[Illustration: Types of Turkish Soldiers.]
Although I was fully aware before going to Constantinople that no
traces of the magnificent army of former days were still to be seen,
nevertheless, as soldiers are always a source of lively interest to
me, I had no sooner arrived than I began to look about for them with
eager curiosity. What I found, however, fell short of even what I
had been led to expect. In place of the ancient costume, flowing,
picturesque, and eminently warlike, they have adopted an ugly, forlorn
uniform, consisting of red trousers, little scant jackets, stripes
like a lackey’s livery, belts like those of college students, and
on every head, from the Sultan’s down to the lowest man in the ranks,
that miserable fez, which, besides being undignified and puerile,
especially when perched on the head of a big, stout Mussulman, is the
direct cause of any amount of ophthalmia and headache. The brilliancy
of the Turkish army is lost, without any of that which belongs to the
European military having been gained. The soldiers looked to me a
mournful, half-hearted, dirty set of men. They may be brave, but they
are certainly not impressive; and as to the nature of their training,
one may form some idea of that from seeing officers and men employing
their fingers in the street in place of handkerchiefs. One day I saw
the soldier on guard at the bridge, where smoking is not allowed, bring
this fact to the knowledge of a vice-consul by snatching the cigar out
of his mouth; and on another occasion, in the mosque of the Dancing
Dervishes, on the Rue de Pera, a soldier informed three Europeans
that they were expected to uncover by knocking their hats off before
my eyes: I knew very well that to raise a protesting voice on such
occasions would mean nothing less than being seized and carried off
bodily, like a bundle of old rags, to the guard-house. Hence throughout
my entire stay at Constantinople my attitude toward the military was
one of profound deference. On the other hand, one ceases to wonder
at the uncouthness of the soldiers after seeing what sort of people
they are before donning the uniform. One day in Skutari a hundred or
so recruits, probably brought from the interior of Asia Minor, passed
close by me, and it was a sight which aroused both my compassion and my
disgust. They looked like those terrible bandits of Hassin the Mad who
passed through Constantinople toward the close of the sixteenth century
on their way to die by the Austrian cannon on the plain of Pesth. I
can see before me now their wild, sinister faces, rough shocks of
hair, half-naked, tattooed bodies, and barbarous ornaments, and I seem
to smell again the close, sickening odor, like that of wild animals’
dens, which they left behind them in the street. When the first news
was brought of the massacres in Bulgaria, at once my thoughts turned
to them. “My Skutari friends, beyond a doubt,” I said to myself. It is
a fact, however, that they form the one solitary picturesque feature
which I am able to recall of the Mussulman army.
O glorious pageant of Bayezid, of Suleiman, of Muhammad! could one but
behold you just once from the walls of Stambul, drawn up in glittering
array upon the plain of Daûd Pasha! Every time I passed the triumphal
gate of Adrianapolis I would be haunted by this brilliant vision, and
pause to gaze fixedly at the opening, as though expecting each moment
to see the pasha quartermaster come forth, heralding the approach of
the imperial troops.
It was, in fact, the pasha quartermaster who marched at the head of
the army, with two horse-tails, his insignia of rank, while behind him
for a great distance flashed and glistened in the sunlight certain
objects which were nothing less than the eight thousand brazen spoons
fastened in the folds of the Janissaries’ turbans; in their midst could
be seen the waving herons’ plumes and glittering armor of the colonels,
followed by a crowd of servants laden with arms and provisions. Behind
the Janissaries came a small troop of volunteers and pages dressed in
silk, with iron mail, and shining head-pieces, accompanied by a band of
music; after them, the cannoneers, with the cannon fastened together
by means of metal chains; and then another small band of aghas, pages,
chamberlains, and feudal soldiers, mounted on steeds with plumes
and breast-plates. All of these were only the advance-guard, above
whose closely-packed ranks floated thousands of brilliantly colored
standards, waving horse-tails, and such a sea of lances, swords,
bows, quivers, and arquebuses that it was not easy to distinguish the
lines of swarthy faces burned by exposure in the Candian and Persian
wars; accompanying them was the discordant sound of drum and flute,
of trombone and kettledrum, mingling with the voices of the singers
who escorted the Janissaries, and, with the rattle of arms, clanking
of chains, and hoarse cries of Allah, forming a mighty roar, at once
inspiriting and terrible, which could be heard from the Daûd Pasha
camp to the other bank of the Golden Horn. O poets and painters, you
who have dwelt with loving touch upon every picturesque detail of that
vanished life of the Orient! come to my aid now, that together we may
recall to life the Third Muhammad’s famous army and send it forth,
brilliant and complete, from the ancient walls of Stambul.
Passed the advance-guard, we see another glittering body of troops.
Is it the Sultan? No, as yet the deity has barely quitted his temple.
This is only the favorite vizier’s retinue, consisting of forty aghas
clad in sable, and mounted upon horses caparisoned with velvet and
with silver bits in their mouths; behind them are a crowd of pages and
gorgeous grooms, leading other forty horses by the bridle, with gilded
harness, and laden with shields, maces, and cimeters.
Another troop advances. This is not the Sultan, either, but a body
of state officials--the chief treasurer, members of the council, and
the high dignitaries of the Seraglio--and with them a band of players
and a throng of volunteers wearing purple caps decorated with birds’
wings and dressed in furs, scarlet silk, leopard skins, and Hungarian
_kolpaks_, armed with long lances entwined with silk and garlands of
flowers.
Still another sparkling wave of horsemen pours out of the Adrianapolis
gate, but it is not the Sultan yet. This is the train of the grand
vizier. First comes a crowd of mounted arquebusiers, _furieri_, and
aghas, all high in favor with the Grand Seigneur; after them forty
aghas of the grand vizier, surrounded by a forest of twelve hundred
bamboo lances, borne by twelve hundred pages, and then the forty pages
of the grand vizier clad in orange color and armed with bows, their
quivers richly ornamented with gold. Following them are two hundred
more youths, divided into six bands, each band having a distinctive
color, and, riding in their midst, the governors and relatives of the
chief minister; after these come a throng of grooms, armor-bearers,
employés, servants, pages, and aghas, wearing gold-embroidered
garments, and a troop of standard-bearers carrying aloft a multitude of
silken flags; and last the _kiâya_, minister of the interior, escorted
by twelve _sciau_, or legal executioners, followed by the grand
vizier’s band.
Another host pours out from the city-walls, and still it is not the
Sultan, but a throng of _sciau_, _furieri_, and underlings, gorgeously
attired and forming the retinues of the jurisconsults, the _molla_
and _muderri_; close behind them are the head-masters of the falcon,
vulture, hawk, and kite hunts, followed by a line of horsemen
carrying on their saddles leopards trained for the chase, and a crowd
of falconers, esquires, grooms with ferrets, standard-bearers, and
drummers, and packs of caparisoned and bejewelled dogs.
Another brilliant concourse sweeps out: the crowds of spectators
prostrate themselves. At last the Sultan? No, not yet. This is not
the head of the army, but its heart, the holy flame of courage and
religious enthusiasm, the sacred ark of the Mussulman, around which
mountains of decapitated heads have been reared, torrents of human
blood have flowed--the green ensign of the Prophet, the flag among
flags, taken from its place in the mosque of Sultan Ahmed, and now
floating in the midst of a ferocious mob of dervishes clad in lion and
bear skins, a circle of rapt-looking preaching sheikhs in camel’s-hair
cloaks, and two companies of emirs, descendants of the Prophet, wearing
the green turban; all of whom together raise a hoarse clamor of shouts,
prayers, shrill cries, and singing.
Another imposing troop of horsemen herald the approach, not of the
Sultan yet, but of the judiciary, the judge of Constantinople and chief
judge of Asia and Europe, whose enormous turbans may be seen towering
above the heads of the sciau, who brandish their silver maces to clear
a space for them through the crowd. With them ride the favorite vizier
and vizier kaimakâm, their turbans decorated with silver stars and
braided with gold; all the viziers of the Divan, before whom are borne
horse-tails dyed with henné, attached to the ends of long red and
blue poles; and last of all the military judges, followed by a train
of attendants dressed in leopard skins and armed with lances--pages,
armor-bearers, and sutlers.
The next company pours out, glittering, magnificent. Surely the Sultan?
No--the grand vizier, wearing a purple caftan lined with sable and
mounted upon a horse fairly covered with steel and gold, he is followed
by a throng of attendants clad in red velvet, and a crowd of high
dignitaries, and the lieutenant-generals of the Janissaries, among whom
the _muftis_ shine out like swans in the midst of a flock of peacocks;
after these, between two lines of spearmen carrying gilded spears and
two lines of archers with crescent-shaped plumes, come the gorgeous
grooms of the Seraglio, leading by the bridle a long file of horses
from Arabia, Turkestan, Persia, and Caramania, their saddles of velvet,
reins gilded, stirrups chased, and trappings covered with silver
spangles, and laden with shields and arms glittering with jewels;
finally the two sacred camels are seen, bearing one the Koran, the
other a fragment of the Kaaba.
The grand vizier’s retinue has passed, and a deafening clamor of drums
and trumpets assails the ear. The spectators fly in every direction,
cannon roar, a multitude of running footmen pour through the gate
brandishing their cimeters, and here at last, in the midst of a thick
forest of spears, plumes, and swords, the central point of those
dazzling ranks of gold and silver head-pieces, beneath a cloud of
waving satin banners, behold the Sultan of sultans, King of kings,
the dispenser of thrones to the princes of the world, the shadow of
God upon earth, emperor and sovereign lord of the White Sea and of
the Black, of Rumelia and Anatolia, of the province of Salkadr, of
Diarbekr, of Kurdistan, Aderbigian, Agiem, Sciam, Haleb, Egypt, Mecca,
Medina, Jerusalem, the coasts of Arabia and Yemen, together with all
the other dominions conquered by the arms of his mighty predecessors
and august ancestors or subdued by his own flaming and triumphant
sword. The solemn and imposing train sweeps slowly by. Now and again,
the serried columns swaying a little to right or left, a glimpse is
caught of the three jewelled plumes which surmount the turban of
the deity, the serious, pallid countenance, the breast blazing with
diamonds; then the ranks close in once more, the cavalcade passes on,
the threatening cimeters are lowered, the bystanders raise their bowed
heads, the vision disappears.
After the imperial retinue a crowd of court officials come, one
carrying on his head the Sultan’s stool, another his sabre, another his
turban, another his mantle, a fifth the silver coffee-pot, a sixth the
golden coffee-pot; then more troops of pages, and after them the white
eunuchs; then three hundred mounted chamberlains in white caftans, and
the hundred carriages of the harem with silvered wheels, drawn by oxen
hung with garlands of flowers or horses with velvet trappings, and
escorted by a troop of black eunuchs; then three hundred mules file by
laden with baggage and treasures from the court; after them a thousand
camels carrying water and a thousand dromedaries laden with provisions;
next a crowd of miners, armorers, and workmen of various kinds from
Stambul, accompanied by a rabble of buffoons and conjurers; and finally
the bulk of the fighting ranks of the army--hordes of Janissaries,
yellow _silidars_, purple _azabs_, _spahis_ with red ensigns, foreign
cavalry with white standards, cannon that belch forth blocks of lead
and marble, the feudal soldiery from three continents, barbarian
volunteers from the outlying provinces of the empire, seas of flags,
forests of plumes, torrents of turbans--an iron avalanche on its way to
overrun Europe like a curse sent from God, in whose track will be found
nothing but a desert strewn with smoking ruins and heaps of skulls.