Van, at the time of our visit, was the proud possessor of no less a dignitary than a Director of Public Instruction. Whatever may have been his full Turkish title, he was always addressed by the less ornate style of Mudir. By origin he was an Albanian, by religion a Mussulman; he spoke French well, and impressed me strongly as a zealous and capable man. It is a pity, and indeed a shame, that such material is not employed to fill the higher administrative posts. Although the Turkish schools fell more particularly within his province, to him was assigned the regulation of the Armenian private schools. They were constrained to submit their syllabus for his approval, and also their text-books. Changes or additions to their teaching staff were subject to the same sanction. I am not quite sure that these rules did not equally apply to the Church schools; but, however that may have been, they were in practice mildly enforced. The Turkish scholastic system, as it is operative in Van, comprises three grades. There is first the primary; then the secondary, which is termed Rushdiyeh; and last the college or lycée, called Idadiyeh. Of official primary schools not one existed prior to the arrival of the Mudir, only a few months before ourselves. The Mussulmans were in the habit of sending their children to small schools attached to the mosques. This practice had only partially been discontinued since the institution by the new functionary of six primary schools, numbering altogether some 240 boys. Of these fresh foundations I was only invited to visit one. Secondary education was dispensed in three institutions of the Rushdiyeh class to about 350 students in all. The Mudir was in hopes of opening an Idadiyeh during the following summer; and it was also his ambition that Christians as well as Mussulmans should attend the course. The bringing together of the two elements would certainly work to their mutual advantage; and the experiment might succeed if it were tried on social and educational grounds, and not as a political thrust against the Armenian schools.
Of the three secondary institutions only two deserve remark, the third being apparently in an inchoate state. Both are situated on the great avenue leading from the walled town and forming the artery of the gardens. So far as I could ascertain, neither dated more than a few years back. The spacious buildings in which they are housed, the fine classrooms, the dress of the pupils—everything contrasts to their advantage in external matters with the comparative squalor of the Armenian schools. We did not see a single untidy youth; the air was sweet, the floors scrupulously clean. Scholars and teachers, with the exception of a mollah or two, were attired in a distinctive uniform. Such, indeed, was the case in both institutions; but it was a more noticeable feature in the more numerously attended of the two, popularly known as the military school. The Mudir was careful to explain that it was not in fact a military school; that it so appeared was due to the circumstance that they had been unable to obtain good civilian teachers, and had been obliged to have recourse to the military academy at Constantinople. I was the more inclined to give implicit credit to this statement after making the acquaintance of the staff of the purely civilian school. It was evident, however, that the instructors in the companion establishment had not abandoned any of their military methods. They wore their uniforms, and all their pupils, even the youngest, had been drilled. Here again we were introduced to a copy of Russian institutions; and we might almost have been visiting the Russian High School at Erivan. The curriculum included the French, Persian and Arabic languages. The boys had evidently learnt by rote, but had learned well. They could draw maps of the countries of Europe on the blackboard. One of their number stood up and answered all geographical questions with an accuracy which no German boy could excel. The outline of England was rapidly sketched in from memory; and, when I enquired the situations of even Greenwich and Gravesend, they were each assigned their proper place. The population of London was correctly given. Most of the faces one saw around one were extremely intelligent; and only in a few instances were those dull, stupid features conspicuous which are not rare among the settled Mussulman population. All, without exception, were Mohammedans, and the majority the sons of officials. Unlike the Armenian boys, most of whom wear a shapeless cap, every youth had a clean fez with tassel upon his head. In the evening they would canter off on richly caparisoned horses; but, to sum up the relative merits of the Armenian and the Turkish schools, while the first contemplate Knowledge, the second pursue her image, heedless of the resentment which the sensitive goddess keeps in store.
Fig. 128. Interior of Haykavank from the East.
While one is walking through the gardens, paying visits to the various schools, the attention will often be distracted to the very interesting churches, of a type which I have not seen in any other Armenian town. It might not be inappropriate to call them log churches, although the outer walls are built of stone. The oldest is no doubt that of Haykavank, situated in the quarter of the same name. I was unable to ascertain its age. But it represents a transition form from the usual stone edifice to the style of the other four churches in the gardens, in which the columns of the nave, the roofs and the interior fittings are exclusively of wood. The exteriors of all are featureless and plain. In Haykavank the nave is separated from the aisles by four stone piers as well as by sixteen wooden shafts, eight on each side. The face of the daïs supporting the altar is also of stone. Light is thrown upon the interior through three box-shaped structures in the roof, each containing four windows ([Fig. 128]). The shafts are in every church mere trunks of trees with the bark lopped off them; and at the west end, seen in the background of my illustration, will always be situated a wooden gallery for the women. The floors are carpeted. The most attractive of the five is Norashen, remarkable for its two octagonal domes in wood. The largest is Arakh, with a length inside of 135 feet and a breadth of a little over 56 feet. It appears to have been built as late as 1884 on the site of a smaller edifice. Nor is Norashen said to have been constructed more than about fifty years ago. It is remarkable that of these five churches of the gardens—the remainder are known respectively as Hankusner and Yakob—all, with the exception of the last, are dedicated to the Virgin. The same may be said of two out of six in the walled town. The fact would seem to point to something approaching a cult of the Virgin, though plainly not for the reason for which, according to Voltaire, she was worshipped in old France.
One may be disposed to linger awhile in two of these churches—Haykavank and Hankusner. The first is filled with the musty memories of the dark ages, and the second with the vivid magnetism of a personality which has not yet been removed from our midst. The ancient stone crosses inlaid into the daïs of Haykavank, the painted reliefs of angels in the screen of the altar, and a most barbarous carved panel of the Last Supper are so many survivals of pure mediævalism. The dingy logs and the rickety boxes in the roof, through the little windows of which the sweet light falls, are in harmony with the stiff figures, overlaid with gaudy but faded colours, which turn towards one from the shrine. From an adjoining apartment comes the sound of a chant by the choir at practice—a graceless music, sung through the nose. During a respite from this discord you hear the tick of an old standard clock; and, moving towards it, read the name of its English maker years ago—Markwick Markham of the city of London. It has a companion of its own kind in this same church. Here they have stood and ticked in company for, I wonder, how many years! The colleague is by Michael Paieff of Vienna, and has a song chime, so sweet and clear and pure.... Hankusner, on the other hand, if devoid of any antiquities, is associated with a name which should always be honoured in Armenian history, and with a spirit which calls to the Church to throw off her mediæval fetters and look into the light of the day. It was in that humble structure across the river, beneath the cliff of Toprak Kala, that Mekertich Khrimean was for many years accustomed to address his countrymen, standing upon the low daïs by the altar beneath the roof of logs. His humble residence is situated on the Van side of the stream. You knock, and a man in the garb of a peasant steps forth and holds your reins as you dismount. Yet he is the nephew of the supreme pontiff of the Armenians. He informs you that this was the house in which the Hayrik was born. It is now tenanted by the girls’ school. The rooms are neatly maintained, but their walls of mud are neither plastered nor papered. That which used to serve as his sleeping apartment contains a couple of wooden divans, used as seats by day and couches by night. Two pictures, one in oil and the other a crayon, portray the familiar face in youth as well as in age. What a handsome type, with the magnificent features and silky black beard! The remaining frames, most, no doubt, due to the piety of his relations, display by the side of Armenian texts the title page of a journal upon which figures in all his splendour the eagle of Vaspurakan.
Fig. 129. The Rock and Walled City of Van.
Fig. 130. Street in the Walled City.