Chapter III: Front Matter (3)

Politics, since the year 1848, have engrossed so unwonted a share of the attention of the reading world, that there can be no doubt that, in more than one European country, books of great literary and scientific interest have been withheld from publication until more tranquil days should give them a better chance of the welcome they merit. Such has avowedly been the case with Dr Wagner’s latest work, the fourth and most important of a series suggested to him by several years of Oriental travel and study. It was, if we rightly remember, in the second book of this series, relating to Armenia,[2] that he announced his intention of reserving for a final work the more important results of his rambles and observations. Previously to the Armenian volume he had published his account of Caucasus and the Cossacks,[3] to the general reader more interesting than any of its successors. Third in order of appearance came the Journey to Colchis;[4] and now, believing that his countrymen’s taste for books of foreign travel and adventure is reviving, he puts forth two copious volumes, containing all that he has to say, and that he has not previously published, concerning his Eastern journeyings and residence.

Dr Wagner is one of the most experienced, indefatigable, and, as we believe, one of the most trustworthy and impartial of foreign literary travellers. On a former occasion we explained how his strong natural bent for travel and scientific research had overcome many and great obstacles, and had conducted him not only through various European countries, but with a French army to Constantina, and afterwards over a great part of Western Asia. His present book is comprehensive and somewhat desultory in its character. It details the author’s residence in the Alpine region of Turkish Armenia, his travels in Persia, and his adventurous visits to certain independent tribes of Kourds, whose country is immediately adjacent to that interesting but unsafe district of Kourdistan, where Schulze, the German antiquarian, and the Englishman Browne (the discoverer of Darfour) met a bloody death, and rest in solitary graves. Dr Wagner is sanguine that, now that the revolutionary fever has abated, many will gladly quit the study of newspapers, and the contemplation of Europe’s misty future, to follow him into distant lands, rarely trodden by European foot, and some of which have hitherto been undescribed “by any German who has actually visited them.” As the most novel portions of his book, he indicates his visits to the mountain district south of Erzroum, and his excursions east, south, and west of the great salt lake of Urumiah, the Dead Sea of Persia. A keen politician, and this book being, as we have already observed, a sort of omnium-gatherum of his Eastern experiences, political, scientific, and miscellaneous, he devotes his first chapter to what he terms “a dispassionate appreciation of Prince Metternich’s Oriental policy,” (chiefly with respect to Servia,) which chapter we shall avail ourselves of his prefatory permission to pass unnoticed, as irrelevant to the main subject of the book. Equally foreign to the objects announced in the title-page are the contents of Chapter the Second, in which, before taking ship for Trebizond, he gives a hundred pages to the Turkish capital, promising, notwithstanding all that has of late years been written concerning it, to tell us something new about Constantinople, and bidding his readers not to fear that he is about to impose upon them a compilation from the innumerable printed accounts of that city, which have issued from female as well as male pens, “from the days of Lady Montague down to Mrs Ida Pfeiffer the far-travelled, and Madame Ida Hahn Hahn the devotee.” He fulfils his promise. His sketches from the Bosphorus are not only amusingly written, but novel and original. Dr Wagner, it must be observed, set out upon his Eastern wanderings well provided with circular letters of recommendation from Lord Aberdeen and M. Guizot to the various British and French agents in the countries he anticipated visiting. From the Russian government he also obtained, although with greater difficulty, similar documents. The natural consequence was, that, at Constantinople, and elsewhere, he passed much of his time in diplomatic and consular circles, and to such intercourse was doubtless indebted for much useful information, as his readers unquestionably are for many pungent anecdotes and entertaining reminiscences.

Upon an early day of his stay in Constantinople, Dr Wagner was so fortunate as to enjoy a near and leisurely view of his Highness Abdul Meschid. It was a Friday, upon which day the Grand Seignior is wont to perform his devotions in one of the principal mosques of his capital. In the court of the great Achmet mosque, Dr Wagner saw a crowd assembled round a group of twenty horses, amongst which was a slender, richly-caparisoned, silver-grey Arabian, of extraordinary beauty and gentleness. It was a favourite steed of the Sultan’s. Presently the door of the mosque opened; the grey was led close up to the lowest step; a slender Turk came forth, descended the steps stiffly and rather unsteadily, was assisted into saddle and stirrup by black slaves, and rode silently away through the silent crowd, which gave back respectfully as he passed, whilst every head was bowed and every hand placed upon the left breast. No shout or cheer was heard—Turkish custom forbidding such demonstrations—nor did the sovereign requite by salute or smile his subjects’ mute reverence. At that time Abdul Meschid was but twenty years old. His appearance was that of a sickly man of thirty. Early excesses had prematurely aged him. His cheeks were sunken; lines, rarely seen in youth, were visible at the corners of his eyes and mouth; his gaze was fixed and glassy. Dr Wagner is witty at the expense of another German writer,[5] who saw the Sultan since he did, and sketched his personal appearance far more favourably.

“It is possible, however,” he says, “that with improved health the Sultan’s figure may have improved and his countenance have acquired nobility, so as to justify the description of the genial author of the ‘Fragments.’ Possible is it that Dr Spitzer’s[6] steel pills, combined with the seraglio-cook’s strong chicken broth and baths of Burgundy wine, may have wrought this physical marvel, have given new vigour to the muscles, have braced the nerves, and have imparted to his Highness’s drooping cheeks that firm and healthful look which the learned German declares he noted on the occasion of his audience. Abdul Meschid has still youth on his side; and when such is the case, nature often willingly aids the physician’s inadequate art. At the time I speak of, it is quite certain that the young Sultan looked like a candidate for the hospital. His aspect excited compassion, and corresponded with the description given to us of him by the German sculptor Streichenberg, who certainly contemplated his Highness more closely and minutely than the ‘Fragment’ writer, seeing that his business was to carve the Padisha’s likeness in ivory. As an artist, Mr Streichenberg was not particularly edified by the lean frame and flabby countenance of so young a prince. Not to displease his sublime patron, he was compelled to follow the example of that other German sculptor, who, commissioned by his royal Mæcenas to model his hand and leg for a celebrated dancer, adopted, instead of the meagre reality, the graceful ideal of the Belvidere Apollo, and so earned both praise and guerdon. The person of the Grand Seignior appeared to Streichenberg, as it did to me, emaciated, relaxed, narrow-breasted, and faded. Two years later, when I again saw the Sultan, in the solemn procession of the Kur-ban-Beiram, a renegade, who stood beside me, exclaimed, ‘Were I the Sultan, and looked as he looks, I would never show myself in public.’”

Close behind the Sultan rode the chief of the eunuchs, a fat negro from Sudan, mounted upon a horse as black as himself; and behind him came a young Turk of remarkable beauty, whose thick raven-black beard contrasted with the whiteness of his complexion, as did his whole appearance with that of the sickly sovereign, and with the dingy, monkey-like physiognomy of the Kisslar Aga. Beside such foils, no wonder that the picturesque young Oriental, with his profile like that of some Saracen warrior, and his dreamy thoughtful eyes, found favour with the fair. Riza Pasha was his name; he was then the seraglio-favourite, the lover of Valide, the mother of the Sultan. He alone pulled the strings of Turkish politics, and made the lame old Grand Vizier, Rauf Pasha, dance like a puppet to whatever tune he piped.

The Sultan and his suite were attired in the reformed costume—in blue frocks of Polish cut, red trousers, and the red fez, with its abundant blue tassel drooping over it on all sides. Scarcely had they ridden out of sight when a group of very different character and appearance issued from the chief gate of the mosque, gathering on its way far more demonstrations of popularity than did Abdul Meschid and his Kisslar Aga. It was composed of Turkish priests and doctors—_Ulemas_, with their _Mufti_ at their head—all in the old Turkish garb, with ample turbans and huge beards. The sympathy of the people with these representatives of the old régime was expressed by far lower bows, by more fervent pressure of hand on heart, than had greeted the Sultan’s passage. The holy men looked kindly upon the crowd, amongst whom the Mufti occasionally threw small coins, which naturally augmented his popularity, and secured him many followers and good wishes. Dr Wagner remarks upon the present contradictory and anomalous state of Turkish dress. At the festival of the Kurban-Beiram he saw the Sultan and all the state officials, from the Grand Vizier downwards, in European uniforms—narrow trousers, gold epaulets, tight-buttoned coats, collars stiff with embroidery. But at the collar the Frank ceased, and the Oriental reappeared. There was the long beard, and the brimless fez. With this last item of costume, the boldest Turkish reformer has not as yet dared to interfere. The covering of the forehead with a peak or brim to the cap is an innovation for which the Turks are not yet ripe. It is considered the outward and visible sign of the Giaour, and a Turk who should walk the streets of Constantinople in a hat, or in a cap with a peak, would be stoned by the mob. The prejudice springs from the duty stringently enjoined upon every true believer, to touch the ground with his forehead when praying. Hence, to wear a vizard over the brow appears to the Turk like contempt of a religious law. A bold European in the service of the Porte advised Sultan Mahmoud to put leathern peaks to his soldiers’ caps. On duty they would keep off the sun; at prayer-time the caps might be turned round upon the head. But Mahmoud, passionate reformer though he was, shrank from offering so deadly an affront to Turkish fanaticism. Neither did he dare, like Peter the Great, to crop his subjects’ beards. The well-intended changes which he did introduce were sufficiently startling, and to many of them, even at the present day, the nation is scarcely reconciled. In a picturesque point of view, the new style of dress, intended as the signal of a general change in Turkish usages and institutions, is anything but an improvement upon the old one. The physical prestige of the Oriental departed with his flowing robe, with his shawls and his rich turban.

“These fat-paunched, crooked-legged pashas,” exclaims Dr Wagner, “what caricatures they appear in their buttoned-up uniforms! Formerly, when the folds of their wide garments concealed bodily imperfections, the Turks were held to be a handsome race. Now, in Constantinople, a handsome man, in the reformed dress, is an exception to the rule. The Turks of the towns are rarely slender and well-built; and the tall, muscular figures which one so commonly finds amongst Arabs, Persians, and Tyrolese, are scarcely ever to be seen in Turkey. Neither do we see in Turkish cities anything to remind us of the fine knightly figures of the Circassians—although, from the female side, so much Circassian blood runs in the veins of the higher classes of Turks. The indolent manner of life, the bringing up of boys in the harem until the age of puberty, too early indulgence in tschibouk-smoking and coffee-drinking, and premature excesses of another kind, have all contributed to enervate and degrade an originally vigorous and handsome race.”

In the whole Beiram procession, Dr Wagner declares, there were, besides Riza Pasha, but two handsome men amongst all the Turks of the higher class there present. Of the numerous array of officers and soldiers, it was but here and there that he saw one tolerably well-made, and athletic figures were still more rarely observable. Worse than any looked the debilitated Sultan, cramped in his tight coat, oppressed by his heavy epaulets and gold lace, his diamonds and his plumes, and leaning languidly forward on his fine charger. What a contrast with the portrait of the Emperor Nicholas, which Dr Wagner saw when visiting the summer seraglio of Kadi-Köi! Opposite to a divan upon which Abdul Meschid was wont to repose—whilst his tympanum was agreeably tickled by the harmony of half-a-dozen musical boxes, playing different tunes at the same time—stood two costly porcelain vases, whereon were painted likenesses of the Emperor and Empress of all the Russias. They were presents from Nicholas to the Sultan. “The Emperor’s gigantic and powerful frame and martial countenance were admirably portrayed. The painter had given him a mien and bearing as though he were in the act of commanding his grenadiers. As a contrast, I pictured to myself the Turkish monarch reposing his feeble frame upon the luxurious velvet divan; the harmless ruler who prefers ease in his harem to a gallop at the head of his troops; the trill of his musical boxes, and the flutes of dancing dervishes, to the clatter of cuirasses and the thunder of twelve-pounders.” Russia and Turkey are well typified by their rulers. On the one hand, vigour, energy, and power; on the other, weakness, decrepitude, and decline. What wonder if, as Dr Wagner relates, the young Archduke Constantine, when visiting the city that bears his name, gazed wistfully and hopefully from the lofty gallery of the Galata tower on the splendid panorama spread before him, as though dreaming that, one day, perhaps, the double eagle might replace the crescent upon the stately pinnacles of Stamboul!

After passing in review several of the most remarkable men in Turkey, Reschid Pasha, Omar Pasha the Renegade, Tahir Pasha, the fierce old admiral who commanded the Turkish fleet at Navarino, and who—never well disposed towards Christians—regarded them, from that disastrous day forward, with inextinguishable hatred, Dr Wagner speaks of the representatives at Constantinople of various European courts, briefly retracing some of the insults and cruelties to which, in former times, the ambassadors of Christian sovereigns were subjected by the arrogant Porte, and noting the energy and success with which Great Britain alone, of all the aggrieved powers, and even before the empire of the seas had become indisputably hers, invariably exacted and obtained satisfaction for such injuries. He remarks with admiration upon the signal reparation extorted by Lord Ponsonby in the Churchill case, and proceeds to speak in the highest terms of that diplomatist’s able successor.

“The most prominent man, by his political influence, as well as by his spirit, character, energy, and nobility of mind, in the diplomatic world of Pera, was and is, to the present day, the Englishman Stratford Canning. With external advantages, also, Nature has endowed this man more richly than any of his colleagues, whether Turks or Franks. He is of a very noble figure, and possesses that innate, calmly dignified majesty which characterises Britannia’s aristocracy. Totally free from affectation or theatrical manner, he has a thoughtful brow, marked with the lines of reflection and labour, and fine deep blue eyes, whose meaning glance seems to reveal a host of great qualities, and to tell, at the same time, that with the highest gifts of a statesman is here combined a warm, a generous, and a sympathetic heart.”

Dr Wagner was presented to Sir Stratford Canning by a German friend, and the ambassador seems completely to have won his heart, partly by the admiration he expressed of Circassia’s heroic struggle against the overwhelming power of the Czar, and by his sympathy with the Nestorian Christians of Djulamerk—at that time persecuted and cruelly handled by Beder Khan—but still more by the general liberality of his views, and by his un-diplomatic frankness of speech and manner. The Doctor pays a warm tribute to his high qualities, and to his success and diplomatic triumphs at Constantinople; and Dr Wagner’s eulogiums are, in this instance, the more to be valued that he does not often bestow them upon our countrymen, but more frequently dwells upon their less amiable qualities. As a philanthropist and man of high honour, he says, Sir Stratford Canning is really a rarity in old Byzantium, where, for so many centuries, tyranny and servility, corruption and lies, have established their seat. And he proceeds to exhibit the less favourable side of the character of the diplomatic corps at Constantinople, bearing with particular severity upon an Austrian envoy, concerning whom he tells some good stories—one, amongst others, of a diamond ornament, which brought great ridicule and discredit upon the internuncio. When Ibrahim Pasha was driven out of Syria, the Sultan, in token of his gratitude, ordered the court jeweller to manufacture costly diamond ornaments for the ladies of the British and Austrian ambassadors. Lady Ponsonby (we abridge from Dr Wagner) duly received hers, but Count Stürmer intimated, on behalf of his lady, that she would prefer ducats to diamonds. The cunning Austrian well knew that upon such occasions the jewellers were wont to take large profits. So he had it mentioned at the seraglio, by one of his dragomans, that the ambassadress was no lover of trinkets, but would willingly receive their value. To this there was no objection, and the pleasant sum of half a million of piastres was transferred from the Sultan’s treasury to the internuncio’s strong box. If the Austrian flattered himself that the transaction would be unknown, he was terribly mistaken. Pera is the Paradise of evil tongues, and next day the ambassadress’s dealings in diamonds were the talk of the town. Count Stürmer had many enemies and no friends; even his attachés had little attachment for him; the story was too piquant to be lost, and it was repeated with a thousand good-natured embellishments and commentaries, until it came round to the ears of the person principally concerned. Thereupon, the wily ambassador devised a plan to outwit the gossips. The finest diamond ornaments in the best jeweller’s shop in the bazaar were ordered to be sent to the Austrian embassy, on approval. An order for diamonds had been received from Vienna. The jeweller, anticipating a prompt sale and good profit, hastened to send the best he had. Meantime a number of the members of the different embassies were asked to dinner. At dessert, Count Stürmer led the conversation to the Sultan’s generosity and gallantry to ladies, and, turning to the Countess, asked her to show their guests the beautiful set of diamonds she had received as a present from his Highness. Great was the company’s admiration of the costly jewels—far greater their astonishment at this ocular refutation of the current tale which had transformed the brilliants into piastres. They had thought the sources of their information so sure! The ambassador noted and enjoyed their confusion. But, clever as the trick was—in political matters its author had never exhibited such ingenuity and inventive talent—its success was but temporary. The sharp noses of the Pera gossips smelled out the truth. Having served their purpose, the jewels were returned to the jeweller, and one may imagine the shout and halloo that resounded through the drawing-rooms, coffee-houses, and barbers’ shops of Pera and Galata, when the real facts of the case were at length verified beyond a doubt.

The admission made by Dr Wagner in another place, that the hotel of the Austrian internuncio was remarkable for its hospitality, and was the chief place of meeting in Constantinople for foreigners and natives of distinction, should perhaps have induced him to take a more indulgent view of Count Stürmer’s dealings in diamonds. Go where you will, says a French proverb, you shall always be welcome if you take with you a fiddle and a frying-pan. Dinners and dances are amongst the most important of diplomatic duties; and the Austrian may have thought he could better dispense with diamonds than with these. At his hotel, during one of Dr Wagner’s visits to Constantinople, that singularly successful soldier of fortune, General Jochmus, was a constant guest. This fortunate adventurer, of insignificant family at Hamburg, who has been indebted, for his remarkable rise, partly to his gallantry and talents, partly to extraordinary good luck, and who has passed through half-a-dozen services, always with more or less distinction, began his career in Greece, afterwards joined the Anglo-Spanish Legion, passed thence into the native Spanish army with the rank of general, quitted it on account of an insult received from a French tailor settled in Spain, and for which the feeble and _Afrancesado_ Christino government dared not give him the satisfaction he justly demanded, and, at the time referred to by Dr Wagner, was Ferik-Pasha in the Turkish service—subsequently to become Imperial minister under the brief rule of the Archduke John. His skill as a chess-player, Dr Wagner informs us, is still more remarkable than his military talent. When in command of the Turkish army in Syria, at the time that Ibrahim Pasha and his Egyptians were about to retreat through the desert, Jochmus, entering Damascus—long a stronghold of chess—challenged the best players in the place to a match, and carried off the victory. From this officer, and from other Europeans of high rank in the Turkish service, Dr Wagner, who loves to speculate on the political future of the East, and on the probable or possible infringements of Russia upon the territories of her weaker neighbours, gathered opinions, valuable although very various, as to the military power of Turkey, and her means of resistance to Muscovite aggression. The Doctor entertains a very high respect for the power of Russia, strikingly illustrated by the recent crisis, when, with one army guarding Poland and another warring in the Caucasus, she was able to lend a third—not far short of two hundred thousand men—to the neighbouring empire, which was on the point of being overturned by an insurgent province. In his second volume he talks ominously of the result of an anticipated conflict between an Anglo-Indian and a Russian army, predicting victory to the latter, even whilst recognising the justice of the high encomiums passed by another German writer on the corps of British officers in India. “An impartial and competent observer and judge of most of the armies of Europe, Leopold von Orlich, who has written a valuable book of travels in India, assures us that that numerous body of officers (eight hundred and twenty staff officers, and five thousand five hundred of inferior rank) has not its equal in the world with respect to military spirit and efficiency, and that he never witnessed in any army so much mutual self-devotion as amongst the officers and soldiers of the British Indian host. Thirst for action, high spirit, self-confidence and practical good sense, are the special characteristics of the English officers.” Than this, nothing can be truer. Dr Wagner proceeds to theorise on the probable defection of the Sepoys, in the event of a Russian army showing itself on our Indian frontier. Theories referring to such remote and improbable contingencies we need hardly be at the pains to combat; and, indeed, were we to take up the argumentative cudgels every time that Dr Wagner’s frequent political digressions hold out temptation so to do, we should get to the end of our paper and have got never a step from Constantinople. Our present object being the general examination of a book of travels, we prefer accompanying the Doctor on board the Austrian steamer Stamboul, bound for Trebizond. Thence his road was by land, south-eastward to Erzroum, travelling with Turkish post-horses—not in a carriage, but in the saddle and with baggage animals—at first through a garden of azaleas and rhododendrons, of geraniums and ranunculuses; afterwards through an Alpine district, over dangerous mountain-paths, unequalled, he declares, for the hazards of the passage, by anything he ever met with in the European Alps. Whilst traversing these bridle-roads, which are often scarcely two feet broad, with precipices of giddy depth now on the right hand and then upon the left, travellers keep their saddles and trust to the good legs, prudence, and experience of their horses. Dr Wagner witnessed more than one accident. A pack-mule fell over a precipice, but escaped with the fright and a few bruises. A Turkish official had a very narrow escape. His horse slipped upon a wet rock, fell, and lay where he fell. The Turk found himself with half his body under the horse, the other half hanging over a gulf which gaped, in frightful profundity, at the edge of the road. “I had passed the dangerous spot,” says the Doctor, “but one minute before him; I heard the fall, looked round, and saw the Turk just below me, in that horrible position. The horse lay with the saddle turned towards the precipice, down which it seemed inevitable that, at the first effort to rise, he and his rider must fall. But the animal’s fine instinct saved both itself and its rider. Snorting, with dilated nostrils and ears erect, the brave horse gazed down into the chasm, but made not the slightest movement. The Turk remained as motionless; he saw the peril and dared not even shout for aid, lest he should scare his horse. The utmost caution was necessary in approaching him. Whilst the Pole and I quickly alighted and descended to his assistance, the Turk’s companions had already got hold of his bridle and coat skirts, and soon horse and man stood in safety upon their six legs.”

The Pole here referred to—John Saremba was his name—accompanied Dr Wagner from Constantinople as a sort of guide or travelling servant, and was his stanch and faithful follower during very long and often dangerous wanderings. He spoke Turkish and Italian, could cook a good pilau, and handled his sabre, upon occasion, with dexterity and effect. The story of his eventful life, which he related to his employer after dinner at Gumysh Haneh, a town between Trebizond and Erzroum, whilst their companions enjoyed the _Kef_, or Oriental idleness after meat, is unquestionably the most interesting digression of the many in Dr Wagner’s book. Wonderful to relate, Saremba, although a Pole and a refugee, claimed not to be either a count or a colonel. His father had been a glazier in Warsaw, and brought his son up to the same trade. When the Polish revolution broke out, in November 1830, young Saremba entered the service as a volunteer, was present at the battles of Grochow, Praga, Iganie, Ostrolenka, but neither received wounds nor obtained promotion. It is rare to meet a Pole who has not been at least a captain, (the Polish army lists of that period being now out of print.) Saremba admitted that he had never attained even to a corporal’s worsted honours. After the capture of Warsaw, his regiment retreated upon Prussian ground. Their hope was that the Prussian king would permit their passage through his territory, and their emigration to America. This hope was unfulfilled. They were disarmed; for a few weeks they were taken good care of; then they were sent back to Poland, there to be drafted into various Russian regiments, or sent, by troops, to the interior, or to Caucasus. The latter was Saremba’s lot. Incorporated in a Russian regiment of the line, and after many changes of garrison, he found himself stationed at the camp of Manglis, in the neighbourhood of Teflis.

In Saremba’s company there were sixteen Poles besides himself. Seven of them had fought in the revolutionary war; the others were recruits, enlisted since its conclusion. One of the number was married. Their treatment by the Russian officers was something better than that of the other soldiers, Russians by birth. This proceeded from no sympathy with the Polish cause, but from an involuntary feeling of compassion for men superior in breeding and education to the Russian boors, and who were condemned for political offences to the hard life of a private soldier. More dexterous and intelligent than the Russians, the Poles quickly learn their duty, and would monopolise most of the chevrons of non-commissioned officers, had not the colonels of regiments instructions on this head from the Czar, who has little confidence in Polish loyalty. Saremba was tolerably fortunate in his commanding officer; but the latter could not always be at his subaltern’s elbow, and the poor Poles had much to put up with—bad food, frequent beatings, and extra duty, as punishment for imaginary offences. When to these hardships and sufferings was added the constant _heimweh_—the ardent and passionate longing after home, which has often driven Swiss soldiers, in foreign services, to desertion, and even to suicide—no wonder that every thought of the Poles was fixed upon escape from their worse than Egyptian bondage. There is peculiar and affecting interest in Saremba’s narrative of this portion of his adventures, which Dr Wagner gives in substance, he says, but, as we are disposed to believe, pretty nearly in the Pole’s own words.

“When off duty, we Poles often assembled behind the bushes of the forest that encircles the camp of Manglis; sang, when no Russian was within earshot, our national Polish airs, which we had sung, during the revolution, in the ranks of our national army; spoke of our homes, of days gone by, and of hopes for the future; and often, when we thought of all we had lost, and of our bitter exile in a wild foreign land, we all wept aloud together! Well for us that none of our officers witnessed that. It would have gone hard with us.

“We formed innumerable plans of flight into Turkey, but, lacking any accurate knowledge of the country, we for a long time dared not come to a positive resolution. Meanwhile, we took much trouble to acquire the Tartar tongue, and to extract information from the inhabitants concerning the way to Turkey. One of our comrades helped a Tartar peasant in the neighbourhood of Manglis to cultivate his fields, receiving no payment, in order to make a friend of him, and to question him about the country. The Tartar soon divined his project, and willingly lent himself to facilitate our escape. Flight to Persia would have been easiest; but the Tartar would not hear of that, for he was a Sunnite, and detested the heretic followers of Ali. He advised us to fly to Lasistan, as easier to reach than Turkish Armenia. My comrade was compelled to promise him that, once beyond the Russian frontier, we would adopt Islamism. The Tartar minutely explained to him the bearings of the heavens, taught him the names of all the mountains and rivers we should have to cross, and of the villages in whose vicinity we must cautiously conceal our passage. Should we find ourselves in extreme difficulty or danger, he advised us to appeal to the hospitality and protection of the nearest Mollah, to confide to him our position, and not to forget to assure him of our intention to become good Mussulmans as soon as we were on Turkish territory. After we had quite made up our minds to desert at all risks, we required full three months for preparation. Wretched as was our pay, and scanty and bad our rations, we husbanded both, sold our bread and sought to accustom ourselves to hunger. Some of us were mechanics, and earned a few kopeks daily by work in our leisure hours. I worked as glazier for the Russian officers. Our earnings were cast into a common fund. The summer drew near its end: already the birds of passage assembled and flew away in large flocks over the high mountains of Manglis. We watched their flight with longing and envy. We lacked their wings, their knowledge of the way.

“More than once we faltered in our resolution. Some Russian deserters, who had been captured and brought back to camp by Cossacks, when attempting to desert into Lesghistan, were condemned to run the gauntlet thrice through a thousand men, and we Poles were compelled to assist in flogging the poor wretches almost to death. Deep and painful as was the impression this made upon us, hope and the ardent longing for freedom were yet more powerful. We fixed the day for flight. Only one Pole of our company, who was married to a Cossack’s widow, and had a child by her, detached himself from us and remained behind. With knapsacks packed, and loaded muskets, we met, at nightfall, in the forest. There we all fell upon our knees and prayed aloud to God, and to the blessed Virgin Mary, that they would favour our design, and extend over us their protection. Then we grasped each other’s hands, and swore to defend ourselves to the utmost, and to perish to the last man sooner than submit to be taken back to camp and flogged to death by the Russians.

“We were fourteen men in all. Some had suffered from fever; others were debilitated by bad nourishment. But the burning desire for liberty, and dread of the fate which awaited us in case of failure, gave vigour to our limbs. We marched for thirteen nights without intermission. By day we concealed ourselves in the forests; during the darkness we sometimes risked ourselves in the vicinity of the roads. When the provisions we had in our knapsacks were exhausted, we supported ourselves partly with the berries we found in the woods, and partly with half-raw game. Fortunately, there was no want of deer in the woods. Towards evening we dispersed in quest of them, but ventured to fire at them only when very near, in order not to squander our ammunition and betray our hiding-place to the Cossack piquets. For this latter reason we dared not light a fire at night, preferring to suffer from cold, and to devour the flesh of the slain beasts in a half-raw state.

“After our thirteen nights’ wanderings, we had reached the neighbourhood of the river Arpatschai, but did not rightly know where we were. From the high and barren mountain peaks on which we lay, we beheld, in the far distance, the houses of a large town. We knew not whether it was Russian or Turkish. Without knowledge of the country, without a compass, without intercourse with the inhabitants, whom we anxiously avoided, because we constantly feared discovery and betrayal, we roamed at random in the mountains, ignorant what direction we should take to reach the frontier. Latterly the chase had been unproductive, and we suffered from hunger, as well as from fatigue and severe cold. We saw a herd of wild goats upon the heights, but all our attempts stealthily to approach them were unsuccessful; with extraordinary swiftness they scoured across the fields of snow which covered those lofty mountains, and we lost a whole day in a fruitless pursuit. The sharp mountain air, the toilsome march on foot, increased our hunger. Driven almost to despair, we resolved to run a risk and approach the first village we saw, calling to mind the oath we had taken to defend ourselves to the last drop of our blood, and rather to put each other to death than to fall alive into the hands of the Russians.

“On the upper margin of the forest we discovered the minarets of a Tartar mosque. At dusk we cautiously approached and fell in with two Tartars, cutting bushes. From them we learned that we were about thirty versts from the town of Gumri, where the Russians were building a great fort. The frontier was but a short day’s journey distant, and the long blue line which we had seen from the mountain tops was really the river Arpatschai, whose farther bank is Turkish. We did not conceal from the Tartars our condition and design. The state of our uniforms, all torn by the brambles, and our wild hungry aspect, would hardly have allowed us to be taken for Russian soldiers on service, and they had at once recognised us for what we were. Mindful of the advice of the old Tartar at Manglis, we told them it was our firm resolution to become good Mahometans as soon as we got to Turkey. We adjured them, in the name of Allah and the Prophet, to send us provisions from the village, into which they themselves advised us not to venture. According to their account, there was a Cossack post in the neighbourhood, and the banks of the Arpatschai were, they assured us, so strictly watched by Russian piquets, that there was little hope of our getting across the frontier in that direction.

“At a rapid pace, the Tartars returned to their village. One of our party, well acquainted with the Tartar tongue, followed them, concealing himself behind the bushes, in order to overhear, if possible, their conversation, and to satisfy himself whether they were honest people, in whom we might confide. But the Tartars exchanged not a word upon their way home. In an hour they came to us again, bringing three other men, one of whom wore a white turban. As they passed before some brushwood in which our comrade lay concealed, he heard them in animated conversation. Following them stealthily through the thicket, he caught enough of their discourse to ascertain that they were of different opinions with respect to the line of conduct to be adopted with respect to us. One of them, who, as we subsequently learned, had served at Warsaw in Prince Paskewitch’s Oriental body-guard, would at once have informed the Cossacks of our hiding-place. But the man in the white turban sought to restrain him, and wished first to speak with us.

“The Tartars found us at the appointed place. The White Turban was a Mollah, a fine grey-haired old man with a venerable countenance. To him we frankly confided the history of our sufferings and the object we had in view. After hearing us, he remained for some time buried in thought. To our great surprise one of the Tartars now addressed us in broken Polish, and told us that he had been at Warsaw. At this we were so overjoyed that we were near embracing the man. But the comrade we had sent out to reconnoitre had rejoined us. He seized the Tartar furiously by the beard, upbraided him with the treacherous advice he had given to his countrymen, and threatened to kill him. The old Mollah interfered as peacemaker, and assured us of his assistance and protection, if it were seriously our intention to escape into Turkey and become converts to the creed of Mahomet. We protested that such was our design, although we mentally prayed to our God and to the Virgin to forgive us this necessary lie, for our design was to escape from the Russian hell, but not to become faithless to our holy religion. Before the Mollah departed, he had to swear by his beard and by the Prophet that he would not betray us. We made the others take the same oath. The ex-life-guardsman we proposed keeping as a hostage. But the Mollah begged us not to do so, and to trust to his word, which he pledged for the man’s silence. Above all we wanted provisions. The Tartars had unfortunately come empty-handed. The pangs of hunger almost drove us to accompany them into the village. But the Mollah warned us that we should there find families of Armenian peasants, who would certainly betray us to the Russians. Fluctuating between hope and fear, we saw them depart. The Mollah’s last advice was to be vigilant during the night, since our presence might have been observed by others, who might report it to the Russians.

“Two heavy hours went by. Night had set in, and the stillness was broken only by the occasional howling of the village dogs. As the distance to the village was not great, and as the Mollah had so positively promised to send us food immediately, our suspicions were again aroused, and we mutually reproached each other with having been so foolish as to trust to the oaths of the Tartars and with having suffered them all to depart, instead of keeping the Mollah and the Warsaw man as hostages. Taking our muskets, we stationed ourselves upon the look-out. Our apprehensions were not unfounded. Soon we heard through the darkness the neighing of horses and distant voices. Those of our comrades who were strongest on their legs went out to reconnoitre, and came back with the terrible intelligence that they had plainly distinguished the voices of Russians. Meanwhile the noise of horses’ feet died away; once more all was still as the grave; and even the vigilant dogs seemed sunk in sleep.

“Before the first grey of morning appeared, one of the Tartars whom we had met the day before, in the wood, came to us, with three others whom we had not yet seen. They brought us a great dish of rice, and half a roasted lamb; also bread and fruit. Our presence in the neighbourhood, they said, had been disclosed to the Russians by an Armenian of the village. The Cossack captain had sent for the Mollah and threatened him, but the old man had revealed nothing. The Cossacks did not know our exact hiding-place, and one of the Tartars had led them in a wrong direction. As we were already considered as Mahometans, no Tartar would betray us, unless it were that man who had been in Warsaw, and who was an object of contempt with the people of the village on account of his dissolute and drunken habits.

“Our fierce hunger appeased, our spirits and courage revived, and we decided to continue our march at once. The Tartars advised us not to cross the Arpatschai, which was too closely guarded by the Russian frontier piquets, but to move more northwards, across the mountains of Achalziche, in which direction we should find it far easier to reach Turkish territory. We bade them a grateful farewell. But with the first beam of morning we heard the wild hurra of the Cossacks and saw them in the distance, galloping, accompanied by a number of Tartar horsemen, to cut us off from the valley. We drew back amongst the bushes, and fired a full volley at the nearest group of horsemen, as it tried to force its way into the thicket. Two Cossacks and a Tartar fell, and the rest took to a cowardly flight. We retreated forthwith to the mountain summits whence we had so recently descended, and did not even wait to search the fallen men. Soon a single horseman rode towards us, waving a green branch. We recognised one of the Tartars who had brought us food. He said that the Mollah was at the old place in the wood, and wished to speak with us. We had nothing more to fear from the Cossacks. They took us to be twice as numerous as we really were, had returned to their post and sent to Gumri for reinforcements, which could not arrive before evening. Observing that we harboured mistrust, the man offered to remain as a hostage. I and three of my comrades went to the appointed place. The others remained on the mountain, with the Tartar in custody. The Mollah was really waiting for us, with two of the men who had accompanied him the previous evening. We learned, to our astonishment, that the Tartar whom we had shot was the same old soldier who had been at Warsaw and had spoken Polish to us. We held this to be a judgment of God. For, notwithstanding his oath, the man had betrayed our hiding-place to the Russians, who were already aware of our vicinity. The other villagers had been compelled to mount and follow the Cossacks, but, at the first volley, gladly joined the latter in their flight.”

The Mollah gave the unfortunate Poles directions as to the road, and as to how they should act if they fell into the hands of the Pasha of Kars, who was well disposed towards Russia, and might deliver them up through fear or greed of gain. All that day they toiled over the rude mountain peaks, and next morning they were so lucky as to kill a wild goat; but on those barren heights not a stick of wood was to be found, and they had to eat the flesh raw. After a few hours’ rest they continued their arduous journey. It was bitterly cold, the snow fell in thick flakes, and a cutting wind beat in their faces. Towards evening, guided by a light, they reached the wretched huts of some poor Russian frontier settlers, who were cooking their food over fires of dried cow-dung. From these people they obtained meat and drink, gave them the few kopeks they had left, which they knew would not pass current in Turkey, and departed, their flasks filled with brandy, and bearing with them the best wishes of their poor but hospitable entertainers. Their march next day was through a dense fog, which covered the high ground. They could not see ten paces before them, and risked, at every step, a fall over a precipice. On the other hand, they flattered themselves that they could pass the frontier—there marked by the mountain chain—unseen by the Russian troops. To guard against smuggling and the plague, as well as against military desertion and the flight of the natives into Turkey, the frontier line had latterly been greatly strengthened. But, once on the southern slope of the mountains, the fugitives had been assured, they would meet no more Cossacks and would be on Turkish ground. Accordingly they gave themselves up to unbounded joy at being out of Russia and of danger.

“How great was our horror,” continued Saremba, “when, on descending into the valley, the fog lifted, and we found ourselves close to a post of Cossacks. It was too late to retreat. We marched forward in military order, keeping step as upon parade. The stratagem succeeded. The Cossack sentinel took us for a Russian patrol. We surrounded the house, made prisoners of the sentry and of seven half-drunken Cossacks, and learned from them that in the fog we had missed our way over the frontier. The piquet was thirty men strong, but two and twenty had marched that very day on patrol duty. The report of our flight had been received from Gumri, as well as information that the Cossacks should be reinforced by a detachment of infantry. The sentry had taken us for this expected detachment. We were well pleased with the issue of our adventure. The contents of the Cossacks’ larder revived and strengthened us, and we packed the fragments of the feast in our knapsacks. We also took their horses, and finally, at their own request bound them hand and foot; for, now that they were sober, they trembled for the consequences of having allowed themselves to be surprised and unresistingly overpowered. They anticipated a severe punishment, and consulted together how they should best extenuate their fault. The dense morning fog was a good circumstance to plead, and so was our superiority of numbers, and also the expectation of a Russian infantry piquet from Gumri. But when all was said, the poor fellows were still pretty sure to get the stick. At their request we fastened the door of the piquet-house before marching away with our booty. That afternoon we crossed the mountains, and reached, without further adventure, a Turkish military post.”

The sufferings and disasters of these fourteen hardy Poles were not yet at an end. After their arms had been taken from them, their arrival was reported to the Pasha of Kars, to whom the Russian commandant at Gumri forthwith sent a threatening letter, demanding the bodies of the fugitives. Four days of anxious suspense ensued, during which orderlies rode to and fro, carrying the correspondence between the Pasha and the commandant, and at last the Poles were told that their only chance to avoid being delivered up was instantly to become Mahometans. In this perplexity they accepted the secret offer of the son of a Lasistan bey to aid their flight into the Pashalik of Trebizond. They started in the night with a caravan of armed mountaineers. On the first day they were divided into two parties, which were separated from each other. On the second day, four, out of the six who were with Saremba, disappeared, although they entreated to be left together. Finally, when Saremba awoke upon the third morning, he found himself alone. Thus torn from the true and steadfast friends in whose brave companionship he had faced and surmounted so many perils, his courage deserted him; he wept aloud, and cursed his fate. There was good cause for his grief when he came to know all. The rascally Turk who had facilitated their flight had sold them into slavery. For six months Saremba toiled under a cruel taskmaster, until fever robbed him of his strength; when his owner, Ali Bey, took him to Trebizond, where the Pole had invented the existence of a brother who would pay his ransom. There he obtained the protection of the French consul, was forwarded to Constantinople, married a Greek woman, and managed to eke out an existence. Of the thirteen comrades who had fled with him from Manglis he had never seen or heard anything, and tears fell upon the honest fellow’s weather-beaten moustache as he deplored their probable fate—that of numbers of Polish deserters, who drag out a wretched existence, as slaves to the infidel, in the frontier provinces of Asiatic Turkey.

Dr Wagner found his follower’s narrative so striking, and so illustrative of the characteristics of the inhabitants of the trans-Caucasian frontier, that he at once wrote it down in his journal; and he did quite right, for certainly Saremba’s adventures equal, if they do not exceed, in interest, any of the Doctor’s own.

After Gumysh Haneh, the next town on the road to Erzroum is Baiburt, once noted for its inhabitants’ fanaticism and hatred of all Europeans. Poverty, misery, and the visit of the Russians in 1828, have broken their spirit, and humbled them to the dust. Theirs was the last effort of resistance against Paskewitch, but all their fierce fanaticism did not qualify them to cope with the well-drilled Russian troops. “Is it true,” asked Saremba, with a little irony in his tone, of a white-bearded Turk, in the expression of whose hard and furrowed features something of the old spirit was still plainly to be read—“is it true that the _Moskof_ has come as far as this?” “_Geldi!_” (he came) was the old man’s laconic but melancholy reply. At Baiburt the traveller has a foretaste of the impoverished, decayed, half-ruined towns which extend thence through the whole of Asiatic Turkey to the Persian frontier, and to whose deplorable condition Erzroum constitutes the sole exception. Journeying south-east from Baiburt to the latter city, the first day’s march brings the traveller, by the usual caravan road, to no regular halting-place for the night. At Baiburt Dr Wagner parted from his Turkish travelling companions, and proceeded with only Saremba and a horse-guide, “a man of most horrible physiognomy, who professed to be a Turk, but whose long distorted visage, great crooked nose, bushy brows, dingy complexion, puffy turban, and ragged clothes, gave him more the look of a Kourd or Yezidee. The fellow spoke a Turkish,” continues the Doctor, “of which I understood nothing, and my servant, although well acquainted with the language of Stamboul, but little. He was very taciturn, and replied to the questions I occasionally put to him by croaking out inarticulate guttural sounds, something between the cry of a screech-owl and the snarl of a jackal. Then he twisted his ugly face so strangely, and grinned and ground his teeth in so hyena-like a fashion, that I was reminded of that horrible Texas Bob, whom Charles Sealsfield, in his Cabin-Book, has so graphically sketched.”