THE LAST DAYS.
At this point I find that the chain of my reminiscences is broken. I can no longer recollect clearly what I did and saw, nor give those long, minute descriptions which flowed so readily from my pen when writing of the earlier part of my visit. It was nothing now but a succession of hurried expeditions back and forth across the Golden Horn, and from Europe to Asia and back again, followed in the evening by visions of populous towns, throngs of people, forests, fleets, hills, all tinged with a faint touch of melancholy by the ever-present shadow of the day of departure now drawing rapidly near, as though already these sights were only memories of what had been. And yet through all the sense of hurry and confusion which the thought of those last days is sure to bring up, certain objects stand out clearly in my memory. I remember, for instance, very distinctly that beautiful morning on which I visited for the first time the greater number of the imperial mosques, and at the mere thought of it I seem instantly to find myself surrounded by an immense space and a solemn stillness. The tremendous impression made upon one’s mind by St. Sophia does not seem to detract from the effect produced by the first sight of those titanic walls. Here, as elsewhere, the religion of the conquerors has appropriated to itself the religious art of the conquered. Almost all the other mosques are built in imitation of Justinian’s great basilica, with huge domes and semi-domes, courts, and porticoes, some even having the form of a Greek cross. But Islamism has tinged everything with a light and color all its own, which, joined to these familiar features, results in an altogether different style of building, where one sees, as it were, the horizon of an unknown world and breathes the atmosphere surrounding a strange God.
These mosques have enormous naves, white, austere, majestic in their simplicity, over which a flood of soft, uniform light pours from numberless windows; every object stands out distinctly from one extremity to the other, and mind and sight seem lulled to sleep by a dreamy sense of utter peacefulness and calm, as though in some misty valley surmounted by a serene white heaven; only the reverberation of your own footsteps recalls the fact that you are in an enclosure. There is nothing to distract the mind; the imagination, spanning directly and without effort the intervening space and light, arrives at once before the object of adoration. There is nothing to suggest either melancholy or terror—no illusions, no mysteries, no shadowy corners in which the symbols of a complicated hierarchy of supernatural beings glimmer vaguely before the confused senses. There is the one clear, distinct, all-compelling idea of a sole and omnipotent God, who demands in his temple the severe nakedness of the sunlit desert, and permits no likeness or image of himself other than the sky. All the imperial mosques of Constantinople possess these common characteristics—a majesty which uplifts and a simplicity which concentrates upon one single object the mind of the worshipper, differing so little from one another, even in the matter of detail, that it is difficult to preserve any distinct recollection of them.
The Ahmediyeh has a peculiarly graceful and pleasing exterior, possessing, notwithstanding its great size, the airy lightness of a fabric built of clouds; its dome is supported on enormous white marble piers around which four small mosques could be built, and it is the only one in Stambul which can boast of the glorious girdle of six minarets. The mosque of Suleiman, more like a little sacred city than a single temple, where a stranger might readily lose his way, has three great naves, and its dome, higher than that of St. Sophia,[J] rests upon four marvellous columns of red granite, suggesting the trunks of those gigantic trees in California. The mosque of Muhammad is a white and radiant St. Sophia; that of Bayezid has the pre-eminence for elegance of outline; that of Osman is built entirely of marble; the Shazadeh mosque possesses the two most exquisite minarets in Stambul; that in the Ok Serai quarter is the most charming example of the renaissance of Turkish art. The Selimiyeh is the most severe, the mosque of Mahmûd the most elaborate, the Validéh Sultan the most ornate. Each one has some peculiar beauty of its own, or else a legend or special privilege attached to it. The Ahmediyeh guards the standard of the Prophet; the Bayezidiyeh is crowned by clouds of pigeons; the Suleimaniyeh can boast of inscriptions written by the hand of Kara Hissari; in the mosque of the Validéh Sultan is the imitation gold column which cost the conqueror of Candia his life. Sultan Muhammad sees, “eleven imperial mosques bow their heads around him, even as the sheafs of Joseph’s brothers bowed themselves before his sheaf.” In one may be seen the columns carried away from the imperial palace and Augusteon of Justinian which formerly supported statues of Venus, Theodora, and Eudoxia; in others are marbles from the ancient churches of Chalcedon, pillars from the ruins of Troy, columns from Egyptian temples, precious stained glass stolen from Persian palaces, building materials, the plunder of circus and forum, aqueduct and basilica, all engulfed and lost sight of in the white immensity of the religious art of the victors.
[J] “The dome itself is 86 feet in diameter internally and 156 feet in height. At St. Sophia the dome is 108 feet in diameter and 175 feet in height, or 22 and 19 more, respectively.”—Fergusson, Hist. Architecture.—Trans.
Panorama of Mosque of Bayezid.
The interiors differ from one another even less than the exteriors. At the farther end is a marble pulpit, facing it, the Sultan’s seat enclosed within a gilded lattice; beside the mihrab stand two huge candelabra supporting tapers which look like the trunks of palm trees; innumerable lamps composed of large crystal globes are disposed about the nave in so singular a manner as to seem more fitting adjuncts of a grand ball than of religious solemnities. Inscriptions encircling the columns, doorways, and windows, friezes painted in imitation of marble, and floral designs executed in stained glass are the sole attempts at ornamentation which break the white monotony of those lofty walls. The marble treasures of the pavements in the vestibules, the galleries surrounding the courtyards, the ablutionary fountains, and minarets do not impair at all the character of charming yet severe simplicity which marks those great white fabrics, framed in verdure, whose lofty domes stand out clear and sparkling against the blue sky.
And, after all, the jami—that is, the mosque proper—covers only a minor part of the enclosure which goes by its name, the rest being taken up by a labyrinth of courtyards and buildings, consisting of auditoriums, where the Koran is read; treasuries, where private individuals deposit their valuables for safe-keeping; academies, medical colleges, children’s schools, quarters for students, and soup-kitchens for the poor; insane asylums, hospitals, khâns for travellers, and baths—a little philanthropic settlement nestling at the base of the lofty temple as at that of a mountain, and shaded by mighty trees.
Now, however, all these things have faded into one another in my memory. I only see the tiny black speck of my own insignificant self wandering like a detached atom up and down those vast naves, between two lines of diminutive Turks prostrated at their devotions. As I move on, dazzled by the pervading whiteness, stupefied by the strange light, awed and subdued by the immensity around me, dragging my worn slippers—and my humbled pride as a descriptive writer as well—it seems as though one mosque melted into another, and that all around me in every direction there arose interminable ranks of roofs and pilasters, a white illimitable throng in which sight and sense are swallowed up.
My recollections of how I passed another day are full of mystery and crowded with phantom shapes. Entering the courtyard of a Mussulman private house, and descending by the light of a torch to the very lowest of a flight of damp, mouldy stairs, I found myself beneath the vaulted roof of the Yeri Betan Serai, the great cistern basilica of Constantine, whose confines, according to vulgar belief in Constantinople, are unknown; the greenish waters lose themselves in the distance beneath the black roof, lit up here and there by a vivid ray of light, which seems only to increase the horror of the surrounding darkness. The crimson flame from our torch throws a lurid glare over the arches nearest to us, falls in slanting rays upon the dripping walls, and brings into view dim, confused tiers of columns intercepting the perspective in all directions like the tree-trunks of some vast submerged forest. The imagination, drawn on in spite of itself by a sort of horrible fascination, penetrates those sepulchral galleries, hovers above the face of those gloomy waters, and finally loses itself amid the intricate windings of those endless columns. Meanwhile the dragoman is murmuring in one’s ear blood-curdling tales of adventurous persons who have embarked upon those waters and started off with the intention of exploring their farthermost limits, only to return, long hours afterward, with blanched faces and hair on end, while behind them could be heard boisterous shouts of mocking laughter and piercing shrieks, which echoed and re-echoed beneath the vaulted roof; and others, again, who never returned at all, having met their end—who knows how?—driven insane, perhaps, by terror, or possibly starved to death, or drawn by mysterious currents to some unknown abyss far away from Stambul, God only can tell where. Issuing once more into the broad, sunny light of the At-Meidan square, all these gloomy fancies at once take flight, and a few minutes later we again descend, and find ourselves surrounded by the two hundred pillars of the dry cistern of Binbûr, where a hundred Greek silk-spinners are singing a martial song as they work in the pale, unearthly light broken by interlacing lines of arches, while from overhead comes the dull, confused rumble of a passing caravan. Then fresh air and sunlight again, followed by another plunge into semi-obscurity, more rows of columns and vaulted roofs, and the stillness of the tomb broken by far-away voices; and so on until evening—altogether a mysterious, unearthly sort of pilgrimage, which left a haunting mental impression for long after of a vast subterranean sea which, having already engulfed the Greek empire, was destined one day to draw gay, thoughtless, unheeding Stambul into its shadowy depths as well.
Ancient fountain at Scutari.
These depressing fancies, however, were entirely dispelled by the gay image of Skutari. Whenever we went there, embarking upon one of the crowded little steamers for the purpose, my friend and I used invariably to get into a discussion as to which ranked first in point of beauty—Skutari or the two banks of the Golden Horn. Yunk preferred the former, but I held out for Stambul. Nevertheless, Skutari captivated me by its sudden, unexpected changes of aspect: it seems to mock all those who approach it by water. From the Sea of Marmora it is only a big village scattered over a hillside; from the Golden Horn you realize that it is a town; but when the steamboat, after rounding the most advanced point on the Asiatic shore, proceeds in a straight line toward the harbor, the little town spreads out in the most astounding fashion; other hills, quite covered with buildings, come into sight, rising one behind the other; the valleys are filled with houses; villas crown the heights; the outskirts stretch away along the shore as far as the eye can reach; and you find that you are approaching a great city, which in the course of a few minutes has come into view from some obscure hiding-place, much as though a huge curtain had been rolled back, and you gaze stupidly at it, half expecting to see it disappear at any moment with the same suddenness with which it came. Landing by means of a wooden gang-plank, and amid the shouts and vociferations of boatmen, dragomen, and others with horses to hire, we mount the principal street, which winds up the hillside among yellow and red houses decked with vines and creepers, and between garden-walls, over which a mass of verdure trails and clambers: overhead tall trellisworks and lofty plane trees cast their shade, the latter so large as to sometimes nearly close the street. As we go on we pass Turkish cafés, before which lounges the usual crowd of Asiatic idlers, smoking, stretched out at full length, their gaze fixed on no one knows what. Then we meet a herd of goats; heavy country carts jolt slowly by, drawn by oxen with wreaths of flowers on their heads; peasants, some in fez and others in turban, pass us on the road; Mussulman funeral processions, and groups of hanums, spending the summer in their country-houses, carrying great bunches of flowers or sprays of blossoms in their hands. We seem to be in another Stambul, less mysterious, but gayer and more cheerful than she of the Seven Hills. This one is more like a great city of villas into which the country is making inroads on every side. The little back streets lined with stables rise and descend again over hill and valley, swallowed up at last by the green of park and garden. On the heights the profound peace of the country still reigns, but lower down there is all the stir and activity of a seaport town. From the huge barracks which rise here and there comes a confused sound of bugle-calls, snatches of songs, and the beating of drums, while clouds of birds fly about and settle in the quiet lanes and byways.
Following in the wake of a funeral procession, we finally leave the town, and, entering the famous cemetery, are soon lost in that vast forest of mighty cypress trees which extends in one direction toward the Sea of Marmora and in the other toward the Golden Horn, covering a large area of undulating ground. On all sides there is nothing but group on group, row on row, of glimmering white tombstones outlined against the turf and gay colors of the wild flowers, and an intricate network of footpaths winding in and out among the trunks of the trees, crowded so closely together as barely to allow any view of the horizon stretching away in a long shimmering line. We wander aimlessly among the little painted and gilded columns, some erect, others toppling over or fallen flat, and between railings of family sepulchres, mausoleums of dead pashas, rude tombstones of the poor. Here and there lie bunches of faded flowers, and sometimes, where the earth has been disturbed, the light falls upon a half-buried skull; on and on, no sound save the cooing of doves concealed overhead amid the branches of the cypress trees; and the farther we go the more does the forest seem to expand, the tombstones multiply, the paths increase in number, the shining strips of the horizon recede into the distance, and the reign of death keeps pace with us step by step, until at length, just as we begin to despair of ever finding our way out, we issue quite unexpectedly upon the wide avenue leading to the vast open plain of Haidar Pasha, where the Mussulman troops once assembled preparatory to setting out for the Asiatic wars. The view from thence, embracing the Sea of Marmora, Stambul, the mouth of the Golden Horn, Galata, and Pera, all veiled beneath the light morning mist and tinted with the colors of paradise, is so exquisitely lovely that we catch our breath with something of the same incredulous wonder with which we first beheld those shores.