Immediately in front of you was another building of a similar, though superior, type. Here the ground floor was devoted to the offices of the Grand Master of Ceremonies; on the first floor was that of the Sultan’s First Secretary, Tahsim Pasha. You passed on to the right towards a slight incline, up which many a fat Turk has toiled breathless, and beheld further to the right a more pretentious and massive structure in that peculiar bastard Oriental style of French design which apparently came into fashion in Turkey in Abdul Aziz’s time, and which, on a larger scale, is represented on the European shores of the Bosphorus by the palaces of Dolma-Baghtchè and Tcheragan, and on the Asiatic side by Begler-Bey, the villa farther away, in which once upon a time the Empress Eugénie had been the Sultan’s guest. In this particular building, in the Palace at Yildiz, Ghazi Osman Pasha had his office and several of the Sultan’s chamberlains had their rooms. There also the sittings of the Supreme Military Commission, over which Osman Pasha presided, were occasionally held.
Immediately on the left was another white structure, with a richly ornamented glass door in the centre. This was the Sultan’s own kiosk, where he was much during the day and where he granted audiences. Rarely was a soldier, or indeed any other person, to be seen there, for the military guard-house was hidden from view farther away to the right. There a solitary soldier stood on guard, and the chances were that a stray officer would be sitting on a camp-stool close by smoking a cigarette. But no challenge came as you passed on to enter another unpretentious two-storied bungalow type of building. A number of dirty goloshes in the hall denoted that the official residing here must be a personage who had many callers and was much sought after, and no wonder! It was the office of the notorious Izzet Pasha, the Sultan’s Second Secretary, his favourite, and reputed to be the most influential personage in the Turkish Empire. You walk upstairs and take a seat in his room, where already a number of persons are awaiting his arrival—indeed, several rooms are full of callers waiting to see him.
A cat moves along the corridor rubbing its sides against the wall. Nobody thinks of disturbing it. Izzet Pasha’s little son is playing about the room. The white buildings of Constantinople are seen in the distance from the window, indistinct in the mist rising from the blue waters of the Bosphorus on a sunny morning. A few pigeons coo and play on the leads immediately under the window. Undisturbed, they too are apparently safe from intrusion. In the garden immediately in front some gardeners are peacefully at work. In the room itself a Turk takes a small rug which had lain rolled up in a corner and places it on the floor so that at the further end it is supposed to point in the direction of Mecca. Thereon he murmurs his prayers. Only his lips move, at times almost convulsively. He kneels down, bends backwards and forwards, repeatedly bringing his forehead down into contact with the carpet; he folds his hands on his breast, then rises upright and stretches them out with palms upward. This continues for fifteen or twenty minutes, and nobody takes the least notice of him or his proceedings. Then he picks up the rug, folds it carelessly, throws it into a corner of the room, and begins talking unconcernedly with those present. “Il a fait ses prières, il a fait son devoir,” and within five minutes he is as blithe as the rest of the company.
We are still waiting, for one and all are anxious to have a few words with the powerful favourite. He is expected, but he has not arrived yet, and, as far as any distinct obligation to put in an appearance is concerned, may not appear at all this day or the next. For among the possibilities of his position is that of having fallen into temporary disgrace overnight and being ordered like some naughty school-boy to stay at home and not to quit his konak for days together. Sometimes he would not leave the Palace at all, but work half through the night, for which eventuality a bedstead stood in one of the waiting-rooms. On this particular occasion he has been attending an important meeting of the Conseil des Ministres—a Cabinet Council, we should say—at the Sublime Porte in Stamboul. He is already on his way to Yildiz, leaning back in his closed brougham, for he is not popular, and consequently not anxious to be recognized. His carriage has thundered across the rickety old wooden planks of the Galata Bridge, he has driven along the shores of the Bosphorus, past the arsenal, Tophanè, past the Palace of Dolma-Baghtchè, and is now driving up the steep hill from Beschiktasch towards the Palace at a sharp trot. The heavy gilt harness of the two magnificent black carriage horses gleams in the sun as the white foam starts from their coat. It is as if instinct had revealed to the very walls that the great man is coming, for everybody is on the alert; even the cat in the corridor, still rubbing its sides against the wall, curls up its tail higher than before in purring glee. I look out of the window, and am just in time to see Izzet’s slim figure coming through the narrow passage at the back of the building. He is surrounded by several secretaries and attendants and followed by a crowd of suppliants, who are anxious to interview him and put their claims before him even before he has reached his sanctum. There is a rush to the door, and half a dozen dark-eyed servants simultaneously offer their services to divest the great man of his overcoat. He takes his seat at his desk, upon which lies a heap of letters. They have arrived overnight, most of them addressed in Turkish characters, but one of stout dimensions has a boldly printed address in Latin characters to his Excellency scrupulously enumerating all his titles and dignities. It is from the Deutsche Bank in Berlin, where he keeps his banking account, and through which institution he invests his securities—the harvest of the favours bestowed upon him by his master, the sum of which, according to rumour, is a private fortune of several millions. He bows distantly to those present and goes through the stately Turkish salute, termed “temena,” to each one in turn of the visitors who are seated on the couches or all round the room, and who return his greeting with the same dignified motion of hands and head, though with an extra degree of deferential eagerness. He hands cigarettes round, and even throws some across the room to one or two of his more familiarly known visitors, and then proceeds to open the most important of his letters. Coffee is brought in, smoking is indulged in, and there is a distinct air of relief and ease among those present; but still not a word is spoken.
A fine, dignified-looking man in the prime of life, wearing the garb of a Sheikh or a Ulema or Mollah, crosses the room and takes a seat quite close to Izzet Pasha. He is evidently a personage of importance, for the two converse a long time in whispers, and whereas the Sultan’s favourite is most courteous to his interlocutor, the latter maintains a dignified, almost severe demeanour. As I was told afterwards, he is one of the most influential of Ulemas in Constantinople, learned in law, and of high standing as regards personal character. Izzet assured me that this man was able to trace his descent from Mohammed, if not even back to Abraham. He enjoys high consideration in the Mohammedan world, beyond that of any pasha or even the Grand Vizier himself. There is an evident reflex of his high standing in the deference with which Izzet listens to what he has to say, and with good reason, for the chances are that he will remain a great personage in Turkey long after the favourite has fallen into disgrace or the Sultan himself has passed away. The men of this type are among the most distinguished visitors at Yildiz—these Sheikhs, Mollahs, and Ulemas, who, in their white and green turbans and flowing garments, come occasionally from distant parts of the Turkish dominions and look in to have a chat with the Sultan’s Second Secretary, by whom they are treated with greater distinction than any other visitor. They are in fact the only callers with regard to whom the word deference can justly be used; for they are almost the only visitors who do not come to ask for personal favours. They stand for the ideals of conduct of the Mohammedan world.
As the sunflower turns naturally towards the sun, so also every hope of worldly advantage, every hope of preferment, turned at that time towards the Imperial Palace of Yildiz and the august person of the Sultan. Only those who have had personal experience of the conditions prevailing at this centre of intrigue can form a conception of what is conveyed in so simple a statement. The prestige of being in Imperial favour could raise the humblest to a position of influence over and above the Grand Vizier himself, not to mention such minor satellites as Ambassadors or Ministers of State. The Turkish Ambassador on leave might be obliged to loiter about antechambers for weeks and months together without being admitted to an audience of the Sultan, whereas the favourite would go in and out daily, even hourly. Thus “to be received” was the first stage on the road to fortune; to be granted a favour the second step, the culmination of which lay in the magic word “Iradè,” meaning the Imperial decree by which a favour promised and granted, whether a high appointment or a valuable concession, had become law.
Sheikhs, Ulemas, Mollahs, Softas, even the Muezzin of the Minaret (the caller to prayer), Armenian Patriarchs, Archbishops, Archimandrites, Grand Rabbis, Ministers-Plenipotentiary, Turkish Ambassadors awaiting their final instructions, Pashas, Generals, Admirals, Ministers, were to be met here doing antechamber service and sitting round the room in silence for hours, even days together. I have even met here a deputation of Kurdish chiefs of the Milli tribe, with Ibrahim Pasha, their leader, a right jovial fellow, and as mild-mannered a man as ever cut a throat, whose advent at Constantinople with a regiment of Hamidiè cavalry shortly after the Armenian outbreak caused quite a panic among the nervous members of the foreign colony in Constantinople.
Traders called for their accounts and sat down sipping coffee with the rest: imagine the collector of Marshall and Snelgrove or Whiteley walking into Buckingham Palace and sipping tea with one of the King’s chamberlains! Officials came begging for their overdue salaries. The Hebrew Court jeweller from Stamboul was a regular caller. One day he brought a beautiful coronet of diamonds and pearls which he drew from a bag, and which Izzet Pasha took in to the Sultan, probably destined as a gift for one of His Majesty’s many wives. He too, like the rest, I was told, was unable to do business on a cash basis, the Sultan being in his debt to the amount of some £T20,000 or £T30,000.
Those who are familiar only with the social effulgence, the mystery surrounding Turkish diplomatists abroad, from the full-blown Ambassador accredited to the Great Powers to the Minister-Plenipotentiary and Envoy-Extraordinary, can scarcely form an idea of the everlasting delays, tracasseries, humiliations, and heart-burnings which often preceded their appointment under the Hamidian régime. Sometimes the suspense dragged on for months, and nearly wore out the heart of the suitor for the post. Even more aggravating were the circumstances which followed upon the recall of a diplomatist who might not have satisfied the Sultan. I knew a Minister-Plenipotentiary and Envoy-Extraordinary of distinguished family and high intellectual attainments who, after being summarily recalled from his post, haunted the antechamber of the Sultans secretaries at the Palace for ten years without obtaining another appointment in all that period; nearly half a lifetime wasted in idleness, chewing the bitter cud of hope deferred. No wonder that such a man became disgusted with Hamidian conditions and longed for the introduction of European institutions. “How can you hope to carry on a Government,” he once said to me, “which does not even pretend to furnish a Budget?” He was one of many who were great admirers of England, and longed for English influence to regain a foothold in Turkey. The whims of the autocrat, the intrigues of his surroundings, sounded the funeral knell of every form of honesty, as they shut the door to every chance of ability coming to the fore. For all that, such conditions having been more or less traditional features of Oriental life from Byzantine times down to the present day, their effects were less disastrous to the Turks themselves than to some alien elements in the service of the Sultan; upon these they acted in some cases like fire and sword, extirpating the last vestige of self-respect.
Solicitants for favours of every kind—place, office, appointment, contributions in money—used to swarm into the Palace. The applicants embraced nearly every nationality that was represented at Constantinople, with the one, and I cannot help saying striking, exception of Russia. Whatever may be averred in connexion with bribery and corruption, official or otherwise, in Russia itself, or of the ruthless policy towards the Ottoman Empire pursued by Russia for generations past, I can say that during my many visits to Constantinople I never met a single Russian either at the Palace or elsewhere asking anything of the Turk, and the Russians are the only nation of which I can say as much; for even the Americans were not above seeking favours in the missionary interest. The only Russian I ever knew to call at Yildiz was the chief dragoman of the Russian Embassy, M. Maximow. It was during the Armenian trouble, and he came to rage and threaten. “Go in to your master and tell him to go to ...!” he shouted, to the dismay of the stately Turks present, whose voices never rose above a whisper in the hallowed precincts of the Palace.