The most turbulent revolutionary

Nor is it true that we show no honour to the men of the past, are not guided by their ideas, and do not dwell upon their lives, their work, and their characters. The most turbulent revolutionary that ever lived, the most bitter hater of the past, finds many to admire. It may be Cromwell, it may be Rousseau, or Voltaire, it may be Robert Owen, but some such leader each will have; his memory he will revere, his influence he will admit, his principles he will contend for. Thus it will be in every sphere of active life. No serious politician can fail to recognise that, however strongly he repudiates antiquity, and rebels against the tyranny of custom, still he himself only acts freely and consistently when he is following the path trodden by earlier leaders, and is working with the current of the principles in which he throws himself, and in which he has confidence. For him, then, it is not true that he rejects all common purpose with what has gone before. It is a question only of selection and of degree. To some he clings, the rest he rejects. Some history he does study, and finds in it both profit and enjoyment.

Suppose such a man to be interested-in any study what-ever, either in promoting general education, or eager to acquire knowledge for himself. He will find, at every step he takes, that he is appealing to the authority of the past, is using the ideas of former ages, and carrying out principles established by ancient, but not forgotten thinkers. If he studies geometry he will find that the first text-book put into his hand was written by a Greek two thousand years ago. If he takes up a grammar, he will be only repeating rules taught by Roman schoolmasters and professors. Or is he interested in art ? He will find the same thing in a far greater degree. He goes to the British Museum, and he walks into a building which is a good imitation of a Greek temple. He goes to the Houses of Parliament to hear a debate, and he enters a building which is a bad imitation of a mediaeval town-hall walking tours ephesus.

Shakespeare and Milton

Or, again, we know that he reads his Shakespeare and Milton ; feels respect for the opinions of Bacon or of Hume, or Adam Smith. Such a man, the moment he takes a warm interest in anything — in politics, in education, in science, in art, or in social improvement — the moment that his intelligence is kindled, and his mind begins to work — that moment he is striving to throw himself into the stream of some previous human efforts, to identify himself with others, and to try to understand and to follow the path of future progress which has been traced out for him by the leaders of his own party or school. Therefore, such a man is not consistent when he says that history is of no use to him. He does direct his action by what he believes to be the course laid out before him ; he does follow the guidance of certain teachers whom he respects.

We have then only to ask him on what grounds he rests his selection ; why he chooses some and rejects all others; how he knows for certain that no other corner of the great field of history will reward the care of the ploughman, or bring forth good seed. In spite of himself, he will find himself surrounded in every act and thought of life by a power which is too strong for him. If he chooses simply to stagnate, he may, perhaps, dispense with any actual reference to the past; but the moment he begins to act, to live, or to think, he must use the materials presented to him, and, so far as he is a member of a civilised community, so far as he is an Englishman, so far as he is a rational man, he can as little free himself from the influence of former generations as he can free himself from his personal identity ; unlearn all that he has learnt; cease to be what his previous life has made him, and blot out of his memory all recollection whatever.

Public school system established by the Government

It has been mentioned already that these schools are quite separate from the public school system established by the Government. The primary school alone is common to both systems of education. Travellers and artists have made known before this the quality of the old primary school of Turkey. The teacher sat on a cushion at one end of the room and the children sat in front of him with their books, and shouted to him at the top of their lungs the words there written, which being in Arabic were entirely unintelligible to the poor little scholars. The main duty of the teacher was to see that each child shouted, and that the accent and enunciation were passable.

After six or seven years of this kind of exercise, varied by efforts at writing the Arabic letters and perhaps by some ineffectual wrestling with simple arithmetical processes, the child was deemed educated, except for those boys of peculiar promise who were taken into the mosque schools to go on toward the goal of becoming “ Wise men.” Under the improved modern system which has been a good result of intercourse with the West, the primary school has been somewhat changed. Children are really taught some things about reading, writing, and arithmetic. They still shout in chorus the passage from the Koran. But the chorus now has been swollen by the addition of the multiplication table. They still have much to do in the way of learning by heart things that they do not (and are not expected to) understand. Elocution is still regarded an essential part of primary instruction. But the primary school is no longer a thing to be laughed to scorn—at least in the city of Constantinople private bulgaria tours yachting.

With the primary school instruction, or at most with the additional knowledge derived from a course in the next higher grade of the public school system the student enters a mosque school. The course of study in these latter schools is rather loosely organized, but it includes The Koran, Elocution, Arabic Grammar, Syntax, Rhetoric, Logic, Metaphysics, and Mohammedan doctrine, embracing Theology, Casuistry, and Moral Philosophy, and the whole vast range of Jurisprudence. Some attention is given to the Persian language, and History, Geography and some Mathematics are given in the later part of the course, but at the first the whole attention of the student is concentrated on the Koran and its interpretation.

The theory of the method of study seems to be that reiteration will finally bring understanding, for students at Constantinople do not understand Arabic, in which the Koran is written. Many of the Softas commit the whole book to memory and can recite it forwards or backwards or beginning in the middle, and all without understanding the meaning of a verse. Many copy out the whole book in fine manuscript. While thus wrestling with the text, they attend lectures where learned professors give them the exegesis of the various passages. These gentlemen mingle critical and grammatical notes with the interpretation of the text, and thus by long repetition of sounds the students arrive at some knowledge of the structure and meaning of the language.

Accordingly the faculty of memory

The system of instruction depends upon memory for its effectiveness. Accordingly the faculty of memory is wonderfully developed. But the use of the reflective faculty is restrained. The young men are taught, as the lady did her footman. “ that they have no business to think.” It is only after ten or fifteen years of training that it is considered safe for a man to use his own powers. By that time the bias of his mind, and its habit of ignoring inconvenient matter is pretty well fixed and the man himself is safe as a teacher of the people. The exclusiveness of Islam and the narrowness of its leading men is fully explained by such an imprisonment in the dark as is implied by attendance at the schools of the Ulema.

During the educational course a constant process of weeding out takes place. Many a man fails to absorb wisdom and is provided with a berth as teacher of a primary school. Others, who have good elocution, but fail to master the higher problems of Arabic grammar and logic, drop out to fill vacancies as Imam or pastor of some parish. Others again, who while good writers cannot be good reasoners, are made clerks of the courts, and leave the unprofitable study. The man who goes on far enough to have a place among the heads of the people receives the degree of “ Rouous ” * and the title of Muderris or teacher. He is then entitled to hold his head above the mass and may receive appointment to teach the people in some mosque. The degree would be called in the West a license to preach. He will be sure after this point of having money to buy bis bread.

The Woman Question in Turkey

The Woman Question in Turkey then, is the question of changing the character and the direction of the influence of the women of the country—a class in all essentials of different aim and interest from the men, in mental power far less cultured than the men, in religion still dominated by heathen notions which have lost their hold on the men, in knowledge centuries behind standards attained by the best of the men—a class, even to some extent among the Christians of the country, still walled in against influences from outside, and yet having in their hands control of the nation during its early years, as well as the ultimate direction of the acts and the consciences of the men through the same means by which women everywhere influence the conduct and aspirations of their husbands. Ignorance, superstition and crude selfishness have their citadel of refuge in Turkey among the women, and this citadel is well nigh cut of if from approach. Yet if the plane of life of this people is to be elevated, access to this well defended citadel must be found. The key to success in such an enterprise is held by the women of the country, for the men see them, that they are fair to look upon, and at once they do their bidding..

Some Mohammedans have painfully wrestled with this problem and long to secure change that will modify the character and influence of their women-folk. The missionary bystander necessarily asks himself how such men may be helped to gain their wish. Tveal comprehension of the condition of women among the millions of Asia will lead any one who has a trace of good will toward submerged humanity to feel sympathetic yearning that those women may be led to a better use of life. Perhaps some able to lend them a hand may find it hard to escape responsibility if the help is not given city tour istanbul.

Acting the good Samaritan

Some will answer that we have the best authority for leaving the dead to bury their dead. But that phrase was not uttered for the consolation of those who wish to escape the burden of acting the good Samaritan. The use of it in a case like this is short-sighted as well as cruel. Recent experience in China shows that penalty can reach even to us for neglect of effort to humanize the backward races. Furthermore the history of the siege of the Peking Compound has revealed a reward which we actually gained for taking a juster view. For I opine that if all the money were reckoned up which missions to China have cost during the last twenty years of effort, and if those few hundred of Chinese diggers and ditchers at the Legation who thus learned to be men were set down as the whole result of the expenditure, the humble part taken by those Christian Chinese in preventing the horrible catastrophe which we feared was not dearly bought. There is self- interest as well as duty in studying what we can do toward solving this Woman Question which looms so large at Constantinople.

The whole force of Oriental logic and philosophy is directed against culture of womankind as a class. To prevent her use of her mind woman is forced into marriage in childhood, becoming a mother often at fifteen. For this end the dwarf- in” effect of premature encounter with the heaviest perplexities of life is derided as proof of mental deficiency. For this end the moral consequences of lack of training are rated as evidence that woman is so essentially vicious as to make her education a crime. The man of the East knows that if the woman is allowed to read and to think, facilities for gratifying his own tastes will be greatly diminished. So he obstructs efforts to open her mind, pointing out that any large view of education for women will teach her to sew instead. All this shows that custom and prejudice in Asia fear attacks made at this point. Hence the line of effort which promises effective results on the Woman Question in Turkey is the line of education for women. Before we saw how the reactionary Turk dreads education for woman, wc all knew that she must be brought out of the depths to the level of the century in which she lives before she can take her due share in the work of stimulating its progress.

Turkish Government wished to expel

In this delicate situation one day we were officially notified that the Turkish Government wished to expel from the country the “ director of the Bible House Mission ” whom an English newspaper had declared on authority of the mayor of an English city, to have stated that the Sultan ordered the massacres. Who was meant was not clear. There is no mission in Constantinople known as the Bible House Mission, and the mission of the American Board is under no director in Constantinople. But it fell to me to try to arrange the affair. I did not know, and did not wish to know whether any missionary had been careless enough to say to the English mayor what he could not possibly prove. But the newspaper paragraph might be understood to point toward one of our most efficient missionaries, to lose whom from the work would be a disaster.

I proposed to draw up a card for publication in the London newspaper where the paragraph appeared, remarking on the uncertain identity of the person whose statements were given this weight, but adding that the American Board’s Mission, whose offices are in the Bible House deemed it proper to say that it had never felt called upon to formulate its views upon the matter in question, nor had it authorized any one to speak for it upon the subject. The American Legation agreed that such a card would be a sufficient satisfaction to the Turkish Government. But well informed friends objected that if I signed the card I would certainly he shot by the revolutionists as too friendly to the Turks. On the other hand the card would be worthless unless signed, and the missionary supposed to be implicated must be saved at all hazards. So the card was signed on the spot, the Turks accepted it as a satisfactory statement, the missionary was neither questioned nor molested,—and I was not shot.

Holding familiar intercourse

Perhaps the contact with gross defects of moral character which results from holding familiar intercourse with people in no way interested in Christian truth may be regarded as a reason for advising the missionary to keep aloof from such friendships. Yet that missionary must know the people about him to the utmost or he cannot find a remedy for their ills private sofia tours. Moreover some of these chance friendships, merely because the missionary deals with natives as other foreigners at Constantinople do not in thus patiently seeking to know them, have resulted in lasting benefit to both parties.

An incident which deeply moved my sympathy while illustrating this point was in the course of a somewhat intimate acquaintance with a distinguished Mohammedan religious teacher, who was believed to have the power of working miracles, and who was the guest of the Sultan at Constantinople for some time, on the principle common in Turkey of controlling a people by controlling their leader. For this man was the acknowledged leader of more than a million people in the Eastern part of Turkey. After a time this gentleman asked a Mohammedan, also a mutual friend, to help him solve a doubt. The Arabs say that fools are of two kinds, “ simple ” and “ complex.” A man who does not know everything and knows that he does not know, is a simple fool, while the man who does not know, and does not know that he does not know, is a complex fool. “ Of course I know,” said he, “ that this American regards me as a good deal of an ignoramus. But I wish you could find out whether he thinks me a simple or a complex fool. Try at all events to let him know that I am not a complex fool, for I know that I do not know much.” This man was a warm and sturdy friend to the day of his death.

Such friends of American missionaries in Turkey are not a few among Turkish officials. Sometimes they are made friendly by opportunity of studying the character and work of the missionary, sometimes by the very efforts of hostility. One official, who has rendered important services to missionaries, commenced his acquaintance by trying to blackmail them. By such means officials often reach the point of helping the missionaries in getting permits for their schools or in building churches or in suggesting means of guarding against unjust suspicions excited by sonic innocent act.

Congeries of little thoroughfares

We took a stroll through the body of the village, which consisted of a congeries of little thoroughfares — they could not be called streets — rudely paved, and not broader than the Haymarket footpath. At the doors of the houses, the girls were sitting, according to custom, all without bonnets, and mostly very pretty. There were, also, more coffee-houses; but these inland ones had no fireworks. We were obliged to buy lanterns here, to go about with, as at Constantinople; for the night was dark, and several of the lanes had open gutters running along the middle of them. When we had walked enough, we came back to the hotel and went to bed.

The house was so slightly built, that the least noise was heard all over it; and the boards bent and creaked when you trod on them, in a manner that was perfectly awful. .My bedroom was over the storehouse ; and the planks of the floor had so shrunk, that when any one came below with a candle, the reflection of their divisions ran all along the ceiling in bars of light. The only ornament of my chamber was a picture of a ship by a native artist. His ideas had been more extensive than his canvas ; for, wishing to portray an immense vessel, he had commenced her on so large a scale, that he found he had left no room for her topmasts; but not wishing to omit them he had bent them down at right angles, and so finished them horizontally. I suppose this picture may rank as the worst in the world.

Shaved in a coffee-house

We were up at seven next morning, and in the sea ten minutes afterwards. My two friends were shaved in a coffee-house. The master was also the barber. He lathered in the old-fashioned style, with his hand and a basin; and he kept his strop tied round his waist. His razor had an English blade, which was put in an awkward wooden handle. The floor of this cafe was of mud, and very uneven. Lots of customers were there already, sitting on the benches, like tailors, and smoking narghiles. Principe was evidently an early place. All the Greek girls were about in crowds, fresh as dewy flowers; the band of music was also beginning to play, and the coffee-houses generally were filling. All the dwellings were built in the same fragile manner as the hotels. You imagined a grand palace, with porches and columns; and then you came close to it, and found only boards painted in distemper, like scenery guided tours turkey.

After breakfast, we started, on donkeys, to make an excursion about the island. The animals were not so clever as their Cairo brethren, but went much better than the asses in England. No whip was respired: the proprietor, on starting, gave each of us a skewer, and with this we were expected, literally, to peg into the poor devil’s shoulders. The least touch, however, sufficed to start the animal into an amble. We skirted an iron mine — the entire island is composed of red ferruginous earth and stone — and then passed a long vineyard of curiously small grapes, after which wo came upon an open track of ground, very like Hampstead Heath. Two or three desolate-looking monasteries were perched about upon the hills, and we went up to one of these. The inmates were all Greek. The principal monk showed us the church — a small, damp building, very old, with some tawdry and tarnished saints about it, painted and gilt as usual. On the lectern was a testament, and the priest asked me to show him how the English read and pronounced Greek; and was surprised to hear that the study

of that language was part of our ordinary school education. I afterwards penciled down the commencement of the nativity chapter in the Diatessaron, and asked him if he could read it. This he did pretty well, but with a pronunciation entirely different to ours; indeed, had I not known the sentence by heart — it having formed part of an old “Doctor’s Day” examination — I could not have understood him.

The brilliant azure color of the Bosphorus

Our little caique went with wonderful speed. These boats are singularly light, and admirably built to cut through the water.

The ordinary ones hold two persons comfortably, but the passengers must sit at the bottom, and be as careful in getting into them as if they were wager-boats, or they will upset. The oars are, I think, an improvement on our own. Above the spot where the “button” would be, they swell into a large bulb, and this serves to counterbalance the blade, which is straight. They work with a thong, slipped over a peg, instead of rowlocks; and are managed with great dexterity by the caiquejees, as the watermen are called.

The brilliant azure color of the Bosphorus does not depend upon reflection. It is still blue, even on a cloudy day, that would make our own seas and rivers leaden. The tint is, to an extent, in the fater, as it may be seen nearer home in the Rhone, -where it issues from the lake of Geneva, under the bridge, before it is polluted by the Arve.

Nobody could read

We landed on the other side of the Golden Horn, near a picturosque and thoroughly oriental Mosque, to which I was told the Sultan retired on the day of the murder of the Janissaries; and then had a long, tiring walk, skirting the Mosque of St. Sophia, into the first court of the Seraglio, which is public, and conducts to certain government offices. We went under some of the buildings private ephesus tours, supported on pillars, where there was great hustle — horses waiting for men in power, with elaborate trappings, rickety carriages, slaves, soldiers, porters, and eunuchs — with attendants to make everybody take off their shoes, as they went up to the different apartments. Here the luckless letter gave rise to the same difficulties.

Nobody could read, but they took the note and handed it round from one to the other, stared at us, and then returned it. At last, a learned man, whom we attacked, told one of the servants whom it was for, and he said if I would give him baksheesh be would take it in, but not without. A few paras were accordingly put in his hand, and he kicked off his slippers, and disappeared. In a few minutes ho returned, and said that the effendi had gone ‘ away, nobody knew where, but that he would be back again to-morrow. At all events, we had received the first confirmation of his actual existence, which, for the last hour or two, I had altogether doubted; but as the day was now advanced, and as I felt that if I continued the research any longer, I might get cross from fatigue and disappointment, I gave up the pursuit for this day, at least.

As I went home, up the steep Galata Hill, I saw a mad horse — an awkward customer to meet in such a narrow thoroughfare, lie had been suddenly taken so ; and was tearing along, kicking out wildly, and scattering, on cither side, the bricks with which his panniers were laden. It is impossible to describe the confusion be created, for the Galata Hill is always thronged. The women were screaming and flying in all directions, leaving their outer slippers behind them all about the street. One of them chanced to get her yashmak caught by a shutter as she retreated. The veil was pulled off, and, for the first and only time in my life, I saw the naked face of a Turkish female. She was, however, ugly enough to make any concealment of her features perfectly unnecessary. The unveiling frightened her far more than the mad horse, and she directly threw her coarse outer wrapper over her head, and bolted into a shop. The horse finished by falling down near the Galata gate, shattering his knees to pieces, and having his throat cut by one of the police. That night, I expect, the dogs of Pera and Galata held high and gory festival.

THE JOURNEY

The direct line to Constantinople by the English boats, starting from Southampton, is that usually patronized by travelers with much luggage, and in such cases is decidedly the preferable one. As full information connected with the departure of these fine vessels may be obtained at the London offices, it is unnecessary to repeat it here, beyond stating

that the fares are, for the First class, £41, and for the Second, £27 10s. Passengers’ servants are charged £22.

2. The excellent service of the French Paquebots- Postes de la Med it err a nee, which start from Marseilles, is less generally known. This is by far the best method for the mere tourist, unencumbered with luggage; and it is also the most agreeable, and cheapest bulgaria private tours kazanlak.

There are two lines from Marseilles to Malta. One of these is a direct one; the other touches at Genoa, Leghorn, Civita-Veechia, Naples, and Messina; and both are so arranged as to correspond, at Malta, with the boat proceeding, without loss of time, to Constantinople. The departures take place three times a month, and are very regular. The direct boat to Malta starts on the 1st, 11th, and 21st; that touching at Italy, on the 9th, 19th, and 29th; and all these arrive respectively in time for one or the other of the boats which leave Malta in turn, on the 5th, 15th, and 25th, and arrive at Constantinople on the day week of their departure from that port.

The fares are—presuming the direct line be chosen —from Marseilles to Constantinople: first class, 4G5 francs; second, 279 francs; third, 18G francs; fourth 11G francs; or, in rough sums, respectively about 18/. 12,9.; 11/.; 71. 10.v.; 4/. 12s. The living is not included in this, hut the tariff is fixed at six francs a-day for first-class passengers, and four francs for the second. This must be paid whether the passengers partake of the meals or do not. If there are servants on board, they have their meals in the second cabin, after the passengers, but are not allowed

to join them at any time. The third and fourth class passengers can lay in their own stock, but may get anything from the restaurateur on board by paying for it. I add the bill of fare of one day’s dinner, in the fore-cabin, taken at random:

THE HOWLING DERVISHES ROBBERY OF TRAVELLERS

Besides the dancing dervishes, there is another set at Scutari, who howl; and their exhibition is also public every Thursday afternoon, about two o’clock. It is a mile and a half across the Bosphorus, from Galata to Scutari. The Maiden Tower, (or Leander’s Tower, as it is sometimes called,) is a little building rising from the water, about which the old story is told of the favourite child, shut up until he or she was of age, because a prediction had announced an early accidental death, and being at last killed by a viper from some fire-wood. The same legend belongs to the Folly, at Clifton, and a dozen other places.

Landing at Scutari, which I imagine must be the most oriental portion of Constantinople, wc went up to the Convent of the Howling Dervishes, and were introduced into a square room, with a balustrade round it, and at the top a latticed gallery for the women. All around were hung rude musical instruments— chiefly little drums and tambourines: and against the wall at the end were battle-axes, and apparently instruments of torture, in great numbers —hooks, spikes, and the like. The dervishes, who were crouching on the floor, on sheepskins, did not appear to have any particular costume, as those at Pera; but each afterwards put on a felt skull-cap. Round the enclosure were other persons sitting, who appeared to be visitors ; one was a soldier. Some large-eyed unwholesome children were also of the party of performers; and a dancing dervish joined them before they finished. They went through a great many ceremonies of bowing, embracing, and repeating prayers, and at last got in a line at the end of the room by the railing, one or two of the elders still squatting in front of them. Here they commenced to chant, swinging themselves backwards and forwards, and then sideways ; getting quicker and quicker in their motions, like a railway engine going off, and shouting “La ilah illah-lah’’ (There is but one God!) faster and faster, until they worked themselves up into an extraordinary state of frenzy, children and all. They kept shouting this monotonous line and throwing themselves about for at least half an hour: when the noise was so wearing, and the place so close and disagreeable, that I made my escape.

I could not exactly understand what induced these men to malm such fools of themselves. Certainly it was not for money, for none was given by the spectators, nor indeed was any solicited. Neither can I suspect it to have been for religious motives, for, to all appearances, a greater set of scamps had seldom been collected together. I must leave the explanation to those familiar with the mysteries of Eastern worship.

Sultan Mahmoud

Above that convent, there is another enormous burying-ground, through which the road runs—a perfect forest, with millions of tombstones. Here again the road is divided ; and its paved portion is at least ten feet higher than the dusty half. The proper complement of dogs and poultry were wandering about; and a large tomb, formed by a cupola upon six pillars, was shown as the grave of a favourite horse once belonging to the Sultan Mahmoud. Another was surrounded by an iron railing, upon which shreds of clothes were hung, in large numbers, as I had seen at the Giant’s Mountain private tours istanbul.

A very hot walk of an hour took us to the top of the hill of Bulgarlu, from which the finest panorama of Constantinople, the Sea of Marmora, Prince’s Islands, and the contiguous Asiatic country, can be seen.

I was much pleased, on my return to the Hotel, to find on my key-hook a card left by Lord Mandeville, who was staying at Misseri’s. He had been attacked by robbers, a day’s journey from Smyrna; and they had taken everything that he had about him. Whilst talking of the affair, a report arrived that Mr. Urquhart had suffered also from thieves, but on the sea—his boat having been attacked by pirates. These two misadventures made sufficient noise to prove that such robberies upon Eastern travellers were of rare occurrence.

The way in which the first robbery came about was this. The steamers of the Austrian Lloyd’s Company arriving at Smyrna in the morning, do not start again until noon the next day, and so Lord Mandeville, and a gentleman who accompanied him,—Mr. Percy Herbert,—determined to spend their time in riding to Nimfi; where, a short time ago, one of the most ancient monuments of the world was discovered, in the shape of an enormous human figure, sculptured in the solid rock. It agrees closely with the description of a monument given by Herodotus, and is said to be a trophy of Sesostris.