the formation of the grounds about it, Dooz Oglou purchased no less than
five and thirty houses, for which he paid, in every instance, several
hundred piastres beyond the demand of their owner; and once established,
he filled his spacious apartments with costly furniture, and all the
luxuries which unbounded wealth and a fine taste could command. Alas!
he was but gilding his own ruin, and lavishing his resources upon a
pile which was not even destined to be his monument. This outlay awoke
the cupidity of the Ottoman court, which was at that period much more
venal than it is at present, and his ostentation alarmed its vanity; he
was accused of usury, or treason, or both—for the nature of his crime
was never very clearly defined—his property was confiscated, and he was
hanged upon his own threshold, from a staple driven into the wood-work of
the gate opening upon the seaward terrace. The mansion at Yenikeuï was
subsequently presented by the Sultan to Nicholas Aristarchi, the present
Logotheti,[35] by whom it is inhabited during the summer.
Yenikeuï is also remarkable as being one of the three hamlets in which
the Greek “Festival of Fire,” instituted in commemoration of the second
capture of Constantinople by the Cæsars, is still permitted to be held.
This singular ceremony was formerly common in all the Greek villages, and
even in that quarter of the capital itself in which that nation reside;
but the privilege of promiscuous illumination has been withdrawn, owing
to the great risk of conflagration to which it subjected the city; and
the festival is now held only at Yenikeuï, Therapia, and Buyukdèrè.
Artificial islands, formed of hurdles, and heaped with inflammable
matter, are formed in the bay—caïques, saturated with bitumen, are moored
off the shore—and lines of bonfires are raised along the coast, linking
the three hamlets together—all of which are simultaneously ignited at
a given signal, and the effect is awfully grand and impressive. The dim
outline of the Asian hills is suddenly revealed, as by the touch of an
enchanter’s wand, and seems to be traced in gold; the ripple of the
channel dances along like sparks of fire; while around, and on every
side, are to be seen groups of people in their holiday-dresses, seated
upon mats and carpets, enjoying the extraordinary spectacle.
But, perhaps, the most novel feature of the entertainment is presented by
a crowd of men, partially clad in white cotton, their shaven heads bare,
and their arms tossing wildly in the air; who, with shrieks and yells,
which are sullenly thrown back by the rocky heights above them, at one
time feed the fires that are floating in the bay, above their waists in
water; and at others, joining hands, dance in a fantastic circle round
their flaming islands. Meanwhile, servants are flitting here and there,
holding paper lanterns, and guiding the different parties of revellers
to the houses of their respective friends; while the channel is alive
with caïques, each with a light at its prow, and freighted with mirth and
music.
These wild sports continue for hours, until the fuel and the energies of
the assistants are alike exhausted, when the fires gradually die away;
though the pale light of morning not unfrequently breaks above many a
homeward-bound caïque, ere it is safely moored beside the terrace of its
owner.
DOLMA-BATCHÈ, FROM THE GRAND CHAMPS DES MORTS.
“Fair the vernal mead,
Fair the high grove, the sea, the sun, the stars,
True impress each of their creating sire.”
COLERIDGE.
Dolma-Batchè, or the Valley of the Gourds, is a fair and fertile spot,
situated between Top-hannè and Beshik-Tash, and partially occupied by an
Imperial residence, seated on the lip of the channel, along which its
gilded terraces stretch for a considerable distance, and are succeeded by
the Palace itself, gay with paint and bright with gold, which, in turn,
yields its place to groves and kiosques overhanging the water; while its
spacious gardens and pleasure-grounds, jealously walled in for the use
of the ladies of the Imperial Harem, fill a large portion of the valley.
Beyond these guarded precincts the ground gradually rises, rich with
vegetation; while clusters of fruit-trees overshadow the gourds for
which the spot is famous, and the bright patches of Indian corn that are
scattered on all sides.
[Illustration: DOLMA-BATCHÈ. (From the Necropolis of Pera.)
_DOLMA-BATCHÈ (VU DU CIMETIÈRE DE PÉRA.)_ _DOLMA-BATCHÈ (VOM LEICHENHOFE
ZU PERA.)_
W. H. Bartlett. E. Benjamin.
London. Published for the Proprietors, by Geo: Virtue, 26, Ivy Lane,
1839.]
The spot chosen by the artist to give a glimpse of this lovely valley,
is one which is much frequented by the Turks: it is a height at the
extremity of the beautiful Necropolis of Pera, whence the land suddenly
takes a downward slope, and descends to the edge of the Bosphorus,
covered with foliage; the almond-tree mingling its bright sunny green
with the dense hues of the cypress, and the apple-blossom laughing out in
its pure beauty beside the overshadowing and majestic maple. The cemetery
itself is very picturesque, occupying a portion of this same slope, where
it descends less abruptly to the sea; and then stretching away like a
dark fringe along the edge of the height for a considerable distance, in
the direction of Pera.
The Turks have a singular tradition attached to this burial-place, of
which mention must not be omitted. They believe that, on particular
anniversaries, sparks of fire exude from the graves, and lose themselves
among the boughs of the cypresses by which they are overshadowed; an idea
so eminently poetical, that it induces a disinclination to canvass its
rationality.
A wooden kiosque occupies the crest of the hill immediately above the
valley, and is a favourite resort with all classes of people who can
afford to enjoy an hour’s leisure in the balmy season, and to indulge
themselves in the contemplation of one of the loveliest spots on the
Bosphorus. The Cafejhi, by whom it is tenanted, not only provides the
everlasting coffee, and the eternal chibouque, but also adds a low
wicker stool for the accommodation of his visitor, which enables him to
select his own favourite spot beneath the sheltering branches of the
trees planted about the kiosque; and to feast his vision with the fair
scene, whose blended beauties can gain no single charm from mere verbal
description with which they have not already been embued by the pencil of
Mr. Bartlett.
A BENDT IN THE FOREST OF BELGRADE.
“A lovely spot, half sunshine, and half shade,
Where flickering boughs a shifting picture made;
And tranquil waters, ’mid the general hush,
Gazed on the sun until they stole his blush!”
The village of Belgrade, formerly called Beil-Gorod, (a word signifying,
in the Sclavonian language, White Fortress,) is situated at the
termination of the Great Bendt, or Reservoir, which forms the subject
of the accompanying sketch. Nothing can exceed in beauty the situation
of this mountain-hamlet, nestled in a green valley bright with turf
and flowers, and traversed by a sparkling stream, which, after winding
gracefully for two or three miles through the plain, finally empties
itself into the Bendt.
The heights by which the valley is encompassed are a portion of the chain
of the Lower Balcan, and are, in this immediate neighbourhood, richly
clothed with stately forests of chestnut, maple, oak, and other noble
timber; while the glen itself is studded with groups of beech-trees,
whose soft and fantastic outlines cut gracefully against the sunny sky,
and whose flexile and leafy branches throw their long and refreshing
shadows across the grass, and the dancing ripple of the pigmy river.
[Illustration: A BENDT, in the Forest above Belgrade.
_UN BENDT, DANS LA FORÉT PRÈS DU BELGRADE._ _EINE BIEGUNG IM WALDE
OBERHALB BELGRAD._
W. H. Bartlett. R. Wallis.
London. Published for the Proprietors, by Geo: Virtue, 26, Ivy Lane,
1839.]
But Belgrade, beautiful as it undoubtedly is, is nevertheless much
changed since the year 1717, when the talented Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,
courting its shades in the sultry month of June, thus wrote to the
immortal bard of Twickenham.
“The heats of Constantinople have driven me to this place, which
perfectly answers the description of the Elysian fields. I am in the
middle of a wood, consisting chiefly of fruit-trees, watered by a vast
number of fountains famous for the excellency of their water, and divided
into many shady walks, upon short grass, that seems to me artificial,
but, I am assured, is the pure work of nature, and within view of the
Black Sea, from whence we perpetually enjoy the refreshment of cool
breezes, that make us insensible of the heat of the summer. The village
is only inhabited by the richest amongst the Christians, who meet every
night at a fountain, forty paces from my house, to sing and dance. The
beauty and dress of the women exactly resemble the ideas of the ancient
nymphs, as they are given us by the representations of the poets and
painters.”[36]
When the fair and gifted Ambassadress sketched this beautiful picture
of the spot, she must have been, as she herself expresses it, “in the
middle of a wood;” for, until the summer of 1823, the Valley of Belgrade
was rich in chestnut, beech, oak, walnut, lime-trees, plantains, and
every description of forest timber; but, unfortunately for the lover of
“the gay green wood,” the recesses of Belgrade became at that period the
retreat of parties of the scattered Janissaries, who had escaped during
the massacre; and who, carrying along with them all the surviving rabble
of the city who had espoused their cause, and sided with them during
the carnage, divided themselves between the forest of Belgrade and the
heights of Moudania; the more active passing over into Asia Minor, and
infesting the mountains as far as Broussa; and the less far-seeing,
concealing themselves in the dense woods bordering the Black Sea.
Here the wretched men subsisted for a time on fruits and herbs; but,
despairing of brighter fortune, they soon became desperate, and sallying
forth upon every chance traveller, in parties of eight or ten, as they
had associated themselves, they constantly robbed, and occasionally
murdered, until the roads were considered to be impassable. Various, and
even strenuous efforts were made by the government to capture or disperse
them, but as they amounted to some hundreds, they set at defiance both
the soldiery and the police; and although an occasional straggler was
captured by the troops, summarily strangled, and his body flung by the
wayside for the purpose of terrifying his comrades into submission, no
effect was produced; until the Sultan, irritated and wearied by their
prolonged enormities, decided on setting fire to the forest, and thus
destroying their stronghold. This expedient was accordingly adopted;
the woods were ignited in several directions, and a military _cordon_
established on the heights, with strict orders to fire upon every
individual who attempted to escape. Could the mind have been freed from
the consciousness that the fierce flames were serving as the ministers of
a painful and relentless death, the scene would have been surpassingly
magnificent!
The primeval forest which had stood tall and dark upon the earth in
solemn grandeur for centuries, challenging the antiquity of the hoary
heights beyond, and excluding from its mysterious depths the brightness
of the stars; defying the glorious day-beam which failed to penetrate
its wild recesses, and concealing amid its trackless wilderness a
thousand things of life, became suddenly girdled with fire—the tall trees
shivered, crackled, swayed, leant towards each other as the tongues of
flame bound them in one apparently solid mass—stood out for an instant,
charred and leafless against the sky, as the scared ocean-wind struggled
for a brief interval with its rival element—and then fell with a crash
that woke the caverned echoes of Asia, while the leaping waves that
chafed against the bleak Symplegades, caught, the deep tint, and turned
the sea to gold; and the majestic aqueduct of Baghtchè-Keuï, above the
valley, lost for a time its snowy tint, and seemed to be formed of
sculptured ore.
The ruin wrought bravely. Belgrade was girt with fire; the flames
extended for several square miles, and ere many hours elapsed, all was
desolation; while, (meet accompaniment for such a scene!) the constant
report of musquetry was blent with the shrieks of human agony, and the
deep groan of human suffering filled up the horrid diapason. Of all who
had been sheltered by the forest of Belgrade, it was believed that not
one escaped with life. Most of the fugitives fell beneath the bullets of
the soldiery; while a few, strong and stern even in extremity, disdained
to fly merely to exchange a death of suffering for a prompter end at the
hands of their exulting victors; and thus they perished in their silent
fortitude, with the forest-trees amid which they had been so long hidden.
The Bendts, or Tanks, are of classic origin, having been formed by the
Greek Emperors when Byzantium became a second Rome, and the necessities
of an increasing population rendered it imperative on their rulers to
secure to the growing city a sure and sufficient supply of water. They
were constructed with considerable ingenuity, extreme care, and great
cost; and their preservation was anxiously insured by repeated edicts,
several of which are still in the Imperial Library of the Eski-Seraï,
insisting strongly upon their immense utility, regulating the planting
of the trees by which they were to be surrounded, and prohibiting, under
pain of the Imperial displeasure, and a heavy fine, the abstraction of
water by any individual whomsoever; every such offender being compelled,
upon detection, to pay a pound of gold for each ounce weight of water!
All the rills which trickle through the valley have been directed to one
point, and now unite in a stream of considerable volume, which flows
between two hills, and finally empties itself into the Great Bendt;
while, in every instance where a similar arrangement is feasible in this
region of springs and moisture, another of these mountain-reservoirs,
smaller in size, but equally perfect in construction, will repay the
search of the traveller.
[Illustration: AQUEDUCT OF VALENS. (In the City.)
_AQUEDUC DE VALENS._ _WASSERLEITUNG DES K. VALENS._
W. H. Bartlett. J. C. Bentley.
London. Published for the Proprietors, by Geo: Virtue, 26, Ivy Lane,
1839.]
The Suy-Terrasi, by whose means the water is now conveyed on a summit
level, were described earlier in the work; and their effect, scattered
for miles over the face of the country, from the Black Sea to Pera, is
extremely singular, setting all the conjectures of the uninitiated at
defiance. These were invented at a later period by the Turks themselves,
in order to avoid the enormous outlay necessary to the erection of
Aqueducts; but they were not allowed, nevertheless, to supersede them
altogether—a fact which must gratify every lover of the picturesque,
as he gazes on the majestic Aqueduct of Validè, which is flung across
the fair valley of Buyukdèrè, terminating the vista as seen from the
Bosphorus, and linking the heights with a range of snowy arches.
Another, of more vast, but, perhaps, less graceful proportions, and
certainly less happily situated, is that of Solyman, near Pyrgo, of which
a sketch has been already given. It dominates a valley one thousand six
hundred feet in width, is formed by a double range of fifty arches, and
is of very imposing appearance, and constructed with great solidity.
The Aqueduct of Valens is one of the most striking objects that meets the
eye of the stranger, as he gazes enraptured on the far-famed city of the
Bosphorus. Dark, and hoar, and massy, it links two of the seven hills,
and spans the peopled valley with a giant grasp; in strong contrast
to the gaiety and glitter of the marble mosques, and party-coloured
houses. Festoons of the graceful wild-vine, and the scented honeysuckle,
drapery its mouldering masonry; masses of the caper-plant, with its
beautiful blossoms, conceal the ravages of time; lichens trail among
its arches; and a variety of stone plants, fed by the moisture which is
continually oozing through the interstices of the building, flourish in
picturesque luxuriance, and lend a glory to its decay. Historians allude
to several other Aqueducts, which they assert to have had existence in
Constantinople, but no trace now remains within the walls of the city
of any, save this; and its origin is thus curiously accounted for by a
modern traveller.
“The Emperor, incensed at the conduct of the people of Chalcedon, who had
favoured the party of Procopius, ordered their walls to be pulled down.
Among the stones was found one with an oracular inscription, implying
that ‘the walls of Chalcedon would bring a great supply of water to the
city;’ and, to complete the prophecy, Valens erected his Aqueduct with
the materials.”[37]
It is impossible to calculate how often this venerable ruin must have
overlooked a scene of flame and terror; in 1836, the streets by which it
is surrounded were levelled by an extensive conflagration, that lit up
the sky of midnight with a wild and lurid gleam, and turned the ripple
of the channel into liquid metal. Every object within the harbour was
as visible as at noonday, but wore a spectral brightness never to be
forgotten by those who witnessed the grand and imposing spectacle; the
dark hulls of the shipping seemed to float upon a sea of molten lead,
while the delicate tracery of the cordage appeared to be hanging in links
of gold from mast to mast. The dome of St. Sophia glowed like a huge
carbuncle; and the slender minarets stood out like silver wands from an
atmosphere of brass; while the rigid cypresses, whose dense foliage flung
back the unnatural brightness as if in mockery, loomed darkly on the eye
like the presiding forms of destroying demons overlooking their work of
devastation.
Amid all this ruin, the Aqueduct of Valens remained unscathed. Some
portions of its leafy coronal, parched by the intense heat, hung on the
morrow, scorched and blighted; but the hoary remnant of by-gone centuries
still soared proudly above the prostrate city at its feet, and received
as incense the smoke of its destruction.
No single inscription can now be traced on any portion of the work; not
a lettered stone has ever repaid the search of the curious, or rewarded
the labour of the antiquary; and the tradition cited by Dr. Walsh is said
to be the only record of its date, or of its founder. To the picturesque
traveller, the Aqueduct of Valens will, however, require no historical
interest to lend it value; as of all the antiquities of Constantinople,
none form so prominent a feature in the landscape, or tend so greatly to
contrast their classic and graceful shadowing with the broad lights and
vivid colouring of the remainder of the picture.
Many others exist without the city, but all more or less in a state
of decay; the Turks, by an unaccountable fatality, neglecting their
aqueducts and cisterns, while they are rigorously strict on the subject
of the Bendts; planting the embankments; and condemning to severe
penalties, not only the “drawers of water,” but also the “hewers of
wood,” who may be rash enough to exercise their vocation within the
guarded precincts.
The cisterns of the city are, in many instances, merely immense tanks, or
wells, excavated beneath the houses, and intended to act as reservoirs
for rainwater; but these are far from being the most important; four
vast subterraneans being yet in existence, which were the work of the
Greek Emperors, and which were formerly supplied by aqueducts from the
waters of the Bendts. One of them, called by the Turks Ben-Veber-Direg,
is supported by three hundred and thirty-six pillars of rough marble;
and is known as the “Thousand and One,” because the separate blocks
employed in forming the columns are said to amount to that mystic number;
but in the time of the Romans this cistern enjoyed the appellation of
the “Stranger’s Friend,” being a public reservoir, of which every comer
might claim his share. The tank was computed to contain one million
two hundred and thirty-seven thousand, nine hundred and thirty-nine
cubic feet of water, and to suffice for the consumption of the whole
city more than fifty days. It is now, however, perfectly dry, and filled
with earth to one-third the height of the columns; and is the damp and
unwholesome resort of a score or two of silk-twisters, who ply their
rapid wheels beneath its hoary and time-tinted arches. Tradition says
that the water-courses were diverted from this reservoir by order of the
Emperor, who, when digging the foundations of Saint Sophia, caused all
the soil to be flung into the cistern, rather than submit to the delay
necessary to its transport beyond the walls of the city. The channel worn
in the stone by the water that once flowed into it, is distinguishable
on three different sides of the reservoir, which is lighted by narrow
grated windows, level with the street; and the loud clamours of the
silk-twisters, as they besiege the visitor for backschish, (_Anglicè_
money,) prolonged by the dull and distant echoes of the vaulted recesses,
die away with a sound so hollow and supernatural as to induce a momentary
belief that no human being could have given them utterance.
[Illustration: CISTERN OF BIN-VEBER-DIREG. (Or the Thousand and One.)
_CITERNE DE BIN-VEBER-DIREG, OU LES MILLE ET UNE._ _DIE CISTERNE
BIN-VEBER-DIREG, ODER DIE TAUSENDSTE UND EINE._
W. H. Bartlett. J. Carter.
London. Published for the Proprietors, by Geo: Virtue, 26, Ivy Lane,
1839.]
A second and smaller tank, known only as the Boudroum, or Subterranean,
is situated in the same quarter of the city, not ten minutes’ walk from
Bin-Veber-Direg; and, although of lesser dimensions, is infinitely
handsomer; the columns being at least three times the circumference of
those in the other cisterns, uncovered to their base, and composed of a
single block. Two only of the pillars are imperfect, and the _coup-d’œil_
from midway of the stone stair which leads into the vault is most
imposing. Here, not a sound breaks the deep and dreary silence; for,
although this reservoir is tenanted during the day like the other, the
squalid and miserable objects who frequent it, and who earn a scanty and
painful subsistence by spinning cotton, are too much enervated by the
clammy and unwholesome atmosphere of the place to have any strength to
lavish upon supplication; nor, indeed, to the humane traveller who may
chance to visit their gloomy work-room would supplication be necessary,
for one glance at their pallid and livid faces, and their bent and
attenuated bodies, must be more effective than any words, whatever were
the tale of wretchedness those words might tell.
But there yet remains one subterranean beneath the city streets which
has not been entirely diverted from its original purpose; the most vast
and impressive, the most dim and mysterious of all; and one which has
defied alike the power of time, and the curiosity of a newer and less
glorious generation—the far-spreading and extraordinary Hall of Waters,
known by the Turks as the Yèrè-Batan-Seraï, or Swallowed-up Palace. The
roof of this immense cistern is supported, like that of Bin-Veber-Direg,
by marble columns, distant about ten feet from each other, each formed
from a single block, with elaborately wrought capitals, and, in some
instances, entirely covered throughout the whole length of the shaft with
sculptured ornaments in high relief to the level of the water, which
varies in depth according to the season, from five to fifteen feet.
The spot whence the traveller looks through the gloomy arches of the
Yèrè-Batan-Seraï, is not a regularly constructed entrance to the
vault, (nor is it known if such an one really exists,) but an opening,
formed by the failure of several of the pillars, which, yielding to
the superincumbent weight, have caused the roof to fall in, and thus
revealed the watery waste beneath. Nor does any boat now offer the means
of penetrating the wilderness of columns: so many accidents having
occurred through the rashness of strangers who could not be prevailed
upon to forego the gratification of their perilous curiosity, and their
desire of ascertaining the size of the subterranean—a fact hitherto
undetermined—that the little bark was removed; and the traveller is,
consequently, fain to rest satisfied with the view of this extraordinary
structure which he commands from the ruined aperture.