that the Jew slave-merchant who buys them, endeavours to bestow on them
such accomplishments as may enhance their value. These, however, are
generally fruitless efforts. Personal, not mental qualities, are those
that are sought for, and most prized. The Circassian seems to have an
inaptitude for any improvement of the mind; and while the Greek or
French females, whom the fortune of war or other calamity has consigned
to slavery, make considerable progress under their instructors, the
indolent and voluptuous Circassian despises such vain labours, and
few attain even the elementary accomplishment of reading or writing.
Music, such as it is, is most frequently attempted, because it is an
enjoyment of the sense, and acquired without mental labour.
Our illustration represents the master of the harem indulging in his
favourite recreation. His nargillai, scented with fragrant pastils,
fills the small apartment with its drowsy vapours. Reclining on his
cushioned carpet, he contemplates the languid, sensual features of his
Circassians placed on the divan beside him, who try to amuse him with
the only accomplishment they are capable of attaining, or he of feeling
or comprehending. Next the door stands the black eunuch, guarding with
jealous and malignant eye the entrance into this sacred seclusion.
[Illustration: T. Allom. J. C. Armitage.
CONSTANTINOPLE, FROM CASSIM PASHA.]
From the summit of the hill of Pera, called from its elevation Tepe
Bashi, or “the head of the hill,” the ground slopes to the Golden
Horn, displaying an exceedingly diversified and picturesque surface,
comprehending not only the beautiful cemetery, and the city of
Constantinople, but also the suburbs of Cassim Pasha and Piri Pasha,
both connected with many important and interesting events. The view is
so attractive, that the Tepe Bashi forms the great promenade of Pera.
It is every evening crowded with the elite of the Frank society of the
capital, mixed with distinguished natives. Ambassadors, attachées,
dragomans, hakims, merchants of all nations, in their respective
costumes, here assemble, and form a moving picture of a very gay and
varied aspect.
From hence one of these cemeteries, which give to Turkish cities
so striking a character, extends its cypress shades over a surface
undulating into sloping lawns, deep glens, and swelling hills,
comprehending a circumference of many miles. Through this run broad
walks, forming crowded thoroughfares, which lead to the suburbs and
the several iskelli, or slips of embarkation to the city rising on the
hills at the opposite side of the water, but which are all now nearly
deserted for the Buyuk Tchekmadgé, or “Great Bridge,” which Mahmoud II.
caused to be thrown across the harbour.
Not many years ago, this district was very unsafe, and the Frank, whom
business or curiosity led through it, was liable to the abuse or insult
of any Turk he met in the day, or the attacks of robbers or assassins
in the night. The last outrage committed here was on a man eminently
distinguished for many years among the Frank, as well as Turkish
population, and whose fate excited a commotion and consternation which
have hardly yet subsided. This man was the Hakim Lorenzo.
Among the Franks who flock to Constantinople in search of fortune,
there is a large proportion of Italians. Many of them have received an
education at Padua, or other Italian universities, taken out degrees
in medicine, and so come qualified for the practice of it. Many adopt
the profession after their arrival, as the most lucrative and easiest
means of living. It requires but slight knowledge to be superior to
the native hakims, and the acuteness and sagacity of these versatile
Italians supply every deficiency. Among these was Lorenzo, a native of
Florence. He had acquired some reputation by the practice of his art
among the Franks; and the Turks, ever eager to avail themselves of the
superior lights of Europeans when health is concerned, soon gave him
the preference over their own doctors. It happened that the eldest son
of the reigning Sultan, Abdul Hamed, fell sick; and the reputation of
this Frank physician was so high, that he was sent for to the Seraglio.
The boy recovered, and nothing could exceed the gratitude of the
father. He built for the physician a large house in Pera; conferred on
him a beautiful kiosk and chifflik at St. Stephano, for his country
residence; and, in order to secure his future practice, he appointed
him Hakim Bashi, or “principal physician” to the Seraglio.
These gifts and this situation, not only gratified his cupidity,
but unfortunately excited his ambition also. His patronage became
unbounded. The appointment and deposition of pashas, the banishment
or recall of vizirs, in which the secret influence of the Seraglio
became every day available, were exercised by him, and the fanaticism
of the Moslem was forgotten, when he became indebted to this giaour
for the highest services. On the death of his patron, Abdul Hamed, his
successors, Selim and Mustapha continued their favour, and treated
him with the same confidence and indulgence; and when the young and
inexperienced Mahmoud succeeded, it was supposed he would exercise
over him the same influence. He was now arrived at the age of eighty.
He was about to withdraw from the care and anxiety such a life imposed
upon him, with credit and reputation, and devote what remained of it
to retirement and peace, when in an evil hour he was induced to engage
in one more of those court intrigues from which his Italian dexterity
had so often extricated him. The young Sultan notified to him, that
he would have no one intermeddle in his affairs, and cautioned him to
desist. He would not take warning, and his summary death was resolved
on.
By the capitulations entered into with foreign powers, every Frank
subject is under the protection of the representative of that state to
which he belongs, and amenable only to its tribunal. Lorenzo therefore
could not be dealt with as a Raya, and put to death by the mandate
of the Sultan. It would have excited the whole diplomatic corps of
Pera, who would make a common cause to support their privileges and
immunities. It was therefore necessary to dispose of him in another
manner. He was sent for one evening by the Capitan Pasha, to see one
of his family, taken suddenly ill; and the way from Pera, where his
house was, to the palace of the pasha, on the harbour, lay through this
cemetery. He took with him his Capi Tchocadar, who always attended him
to the Seraglio, and proceeded to pay his visit, apprising his family
that he would return when he had prescribed for his patient. The Turks
retire to rest early, and the period was past when he was expected
home. His way led through a place infamous for outrage of all kind, and
the apprehensions of his family were considerably excited. He did not
return during the night, and at the dawn of morning they proceeded to
meet him along the avenue leading through Cassim Pasha to the Capitan
Pasha’s palace. In a small dell, where the road winds down a steep,
they stumbled on two bodies−-one was that of the Tchocadar, and the
other that of Lorenzo. They were quite dead, with the marks of the
bowstring, with which they had been strangled, round their necks. The
valuables they had about their persons were untouched, and it was hence
inferred that it was the work of no robbers. The usual legal process
of inquiry was taken by the Austrian internuncio, and the conclusion
formed from the proceedings was, that the assassin was no other than
the young Sultan himself, who had caused him and his attendant to
be executed in the palace of the Capitan Pasha, and the bodies laid
where they were found; and the property was not taken from them,
that it might not be supposed they fell victims to common assassins,
but to that terrible, mysterious vengeance, which suffered no man to
escape that once excited it. The Turkish ministry, however, affected
to believe it was a common death by midnight murderers in a dangerous
place; and to prevent the recurrence of such accidents, a small edifice
was built, and a guard established on the spot, which yet remain. A
guard-house here is not like one in Europe, from whence a passenger is
rudely repulsed. Beside it is a small caffinet, with benches, on which
he is invited to repose; and while he partakes of the refreshments
offered him, some hoary-headed sentinel enters into conversation with
him, and tells him the melancholy fate of Lorenzo the Hakim Bashi.
On the right of Cassim Pasha begin the suburbs of Piri Pasha, so called
from a very distinguished event in Turkish history. When the knights of
the holy sepulchre were driven from Palestine, they took refuge in the
island of Rhodes, where they fortified themselves, still lingering in
the vicinity of that holy place, which they vainly attempted to hold,
and in the hope of keeping alive the expiring spark of Christianity
in the East. But Soliman the Magnificent was resolved to extinguish
it utterly, and made stupendous preparations to dislodge its gallant
defenders from their last strong-hold. An army of 150,000 men was
embarked in a fleet of 400 ships, and proceeded to exterminate this
devoted community, shut up on their insulated rock. The first notice
they received of their intended fate, was from fires lighted on the
opposite coast of Lycia. A galley was despatched, to ascertain the
cause of these unusual beacons, when a packet was thrown on board
directed to the grand master. It was opened, and found to contain a
summons of unconditional submission, and the surrender of the place. To
oppose the countless multitudes who rushed to this unexpected attack,
6000 men alone were found on the island, and they prepared to defend
it. With incredible efforts they resisted every assault, and the great
Sultan himself, impatient of delay, hastened from Constantinople, to
animate his troops by his presence. It was fruitless. The assailants,
under the eye of their sovereign, were repulsed, leaving the bodies
of 20,000 of their companions weltering on the rocks. The commanders
were deposed and punished, and the enraged and disappointed Sultan
conferred the whole direction of the siege on his favourite Piri Pasha.
He desisted from sanguinary and ineffectual assaults, and proceeded
by sapping the fortress. The most distinguished engineers in Europe
were invited by the magnificent Sultan, and the island was perforated
by fifty-five mines, sufficient to blow the fortress and the rock on
which it stood, into the air; but they were met by counter-mines,
and harmlessly exploded. At length, worn out by famine and fatigue,
exhausted but not subdued, the gallant garrison were incapable of
further resistance, and this handful of Christians, the last and only
valuable remnant of the insane Crusaders, retired to another island,
farther west, still destined for two centuries more to defend the cause
of the Gospel farther west against the encroaching of the Koran. The
distinguished Turk who effected this conquest of Rhodes, gave his
name to this suburb of Constantinople; and the district of Piri Pasha
recalls to the Moslem the expulsion of the last remnant of Christianity
from the East.
On the conquest of Rhodes, Soliman erected his splendid mosque on
the summit of the highest of the seven hills of the capital, and
his faithful pasha determined to follow his example, but in a less
ostentatious form. He knew how dangerous it was to be his rival, so
he became his humble imitator. In the low district assigned to him, a
mosque rears its unpretending head, simple in its aspect, but still
distinguished by its beauty and architectural ornaments. It strikingly
deviates from the usual style of Oriental building, as it is elevated
on light arcades, supported on pillars, having three equal colonnades,
in each division.
Near this is the Ain Ali Kasa Seraï, or “The Palace of Mirrors.” When
Achmed III., in 1715, recovered the Morea from the Venetians, they
wished to conciliate him by some valuable present. They were then
famous for the manufacture of mirrors, and they sent him the largest
specimens that ever had been made. Achmed accepted them, and built a
palace in this place for their reception.
The great fire kindled by the discontented adherents of the Janissaries
in 1831, commenced at Sakiz Aghatz in this district. The whole of it
was consumed, including the palaces of all the European embassies,
as well as that of the Capitan Pasha. The remains of this last still
stand on an eminence near the Arsenal, consisting of a line of arcades,
resembling an aqueduct, flanked by clusters of little towers: it was in
this place the murder of the Hakim Bashi was perpetrated, and, as long
as it stands, it will keep alive the memory of the unfortunate Lorenzo.
Our illustration presents the city as it appears from this district.
The Mosque of Sulimanie towering in the centre, and the aqueduct of
Valens uniting the hill on which it stands with the opposite. But the
most conspicuous and novel object is the Buyuk Tchekmadgé, or “Great
Bridge,” which Mahmoud II. caused to be thrown across the harbour.[9]
This structure, so necessary for the communications of a great city,
had been called for ever since Constantine had made this the capital
of the Roman empire. The peninsula of Pera, containing 200,000
inhabitants, was an important part of the city; yet the only passage
to it by land, was a bridge over the Barbyses, by a circuit of nine or
ten miles. Among the obstacles to erecting a bridge across the harbour,
was the immense number of caïquegees, or “boatmen,” who obtained
their living by the many ferries. On various pressing occasions the
government had attempted to avail itself of their services in manning
the fleet; but they resisted with obstinancy, and, notwithstanding
the unmitigated despotism and unsparing ferocity of the Sultan, it
was considered too hazardous to exasperate this fierce democracy.
With the same obstinacy they opposed the building of a bridge, which
would interfere with their means of living. But when the terrible
and energetic sovereign had cut off the Janissaries, all effectual
resistance to any of his plans of innovation was removed, so he
determined on uniting the divided parts of his great city. Among the
modes by which many of his improvements were effected, was availing
himself of the services of some rich subject. When navigation by steam
was introduced into Europe, Mahmoud ardently wished for its adoption
in Turkey. He was one morning agreeably surprised, by seeing a noble
steam-boat moored under the Seraglio, and he was told it was the gift
of Casas Aretine, a rich Armenian. In the same way an individual
completed for him this bridge, when the caïquegees no longer dared to
oppose it.
On the 20th of October, 1837, it was opened for passengers, and the
ceremony was attended with another extraordinary innovation on Turkish
manners. He not only attended himself with his sons, but his harem was
thrown open, and ladies dressed in their gayest attire appeared in
their arrhubas, mixed with the spectators, and mingled in the fête with
all the freedom and gaiety of a similar event in Paris or London. The
novelty and brilliancy of the spectacle form a new era in the society
of the Moslem capital. As it was almost the only level way in the
city, it became a favourite carriage promenade; and the Sultan himself
was seen to abandon his caïque, and frequently drive across it in an
European carriage.
[Illustration: J. Salmon Drawn from Nature by F. Hervé. J. C. Bentley.
VILLAGE OF ROUMELIA, NEAR ADRIANOPLE.]
The district of ancient Thrace is sometimes called Romania, but more
properly, Roumelia, from the Turkish name Roum Eli, “the country of
the Romans.” It extended from the Euxine Sea to the river Strymon,
and from Mons Hemus to the Propontis and Egean, which limits it has
retained through all its vicissitudes to the present day. Byzantium,
or Constantinople, is its former, as it is its present capital. The
ancient Thracians were distinguished for their ferocity, and the poets
have reported it as the theatre of many scenes of cruelty. Here it was
that their king, Diomedes, fed his horses on human flesh, casting every
stranger he found into their mangers, to be devoured alive; and here
it was that the poet Orpheus, while lamenting the loss of his beloved
Eurydice, was torn to pieces by the women, and his head cast into the
Hebrus; and he who was represented to soothe tigers, soften rocks, and
lead lofty oaks by his song, could not charm into humanity the Thracian
ladies. In less fabulous times, their barbarism is unfortunately too
well authenticated. It was the region where they offered up human
victims as grateful offerings to their gods, and that from whence the
Roman people obtained their theatrical assassins; so that the names of
Thracian and gladiator are synonymous in their language: and such was
the horrid delight taken in their exhibition, that from one thousand
to fifteen hundred of those barbarians are reported to have been seen
dead or dying, by each others swords, at the same moment, on the bloody
stage, for the amusement of the assembled citizens of Rome.
The original barbarians of this region were amalgamated with various
people as barbarous as themselves, who were driven from their own
deserts, and invited to settle there. The Bastarnæ, a nation from
the banks of the Rhine, were located here by the Emperor Probus,
who attempted to instruct them in the ways of civilized life; but
the intractable savages rejected the instruction, and, by repeated
rebellions and insurrections, devastated the country they were allowed
to settle in. In the reign of Valens, another nation was transported
hither. The Goths were assaulted by the Huns, whom they represented
as an unknown and monstrous race of savages, and they supplicated
permission to escape from their ferocity by migrating into Thrace, and
occupying the vast uncultivated plains then waste and unproductive.
This second immigration was permitted; and these barbarians, like the
former, ungratefully rebelled against their benefactors.
To this mingled population was finally added that of the Turks. In the
year 1363 they crossed the Hellespont, and spread over this region
their conquering hordes, adding Oriental ignorance and fanaticism
to the catalogue of Thracian qualities. They seem to have even
deteriorated the original character they brought with them in this
European district. The Thracian Turk is said to be more inhospitable
than a Turk in any other place. Travellers frequently fall victims to
their intractable jealousy; and should a benighted stranger seek for
shelter and protection, he is driven from the door by savage dogs, and
fired at by the more savage master from within. And this repulsive
conduct extends equally to their own countrymen as to those of other
nations. Tartar couriers, or Turkish travellers, overtaken by night
or storm in the winter, have been frequently found dead in the snow,
near the inhospitable house where they had been denied a shelter. Their
conduct, in this respect, forms a strong contrast with that of the kind
and hospitable Bulgarians, who are spread over part of this district,
and mingled with the Moslem population.
The general aspect of the country, from the Balkans to the sea, is
exceedingly beautiful. Swelling downs, expanded to an interminable
distance, bounded only by the horizon. These are covered with a rich
green sward, capable of any purpose of cultivation, either tillage or
pasture. Occasionally the downs are intersected by depressions, which
form winding glens, and sometimes a low ridge from the Balkans runs to
an immense extent, till it is gradually lost in the plain, affording
in its progress a variety of knolls and eminences highly picturesque
and beautiful. The country is watered by the Hebrus and its tributary
streams, which rising among the snows of the Balkans, and continually
augmented by their solution, meander through the plains down to the
sea; unceasingly refreshing the thirsty but fertile soil with their
copious, cool, and limpid currents. The climate is exceedingly bland
and temperate, and the moment a traveller passes the mountains he feels
its influence. He ascends the northern side at an advanced season of
the year, leaving behind him a country faded in its verdure, denuded
of its foliage, and having the hand of winter everywhere impressed
upon it. He descends on the southern side, and in a few days finds
every thing changed. He breathes a warm temperate air, sees spring and
summer blooming around him; the fields are green, the hills are gay,
and the romantic woods and copses which clothe them, retain not only
their leaves but their flowers also.
But in the midst of these beauties of nature he observes that
everything is solitary and deserted. He passes a day’s journey through
them, and meets nothing that has life from morning till evening. He
sees on the distant horizon something that has the semblance of an
inhabited place; he finds, when he approaches, that it is only a
cemetery, which indicates that human life had once been there, but
has now long since departed. Not a trace of the villages to which
they once belonged remains behind, to mark where social man had once
existed. Some of these solitary cemeteries are very extensive, and seem
to mark the vicinity of a large town and numerous inhabitants; but so
completely and so long ago have they been obliterated, that their very
names have perished. It is natural for an inquisitive traveller, when
he sees a large grave-yard, to ask his Tartar, or surrogee, the name
of the city to which it belongs−-but the Turk who daily travels by it,
shakes his head at the hopeless question, and replies “Allah bilir,”
God only knows.
What adds to the singularity and solitude of these plains, is the
multitude of conical mounds which are everywhere scattered over
them. These are lofty, and evidently artificial heaps, thrown up at
some remote period by human labour, and to answer some purpose. They
exactly resemble those mounds on the opposite coast of Asia, on the
plains of Troy, which are supposed to be the tombs of heroes who fell
during the siege, and the monuments erected over them, to mark the
spot where their bodies are deposited. They are both equally called
tepé in Asia and Europe, which is supposed to be a corruption of the
Greek word ταϕος, by which the tombs of heroes were designated, and
this coincidence renders it probable they both had the same origin.
They are sometimes so numerous, that eight or ten appear at once,
and the traveller passes close to them in succession, while whole
ranges of them are seen marking the outline of the distant horizon.
The supposition that they are tombs, adds considerably to the sense
of solitude in these lonely regions. The traveller supposes himself
passing through a vast grave-yard of several hundred miles in extent,
the receptacle of human bodies, where, from the earliest ages, the
kings, and heroes, and great ones of their nation are reposing in
solitary magnificence.
While the fields are abandoned and agriculture is neglected, there is
no art substituted or manufacture pursued, to engage the corresponding
scanty population. The gold mines of Thrace were formerly so rich as
to yield Philip of Macedon the value of £200,000 annually; an immense
sum in those days, which enabled him to corrupt the patriot orators
of Athens, and to boast that no city could resist him, that had a
breach wide enough to admit an ass laden with the produce of these
mines. They are unproductive to the Turks; and while they might raise a
richer harvest of golden grain on those plains close to their capital,
they are indebted to Odessa, and the permission of their enemies, the
Russians, for the daily bread of Constantinople.