William Francis Lynch

“ Do the Turkish ladies wear black gloves? Credat Judaeus Apella! Let the circumcised Jew believe it! Can a Christian credit that she was a Nubian, of the deepest Cimmerian tint?
We landed and passed into the streets, the narrow, winding ways of Smyrna. How strange everything seems! After all one has fancied of an eastern city, how different is the reality! The streets are very narrow and dark, and filled with a motley and, in general, a dirty population, passing to and fro, or sitting in their stalls, for they deserve no better name. Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, seem to prevail. ”

“ The country around Smyrna is highly cultivated, and the benignant soil and genial climate amply repay the toil of the husbandman. Less productive of the cereal grains, its vintage and its crops of fruit are most superior and abundant. Except the mountain sides, which are sparsely covered with brushwood, the frequent groves of cypress, each denoting a burial-place, and the clusters of orange trees around the villas of the wealthy, the surface of the country is thickly dotted with the olive and the almond, the mulberry and the fig-tree. ”

“ But, as if to teach mankind a lesson which tradition could never forget, the crimes of the French people were permitted to accumulate until Paris rivalled Sodom in iniquity: and, perhaps, the sudden and consuming wrath which fell upon the city of the plain, was mercy compared with the protracted sufferings of this abandoned people. If the world shuddered at the enormity of their crimes, nations grew pale at the intensity of their sufferings. ”

“ This is one of the customs of the East which so peculiarly differ from our own. Here man is indeed the sole monarch of creation; but his degradation of the female sex recoils fearfully upon himself.
After wandering about beneath the shade of the orange and the cypress, admiring the night-blooming cereus, and inhaling the fragrance of the rose and the jasmine, and examining the old-time Persian water-wheel and artificial mode of irrigation, we entered a saloon where an oriental collation of fruits and cream had been prepared for us. ”

“ Crime, like a leprous cancer, spreads from individuals to nations. It should be the duty, therefore, of a Christian to oppose everything which tends to corrupt morals and promote licentiousness. History, with her grave and solemn countenance, constantly admonishes us, that, whatever may have been the immediate cause of national calamities, licentiousness of morals has always preceded and precipitated the catastrophe. The political revolutions which have most afflicted mankind were introduced by an era of national profligacy. ”

“ The day will come, and is coming, when the public mind in every enlightened community will shrink with horror from the infliction of the punishment of death. But, until the minds of men are more enlightened, and their conduct influenced more by holy aspirations than base, ignoble fears, there necessarily must be an inflexibly restraining power. ”

“ But the most striking, living feature of the east is the long strings of camels, huge, meek-looking beasts, with long necks and small projecting heads, tramping along under enormous loads, with their great pulpy, India- rubber splay feet, threatening to bear down everything in their onward march. ”

“ Alas! man, whether in his individual or social capacity, is a frail and rebellious creature, and the sternest sanctions of the law have, in all ages, been required for the maintenance of peace and order. ”

“ Offley, an honour to his name and to the position he fills, told us that he once took a Turkish bath, but never repeated the operation.
The city of Smyrna, so inviting in its exterior, is crowded, dirty, and unprepossessing within. The houses, excepting those on the Marina, or Water front, rarely exceed one story in height, and are dingy and mean; and the very mosques, so imposing from without, fall far short of the conceptions of the visitant. ”

“ A queen-like old lady, dressed in a blue silk sack, trimmed with rich fur, and wearing upon her head a braided turban interwreathed with natural flowers and silver ornaments, was introduced to us by our kind entertainer as his mother. ”

“ The variety of costume; the filthy, unpaved lanes for streets, and the necessity of giving way before the onward tramp of a line of loaded camels or a mud-bespattering donkey. We were much assisted, however, by the consul’s janissary, who did his best to clear the way before us. Consuls and other foreign officials in Turkey are allowed, as guards, a certain number of janissaries,or kavashes, recognized and appointed for that purpose by the Turkish government. This janissary is always heavily armed, and possessing much authority, is very cavalier in his treatment of the common people. ”

“ P.M. Passed the island of Pantellaria, the Botany Bay of Naples and Sicily, and accounted by some to be the Isle of Calypso. To avoid danger in the shape of rocks and shoals at sea, it is ever best to shape the course directly for them, for then all are vigilant. We stood, therefore, directly for the shoal which marks the spot where, some years since, a volcanic island suddenly rose from the sea; and shortly after disappeared. We saw nothing of it.
During the night we shortened sail, but, with the fresh wind blowing, it was difficult to check the ship in her headlong velocity. ”

“ The head-stones of the males have invariably a carved turban, coloured red or green, according to the family of the deceased. On the head-stones of the females, carved rose-branches are generally seen. ”

“ It is further said, that in the times of Turkish despotism, a man’s family deemed it a sure and convincing proof of the wealth or talent of their ancestor, if he had been considered of sufficient importance to be executed. ”