Near this pillar we were admitted thro a gate, which opens into a green court, and that again into a garden kept in somewhat a regular order. From hence we ascend by a few steps into an apartment of the Grand Signior, where are two rich kiosks, a fish pond, a paved walk, and an open gallery. Here we were shewn the lodgings, where the unhappy princes of the empire are detained prisoners, as also the dark chambers of the ichoglans, and the door that leads into the harém of the Grand Signior. There also are shewn two or three instances of the strength and the activity of Sultan Morát; as a ponderous round stone, which with one finger he is said to have lifted by a ring fixt therein; likewise five thick and substantial sheilds, which being placed upon one another were peirced thro by a cast of his jiríd still sticking in them; also several silver pellets thrown by him with that violence, as to stick in an iron door. The above mentioned gallery is rich and splendid, adorned with various gilding of flower work, and supported with beautiful serpentine pillars. In the sides of one of the kiosks are three orbicular stones of fine porphyry, the middlemost of which is curiously polished, and thereby serves to reflect the prospect of the seraglio and adjoining city, in the nature of a looking glass. At the further end of the garden of the seraglio are the intire walls of an antient Christian church, and near to that the aviary of the Grand Signior, where I observed the hens of Grand Cairo, having blue gills and feathers curiously coloured with grey circles, and in the center of each a spot of black.
This day I retired again to Belgrade, for the advantage of its healthy air and water, and the entertainment of its shady situation. Hence on the twelfth instant I made a tour towards Domuzderé, and the shore of the Black Sea, on which we rode for some space of ground, and returned by that called Ovid’s Tower, thro a fertile tract of ground, curiously varied with corn, grass, and shady woods.
May xx.
I returned again to my lodgings at Galata, and the next day crossed the water in company with Mr. Goodfellow to Constantinople, where after a visit to the mosque of Solymán the Magnificent, we obtained leave to ascend one of the minarées, from which the muezins call the Turks to their namáz, being about an hundred and twenty feet high. Here we took a delightful prospect of the whole situation and extent of Stambol, as likewise of Galata, Pera, and Scutari, with the neighbouring seas, canals, and land that encloses them. But the peculiar happiness of this day was the employment of about two hours, which we leisurely spent in viewing the stupendous church of Sophía[86], now profaned by its conversion into a Turkish mosque. It chiefly merits the regard of any curious traveler for the reliques of its rich mosaic work; the variety of pretious marble[87], which adorns it, consisting of serpentine, alabaster, and porphyry; and the architecture of its large and flat tho sublime cupola[88], in which are still the entire figures of Christ and the twelve Apostles, and in the windows many inscriptions in mosaic work from the New Testament.
May xxiii.
I returned again to Belgrade, as well for the opportunity of confirming my health, as for continuing my respects to his Excellency the Lord Paget.
June vi.
I waited on his Excellency from Belgrade to Pera, going first to Boiukderé and thence down the Bosphorus by boat.