Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family | Page 4

never raise a dangerous sea in that channel. What did
the crew of that distressed ship do, when Jesus showed them his chart,
and gave them all the bearings? They laughed at him, and threw his
chart back in his face. He find a channel where they could not!
Impossible; and on they sailed in their own course, and everyone of
them perished."
At Smyrna, I signalized my return to the land of the Franks, by
ordering a beef-steak, and a bottle of porter, and bespeaking the paper
from a gentleman in drab leggings, who had come from Manchester to
look after the affairs of a commercial house, in which he or his
employers were involved. He wondered that a hotel in the Ottoman
empire should be so unlike one in Europe, and asked me, "If the inns
down in the country were as good as this."
As for Constantinople, I refer all readers to the industry and accuracy of
Mr. White, who might justly have terminated his volumes with the
Oriental epistolary phrase, "What more can I write?" Mr. White is not a
mere sentence balancer, but belongs to the guild of bona fide Oriental
travellers.
In summer, all Pera is on the Bosphorus: so I jumped into a caique, and
rowed up to Buyukdere. On the threshold of the villa of the British
embassy, I met A----, the prince of attaches, who led me to a beautiful
little kiosk, on the extremity of a garden, and there installed me in his
fairy abode of four small rooms, which embraced a view like that of
Isola Bella on Lake Maggiore; here books, the piano, the narghile, and

the parterre of flowers, relieved the drudgery of his Eastern diplomacy.
Lord N----, Mr. H----, and Mr. T----, the other attaches, lived in a house
at the other end of the garden.
I here spent a week of delightful repose. The mornings were occupied
ad libitum, the gentlemen of the embassy being overwhelmed with
business. At four o'clock dinner was usually served in the airy vestibule
of the embassy villa, and with the occasional accession of other
members of the diplomatic corps we usually formed a large party. A
couple of hours before sunset a caique, which from its size might have
been the galley of a doge, was in waiting, and Lady C---- sometimes
took us to a favourite wooded hill or bower-grown creek in the
Paradise-like environs, while a small musical party in the evening
terminated each day. One of the attaches of the Russian embassy, M.
F----, is the favorite dilettante of Buyukdere; he has one of the finest
voices I ever heard, and frequently reminded me of the easy humour
and sonorous profundity of Lablache.
Before embarking the reader on the Black Sea, I cannot forbear a single
remark on the distinguished individual who has so long and so worthily
represented Great Britain at the Ottoman Porte.
Sir. Stratford Canning is certainly unpopular with the extreme fanatical
party, and with all those economists who are for killing the goose to get
at the golden eggs; but the real interests of the Turkish nation never had
a firmer support.
The chief difficulty in the case of this race is the impossibility of fusion
with others. While they decrease in number, the Rayahs increase in
wealth, in numbers, and in intelligence.
The Russians are the Orientals of Europe, but St. Petersburg is a
German town, German industry corrects the old Muscovite sloth and
cunning. The immigrant strangers rise to the highest offices, for the
crown employs them as a counterpoise on the old nobility; as burgher
incorporations were used by the kings of three centuries ago.
No similar process is possible with Moslems: one course therefore

remains open for those who wish to see the Ottoman Empire upheld; a
strenuous insistance on the Porte treating the Rayah population with
justice and moderation. The interests of humanity, and the real and true
interests of the Ottoman Empire, are in this case identical. Guided by
this sound principle, which completely reconciles the policy of Great
Britain with the highest maxims of political morality, Sir. Stratford
Canning has pursued his career with an all-sifting intelligence, a vigour
of character and judgment, an indifference to temporary repulses, and a
sacrifice of personal popularity, which has called forth the respect and
involuntary admiration of parties the most opposed to his views.
I embarked on board a steamer, skirted the western coast of the Black
Sea, and landed on the following morning in Varna.
CHAPTER II.
Varna.--Contrast of Northern And Southern Provinces of
Turkey.--Roustchouk.--Conversation with Deftendar.--The Danube.--A
Bulgarian interior.--A dandy of the Lower Danube.--Depart for Widdin.
All hail, Bulgaria! No sooner had I secured my quarters and deposited
my baggage, than I sought the main street, in order