of the Divân, which is almost precisely as it was in the days when the
deliberations of the chief assemblage of the state were held within its
walls. It is a large, vaulted apartment, lighted from above by small
Moorish windows, lined with marbles, covered with gold arabesques, and
without other furniture save the long divan upon which the members of
the council took their seats. Directly above the grand vizier’s place
may still be seen the small window covered with a gilded lattice from
behind which first Suleiman I., and after him all the other pâdishahs,
took part unseen, or at all events were supposed to take part, in the
sessions.[H] A secret passageway led from this hidden recess to the
imperial apartments in the third enclosure. Here the great assembly,
composed of all the chief ministers of the empire, met five times a
week, presided over by the grand vizier. It was a most impressive
sight: facing the entrance sat the grand vizier, and near him the
viziers of the dome, the _kapudan pasha_, or chief admiral, the two
chief justices of Anadoli and Rumili, representing the judiciary of
the provinces of Asia and Europe; on one side the imperial treasurers,
on the other the _nisciandgi_, whose duty it was to affix the Sultan’s
seal to all decrees; beyond, to the right and left, two long lines
of ulemas and chamberlains, and in the angles the sciaùs to whom
were assigned the duties of bearing the orders and despatches of the
assembly and carrying out the sentences, and who were trained to
comprehend at once the exact significance of every look and gesture.
Before this gathering the boldest quailed and the most innocent began
to fearfully interrogate their own consciences. Every one sat with
immovable countenance, crossed arms, and hands concealed in the folds
of his garment; from overhead a flood of pale golden light fell upon
the white turbans, long beards, rich furs, jewelled dagger-hilts, and
motionless figures of the council, lending them a death-like pallor,
as though a row of statues had been dressed and colored in imitation
of life. Thick matting muffled the footfall of all who came and went,
heavy perfumes filled the air from the rich furs of the ministers, and
the green branches of the trees in the court without were reflected
in the polished marbles of the walls, while from time to time the
silence was broken by bursts of melody from the birds, which echoed
and re-echoed beneath the gilded roof. All the surroundings of that
awful tribunal were graceful, charming, delicate. One at a time the
different voices of the members could be heard, subdued, monotonous,
like the murmur of a brook, so that the accused, standing erect in the
centre of the hall, would not know even from which particular mouth
the sounds issued. A hundred great eyes were fixed with penetrating
scrutiny upon a single face, whose every shade of expression was noted,
and every smallest word that dropped from whose lips was taken account
of. The deepest, most hidden secrets of the heart were guessed from a
change of countenance. Sometimes the death-sentence would be pronounced
in a few calm words after long dialogues carried on in subdued tones
and listened to in sepulchral silence; or, again, it would fall
suddenly, unexpectedly, like a clap of thunder, having its echoes in
the passionate remonstrances of a tortured soul in its supreme moment,
cut suddenly short when, at a sign from the vizier, a cimeter would
descend, cleaving the skull in twain and staining the marbles and
matting with blood. Aghas of spahis and Janissaries would fall to the
earth, thrust through with daggers; governors and _kaimacan_ sink with
staring eyes, the noose drawn tight about their necks. In a few moments
the body would have been laid beneath the plane trees with a green
cloth thrown over it, the blood have been wiped up, the air perfumed
afresh, and, the executioner having returned to his post, the council
would resume its deliberations with countenances unmoved, hands still
concealed, and unruffled, monotonous voices, while from the little
Moorish windows above the same long, slanting rays of pale yellow light
fell upon the same white turbans and black beards. It was those haughty
judges’ turn to tremble, however, when, the Divân having incurred the
displeasure of Murad IV. or the second Selim by some of its measures,
the gilded grating which concealed the imperial recess was suddenly
heard to resound beneath the furious fist of their supreme lord; even
then, after a long and profound silence, during which terrified eyes
furtively took counsel of one another, the deliberations were resumed
in solemn tones and with impassive faces, but their icy fingers
trembled beneath the great sleeves and their souls they commended to
the mercy of God.
[H] The sultans sat behind this lattice when giving audience to
foreign ambassadors.--TRANS.
At the end of this second courtyard, which may be called, in a certain
sense, the diplomatic court of the Seraglio, stood the third gate,
flanked by marble columns and covered by a wide, overhanging roof,
before which, night and day, a troop of white eunuchs and a band
of kapuji, armed with sabres and daggers, stood on guard. This was
the famous Bâb-i-Sâdet, or Gate of Felicity, leading to the third
and innermost enclosure--that sacred portal which for nearly four
centuries remained obdurately closed to every Christian who was not the
representative of a reigning sovereign or a state; that door at which
the supplicating curiosity of thousands of celebrated and influential
travellers has knocked in vain; that door from out of which flowed,
to spread abroad through every country on the surface of the earth,
so many wild and fantastic and romantic tales, so many strange and
mournful rumors, so many recitals of love and adventure and shadowy
whispers of intrigues and dark conspiracies--so many volumes of poetry,
voluptuous, fantastic, and horrible. It was the sacred threshold of
the sanctuary of the king of kings, whose name was only pronounced
by the common people with bated breath and feelings of secret awe
and terror, as though it were the portal leading to some region of
enchantment, passing which a profane mortal might suddenly find himself
turned to stone or else behold sights which human language would be
powerless to express--a door, in short, before which even now the most
matter-of-fact, unimaginative traveller pauses with some slight feeling
of awe, while his incredulous glance rests upon the lengthened shadow
of his own stiff hat as it falls athwart the heavy half-closed doors.
And yet even this sacred precinct was not respected by the mad billows
of military revolt. Indeed, it may be said that this particular corner
of the great courtyard, situated between the hall of the Divân and the
Bâb-i-Sâdet, is the precise spot in which the blind fury of rebellion
has committed some of its most daring acts of insubordination. The
vicar of God sometimes beheld that gleaming sword with which he ruled
the world turned against himself, and that despotism which so jealously
guarded every approach to the Seraglio was the very same which, on
occasion, violated its most secret recesses. Once the dazzling blades
of the cimeters were withdrawn from around that threatening colossus,
it was easily seen upon how fragile a support its power rested. Armed
hordes of Janissaries and spahis, pounding down the first and second
doors with clubs, poured through in the dead of night, waving lighted
torches and brandishing on the points of their gleaming blades the
names of those ministers upon whom they were determined to wreak
their vengeance, while their fierce shouts, reaching far beyond those
invulnerable walls, spread terror and dismay in the very innermost
recesses of their sovereign’s abode. In vain were bags of gold and
silver coins thrown down from the summits of the walls; in vain did
terrified muftis, sheikhs, ulemas, and all the most powerful and
influential members of the court plead, reason, implore, promise, try
by every means their fears or ingenuity could suggest to lower those
brawny arms rigid with rage and fury; in vain the validéh sultans, half
dead with fright, appeared at the grated windows holding up to view
their little innocent children. The blind beast with a thousand heads
was unchained, and nothing would satisfy it but living human victims,
flesh to tear, blood to pour out, heads to carry stuck on the points
of spears; and then the Sultan would appear in person between the
battlements, even adventure as far as the barricades of the gateway,
surrounded by trembling eunuchs and terrified pages armed with useless
daggers, and, one by one, plead for each victim, promising, weeping,
begging for mercy in the name of his mother, his sons, the Prophet,
for the glory of the empire, the peace of the world; but nothing would
avail. A fresh outburst of insults and threats, a waving of torches and
brandishing of cimeters, was the only response to all entreaties; and
so at last forth from the Gate of Felicity were led ministers, viziers,
generals, eunuchs, favorites, one after another, cowering, shrieking,
swooning with terror, and on the instant were torn in pieces by the
howling pack, hacked by a hundred blades, trodden underfoot, mangled
past recognition. Thus Murad III. surrendered his favorite falconer
to be torn in pieces before his very eyes, as did Muhammad III. the
kislaraghà Otman, and Ghaznèfer, chief of the white eunuchs, being
moreover forced to salute the troops in the actual presence of their
bleeding and mutilated corpses. And Murad IV. cast down the shrinking
form of his grand vizier, Hafiz, into which seventeen daggers were
instantly buried to the hilt, while Selim III. sacrificed his entire
ministry to the fury of the mob; and then, as these weak pâdishahs
returned to their own apartments beside themselves with shame and
impotent rage, the triumphant rebels paraded the streets of Stambul,
the lights from thousands of torches falling upon the torn and bleeding
bodies of their victims dragged in brutal exultation in their midst.
The Gate of Felicity, like the Bâb-el-Selam, is a sort of passageway
out of which one issues directly into that mysterious enclosure, the
abode of the “brother of the sun.”
For my description to be effective, or for it to give a really good
idea of the character of this part of the Seraglio, it should have
a running accompaniment of subdued music full of sudden breaks and
changes.
This small enchanted city, with its strange, confused architecture,
whimsical, graceful, charming, was buried in a forest of great plane
trees and cypresses, whose mighty branches stretched far above the
roofs, casting their thick shade over an intricate labyrinth of gardens
filled with roses and verbenas, courtyards reached by small, heavy
doorways, and narrow streets flanked by rows of pavilions and Chinese
kiosks. Footpaths led off under the trees to little lakes fringed with
myrtle, in whose sparkling bosoms were reflected tiny white mosques and
the silver domes of buildings built to resemble temples and cloisters,
connected by covered galleries and long files of airy columns, and
wooden roofs, inlaid and painted, overhanging arabesqued doorways,
and flights of stairs leading to balconies furnished with carved
balustrades. In every direction were long, dim perspectives, through
which fountains could be seen sparkling in the distance, while glimpses
of marble arch and column and terrace alternated with broad views
of the Sea of Marmora, two shores of the Bosphorus, the harbor, and
Stambul, all framed in by the deep green of the pines and sycamores;
and spreading above this paradise that wonderful sky.
The buildings had been added on to one another without any settled plan
or design, just as the needs or whims of the moment might dictate,
both imposing and flimsy, like a stage-setting, and fairly bristling
with secret passage-ways and hidden chambers, planned by a childish
jealousy which, unseen itself, desired to see and hear everything.
Although swarming with life, this little imperial city looked almost
deserted upon the surface, as though the contemplative, pastoral
character of the ancient Ottoman princes still brooded over the abode
of their descendants--an encampment of stone, which, with all its
pomp and splendor, still brought to mind that other one of canvas of
the wandering tribes of Tartary; a great, spreading royal residence
composed of a hundred little princely dwellings hiding behind one
another, combining something of the confinement and melancholy of a
prison with the decorum of a temple and the gay abandonment of the
country. Before this spectacle, so full of princely magnificence and
fantastic ingenuity, the new-comer pauses to ask himself what country
he lives in or if he has fallen into another world.
This was the heart of the Seraglio, whence all the arteries of the
empire drew their life, and to which all its veins led back.
The first building you see on entering is the throne-room, which
is open to visitors. It is a small square edifice, surrounded by a
beautiful marble portico, entered through a richly ornamented doorway
flanked by two charming fountains. The roof is covered with gold
arabesques, and the walls are lined with slabs of marble and faïence
set in a symmetrical design: in the centre is a marble fountain, and it
is lighted by means of lofty windows of stained glass. At the farther
end stands the throne, fashioned like a great bedstead, covered by
a canopy edged with pearls and supported on four slender columns of
gilded copper, ornamented with arabesques and precious stones, and
surmounted by four golden balls and crescents, from which horses’
tails--the emblem of the military power of the pâdishahs--are suspended.
Here the supreme lord held his solemn receptions of state in the
presence of the assembled court, and here at the feet of the
newly-installed Sultan were thrown the bodies of his brothers and
nephews murdered to secure his reign from plots and conspiracies. My
first thought on entering that room was of the nineteen unfortunate
brethren of Muhammad III. The sound of the guns which announced their
father’s death to Europe and Asia was heard in their prisons as well,
where it meant the death-knell of them all, and soon after the Seraglio
mutes threw them in one ghastly heap at the foot of the throne:
young and old, it made no difference--some babies whose golden heads
rested upon the sturdy chests of grown men, while even grizzled locks
flowed over the pavement beneath the feet of boys of ten or twelve,
rough prison caftans and muslin swaddling-bands all alike enwrapping
stiffened limbs and staring faces. What rivers of blood have been
reflected in those polished marbles and beautiful porcelains in this
spot where the savage fury of Selim II., of Murad IV., of Ahmed I.,
and of Ibrahim burst all bounds, and they stood exulting witnesses of
their victims’ agonies! Here viziers have been beaten down and trodden
under foot by the sciaùs, their brains dashed out beneath the marble
fountain, and governors conducted all the way from Syria or Egypt, tied
to an agha’s saddle, to have their heads struck off at last; any one
whose conscience accused him did well to turn on this threshold and bid
an everlasting farewell to the blue sky and beautiful hills of Asia,
while he who came forth alive greeted the sunshine with the feelings of
a man who had just escaped death.
The throne pavilion is not the only building to which the public is
now admitted. On coming out from thence we pass through a number of
flower-gardens and courtyards surrounded by small buildings and Moorish
archways supported upon slender marble columns. Here stood the college
where the imperial pages received such instruction as should fit them
for the highest offices of the state and court, and their princely
residences and recreation halls; troops of servants waited upon them,
and their masters were selected from among the most gifted and learned
men of the empire. In the centre stood the library, consisting of a
row of graceful Saracenesque kiosks with open peristyles; one of these
is still standing, and is chiefly noticeable for its great bronze
door ornamented with reliefs in jasper and lapis lazuli and covered
with marvellous arabesques of foliage, stars, and figures of every
conceivable device, so intricate and so delicately executed as to
hardly seem like the work of mortal hands. Not far from the library
stands the treasury, glistening with tiles, once the repository of
fabulous riches, consisting for the most part of weapons seized by, or
presented to, victorious sultans, and preserved by them as curiosities;
but Muhammad II., who prided himself upon his skilful penmanship, left
his inkstand studded with diamonds to the collection. The greater part
of these treasures have now passed, converted into gold coins, into the
coffers of the public treasury, but in the great days of the empire
this pavilion contained a glittering array of Damascus cimeters whose
hilts were solid masses of pearls and precious stones; huge pistols,
their handles studded with as many as two hundred diamonds; daggers,
a single one of which was worth a year’s tribute from an Asiatic
province; massive silver and steel clubs, whose hand-pieces were of
solid crystal, all chased and gilded; and among them the jewelled
aigrettes of the Murads and Muhammads, the agate goblets in which once
sparkled the wines of Hungary at imperial banquets, cups hollowed out
of a single turquoise which once graced the tables of shahs of Persia,
necklaces of Caramanian diamonds the size of walnuts, pearl-studded
belts, saddles overlaid with gold, rugs glittering with gems; so that
the whole building seemed to be on fire and one’s sight and reason
alike became dazed. A little farther on, in the middle of a lonely
garden, is the famous “cage” in which, from the fourth Muhammad’s[I]
time on, those of the imperial princes whose liberty seemed to offer a
menace to the peace of the throne were kept in confinement, until, on
the death of the reigning monarch, the shouts and acclamations of the
Janissaries should call one of them to succeed him, or the appearance
of the executioner warn them to prepare for death. It is built in the
form of a small temple, with massive walls unbroken by windows, and
lighted from above. Against the single door, made of iron, a heavy
stone was always rolled. Here Abdul-Aziz passed the few days which
elapsed between his downfall and death. Here the Caligula of Ottoman
history, Ibrahim, met his horrible and wretched end, and his image
is the first which rises to confront the visitor as he pauses at the
entrance to that necropolis of the living. The military aghas, having
torn him from the throne, dragged him hither like any common criminal,
and imprisoned him with two of his favorite odalisques. After the first
wild paroxysms of despair he grew resigned. “This doom,” said he, “was
written upon my forehead; it is the will of God.” Of all his great
empire and that vast harem, the scene for so many years of such acts of
mad folly, nothing remained to him but a prison-cell, two slaves, and
the Koran. Believing his life, at all events, to be safe, his mind was
at rest, and he even cherished a hope that his boon-companions of the
barracks and taverns of Stambul might bring about a popular reaction
in his favor. But, unfortunately, if he had forgotten that admonition
in the Koran, “When there are two khalifs, kill one of them,” the
muftis, their memories jogged by the aghas and viziers, had not. And
so it came to pass that he sat one day upon a mat in a corner of his
prison reading aloud from the Koran to the two slaves who stood erect
before him, their arms crossed upon their breasts; he wore a black
caftan fastened about the waist with a tattered scarf, and upon his
head a red woollen cap, while a ray of pale light falling from above
upon his face showed it to be wasted and waxen, but composed. Suddenly
there was a dull, hollow noise without, and, leaping to his feet as the
door opened, he confronted a sinister group upon the threshold whose
significance he understood at once. Raising his eyes to a small grated
balcony extending out from the wall near the roof, he could distinguish
the impassive faces of a group of muftis, aghas, and viziers upon which
his doom was plainly written. Beside himself with terror, he poured out
a torrent of prayers and supplications: “Mercy! mercy for the Pâdishah!
spare my life! If there be any among you who have eaten my bread, save
me now in God’s name! You, Mufti Abdul-rahim, be careful of what you
are about to do; you will see very soon that people are not all blind
and stupid. I will tell you now that Insuf-pasha advised me to have
you executed for a traitor, and I refused, and now you want to kill
me! Read the Koran, as I am doing; read the word of God, and see how
ingratitude and injustice are condemned! Let me live, Abdul-rahim!
Life! life!”
[I] It was during the reign of Muhammad III., 1595-1603, that
the custom of confining the imperial princes in the kafess,
or cage, was first introduced.--TRANS.
The trembling executioner raised his eyes inquiringly toward the
gallery; but a hard, dry voice was heard issuing from among those calm
faces as unmoved and devoid of all expression as so many statues.
“Kara-ali,” it said, “perform your duty.” The executioner at once
attempted to seize Ibrahim by the shoulders, but he, uttering a loud
shriek, flung himself into a corner behind the two slaves. Kara-ali,
assisted by the sciaùs, however, threw the women aside, and again laid
hold of the Pâdishah. There was an outburst of curses and maledictions,
the sound of a heavy body being thrown violently to the ground, a
piercing cry which ended in a dull rattle, and then profound silence. A
bit of silken cord had launched the eighteenth sultan of the house of
Osman into eternity.
Other buildings, in addition to the ones already described and those
of the harem, were scattered here and there throughout the woods
and gardens; as, for instance, the baths of Selim II., comprising
thirty-two vast apartments, a mass of marbles, gilding, and painting,
and every variety of kiosk, round and octagonal, surmounted by domes
and fantastic roofs, and enclosing rooms lined with mother-of-pearl and
decorated with Arabian inscriptions. In every window hung a parrot’s
or nightingale’s cage, and the light streamed through stained-glass
panes in floods of blue or rose color. In some of these kiosks the
pâdishahs were wont to have the _Thousand-and-One Nights_ read aloud
to them by old dervishes; in others the little princes would receive
their first lessons in reading with appropriate solemnities. There
were little kiosks designed for meditation, and others for nocturnal
meetings; nests and graceful little prison-houses erected and destroyed
in obedience to some passing fancy, and commanding the most exquisite
views of Skutari empurpled by the setting sun, or the Olympus bathed
in silver by the rays of the moon, while the soft winds from the
Bosphorus, heavy with perfume, made the golden crescents tremble and
sway from the summit of each slender pinnacle.
At last we come to where, in the most retired part of the harem, stands
the Temple of Relics, or _apartment of the robes of state_. It was
built in imitation of the Golden Room of the Byzantine emperors, and
closed with a door of silver. Here were preserved the mantle of the
Prophet, solemnly exhibited once a year in the presence of the entire
court, his staff, the bow enclosed in a silver case, the relics of the
Kaaba, and that awful and highly venerated standard of the Holy War
enveloped in no less than forty silken wrappings, upon which should
any infidel be daring enough to fix his eyes, he would be struck with
instant blindness as from a stroke of lightning. All the most sacred
possessions of the race, the most precious belongings of the royal
house, the most valuable treasures of the empire, were preserved in
that retired spot, that little veiled shrine toward which every portion
of the huge metropolis seemed to converge, as a vast multitude turns
to prostrate itself in adoration before some common centre.