Such was the past magnificence of Turkey, now rapidly losing its former type of varied external beauty, as it merges from day to day in the great stream of civilization.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE SULTAN AND HIS PERSONNEL.
Rousseau has wisely observed, “Il faut étudier la société par les hommes, et les hommes par la société,” and as the tone of society in all countries is derived from the courts and the wealthy, so also in Turkey, the sultan and his court are the model of domestic life and its institutions.
Sultan Abd-ul Medjid Khan, the Padishah of the Osmanlis, or the reigning monarch of Turkey, was born May 6th, 1822, and succeeded his father Sultan Mahmoud, July 1st, 1839, at the age of seventeen.
He has a brother and a sister, both younger than himself.
His brother, Aziz Efendi, lives in the same palace with him, having apartments therein for his own use and accommodation.
His sister Adilé Sultan, who is married to Mehmed Aali Pasha, the ex-Grand Vezir, resides in a separate palace on the Bosphorus.
The sultan has until now had nine children, two girls and seven boys, but none of his children will succeed him while his brother is living; for the law of the country requires that the eldest living male member of the Imperial family shall ascend the throne.