The Cadi’s Wife—Singular Custom—Haïsè Hanoum—The
Odalique—The Cadi—Noisy Enjoyment—Lying in
State—Cachemires—Costume—Unbounded Hospitality of the
Wealthy Turks—The Dancing Girl—Saïryn Hanoum—Contrast.
The wife of the Cadi of Tzèkerghè having given birth to her first-born
son, I received an invitation to visit her the same evening, which I
accepted, although not without some surprise; and, on expressing my
astonishment at her subjecting herself to the intrusion of guests at
such a period, I learnt that it is universally the custom, among the
wives of the wealthy Turks, to receive company during seven days after
the birth of the first son, until midnight; on which occasion they
display the most valuable portions of their _trousseau_.
Haïsè Hanoum was a young creature of sixteen, very pretty, and very
stupid, who, individually, created no great interest; but she had a
rival in the harem, a sweet girl of twelve years of age, with the face
of an angel, and the grace of a sylph; who, if the gossipry of the
neighbourhood may be relied upon, was no especial favourite with her
companion, whose dullness yet left her discrimination enough to be
jealous of the superior attractions of the gazel-eyed Odalique. The Cadi
himself had reached his eightieth year, and his silver beard would
rather have distinguished him as the grandsire than as the husband of
these two beautiful young creatures.
I entered the house at eight o’clock in the evening; and, having
traversed the marble court, whose fountain poured forth its limpid
waters beneath the shade of a venerable fig tree, I passed along the
latticed terrace of the harem, to the Hanoum’s apartment. Long before I
reached it, I was deafened with the noise which issued from its open
door; the voices of the singing-women—the rattle of the
tambourines—the laughter of the guests—the shouts of the attendant
slaves—the clatter of the coffee and sherbet cups—I could scarcely
believe that I was about to be ushered into a sick-chamber! At length,
the three attendants who had lighted me upstairs, made way for me
through the crowd of women who thronged the entrance of the apartment,
and one of the most extraordinary scenes presented itself upon which it
has ever been my fate to look.
Directly opposite to the door stood the bed of the Hanoum; the curtains
had been withdrawn, and a temporary canopy formed of cachemire shawls
arranged in festoons, and linked together with bathing scarfs of gold
and silver tissue: and, as the lady was possessed of fifty, which could
not all be arranged with proper effect in so limited a space, a silk
cord had been stretched along the ceiling to the opposite extremity of
the apartment, over which the costly drapery was continued. Fastened to
the shawls were head-dresses of coloured gauze, flowered or striped with
gold and silver, whence depended oranges, lemons, and candied fruits.
Two coverlets of wadded pink satin were folded at the bed’s foot; and a
sheet of striped crape hung to the floor, where it terminated in a deep
fringe of gold.
The infant lay upon a cushion of white satin, richly embroidered with
coloured silks, and trimmed like the sheet; and was itself a mass of
gold brocade and diamonds. But the young mother principally attracted my
attention. As I entered, she was flinging over her child a small
coverlet of crimson velvet, most gorgeously wrought with gold; and as
the sleeves of her striped silk antery and gauze chemisette fell back to
the elbow, her white and dimpled arms circled by bracelets of
brilliants, and her small hand glittering with jewelled rings, were
revealed in all their beauty. Her dark hair was braided in twenty or
thirty small plaits, that fell far below her waist, as she leant
against a cushion similar to that on which she had pillowed her infant.
Her throat was encircled by several rows of immense pearls, whence
depended a diamond star, resting upon her bosom; her chemisette was
delicately edged by a gold beading, and met at the bottom of her bust,
where her vest was confined by a costly shawl. Her head-dress, of blue
gauze worked with silver, was studded with diamond sprays, and
ornamented with a fringe of large gold coins, which fell upon her
shoulders, and almost concealed her brilliant earrings. Her satin antery
was of the most lively colours, and her salva were of pale pink silk,
sprinkled with silver spots. A glass vase of white lilies rested against
her pillow, and a fan of peacocks’ feathers, and a painted handkerchief,
lay beside her. Previously to her confinement, she had plucked out the
whole of her eyebrows, and had replaced them by two stripes of black
dye, raised about an inch higher upon the forehead. This is a common
habit with the Turkish women on great occasions; and they no where
display more coquetry or more decided bad taste than in the arrangement
of their eyebrows, which they paint in all kinds of fantastic shapes;
sometimes making them meet across the nose, and sometimes raising them
at the outer point to the temples! I have seen many a pretty woman
destroyed by this whim.
I was conducted with great ceremony to the sofa, when I had saluted the
Hanoum, and uttered my “Mashallah” as I leant over the infant; which,
poor little thing! was almost smothered in finery; and, having taken my
seat, I had time to contemplate the singular scene around me.
I have alluded elsewhere to the facility with which the working classes
of Turkey obtain access into the houses of the wealthy. On every
occasion of rejoicing, the door is open to all; it is the sofa only
which is sacred; but the poor share in all the enjoyments of the
festival; the coffee and sherbet is served to them, if not with the same
ceremony, at least with the same welcome, as to the prouder guests; they
listen to the music—they mingle in the conversation—they join in the
gaiety—and they are never made to feel that their lot is cast in a more
lowly rank than that of their entertainer.
On the present occasion the floor was thronged. Mothers were there with
their infants at their breasts, for whose entire costume you would not
have given fifty piastres; and whose sunburnt arms and naked feet bore
testimony to a life of toil. A group of children were huddled together
at the bed’s foot; a throng of singing women occupied the extreme end of
the apartment; the mother of the young wife sat beside the pillow of her
child, dressed in a vest and trowsers of white, with a large
handkerchief of painted muslin flung loosely over her turban; the lovely
little Odalique, totally unheeded, squatted on the ground at my feet;
half a dozen stately Hanoums were seated on the crimson velvet sofa,
leaning against its gorgeous cushions, and some of them engaged with the
chibouk. But the most attractive object in the apartment was the
dancing-girl, who occupied the centre of the floor.
I have rarely beheld any thing more beautiful; and, with the exception
of the daughter of the Scodra Pasha, I had seen no woman in the country
who could be compared with her. On my entrance she had been beating the
tambourine; and as, out of respect for the Frank visitor, the music was
momentarily suspended, she remained in the attitude she had assumed when
she first caught sight of me. Her arms were raised above her head, and
her open sleeves fell back almost to her shoulder; her delicate little
feet were bare, and only partially revealed beneath the large loose
trowsers of dark silk; a chemisette of gauze, richly fringed, relieved
the sombre tint of her tightly-fitting antery, and a shawl of the most
glowing colours bound her slender waist; her head-dress was nearly
similar to that worn in the Imperial Seraïs—a painted handkerchief was
folded round her forehead, whose deep fringe fell low upon her cheeks;
part of her long hair was dishevelled, and spread wide upon the summit
of her head, and the rest, formed into innumerable little plaits, was
looped about her shoulders. A large bunch of white lilies drooped
gracefully above her right ear, and her figure was bent slightly
backward, in the easiest attitude in the world.
She was assuredly very lovely; but it was not genuine oriental beauty.
Her large, full eyes were as blue and bright as a summer sky, when the
heavens are full of sunshine; her nose was _à la Roxalane_; and she had
a pretty pout about her little cherry-coloured lips, worth half a dozen
smiles.
I could not help expressing my surprise at the style of her _coïffure_,
as I had never before seen it so worn, except in the Imperial Palaces;
when I was informed that the Sultan, having accidentally seen her
mother, who far exceeded the daughter in beauty, became so enthralled by
her extreme loveliness as to make her an inmate of his harem, where she
still remains.
When I had seated myself, the dancer suddenly suffered her arms to fall
by her side, and flinging the tambourine to one of the singing women,
she clapped her hands, and a couple of slaves entered with coffee. One
bore a large silver salver, from which depended a napkin of gold tissue,
richly fringed, with the tiny cups of glittering porcelain, and the
silver coffee-holders neatly arranged upon its surface; and the other
carried a weighty sherbet-vase of wrought silver, shaped as classically
as that of Hebe herself.
I never saw any woman so light or so graceful as that lovely
dancing-girl. She had the spring of a sylph, and the foot of a fawn. As
she presented the coffee, she laid her hand first upon her lips and then
upon her head, with an elegance which I have seldom seen equalled; and
then bounding back into her place, she twirled the tambourine in the air
with the playfulness of a child; and, having denoted the measure,
returned it to one of the women, who immediately commenced a wild chant,
half song and half recitative, which was at times caught up in chorus by
the others, and at times wailed out by the dancer only, as she regulated
the movements of her willow-like figure to the modulations of the music.
The Turkish women dance very little with the feet; it is the grace and
art displayed in the carriage of the body and arms which form the
perfection of their dancing; the rapid snapping of the fingers,
meanwhile, producing the effect of castanets.
Even at the risk of making a portrait gallery of my chapter, I must
mention the magnificent Saïryn Hanoum, who shortly afterwards entered
the apartment. She was in the autumn of her beauty, for she must have
been eight or nine and twenty, at which period the women of the East
begin to decline. But what an autumn! Could you only have clipped the
wings of Time for the future, you would not have wished her to be a day
younger. She was dark, very dark: almost a Bohemian in complexion; but
you saw the rich blood coursing along her veins, through the clear skin;
her eyes were like the storm-cloud, from which the lightning flashes at
intervals; her hair was as black as midnight; her teeth were dazzling:
and her brow—it was a brow which should have been circled by a diadem,
for it was already stamped with Nature’s own regality. She was tall,
even stately; and the dignity of her step accorded well with the fire of
her dark eye, and the proud expression that sat upon her lip, and
dilated her thin delicate nostril. Her costume was as striking as her
person; and, had she studied during a century how best to enhance her
beauty, she could never have more perfectly succeeded. Her vest and
trowsers were of the most snowy muslin; she wore neither diamond nor
pearl; but the handkerchief was fastened about her head with a chain of
large gold coins, which being threaded upon a silken cord, formed a
fringe that rested upon her forehead; and a necklace of the same
material fell low upon her bosom. The Turkish women of rank have
universally very sweet voices—her’s was music.
On glancing back upon what I have written, I fear that much of it may
be condemned as hyperbole, or at best as exaggeration. I only wish that
they who are sceptical could look for an instant upon Saïryn
Hanoum—they would confess that I have done her less than justice.
_En révanche_, the floor was crowded with withered old women and stupid
children: the atmosphere was impregnated with onions, tobacco, and
garlic; and the noise was deafening! The singing women shouted at
intervals at the very pitch of their voices; the infants cried with
weariness and fright; the impatient guests demanded coffee and sherbet
as unceremoniously as though they had been at a public kiosk, and much
more rapidly than they could be supplied; and the ringing rattle of the
tambourine kept up a running accompaniment of discord.
Altogether the scene was a most extraordinary one; and I compelled
myself to remain a couple of hours the guest of Haïsè Hanoum in order to
contemplate it at my leisure. The same ceremonies, the same amusements,
and the same noise, continued until midnight, during the whole of the
seven days; when the harem doors were once more shut against such
general intrusion, and the young mother left to enjoy the repose which
she required.