From Angora we came to the village of Balygazar, thence to Zarekuct, next to Zermeczii, after which we arrived at the bank of the river Halys (Kizil Irmak).
As we crossed the country towards the village of Algeos, we had a distant view of the mountains near Sinope. They have a red appearance from the red chalk which takes its name from Sinope.
Here is the famous Halys, once the boundary between the kingdoms of Media and Lydia, about which the ancient prophecy said that ‘Crœsus, if he crossed the Halys to make war on the Persians, would destroy a mighty realm’—but he did not know that the realm he was to destroy was his own. On the bank was a copse of trees, which at first excited our attention, as we thought we had discovered a new kind of fruit tree; but we soon became aware that it was the liquorice tree, and gorged ourselves with the juice from its roots.
It happened that a country fellow was standing there, so we asked him through an interpreter whether there were plenty of fish in the river, and how they were caught. His answer was, that there were plenty of fish, but that it was impossible to catch them. When we expressed our surprise at this intelligence, the man explained the matter thus: ‘Well, if anyone tries to put his hand on one of these fish, they jump away, and will not wait for him to catch them.’
On a former occasion, when we met with some birds of a species unknown to us, and asked how they could be caught, another fellow declared that ‘it was impossible to catch them, because, when anyone tried to lay hold of them, they flew away.’ One of my colleagues, Francis Zay, had with him nets, which he ordered to be unpacked with a view to fishing. Amongst other fish, we caught the common Danube shad. There are also crabs in the Halys in large numbers, which, if they are not sea crabs, are, at any rate, very like them.
The Turks, who stood by, were amazed at the great pains we Christians took in fishing. ‘How so,’ you will say, ‘are there no fishermen in Turkey?’ Well, there are some, but in those districts they are very rare. I remember, in another place, we were greeted with roars of laughter when we drew off the water of a stream and captured a quantity of gudgeons. They were greatly amused at our fishing for anything so small, and could not make out what gain or advantage we expected to get from them. The foolish fellows did not understand that a large supply of these little fishes enabled us to prepare big dishes of stew sufficient to dine a great many people.
But these Turks live so sparingly, and care so little for the pleasures of the table, that if they have bread and salt with an onion or leek, or a kind of sour milk which Galen mentions by the name of oxygala, and they call yoghoort, they are quite content. They mix this milk with very cold water, and crumble bread into it, using it when the heat is overpowering, to allay their thirst. We, too, often found this drink most useful in hot weather, for not only is it very pleasant and wholesome, but it also has, to a remarkable degree, the power of quenching thirst.
At all the caravanserais (or Turkish inns, as I explained before) there is plenty of it for sale, and other relishes are also to be bought. For the Turks do not, when travelling, require hot dishes or meat; their relishes are sour milk, cheese, dried prunes, pears, peaches, quinces, figs, raisins, cornel berries. Dainties of this description are set out for sale on great pans of earthenware, having been first boiled in plain water. Each man buys what he fancies most, and eats the fruit with his bread by way of a relish; when he has finished the fruit he drinks the water. Thus these men’s food and drink costs them very little, so little, indeed, that I would venture to say that one of our people will spend more on his food in one day than a Turk does in twelve. Moreover their yearly feasts generally consist only of cakes and buns, and other confectionery, with several dishes of rice, to which they add mutton and chickens—not capons,[136] for poultry of that kind is unknown to the Turks. As to pheasants, thrushes, becaficos, &c., they have never even heard them mentioned. If honey or sugar be mixed with their draught of water, they would not envy Jove his nectar.
I must not, however, pass over one kind of drink, if I am to give you a full account. They take raisins and have them ground; when ground and pounded they throw them into a wooden vessel, and pour over them a certain proportion of hot water and mix them up; they then cover the vessel carefully, and leave the liquor to ferment for a couple of days; if the fermentation is not sufficiently active they add the lees of wine. If you taste it when first it begins to ferment, it seems insipid and disagreeably sweet; afterwards it gets a kind of acid flavour; in this stage it is extremely palatable when mixed with the sweet liquor. For three or four days it forms a most pleasant drink, especially when cooled with plenty of snow, of which there is an unfailing supply at Constantinople. They call it ‘Arab sherbet,’ i.e. ‘the drink of the Arabs.’ But after three or four days it is spoilt, and gets quite sour. In this stage it affects the head, and makes people stagger quite as much as wine, and on this account is condemned by the religious laws of the Turks. I must confess that I thought sherbet a most pleasant drink.
I found also the grapes, which in many places they keep till the summer, most refreshing at times. The following is their method of preserving them, as I took it down from their lips:—They select a bunch in which the grapes are of a good size and fully ripe, a condition which is easily brought about by the sun in Turkey. This bunch they put into a vessel of wood or earthenware, after first covering the bottom with a good layer of ground mustard; on the top of this they put the grapes; then they pour the mustard flour in gradually, so as to pack the grapes in it; lastly, having filled the vessel with grapes up to the top, they end by pouring in unfermented wine as fresh as possible; this done, they shut up the vessel and keep it till the hot summer weather sets in, when people are thirsty, and refreshment of this kind is acceptable. They then unseal the vessel, and put out the grapes for sale, together with the sauce, which last the Turks like quite as well as the grapes themselves. But the flavour of mustard was not at all to my taste, so I had my grapes carefully washed. I found them very refreshing and wholesome during the great heats.