Chapter V: Preface (5)

The views from the different avenues leading through the cemetery, are very beautiful, particularly the higher part, in so much so, that it has become the great promenade of the Franks, who here assemble every evening, to enjoy the air and prospect; and by a singular anomaly, the cypress shades are converted into myrtle bowers, and gay groups of laughing Franks desecrate the last resting-place of the solemn Turks. The dogs, however, avenge this insult to the Moslem graves; there is no place where these hateful animals give such annoyance. Crouched among the decaying bodies, and attracted, perhaps, by the foul odour, they rush furiously at the passing Frank who comes to disturb them. It seems a strange contradiction in the Turks, that these carnivorous animals should be permitted to burrow among the remains of the dead, which they are so anxious to preserve, as the Oriental dogs have been, from the earliest times, the last consummaters of human vengeance,−-as they are now of human justice. The bodies of criminals are left weltering in the streets, with a view that the dogs may tear them. Their howl at night, issuing from the graves, adds much to the dismal solemnity of the field of tombs.

The illustration presents a view of a fine fountain. It was surmounted by a roof of correspondent beauty, but it fell a victim to the great fire that ravaged Pera in the year 1823, and destroyed all the European palaces, including the English. Near the fountain is a sacgee, or water-man, with his leathern vessel, and beside it are women in the common walking-dress of the country: this consists of a ferridgé and yasmac; the first is a wide misshapen garment, that totally conceals the form of the person; and the other is composed of two veils, drawn over the upper and lower parts of the face, and meeting at the ears, leaving open a small triangular space, through which the nose and eyes protrude. In the perspective is, the city of Constantinople, displaying its most conspicuous objects−-the Mosque of Solimanie, and the Aqueduct of Valens. In the centre is the new bridge which the sultan has erected across the harbour.

GATE OF ENTRANCE TO THE RECEPTION ROOM OF THE SERAGLIO.]

This magnificent palace occupies the apex of the triangle on which the city is built, including nearly the whole of ancient Byzantium. It was appropriated, under the Greek empire, as a college for the numerous priests of Santa Sophia, which is close beside it; but when Mahomet converted that edifice into a mosque, the convent was fixed on as the site of his own palace, and exceeds in beauty any other spot he could have chosen, even in his recent conquest. He added new buildings, and extended its area: his successors made further additions, and it now includes a space four miles in circumference; washed on one side by the sea of Marmora, and on the other by the Propontis, while the rapid current of the Bosphorus sweeps round its walls with a pure and limpid stream. It is filled with a gorgeous display of palaces, baths, mosques, kiosks, gardens, and cypress groves, laid out by the Greeks, and preserved by their Turkish successors. Here is also an armoury, containing the various weapons used by the crusaders in their attack on Constantinople; and the library of the Greek emperors, which was supposed formerly to contain all the classical literature of the ancient world, and many of the lost works of the classic writers,−-but it has been explored by Franks, and whatever remains of classical literature were once there, have now disappeared.

The principal entrance of the Seraglio is on the summit of the hill. There is the large and lofty gate called Babu Hummayoun, which literally signifies, “the high door,” and from thence the diplomatic phrase adopted by the Franks, who call the Turkish government “the Sublime Porte,” because all political business is supposed to be here transacted. It was erected by Mahomet II. On each side are deep niches in the thickness of the wall, and here the heads of inferior delinquents are exposed. Within is a large area of an irregular shape, containing the Taraphanay, or mint, built on the site of the Greek church dedicated to St. Irené. In the centre is a low marble pillar, destined for the exposure of the heads of pashas, and offenders of rank in the Turkish empire. Here they are displayed upon a large dish for the inspection of the curious; while a Bostangee stands by with a rod, with which he points to each head, and enumerates the offences of the sufferers. On the wall beside is usually a paper called a _yafta_, containing the titles of the criminal and other particulars, all strongly reminding us of the permanency of Oriental usages. In the first court, though it is thronged with the officers of the palace, a strict silence prevails, and the breach of it is attended with corporal chastisement. Passing through this, you enter the second gate. Here sits the chief executioner with his assistants, and on the walls are suspended various implements of punishment. Foreign ambassadors, proceeding to an audience, were formerly delayed in this spot for a considerable time, as if to exhibit the superiority of the Osmanli, and proud contempt for the infidels, who were meet associates for the public executioner of the empire. Beyond this is a more spacious and secluded court, planted and laid out in walks. On one side is an extensive range of kitchens, each appropriated to the respective officers in the seraglio. On the other is the divan, where the grand council is held, the troops paid, law-suits decided, and where foreign ambassadors used formerly to be washed, fed, and clothed, before they were admitted to the presence of the Sultan. It is a small edifice containing two compartments, surmounted with domes. Inside are sofas round the walls, which are called _divans_, and hence the name of the building. Behind, projecting from the wall above, is a small lattice-work gallery, capable of containing one person, entirely concealed from view. This has been compared to the Ear of Dionysius, where the tyrant sits unseen, and hears the opinions of those below. He sometimes applies his eye to a small aperture, through which it is seen gleaming like that of a basilisk, fascinating and paralyzing the speaker on whom it lights.

Beyond this, and opposite the entrance, is the gate represented in our illustration. It is decorated with the most gorgeous display of Turkish sculpture, covered with large semicircular projections, supported on a colonnade of pillars. The embossments are of gold on blue and green grounds, and the whole is in a style perfectly Oriental. To add to this effect, the gate is usually thronged with eunuchs, both black and white. The sallow aspect, beardless chin, and disproportioned bodies of these creatures, dressed in satin robes of bright green, have an unnatural appearance that is quite revolting. The time chosen, is a procession of the grand vizir to visit the Sultan, attended by guards in the costume of the seraglio. The practice of salutation, by drawing the hand or garment in the dust, and placing it afterwards on the forehead, is observed as the vizir is passing. Here it is that the foreign ambassadors and their suites were seized by the collar, and dragged, as it were, down the passage leading to the reception-room of the Sultan. This apartment is dark and mean, dimly lighted by a single window; and the throne is a dingy platform, very much resembling a four-post bed.

Beyond this, all is veiled in impenetrable mystery; and no Frank can enter, except at the hazard of his life. Some travellers have described the imminent peril they encountered in attempting to explore these forbidden haunts. From the secrecy observed, many suppose the word seraglio to be derived from “serrare,” to lock up, but _serai_ signifies simply a palace, or hotel, and is indiscriminately applied to any large building. Here begins the harem, or women’s apartments, in which are kept five hundred females, devoted exclusively to the Sultan’s pleasure. On his accession, he is presented with a number of virgin slaves, from whom he selects six, called afterwards “Kadina,” from whom alone are born heirs to his crown; she that first provides one, obtaining the superiority over the rest, is called “Hassekir Sultana.” The Sultan uses no such ceremony as throwing his handkerchief at the female whom he selects; she is simply conducted to him by the kislar aga, or chief eunuch, when he has made his choice.

From the gardens of the harem, gates open on the sea of Marmora, with kiosks of various Turkish character. One is the “yali kiosk,” where a suspected vizir, or other high officer of the seraglio, is ordered to retire to await his destiny. A venerable man, with a long beard, is sometimes observed, by passing boats, sitting in this kiosk, smoking his chibouque. He is a dismissed favourite, quietly waiting his doom; and when the door opens behind him, does not know whether the chaoush who appears, is the bearer of a Princess to strangle him, or a pelisse to invest him with new honours. Near it is a window, from whence the bodies of the strangled are thrown into the sea at night; and the number of the victims as they drop into the water, is announced by a correspondent discharge of the cannon below. The seraglio is inhabited by six thousand persons, including the corps of bostanjee, or gardeners, who are distinguished by a very peculiar costume.

BRUSA AND MOUNT OLYMPUS.

ASIA MINOR.]

This city, sometimes called Boursa, retains, with little corruption, its primitive name, and commemorates the king of Bithynia more celebrated for his illustrious guest than for any achievement of his own. When Hannibal fled from the persecutions of his inveterate enemies, the Romans, he retired into Bithynia, and was received with apparent kindness by Prusias, its king. In return for this hospitality, the accomplished Carthaginian introduced into the more barbarous regions of his host, the arts and sciences of Tyre and Phœnicia, and, in the year 220 before Christ, evinced his taste and judgment by building a city for him on the most beautiful spot that Asia Minor or any other country could afford, the side of Mount Olympus. The effeminate Oriental, however, had not the fortitude to continue the protection he had afforded. Terrified by the threats of the implacable Romans, he was preparing to surrender his persecuted guest to his enemies; but he anticipated his intention by poison, which historians say he carried in his ring for that emergency. He was closely besieged in a house in Brusa, where he swallowed the draught, and he was buried in Libyssa on the Propontis, where a monumental tumulus at this day marks the spot; and the first object a traveller to Brusa sees on landing, is the last resting-place of its illustrious founder. When he enters the city, he is shown a fortress, as the military work of that great master in the art of war, which has stood for 2058 years.

When the crusaders sacked Constantinople, and established their usurped authority in the capital of the Greek empire, they seized on all its dependent cities in Asia Minor, and Brusa formed part of the dynasty of Lascaris. It finally fell into the hands of the Turks when they expanded themselves over the region of Bythinia in 1327, and Othman made it the capital of the young Turkish empire. It continued to enjoy this distinction till the increasing power and ambition of the Osmanli led them into Europe, and they seized on Constantinople itself. Their seat of empire was then transferred to the great capital of the Greeks, and Brusa remained a provincial town.

It has, however, numerous local attractions, which will always render it a delicious residence to any people; and some of so peculiar a character, as to endear it particularly to a Turk. It is situated on the side of a magnificent mountain, embosomed in lofty forests behind, and having before it, on a gentle declivity, the richest tract in nature. Issuing above the forest scenery, are conspicuous the abrupt and rugged ridges of the mighty mountain, covered with eternal snows, glittering in the sun, and forming a strong contrast with the dark and dense foliage below them. The rays of summer acting for nine sultry months on the frozen surface, send down perennial torrents of pure and limpid water, tumbling over the sides of the mountain in a thousand streams. As they rush along, some of them are conducted through the city, and every street is permeated by a meandering rill of the coolest water, under a heated atmosphere, when the thermometer stands at 96°. From the streets it is led through mosques, bazaars, shops, and private houses, so that almost every edifice in the city has a marble reservoir in the centre, where the living waters leap and gurgle, and beside this the daily repast is spread. After thus imparting freshness and coolness to the city, the currents ripple into the plains below, where they form streams and rivulets, giving to the favoured spot a surprising verdure and fertility, when all beyond is parched and arid. Nor is this the only recommendation that endears this place to the followers of the Prophet. Besides these copious means of cold ablution, there are others which they still more highly prize. In the midst of those frigid solutions of snow, the soil contains hot water, which issues forth in strong currents, at a boiling temperature. These are collected into marble reservoirs of great extent, surmounted with lofty domes, and forming the most noble baths in the world. With such local and permanent attractions for a people whose most indispensable and unremitting duty is washing the body, it is not surprising that this should escape the fate of other deserted capitals. It has been remarked “that Nature seems to have created Brusa for the Turks.” It is, therefore, at this day a more beautiful city than when their sultan abandoned an Asiatic for an European capital. It is still resorted to as the most delightful residence in the Turkish dominions; and many of the sultans, as if to compensate for their abandonment when living, directed that their bodies should repose here in death. It is distinguished by many imperial tombs; and among the rest, that of Orchan, who first penetrated into Europe, but returned here to die.

Brusa stands upon an area of eight miles in circumference, and contains a population of 75,000 people, of whom 11,000 are Jews, and Christians of the Greek and Armenian Church. The most striking objects the town presents are, the mosques and spires, which seem to bear a larger proportion to the size of the place than in any other Mohammedan city: some travellers estimate them at 300. In fact, the whole surface seems swelling into domes, and bristling with tall and taper minarets. The tree whose foliage gives a distinctive character to the vicinity of the town is the mulberry, which is every where planted for the nourishment of silk-worms, the management of which forms the employment of the whole population. The web manufactured from their spinning is highly prized; and Brusa silk is not only famous all over the East, but it is one of those articles which the Asiatic traveller sends home to his friends among his Oriental curiosities.

But the circumstance which gives Brusa its greatest interest, is the mighty mountain on whose side it is built. Olympus, which literally means “all-shining,” was a name by which many mountains were distinguished amongst the ancients, from their conspicuous appearance; but it seems to be applied to this vast and glittering object with peculiar propriety. It stands on a base of seventy miles in circumference, rising by itself from the plain in single and solitary grandeur. Situated in the immediate vicinity of Troy, it is by some supposed the place assigned by Homer,

“Where Jove convened the senate of the skies;”

and poetic fiction adds its interest to the beauty and magnificence of nature.[5] Ascending from the city, the traveller penetrates an immense forest, with trees of surprising magnitude. This is intersected by ravines of immeasurable depth, and his way leads along the edges of precipices of awful grandeur. He at length emerges on an extensive plain of the richest verdure, intersected with considerable rivers, rushing from the snowy ridges, which now rise before him like a vast wall. These rivers are distinguished for nourishing fish, which are nowhere else to be found in Asia Minor: congenial to the cool streams of this region, they perish and cease to exist when carried down by the currents into the heated climate below. When the venturous traveller climbs through the barrier of snow which lies before him, he issues at length upon a clear and open summit, which the region of snow girdles as with a broad belt. From the point of this cone, 10,500 feet above the level of the plain, he commands a magnificent prospect of Asia and Europe; the Euxine and the Egean, with the strait and seas that unite them, winding like rivers just below him; and feels that “the wide-seeing Jupiter” could not have selected a more judicious point to overlook the affairs of the nether world. A singular object marks this summit,−-a circle of twelve large stones, resembling what we call druidical remains; but, from the Oriental region in which they are found, they recall the memory to the usages of a still more remote antiquity, when Moses “builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars,” and Joshua set up “twelve stones” in the midst of Jordan, and ordered twelve more to be carried on men’s shoulders, to be “set up in their lodging-place.”[6]

The snow of this mountain constitutes a considerable part of the treasures of the Turkish empire, as it does of its comforts and its luxuries. It is the exclusive property of the sultan, who farms it out to tenants, who vend it as more valuable than any produce of the soil. They are bound to supply the seraglio with a certain quantity, and the rest is disposed of to the population of Constantinople. It is sent down from the mountains cut into cuneiform wedges, and packed in felt, and caravans of mules are continually descending with such loads. It is brought to a promontory near Moudania, called from thence Booz Bournou, or “the Cape of Ice,” whence it is embarked for the capital, and in such abundance, that the poorest hummal cools his sherbet with it during the hottest season of the year.

The illustration presents all the objects of interest peculiar to the place. In the foreground is a caravan crossing an antique bridge, thrown over one of the snow-dissolved currents which intersect the plain. On one side buffaloes are dragging the ponderous arrhuba; on the other, they are grazing on the low pastures, or cooling themselves in the water. The horse, in Turkey, is never degraded to a servile use: the drudgery of labour is thrown upon the buffalo. It is a singular species of ox, of immense strength, but of a structure so coarse and rude, that it seems “as if Nature’s journeymen had made it, and that not well.” Its ponderous body, its clumsy limbs, its flatted horns, and lustreless eyes, like dull glass, give it a singular appearance of obstinacy and stupidity; but it drags the greatest burdens, through places impassable to other animals, with irresistible force. On the left is the city of Brusa, with its minarets, domes, and regal tombs; and in the background are the rugged ridges of Olympus, with its snows, forests, and precipices.

EMIR SULTAN, BRUSA.

ASIA MINOR.]

When the conqueror of Constantinople recrossed into Asia, and was preparing to attack his enemies, the sultan of Caramania, the shah of Persia, and the sultan of Egypt, who had conspired against him, he was overtaken by death near Brusa, and was brought to be buried, not in his new conquest in Europe, but in the ancient capital of his race. A magnificent mosque was erected at Emir Sultan, and his body deposited in a mausoleum beside it. This is represented in the background of the illustration. The time is that of the Ezan, when the muezzin invites the people to pray, represented by the human figures in the galleries of the minarets. When the prophet fled to Medina, he did not neglect the five periods of daily prayer: his followers wished that all the faithful should offer up theirs to Allah at the same moment, and that it should be publicly announced; but the manner of the announcement was a subject of controversy. Flags, bells, trumpets, and fires, were already used by various sects, but they were all exceptionable: the first, as not comporting with the grave sanctity of devotion−-the second, as a Christian practice, and to be abhorred−-the third, as a Jewish profanation−-and the last, as a symbol of idolatrous worship. In this indecision they separated; but during the night one of the party had a vision of a celestial being, clothed in green, who ascended to the top of the house, and called the people to prayer. This was communicated to the Prophet, who adopted the human voice as his signal.

The houses leading to the mosque are perfect specimens of Turkish edifices. They generally have a foundation of stone to the height of eight or ten feet, and then a superstructure of wood, supported on curved beams, which rest upon the masonry. The house is covered by a far-projecting roof, which is surmounted by a kiosk, or cupola, commanding a view of the distant country. The windows are strictly closed with lattice-work of cane, in the centre of which the incarcerated female endeavours to see what is passing in the street. Whenever the clattering of hoofs and the yelping of dogs announce a passing stranger, he will perceive, if he looks up, an eye gleaming on him through the aperture, or the ruddy lips of a mouth hissing on the dogs to attack him. A Turk seldom builds a house for himself entirely of stone. The insecurity of property is such, that he never calculates on any possession, even for his own life: and he thinks, besides, it is irreligious to erect any thing like a permanent dwelling for his own use on the earth. Hence it is, that while wooden frame-work houses have long since been laid aside in Europe, a Turk, with Oriental pertinacity, still clings to them; and hence it is that fires are so frequent, and that they consume not merely houses and streets, but whole towns, and are never extinguished till the inflammable materials are exhausted.

THE VALLEY OF GUIUK-SUEY, SWEET WATERS OF ASIA.]

“Sweet Waters” is a translation of the French _eaux douces_, and does not imply that they are distinguished by any remarkable purity or sweetness of taste, but simply that they are not salty. Two rivulets are so named by the Franks, one in Europe and the other in Asia; and they both flow through flat alluvial soils, and are generally muddy and dirty. Their banks, however, in summer are rich and verdant, enamelled with flowers, and are places of resort, where gay and festive parties of Turks, Franks, and Rayas meet for recreation. That in Asia is the place represented in the illustration.

It is situated on the shores of the Bosphorus, near the Anadoli Hissar, or Asiatic castle, in a verdant meadow, through which the river meanders. Here the Sultan has a kiosk to which he retires in summer, to practise archery or shooting with a rifle, and amuse himself with various sports, some very coarse, where buffoonery of a very indelicate kind forms the principal part of the entertainment. This kiosk is represented in the background of the illustration. This retreat of the sultan attracts great crowds of his subjects, particularly on the evening of Friday, the Turkish sabbath. Those who resort from the European shore come in caïques; those from the Asiatic in arrhubas. This carriage, peculiar to Turkey, forms a conspicuous object in the plate. The general shape is a flooring of planks laid upon high wheels, without springs: on this are erected pillars supporting a canopy of wood, from which descend fringed curtains of silk or rich stuff. The body and canopy are sometimes highly carved and gilded: within, sit on the floor as many women as it can contain, their heads just appearing above the edge whenever the motion on the uneven road throws the curtains aside. It is drawn by two or more buffaloes, or oxen, whose tails are fastened to a long and lofty bow extending from the neck-yokes, and projecting over their backs. This arch is profusely decorated with gaudy tassels. The white locks of the animals between the horns are stained with henna, and round the necks are suspended amulets of bright blue beads, to guard them against the effects of an evil eye. It is the most improved carriage of the Turkish empire, and travels at the rate of two miles an hour. In these machines, covered up from human gaze, the sultan and great men of the empire transport their harems: they are conducted by black eunuchs, with drawn sabres, who menace any one who approaches the line of march, with instant death.

When parties proceed to those pic-nics, even the members of a family never mix together. The unsocial jealousy of a Turk so separates the sexes, that the father, husband, and brother are never seen in the same groups with their female relatives. The women assemble on one side round the fountain, and the men on the other, under the trees. Between, are the various persons who vend refreshments to both indiscriminately. On the left is the _tchorbagee_ mixing sherbet. This word means, literally, any kind of fluid food, and it is sometimes applied to soup. A colonel of janissaries was called a tchorbagee, because he was the dispenser of soup to his corps. The drink, however, which is generally so called, is a decoction of dried fruit. Raisins, pears, peaches, prunes, and others, are prepared and kept for the purpose, and a liquor of various flavour is compounded from them, more or less acidulated or sweetened, and always cooled with ice, a small lump of which floats in every cup. On the other side is a vender of _yaourt_. This is a refreshment of universal consumption and extreme antiquity. The Turks affirm that Abraham was taught by an angel how to make it, and that Hagar, with her son Ishmael, would have perished in the wilderness, but for a pot of it she had the precaution to take with her. It is more certainly described by Strabo as in use in his day in the Taurica Chersonesus, and so is at least 1800 years old. It is a preparation of sour milk, forming a thick consistent mess, cool and grateful to the taste, and wholesome to the constitution. It is sold in small shallow bowls of coarse earthenware, and is the constant food of all classes in Turkey.[7]

The itinerant confectioner is always a necessary person at these meetings. He carries about upon his head a large wooden tray, and under his arm a stand with three legs. When required, he sets his stand, and lays his tray upon it covered with good things. The first is a composition of ground rice boiled to the consistence of a jelly, light and transparent, called _mahalabie_; from this lie cuts off a slice with a brass shovel, lays it on a plate, of which he has a pile on his tray, and, dividing it into square morsels, he drops on it attar of roses, or some other perfume, from a perforated silver vessel, and it forms a very cooling and delightful food. The next is halva, a composition of flour and honey, which separates into flakes; a third is a long roll like a black-pudding, formed of walnuts, enclosed in a tenacious glue, made of the inspissated juice of various fruits; the fourth is a gelatinous substance, formed into large square dies; it is made with honey and the expressed juice of fresh ripe grapes. It melts in the mouth with a very delicious flavour, and at once softens and mitigates any inflammation there. It is the most highly-prized confection of the Turks, who call it by a very appropriate name, rahat locoom, or “comfort to the throat,” which it well merits. These are the principal confections peculiar to the country; they are all excellent in their kind, and consumed in great quantities by the natives at those parties.

But of all the refreshments sought for, simple water is perhaps the most in request. It is inconceivable to a person born in a cold, humid, western climate, how necessary, not only to enjoyment but to existence, is this simple element, in the torrid regions of the East. The high estimation in which it is held, and the eagerness with which it is sought, are recorded by all writers, ancient and modern, sacred and profane. It is a pure beverage, particularly adapted to the taste of a Turk. He never rides to any distance without a leathern bottle of it attached to his saddle: he never receives a visit, that it is not handed to his guest; and in all convivial pic-nics on the grass, the sougee, or “water-vender,” is in the greatest request. He is everywhere seen moving about, with his clear glass cup in one hand, and his jar with a long spout in the other, and the cry constantly heard is, _sou_, _soook-sou_, “water, cold water.” When called, he attaches a mass of snow to the spout, and the water comes limpid and refrigerated through the pores of it. In the illustration is seen one of those magnificent fountains, by which the Turks express their respect for the precious fluid. The front is the reservoir into which the water pours. This is generally surrounded with gilded cups or basins, and a dervish, or other person, stands beside them to dispense the water.−-Among the fruit sold is the grape. The Turks cultivate a peculiar kind, called chaoush; it is large, white, and sweet, and consumed in vast quantities. Though producing indifferent wine, it is perhaps the finest table-grape that is cultivated. Among the sellers of refreshments, is the oozoomgee, who weighs out his fine fruit at five paras, or less than one halfpenny, per pound.

It has been truly said of the Turks, that “they hold impurity of the body in greater detestation than impurity of the mind.” This feeling the precepts of the Koran have caused or increased. They make frequent ablution so essential, that “without it prayer will be of no value in the eyes of God.” There is no point, therefore, of religious discipline, for which the directions are so minute, or so often repeated. Two modes are prescribed. The goul, which requires the ablution of the whole body, and the hodû, which confines it to the head and arms as high as the elbow; and where water cannot be procured in the desert, the ceremony must be performed by sand or dust, as its symbol. These ablutions are enjoined to all at stated times, but besides there are occasional circumstances which render them essential. The law enumerates eleven occurrences after which the person must wash, some of which are exceedingly curious, but not fit for the public eye. So important is this practice deemed, that it forms an item in every marriage-contract. The husband engages to allow his wife bath-money, as we do pin-money; and if it be withheld, she has only to go before the cadi, and turn her slipper upside down. If the complaint be not then redressed, it is a ground of divorce.

The first objects which strike a stranger on entering a Turkish city are the mosques, and the next certain edifices, roofed like them with domes, contiguous to each other. These domes are perforated by a number of apertures, which are closed by hemispheres of glass, resembling the globes by which our streets were lighted, inverted on the roof. These edifices are the public _hummums_,[8] or baths, and the globes the means by which the light is admitted. There is no town in the Turkish empire so obscure, or so destitute of other comforts, that is not provided with a public bath, which is open from four o’clock in the morning until eight in the evening. The bather enters a saloon, in the midst of which is a fountain, where the linen of the establishment is usually washed; round this is a divan, covered with mats or cushions, on which he sits smoking till the _hummumgee_, or master of the bath, directs him to undress. His clothes are carefully deposited in a shawl tied up in the corners, and remain on his seat till his return. The _tellah_, or bathing attendant, now approaches, with two aprons and a napkin: the first he ties round his waist, and the latter round his head. He is then led into another saloon, more heated than the first; but the heat is so regulated that he feels no difference, though divested of his clothes; and when the body is thus prepared by this gradual increase of temperature, he is led into a third, when the business of the bath commences. This, in some baths, is very fine, supported on columns, and lined with marble.

The marble flooring is so hot, that he is now obliged to mount on wooden pattens, as his bare feet could not endure to come in contact with it. A dense vapour sometimes so fills this saloon, that he sees nothing distinctly, but figures flit before him, like visions in a mist. At the sides are ornamented fountains, whence issue pipes of hot and cold water, which he mixes to his fancy, and bedews his person with it from a large copper or iron spoon provided for the purpose. Having walked or sat in this heated mist till a profuse perspiration bursts out, the _tellah_ again approaches, and commences his operations. He lays the bather on his back or face, and pins him to the ground by kneeling heavily on him; and having thus secured him, he handles him in the rudest and most painful manner: he twists and turns the limbs, so as to seem to dislocate every joint. The sufferer feels as if the very spine was separated, and the vertebræ of the back torn asunder. It is in vain he complains of this treatment, screams out in anguish and apprehension, and struggles to extricate himself. The incubus sits grinning upon him, and torturing him till he becomes passive from very exhaustion. When this horrid operation is over, the tormentor offers to shave him; and if he make no resistance, he leaves but one small lock of hair on the crown, by which the angel of death is to draw him from his winding-sheet. It is remarkable, that while the bather is burning with heat, the flesh of this fiend, though exposed to the same temperature, is as cold and chilling as monumental marble. A second tellah now attends, and uses him more gently than the first: he envelopes his hands in gloves, or little bags of camlet, and, by a gentle and dexterous pressure of the surface, he expresses, as it were, all the deposit of insensible perspiration: it is surprising what a quantity he peels from the surface of the skin, of this inspissated fluid, resembling in colour and consistence rolls or flakes of dough.

When this substance ceases to exude, the operator rubs him with scented soap, and drenches him almost to suffocation with deluges of hot water. After this thorough ablution, he wipes him perfectly dry with soft, warm, perfumed towels, and leads him to a divan, on which he reposes some time,--still in a state of nudity, with the exception of a shawl thrown over him. Here refreshments are brought, and partaken of with an extraordinary increase of appetite; after which he rises and dresses, perfectly refreshed. Before he goes forth, a looking-glass set in mother-of-pearl is brought, to adjust his cravat, on the glass of which he deposits the price of his bath. It was originally settled at four aspers, which according to the present currency would be about one-third of a farthing, and it still continues nearly the same in the small towns and villages. In the capital, however, it is increased, in the more sumptuous baths, to fifty paras, or four pence.

Where warm-springs are found, they are immediately diverted into reservoirs, and edifices erected over them. Those of Kaplizza, near Brusa, already mentioned, are perhaps the finest in the world. In the centre saloon, under a noble dome, supported by marble pillars, is a basin of fifteen yards in circumference, also of polished marble, and five feet deep, filled with hot and limpid water. At its source, whence it first issues into day, it is at a boiling heat, and blisters the finger that incautiously feels it. In the baths, however, the heat is reduced to a tolerable temperature−-in summer to 102°, and in winter to 90°. The process of bathing, substituting water for steam, is the same as that described. The salutary effects of it are highly extolled, and perhaps with reason−-opening the pores, and emulging, as the hakims say, the perspiratory glands; but strangers who first submit to the rude and suffocating process, complain that it is as debilitating as it is painful, under the coarse and awkward manipulation of such an operator; and to natives who constantly use it, it is one of the enervating causes which is justly supposed to exhaust the strength and prostrate the energies of a modern Turk.

The mysteries of a female bath, it is not permitted to see, no more than those of Eleusis: all that could be known, Lady Mary Wortley Montague has told a century ago. Their bath is the great coffee-house, where they assemble, and enjoy a freedom they can nowhere else indulge. If a stranger enter this sacred place by mistake, even his mistake is punished with death. Not long since a Frank stumbled into one, supposing it to be for his own sex; he was instantly seized, and dragged before the cadi. On his way, some friendly passenger suggested to him to feign madness, as his only chance of escape: he took the hint, and did so with such success, that the cadi, instead of ordering him to execution, dismissed him with that tenderness and respect the Turks show to the foolish or insane, whom they fancy to be chosen vessels inspired by Allah with a better gift than reason. Another Frank, presuming on the impunity thus acquired, entered a female bath by design. He was seized; but not counterfeiting insanity with such success, he was suspected−-and disappearing soon after, was supposed to have been strangled.

THE AURUT BAZAAR, OR SLAVE MARKET.]

The Aurut Bazaar, or Female Slave Market, stands in the quarter of the city near the burnt column. It consists of a quadrangular edifice, including a square area of about two hundred feet, surrounded with apartments. In the front are platforms raised four or five feet from the ground, and ascended by steps, forming a kind of colonnade, and in the rear are latticed windows. In the one, blacks and slaves of an inferior kind are kept and disposed of; in the other, those of a choicer quality, who are guarded with a more jealous vigilance, and secluded from the public eye.

All parts of the old world furnish materials for this market, but principally the shores of the Mediterranean and the eastern end of the Euxine sea. The human face is here seen in every diversity of colour, from the ebony of Nubia and Abyssinia, to the snowy whiteness of the mountains of Georgia and Mingrelia, Formerly, Franks were freely admitted into this bazaar, but they were excluded by a firman, because it was supposed they purchased slaves only for the purpose of giving them freedom; and the Turks allow no manumission unless the captives embrace Islamism, and then they become free as of right, and can be no more sold. The strictness of this exclusion, however, is now relaxed, and Franks are admitted to see, but not to purchase.

The first impression made upon a stranger is the cheerfulness and hilarity of the inmates of this prison. He enters with his mind full of the horrors of slavery: he expects to see tender females dragged from their families, the ties of nature torn asunder, and the helpless victims overwhelmed with grief−-sad, and weeping, and sunk in despondency. He sees no such thing: they are singularly cheerful and gay, use every means to attract his attention, and, in their various dialects, invite him to purchase them.[9] The circumstances of their early life, and the state into which they are about to enter, account for this. The condition of slavery in Turkey is generally to them an amelioriation. A regular traffic is carried on, and parents in Circassia and Georgia educate their most comely daughters, not less that they should profit by the sale, than that the children should profit by being sold. They impress upon their minds the splendid fortune that awaits them at Stambool; and when the annual traders arrive at Anaka, or other ports of the Euxine, for white slaves, the girl leaves without regret the home where she is taught to feel no ties of family affection, and embarks with a light heart and joyous anticipations of the happy prospect before her. Nor are her bright hopes disappointed: the state of slavery in which she is found, and the traffic by which she is bought, do not degrade her in the eye of the Turk who purchases her; she is transferred to the harem of some vizir or pasha, where she may become its mistress, invested with all the consequence and dignity of his favourite wife; the splendid destiny of those that are periodically purchased for the imperial seraglio is quite dazzling−-any one of them may become the arbitress of empires, and the mother of sultans. Yet this bright prospect is clouded by dismal forebodings. When the reigning monarch dies, his whole female establishment purchased here, is removed to the eski seraï, or old palace, where five hundred of the most youthful and lovely females in the universe are condemned to a state of perpetual celibacy and seclusion. A still more terrible fate sometimes attends them. On vain pretexts they are sacrificed to the caprice or suspicion of the successor to the throne; and hundreds at once, in the prime of life and splendour of beauty, are consigned to a watery grave.

The merchants who purchase slaves are usually Jews. When a female of great beauty is not accomplished in the arts of pleasing, the Jew undertakes her instruction. She is taught, by competent masters, music, dancing, and other personal attractions−-the cultivation of the mind is never thought of. When her value is thus enhanced by her acquirements, the most extravagant price is exacted and given. The usual purchase of a young white slave is 6000 piastres, or about £100: for a black, merely intended for the domestic drudgery which a Turkish woman will not submit to, 1200 piastres, or £16.

The illustration represents the act of sale. On one side are females purchasing black servants. A slight examination as to health and strength is all that is used. The girl starts up, draws her scanty coarse garments about her, and, with a merry laugh and cheerful countenance, trips away after her mistress. The severe decorum of a Turk at once changes her half-nakedness for a more suitable dress: her head and feet are no longer bare−-her dark visage is dignified with a snow-white veil−--and she feels pride and gratification in her new and altered state. On the other side are white slaves, who are examined not by females, but by a master, of whose happiness they are hereafter to constitute a part. He is attended by his black eunuch, and the slave-merchant is pointing out all the personal charms of his purchase, and eulogising those which escape his observation. In the gallery above, are slave-merchants settling their various accounts, with the aid of coffee and tobacco.

THE MOSQUE OF YENI JAMI.]

This is called _Yeni_, or “new,” to distinguish it from those of more ancient structure. It is justly remarked by writers, that no people have selected such excellent sites for their religious houses as the Turks: they are generally seen crowning the summits of hills, and having every advantage of display for their architectural ornaments. This, however, is an exception. It stands near the centre of the Golden Horn, in a low part of the city, but is very conspicuous from its situation. It swells, as it were, from the water’s edge, forming a mountain of edifices. The only place where Turkish beggars are seen is the area or vicinity of a mosque, and even here very few obtrude themselves; forming a strong contrast to the multitudes that beset houses of Christian worship. Those who with us are disabled by age or sickness, are in Turkey supported by their masters, either because they are slaves, or because the charity of the Osmanli will not suffer his brother to want. The few who ask alms are idiots, a respected and privileged class; or Arabs, who bear about standards, which they affirm were the same as those under which their ancestors propagated the faith of the Prophet. In the evening, you are met by a man who proffers you a candle, an orange, or a melon, and you purchase it for double its value: so, a Turkish beggar sells, but receives no alms. In the populous region about this mosque, such persons are more usually met than elsewhere. Immediately below is a great scala, or landing-place, which is constantly crowded with caïques of all shapes and sizes, and forms an animated scene of bustle and activity. Leading to it is one of the aqueducts which convey water for the necessary ablutions of the faithful, when they attend the call of the muezzin to assemble at the hour of prayer.

BALUK HANA AND METHOD OF FISHING FOR THE RED MULLET.

AT THIS SPOT, STATE CRIMINALS ARE THROWN INTO THE BOSPHORUS FROM THE SERAGLIO.]

This literally means the house or edifice of fish. It is one of the numerous stages erected on many parts of the Bosphorus, from the Euxine to the Propontis, to arrest the numerous shoals of fish that are migrating from sea to sea through this channel. It is formed in this manner:--posts are driven into the water at a short distance from the shore, with which they sometimes communicate by a platform; these are strengthened by cross-posts, forming a ladder by which the platform is ascended. On the summit is raised a shed, ten or twelve feet above the surface, over which is drawn a rude covering of mats. Below, is an enclosed area, marked by piles, into which the passing fish enter, and cannot again make their way out. A man continually on the watch in the shed gives notice of this to the fishermen on the shore, when the nets are drawn, and the whole shoal generally captured.

The progress of these shoals is frequently marked by flights of gulls and other aquatic birds, which, when the net is drawn, rush down among the fishermen, and fearlessly and clamorously demand their share, which is never withheld from them. These wild fowl are so tame by use and impunity, that they are sometimes seen disputing with a Turk for a particular fish; and the man almost always yields to the bird.

The fish usually taken in these nets are of various sizes, and many peculiar to this region. The largest is the _xiphias_, or sword-fish, sometimes attaining the length of six or eight feet in the body, and a circumference of three or four. From its snout is projected a flat horn, a yard or more in length, exactly resembling a Highland broad-sword, from whence the fish derives its name. Its flesh is red, and when exposed for sale in the market, a junk of it might be mistaken for a round of beef. The next in size is the _thunny_; the various kinds of scomber, down to the size of small mackerel fry; the _lufer_ and the _kephālos_, called so by the Greeks, from the size of its head. Among the flatfish is a species of turbot, of excellent quality, covered with hard cartilaginous knobby scales like a bossy shield, and thence called by the Turks, _kalchan_, or the buckler-fish. These, and an infinite variety of others, crowd the waters in incredible quantities, for nine months in the year; and the boats engaged in taking them are so numerous, as to stretch from side to side of the strait in such a way as to bridge the current; and the eagerness to take them is so great, that all ranks indulge in it, from the sultan to the hummal. Mustapha, the brother of Mahmoud, was engaged in it when he heard of the insurrection in favour of Selim−-and he left his fishing, to strangle his cousin. The present sultan is so fond of it, that one of his apartments at Beshiktash has a trap-door over the water, from whence he often angles. Nor is this amusement confined to the day: by night the waters are covered with many lights, which float in various mazes, and form picturesque objects round the islands of the Propontis. A brazier is projected from the prow, in which a glowing fire is kept up continually, and the fish, attracted by the flame, hover about like moths round a taper, and are harpooned as they approach the boat; when the water is disturbed or muddy, a small quantity of oil is cast upon the surface, which renders it transparent and every object distinct.[10]

The Baluk Hané, represented in the illustration, is distinguished by another circumstance. It is situated on the sea of Marmora, below the walls of the seraglio, and above it are seen, towering, the dome and minarets of the mosque of Achmet. The torch in the caïque is not for the purpose of fishing, but for a very different and dismal one. When sentence of death is passed on an inmate of the seraglio, he is brought to the _Capi Arasi_, a space so called between the second and third gates, and there arrested “within the doors,” as it is ordered. Here the executioners reside who despatch him; and the strangled or headless man is brought down to a kiosk on the sea-wall, from whence a window opens on the water. From hence, in the dead of night, the body is consigned to a caïque in waiting, which rows to a little distance, and consigns it to its watery grave. The sullen plash is sometimes accompanied by a discharge of a gun on a wharf not far distant, and the silence of the night is broken by a solemn sound which comes booming over the water as the knell of the departed. So frequent have these executions been, that a passing boat to ships in the harbour, at this place, might always expect to see at midnight the gleam of a torch attendant on this watery funeral. There is something insuperably revolting in the proximity of the places. The fish are said to be attracted by such bait, and are thus fed and fattened on human flesh in this aquatic charnel-house.

THE GREAT BAZAAR, CONSTANTINOPLE.]

Markets at Constantinople, where various commodities are vended, are properly distinguished by three names−-_Bezesteen_ contained shops where cloth was sold; _Bazaar_ was an open market where eatables were exposed for sale; thus _Et-Bazaar_, and _Baluk-Bazaar_, are the flesh and fish markets; and _Charschey_ was a covered street, with stalls or shops on each side, where all kinds of manufactured wares were to be met with. These original designations, however, have merged into one, and bazaar is a general name by which every market is denominated.