CONSTANTINOPLE.
CONSTANTINOPLE, March 9, 1890.
The harbor appears to be about a mile wide and two miles long,
surrounded by steep hills, on which the city is built, largely in
terraces, with many great palaces, mosques, and public buildings, the
Mosque of St. Sophia being very prominent. I took a guide at the ship
and went ashore in his boat. I had been often informed of the annoyances
by custom-house officials to which travellers are often obliged to
submit on their arrival in the Turkish dominions, and was agreeably
surprised at the ease with which I was permitted to go on shore. The
guide showed my passport to an officer, who looked it over and returned
it, and we went to another wharf, where my trunk and bag had been
landed. There were three venerable officers here, who each took a franc
and passed the baggage without opening any thing, or saying a word.
A big Turk took my trunk and bag on his back, and we went up an
ill-paved and dirty street, a quarter of a mile long, and almost as hard
to climb as the Pyramids of Egypt, leading to a nice and well-paved
avenue, lined with fine shops, on which was the Hotel Pesth, where we
found comfortable quarters.
I had a cup of tea, and then sallied out to see the city. There are few
carriages to be seen in the streets, but great numbers of large and
homeless yellow dogs, all of the same shaggy breed, apparently well fed
and happy and certainly good-natured. There were twelve of these dogs on
the walk opposite the hotel, and I counted 164 on one of the main
streets, about a mile long. We remarked that they were about as thick
all over the city, and there must be as many as fifty thousand
altogether. We walked down a fine street to the water, and along the
shore for a mile or two, and again admired the beautiful bay, which
poets have raved about for centuries, and which most people think the
finest in all the world.
We went as far as one of the big palaces belonging to the Sultan, which
faces the water. It is twelve hundred feet long, and has two grand
entrances built of white marble. There we took a circuit around the
hills, and saw many great buildings, barracks, schools, etc. Once we saw
a regiment of horsemen drilling in a large square. The men were tall and
fine-looking, and the horses excellent. There were two fire alarms while
we were out, and it was enough to make a New York horse laugh to see the
arrangements for putting them out. The engine, so called, was an
ordinary force-pump with two handles, placed on a platform and carried
by a dozen men, who were followed by fifty more, in a leisurely way.
There are no water-works, and many large and very old wooden buildings,
so one can readily see that there must be destructive fires here
sometimes.
I have been here a week, and have seen many mosques, including the
immense and famous St. Sophia, which must have been in days of old very
magnificent, but it has been largely robbed of its treasures, and is now
quite dilapidated.
The weather here is very bad, cold, rainy, and blustering, much as we
often have it in March. There was a heavy fall of snow two weeks ago,
and the streets are wet, slippery, and disagreeable. On the 6th instant
we made the famous trip up the Bosphorus to the Black Sea, which has
been so often written about. There were four of us, Mr. Zucker, myself,
and two friends, all sedate, over sixty years of age, and representing a
combined weight of nearly eight hundred pounds.
We left the hotel at 9 A.M., walked a short distance through the middle
of the muddy streets to a cable road, which we took, and in ten minutes
were in a busy street near the water. We then crossed a fine iron bridge
and went on board a side-wheel steamer. Looking across the water we
could see the great hospital buildings where Florence Nightingale
immortalized her name, by her care of wounded soldiers during the
Crimean war. Steam was up, and soon we were away, going along near the
shore of the European side and making about ten landings. On the shore,
buildings have been erected, sometimes a hundred or more together, so
that practically speaking the ten miles to the Black Sea is a
continuation of the city. Palaces are to be seen all along, several of
them belonging to the Sultan, and one very large and splendid one
occupied by the Persian Ambassador.
The ranges of hills near the water are largely cultivated, and even now
are covered with green grass, the whole presenting a panorama of great
beauty.
We stopped at noon, went on shore and had an excellent lunch at a German
restaurant, and then took another boat as far as the Black Sea, and
returned along the shore of Asia, stopping at numerous places to take on
passengers and mail, and in an hour reached the city.
There was a lot of women on board, with their faces more or less
covered. Once as the steamer was passing a house I saw a very pretty
sight. A couple of little girls made signals to our captain, and a
larger one held up, for him to see, a small white puppy. The
white-headed old sailor smiled a grim smile, and the swift steamer swept
on.
One day I took a guide and went to see the famous native bazaars, where
under one roof were several hundred small stores, the passage-ways
narrow, wet, and ill-paved, such as you find everywhere in the East,
filled with every thing native and foreign one ever thought of. An
Armenian pulled me into his store and showed me elegant stuff, sofa
pillows, silks, shawls, and gold embroidery, but having no use for such
things I came away without purchasing.
Another day I called on Mr. Sweeney, our Consul, and later upon Mr.
Solomon Hirsch, U. S. Minister, who kindly gave me all the information I
wanted about Constantinople. Returning through the lower part of the
city, where there was a large crowd of people, I saw a dog-fight. A
strange black dog had invaded this part of the city, and a dozen yellow
ones went for him fiercely, causing an immense row and confusion, until
a Turk appeared with a big rope, thrashed them all and sent them yelling
away.
One morning we took a carriage, and went to see the Sultan make his
weekly trip to a mosque. We drove some three miles to the front of the
mosque through the mud and snow.
This mosque is a new and beautiful one, and soon after we arrived, there
was a great gathering of horse and foot-soldiers.
The horsemen were fine-looking, and rode splendid horses. They formed
several deep in front of our carriage, but I got on a high fence, so as
to have a good view, and stood there in the snow and rain for an hour,
waiting for his Highness. At length there came a band of music, a troop
of cavalry, and many decorated officers, followed by an open carriage
containing the Sultan, a dark, black-bearded middle-aged Turk, wearing
the national red fez. He passed slowly on to his devotions, and I was
asked if I would wait and see him return. I said most decidedly not, and
returned with my friends to the hotel and to a late but excellent
breakfast at 2 P.M.