In the Levant / Twenty Fifth Impression

by Charles Dudley Warner

XXVI.—SAUNTERINGS ABOUT CONSTANTINOPLE.

DURING the day steamers leave the Galata bridge every halfhour for the villages and palaces along the Bosphorus; there is a large fleet of them, probably thirty, but they are always crowded, like the ferry-boats that ply the waters of New York Bay.

We took our first sail on the Bosphorus one afternoon toward sunset, ascending as far as Bebek, where we had been invited to spend the night by Dr. Washburne, the President of Roberts College. I shall not soon forget the animation of the harbor, crowded with shipping, amid which the steamers and caïques were darting about like shuttles, the first impression made by the palaces and ravishingly lovely shores of this winding artery between two seas. Seven promontories from Asia and seven promontories from Europe project into the stream, creating as many corresponding bays; but the villages are more numerous than bays and promontories together, for there are over forty in the fourteen miles from the Sea of Marmora to the Black Sea; on the shores is an almost unbroken line of buildings, many of them palaces of marble; the heights are crowned with cottages and luxurious villas, and abodes of taste and wealth peep out along the slopes. If you say that we seem to be sailing in the street of a city, I can only answer that it is not so; nature is still supreme here, and the visible doweress of the scene. These lovely hills rising on both sides, these gracious curves are hers, as are these groves and gardens of fruits and flowers, these vines and the abundant green that sometimes conceals and always softens the work of man.

Before we reached the Sultan's palace at Beshiktash, our steamer made a détour to the east bank, outside of the grim ironclads that lie before the imperial residence. No steamers are permitted to approach nearer, lest the smoke should soil the sparkling white marble of the palace, or their clamor and dangerous freight of men should disturb the serenity of the harem. The palace, which is a beautiful building, stretches for some distance along the water, with its gardens and conservatories, and seems to be a very comfortable home for a man who has no more ready money than the Sultan.

We landed at Bebek and climbed the steep hill, on whose slope nightingales were singing in the forest, just in time to see the sunset. Roberts College occupies the most commanding situation on the strait, and I do not know any view that surpasses in varied beauty that to be enjoyed from it. I shall make myself comprehended by many when I say that it strongly reminded me of the Hudson at West Point; if nature could be suspected of copying herself, I should say that she had the one in mind when she made the other. At that point the Hudson resembles the Bosphorus, but it wants the palaces, the Yale of the Heavenly Water into which we looked from this height, and some charming mediaeval towers, walls, and castles.

The towers and walls belong to the fortress built in 1451 by Mohammed II., and are now fallen into that decrepitude in which I like best to see all fortresses. But this was interesting before it was a ruin. It stands just above the college, at Roomeli Hissar, where the Bosphorus is narrowest,—not more than half a mile broad,—and with the opposite fortress of Anatolia could perfectly close the stream. Two years before the capture of the city, Mohammed built this fort, and gave it the most peculiar form of any fortress existing. His idea was that the towers and the circuit of the walls should spell the name of the Prophet, and consequently his own. As we looked down upon it, my friend read for me this singular piece of caligraphy, but I could understand it no further than the tower which stands for the Arabic ring in the first letter. It was at this place that Darius threw a bridge across the Bosphorus, and there is a tradition of a stone seat which he occupied here while his Asiatics passed into Europe.

So far as I know, there is no other stream in the world upon which the wealth of palaces and the beauty of gardens may be so advantageously displayed. So far as I know, there is no other place where nature and art have so combined to produce an enchanting prospect. As the situation and appearance of Constantinople are unequalled, so the Bosphorus is unique.

Whatever may be the political changes of the Turkish Empire, I do not believe that this pleasing picture will be destroyed; rather let us expect to see it more lovely in the rapidly developing taste of a new era of letters and refinement. It was a wise forethought that planted the American College just here. It is just where it should be to mould the new order of things. I saw among its two hundred pupils scholars of all creeds and races, who will carry from here living ideas to every part of the empire, and I learned to respect that thirst for knowledge and ability to acquire it which exist in the neighboring European provinces. If impatient men could wait the process of education, the growth of schools, and the development of capacity now already most promising, the Eastern question might be solved by the appearance on the scene in less than a score of years, of a stalwart and intelligent people, who would not only be able to grasp Constantinople, but to administer upon the decaying Turkish Empire as the Osmanli administered upon the Greek.

On Friday the great business of everybody is to see the Sultan go to pray; and the eagerness with which foreigners crowd to the spectacle must convince the Turks that we enjoy few religious privileges at home. It is not known beforehand, even to the inmates of the palace, to what mosque the Sultan will go, nor whether he will make a street progress on horseback, or embark upon the water, for the chosen place of prayer. Before twelve o'clock we took carriage and drove down the hill, past the parade-ground and the artillery barracks to the rear of the palace of Beshiktash; crowds on foot and in carriages were streaming in that direction; regiments of troops were drifting down the slopes and emptying into the avenue that leads between the palace and the plantation of gardens; colors were unfurled, drums beaten, trumpets called from barrack and guard-house; gorgeous officers on caparisoned horses, with equally gaudy attendants, cantered to the rendezvous; and all the air was full of the expectation of a great event. At the great square of the palace we waited amid an intense throng; four or five lines of carriages stretched for a mile along; troops were in marching rank along the avenue and disposed in hollow square on the place; the palace gates were closed, and everybody looked anxiously toward the high and gilded portal from which it was said the announcement of the Sultan's intention would be made. From time to time our curiosity was fed by the arrival of a splendid pasha, who dismounted and walked about; and at intervals a gilded personage emerged from the palace court and raised our expectation on tiptoe. We send our dragoman to interrogate the most awful dignities, especially some superb beings in yellow silk and gold, but they know nothing of the Sultan's mind. At the last moment he might, on horseback, issue from the gate with a brilliant throng, or he might depart in his caïque by the water front. In either case there would be a rush and a scramble to see and to accompany him. More regiments were arriving, bands were playing, superb officers galloping up and down; carriages, gilded with the arms of foreign embassies, or filled with Turkish ladies, pressed forward to the great gate, which still gave no sign. I have never seen such a religious excitement. For myself, I found some compensation in the usual Oriental crowd and unconscious picturesqueness; swart Africans in garments of yellow, sellers of sherbet clinking their glasses, venders of faint sweetmeats walking about with trays and tripods, and the shifting kaleidoscope of races, colors, and graceful attitudes.

Suddenly, I do not know how, or from what quarter, the feeling—for I could not call it information—was diffused that the successor of the Prophet would pray at the mosque in Ortakeui, and that he would go by caïque; and we all scampered up the road, a mile or two, racing carriages, troops and foot men, in eager outset, in order to arrive before the pious man. The mosque stands upon the Bosphorus, where its broad marble steps and pillared front and dome occupy as conspicuous a position as the Dogana at Venice. We secured a standing-place on the dock close to the landing, but outside the iron railing, and waited. A cordon of troops in blue regimentals with red facings was drawn around the streets in the rear of the mosque, and two companies of soldiers in white had stacked their guns on the marble landing, and were lounging about in front of the building.