Chapter IX: Part 9

The unofficial side of _Baïram_ is quite as full of colour in its more scattered way. Then every man who can afford it, or whose master can, puts on a new suit of clothes. He at least dons something new, if only a gay handkerchief about his fez or neck. It is interesting to stand at some busy corner in a Turkish quarter and watch the crowd in its party-coloured holiday finery. Friends meeting each other stop, seize a hand between their two, and solemnly rub cheeks. Inferiors try to kiss the hand of superiors, who try in turn to snatch the hand away, their success depending on the degree of their superiority. And everybody wishes everybody else a blessed _Baïram_. The _bekjis_—watchmen who have beaten drums during the nights of Ramazan in order to get people up in time for their last meal—march about collecting tips. They announce themselves by their drums, to which they often add a pipe or a small violin, and they carry a pole that is gaudy with the handkerchiefs people give them. The sound of music, however, often means that dancing is on. There is sure to be something of the sort wherever Kürds or Laz gather together. Your true Turk is too dignified for such frivolities. And be it well understood that the only women who dance in the open at _Baïram_ are gipsies, hussies who love to deck themselves out in yellow and who blush not to reveal their faces or their ankles. I regret that I am too little of an expert in matters terpsichorean to enter into the fine points of these performances. I can no more than sketch out an impression of a big green tent in some vacant lot, of the high lights of brass that go with tea and coffee drinking in its shadow, and of fiercely moustachioed persons in tall felt caps, in hooded or haply goatskin jackets, and in wide trousers, if they be Kürds, or of slighter Laz with tight black legs that bulge out at the top and hoods picturesquely knotted about their heads, who join hands and begin very slowly a swaying step that grows wilder and wilder with the throbbing of a demon drum.

It is the children, however, to whom _Baïram_ chiefly belongs. In their honour all the open spaces of the Mohammedan quarters are utilised for fairs and playgrounds. The principal resort of the kind is the yard surrounding the mosque of the Conqueror—or it used to be before gardens were planted there. I discovered it quite by accident one day when I went to Stamboul to see how _Baïram_ was being celebrated and saw a quantity of carts, dressed out with flags and greens, full of children. I followed the carts until I came upon the most festive confusion of voices, of tents, of music, of horses, of donkeys, of itinerant venders, of fezzed papas, of _charshafed_ mammas, of small girls in wonderful silks and satins, and small boys as often as not in the uniform of generals. Amidst them I remarked with particular pleasure a decorative Arab in white, who strode about with a collection of divinatory green birds. A countryman of his had a funny little peep-show, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, into which I was dying to look but considered myself too dignified to do so. Neither did I go into the tent which bore this ingratiating sign: “Ici on expose animaux vivans et la demoiselle laquelle à la poitrine une cavité.” In other tents the physical man was more particularly catered to. Indeed, stuffing seems to be the great affair of _Baïram_. I must not omit, however, the numerous contrivances for inducing motion more or less violent. Merry-go-rounds propelled by hand, swings in the form of boats, milder swings for girls, where one could sit under an awning like a lady and run no risk of being dashed to death, and a selection of miniature vehicles for the very little person, were so many arguments against Mr. Kipling and the East-is-East theory. Another argument was put forward by the discreet gambler, with his quick eye for the police, who in various familiar ways tempted youth to flirt with destiny.

It was with some misgiving that I first entered this assemblage, mine being the only hat and camera visible. But during the several _Baïrams_ that I returned there no one ever seemed to resent my presence except one young and zealous police officer who made up his mind that I had no other purpose in visiting the fair of Fatih than to take photographs of ladies. At a tent where wrestling was going on they once demanded a pound of me for admission, supposing that I was a post-card man and would make vast gains out of their entertainment. But at another, where I paid the customary ten cents or less, I was invited into the place of honour; and there, no seats being left, a naval officer insisted on my occupying his—because, as he said, I was an amateur of the great Turkish sport and a guest, _i. e._, a foreigner. Occidental hospitality does not often take that particular form. Another trait struck my transatlantic eye when I happened once to be at Fatih on the last day of _Baïram_. The barkers had all been shouting: “Come, children! Come! To-morrow is not _Baïram_!” Presently cannon banged to announce _ikindi_, the afternoon hour of prayer, which is both the beginning and the end of _Baïram_. All about me I heard people saying: “_Baïram_ is finished.” And _Baïram_ was finished. It was only the middle of a sunny afternoon, and in any other country the merrymaking would have gone on till night. But the children went away, and men began taking down the swings and tents in the most philosophical manner. In 1911 and 1912 Baïram was hardly celebrated at all, as a mark of mourning for the Italian and Balkan wars.

The greater _Baïram_, called _Kourban Baïram_, or the Feast of Sacrifice, is more of a religious observance. It lasts one day longer than the other. It commemorates, as I have said, the sacrifice of Abraham. According to Mohammedan tradition, however, Ishmael and not Isaac was the hero of that occasion. In memory of the miracle of his escape every household that can afford to do so sacrifices at least one ram on the 10th Zilhijeh. Among the rich a ram is provided for each member of the family, and those who have recently died are not forgotten. It is also the custom to make presents of rams, as between friends, engaged couples, and masters and dependants. The Sultan is naturally distinguished among these donors by the scale of his generosity. He gives a sacrificial ram to each of the imperial mosques and theological schools, as well as to those whom he delights to honour. These huge creatures belong to a very aristocratic race. They are bred by a semi-religious, semi-agricultural community called the _Saïeh Ojaghî_, established since the early days of the conquest in the inner valley of the Golden Horn. The members of this community still maintain their mediæval customs and costumes and enjoy certain traditional privileges. In return for these they rear the imperial rams, which they bring in procession to the Palace every year about a week before _Kourban Baïram_. There the rams are bathed, their horns and hoofs are gilded, and they are further adorned by velvet muzzles a-glitter with gold fringe and mirror glass. It is not an uncommon sight, although in the already mythic days of Abd ül Hamid it was far more common, to see an immaculate aide-de-camp driving in an open victoria with one of these gaudy companions.

It naturally requires a great many rams to supply the demand of _Kourban Baïram_. Consequently the open spaces of the Mohammedan quarters are full of baa-ing and bargaining for a week or ten days before the sacrifice. The landing-stages of Scutari and Beshiktash are headquarters of this traffic, Top Haneh, and the vicinity of the mosques of Yeni Jami, St. Sophia, Mohammed II, and Baïezid II. The last is perhaps the largest and most characteristic of these markets. Single rams that have been grown for the occasion stand picketed near the mosque awaiting a well-to-do purchaser. They are sometimes as large and as gaily dressed as the Sultan’s rams. They wear a necklace of blue beads to keep off the Evil Eye, and bits of their uncut fleece will be tied up with tinsel or ribbon. I remember one which had a red silk sash on which was printed his name in gold letters—_Arslan_, lion. Such a _kourban_ represents a sacrifice of five to fifteen pounds. Most buyers prefer to patronise the shepherds who bring their flocks into the city for the occasion. These shepherds, usually Albanians, make a very picturesque addition to the scene with their huge square-shouldered cloaks of felt, fancifully painted in red and blue. The sheep, too, are daubed with colour, to distinguish one flock from another. They sell for rather less than a pound apiece, growing cheaper as the day of sacrifice approaches. It is amusing to watch and to listen to the bargaining that goes on between shepherd and householder until their demands come within sight of each other. Most amusing, though, is it to see the ram—which, I suspect, is not seldom a sheep—when the bargain is made, carried away pickaback by one of the innumerable _hamals_ who hang around for such an opportunity. These strange couples are the characteristic harbinger of _Kourban Baïram_, the ram staring over the man’s shoulder with vast apparent interest in the sights he sees, his hind quarters making the roundest and most comfortable curve in the small of the _hamal’s_ back.

The actual sacrifice I have never seen, and I hope I never may. I once witnessed a cinematographic representation of what takes place at the Palace, and that was enough for me. The moving pictures represented his majesty returning from early morning prayer, alighting at the great door of Dolma Ba’hcheh, and greeting the dignitaries there assembled to receive him. He then read a brief prayer, took a knife from a platter handed him by an attendant, and passed it to the actual executioner. In theory, the head of each house is supposed to perform the sacrifice. The flesh must be given away, and the fleece, or its proceeds, is used for some charitable purpose.

X

TWO PROCESSIONS

I had been in and out of Constantinople a good many years before I even heard of the Sacred Caravan. The first I heard of it then was on the Bridge one day, when I became aware of a drum beating out a curious slow rhythm: _one_, two, _three_, _four_, five, six; _one_, two, _three_, _four_, five, six. I waited to see what would happen, and presently from the direction of Stamboul straggled a procession that, of course, I had no camera to photograph, against the grey dome and springing minarets of Yeni Jami. It was led by two men with tom-toms beating in unison the rhythm I had heard. I later learned that those tom-toms have a special name, _kyöz_. After the drummers marched a number of boys in pairs, carrying small furled flags of red silk embroidered with gold. Behind the boys strode a serious-looking person who held a small round shield and a drawn sword. He was followed by a man bearing a big green standard, embroidered and fringed with gold, on a white staff tipped by a sort of brass lyre in which were Arabic letters. Next came a palanquin of white wood slung between mules. It had glass windows and wooden shutters, and looked very cosy with its red silk cushions; but nobody was there to enjoy them. In the rear of the palanquin were men carrying staves with bunches of dyed ostrich feathers at their tips, like enormous dusters. And then slouched along a magnificent camel. He wore a green silk saddle-cloth embroidered in white, and above that a tall green silk hoodah with gold embroidery; and ostrich plumes nodded from him in tufts, and at his knees he wore caps of coloured beads. Behind him trotted a lot of mules in pairs, all loaded with small hair trunks. I did not know that the trunks were full of presents for the good people of Mecca and Medina.

So lamentable a state of ignorance would not be possible, I suppose, in Cairo, where the annual departure of the _Mahmal_ is one of the stock sights. But if the Constantinople caravan attracts less attention in the larger city, it is the more important of the two. The Sultan Bibars Boundoukdari, founder of the Mameluke dynasty of Egypt in the seventh century, was the first to send every year to Mecca a richly caparisoned camel with a new cover for the Kaaba. In the process of time other gifts were sent by the Sacred Caravan to both the holy cities. The first of the Turkish sultans to imitate this pious custom was Mehmed I, builder of the beautiful Green Mosque in Broussa. His great-great-grandson Selim I conquered Egypt in 1517, and with Egypt the relics of the Prophet and the insignia of the caliphate, which were removed to Constantinople. Having become by virtue of his conquest Protector and Servitor of the Holy Cities, Selim largely increased the generosity of his fathers. His descendants of to-day are unable to display the same munificence, but the annual _sourreh_ still forms the strongest material bond between Turkey and Arabia. It consists of money in bags, of robes, of uncut cloth, of shoes, and even of a certain kind of biscuit. The total value of these and other articles, which are all minutely prescribed by tradition and which are the perquisite of particular families or dignitaries, now amounts to some £ T. 30,000. As for the covering of the Kaaba, it is still made in Egypt and sent from there. The old coverings afford quite a revenue to the eunuchs in charge of the temple. The smallest shred is a relic of price, while a waistcoat of the precious fabric is supposed to make the wearer invulnerable and is a fit present for princes. The hangings for the Prophet’s tomb at Medina, changed less frequently, are woven in Constantinople. The work is a species of rite in itself, being performed in a room of the old palace, near the depository of the relics of the Prophet, by men who must be ceremonially pure, dressed in white.

The arrival of the imperial presents in Mecca is planned to coincide with the ceremonies of the greater pilgrimage. These take place at the Feast of Sacrifice, which with the two days preceding constitutes the holy week of Islam. Pilgrimage is a cardinal duty of every Moslem, expressly enjoined in the twenty-second Soura of the Koran. The first _Haj_ took place during the lifetime of the Prophet, and every year since then has seen the faithful gather in Mecca from the four quarters of the Mohammedan world. Constantinople is one of their chief rallying places, as being the seat of the Caliph and the natural point of departure for the pilgrims of northern Asia. These holy palmers add a note of their own to the streets of the capital during their seasons of migration, with their quilted coats of many colours, their big turbans, and their Mongol cast of feature. The day for the departure of the Sacred Caravan is the eve of _Berat Gejesi_, or the night when Gabriel revealed his mission to the Prophet. This is nearly four months before the great day of _Kourban Baïram_. In the times when the caravan marched overland from Scutari to Mecca, four months was none too much. But the pilgrimage has been vastly shortened in these days of steam, and will be shorter still when the last links of rail are laid between Constantinople and Mecca. For the time being, however, the Sacred Caravan still makes its official departure on the traditional day, going over to Scutari and waiting there until it is ready to embark for Beyrout. It makes a stop of twenty-five days in Damascus, where the imperial benevolence begins, and thence it proceeds by the new Hejaz railway to Medina. There is also a traditional day for the return of the pilgrims. Part of the ceremony of the Prophet’s birthday is the delivery to the Sultan of a letter from the _Sherif_ of Mecca, sent back by the leader of the Sacred Caravan in response to the Sultan’s own, together with a cluster of dates from the Holy City.

The ceremonial attending the departure of the Sacred Caravan is one of the last bits of Oriental colour left in Constantinople. I have now seen it several times, however, and every year it seems to lose something. My best procession was my first, which also happened to be the last under a Caliph of absolute power to draw upon the public funds. And although I had a camera with me that time, I was not allowed to use it. The convoy I had encountered on the bridge was merely a preliminary of the true pageant, escorting the _sourreh_ from the Ministry of Pious Foundations to Yîldîz Palace. There the presents, installed for two days under rich tents, were inspected by Abd ül Hamid and given into the custody of the _Sourreh Emini_. Then after an imposing religious ceremony the Sacred Caravan commenced its march. For a spectator without the palace walls the first intimation of its approach was given by several carriages of Palace ladies, who take an unofficial part in most public spectacles. Religious and military dignitaries also began sauntering down the road, which was bordered by soldiers, with an air of dispersing after some important function. Presently a double line of cavalrymen came into sight, preceding more religious and military dignitaries on horseback. One of them was the _Emir ül Haj_, the official head of the caravan, with much gold embroidery on his long coat. His post, still an important one, was far more so in the days when the caravan was less certain to escape attack on the way. Some of the horses, particularly of the _ülema_, were led by grooms; others were followed by orderlies carrying big cloth bundles. The body of the procession was made up of an irregular crowd of priests, officers, eunuchs, Palace servants, and nondescripts of various sorts, chanting at the top of their voices, followed by the big camel I had already seen, and the palanquin. But there were eight other camels this time, of all sizes, down to a fluffy little white one that everybody wanted to pat; and two children were immensely enjoying a ride in the palanquin. Behind that rode an official holding out on a red satin cushion an autograph letter from the Sultan to the _Sherif_ of Mecca, confirming him in his office for the coming year. Another bore a huge parcel in his arms, done up in white tissue-paper. This was a robe of honour sent by the Sultan to the _Sherif_. Others still carried silver vessels in which sweet savours burned—“in honour of the angels,” as a dervish once expressed it to me. Next marched a second irregular crowd, louder and more amazing than the first. In front of it were two rows of black men in scarlet robes, beating on tom-toms the rhythm I knew, which they alternated with a quicker one. And midway of the crowd a ring of excited persons brandished swords and challenged the enemies of the Prophet to mortal combat. They were an unaccustomed reminder, in tolerant Constantinople, of the early days of the faith. And then, tied with very new rope to the backs of some thirty mules walking two and two, each gay with flags and ostrich feathers and led by a solemn artilleryman, were the quaint little hair trunks in which the Commander of the Faithful sent his gifts to the far-away people of the Prophet.

There is another annual procession to be seen in Constantinople which recalls to Western eyes even more strangely than that of the _sourreh_ an older day of faith. Turks take no part in it, however, although they also observe the 10th of Mouharrem, on which it falls, as the anniversary of Joseph’s deliverance from prison in Egypt and of Noah’s exit from the ark. They make in honour of the occasion and present to their friends a sweet pudding to which they have given the name of the anniversary—_ashoureh_, or tenth day. The basis of it is boiled wheat, to which are added all manner of grains, nuts, and dried fruits; and the legend is that Noah and his people made a similar pudding on Mount Ararat out of what was left in the bins of the ark.

It is for the Persians that the day is peculiarly sacred. They also make a special dish for it, called _zerdeh_, of rice, sugar, and saffron. But that is a mere detail of what is for them the holiest season in the year. The Persians and the Turks belong to two different sects that have divided the Mohammedan world since the death of the Prophet. It is not for an unlettered unbeliever lightly to declare that so serious a matter was in the beginning a question of _cherchez la femme_. Still, it is a fact that the enmity of Aïsheh, the youngest wife of Mohammed, toward Ali, the Prophet’s cousin and son-in-law, did much to embitter those early differences of opinion. This lady, while on a journey, once caused tongues to wag by disappearing from her litter at a compromising hour and being brought back by a man considerably younger than her distinguished husband. Mohammed was finally forced to silence the voice of scandal by the twenty-fourth _Soura_ of the Koran, entitled Light. In the meantime, however, consulting with his four closest friends and followers as to what should be done, he was assured by three of them that there could be no doubt as to the innocence of the Mother of the Moslems. The fourth, Ali, ventured to suggest that the matter would bear investigation. Aïsheh never forgave the doubt of her step son-in-law, and her enmity was a potent factor in keeping Ali from the caliphate. He eventually did succeed, the fourth to do so, twenty-four years after the Prophet’s death. But the Sunnites regard him as the least of the first four Caliphs. The Shiïtes, on the other hand, do not recognise the first three Caliphs at all. They even fête the anniversary of the death of the second one, Omar. Ali is for them the vicar of God, and they hold his descendants to the ninth generation in peculiar reverence. The twelfth of these _Imams_, as they are called, the _Mehdi_, is supposed never to have died. It is believed that he will reappear before the last judgment in order, curiously enough, to overthrow antichrist. As for Ali, the hatred of Aïsheh pursued him even after he became Caliph, and stirred up disaffection against him. He was finally stabbed. His two sons, Hassan and Hüsseïn, also met violent deaths, the former being poisoned and the latter falling under thirty-three wounds on the heroic field of Kerbela. These tragic events are what the Shiïtes commemorate on the 10th of Mouharrem.

In Persia the entire month is a time of mourning. During the first ten days public passion-plays represent with bloody realism the lives and deaths of the first _Imams_. In Sunnite Constantinople, where there are some six thousand Persians, the commemoration is naturally less public, although the two sects no longer come to blows over it. Most of the Persian colony are from the region of Tabriz, where a Turkish dialect is spoken. Their headquarters are in a number of old stone _hans_ near the bazaars and the War Department. Large tents are put up in the courts of these _hans_ during Mouharrem, and there every evening _mollahs_ recite the story of the tragedy of Kerbela. It took place more than a thousand years ago, and religious feeling has cooled much in those thousand years, but the story still has a strange power to draw tears from the crowding Persians who listen to it. After the third night men with banners and torches give a greater semblance of reality to the recitation. On the tenth night, or on the night of the tenth day, which is the anniversary of the martyrdom of Hüsseïn, the torches and banners march about to the various _hans_ where Persians live.

The last time I saw this ceremony it included picturesque features new to me; and, by way of marking a dramatic contrast between century and century, an aeroplane suddenly whirred across the square of sky visible from the Valideh court. But I shall always remember the first of the processions that I saw. It was in the same paved courtyard of Valideh Han, surrounded by half-ruined cloisters. The central mosque, the temporary shed in one corner, the sparse trees, the silently waiting spectators, made so many vague shapes in the February dusk; and snow was falling. A strange clamour of pipes and drums and shouting began to make itself heard in the distance. Suddenly the archway giving entrance to the _han_ lighted up with a smoky glare, and the procession surged slowly into the court. It was led by men carrying flaming cressets of iron basketwork and three enigmatic steel emblems on long staves. The central one was a sort of sword-blade above a spindle-shaped fretting of Arabic letters, while the other two were tridents springing from a similar base; and from all three floated streamers of crape. Next came two files of standard-bearers, dressed in black, with black caps on their heads. The flags they bore were black or dark-coloured, triangular in shape, with the names of the _Imams_ and other holy inscriptions embroidered on them in silver. On top of some of the staves was an open hand of brass. I was told that it commemorated the mutilation of Hüsseïn. Behind the standard-bearers marched more men in black, chanting in a rhythm of six beats and striking their bare breasts on the fifth. Even a foreigner could distinguish the frequent names of Ali and Hüsseïn. Others held in both hands a chain at the end of which was a bunch of smaller chains. With this, first over one shoulder and then over the other, they beat their backs. The thud kept time with the chanting, and vigorously enough to leave visible, sometimes sickening signs, under the torn black of the single garment they wore. Two white horses followed. The first, with rich saddle-cloth and head-stall, carried a little boy on his back. On the saddle of the second, caparisoned in blood-streaked white, were two doves. Then came a band of musicians, singing, playing pipes, beating drums, and clashing cymbals. And last of all, slowly advancing sidewise in two long lines, appeared a gruesome company of men in white, who chanted hoarsely and slashed their shaven heads with bloody swords. The blood-stained figures in white, the black flagellants, the symbolic horses, the mourning banners, the points of steel answering the flare of the torches, made strange matter indeed for the imagination, moving with desperate music through that veil of driving snow.

The procession marched round the courtyard three times and then went into the tent, where a dirge was chanted in honour of the martyrs of Kerbela. At different moments of the ceremony, and particularly at sight of the child and the doves on horseback—symbolic of Hüsseïn’s son, who was killed in his arms, and of the souls of the martyrs—many a Persian among the spectators sobbed uncontrolledly. Other spectators smiled at the tears streaming down bearded cheeks and at the frenzy of the flagellants. For myself, I can never help feeling respect for any real emotion, however far I may be from sharing it. People say, indeed, that these processions are not what they used to be and that much of the slashing is feigned. That may well enough be. Still, I found myself compelled to turn aside when the men in white passed in front of me. More than one of them, too, had to be helped staggering away before the procession came to an end. It is not every one who takes part in these ceremonies. The participants are men who fulfil a vow of their own or of their parents, usually in gratitude for some deliverance. Their zeal is so great that it is necessary to draw up a preliminary schedule for the processions, so that no two shall meet and dispute the right of way. Each forms in its own courtyard, but the men in white do not begin their cutting till they are in the street. When the marchers finally return to their own _han_—having, in the meantime, visited the public bath—they spread rugs on the floor of the tent and spend the evening drinking tea and entertaining their friends.

This ceremony is repeated in a milder form in Scutari, on the day after _ashoureh_. Early in the morning the Persians flock to a valley of cypresses called Seïd Ahmed Deresi, which is a corner of the great cemetery reserved for their use. There they rejoice over such as have by their own blood atoned for that of Hüsseïn. I have followed them thither only once, but I am happy to say that no interment took place. Tents were set up on the edge of the cemetery, of a faded green that admirably set off the darker cypresses, and close-packed Persians squatted in them, drinking tea or smoking their terrible _toumbeki_. More Persians, recognisable by their black caps if not by their cast of feature, roamed among the trees. Most of them were of the humbler sort, in skirted coats of dull colours. Here and there was one in a long stiff fuzzy black cloak, with a touch of gold at the throat. Many had beards decoratively reddened with henna, and wore their hair shaved high about the neck and off the middle of the forehead. There was much embracing between hairy monsters who had not met, perhaps, since last Mouharrem; and much patronising was there of ambulatory venders of good things to eat. Finally, at what signal I know not, a company of men in black marched out among the graves, bearing triangular flags of the sort I have already described. At some distance they joined forces with a company of coloured flags, headed by the strange ornaments of steel. Two of the coloured flags should have been in a museum rather than in Scutari cemetery on a wet winter day. They were unusually fine examples of the Persian wood-block printing, and in the centre of each smiled an inimitable lion with a curly tail. These two companies marched chanting together to the end of the cemetery, where they met a third made up of flagellants. But this time there were no men in white and no bloody blades. Then they all proceeded down the long road to the water, the steel emblems and the coloured flags first, the black banners next, and the flagellants last, chanting, beating their breasts, and swinging their heavy chains. Every few steps they stopped and went through their rite with greater zeal. The stops were longest in front of institutions and great houses, where a _mollah_ would intone from a parchment manuscript he carried. And in the picturesque little square of Top Tashi, where some fallen Greek pillars lie in front of the madhouse attached to the mosque of the Valideh Atik, a Roufaï dervish, whom I remembered to have seen in the _tekkeh_ of Karaja Ahmed, sang a long threnody in honour of the martyred Hüsseïn. The procession was followed by hundreds of Persians who joined in the chanting and breast beating. Their number, and the many stops, made an opportunity for street vendors and for beggars. Cripples sat on either side of the narrow street with a handkerchief spread out in front of them on which lay a few suggestive coins. Gaudy gipsy girls were not ashamed to show themselves on so solemn an occasion. I saw two women of a race strange to me, with coppery faces and a perpendicular mark painted in ochre on their foreheads. Strangest of all was a holy man who stood humbly by the wayside. Yet, after all, he was of one brotherhood with the mourners for Hüsseïn. He did not raise his eyes as the procession passed him, nor did he hold out his hand. What first attracted my attention to the goodness of his face were two small round reddish things between which I saw it. Then I made out the reddish things to be onions, spitted on either end of a steel skewer that pierced both his cheeks.

XI

GREEK FEASTS

One of the most characteristic things about Constantinople is that while it has become Turkish it has not ceased to be Greek. The same is true of Thrace, Macedonia, and the fringe of Asia Minor, which contain large Turkish and other populations, but which still form a part of the Greek world to which they always belonged. The two races have indisputably influenced each other, as their languages and certain of their customs prove. A good deal of Greek blood now flows, too, in Turkish veins. Nevertheless there has been remarkably little assimilation, after five hundred years, of one element by the other. They coexist, each perfectly distinct and each claiming with perfect reason the land as his own.

This is perhaps one cause why religious festivals are so common among the Greeks of Turkey. It is as a religious community that they have remained separate since the conquest. Through their religious observances they live what is left them of a national life and assert their claim to the great tradition of their race. The fact doubtless has something to do with the persistence of observances that elsewhere tend to disappear. At all events, those observances are extremely interesting. They have a local colour, for one thing, of a kind that has become rare in Europe and that scarcely ever existed in America. Then they are reckoned by the Julian calendar, now thirteen days behind our own, and that puts them into a certain perspective. Their true perspective, however, reaches much farther back. Nor is it merely that they compose a body of tradition from which we of the West have diverged or separated. Our religious customs and beliefs did not spring out of our own soil. We transplanted them in full flower from Rome, and she in turn had already borrowed largely from Greece and the East. But in the Levant such beliefs and customs represent a native growth, whose roots run far deeper than Christianity.

In the Eastern as in the Western church the essence of the religious year is that cycle of observances that begin with Advent and culminate at Easter. It is rather curious that Protestantism should have disturbed the symbolism of this drama by transposing its climax. Christmas with the Greeks is not the greater feast. One of their names for it, in fact, is Little Easter. It is preceded, however, by a fast of forty days nearly as strict as Lent. The day itself is purely a religious festival. A midnight mass, or rather an early mass, is celebrated at one or two o’clock on Christmas morning, after which the fast is broken and people make each other good wishes. They do not exchange presents or follow the usage of the Christmas tree, that invention of Northern barbarism, except in places that have been largely influenced by the West.

The real holiday of the season is New Year’s Day. This is called _Aï Vassíli_, or St. Basil, whose name-day it is. There is an old ballad relating to this venerable Bishop of Cappadocia—too long, I regret, to translate here—which men and boys go about singing on St. Basil’s eve. The musicians are rewarded with money, theoretically for the poor of the community. If it happens to stick in the pockets of the performers, they doubtless regard themselves as representative of the brotherhood for whose benefit they sing. This custom is imitated by small boys who go among the coffee-houses after dark, begging. They make themselves known by lanterns that are oftenest wicker bird-cages lined with coloured paper. I have also seen ships, castles, and aeroplanes of quite elaborate design. These curious lanterns are used as well on Christmas and Epiphany eves of both calendars. The principal feature of St. Basil’s eve is the _vassilópita_, a kind of flat round cake or sweet bread something like the Tuscan _schiacciata_. At midnight the head of the house cuts the _pita_ into as many pieces as there are members of the family. A true _pita_ should contain a coin, and whoever gets it is sure to have luck during the new year. The next day people pay visits, exchange presents, tip servants, and make merry as they will. They also go, at a more convenient hour than on Christmas morning, to church, where the ancient liturgy of St. Basil is read.

Epiphany, or the old English Twelfth-Night, has retained in the East a significance that it has lost in the West. The day is supposed to commemorate the baptism of Christ in the Jordan. Hence it is the day of the blessing of waters, whether of springs, wells, reservoirs, rivers, or the sea. Holy water plays a particular rôle in the Greek Church—although the Roman custom of moistening the fingers with it, before making the sign of the cross on entering a church, is not followed. On the first of every month except January a ceremony called the Little Blessing takes place in the churches, when water is blessed; and this ceremony may be repeated by request in private houses. In January the Little Blessing takes place on Epiphany eve, the fifth. But on Epiphany itself, as early in the morning as local custom may dictate, takes place the Great Blessing. It is performed in the middle of the church, on a dais decorated with garlands of bay, and the important feature of the long ceremony is the dipping of a cross into a silver basin of water. The water is carefully kept in bottles throughout the next year and used as occasion may require. It is sometimes administered, for instance, to those who are not thought fit to take the full communion. The outdoor ceremony which follows this one is extremely picturesque. In Constantinople it may be seen in any of the numerous Greek waterside communities—by those who care to get up early enough of a January morning. One of the best places is Arnaout-kyöi, a large Greek village on the European shore of the Bosphorus, where the ceremony is obligingly postponed till ten or eleven o’clock. At the conclusion of the service in the church a procession, headed by clergy in gala vestments and accompanied by candles, incense, banners, and lanterns on staves of the sort one sees in Italy, marches to the waterside. There it is added to by shivering mortals in bathing trunks. They behave in a highly unecclesiastical manner in their anxiety to get the most advantageous post on the quay. The banners and lanterns make a screen of colour on either side of the priests, incense rises, choristers chant, a bishop in brocade and cloth of gold, with a domed gilt mitre, holds up a small cross; he makes the holy sign with it, and tosses it into the Bosphorus. There is a terrific splash as the rivals for its recovery dive after it. In days gone by there used to be fights no less terrific in the water over the precious object. The last time I saw the ceremony, however, there was nothing of the kind. The cross was even made of wood, so that there was no trouble in finding it. The first man who reached it piously put it to his lips and allowed the fellow nearest him to do the same. Then the half dozen of them paddled back to shore and hurried off to get warm. The finder of the cross is a lucky man in this world and the world to come. He goes from house to house with the holy emblem he has rescued from the deep, and people give him tips. In this way he collects enough to restore his circulation and to pass a convivial Epiphany. The cross is his to keep, but he must provide a new one for the coming year.

The blessing of the waters is firmly believed by many good people to have one effect not claimed by mother church. It is supposed, that is, to exorcise for another year certain redoubtable beings known as _kallikántzari_. The name, according to one of the latest authorities on the subject,[2] means the good centaurs. Goodness, however, is not their distinguishing trait. They are quarrelsome, mischievous, and destructive monsters, half man, half beast, who haunt the twelve nights of the Christmas season. One of the most efficacious means of scaring them off is by firebrands, and I have wondered if the coloured lanterns to which I have alluded might owe their origin to the same idea. Many pious sailors will not venture to sea during the twelve days, for fear of these creatures. The unfurling of the sails is one of the ceremonies of Epiphany in some seaside communities. Similarly, no one—of a certain class—would dream of marrying during the twelve days, while a child so unfortunate as to be born then is regarded as likely to become a _kallikántzaros_ himself. Here a teaching of the church perhaps mingles with the popular belief. But that belief is far older than the church, going back to Dionysus and the fauns, satyrs, and sileni who accompanied him. In many parts of the Greek world it is still the custom for men and boys to masquerade in furs during the twelve days. If no trace of the custom seems to survive in Constantinople it may be because the early fathers of the church thundered there against this continuance of the antique Dionysiac revels, which became the Brumalia and Saturnalia of the Romans.

[2] J. C. Lawson: “Modern Greek Folklore and Ancient Greek
Religion.”

I should not say that no trace survives, because Carnival is, of course, a lineal descendant of those ancient winter celebrations. As it exists in Constantinople, however, Carnival is for the most part but a pale copy of an Italian original, imported perhaps by the Venetians and Genoese. It affords none the less pleasure to those who participate in it, and curiosity of various colours to the members of the ruling race. I remember one night in Pera overhearing two venerable fezzes with regard to a troop of maskers that ran noisily by. “What is this play?” inquired one old gentleman, who evidently had never seen it before and who as evidently looked upon it with disapproval. “Eh,” replied the other, the initiated and the more indulgent old gentleman, “they pass the time!” The time they pass is divided differently than with us of the West. The second Sunday before Lent is called _Apokreá_ and is the day of farewell to meat. Which for the religious it actually is, although the gaieties of Carnival are then at their height. The ensuing Sunday is called Cheese Sunday, because that amount of indulgence is permitted during the week preceding it. After Cheese Sunday, however, no man should touch cheese, milk, butter, oil, eggs, or even fish—though an exception is made in favour of caviar, out of which a delicious Lenten savoury is made. Lent begins not on the Wednesday but on the Monday, which is called Clean Monday. In fact the first week of Lent is called Clean Week. Houses are then swept and garnished and the fast is stricter than at any time save Holy Week. The very pious eat nothing at all during the first three days of Lent.

Clean Monday, nevertheless, is a great holiday. In Constantinople it is also called Tatavla Day, because every one goes out to Tatavla, a quarter bordering on open country between Shishli and Hass-kyöi. A somewhat similar custom prevails in Venice, where every one goes on Ash Wednesday to promenade on the ordinarily deserted quay of the Zattere. But no masks are seen on the Zattere on Ash Wednesday, whereas masks are the order of the day at Tatavla on Clean Monday. They are not so much the order of the day, however, as the progress of a traditional camel, each of whose legs is a man. It carries a load of charcoal and garlic, which are powerful talismans against evil, and it is led about by a picturesquely dressed camel driver whose face is daubed with blue. This simple form of masquerading, a common one at Tatavla, descends directly from the pagan Dionysia. Another picturesque feature of the day is the dancing by Epirotes—Greeks or Christian Albanians. Masquerading with these exiles consists in twisting a handkerchief about their heads in guise of a fillet and in putting on the black or white _fustanella_—with its accompanying accoutrements—of their native hills. They form rings in the middle of the crowd, which is kept back by one of their number called the Shepherd. Like the Christmas mummers of the Greek islands, he wears skins and has a big bronze sheep or camel bell fastened to some part of him. He also carries a staff to which is attached a bunch of garlic for good luck. He often wears a mask as well, or is otherwise disguised, and his clowneries give great amusement. In the meantime his companions join hands and dance around the ring to the tune of a pipe or a violin. The first two hold the ends of a handkerchief instead of joining hands, which enables the leader to go through more complicated evolutions. Sometimes he is preceded by one or two sword dancers, who know how to make the most of their hanging sleeves and pleated kilts. Some of these romantic young gentlemen are singularly handsome, which does not prepare one to learn that they are butchers’ boys.

The Greeks keep no _mi-carême_, as the Latins do. Their longer and severer fast continues unbroken till Easter morning—unless Annunciation Day happens to fall in Lent. Then they are allowed the indulgence of fish. Holy Week is with them Great Week. Services take place in the churches every night except Wednesday, and commemorate the events of Jerusalem in a more dramatic way than even in the Roman Church. The symbolic washing of the disciples’ feet, however, which takes place in Jerusalem on Holy Thursday, is not performed in Constantinople except by the Armenians. On Good, or Great, Friday a cenotaph is erected in the nave of each church, on which is laid an embroidery or some other representation of the crucifixion. Sculpture is not permitted in the Greek Church, although on this one occasion a statue has sometimes been seen. The faithful flock during the day to the cenotaph, where they kiss the embroidery and make some small donation. Each one receives from the acolyte in charge a jonquil or a hyacinth. This graceful custom is perhaps a relic of the Eleusinian Mysteries, which Easter superseded and with whose symbolism, celebrating as they did the myth of Demeter and Persephone, it has so much in common. Spring flowers, at all events, play a part at Easter quite different from our merely decorative use of them. Flower stands are almost as common at church doors as candle stands. For people also make the round of the icons in the churches, on Good Friday, lighting votive tapers here and there. The true use of the tapers, however, is after dark. Then a procession figuring the entombment of Christ issues from the church with the image of the cenotaph and makes the circuit of the court or, in purely Greek communities, of the surrounding streets, accompanied by a crowd of lighted candles. The image is finally taken to the holy table, where it remains for forty days.

An even more striking ceremony takes place on Saturday night. About midnight people begin to gather in the churches, which are aromatic with the flowering bay strewn on the floor. Every one carries a candle but none are lighted—not even before the icons. The service begins with antiphonal chanting. The ancient Byzantine music sounds stranger than ever in the dim light, sung by the black-robed priests with black veils over their tall black caps. Finally, the celebrant, in a purple cope of mourning, withdraws behind the _iconostásion_, the screen that in a Greek church divides the holy table from the chancel. As the chant proceeds candles are lighted in certain chandeliers. Then the door of the sanctuary is thrown open, revealing a blaze of light and colour within. The celebrant comes out in magnificent vestments, holding a lighted candle and saying: “Come to the light.” Those nearest him reach out their own tapers to take the sacred fire, and from them it is propagated in an incredibly short time through the entire church. In the meantime the priests march in procession out-of-doors, headed by a banner emblematic of the resurrection. And there, surrounded by the flickering lights of the congregation, the celebrant chants the triumphant resurrection hymn. At this point tradition demands that the populace should express their own sentiments by a volley of pistol-shots. But since the reactionary uprising of 1909, when soldiers took advantage of the Greek Easter to make such tragic use of their own arms, an attempt has been made in Constantinople to suppress this detail. I have been told that each shot is aimed at Judas. The unfaithful apostle, at all events, used to be burned in effigy on Good Friday at Therapia. And I have heard of other customs of a similar bearing.

The patriarchal church at Phanar is the most interesting place to see the ceremonies of Easter morning. They are not for every one to see, by reason of the smallness of the church. One must have a friend at court in order to obtain a ticket of admission. Even then one may miss, as I once did through ignorance, and perhaps through a lack of that persistence which should be the portion of the true tourist, certain characteristic scenes of the day. Thus I failed to witness the robing of the Patriarch by the prelates of his court. Neither did I get a photograph of them all marching in procession to the church, though I had moved heaven and earth—_i. e._, a bishop and an ambassador—for permission to do so. Nevertheless, I had an excellent view of the ceremony of the second resurrection, as the Easter morning vespers are called. The procession entered the church led by small boys in white and gold who carried a tall cross, two gilt _exeptérigha_ on staves, symbolic of the six-winged cherubim, and lighted candles. After them came choristers singing. The men wore a species of fez entirely covered by its spread-out tassel. One carried an immense yellow candle in front of the officiating clergy, who marched two and two in rich brocaded chasubles. Their long beards gave them a dignity which is sometimes lacking to their Western brothers, while the tall black _kalymáfhion_, brimmed slightly at the top with a true Greek sense of outline, is certainly a more imposing head-dress than the biretta. The Patriarch came next, preceded and followed by a pair of acolytes carrying two and three lighted candles tied together with white rosettes. These candles symbolise the two natures of Christ and the Trinity; with them His Holiness is supposed to dispense his blessing. He wore magnificent vestments of white satin embroidered with blue and green and gold. A large diamond cross and other glittering objects hung about his neck. In his hand he carried a crosier of silver and gold and on his head he wore a domed crown-like mitre. It was surmounted by a cross of gold, around it were ornaments of enamel and seed pearls, and in the gold circlet of its base were set immense sapphires and other precious stones. The Patriarch was followed by members of the Russian embassy, of the Greek, Montenegrin, Roumanian, and Servian legations, and by the lay dignitaries of his own entourage, whose uniforms and decorations added what they could to the splendour of the occasion. These personages took their places in the body of the nave—standing, as is always the custom in the Greek Church—while the clergy went behind the screen of the sanctuary. The Patriarch, after swinging a silver censer through the church, took his place at the right of the chancel on a high canopied throne of carved wood inlaid with ivory. He made a wonderful picture there with his fine profile and long white beard and gorgeous vestments. On a lower and smaller throne at his right sat the Grand Logothete. The Grand Logothete happens at present to be a preternaturally small man, and time has greatly diminished his dignities. The glitter of his decorations, however, and the antiquity of his office make him what compensation they can. His office is an inheritance of Byzantine times, when he was a minister of state. Now he is the official representative of the Patriarch at the Sublime Porte and accompanies him to the Palace when His Holiness has audience of the Sultan.