Fathers do not, in Turkey, build, or plant, or purchase for their sons—their fathers did it not for them—it would entail the probable loss of both principle and interest.
The Armenian houses are peculiarly remarkable for their cleanliness. All the inhabitants of Constantinople in decent circumstances are scrupulously nice on this point, but the Armenians exceed all others: every respectable dwelling being scoured throughout once a week with soap and water. I have already, in speaking of this people, alluded to their utter deficiency in sentiment and ambition: their lives are frittered away in inconsequent details; and hence the attention and interest are bestowed on comparatively insignificant objects, which render them remarkable to strangers.
Another striking object on the coast is the romantic and beautiful little cemetery of Isari, situated immediately beneath the Castle of Europe, by which it is dominated as by the eagle-eïrie of some feudal Baron. Rocks, rudely flung together, and in their perpendicular ascent impervious to vegetation, sustain the foundations of the fortress; while around and among them snatches of kindlier earth are covered with dense rich underwood, from amid which tall graceful trees spring up, and overshadow the gilded marble of many a columned gravestone.
The Castle of Europe, standing immediately opposite to the valley occupied by the castle on the other coast, is built after a singular fancy. Tradition tells that Mahomet, from his Asiatic mountains, contemplated with envy the lovely shores of Europe; and that, unable to restrain his desire of possessing at least a speck of the fair landscape, he entreated permission of the Greeks to be allowed to build a small fortress as a landing-place, on their territory. The favour was granted, the materials collected, and the present Castle of Europe completed in six days; the ground-plan forming the characters of the Prophet’s name.
Near the edge of the channel, a small arched door is pointed out to the curious, whence the Janissaries who had become obnoxious to the reigning Sultan, and whose especial prison it was, were ejected from the fortress after they had been bow-strung, in order to be flung into the Bosphorus; while, at the instant that the waters closed over them, a gun was fired from one of the towers, to intimate to the Imperial despot that justice had been done on his enemies.
This Castle, like the Fortresses of the Dardanelles, has been suffered to fall into partial decay, but an order was lately issued for their simultaneous restoration, and workmen are now busily employed in repairing the united ravages of time and neglect.
The little village of Mirgheun, about a mile higher up the channel, is one of the prettiest things on the Bosphorus. A long street, terminating at the water’s edge, stretches far into the distance, its centre being occupied by a Moorish fountain of white marble, overshadowed by limes and acacias, beneath which are coffee terraces; constantly thronged with Turks, sitting gravely in groups upon low stools not more than half a foot from the ground, and occupied with their chibouks and mocha.
A short distance beyond Mirgheun the channel widens into a little bay, one of whose extremities is occupied by a ruined house, standing in the midst of a garden. This house, which was formerly a chapel dedicated to St. Nicholas, is now the property of a Turk, but is never inhabited in consequence of a superstition so wild, and withal so fully credited by both Greeks and Musselmauns, that I must not pass it by unnoticed.
The chapel was desecrated during the Greek revolution; and taken possession of, under the Imperial sanction, by a Turk, who, hurling the effigy of the saint from the niche above the altar, converted the holy shrine into a dwelling-place for himself and his family; but on the very night on which he removed thither he was destined to pay the price of his sacrilege, for he was found in the morning dead in his bed; an event which so appalled his relatives that they immediately disposed of the house to a neighbour, whose only child fell a victim, in the same mysterious manner, to the vengeance of the outraged saint—a third purchaser lost his wife by the like means; and the spot became from that day the dread and horror of every True Believer; while it is an extraordinary fact that its Infidel owner sent for a Greek Papas to exorcise the evil spirit, or to conciliate the saint; and that a solemn sprinkling of holy water and chanting of hymns took place; but it is impossible to say with what success, as no tenant has subsequently been found for the dwelling, which is rapidly crumbling to decay.
As you approach Therapia, you come upon a long stretch of wall, pierced in one regular line with small square windows, and looking exactly like an ill-kept manufactory; while the fine stone terrace that runs along its whole façade, and the thickly-planted shrubberies which clothe the hill behind it, have something so lordly and imposing in their aspect, that your attention is irresistibly attracted, and your curiosity awakened. Should your caïquejhes be Greeks, they will scarcely answer your inquiry without muttering an imprecation through their clenched teeth. It is the sorry remain of the palace of Prince Calimachi, seized by the Sultan in a fit of despotic jealousy, and converted into a stable for the Imperial stud, but so entirely disproportioned to its new office as to be perfectly useless—the extent being immense, and the number of the Sultan’s horses extremely limited; it has consequently been abandoned to premature decay, and a noble object is thus blotted from the landscape, and degraded into a deformity.