25th May.—Having done what was wanted with regard to the verification of the longitude, we went back in a boat to Cape Anemurium to see the ancient town. On the point is a fortress and citadel. Outside of that a second wall includes a theatre and an odeum, the seats of which are all gone. There are no traces of dwellings within the walls, so that one must suppose the inhabitants to have lived in mud or timber houses, for outside the walls there is the most perfect necropolis I ever saw. Each tomb has two apartments, and all, except for their having been broken open, are as fresh as if just built.
The ship being still at Anemurium, the bey above mentioned came down to the beach attended by his retinue. As soon as we made him out, we pushed off to pay him the compliments of the captain. Nothing could be more picturesque than the scene when we reached the shore. At the foot of the precipice of Anemurium he was seated on a small carpet spread on the rock, surrounded by about a hundred dark, savage-looking men all heavily armed. They were clearly as pleased to look at us as we were to see the barbarians of the interior. The gloomy evening cast a grave air over the wild crags and the savage figures, while the sea broke in heavy waves at the foot of the rock on which Abdul Muim sat. The manner with which the bey received us was free and polite. He told us the history of the country about us, and of the castle in particular. He was very much pressed to come aboard, but he would not be tempted. Instead of that, he contented himself with inquiring the length of the ship and sat looking at her with a pocket telescope for several hours.
We crossed a bay, and lay off Cape Kisliman, a bluff and remarkable cape on which were ruins, but the people of the country seemed to object to our examining them.
Thence to Chelindreh, which, being the nearest point of communication with Cyprus for couriers from Constantinople and other travellers, boasts some twenty huts and their inhabitants. They are barbarous and savage to a degree, and were disposed to treat the crew of the captain's boat, who were looking for inscriptions among the tombs of the ancient city, very roughly. One man even drew his yatagan, when the sudden appearance of the frigate frightened them into politeness.
June 1st.—To the captain, who is always earnestly employed, one day is like another. Even Sundays are only distinguished by the officers' invitation to him and to myself to dine in the gun-room, and by the clean clothes of the men at muster; but the other officers did not forget that to-day was an anniversary, and we all drank the health of Lord Howe.
Porto Cavaliero.—To the eastward of us lay Isola Provenzale, once without doubt a settlement of the Knights of Rhodes. While the captain examined Cape Cavaliero, I went, burning with expectation, to the island, not doubting but that I should come home with a load of inscriptions and arms for the Heralds; but we found no sort of remains of the occupation of the Knights that one could identify. We landed near a quarry of soft stone, in the middle of which an upright rock is left standing, in which it appears that a hermit had made his cell. There are crosses cut in the three sides, and several neat little receptacles for utensils. At the top of the hill are fortifications and two churches, themselves built of the materials of older Greek buildings. Clefts in the rock had been carefully stopped and used as reservoirs. The walls are built with an inner and an outer face of squared stones set in mortar, the interval being filled in with chips and rubble without cement, and the whole making a thickness of eight or nine feet. The north-west side of the island is also covered with ruins, all of the same Romaic work. One was of a church to which several rooms were attached, and in one of them a considerable tomb—probably of a saint of the Early Church. This must at all times have been a valuable station, and would be now. It has one of the best and most defensible harbours on this coast, and is within easy reach of supplies.
The captain had fared no better than ourselves in his search for remains of the Knights at Porto Cavaliero. Here we fell in with a Myconiote ship full of hadjis on their return from a visit to the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem. My Dimitri and Andrea were pigs enough to get drunk there and quarrel with the crew. They got the licking they deserved, but they came and complained to me that they had been ill-used and ourselves insulted, and gave me the trouble of inquiring into it. I found, as I had suspected, that what they had got they had brought upon themselves. Our next move was to Seleucia or Selefkeh. We landed as near as we could to the end of the line of hills on which it stands, and then walked to it, nine miles across the plain at the foot of them. The ancient town is beautifully placed at the side of a river, the Calicadnus. It is partly on the plain and partly on steps of rock which rise gradually from it up to a large castle of late date, which has an Armenian inscription over the gate. The aga received us with obvious ill-humour, which perhaps was owing to his being unwell, for he begged to see our doctor, and promised to send horses for him and for us to the beach next day. We looked about among the ruins, which are very extensive. There is a theatre, a long line of porticoes, and a temple once converted to a Christian church, together with several late churches of the date of the ruins on Provenzale. We then went back to the ship.
Next day, no horses for the doctor or ourselves appearing upon the beach, we started walking, and on our arrival at Selefkeh complained. The aga affected to blame his servants. We expected at least to return well mounted when the doctor had seen the aga and we had seen the town, but only one sorry hack was prepared for the doctor; and, as he refused to ride alone, we made our exit, walking in a huff, and went so briskly that a miserable Turk whom the aga had sent on a pony, while we had to walk, to bring him back his medicine, could not keep up with us, and was quite out of sight by the time we got to the beach. So we went aboard, rather pleased at first to deprive the ungracious aga of his medicine; but upon reflection we wrote him a sharp laconic note and sent his dose. This aga, it is true, was not a man of good character; he had deposed and murdered his predecessor, but as that is the usual mode of succession in this country, it need not necessarily involve discourtesy to strangers. But I must not, in justice to Turks, forget to mention what occurred on our way to the beach as a set-off to the incivility of the aga.
We had had nothing to eat all day, and we were not a little sharp-set when, finding some peasants (Turks) amongst the corn making their evening meal, with that confidence which hunger inspires we pounced upon their dishes and devoured all that appeared before us. The poor fellows were not in the least disconcerted, but begged us to eat, one of them saying as he pointed to the corn all round him, 'There is plenty of bread. It is ours.' They would take no money, and when we got up to go pressed us to stay. Our hearts were melted at their noble benevolence, and we had to agree that all Turks were not brutes.
On the whole, Seleucia is worth the trouble of a visit.