Julius R. Van Millingen

“ In contrast to this inhospitable reception of Nature's winged songsters while travelling through the land, it it pleasant to visit the bird-market, and there see venerable Turks opening their purses and buying as many of these captives as they can afford. They then throw open the prison-doors, and as the birds fly skyward with chirps of delight, the faces of the liberators grow radiant with satisfaction. ”

“ Watching ram-fights is a favourite recreation, and crowds gather round the village green to witness these huge creatures, with their long crumpled horns, dashing at each other at full speed. Their heads strike with a resounding thud, and you expect that a skull or two will be broken, but no, it is only fun, and the rams caper gracefully back, to return again to the charge. ”

“ The luxurious inhabitant of the East, who in his selamlik is wont to recline on cushions, does not pass into the House of God to tenant a crimson-lined and well-padded pew; he takes his place among the crowd—the effendi stands beside the water-carrier, the bey near the charcoal-vendor—he is but one item among many; he arrogates to himself no honour in the temple where all men are as one family. ”

“ Turkish shepherd-dogs, though savage and powerful, have none of the finer instincts of our collies; they will not bring round the sheep in accordance with the shepherd's directions; they are only fighters, and often turn and rend their masters.
It is interesting to watch, as I have done, the yearly migrations of the Albanian shepherds to and from Olympus. My home lay at the foot of the mountain, and one summer's night, when the moon was full, I was waked by the sound of sonorous voices, and the barking of dogs, and bleating of rams. ”

“ It is difficult to depict the habits of a people in a country so widespread as Armenia, but I may briefly allude to the houses they inhabit in Erzerum, the principal town of Armenia, and one which, according to Armenian tradition, stands on the site of the Garden of Eden! ”

“ As a consequence, everything in Turkey that has to be protected from the evil-eye is decorated either with the one or the other, and you seldom see a horse, a draught ox, or even a donkey, that has not a string of blue beads about its neck. Children wear these charms on their caps; and the prows of boats, the roofs of houses, cages of birds, and even hovels have a bunch of garlic suspended with strings. ”

“ The decline of the Ottoman Empire was due to the corruption of the Turks that followed acquisition of wealth. They lost their hardihood, and their Sultans became profligate and luxurious. They filled their harems with wives and numberless slaves, and addicted themselves to pleasure instead of duty. They became tyrants, and their jealousies and fears of being supplanted made them so cruel that it became customary for a Sultan ascending the throne to kill all his brothers or near male relatives. ”

“ The youths and maidens don their picturesque gala costumes, and prepare for the dance, while the elderly men group themselves round the coffee-house, smoking their pipes and sipping coffee, and the matrons, with little ones, sit under the trees and gossip. A musician, with fiddle, pipe, or viol, sits on a barrel, while each youth produces his coloured handkerchief, and, holding it by one corner, presents the other to the girl at his side. ”

“ The Christian Bulgarians of Macedonia, having been brought up more or less under servitude, are of a much meeker character than the Pomaks, but, judging from the strides which have been made by the other Bulgarian races in Turkey since their independence from Turkish rule, we may infer that their Macedonian brethren are also capable of great development. On the whole they are poor, and live in thatched hovels, plastered both within and without with a mixture of clay, cow-dung, and straw. The interior is divided into three rooms—a public room, a family bedroom, and one for keeping provisions. ”

“ Intermarriages have somewhat tainted the purity of their blood, and in many cases they have lost the use of their mother-tongue, and can only speak Turkish, but still they are Greeks to all intents and purposes, and mostly members of the Greek or Orthodox Church.
The Greek type of face is much the same as what we see in the statuary in our museums. The forehead is broad but rather low, the nose and profile straight, the eyes large, the lips full, the chin firm, and the neck rounded. They are tall and stately, and graceful in their movements, and have small hands and feet. ”

“ Armenia is to-day portioned between Russia, Persia, and Turkey, the latter ruling over the largest share. The population of the Turkish section is probably about 1,000,000, but about as many, if not more, are spread about other portions of the Empire, and Constantinople holds 150,000.
The Armenians are of medium height, but broad-shouldered and of powerful build; their complexion is swarthy, their hair black, and they can grow magnificent beards. Their eyes are black, and their nose aquiline, or eagle-beaked. ”

“ The early childhood of both boys and girls among Turks is spent in the harem—that is, the section of the house reserved for the women—but until the age of twelve, girls are not subject to the restraints of grown-up women, nor required to wear the veil, and they often accompany their fathers in excursions or join the boys in their play. They even attend the same elementary school, and, sitting cross-legged with them on a mat, repeat the alphabet, or recite texts from the Koran given out to them by the imam, or priest, of the mosque with which the school is connected. ”

“ It is amusing, in connection with these moonlight promenades, to see the women walking about or sitting with open sunshades to protect themselves from the lunar rays, imagining, no doubt, that they occasion lunacy. ”

“ The main bazaars consist of a labyrinth of streets and alleys, arched over with masonry, and pierced with numerous domes from which the light enters. They extend over a surface of more than a mile, and their windings are so intricate that a traveller may easily lose his way. ”

“ The harvest-festival follows, when, attired in their best clothes and with flowers on their heads and sheaves of golden grain in their hands, the harvesters proceed to the towns, and dance and sing before the doors of their patrons. ”

“ The sunlight streams in from the numerous windows encircling the dome, or from those on the walls of the mosque, many of which are of beautiful stained glass, but without figures of any kind, as Moslems consider this would be breaking the commandment relating to images.
All mosques point toward Mecca, and at the Mecca end stands a mihrab, or niche, from which the imam conducts the devotions. Beside it, supported by pillars, is a terrace for the choir, which consists entirely of men. They chant, seated cross-legged on rugs. ”

“ The Pomaks have intermarried and fused with Tartars, who migrated to Macedonia, as well as to other parts of Turkey, in large numbers when their native lands—the Crimea, Bessarabia, Roumania, and Bulgaria—passed under the sovereignty of Christian rulers. They have high cheekbones, broad flat faces, globular noses, and sunken eyes. They are fanatical, ignorant, and naturally embittered against Christians, and many, as the authors of the so-called Bulgarian atrocities, have fled to escape the punishment they deserved. ”

“ Factories are so seldom to be seen in Turkey that women have few opportunities of employment as factory-girls, but in the silk-spinning factories in Brusa Greek, Armenian, and Turkish girls work side by side. ”

“ Horse-racing is seldom indulged in in Turkey, except among European residents. An effort made several years ago to introduce racing failed, because, it is alleged, foreign jockeys dared to allow their horses to beat the Sultan's stud. Occasionally, however, Turks get up children's races; they strap the youngsters to the saddle, give them the reins, and speed the horses off with a tremendous swipe. ”

“ The foster-mother enjoys a title of courtesy, and often her influence in the palace comes next to that of the reigning Sultan's mother. In the case of the wet-nurse of Sultan Abdul Aziz, her power was such that frequently the appointment or dismissal of Governors and other State officials depended on her good-will.
Greek servants are as a rule honest, but very slovenly, and at first very raw and unused to the ways of civilized life. They love to go about barefooted, or shuffle in slippers. Their hair is seldom combed, and their garments hang loosely about them. ”

“ With all the instincts of the nomad—unkempt, unkept, and owning no master—their home is the street, where they are born and die, a boon and a bane to mankind. They are the former because they are the scavengers—sometimes the only scavengers—that clean the streets of the refuse thrown into them, and which would otherwise putrefy and breed disease. ”

“ Turkey holds sway over some of earth's fairest lands, the homes of its most ancient civilizations and lands familiar to us through Holy Writ and profane history, and the sources of Jewish, Christian, Moslem, and other beliefs.
The rulers of Turkey are the Turks, originally a nomadic tribe from Central Asia. Compelled to abandon their homes on account of the desiccation or drying up of large tracts of their country, which were converted into a desert, they swarmed into Armenia and Persia in quest of new pasture-lands for their flocks and cattle. ”

“ A people resembling the Jews in that, like them, they are "found scattered toward all the four winds of heaven, and there is no nation whither these outcasts have not come," are the gipsies. They are to be met with in every part of the Sultan's dominions, and in physical appearance, manners, and character they are very similar to those in our country.
Moslems and Christians vie with each other in holding them in execration, and they are branded by the former as the Kitabsis, or "bookless" nation, because of the unwritten form of their beliefs and worship. ”