In ancient times, as well as now, towns of importance in these parts were generally found by the sea, which was their source of wealth; but the greatness of Gortyna, though so far inland, was no doubt due to the magnificent cornlands of the rich plain of Messara. As I guess, the town stood on a pointed hill overlooking it.
In a steep part of the hill looking towards the plain is an inconspicuous hole in the rock, unmarked by any architectural or structural feature. This is the entrance to the Labyrinth.[35] We had brought a quantity of string for a clue, which we rolled on two long sticks, then lit torches and went in. At first one enters a vestibule out of which lead several openings. Two of the three, perhaps four, dark entrances are blocked up, but one remains open. This we followed, and for three mortal hours and more we groped about among intricate passages and in spacious halls. The windings bewildered us at once, and my compass being broken I was quite ignorant as to where I was. The clearly intentional intricacy and apparently endless number of galleries impressed me with a sense of horror and fascination I cannot describe. At every ten steps one was arrested, and had to turn to right or left, sometimes to choose one of three or four roads. What if one should lose the clue!
A poor madman had insisted on accompanying us all the way from Candia. He used to call me St. Michael; Douglas, St. George; and Foster, Minos. We knew him as Delli Yani. Much against our will he persisted in following us into the cavern, and when we stopped, going off with a boy who had a lantern. Conceive our horror when we found suddenly that he had disappeared. There in that awful obscurity he might wander about till death relieved him. We sent back two men along the clue with torches to shout for him, and listened anxiously, but the Turks were quite unconcerned. God, they said, takes care of madmen. We went on, and sure enough after about an hour Delli Yani turned up with the boy, who was horribly frightened. We entered many chambers; in some were Venetian names, such as Spinola; in another, 'Hawkins 1794,' 'Fiott' and other Englishmen, and many names of Jews. All the culs de sac were infested with bats, which were very annoying, and rose in thousands when one of our party fired a pistol. In one place is a spring. Here and there we saw some lichen, and there were occasional signs of metallic substances, but not enough to support the idea of its having been a mine. The stone is sandy, stratified, and easily cut, the air dry, and it appears to me that the most probable purpose of this wonderful excavation was as a secure storehouse for corn and valuables from the attacks of robbers in the days of Minos. The work was plainly all done with the chisel.
The passage is always eight or ten feet wide, and four, five, six, eight, or ten feet or more high. In many places it had fallen in. The peasants tell all sorts of stories about it. They told me that in one place there are reeds and a pool, and that the hole goes right through the mountain for three miles; that a sow went in and came out seven years after with a litter of pigs; and so on.
We slept at Hagios Deka, left it at dawn and rode close to the foot of Ida through a very rich country, and in spite of waiting an hour on the road, reached Candia in seven hours and a half. It was evident that for purposes of his own our janissary had taken us something like fifteen hours out of our way in coming, and we had a serious dispute with him in consequence. Our hurrying back was of no use. There was no prospect of our getting away.
Candia.—We have plenty of time on our hands and can only employ it in the worst possible way by the assistance of the agas, who in the name of dullness come and pass away their ennui in our company. To crown our bliss, imagine us sleeping, feeding, and sitting all in one room, without the possibility of finding a hole to hide our heads alone in.
What was to me perhaps the worst affliction of all, was that to entertain our guests we had to have music, wearing on unceasingly in melancholy monotony. Our situation, in fact, was getting to be very trying.
We had a visit from our friend Alilah Agas, who begged us to send for music, which was brought. Then he wished the girls of the house (Jewesses) to come up and dance, and had we not been there no doubt he would have compelled them to come. As it was, we discountenanced it, and he gave it up. But he is a Turk; which is as good as to say utterly unprincipled. He told me himself that in raising recruits in Anatolia for the Bey of Tunis, he gave them three hundred piastres apiece, and set it down as six hundred. That dishonesty and bestiality go hand in hand with ignorance is well seen among the Turks. Moreover they lack the civilising influence of women in their society. As soon as their affected gravity is laid aside, they betray the vilest indecency of feeling. One cannot give instances, but the fact was painfully brought home to us.
At last, on the 24th December, a note came from Mr. North to say that he was at Dia, the island across the bay. We replied begging him to stay where he was, for that if he came to Candia he would certainly be delayed. At the same time we sent to the pasha, begging to have the gate of the port opened in case Mr. North came. The gate, however, was never opened. Happily he did not come, and the dragoman we had sent with our message had to sleep at a cafané outside the gate, and we lowered dinner down to him with a piece of string over the walls. For a wonder we were left alone for this evening, and Douglas and I walked about in our little περιβολἡ [Greek: peribolê] by moonlight, and thought of home and happy Christmas parties there and our dismal Christmas out here. Amongst other subjects we talked of the divine Mrs. Siddons. I trust you never omit my love and duty to her, and my request that she will not forget her devoted admirer during his wanderings. You have never told me whether she intends ever to go on the stage again.[36]
We went to pay a farewell visit to the pasha. We found him sitting in the same state as before—in full dress, with his diamond-hilted dagger in his girdle and several magnificently rich snuff-boxes on the couch beside him. Our conversation, made up of his questions and our answers, lasted half an hour. He said he had seen a drawing of the Labyrinth which I had done, and that it was very beautiful. What was the age of the Labyrinth? the name of the king who made it? the age of the world? &c. &c. Our answers were taken down, and our names. Finally he said our visit was agreeable to him, and bade us cordially farewell.