Easter with the Greeks—Greek Church at Pera—Women’s
Gallery—Interior of a Greek Church—The Sanctuary—The
Screen—Throne of the Patriarch—The Holy Sepulchre—Singular
Appearance of the Congregation—Sociability of the
Ladies—_L’Echelle des Morts_—Shipping—Boats and
Boatmen—Church of the Fanar—Ancient Screen—Treasure
Chests—The Sanctuary—Private Chapels—A Pious
Illumination—Priests’ House—Prison—Remedy against
Mahomedanism—Midnight Mass—Unexpected Greetings—The
Patriarch—Logotheti—Russian Secretaries—Russian Supremacy in
Turkey—Affinity of Religion between the Greeks and
Russians—The Homage—Pious Confusion—Patriarch’s
Palace—Lovely Night-Scene—Midnight Procession—Serious
Impressions—Suffocating Heat—Dawn.
Our own Easter was over. The last dinner had been eaten, the last
quadrille had been danced; politics had succeeded to parties, and
diplomacy to dissipation; when the Greeks were preparing to celebrate
the festival with all the pomp and circumstance of the most gorgeous and
glowing of religions. I took this opportunity of paying my first visit
to the Greek Church of Pera; an elegant edifice built at the expense of
the Russian government, and richly decorated with blue and gold; where
the service is performed both in Greek and Russ, all the priests
attached to it being Russians.
A Greek lady, whose acquaintance I had made, politely offered me the use
of her seat, which I accepted the more gladly, that without such
accommodation I must have failed in my attempts to witness the ceremony;
most of the females being obliged to content themselves with hearing the
service, without a hope of seeing it. This difficulty arises from the
fact that the women are not permitted to occupy the body of the church,
but are confined to a gallery so closely latticed that it is impossible
for those below to catch the faintest glimpse of the secluded fair-ones.
The appearance of a Greek church differs from those of the Roman
Catholics, infinitely more than do the several religions. The Sanctuary,
in the midst of which stands the High Altar, is separated from the
church by a close screen; and there are neither aisles nor side chapels.
The whole edifice is lighted by chandeliers suspended from the ceiling
in three straight lines, reaching from the Sanctuary to the principal
entrance: and the screen is ornamented with the effigies of saints,
hardly and drily painted; which frequently figure in such sort in their
temples as thoroughly to exonerate them from the imputation of making to
themselves the “likeness of anything in Heaven, or on earth, or in the
waters under the earth.” Nor is this all; for the pious being to the
full as prone to make votive offerings to their favourite saints as any
Catholic in Spain or Portugal, the staring, wooden pictures are
furthermore decorated with gold and silver hands, eyes, ears, or noses,
as the case may be; which gives them so comical an effect that the
gravest person cannot contemplate them without a smile.
The centre of the screen is closed by a curtain above the low double
door opening into the church—the veil shrouding from the eyes of the
congregation “the holy of holies,” according to the old Jewish use. On
the present occasion, the curtain was drawn back, and the High Priest
was robing himself in front of the altar.
The Patriarch’s throne was on the right hand, and immediately opposite
to it was the pulpit; while at the bottom of the church on each side of
the door stood two enormous chests of polished wood, containing the
church plate and properties. In the centre of the marble floor was
placed the boast and treasure of the chapel—a stone which once formed
part of the Sepulchre of the Saviour, affirmed to have been brought from
the Holy Land, and ultimately deposited here. The crush towards this
point was enormous: the dense crowd shoving and elbowing each other most
determinedly to secure an approach; which, when they had effected it,
enabled them to cross themselves, according to the rite of their
church, seven times successively with a rapidity only to be acquired by
long practice, and to kiss each extremity of the stone, leaving a piece
of money in the salver of the attendant priest.
Huge wax candles of at least seven inches in diameter were burning in
front of the Sanctuary, and on the canopy covering the Sepulchre; and
the glare fell upon a dense crowd of heads, some shaven close, some
decorated with a single long tress of hair hanging from the summit; some
half-shaved, as though a platter had been adjusted to the cranium of the
individual, and that the barber had operated round its edges; and others
with long dishevelled elf-locks falling about their shoulders—the
effect was perfectly ludicrous!
Meanwhile, the ladies in the gallery were not idle: compliments were
exchanged—inquiries made and answered—and conversations carried on, as
coolly as though the interlocutors had been quietly seated in their own
houses: while every five or six minutes a priest made his appearance,
bearing a salver to receive the donations of the pious and charitable.
But I soon wearied of the nasal, monotonous chant of the officiating
priests, which more than counteracted the light and gladsome aspect of
the edifice; and, satisfied with having seen a great deal of paint and
gilding, and a rich display of tissue and embroidery, as well as a holy
scuffle among the crowd at a particular period of the service, to
possess themselves of the candles that had lit up the Sepulchre, I
escaped from the scene of pious confusion; and slowly taking my way
through the cypress-shaded burial-ground, and onward to the Echelle des
morts, I gladly stepped into the caïque, to share, beneath the
hospitable roof of a friend, in the magnificent ceremonials which were
to take place in the ancient patriarchal church at the Fanar.
As we traversed the port, I was struck by the various character of the
shipping, more than usually conspicuous under a flood of bright
sunshine. The vessels of war, (one of them the largest in the world)
were lying like floating cities on the still surface of the mirror-like
Bosphorus: the foreign merchant ships, anchored in dense ranks along the
shore, with their sails furled, and their slender masts shooting
upwards, like the tall stems of a wind-stripped forest—the Arab
vessels, with their sharp high prows and sterns, precisely as I had
often seen them represented on the antique medals—the steam-packets,
dark and motionless like ocean-monsters, about to vomit forth their
volumes of thick, suffocating smoke upon the clear air; while about, and
around, and among all these, darted, and glided, and whirled, the
slender caïques of polished and carved walnut wood, with their
gracefully-clad rowers, and their minute gilded ornaments glittering in
the light; the sharp shrill cry of “On the European side”—“On the
Asiatic side!”—ringing upon the ear every moment, as the boatmen
indicated each to the other which course to steer, in order to leave to
all a free passage.
We landed on a terrace overhanging the water, at the extremity of our
friend’s garden; and after taking coffee with the ladies, immediately
set forth to visit the church by daylight. Though more limited in its
dimensions, and less rich in its decorations, than the church at Pera,
it nevertheless pleased me infinitely better; there was an air of
time-hallowed holiness about the whole of its interior, far more
attractive than the unfaded paint and fresh gilding which I had seen in
the morning.
The Patriarch’s throne, simple, and even clumsy in its form and fashion,
had existed for twelve hundred years, and was consequently respectable
from its antiquity; close beside it stood the raised and high-backed
chair of Logotheti; and about twenty feet beyond, stretched the
magnificent screen of the Sanctuary, delicately carved in dark oak. This
screen particularly attracted me, the workmanship was so minute and
elaborate, and the columns which separated the panels in such high and
bold relief. Here, as at Pera, dry, hard, savage-looking Saints
ornamented the spaces between them, and were equally decorated with the
incongruous and disjointed offerings of their votaries.
The most popular personage of the whole calendar among the Greeks is
decidedly St. George, who had no less than two entire effigies in beaten
silver in this church. The pulpit was of mosaic, thickly overstrown with
stars of mother-of-pearl; and two large chests, similar to those which I
have already named, were composed of the same materials. The women’s
gallery was even more closely latticed than that at Pera, and the flood
of light without was admitted so sparingly by the high and infrequent
casements, that a solemn twilight reigned throughout the edifice, which
accorded admirably with its antique and somewhat gloomy character.
Thanks to the guidance under which we entered, the priest who had opened
the doors for us was obliging enough to walk to the other extremity of
the church, and thus leave us the opportunity of penetrating into the
Sanctuary, which the profane foot of woman is supposed never to tread.
It consisted of a small chapel, containing an altar by no means
remarkable, spread with the sacramental plate: a high-backed chair of
marble for the Patriarch, a fountain for the use of the officiating
priests, a few miserable oil-paintings, and a vast number of small
pictures of Saints and Virgins, placed there during a certain time for
“a consideration,” to become hallowed by the sanctity of the spot ere
they were removed to the private chapels of the different families:
every Greek, however limited in fortune, having an apartment in his
house fitted up as an oratory.
I was, however, much more amused (for that is the only applicable word)
in watching the proceedings of a Greek lady who had accompanied me, than
in contemplating the portly saints and florid martyrs by whom I was
surrounded. A slight iron rail runs along the screen at the base of the
paintings for the purpose of supporting the tapers which the zeal of the
pious may be inclined to burn in their honour; and my companion was
busily employed in lighting a score of these minute candles at a lamp
that is constantly left burning for the purpose; humming in an
under-tone, while she did so, the barcarolle in Masaniello which was
exchanged, as she commenced her survey of the holy group, for such
exclamations as the following:—
“The Virgin—I shall give her four, because my own name is Mary—and
look, I pray you, at the pretty effect of her gold hand, and her silver
crown, with the light flashing on them. Now comes St. George—I like St.
George, so he shall have two. Who is this? Oh! St. Nicholas; I cannot
bear St. Nicholas, so I shall pass him by.”
I ventured to intercede in his favour.
“Very well, then, as you wish it, there is one for him; but he never was
a favourite of mine: there are two saints in the calendar to whom I
never burn a taper, St. Nicholas and St. Demetrius.”
It was, however, finally settled that no partialities were to be
indulged on the present occasion, and consequently the effect produced
was that of a miniature illumination. My curiosity being satisfied, and
the pious offering of my companion completed, we proceeded to make a
tour of the vast monastic-looking building forming one side of the
enclosure, and which is appropriated to the priests. Ascending an
external flight of steps, we found ourselves in a wide gallery, whence
the apartments opened on the right and left, precisely as the cells are
arranged in a convent. One of these small, but comfortable, rooms is
allotted to each individual; and those which we visited were very
carefully carpeted and curtained, with divans of chintz, and every
luxury customary in Greek apartments. In many of them we found ladies
taking coffee with their owners, while servants were hurrying to and
fro, full of bustle and importance.
Altogether there was an atmosphere of comfort about the establishment,
which quite made me overlook its otherwise dreary extent; and as I
passed out by another door, having before me the Palace of the
Patriarch, I felt no inclination to commiserate the worldly condition of
his subordinates.
From the Priest’s House we proceeded to the prison,[4] where we found
one miserable urchin of twelve years old, “in durance vile” for an
attempt to turn Musselmaun; he was ragged and almost barefooted, and
some pious Turk had promised to recompense his apostacy with a new suit,
and a pair of shoes; but, unfortunately for the cause of the Prophet,
the boy was caught in the act of elusion, and delivered up by his
exasperated parents to the authority of the Church, which had already
kept him a prisoner for eight days, and was about to send him, with a
chain about his leg, to spend a month in a public mad-house!
What analogy the good Papas had found between the mosque and the
mad-house I know not; but the punishment was certainly a most original
and frightful one. The boy told us his own tale, and then added, with a
broad grin, that he would take them in at last. Two other prisoners,
accused of theft, were about to suffer their sentence in a day or two:
exile in both cases, accompanied by branding on the breast in the most
aggravated of the two; and, meanwhile, close confinement. They were a
couple of shrewd-looking, desperate ruffians, and laughed in his face as
the keeper spoke of them. We were then shown the bastinado, and the
rings and chains for insubordinate prisoners; and, after having made a
donation which was received with a surprise perfectly untrammelled with
gratitude, I returned to the residence of our hospitable friends, with
the rattling of fetters in my ears, and a thousand gloomy fancies
floating over my brain.
At half past ten o’clock we repaired once more to the Church, in order
to assist at the midnight mass; where a Greek lady very politely gave up
her seat to me, that I might have an uninterrupted view of the
ceremonies. The service had already commenced when we entered, and the
whole interior of the edifice was one blaze of light. The thirty
chandeliers suspended from the ceiling threw a many-coloured gleam on
the crowd beneath them, from their pendants of tinted glass; and the
huge candles in front of the Sanctuary, and the tapers burning before
the saints, added to the brightness of the glare; which, penetrating
through the lattices of the gallery, enabled me to contemplate as
extraordinary a scene as I had ever witnessed in a place of worship. The
fair tenants of the front seats presented much the same appearance as a
parterre of flowers; there were turbans of every tint, dresses of every
dye, bonnets of every form: and such a constant flutter, fidget, and
fuss; such bowing, smiling, and whispering, that I began to fancy there
must be some mistake, and that we were, in fact, gathered together to
witness some mere worldly exhibition.
But the monotonous chanting of the priests, which had been momentarily
suspended, was suddenly renewed; and I turned away from a score of
polite greetings, offered by persons of whom I had not the slightest
recollection, but to whom I had doubtlessly been presented during the
carnival, in order to observe the proceedings beneath me.
The Patriarch was seated on his throne, dressed in a vestment of white
satin, clasped on the breast with an immense diamond ornament, over
which was flung a scarf of gold tissue; the borders of the robe were
wrought to about a foot in depth with portraits of the saints in
needlework of different colours, interspersed with gold and silver
threads. His crown of crimson velvet was entirely covered with immense
pearls, fashioned into different figures; the intermediate spaces being
occupied by rubies, emeralds, and brilliants, of great beauty and
lustre. He held his staff in one hand, and in the other the Gospel,
bound in white satin, and studded with jewels; and, at every movement
that he made, the tapers by which he was surrounded flashed back the
radiance of his elaborately-gemmed habit in a coruscation perfectly
dazzling.
Beside him, and on a level with the throne, sat Logotheti, in an uniform
richly embroidered with silver; my father was beside him; and at the
foot of his chair stood Vogorede; while immediately in front of the
throne, in a line with the pulpit, four of the Russian Secretaries
occupied a crimson-cushioned seat, whence they had a full view of the
Sanctuary.
Among the numerous causes, all working towards the same centre of
Russian supremacy in Turkey, one of the most dangerous for the Moslem is
the community of religion between the Russian and the Greek. The
Autocrat has built a church for the Greeks in the vicinity of
Constantinople, and the arms of Russia surmount the portal! The
_attachés_ of the Russian Embassy, while the members of all the other
Legations are either sleeping or feasting, are meekly kneeling before
the throne of the Greek Patriarch, and humbly kissing the hand which
extended to them!
The act in itself is simple. It is the effect that it produces on the
minds of the mass which is to be dreaded. The expression of delighted
admiration on the countenances of the crowd was a perfect study, as,
following in the wake of Logotheti and Vogoride, ere less important
persons had an opportunity of doing homage to the Patriarch, the
all-powerful agents of all-powerful Russia bent a willing knee to kiss
the sacred hand. A common interest was created at once, and no tie is so
sure as that of religious faith. The Greeks already writhe in their
fetters—the bondmen loathe their task-masters—the tree is cankered at
the core, and hollowed in the trunk: let Russia apply the axe, and it
will fall.
The Moslem, be he lured to ruin as smilingly as he may, and flattered
into security as blandly as the criminal of his country, who finds the
rope about his neck ere he knows that he is condemned; is the coveted
prey of his semi-barbarous ally. The force of the Russian, and the guile
of the Greek—external power and internal treachery—are at work against
him; and what has he to oppose to these? High-sounding titles, and
pompous phrases—a young and half-trained soldiery—a navy, unequal to
the management of their magnificent shipping—and a Capital, protected
by men, many of whom wear a Russian medal at their breast—a medal
bestowed on them by the munificent Emperor of another nation, for having
done their duty (according to Muscovite notions) towards their own!
But let Turkey be supported for awhile, as her own efforts merit that
she should be; let her find the ready help from European powers, in
which she so fondly trusted—and she will, ere long, prove herself
worthy to take her place among the nations. Her military and naval
forces require only time; her soldiers have already given evidence of
their courage, and, having so done when comparatively undisciplined,
will naturally develop still higher attributes when acting as a
well-organized body; in which each individual receives, as well as
gives, support. Let the Russian medal be trampled in the dust of the
city streets—and this will demand no effort on the part of those who
wear it, into whose breasts it burns, and who consider it rather as a
brand of disgrace, than as a creditable badge—and it will then require
no spirit of prophecy to foretell the future prosperity of Turkey. To
the East, Europe is indebted for her knowledge of military tactics and
military subordination, and she can well afford to pay back the debt.
Half a dozen experienced officers would, in a few months, change the
whole appearance and nature of the Turkish army.
Homage had been paid to the Patriarch, and the chanting became more
animated, as, followed by a train of Archbishops and Bishops, he retired
to the sanctuary, and added to his already costly habiliments several
other jewelled and embroidered draperies. He next received the
sacrament, at which period of the ceremony every man, woman, and child,
within the church hastened to light the taper that they had brought for
the purpose, (the symbol of the Resurrection) which produced a sudden
burst of light absolutely thrilling. As I looked down upon the
struggling and stifling crowd beneath me, so closely wedged together
that it was with difficulty they could raise the arm holding the taper,
which each lit by that of his neighbour, the scene was most
extraordinary. A dense vapour was even then rapidly spreading its heavy
folds over the whole edifice, and, in a few moments, I could distinguish
nothing but a sea of heads, and a multitude of pigmy lights, feebly
struggling through the thick smoke.
The fiery and impetuous Greeks, enthusiastic in all their feelings—in
religion, in love, in hate, and in ambition—did not, in the present
instance, confine themselves so scrupulously as an European congregation
would have done, to the space assigned to them—half a dozen wild,
bandit-looking individuals clambered into the pulpit—a score more clung
to the steps—those who chanced to be nearest to the vacated stalls of
the Bishops appropriated them without ceremony—others hung by the
pillars which supported the gallery—and thus sufficient space was with
difficulty ensured by the panting beadles for the passage of the
procession.
At this moment, I followed my friend from the church, and, four or five
sturdy servants having with considerable effort forced a way for us to
the Patriarch’s Palace, we hastened to take possession of his private
sitting-room, which, as it overlooked the enclosure in which the church
was situated, and where the procession was to halt, he had politely
offered, in order to secure the gratification of my curiosity.
The night was one of beauty. The pale moon was riding high among masses
of fleecy clouds, which were pillowed upon the deep blue of the sky,
forming towers, and palaces, and islets, so changeful and fleeting, that
they looked like the ephemeral creations of fairy-land. A lofty and
leafy plane tree, whose foliage had newly burst beneath the soft
influence of spring, was sighing gently in the midnight wind; and the
long dark outline of the monastic buildings, and the slanting roof of
the church, loomed out in the faint moonlight, with a mysterious depth
of shadow well suited to the solemnity of the hour. The wide doors of
the sacred edifice suddenly fell back—the low chant of the choir
swelled upon the night air—and forth rushed the eager crowd that had so
lately thronged the church; each with his lighted taper in his hand, and
pressing forward to a raised platform in the centre of the enclosure,
railed in for the convenience of the Patriarch and his train of
dignitaries.
Ere long, the whole of the wide space was like a sea, in which the dark
waves flung themselves upwards in fiery sparks, while they rolled and
swelled in gloom beneath the surface—or like a spot upon a sky of
tempest, into which were gathered all the stars of heaven to form one
galaxy of light amid the surrounding gloom. And forth into this place of
brightness slowly moved the holy train from the chapel. First came the
bearer of the golden crucifix, surrounded by gilded lanterns and
gleaming candlesticks; and next the torch-bearers, whose waxen candles,
linked together in threes with gaudily-coloured ribbons, represented the
Trinity; then moved forward a train of priests, walking two and two,
with their flowing robes of saffron-coloured satin, their luxuriant
beards sweeping down to their breasts, their brimless caps, and their
long locks falling upon their shoulders.
Nothing can be more picturesque than the head-dress of a Greek priest.
As they are not permitted to use either scissors or razor from the
period of their birth, when they are vowed to the Church by their
parents, they reduce the beard by plucking it, according to the old
Jewish law; and, being almost universally very fine men, they do this
with a care and skill which heighten the effect of their appearance;
while their long thick locks are, on ordinary occasions, hidden beneath
their caps.
This holy body was succeeded by the Patriarch, supported on either side
by two of the Archbishops, who, in the Greek Church, represent the
Apostles, as the Patriarch himself personates the Saviour, and followed
by the ten others in robes of such dazzling brilliancy that any attempt
at description would be idle. Immediately after these came the Bishops,
walking two and two; succeeded in their turn by Logotheti and Vogoride,
another train of priests, and finally by that portion of the
congregation who had not been able to effect an earlier egress from the
church.
The junior priests arranged themselves in a circle at the foot of the
platform, which was soon filled by the heads of the Church, and the lay
dignitaries, among whom stood my father. The Patriarch read a portion of
the scriptures, from an ample volume that lay open on the stand before
him: the attendant priests chanted a psalm which rose and fell on the
night wind in solemn cadences; and, finally, the elder of the Bishops,
having placed in the hand of the Patriarch one of the triple candles
which I have already named, wherewith to bless the people; and
subsequently two linked together, representing the double nature of
Christ; the whole crowd bowed their uncovered heads, and crossed
themselves seven times, with the collected points of the two
fore-fingers and the thumb; after which a passage was with difficulty
forced through the crowd for the return of the procession, whose chant
gradually died away upon the ear, as it disappeared beneath the portal
of the church, and in five minutes more we were alone, gazing out upon
the empty enclosure flickered with moonlight.
It was a solemn moment! The pomp and circumstance of human worship had
passed away, and we looked only on the uncertain moon, over which the
light scud was rapidly drifting; while the only sound that fell upon our
ears was the sighing of the midnight wind through the leaves of the tall
plane tree. I bowed my head in silence upon the cushion against which I
leaned—my excited fancies were suddenly sobered, my throbbing pulses
stilled—Nature had spoken to my heart, and my spirit was subdued
beneath her influence. It was a sudden and strange reaction; and, could
I at that moment have escaped to the solitude of my own chamber, I do
not think that one idle memory of the magnificence which I had so lately
witnessed would have intruded on my reveries.
Man’s pride, and pomp, and power, had fettered my fancy, and riveted my
gaze—But it was night; the still, soft night, with its pale moon, its
mysterious clouds, and its sighing voice, which had touched my spirit.
In such hours, the heart would be alone with GOD!
When we re-entered the church, I feared that I should have fainted;
thick volumes of smoke were rolling heavily along the roof; the
suffocating incense was mounting in columns from the censers—the myriad
tapers were adding their heat to that of the burning perfume; and the
transition from the light pure atmosphere without was sickening. I
persisted, nevertheless, in my determination of remaining until the
close of the ceremony, which concluded with the Declaration of Faith,
read by Logotheti; and a portion of the Gospel, delivered from the
pulpit by a priest, richly dressed in blue and silver.
The grey light of morning was glimmering on the Bosphorus as we returned
to the house, where we breakfasted, and then retired to bed with aching
heads and dazzled eyes, to prepare for the fatigues of the morrow.