ing in boots. A company of Turks affembled on the beach to view the ship, seemed as it were a new fpecies of human beings. They were in general large and tall; fome with long, comely or venerable beards, of a portly mein and noble prefence, to which their high turbans and loofe garments, of various lively colours, greatly contributed; adding, befides their majesty, to the apparent bulk of the wearers. us We were received on the fhore by the English conful, a fat, welllooking Jew, who, after bidding us welcome in broken Italian or Lingua Franca, conducted through the town to his house, in the quarter affigned to that nation. We afcended fome fairs into a room, which had a raised floor covered with a carpet. Round three fides was a low fopha with cushions for leaning. The cooling breeze entered at the wooden lattices of the windows. Their law not permitting the Jews to touch fire on their fabbath, our hoft was in diftrefs about our entertainment. However we were foon prefented with the customary refreshments, a pipe of lighted tobacco; a fpoonful of fweet-meat put into our mouths; and coffee in a china cup, which was placed in one of filligree-work, to prevent it from burning our fingers. The conful then introduced to us a young man his brother, and his wife and daughter; the latter a girl in a long white veft, with a zone about her middle, her feet naked, her nails dyed red, her hair platted and hanging down her back. She came to us, and taking the right hand of each feparately, kiffed and gently moved it to her forehead. We found fome difficulty in complying with the oriental mode of hitting cross-legged, but at dinner it was neceffary, the table being only a large low falver, placed on the carpet. A variety of dishes were ferved up in quick fucceffion, and we were fupplied as rapidly with cups of wine. We had no plates, or knives and forks, but ufed our fingers. The whole repast and the apparatus was antique. It concluded with fruits of whole fome quality and exquifite flavour, figs and melons fuch as are peculiar to hot climates, and grapes in large and rich clusters fresh from the vineyard. The conful ate with us, while his brother waited, with another Jew. When we had finished, we washed, one of our attendants bringing an ewer, a bason and a towel, and pouring water on our hands. We then received each a cup of coffee, and our hoft, who was much fatigued with his fultry walk to the beach and afterwards to the governor to inform him of our arrival, retired with the whole family to fleep, as is the univerfal practice toward noon, when the heat becomes exceedingly intense. In the evening we went with the conful to view the town. We found the houfes numerous, moftly of wood and mean, and the streets very narrow. We faw the manufactory of earthen ware, which is confiderable; and we fuppofed the fashion had never altered, the jars and veffels in general retaining the old fhapes, and feeming formed by antient models. The fituation of the place is low and subject to epidemical diforders. Beidesthefe, the plague, which commonlyvifits the inhabitants every year, is remarkably remarkably deftructive, and feldom fails to make a long ftay. The cœmeteries are fwelled to a great extent round the town, and filled with broken columns, pieces of granate, and marble fragments, fixed as grave-ftones; fome carved with Turkish characters in relievo, gilded and painted. In the Armenian burying-ground we discovered a long Greek infcription on a flab of white marble, but not legible. On a rocky eminence on the fide next the Propontis is a range of wind-mills. The town and cafle has on the fouth a river, which descends from mount Ida. Its fource, as we were told, is feven hours up in the country; and its violence, after fnow or rain upon the fummits, prodigious. A thick wall has been erected, and plane-trees difpofed to keep off the torrent, and protect the buildings from its affaults. At the mouth, like the Scamander, it had then a bar of fand. The bed was wide, ftony, and interfected with green thickets, but had water in the cavities, at which many women, with their faces muffled, were bufy washing linen, and fpreading it on the ground to dry. This river enables us to afcer. tain the fite of the inner caftles, a point of fome confequence in the topography of the Hellefpont. Its ancient name, as appears from Strabo, was Rhodius; and it entered the fea between Dardanus and Abydos. The remnants of marble, which we faw in the buryinggrounds about the town, have been removed thither chiefly from the ruins of thefe cities, particularly of the latter, which was the most confiderable. The conful fhewed as a head of an image of the Virgin VOL. XVIII. Mary, which was found in the rubbish of a church there. On the European fide, oppofite to the Rhodius, was Cynoffema, The Bar→ row of Hecuba, which is ftill very confpicuous, and within or clofe by the caftle. We returned, when we had finifhed our furvey, to our lodging, where we fupped crofs-legged, about fun-fet. Soon after, when it was dark, three coverlets richly embroidered were taken from a prefs in the room, which we occupied; and delivered, one to each of us; the carpet or fopha and a cushion ferving, with this addition, inftead of a bed. A lamp was left burning on a fhelf, and the conful retired to his family, which lay in the fame manner in an adjoining apartment. We pulled off our coats and fhoes, and expected to be much refreshed by fleeping on fhore. We had not been apprized of a nightly plague, which haunts the place, or perhaps rather the houfes of the Jews. Two of us could not obtain reft for a moment, but waited the approach of dawn with a degree of impatience equalled only by our bodily fuf. ferings, which cannot be defcribed. We had agreed in the evening to vifit fome neighbouring places on the continent, with the principal islands near the mouth of the Hellefpont. Early in the morning the conful asked for money to purchafe provifions, which, with other neceffaries, were put into a fcheik or wherry. He embarked with us, between the hours of eight and nine by our watches. We had fix Turks, who rowed; a Janizary, and a jew fervant. The two latter, with the conful, fate cross-legged R before before us, on a fmall carpet; as the rais or master of the boat did behind, steering with the handle of the helm over his fhoulder. We foon croffed the Hellefpont, and coafting by the European fhore, faw feveral folitary king - fishers, with young partridge, among vaft fingle rocks. The winter torrents had worn deep gullies, but the courfes were dry, except a ftream, which we were informed, turns a mill. A narrow valley, or two, was green with the cotton plant and with vines, or fowed with grain. After paffing the mouth of a port or bay called anciently Coelos, we landed about eleven on the Cherfonefe of Thrace, near the firft European caftle, within the entrance of the Hellefpont; and afcended to the milerable cottage of a poor Jew in the town. Here a mat was spread on the mud floor of a room by the fea-fide, and the catables we had provided, were placed on it. The rocn-tide heat at this place was exceffive. The conful retired, as ufual, to fleep; while we alfo reited, or were amuted with the profpect from the window. Beneath us was the fhining canal, with Cape Maftufia on the right hand and oppofite, the Afiatic town and castle, with the noble plain divided by the Scamander; and the barrows mentioned before, two ftanding by each other not far from the fhore, with in Sigéum, and one more remote. The ancient name of this town, which is exceedingly mean and wretched, was Eleûs. The freets or lanes are narrow and intricate. It is on the north fide of the caftle, and ranges along the brink of a precipice. When the heat was abated a little, we were informed that the governor gave us permiffion to refresh in his garden. We difmiffed his meffenger with a bac-fhish or prefent of three piafters, and an excufe, that we were just going away; but this was not accepted; and we paid another piafter for feeing a very fmall fpot of ground, walled in, and containing nothing, except two vines, a fig and a pomegranate tree, and a well of excellent water. The Turks, after we were landed, had rowed the wherry round Maftufia, and waited for us without the point. In our way to them, by the caftle-wall, we faw a large Corinthian capital; and an altar, made hollow and used as a mortar for bruifing corn. Near the other end of the town is a bare barrow. By this, was formerly the facred portion of Protefilaus, and his temple, to which perhaps the marble fragments have belonged. He was one of the leaders in the Trojan expedition; and was killed by Hector. Afterward he was worfhipped as a hero, and reputed the pation or tutelar deity of Eleûs. On our arrival at the wherry, which was behind the castle, we found our Turks fitting on the ground, where they had dined, chiefly on ripe fruits, with ordinary bread. We had there a wide and deep gulf, a portion of the Agean fea anciently called Melas, on our right hand; with Imbros toward the entrance, twenty five miles A piafter is about half-a-crown English, and is equal in value to thirty peraus. Thefe are a fmall filver coin, about the size of an English penny. from from Maftufia, and twenty-two from Lemnos, which lay before us, and beyond thefe, other islands, and the continent of Europe, in view. We had intended to vifit Lemnos, and the principal places in that quarter, but, the wind pro ving contrary, we now fteered for Tenedos, and, after rowing fome time with a rough fea, hoifted fail: we paffed by fome iflets, and about three in the afternoon, reached the town. On opening the harbour, we difcovered in it, befides fmall craft, three Turkish gallies wait ing to convey the Venetian bailow or refident, who was expected daily, to Conftantinople; the fhips of that republic being by treaty excluded from navigating the Hellefpont. 1 The island Tenedos is chiefly rock, but fertile. It was anciently reckoned about eighty ftadia or ten miles in circumference, and from Sigêum twelve miles and a half. Its pofition, thus near the mouth of the Hellefpont, has given it importance in all ages; veffels bound toward Conftantinople finding fhelter in its port, or fafe anchorage in the road, during the etefian or contrary winds, and in foul weather. The Emperor Juftinian erected a magazine to receive the cargoes of the corn-fhips from Alexandria, when detained there. This building was two hundred and eighty feet long, ninety broad, and very lofty. The voyage from Egypt was rendered lefs precarious, and the grain preferved, until it could be transported to the capital. Afterwards, during the troubles of the Greek empire, Tenedos experienced a variety of fortune. The pirates, which infefted thefe feas, made it for many years their place of rendezvous; and Othman feized it in 1302, procured veffels, and from thence fubdued the other iflands of the Archipelago. inclofed in a mole, of which no The port of Tenedos has been part now appears above water, but loofe ftones are piled on the foundations to break the waves: The bafin is encompaffed by a ridge of the mountain. On the fourh fide is a row of wind- mills and a small fort; and on the oppofite, a castle by the fhore. This was taken in the year 1656 by the Venetians in four days, but foon after abandoned, as not tenable. The houses, which are numerous, ftand at the foot, or on the flope, of an acclivity, with a flat between them and ed down from above. They reckon the fea, formed partly by foil washfix hundred Turkish families, and three hundred Greek. The church belonging to the latter is decent. We of antiquity worthy notice. We found here but few remains perceived on our landing a large and entire farcophagus cr ftone coffin ferving as a fountain, the topftone or lid being perforated to admit a current of water, which fupplies the vent below; and on one fide is an infcription. Near this we faw part of a fluted column converted into a mortar for bruifing corn; and in a fhop was a then recently difcovered. In the remnant of teffellated pavement ftreets, the walls, and buryinggrounds, were pieces of marble, and fragments of pillars with a few infcriptions. day and a feftival, we were much In the evening, this being Sunamufed with feeing the Greeks, who were finging and dancing, in feveral companies, to mufic, near R 2 the the town; while their women were fitting in groups on the roofs of the houses, which are flat, as fpectators, at the fame time enjoying the foft air and ferene sky. We were lodged much to our fatisfaction in a large room, with a raised floor matted, on which we flept in our clothes, in company with two Jews and feveral Greeks; a cool breeze entering all night at the latticed windows, and fweetening our repofe. In thefe countries, on account of the heat, it is ufual to rife with the dawn. About day-break we received from the French conful, a Greek with a refpectable beard, a prefent of grapes, the clusters large and rich, with other fruits all fresh gathered. We had, befides, bread and coffee for breakfast, and good wines, particularly one fort, of an exquifite flavour, called mufcadell. The island is defervedly famous for the fpecies of vine which produces this delicious liquor. We had been told, that an an. cient building remained on the fouth fide of the island, not much out of our way to the ruins of a city called Eski-Stamboul, on the continent of Afia. Our Turks were waiting at the boat, and we juft ready to join them, when we were informed that a scheick was arrived from the Afiatic Dardanell, which we had lately left, and that the prefence of the conful was required on fome very urgent bufinefs at Conftantinople. His brother, who had fet fail in the morning early to overtake him, remained with us in his stead, and foon won our regard by his attentios and civility. THE |