Chapter XVI

PASS OF DUMBELEK. HIGH RANGES OF TAURUS. EFRENK.

_July 18th._—Occupied our former quarters. About one month has elapsed since we were here before, but that time has produced a great change in the climate. The heat is very much greater, and the air oppressive; but in a few weeks autumn will commence, when the heat rapidly diminishes, and at the end of September frost and the first snows may be expected on this high plateau. A traveller (native) who was staying at the khan, had just come up from Mersina, and gave a most unfavourable account of the heat and unhealthiness of that place. I thought that he exaggerated, but I found by sad experience that his account was perfectly true. Strangely enough, he never mentioned the news of an outbreak of cholera in Syria, and consequent quarantine on all the mail steamers.

A handsome “Killim” carpet was offered to me for T. 2_l._, by one of the merchants in the khan. I did not purchase it, as I feared the difficulties of transport, &c., but I afterwards regretted the opportunity lost.

There were the usual difficulties in providing means of transport. The first souriji who came, demanded T. 2_l._ for a single baggage horse to Mersina. The outside price is 80 piastres—this man asks more than 200, which is about one-third the worth of the animal itself!—and as we could not obtain a more reasonable offer, I was obliged to send Nahli to the Serai. I excused myself to the kaimakam from calling upon him in person, on the score of weakness. He has been throughout most courteous and kind to me. He inquired with much interest how we had fared, and when told of our adventures expressed his regret, and said that the villagers of that district were naturally churlish and inhospitable, and the Government authorities—do whatever they would—could not better their behaviour. The chief zaptieh, after taking considerable trouble, at last brought me a souriji—a very pretentious gentleman. Then came the usual delays. He had not half what was necessary—no bags for our boxes, no sacks for carrying barley (an unfortunate want, as will be seen hereafter). Besides his pay, which is high, he requires his own food, and food for his horses, with tobacco and coffee for the journey, and I wonder he did not make an extra charge for giving us the honour of his company! After all this, he had to confess that he did not know the way; for, as we found out later, he was not a souriji by profession, and moreover bore but an indifferent character. Still, we were constrained to take him, for the chief zaptieh told us we should probably find no other souriji, as almost every man and animal in the country is busied with harvesting. Accordingly, we engaged him and his two horses. He poised every article of our baggage with as much care as if he, and not his horses, would have to carry it. The whole was about one moderate horse-load now, and yet he grumbled at it as heavy for two!

We could not start till the afternoon, as we waited to take the letters of our friend, Tchelebi Effendi Morales, to Mersina.

The Greek khanji Simeon made an exorbitant charge for our night’s lodgings, and I was obliged to oppose a resolute stand before he consented to reduce it to a more moderate amount. Even as it was, he was paid twofold more than the fair sum. Unfortunately the character of nearly all the Oriental Christians I have met, is grasping and overreaching, and I must confess that in all business transactions, I would infinitely rather have to deal with the much maligned and hated Muslim, who is generally a man of his word, and though less clever, is much more honest, than the Rayah: such is my experience in Asiatic Turkey. Of course it may be different in Turkey in Europe; I can hardly think it really is so. And as to the _rich_ Levantine Christians, especially those who have gained the protection of some European Consulate, they are unbearable. Their purse-proud arrogance, their vanity, their ignorance, their grasping, avaricious greed, their tyrannical injustice where they have the power, their cynical immorality (in the wide sense of the word), all this must be witnessed to be appreciated. I have no doubt residents in the Levant (not the mere traveller who stays a week or two in these lands, and then goes back to Europe convinced that he knows better than the resident of many years), _residents_, I say, in the Levant, will no doubt recognize the truth of what I am saying. No honourable man can avoid a feeling of righteous indignation at what he too often witnesses in their dealings with the unfortunate people of these countries.

At about 3 P.M. we started. Our route crossed a district of limestone and marble hills to the S.W. of Karaman. Our halting place that night was to be the village of Ibrala, said to be five hours distant, but we found it more, as owing to our souriji’s want of skill, there were continual delays to shift and re-arrange the baggage. The heat as we toiled up the dry ravines and across the bare marble hills was extreme, but we soon reached higher ground and a cooler air. At 4.15 we descended into a well-cultivated valley, traversed by a large stream flowing northwards, and crossed the stream by a fine bridge of one high pointed arch, which was carried from one large rock to another opposite. Night soon came on, and at 8 P.M. we stopped at a large village with many gardens, great groves of poplar and walnut, and extensive cemeteries. We alighted at the house of the mukhtar, a rich cultivator, to whom Tchelebi Effendi had given us a letter of introduction. We had, however, but a cool reception, and having arrived rather late, were fain to content ourselves with a very scanty and poor supper. Having been introduced by a friend, I had not looked for such a reception, but this rich peasant is inhospitable, like most of the villagers in this district.

The people here seem very devout. Everyone in the household—of males, that is—assembled to the Namaz (the canonical prayer) at night. Even the negro slaves of the house were of the number, and these seemed especially devout. Our host took the lead, and the formula which he used, and the ceremonies, prostrations, &c., were far longer and more elaborate than any I had hitherto witnessed.

It had a strange effect to see some eighteen or twenty worshippers, crowded in a small room, all moving alike with the utmost precision, kissing the ground at once, then standing erect with closed eyes, and softly repeating to themselves the words of the formula, then again bursting into a wild chant in response to their leader’s words; and all apparently absorbed in ecstatic devotion.

After the prayer was finished, “yorghans” were brought out. I chose a raised, open balcony, projecting over the road, as my resting place; many of the company lay down on the floor of the room beneath, which was covered with prostrate sleepers; soon a loud chorus of snores was heard, which did not, however, prevent me from sleeping soundly.

_July 19th._—Arose somewhat refreshed, yet still tired; the air of this narrow valley is hot and enervating, and I should suppose feverish. Nahli was obliged to make a remonstrance before the people of the house would bring a little milk and a few eggs, for our breakfast. They brought them at last, but grudgingly and sparingly. In houses like this the traveller is placed in a dilemma; to offer payment downright would be regarded as an affront. Yet there is a reluctance to supply what is needed, they will neither “give” freely, nor yet “sell” freely, and so the unfortunate stranger comes badly off.

The district beyond Ibrala is an extensive rocky plateau almost without cultivation, and uninhabited, except by a few Yourouks during part of the summer. The ground rises continually till it reaches the foot of the high mountains. In a deep valley beyond them is the village of Efrenk, established a few years ago by the Government in order to induce the Yourouks of the district partially to settle. But as this village was more than a day’s march distant, our host gave us a letter of introduction to Mustafa Tekerlèk, chief of a tribe of Yourouks who were usually encamped at some springs called Kara Koyu, and with whom we should be obliged to remain for the night.

Our host also, without mentioning it to us, arranged for us to give a medjidieh to a guide whom he engaged, promising him that, should we object to the amount, he would himself pay whatever fell short of that sum.

About 7.20 A.M. we left. We did not follow the river valley, but ascended to the high ground above the village; nearly at the top we came to a cold and abundant spring, the last water we should be able to find for six or seven hours. Beyond this spring the rocky plateau rose continually till the whole country round could be seen from it, Kara Dagh, Karajah Dagh, Sidevre, the volcanic cones opposite Serpek, and all the east part of the plain of Karaman. The whole of this plateau is bleak and sterile, three-fourths of it being patches of bare rock intermingled with stony earth, and covered with scanty vegetation. At this season there is no grass, but an abundance of flowers still in bloom notwithstanding the great heat. There were a few patches of miserable wheat or barley belonging to the Yourouks, who, in summer, frequent this inhospitable region; and in the torrent valleys, a little better crops and much herbage, though very little grass. With but little variety this was the character of the landscape during a ride of six hours. There was no water anywhere, except in one or two deep cisterns, but the owners had taken care to remove the rope and bucket belonging to them. At last, thoroughly tired and parched by the heat, we alighted at a little fountain on the edge of the mountain district, and turned our horses to graze on the rich grass. There was not so much as a bush to offer a shelter from the burning sun, and when I asked an old Osmanli, who was tending a few wretched sheep near the place, why the people did not plant one or two trees by the fountain, to shelter wayfarers from the sun, I received the very characteristic reply, “If Allah had wished trees to be there, would he not have caused them to grow?”

At this season this route seems well frequented; we met several camel trains, and many labourers returning home from their work in reaping the harvest of the Cilician plain.

At 3.15 P.M. we left the fountain and entered the hilly district which borders Bulghar Dagh on this side.

In about an hour and a half we saw before us the camp of the Yourouk chief to whom we were consigned. We found Mustafa Tekerlèk living under a juniper tree, with a thick fence of juniper boughs in a semicircle behind him, to keep off the north wind. The air was chill, even cold, immediately after sunset, and the men kindled a huge fire, on which a whole juniper tree was dragged. It certainly cast out much heat, but while sitting near such a fire, one side of the body is scorched whilst the other remains chilled. Besides this, the wind suddenly chopped round to the S.W. and blew violently, bringing clouds of pungent smoke into our faces. There was some difficulty in obtaining grass for our horses. Mustafa could supply no barley, and although we had expressly charged our souriji to bring a large sack, which we would fill, before starting, at Karaman, in his desire to spare his horses the extra weight, he would not do this, and in consequence we had but very little barley with us, and were forced to husband it for probable future need. There was no grass to be had excepting at a considerable distance from the camp, and the chief proposed sending his men with our baggage horses to fetch some. To this our surly souriji objected, “his horses were tired and should not go.” But the chief quickly brought him to reason, by saying, “In that case we will fetch grass for the horses of the tchelebi, you can provide for yours as you please.” Thereupon he allowed the horses to go; but himself went with them, being evidently distrustful. They returned in about an hour and a half with plenty of grass; but it was poor fare for our half-starved animals.

The Yourouk chief, Mustafa Tekerlèk, was, for his station, polite and well informed. He was a man of about fifty years, strong and thick set, with pronounced hook nose, projecting chin and under-lip, and grizzled black hair and beard. He was well dressed, for he is rich, possessing very many flocks, and much cultivated land in the plain. The Government has obliged the Yourouks partially to settle; lands have been assigned them in the plain, where thousands of acres are in a state of nature. They are thus forced to become cultivators; but nothing can make them quite abandon their old wandering ways.

Mustafa did not display the ill-bred curiosity I had so often experienced, but contented himself with the explanation that I was travelling with a firman, at my own expense, and for my pleasure. He listened patiently to what we chose to tell him of our journey, and put no questions. There was another traveller staying in the camp, a man from a village in Alvanlö, the mountain district west of Mersina, who had, I think, some good reason for lying _perdu_ in this out-of-the-way place. He said he had seen Nahli at Mersina, and they engaged in a long conversation about the town and its governor, &c. Mustafa here struck in, and told us that he was at feud with the Kaimakam of Mersina, who was a “fellahh,” as he contemptuously called him (i.e. a Nusairi), and had seized all his wheat; but if ever he caught him in these mountains he would make him repent the wrong he had done him. Then, as if a new thought struck him, “Could not I help to arrange the quarrel between them?” I said that of course I had no influence with the kaimakam, but that, perhaps, by speaking for Mustafa to the English Vice-Consul, something might be done to settle matters. Upon this, he said he would come down with us next day to Mersina. The conversation next turned upon the difficulties and dangers of travel in these regions, and he declared that if there were no Yourouks in these mountains, either the Government would be obliged to keep a large armed force here, or else in a short time the mountains would become impassable for travellers, on account of brigands. He said that even when travellers brought no recommendation to him, he usually sent one of his people to watch them at a distance, as, if any harm happened to them, the Government would hold the Yourouks responsible. It was bad policy on the part of the Government to remove the Yourouks, and the more so, as if there were no Yourouks, these mountains would become useless, which now supported a great many sheep and cattle.

Suddenly, as if the mention of brigands had reminded him of something, he declared that he had seen our souriji before. “Where had we picked him up?” and calling the man, with an imperious gesture, “Gel! otoùr!” (“Come—sit!”), he began to question him very minutely. I could not quite follow his questions, but they seemed to cause much embarrassment to our companion, who answered reluctantly and evasively. When the examination was ended, Mustafa took my interpreter aside, and told him that he knew this man, that he had been a companion of Zeybek brigands in Kara Dagh and Allah Dagh, and came from the “thieves’” quarter in Karaman, but since the Government had become severe, he had turned souriji. Possibly this was true. He was a tall, finely-made man, with an unprepossessing expression, though good-looking in face, but he did not know his professed occupation, and his hands were certainly not used to labour. At length supper was brought. I wished to have my own rice prepared, but Nahli said that Mustafa would be offended, so I did not insist. Mustafa’s supper did not deserve the name. It was scarcely enough for three, but six or seven sat down to it and I rose still hungry. After a while I told Nahli to make some tea. While drinking it, Mustafa said that the tea plant grew wild on these hills, that they often gathered the leaves and used them, that he knew a place not far from the camp where the plants grew in large quantities, and he promised to show me a specimen of their tea, but did not. After this, the Yourouks, with the exception of Mustafa, began to ask us for tobacco, and we gave what we could spare. Some of them asked if we could give them also a little gunpowder. Then Mustafa began to talk about firearms, and desired to see our pistols. We showed them and explained their action, whereupon Mustafa said his fingers could not handle anything so fine (nazìk), and asked me to discharge a barrel. The pistol had been charged since May 13th, but was still perfectly in order, and being heavily loaded, when I fired in the air close by his ear, the loud report from so small an arm somewhat startled him. Nahli, who was a joker, told some unconscionable fibs as to the distance of its range, which I was glad Mustafa did not ask to see verified; and I think the incident made a good impression. All night the wind blew cold and violent, but I covered myself well, and slept soundly under the juniper tree.

_July 20th._—Rather an unpleasant affair occurred with our guide, who is really a good fellow. When he told me of the arrangement about his pay, made by the mukhtar of Ibrala, I told him that a mejidieh was too much. I would give him 12 piastres, and Nahli should write him a letter to the mukhtar, to say that we had given him that sum. With this he was quite satisfied, but when the letter was written, he began to mistrust our sincerity, and it seems, insisted upon having the letter read by the “moollah” of the tribe. When I learned this, I told him he might have trusted our assurance. “But,” he said, “I was afraid you had written something different from what you told me.” Upon which I asked him if he “was mad (sen deli mi sen?) Did he think an English gentleman would write one thing, and tell him that he had written another?” He seemed abashed, and then quietly replied, “Deli im, effendim, deli im!” (“Yes, sir, I am a foolish fellow!”). We had charged him especially not to let the Yourouks know what we had given him, but he could not keep his tongue still, so that none of them would act as our guide under a mejidieh. This I would not give, and we were obliged to dispense with a guide.

I was much annoyed by the curiosity of the people; they would not even give me a little leisure for my toilet, until Nahli appealed to them several times. But the Alvanlö villager, of whom we afterwards heard a very bad account at Mersina, was most pertinacious, and returned again and again, evidently wishing to see what was in the zinc case which contained my personal baggage. Three times Nahli was obliged to send him away; the last time he turned upon Nahli angrily, and said he was insulting him. They came to high words at last, and the Alvanlö man bade him remember “he was not now in Mersina, but in the mountains.” The tone of the voice was ugly and menacing, and the expression of his face as he mockingly addressed the interpreter, “dostoùm” (my friend), very unpleasant. Fearful of some violence, I was obliged to interfere. I sent away Nahli, who retired vowing vengeance if ever he found the man in Mersina. Meanwhile, I insisted on being left alone for the present, and the fellow reluctantly retired. But it seems the Yourouks too were offended, and all left. As we sat down to breakfast, Mustafa came up. I was so vexed with him for allowing me to be thus annoyed, that although Nahli wished me to invite him to share the meal with us, I would not do so, and he too went off, probably offended. Breakfast over, we packed up and prepared to start. Mustafa meanwhile had mounted his horse, slung his gun across his back, and was ready to accompany us as he had himself proposed. But at the last moment he changed his intention, afraid, perhaps, of putting himself in the power of his enemy, and rode off without bidding us adieu. When about to start, Nahli called to one of the Yourouks, and asked him “if there was no one to whom we could bid adieu?” It is regarded as the height of discourtesy to go off without the formula of usage, “Allaha issmarladik,” “We have made a request to God” (for you), or “We have commended (you) to God.” To which the reply is “Oghourlar ola” (or “olsoun!”), “May you have a favourable journey!” (perhaps derived from the Latin _augurari_). The man accordingly came up, told us Mustafa had gone to a distant encampment, and would join us on the road in an hour. I wished Nahli to pay this man. “What for?” said Nahli. “At the outside it would be only four or five piastres. If Mustafa treats us thus, he shall have nothing.” So we started at 7 A.M.

The country all about Kara Koyu consists of broken hills of limestone, scantily covered with junipers. The pasturage is much burnt up, but the wealth of the tribe must be considerable, judging from the large flocks of sheep and goats which were being tended by the armed shepherds and their magnificent grey dogs. The encampment of the women, half a dozen dark-brown tents of goats’-hair cloth, was at some distance apart from Mustafa’s bivouac.

Our horses were half starved, owing to the negligence of our wretched souriji in not providing bags sufficiently large for carrying a supply of barley. The little that we have we are obliged to use very sparingly, as we know not if we shall be able to find any food whatever farther on in the mountains. About half an hour from the camp, we stopped at a beautiful little meadow. Two Yourouks who were watching it, said that my horses might graze, but not those of our souriji; but for a piastre per head they permitted all to graze. A few cigarettes made us excellent friends, and they told us that Mustafa would never venture into Mersina; that he was in trouble, and at feud with the kaimakam, who had seized all his wheat for real or pretended arrears of taxation. At Mersina, however, we heard much less favourable accounts of our friend Mustafa.

Even hard work and starvation do not tame my spirited little horse, for he broke loose from his tethers and rushed off to fight the horses of the Yourouks. One of the men was so pleased with him, that he offered to give me T. 9_l._ for him. He would give me an order on Mr. Mavromati, the Greek merchant of Mersina, with whom they did much business, and would send a man with me to receive the horse when I had drawn the money. We saw no more of Mustafa, but these men gave us minute directions as to our route.

A long, dreary, tedious ride followed, across flat-topped undulating hills of rough limestone, but the track was plain and easy. There were a few small Yourouk encampments, and we met many passengers, amongst them two zaptiehs from Mersina, on their way to arrest a man who had not paid his taxes. Nahli knew them and inquired “if they had been sent to arrest Mustafa Tekerlèk?”

All this district is gloomy and desolate; there is no vegetation except a little withered aromatic herbage; there is not a tree, nor even a bush, and in about three months from the present time the route will become impassable from snow.

We had left the meadow at 10 A.M.; at 4 P.M. we passed on our left a ruined fort, and leaving the torrent ravine down which we had been long marching, we turned abruptly to our left, and after crossing sundry heights, at 5.30 P.M. we entered a region full of magnificent forest. This was the highest point of the pass. A very long, steep, and rocky incline, which we were obliged to descend on foot, brought us to a little plain. Again we turned to the left, and after passing through a number of hills, came to a second long descent. A young negro boy whom we met here, directed us to keep continually descending towards the left, and that Efrenk was “not far off.” Yet again we turned leftwards, and a longer descent than either of the others, between mountains covered thickly with forest, brought us to the head of a magnificent mountain valley, watered by a beautiful little stream, and full of cultivated ground, fruit trees, and wheat still in ear—some even only about four inches high. From our point of entrance the village seemed close, but it took us an hour and a half to reach it, so deep and wide were the many ravines between us and it. Much of the upper end of the valley had been cleared of forest, and there was a luxuriant growth of grass along the brook.

Efrenk is one of the villages established by the Government some five years ago, in which they wished to force the Yourouks to settle. The climate now is exactly that of England in June, only that the sun is much hotter; but in winter the snow lies four to five feet deep, and the place is quite cut off from human society. It was about 8 P.M. when we reached the village, and upon inquiring for the mukhtar, we were told by a boy whom we met, that he was “up above.” Thinking he meant the upper part of the village, we followed, but when he pointed to the top of a mountain range, some 1200 feet above us, and said that he and all the men, were in a higher yaila “up there,” we resolved to stay in the village, neither we nor our tired horses being capable of further exertion that night. After wandering about for some time in the darkness, we settled at last on the flat roof of a house, tethered the horses, and prepared to take possession of a deserted portico, but some boys came up and warned us to avoid it on account of the fleas! We therefore camped out on the roof. A hospitable woman came up and brought us some firewood, a little butter, and some excellent “eiràn.” Pilaff and tea were made, and we supped. Nahli engaged the boys to go out and cut some grass for our horses; the poor animals were half starved, we had not been able to procure them anything excepting the little grass in the morning; indeed in this country it is harder to find food for one’s horses than for oneself! The moon rose grandly above the mountains on the south side of the valley, and here and there in the forests on the high summits could be discerned the twinkling light of camp fires, kindled by some wandering Yourouk or “tahtaji” (wood cutter); none else live in these wild solitudes. We were not troubled by visitors, as only women, boys, and a few old men remained in the place, and I was not sorry to be free from the intrusion of the men, who generally never leave the stranger alone for a single instant.

Late at night the poor woman who waited on us, sent in a great hurry to beg a little pepper; her husband had just returned from Mersina, ill of a sun-stroke.

The humidity of the air was excessive, so different from the dry, cold, bracing air of the plateau where we had passed the previous night, at the camp of Mustafa Tekerlèk! Everything was completely wet, but I wore my mackintosh, and on lying down to sleep spread it outside all my coverings; then taking care to cover well my eyes and head, I slept soundly; nothing more readily causes fever and ophthalmia than the chill night dews of these latitudes.