Amysus, Sinope, Comana, Amastris, and lastly, some of Amasia, the city
to which we were going. Talking of coins, a coppersmith roused my anger
by telling me, when I inquired for coins, that a few days before he
had had a whole potful of them, and that, thinking they were worthless,
he had melted them down, and made several copper kettles out of the
metal. I was greatly vexed at the destruction of so many interesting
relics; but I had my revenge. I informed him that, if he had not
destroyed the coins, I would have given him a hundred gold pieces for
them. So I sent him away quite as unhappy at the loss of the windfall
which he had been so near getting, as I was at the sacrifice of these
records of antiquity.
We did not meet with many new botanical specimens on the road. The
plants were, for the most part, identical with those in our country;
the only difference being that they grew more or less luxuriantly,
according to the nature of the soil.
We sought unsuccessfully for the balsam tree, which Dioscorides tells
us is indigenous in Pontus, so that I cannot tell whether the stock has
died out, or migrated to another country.
Angora formed our nineteenth halting place from Constantinople. It
is a town of Galatia, and was, at one time, the head-quarters of the
Tectosages, a Gallic tribe. Pliny and Strabo both mention it, but it is
not improbable that the present city covers only a part of the ancient
town. The Kanûns[133] call it Anquira.
Here we saw a very beautiful inscription,[134] containing a copy of
the tablets in which Augustus gave a summary of his achievements. We
made our people copy out as much as was legible. It is engraven on the
marble walls of a building now ruinous and roofless, which formerly may
have formed the official residence of the governor. As you enter the
building one half of the inscription is on the right, and the other
on the left. The top lines are nearly perfect; in the middle the gaps
begin to present difficulties; the lowest lines are so mutilated with
blows of clubs and axes as to be illegible. This is indeed a great
literary loss, and one which scholars have much reason to regret; the
more so as it is an ascertained fact that Ancyra was dedicated[135] to
Augustus as the common gift of Asia.
Here we also saw how the famous watered stuff, or mohair, which is
woven of the hair of the goats I have already described, is dyed; and
how, when water has been poured on, it takes those waves from the
action of the press, from which it derives its name, and for which
it is prized. The stuff which bears the mark of a very large wave,
and keeps its pattern, is considered the best; but if, in any part,
smaller and uneven waves occur, although the colour and material be
precisely the same, it is worth less by several gold pieces on account
of the flaw. Elderly men among the Turks, when they are of high rank,
are generally distinguished by dresses made of this material. Solyman
prefers it to any other dress for state occasions, wearing that which
is of a green colour; a hue which, according to our notions, is hardly
becoming to a man of advanced years; but their religion, and the
example of their prophet Mahomet, who wore it constantly, even in his
old age, gives it favour in the eyes of the Turks. Among them black
is considered a mean and unlucky colour, and for any one in Turkey to
appear dressed in black is held to be ominous of disaster and evil.
On some occasions the Pashas would express their astonishment at our
going to them in black clothes, and make it a ground for serious
remonstrance. No one in Turkey goes abroad in black unless he be
completely ruined, or in great grief for some terrible disaster. Purple
is highly esteemed, but in time of war it is considered ominous of a
bloody death. The lucky colours are white, orange, light blue, violet,
mouse colour, &c. In this, and other matters, the Turks pay great
attention to auguries and omens. It is a well-known fact that a Pasha
has sometimes been dismissed from office because his horse stumbled,
under the idea that it portended some great misfortune, and that,
if the man were removed from his office, it would fall on a private
individual, and not on the state.
From Angora we came to the village of Balygazar, thence to Zarekuct,
next to Zermeczii, after which we arrived at the bank of the river
Halys (Kizil Irmak).
As we crossed the country towards the village of Algeos, we had a
distant view of the mountains near Sinope. They have a red appearance
from the red chalk which takes its name from Sinope.
Here is the famous Halys, once the boundary between the kingdoms of
Media and Lydia, about which the ancient prophecy said that ‘Crœsus,
if he crossed the Halys to make war on the Persians, would destroy a
mighty realm’—but he did not know that the realm he was to destroy was
his own. On the bank was a copse of trees, which at first excited our
attention, as we thought we had discovered a new kind of fruit tree;
but we soon became aware that it was the liquorice tree, and gorged
ourselves with the juice from its roots.
It happened that a country fellow was standing there, so we asked him
through an interpreter whether there were plenty of fish in the river,
and how they were caught. His answer was, that there were plenty of
fish, but that it was impossible to catch them. When we expressed our
surprise at this intelligence, the man explained the matter thus:
‘Well, if anyone tries to put his hand on one of these fish, they jump
away, and will not wait for him to catch them.’
On a former occasion, when we met with some birds of a species unknown
to us, and asked how they could be caught, another fellow declared that
‘it was impossible to catch them, because, when anyone tried to lay
hold of them, they flew away.’ One of my colleagues, Francis Zay, had
with him nets, which he ordered to be unpacked with a view to fishing.
Amongst other fish, we caught the common Danube shad. There are also
crabs in the Halys in large numbers, which, if they are not sea crabs,
are, at any rate, very like them.
The Turks, who stood by, were amazed at the great pains we Christians
took in fishing. ‘How so,’ you will say, ‘are there no fishermen in
Turkey?’ Well, there are some, but in those districts they are very
rare. I remember, in another place, we were greeted with roars of
laughter when we drew off the water of a stream and captured a quantity
of gudgeons. They were greatly amused at our fishing for anything so
small, and could not make out what gain or advantage we expected to
get from them. The foolish fellows did not understand that a large
supply of these little fishes enabled us to prepare big dishes of stew
sufficient to dine a great many people.
But these Turks live so sparingly, and care so little for the pleasures
of the table, that if they have bread and salt with an onion or leek,
or a kind of sour milk which Galen mentions by the name of oxygala,
and they call yoghoort, they are quite content. They mix this milk
with very cold water, and crumble bread into it, using it when the
heat is overpowering, to allay their thirst. We, too, often found this
drink most useful in hot weather, for not only is it very pleasant
and wholesome, but it also has, to a remarkable degree, the power of
quenching thirst.
At all the caravanserais (or Turkish inns, as I explained before) there
is plenty of it for sale, and other relishes are also to be bought.
For the Turks do not, when travelling, require hot dishes or meat;
their relishes are sour milk, cheese, dried prunes, pears, peaches,
quinces, figs, raisins, cornel berries. Dainties of this description
are set out for sale on great pans of earthenware, having been first
boiled in plain water. Each man buys what he fancies most, and eats
the fruit with his bread by way of a relish; when he has finished the
fruit he drinks the water. Thus these men’s food and drink costs them
very little, so little, indeed, that I would venture to say that one of
our people will spend more on his food in one day than a Turk does in
twelve. Moreover their yearly feasts generally consist only of cakes
and buns, and other confectionery, with several dishes of rice, to
which they add mutton and chickens—not capons,[136] for poultry of that
kind is unknown to the Turks. As to pheasants, thrushes, becaficos,
&c., they have never even heard them mentioned. If honey or sugar be
mixed with their draught of water, they would not envy Jove his nectar.
I must not, however, pass over one kind of drink, if I am to give you
a full account. They take raisins and have them ground; when ground
and pounded they throw them into a wooden vessel, and pour over them a
certain proportion of hot water and mix them up; they then cover the
vessel carefully, and leave the liquor to ferment for a couple of days;
if the fermentation is not sufficiently active they add the lees of
wine. If you taste it when first it begins to ferment, it seems insipid
and disagreeably sweet; afterwards it gets a kind of acid flavour; in
this stage it is extremely palatable when mixed with the sweet liquor.
For three or four days it forms a most pleasant drink, especially when
cooled with plenty of snow, of which there is an unfailing supply at
Constantinople. They call it ‘Arab sherbet,’ i.e. ‘the drink of the
Arabs.’ But after three or four days it is spoilt, and gets quite sour.
In this stage it affects the head, and makes people stagger quite as
much as wine, and on this account is condemned by the religious laws of
the Turks. I must confess that I thought sherbet a most pleasant drink.
I found also the grapes, which in many places they keep till the
summer, most refreshing at times. The following is their method of
preserving them, as I took it down from their lips:—They select a bunch
in which the grapes are of a good size and fully ripe, a condition
which is easily brought about by the sun in Turkey. This bunch they
put into a vessel of wood or earthenware, after first covering the
bottom with a good layer of ground mustard; on the top of this they
put the grapes; then they pour the mustard flour in gradually, so as
to pack the grapes in it; lastly, having filled the vessel with grapes
up to the top, they end by pouring in unfermented wine as fresh as
possible; this done, they shut up the vessel and keep it till the hot
summer weather sets in, when people are thirsty, and refreshment of
this kind is acceptable. They then unseal the vessel, and put out the
grapes for sale, together with the sauce, which last the Turks like
quite as well as the grapes themselves. But the flavour of mustard was
not at all to my taste, so I had my grapes carefully washed. I found
them very refreshing and wholesome during the great heats.
You must not be surprised at my gratefully recording in my letter to
you the things which proved beneficial to myself, for you will remember
that the Egyptians carried this feeling to such an absurd length, that
they worshipped as gods the vegetables of their own gardens from which
they had derived benefit.
But it is high time for me to return to my road. Leaving the bank
of the Halys (which the Turks, I think, call Aitoczu) we came to
Goukurthoy, and thence to Choron (Chorum), and after this to Theke
Thioi (Tekiyeh). Here there is a famous monastery of Turkish monks,
or dervishes, from whom we learned a great deal about a hero named
Chederle, a man of great prowess and courage, whom they try to identify
with our St. George, ascribing to him the same feats as we claim for
our saint—to wit, that he saved a maiden, who had been given up to a
fierce and terrible dragon, by slaying the monster; to this they add
many other stories of their own invention, telling how their hero was
wont to wander through distant lands, and at last came to a river whose
waters gave immortality to those that drank thereof.
They do not mention the geographical position of this river (methinks
it ought to be marked down in Dreamland); all they tell me is that it
is concealed beneath a covering of deep darkness and thick night, and
that no mortal since Chederle has had the luck to see it; but that
Chederle himself, being released from the laws of death, rides to and
fro on a gallant steed, which, like its master, has, by a draught of
this same water, purged itself of mortal dross. They represent him
as one who loves the battle shock, and helps in war those who are
in the right, and those who have invoked his aid, of whatever faith
they may be. These tales seem absurd, but I will tell you one still
more ridiculous. They declare that he was one of the companions and
friends of Alexander the Great. The Turks have not the slightest idea
of chronology, or of different epochs, and they mix up together in
a wonderful way all historical events. Should the thought occur to
them, they have no hesitation in stating that Job was king Solomon’s
seneschal, and Alexander the Great commander-in-chief of his armies.
Even these are not the greatest of their absurdities.
There is in the mosque (as the Turks call their temples) a fountain
of choice marble, fed by a spring of the purest water; and this they
believe to have been miraculously produced by Chederle’s steed. They
have many stories also about Chederle’s comrades, his groom and his
sister’s son, whose tombs they show in the neighbourhood. They tried
hard to persuade us that miracles daily took place for the benefit of
those who come to these tombs to ask for aid. They firmly believed,
moreover, that chips of stone and earth taken from the spot, where
Chederle stood waiting for the dragon, were, when mixed with water,
efficacious against fever, headache, and diseases of the eye. I must
tell you that the neighbourhood is full of snakes and vipers; they are
so numerous that some places in the hot hours positively swarm with the
venomous beasts, who are basking in the sun, to such an extent that men
dare not approach them. I must not forget to tell you that the Turks
shake with laughter when they see in the Greek churches pictures of St.
George, whom they declare to be their own Chederle, with a boy sitting
on the haunches of his master’s steed, mixing wine and water for
him—for this is the manner in which St. George is painted by the Greeks.
But our journey has been long and we must shortly rest. There was
now only one stage, namely Baglison (Baglijah), between us and our
destination, Amasia, which last we reached on April 7, thirty days
after our departure from Constantinople. As we drew near we were met by
some Turks, who came to congratulate us on our arrival, and to do us
the compliment of escorting us into the city.
Amasia is the chief town of Cappadocia, and there the governor of the
province is wont to hold his courts, and to keep the main body of his
troops. But even from the time of Bajazet the place seemed in some
mysterious fashion to be associated with misfortune, and that this
idea was not groundless is proved by the miserable end of Mustapha.
Strabo tells us that this was his native place. The town lies between
two ranges of hills, and the river Iris (Yeshil-Irmak) flows through
its centre; so that both banks are covered with houses, which rise
gradually up the sides of the hills, like the tiers of seats in a
theatre; every part of the town therefore commands a view of the river,
and those who live on one side of the town are completely exposed to
the eyes of those who live on the other. It is, indeed, so hemmed in
by hills that there is only one road by which carriages and beasts of
burden can enter or leave the city.
On the night of our arrival there was a great fire, which the
Janissaries extinguished after their own fashion by pulling down the
neighbouring buildings. How it arose I cannot say, but there is no
doubt that the soldiers have good reasons for wishing for fires, for,
inasmuch as they are employed to put them out, and in most cases this
is only effected by pulling down the neighbouring houses, as I told you
before, they pillage, not only the goods and chattels of the people
whose houses are on fire, but also those of their neighbours as well.
So the soldiers themselves are often guilty of incendiarism in order to
get an opportunity of plundering the houses.
I remember an instance of this when I was at Constantinople. There
had been a great many fires, and it was quite certain that they were
not accidental, yet the incendiaries were never caught. Most people
laid the blame on Persian spies; but at length, after a more careful
investigation, it was discovered that they were the work of marines
from ships lying in the harbour, who set fire to the houses in order to
cover a raid on the goods of the neighbourhood.
On the highest of the hills which overhang Amasia there is a citadel
of respectable strength, which is permanently occupied by the Turks,
either to overawe the tribes of Asia, who (as I shall explain later)
are not over well disposed towards their Turkish masters, or to hold
the Persians in check; for, great as the distance is, they have
sometimes extended their raids as far as Amasia.
On this hill are many traces of ancient monuments, possibly those of
the kings of Cappadocia themselves. But neither the houses nor streets
of Amasia have any beauty to attract one’s notice. The houses are built
of white clay, almost in the same fashion as those in Spain; even the
roofs are made of this material, being flat without any gable. They use
a fragment of some ancient pillar for a roller, and when any part of
the roof is damaged by rain or wind, they pull this roller backwards
and forwards until the roof is once more solid and smooth. In summer
time the inhabitants sleep on these roofs in the open air. In these
districts rain does not fall either often or heavily; but when it
does come down, the clothes of the people walking in the streets are
terribly soiled by the mud which drips everywhere from the roofs. On a
house top near our lodgings I saw a young Sanjak-bey eating his supper
on a couch after the fashion of the ancients.
On our arrival at Amasia we were taken to call on Achmet Pasha (the
chief Vizier) and the other pashas—for the Sultan himself was not
then in the town—and commenced our negotiations with them touching
the business entrusted to us by King Ferdinand. The Pashas, on their
part, apparently wishing to avoid any semblance of being prejudiced
with regard to these questions, did not offer any strong opposition to
the views we expressed, and told us that the whole matter depended on
the Sultan’s pleasure. On his arrival we were admitted to an audience;
but the manner and spirit in which he listened to our address, our
arguments, and our message, was by no means favourable.
The Sultan was seated on a very low ottoman, not more than a foot
from the ground, which was covered with a quantity of costly rugs and
cushions of exquisite workmanship; near him lay his bow and arrows.
His air, as I said, was by no means gracious, and his face wore a
stern, though dignified, expression.
On entering we were separately conducted into the royal presence by the
chamberlains, who grasped our arms. This has been the Turkish fashion
of admitting people to the Sovereign ever since a Croat,[137] in order
to avenge the death of his master, Marcus, Despot of Servia, asked
Amurath for an audience, and took advantage of it to slay him. After
having gone through a pretence of kissing his hand, we were conducted
backwards to the wall opposite his seat, care being taken that we
should never turn our backs on him. The Sultan then listened to what
I had to say; but the language I held was not at all to his taste,
for the demands of his Majesty breathed a spirit of independence and
dignity, which was by no means acceptable to one who deemed that his
wish was law; and so he made no answer beyond saying in a tetchy way,
‘Giusel, giusel,’ i.e. well, well. After this we were dismissed to our
quarters.
The Sultan’s hall was crowded with people, among whom were several
officers of high rank. Besides these there were all the troopers of
the Imperial guard,[138] Spahis, Ghourebas, Ouloufedgis, and a large
force of Janissaries; but there was not in all that great assembly
a single man who owed his position to aught save his valour and his
merit. No distinction is attached to birth among the Turks; the
deference to be paid to a man is measured by the position he holds in
the public service. There is no fighting for precedence; a man’s place
is marked out by the duties he discharges. In making his appointments
the Sultan pays no regard to any pretensions on the score of wealth
or rank, nor does he take into consideration recommendations or
popularity; he considers each case on its own merits, and examines
carefully into the character, ability, and disposition of the man
whose promotion is in question. It is by merit that men rise in the
service, a system which ensures that posts should only be assigned to
the competent. Each man in Turkey carries in his own hand his ancestry
and his position in life, which he may make or mar as he will. Those
who receive the highest offices from the Sultan are for the most part
the sons of shepherds or herdsmen, and so far from being ashamed of
their parentage, they actually glory in it, and consider it a matter
of boasting that they owe nothing to the accident of birth; for they
do not believe that high qualities are either natural or hereditary,
nor do they think that they can be handed down from father to son,
but that they are partly the gift of God, and partly the result of
good training, great industry, and unwearied zeal; arguing that high
qualities do not descend from a father to his son or heir, any more
than a talent for music, mathematics, or the like; and that the mind
does not derive its origin from the father, so that the son should
necessarily be like the father in character, but emanates from heaven,
and is thence infused into the human body. Among the Turks, therefore,
honours, high posts, and judgeships are the rewards of great ability
and good service. If a man be dishonest, or lazy, or careless, he
remains at the bottom of the ladder, an object of contempt; for such
qualities there are no honours in Turkey!
This is the reason that they are successful in their undertakings, that
they lord it over others, and are daily extending the bounds of their
empire. These are not our ideas, with us there is no opening left for
merit; birth is the standard for everything; the prestige of birth is
the sole key to advancement in the public service. But on this head I
shall perhaps have more to say to you in another place, and you must
consider what I have said as strictly private.
For the nonce, take your stand by my side, and look at the sea of
turbaned heads, each wrapped in twisted folds of the whitest silk; look
at those marvellously handsome dresses of every kind and every colour;
time would fail me to tell how all around is glittering with gold, with
silver, with purple, with silk, and with velvet; words cannot convey
an adequate idea of that strange and wondrous sight: it was the most
beautiful spectacle I ever saw.
With all this luxury great simplicity and economy are combined; every
man’s dress, whatever his position may be, is of the same pattern;
no fringes or useless points are sewn on, as is the case with us,
appendages which cost a great deal of money, and are worn out in three
days. In Turkey the tailor’s bill for a silk or velvet dress, even
though it be richly embroidered, as most of them are, is only a ducat.
They were quite as much surprised at our manner of dressing as we were
at theirs. They use long robes reaching down to the ankles, which have
a stately effect and add to the wearer’s height, while our dress is so
short and scanty that it leaves exposed to view more than is comely of
the human shape; besides, somehow or other, our fashion of dress seems
to take from the wearer’s height, and make him look shorter than he
really is.[139]