your curiosity awakened. Should your caïquejhes be Greeks, they will scarcely answer your inquiry without muttering an imprecation through their clenched teeth. It is the sorry remain of the palace of Prince Calimachi, seized by the Sultan in a fit of despotic jealousy, and converted into a stable for the Imperial stud, but so entirely disproportioned to its new office as to be perfectly useless—the extent being immense, and the number of the Sultan’s horses extremely limited; it has consequently been abandoned to premature decay, and a noble object is thus blotted from the landscape, and degraded into a deformity.
The son of the Prince was Dragoman to the Porte when the seizure was made; but being a Greek, his court interest availed him nothing; his ideas were too magnificent, and he paid the forfeit of his luxury.
But the misfortunes of Prince Calimachi didnot end here. Exiled to Broussa, he endeavoured in the bosom of his family to lose the memory of his departed splendour; when he was one day invited to the palace of the Pasha to encounter him at chess, of which game both were passionately fond. Calimachi accepted the defiance with alacrity, for he knew not how dearly he was to pay the gratification. While he was deliberating on a move, the Pasha waved his hand, and in an instant the fatal cord was about the throat of his victim. The bereaved wife was next summoned; and though the dark ring of extravasated blood betrayed the deed which had been done, she was told that the Prince had expired from an attack of paralysis; nor did she dare to gainsay the falsehood; and thus she bore away the body of her murdered husband in the silence of despair.
The Sultan has a kiosk on the one hand, and a summer palace on the other, of this melancholy memorial of despotic power; but I was in no mood to admire either with such an object before me.
To be seen in all its beauty, the Bosphorus should be looked upon by moonlight. Then it is that the occupants of the spacious mansions which are mirrored in its waters, enjoy to the fullest perfection the magnificence of the scene around them. The glare of noon-day reveals too broadly the features of the locality; while the deep, blue, star-studded sky, the pure moonlight,and the holy quiet of evening, lend to it, on the contrary, a mysterious indistinctness which doubles its attraction. The inhabitants of the capital are conscious of this fact; and during the summer months, when they occupy their marine mansions, one of their greatest recreations is to seat themselves upon the seaward terraces, to watch the sparkling of the ripple, and to listen to the evening hymn of the seamen on board the Greek and Italian vessels; amused at intervals by a huge shoal of porpoises rolling past, gambolling in the moonlight, and plunging amid the waves with a sound like thunder: while afar off are the dark mountains of Asia casting their long dusky shadows far across the water, and the quivering summits of the tall trees on the edge of the channel sparkling like silver, and lending the last touch of loveliness to a landscape perhaps unparalleled in the world.
Shakspeare must have had a vision of the Bosphorus, when he wrote the garden scene in Romeo and Juliet!
All the Orientals idolize flowers. Every good house upon the border of the channel has a parterre, terraced off from the sea, of which you obtain glimpses through the latticed windows; and where the rose trees are trained into a thousand shapes of beauty—sometimes a line of arches rises all bloom and freshness above a favourite walk—sometimes the plants arestretched round vases of red clay of the most classical formation, of which they preserve the shape—ranges of carnations, clumps of acacias, and bosquets of seringa, are common; and the effect of these fair flowers, half shielded from observation, and overhung with forest trees, which are in profusion in every garden, is extremely agreeable.
Another peculiarity of the Bosphorus is the great depth of the water to the very edges of the channel. The terraces that hem it in are frequently injured by their contact with the shipping which, in a sudden lull of wind, or by some inadvertence on the part of the helmsman, “run foul” (to use a nautical expression) of the shore; nor is it the terraces alone that suffer, for the houses whose upper stories project over the stream, which is almost universally the case where they are of any extent, are constantly sustaining injury from the same cause.
We had occupied our summer residence only two days, when an Imperial Brig in the Turkish service, in attempting a tack, thrust its bowsprit through the centre window of the magnificent saloon of an Armenian banker, with whose family we were acquainted. The master of the house, exasperated at the evident carelessness in which the accident had originated, rushed out upon the terrace to remonstrate, but his remonstrances were unheeded; and hehad scarcely re-entered the house when the Turkish captain, who was intoxicated, landed, and without ceremony passed into the outer court, accompanied by some of his crew; and, seizing the brother of the gentleman, and several of his servants, gave them a severe beating, and then quietly returned on board. The vessel was extricated after a time, carrying away with it nearly the whole front of the saloon, and a large portion of the roof; after which, the gallant commander again entered the house, and insisted upon conveying its master to Constantinople, there to expiate the sin of insolence to a Turkish officer. The Saraf, however, having business in the city, had already departed, and consequently escaped the inconvenience and insult destined for him.
Were I the Admiral of a Fleet charged with the conquest of a channel like that of the Bosphorus, I would employ none but Turkish sailors, who are never so much at home as when aground, or hung on to some building; they would literally carry the thing by assault. Their mighty ships of war do as they like, for they are constantly “touching,” when they are supposed to be cruizing; and “aground” when the authorities at home believe them to be at sea.
Where did you meet the Admiral’s schooner as you came from Malta? On shore off Tenedos. Where did you speak the frigate on your wayhere? Aground at Gallipoli? These were the answers to two questions put by myself; and had I ventured twenty more I should probably have received similar replies.
Englishmen will probably, at the first glance, wonder why it should be thus; but it would be greater subject for astonishment were it otherwise. When a Field Marshal, by kissing the Sublime Toe, is translated at once into a Lord High Admiral; and the Colonel of a Cavalry regiment becomes by an equally simple process a manufacturer of Macaroni; and when each is called upon to teach that which he never learnt, and to command ere he has been taught how to obey; the effects of the system may be readily foreseen. Nevertheless, were the Turks permitted to employ even subordinate European officers in their army and navy, much of the evil might be obviated. But Russia is opposed to a measure which would give them a correct idea of their own physical strength—by weakening themorale, she enervates the whole system; while, by her happy art of consopiation, and her finished tact at glossing over effects, and inventing causes, she has taught them to believe themselves independent of extraneous aid, Heaven-inspired, and all-sufficient.
It signifies not how irrelevant the duties of any situation may be to his previous habits and talent, no Turk would hesitate to accept iton that account, should the occasion of self-aggrandizement present itself; and he has two satisfactory reasons for acting thus—he must at least be as capable of fulfilling them as his predecessor, who was equally ill-fitted for the trust—and, should he refuse one good offer, he would probably never have a second. Thus reason the Osmanlis, and upon this conviction they act. Nor is Sultan Mahmoud one whit more difficult or quick-sighted on this point than his subjects; or more scrupulous as to the efficiency of those to whom he gives important appointments, than they are in accepting them; and a ludicrous example of this uncalculating facility occurred very lately, so perfectly in point that I cannot forbear to mention it.
His Highness had a favourite physician, to whom he had entrusted the superintendence of a public establishment, and who died suddenly at Scutari. When informed of his death, the Sultan was visibly affected: and in the first moment of regret he inquired anxiously if the deceased had left any family. He was answered that he had an only son, a clerk in the Greek Chancellery, whose situation was far from a lucrative one; and he immediately desired that the youth, who had not yet attained his twentieth year, should be appointed on the instant to his father’s vacancy, and receive the same salary which had been enjoyed by his parent. He was obeyed;and the spruce clerk at once became metamorphosed into the solemn physician, or something as near like it as he could accomplish.
By an arrangement not altogether so satisfactory, surgeons are supplied to the ships of war. When a medical man is required on board some vessel of the line, individuals appointed for the purpose walk into the first chemist’s shop they may happen to pass, seize the master, carry him off, hurry him first into a caïque, and thence to the ship; appoint him surgeon, enter him on the books, acquaint him with the amount of his pay; and, should he venture to remonstrate, give him a sound flogging.
Nor are “the powers that be” at all more particular in their bearing towards the officers of the ships, whom they flog (the captains inclusive) whenever they chance to consider the operation desirable. On a late occasion, two of the frigates ran foul of each other in the Channel, upon which Tahir Pasha, the High Admiral, bestowed the bastinado so unsparingly upon their commanders, that the blood penetrated their garments; and they were subsequently flung into some den in the hold, and there left during three days, not only without attendance, but literally without food!
It may be asked what punishment can be inflicted on the crews, if such unceremonious measures are pursued with the officers; and asone fact is better than a score of assertions, I will reply by relating another very recent occurrence, described to me by a Greek gentleman who was present during the whole transaction. The Capitan Pasha had a party of friends to dine with him on board his ship, who were about to seat themselves at table, when it was reported to him that one of the crew, in defiance of the order which forbade any individual to go on shore, had surreptitiously left the vessel.
“Let me know when he returns on board;” was the cold and careless rejoinder of the High Admiral, who had scarcely uttered the words, when the re-appearance of the delinquent was announced, after an absence of about ten minutes. He was ordered below to account for his conduct to the Pasha, whose very name is a terror to the whole fleet, when he stated that the following day being Friday (the Turkish Sabbath), he had ventured on shore to procure some clean linen, fearing the anger of the Admiral should he appear dirty.
“And was it for this trifle that you disobeyed my orders?” asked the Pasha; “I must take measures to prevent any future instance of the same misconduct—” and grasping an iron bar that served to secure one of the cabin windows, and which stood near him—without the pause of a moment—surrounded by his guestsstanding beside a table spread for a banquet and with his victim crouching at his feet—he struck the quailing wretch upon the head, and murdered him with a blow. The body fell heavily on the earth in the death-spasm; and the Admiral, addressing himself to an attendant, quietly ordered that the corpse should be removed, and the dinner served: but several of the party declined remaining after what they had witnessed, declaring their inability to partake of food at such a moment; these were, of course, Turks; for the Greek guests, although equally disgusted and heart-sick, were not at liberty to withdraw without danger; and the dead man was borne away, and the living feasted, with his death-groan still ringing in their ears, and his last fierce agony yet grappling at their hearts!
Tahir Pasha is a perfect embodiment of the vulgar idea of Turkish character which was so lately prevalent in Europe. He is the slave of his passions, and apparently without human affections or human sympathies. He lost his only son by his own violence, having beaten him so severely for quitting the house without his permission, that the unhappy young man died a day or two subsequently, in consequence of the injuries which he had sustained; and, instead of profiting by this awful occurrence, he afterwards murdered a nephew in the same manner.
And yet I have heard men, carried awayby party-spirit, and hoodwinked by prejudice, maintain that this fiend in human shape was not cruel; and bolster their opinions with a sophistry that made me shudder.
I inquired of anattachéof the Porte whether the Sultan was aware of the waste of life in his fleet, where a week seldom passes in which some luckless wretch does not fall a victim to the wrath of the High Admiral; and the coolness of the answer was inimitable: “What has His Highness to do with it?” “How!” I rejoined in my turn, “are they not his subjects?” “Of course; but Tahir Pasha commands the fleet; and, while he does so, he has a right to enforce its discipline as he thinks best. Why should the Sultan interfere?” “But such wholesale cruelty is so revolting.” “Perhaps so; yet how can it be remedied?” “Were I the Sultan,” I answered unhesitatingly, “I would decapitate the High Admiral; it would be a saving of human blood.” The Turk laughed at my earnestness as he replied; “Mashallah! you have hit upon a radical remedy. But how would you secure the fleet against a second Tahir Pasha?”
He was right. The evil exists rather in the system than in the individual; but it is, nevertheless, a blessing for Turkey, that the equal of her High Admiral, for ruthlessness and cruelty, is probably not to be found in the country. And yet, to look at him, you would imagine that nothought of violence, no impulse of revenge, had ever stirred his spirit; he has the head of an anchorite, and the brow of a saint. I never beheld a more benevolent countenance—Lavater would have been at fault with him.
One of the most pleasant excursions that can be made to the opposite coast, is to Unkiar Skelessi, or the Sultan’s Pier; a sweet valley, under the shadow of the Giant’s Mountain, in which the famous treaty was signed with Russia. It is profusely shaded with majestic trees, the largest in the neighbourhood, and is entirely covered with rich grass. The spot on which the ceremony took place is overhung with maples, and washed by a running stream: behind it rises a range of hills; and on its left stands an extensive manufactory of cloth, and a paper-mill, erected at an immense expense, and furnished with their elaborate machinery by the present Sultan, who caused an elegant kiosk to be erected upon the height for his own use, when he went to superintend the works, which were, however, abandoned as soon as the novelty had worn off. They are now falling rapidly to ruin; and the noble run of water which was forced from its channel to turn the wheels of the mill, is wasting itself in an useless course across the valley, ere it is finally lost in the Bosphorus.
This lovely spot is much frequented on festivaldays by all classes of the population, who form pic-nic parties, and spend hours under the shade of the tall trees, sipping their coffee and sherbet; or occupying the different terraces which overlook the Bosphorus, with regular pleasure-parties, whose servants come well provided with provisions, and who linger throughout the whole day, enjoying the cool breezes from the sea, and the long shadows of the boughs beneath which they sit.
Higher up the valley, you generally meet with an encampment of Bedouin Arabs, where you are almost certain to see two or three faces of dark flashing beauty, which repay you for the annoyance that you experience from the importunity of the troop of children who assail you directly you approach the tents; little, ragged, merry-looking, vociferous urchins, of whom you cannot rid yourself either by bribes or menaces. These dark, proud beauties—for they are proud-looking, even amid their tatters, with their large, wild, black eyes, and their long raven hair plaited in many braids, which fall upon their shoulders, and hang below their waists; their round, smooth arms bare to the elbow, whence the large, hanging sleeves fall back; and their well-turned little feet peeping out from beneath their ample trowsers; these dark, proud beauties greet you with a smile, and a “Mashallah!” that introduce you to teeth like pearls, andvoices like music; and as they sit, weaving their baskets for the market of Constantinople, they extend towards you their slender, henna-tipped fingers, and ask your piastres, without taking the trouble to rise, rather as a tribute to their loveliness, than as an offering to their necessities.
To escape from the importunities of the children, whom the sight of the tempting metal renders only more importunate, you have but to plunge deeper into the valley, and lose yourself among the majestic plane trees with which it abounds. The nightingale alone disturbs the deep silence of the solitude, save when at intervals the lowing of the cattle on the mountain sweeps along upon the wind.
It was here that De Lille wrote his “Pleasures of Imagination.”—It was here that De la Martine improvised to the memory of his daughter; the soil is poetic.