This shameful and barbarous violation of the usages which prevail in every other European government, has at all times been regretted by the respectable Turks, who acknowledge it to be a base and disgraceful stigma upon their national character.
From the time when the Seven Towers thus became the prison of ambassadors, they acquired an interest and celebrity which otherwise they never could have attained. Mystery and romance took them under their especial protection; and Eastern imaginations joined themselves to those of the West, in inventing tales of horror, dark, deep, and tragical, connected with the dungeons and caverns beneath these dreaded walls. That gloomy aperture which yawns beneath your footsteps is called the Well of Blood; even the Turkish guide acknowledges that it has often overflowed with human gore! Within this low arched vault, from which the cheerful sun is for ever excluded, the victim lay extended upon the rack, until death itself became a welcome relief; and upon its walls were arranged, in dreadful order, all the infernal instruments of torture, by which the cruelty of man endeavoured to extort from the wretched prisoners a confession of crimes, perhaps never committed, and of conspiracies, existing only in the guilty imaginations of their oppressors. A little court within the precincts of the building was pointed out to me as having frequently contained a pyramid of human heads, reaching so high, that, standing upon its summit, you might have looked over the walls, and beheld the pure and peaceful Sea of Marmora. The guide also made me remark a number of narrow passages, scarcely high enough to admit a dog, through which it is reported that the miserable captive was formerly compelled to crawl upon his belly, and then left to perish from starvation, while he licked the dust in the extremity of his agony.
Thanks, however, to civilisation, these horrors are now no longer perpetrated; and, indeed, for the honour of human nature, one is desirous of believing that the greater portion of them are mere fables, invented by the guides, for the purpose of gratifying a morbid taste for the horrible, and to enhance the interest of the place. A few old soldiers are at present the only occupants of this redoubtable fortress, which is rapidly falling to ruin, though a remnant of the jealousy of former ages still requires a firman to be obtained, before you are allowed to visit its once formidable interior.
TOMB OF ALI PASHA. Leaving the towers, and proceeding on towards the village of Ejub, we came to the range of tombs, which formed one of the principal objects of the day's excursion. It is situated near the gate Selyori, through which passes the road leading in the direction of Santo Stefano.
It is a low square piece of rough masonry, erected of oblong stones, in the centre of a small verdant grove, and canopied by the luxuriant foliage of a magnificent plane tree.
Intermingled with this mass of smiling verdure and blossom-loaded boughs, appeared the dark funereal cypress, the emblem of death, intruding itself in melancholy contrast with the smiling and cheerful tints by which it is encircled.
The tombs consist of five tall sculptured stones, of unequal height, surmounted by turbans, and inscribed with the following legend in gilded characters, explanatory of the fate of the individuals whose names it commemorates:—"Here is deposited the head of the once celebrated Ali of Tepeleni, governor of the Sanjak of Janina, who for upwards of fifty years aspired to independence in Albania. Also, the heads of his three sons, Mouktar Pasha, Veli Pasha, Saelik Pasha; and that of his grandson, Mehemet Pasha."
RUSSIAN INSOLENCE. Being unable to proceed farther along the walls, we returned, through the city, to the Golden Horn, and arrived rather late in Pera, where Hodgson and a friend of his from Beiroot, were waiting dinner. The latter gentleman is the American Vice-consul in Syria, and has visited Constantinople in the hope of recovering some money to which he is entitled for the salvage of a valuable English ship, lost on the coast near Beiroot. He amused us until a late hour with many interesting descriptions of Beiroot, Lady Stanhope, and the monks and cedars of Lebanon. Among other anecdotes, he related a curious incident that happened to him yesterday. He accompanied a party of Americans to Buyukdere, where they took a caique, and rowed alongside the Russian flag-ship. The sentinel at the gangway immediately ordered them to sheer off, and, on demanding the reason, they were told that they must not attempt to approach without the admiral's permission. Nothing daunted, they desired the man to ask the officer of the watch to allow them to inspect the interior of the vessel; but he flatly refused, because "they were Englishmen."
No sooner, however, was it explained that they were Americans, than they were desired to wait, while the officer reported this communication to his superior; the result of which was, that the admiral himself came on deck and took them down to his cabin, where he treated them to a luncheon of bread and cheese, fruit, and porter. When he had shown them over the ship, he ordered his boat to be manned, and conducted them himself to the head-quarters of the camp, sent an officer as their guide, and patiently waited until they had fully gratified their curiosity. But his attentions did not end there; for he took them on board again, gave them another luncheon, and afterwards sent them ashore at Buyukdere in his own boat.
My friend Marriot, who left us some time ago to visit Ibrahim at Kutahieh, has returned with Mr. Costingen, who went to meet him at Broussa, a charming city, surrounded by mulberry groves, situated at the foot of Mount Olympus. It was the first residence of the Ottoman Emirs, commencing with Orchan, whose mausoleum, strange to say, is a beautiful octagonal church, belonging to a Greek monastery of that period. The tombs of sultans, Ilderim, Bayazid, and of Amurath I., are also at Broussa.