Many of these kahvés are very beautifully constructed, and adorned with pillars and fountains, with gardens attached to them, where visitors are entertained with sweet strains of music; and crowds assemble to listen to the extravagant fictions of the Meddahs, or professed story-tellers, or otherwise to wile away the time; smoking, sipping the fragrant berry, and playing backgammon, dama, or mangala.
All games of chance are played by the Osmanlis, only for amusement, and gambling is not generally practised by them.
The moral effect of these establishments upon the community is very evident; for though wine is forbidden by the Koran, there are many mey-hanés, or grog-shops, to be found in Turkey, which are not generally frequented by people of any pretensions to respectability; indeed drunkenness is a very uncommon vice, doubtless owing to the numerous kahvés, which afford the habitual refreshments of pipes and coffee to the people, with every facility for social intercourse.
On entering the coffee shop, there is an elevated platform on the three sides, which is furnished with cushions or mats for the accommodation of visitors. On the sides of the wall are various grotesque pictures, and also shelves, where the implements of shaving and toilette are so fantastically displayed as to create a somewhat comic appearance, and one altogether peculiar to Turkey. At one of the remotest corners is an elevated fire-place for the preparation of coffee, which is served in very small cups. The diminutive quantity of this beverage was so unsatisfactory to one of the sailors of the English fleet at Constantinople, that upon tasting it he observed, “This is excellent; just bring me a dozen.”
Surrounding the fire-place are shelves, upon which stand the graceful narghillés, with their brazen and polished mountings, attractive and pleasing to the eye. But the most active and busy personage in this establishment is the Berber, or barber, who is not only the shaver, hair-dresser, and trimmer in general, but extends the province of his sharp profession to bleeding, cupping, leeching, and tooth-drawing; the results of which avocations are displayed at the door, fantastically strung and diversified with colored beads.
Barbers always follow in the train of doctors, and even precede them, for bleeding is a universal remedy in Turkey, whether the patient is sick of fever or fright. Indeed, it is the custom for every body to be bled once a year, generally in the spring, in order to purify the system. Add to this the frequent application of leeches, scarifications, and cupping, and it may be easily conceived that this branch of industry is very profitable; still more so when it was the custom to shave the whole head, for the convenience of frequent ablutions. Many, in conformity with European civilization, now allow the hair to grow, but those who oppose other reforms are equally unyielding in this respect, and “calculating even to a hair.”
CHAPTER XXXIV.
HAMAM, OR BATH.
In the East there is one source of comfort and enjoyment which is more essential than all else, and that is the use of the bath, which follows all other pleasures, when excess has wearied the system, and precedes and prepares for anticipated luxuries physical or mental. This process of purifying and refreshing the body, is eagerly sought for as soon as the traveller arrives at Constantinople; indeed seems to be second only in his mind to the impressions of an entrance to the magnificent harbor.