This first difficulty removed, he began to prepare himself for the proper execution of the task he had undertaken, by the study of the Arabic and other oriental languages; and that he might not interrupt his academical studies, continued to be present at the public lectures, underwent the usual examinations, and maintained the requisite theses; so that, though absent, he might yet receive the honours to which his merit entitled him. Having in the spring of 1749 acquired the degree of licentiate, he proceeded to Stockholm, where he delivered a course of lectures in botany, which procured him the patronage of all the lovers of that science. The Levant Company, moreover, in consideration of his extraordinary merit, offered him a free passage to Smyrna on board of one of their ships.
His project having succeeded thus far almost beyond his hopes, he embarked on the 7th of August, 1749, at Stockholm, and sailed down the Baltic, landing at various points on the coast of Sweden for the purpose of examining the plants and other natural productions of the country. The voyage down the Baltic was attended with storms; but the pleasure imparted by the extraordinary features of the scenery, the sandy, columnar mountains of Gothland, the dazzling peaks of Iceland, and the gloomy beech forests of Malmo caused him to attend but little to the inconvenience they occasioned. In traversing the German Ocean and the English Channel, they approached so near our shores that the chalky cliffs and hills which run along the coast were visible; and on entering the Strait of Gibraltar, they discovered on the one hand the mountains of Africa, bare of vegetation, and looking like prodigious heaps of limestone, or moving sand; and on the other those of Spain, with cloud-capped summits, and lighted up at night by numerous watchfires and limekilns. The coasts of Sicily, of the Morea, of Candia were seen in passing, and on the 15th of September they came to an anchor in the harbour of Milo.
Though Hasselquist was by no means destitute of a relish for the beauties of nature, he was not precisely travelling in search of the picturesque. His affections were fixed upon those “children of the spring,” as flowers are termed by an old poet, which in the country where he now was long survive their parent; and was exceedingly delighted, on landing, to observe that numerous plants were still in flower, though others had already been deprived of their beauty by autumn. Among the former were the autumnal dandelion, the anemone coronaria, both white and blue, and the oleander, with a species of rhamnus with small white flowers.
The harbour of Milo is almost wholly surrounded by high mountains, upon one of which stand an ancient castle and village in a position singularly picturesque. On arriving at the town, over a road formed of flint and limestone, he was greatly struck by the air of poverty and misery which everywhere appeared; the houses differed in nothing from prisons, except that their inmates could go in and out when they pleased; and all around were ruins of splendid edifices, which added to their misery, by reminding them of the very different condition of their ancestors. However, poor as they were, they continued to bring up immense numbers of children, with which the whole town swarmed like a beehive. The costume of the women was extraordinary. More cynical even than the Spartan virgins, whose scanty tunic the reader may admire in Mr. Hope’s Costume of the Ancients, the women of Milo went entirely naked to the waist, from whence depended a short petticoat which was very far from reaching the knee. The crown of the head was covered with small pieces of linen, but the hair hung dishevelled to the girdle.
From Milo they sailed for Scio, which Hasselquist regarded as the most beautiful spot in the world; and, after narrowly escaping shipwreck in the gulf, reached Smyrna on the 27th of September. Here he was received and entertained with the utmost kindness and hospitality by M. Rydelius, consul of Sweden, to whom he was nearly related, and who during his stay exerted whatever influence he possessed in furtherance of his designs. M. Peyssonel, likewise, the French consul, showed him very particular attentions, and imparted to him much curious information respecting many of the natural productions of the East.
Among Hasselquist’s favourite researches was an inquiry into the state of the medical science and profession in the countries he visited. In ancient times, he had read that the professors of the healing art had been regarded as the possessors of celestial knowledge; temples had been erected and medals struck in gratitude for the benefits they had conferred on mankind; but at the period of his visit to Smyrna things had greatly changed for the worse. Some few sparks of their ancient genius still burst forth occasionally among the Greeks; but in general they had to struggle up through mountains of prejudice and ignorance; and, indeed, were it not that the love of gain rather than of science occasionally led a few adventurers into the civilized countries of Europe, in which, however, each age despises the science of the one that preceded it, scarcely a trace of medical knowledge would subsist in the Levant. One of the results of his inquiry was, that of all countries islands are the most fertile in illustrious physicians. Cos was the birthplace of Hippocrates, and England of Mead and Sydenham. Scio, too, was fertile in able physicians. He does not, however, pretend to assign any reason for the fact.
The Franks of Smyrna began their carnival with the year, during which a long series of costly balls and suppers were given. Among the musicians employed on these occasions it would be to little purpose, our traveller remarks, to seek for an Orpheus or a Linus; but the favourite dance of the Greek women, which surely could not be the Romaika, or “dull roundabout,” of the tiresomeness of which Lord Byron complains, greatly delighted our traveller. Fifteen young women arranged themselves in a half-moon, and, skilfully keeping time with the sounds of the lute and violin, performed a number of graceful movements, following their leader, who directed their steps by the waving of a scarf which she held in her hand, through various intricate figures, admirably imitating the mazes of a labyrinth. The girls accompanied their movements with songs, which Hasselquist, though a snake and beetle collector, seems to have enjoyed exceedingly. Of the dress of the dancers, he merely observes that it was in the ancient mode,—that is, if we may judge from vases and bas-reliefs, a single tunic covering only one of the breasts, and open at the sides from the girdle downwards.
With the month of February commenced the spring; and Hasselquist, who was really actuated by passion for the objects of his studies, willingly quitted the city and its amusements to ramble abroad among the fields and woods. Here the orange, the pomegranate, the fig-tree, the olive, the palm, and the cypress intermingled their foliage; and it would, perhaps, be necessary to have imbibed something of the tastes of a naturalist to conceive the pleasure with which our traveller, to whom most of them were new, beheld them put forth their blossoms, or otherwise manifest their being under the influence of spring. One of the greatest ornaments of the gardens in the environs of Smyrna, which are enclosed by hedges of willows planted along the brink of a ditch, is a species of ivy, which, when it finds a proper support, bends round into arches, or hangs from tree to tree in festoons, in so rich and beautiful a manner, that Hasselquist, who seems to have had a high notion of royalty, thought it ought to have adorned the garden of a king. Nature, however, is no respecter of persons. Kings or no kings, Turks, Jews, and gentiles are all one to her. In fact, if we may judge of her political opinions by facts, Nature abhors the foppery and rhodomontade of courts, since, when she has any magnificent or sublime spectacle to exhibit to mankind, she retires to scenes where palaces would be exceedingly out of place, and piles her eternal snows, or pours down her cataracts, or puts her terrible sand-columns in motion in barrenness and solitude.
The spring once begun, every day disclosed some new beauty to the naturalist. Wherever he turned his eyes, thickets of almond trees covered with snow-white blossoms, or fields over which anemones and tulips were sprinkled thick as daisies or buttercups in an English meadow, met the view. The anemone, in particular, was everywhere abundant, in all its varieties of purple, deep-red, and scarlet, with a ring of white round the base of its leaves. One of Hasselquist’s favourite walks of this season was the vast Turkish cemetery in the neighbourhood of Smyrna. Here, amid cypresses and a profusion of balsamic and aromatic trees and shrubs, he philosophized on the generation and decay of plants, ignorant, poor fellow, that within the small sweep of the horizon which bounded his view his own mortal remains would soon be deposited, and that the seeds of the flowers before him would shortly germinate upon his grave.
Having sufficiently examined the environs of Smyrna, Hasselquist set out on the 11th of March for Manisa, the ancient Magnesia, on a botanizing excursion. The face of the country in this part of Anatolia was more wild and savage than could be conceived by those who had never visited the East. Mountains and valleys resembling the surface of a stormy sea suddenly converted into solid ground, covered with mosses and wild apple-trees, traversed by deep ravines, by chasms, by mountain torrents, and beautified in various places by the pale flower of the oriental saffron; such were the scenes which the roots and acclivities of the ancient Sipylus presented to the view of our traveller. On arriving at Manisa he was well received by the governor, an extremely young man, who had sixteen women in his harem. Indeed, a physician is generally treated with consideration by the Turks; and our youthful governor, who happened just then to stand in need of his services, conducted himself with distinguished politeness towards the hakim, or doctor. In return, Hasselquist merely requested permission to botanize at his leisure in the environs of the city, a favour which was very readily granted him.