Eothen, or, Traces of Travel Brought Home from the East

Alexander William Kinglake

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pubOne.info thank you for your continued support and wish to present you this new edition. At Semlin I still was encompassed by the scenes and the sounds of familiar life; the din of a busy world still vexed and cheered me; the unveiled faces of women still shone in the light of day. Yet, whenever I chose to look southward, I saw the Ottoman's fortress- austere, and darkly impending high over the vale of the Danube- historic Belgrade. I had come, as it were, to the end of this wheel-going Europe, and now my eyes would see the splendour and havoc of the East.

Informations

• Publié par: Pub One Info
• Date de parution: 27 septembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9782819924340
• Langue: English

Extrait

EOTHEN—A. W. KINGSLAKE
CHAPTER I—OVER THE BORDER
At Semlin I still was encompassed by the scenes andthe sounds of familiar life; the din of a busy world still vexedand cheered me; the unveiled faces of women still shone in thelight of day. Yet, whenever I chose to look southward, I saw theOttoman’s fortress— austere, and darkly impending high over thevale of the Danube— historic Belgrade. I had come, as it were, tothe end of this wheel-going Europe, and now my eyes would see thesplendour and havoc of the East.
The two frontier towns are less than a cannon-shotdistant, and yet their people hold no communion. The Hungarian onthe north, and the Turk and Servian on the southern side of theSave are as much asunder as though there were fifty broad provincesthat lay in the path between them. Of the men that bustled aroundme in the streets of Semlin there was not, perhaps, one who hadever gone down to look upon the stranger race dwelling under thewalls of that opposite castle. It is the plague, and the dread ofthe plague, that divide the one people from the other. All comingand going stands forbidden by the terrors of the yellow flag. Ifyou dare to break the laws of the quarantine, you will be triedwith military haste; the court will scream out your sentence to youfrom a tribunal some fifty yards off; the priest, instead of gentlywhispering to you the sweet hopes of religion, will console you atduelling distance; and after that you will find yourself carefullyshot, and carelessly buried in the ground of the lazaretto.
When all was in order for our departure we walkeddown to the precincts of the quarantine establishment, and hereawaited us a “compromised” [1] officer of theAustrian Government, who lives in a state of perpetualexcommunication. The boats, with their “compromised” rowers, werealso in readiness.
After coming in contact with any creature or thingbelonging to the Ottoman Empire it would be impossible for us toreturn to the Austrian territory without undergoing an imprisonmentof fourteen days in the odious lazaretto. We felt, therefore, thatbefore we committed ourselves it was important to take care thatnone of the arrangements necessary for the journey had beenforgotten; and in our anxiety to avoid such a misfortune, wemanaged the work of departure from Semlin with nearly as muchsolemnity as if we had been departing this life. Some obligingpersons, from whom we had received civilities during our short stayin the place, came down to say their farewell at the river’s side;and now, as we stood with them at the distance of three or fouryards from the “compromised” officer, they asked if we wereperfectly certain that we had wound up all our affairs inChristendom, and whether we had no parting requests to make. Werepeated the caution to our servants, and took anxious thought lestby any possibility we might be cut off from some cherished objectof affection:— were they quite sure that nothing had beenforgotten— that there was no fragrant dressing-case with itsgold-compelling letters of credit from which we might be partingfor ever? — No; all our treasures lay safely stowed in the boat,and we were ready to follow them to the ends of the earth. Now,therefore, we shook hands with our Semlin friends, who immediatelyretreated for three or four paces, so as to leave us in the centreof a space between them and the “compromised” officer. The latterthen advanced, and asking once more if we had done with thecivilised world, held forth his hand. I met it with mine, and therewas an end to Christendom for many a day to come.
We soon neared the southern bank of the river, butno sounds came down from the blank walls above, and there was noliving thing that we could yet see, except one great hovering birdof the vulture race, flying low, and intent, and wheeling round andround over the pest-accursed city.
But presently there issued from the postern a groupof human beings— beings with immortal souls, and possibly somereasoning faculties; but to me the grand point was this, that theyhad real, substantial, and incontrovertible turbans. They made forthe point towards which we were steering, and when at last I sprangupon the shore, I heard, and saw myself now first surrounded by menof Asiatic blood. I have since ridden through the land of theOsmanlees, from the Servian border to the Golden Horn— from theGulf of Satalieh to the tomb of Achilles; but never have I seensuch ultra-Turkish looking fellows as those who received me on thebanks of the Save. They were men in the humblest order of life,having come to meet our boat in the hope of earning something bycarrying our luggage up to the city; but poor though they were, itwas plain that they were Turks of the proud old school, and had notyet forgotten the fierce, careless bearing of their once victoriousrace.
Though the province of Servia generally has obtaineda kind of independence, yet Belgrade, as being a place of strengthon the frontier, is still garrisoned by Turkish troops under thecommand of a Pasha. Whether the fellows who now surrounded us weresoldiers, or peaceful inhabitants, I did not understand: they worethe old Turkish costume; vests and jackets of many and brilliantcolours, divided from the loose petticoat-trousers by heavy volumesof shawl, so thickly folded around their waists as to give themeagre wearers something of the dignity of true corpulence. Thiscincture enclosed a whole bundle of weapons; no man bore less thanone brace of immensely long pistols, and a yataghan (or cutlass),with a dagger or two of various shapes and sizes; most of thesearms were inlaid with silver, and highly burnished, so that theycontrasted shiningly with the decayed grandeur of the garments towhich they were attached (this carefulness of his arms is a pointof honour with the Osmanlee, who never allows his bright yataghanto suffer from his own adversity); then the long droopingmustachios, and the ample folds of the once white turbans, thatlowered over the piercing eyes, and the haggard features of themen, gave them an air of gloomy pride, and that appearance oftrying to be disdainful under difficulties, which I have since seenso often in those of the Ottoman people who live, and remember oldtimes; they seemed as if they were thinking that they would havebeen more usefully, more honourably, and more piously employed incutting our throats than in carrying our portmanteaus. The faithfulSteel (Methley’s Yorkshire servant) stood aghast for a moment atthe sight of his master’s luggage upon the shoulders of thesewarlike porters, and when at last we began to move up he couldscarcely avoid turning round to cast one affectionate look towardsChristendom, but quickly again he marched on with steps of a man,not frightened exactly, but sternly prepared for death, or theKoran, or even for plural wives.
The Moslem quarter of a city is lonely and desolate.You go up and down, and on over shelving and hillocky paths throughthe narrow lanes walled in by blank, windowless dwellings; you comeout upon an open space strewed with the black ruins that some latefire has left; you pass by a mountain of castaway things, therubbish of centuries, and on it you see numbers of big, wolf-likedogs lying torpid under the sun, with limbs outstretched to thefull, as if they were dead; storks, or cranes, sitting fearlessupon the low roofs, look gravely down upon you; the still air thatyou breathe is loaded with the scent of citron, and pomegranaterinds scorched by the sun, or (as you approach the bazaar) with thedry, dead perfume of strange spices. You long for some signs oflife, and tread the ground more heavily, as though you would wakethe sleepers with the heel of your boot; but the foot fallsnoiseless upon the crumbling soil of an Eastern city, and silencefollows you still. Again and again you meet turbans, and faces ofmen, but they have nothing for you— no welcome— no wonder— nowrath— no scorn— they look upon you as we do upon a December’s fallof snow— as a “seasonable, ” unaccountable, uncomfortable work ofGod, that may have been sent for some good purpose, to be revealedhereafter.
Some people had come down to meet us with aninvitation from the Pasha, and we wound our way up to the castle.At the gates there were groups of soldiers, some smoking, and somelying flat like corpses upon the cool stones. We went throughcourts, ascended steps, passed along a corridor, and walked into anairy, whitewashed room, with an European clock at one end of it,and Moostapha Pasha at the other; the fine, old, bearded potentatelooked very like Jove— like Jove, too, in the midst of his clouds,for the silvery fumes of the narghile [2] hung lightly circling round him.
The Pasha received us with the smooth, kind, gentlemanner that belongs to well-bred Osmanlees; then he lightly clappedhis hands, and instantly the sound filled all the lower end of theroom with slaves; a syllable dropped from his lips which bowed allheads, and conjured away the attendants like ghosts (their comingand their going was thus swift and quiet, because their feet werebare, and they passed through no door, but only by the yieldingfolds of a purder). Soon the coffee-bearers appeared, every mancarrying separately his tiny cup in a small metal stand; andpresently to each of us there came a pipe-bearer, who first restedthe bowl of the tchibouque at a measured distance on thefloor, and then, on this axis, wheeled round the long cheery stick,and gracefully presented it on half-bended knee; already thewell-kindled fire was glowing secure in the bowl, and so, when Ipressed the amber up to mine, there was no coyness to conquer; thewilling fume came up, and answered my slightest sigh, and followedsoftly every breath inspired, till it touched me with some faintsense and understanding of Asiatic contentment.
Asiatic contentment! Yet scarcely, perhaps, one hourbefore I had been wanting my bill, and ringing for waiters, in ashrill and busy hotel.
In the Ottoman dominion