sadors to wait under some large spreading trees, till the grand vizir passes, and precedes them to the seraglio. The kaimakam came immediately, with some other officers of state and a great crowd of attendants, and we followed him to the seraglio. Having entered the first gate, we passed through a large open unpaved quadrangular plain, enclosed by low buildings, (in this plain the janizaries were drawn up to the number of between two and three thousand,) before we came to the second gate, which having also passed, we stopped on the further side of it, immediately at the entrance, in a large square chamber between the second and third gates, called Capi Arase (arase between, capi the gates), within which is the cell where grand vizirs and other state prisoners under sentence of death are confined and beheaded. The ceiling of this chamber was handsomely printed, and round the walls were hung arms (shields, spears, and axes), which, I was informed, were very old, and had been taken by the Turks from their enemies. After waiting here about a quarter of an hour, permission was sent for our entrance; and we passed through the third gate into a large garden, in which stood the divan chamber and the front of the seraglio, both built after the Chinese fashion, with the roofs, which were very richly painted and gilt, projecting four or five feet beyond the walls. As soon as we entered this garden, the janizaries all uttered a loud shout, and began running as quick as they could; this was for

their pilaw, the distribution of which was a complete scramble, as I saw some returning with two or three plates, and some with none. This is a farce always played off on these occasions, to impress foreigners with a respect for this contemptible soldiery, who are now formidable only to their own government. We walked forward (for we had dismounted, and left our horses on the outside of the second gate) to the divan chamber, where the kaimakam was sitting in state, immediately opposite the entrance, on the centre of a sofa extending along one side of the chamber, covered with the richest silks, at the further ends of which, on each side of him, sat the Cadileskers of Roumelia and Anatolia*. The chamber was small, but richly decorated, the ceiling being splendidly painted and gilt. It was divided from chambers adjoining on each side, by partition walls, which did not reach to the ceiling. The roofs of two of these apartments were surmounted by lofty cupolas. We walked to one side of the room without making any salutation, as no notice was taken of us when we had been there some minutes, a number of Turks entered, and ranging themselves in two rows from the kaimakam's seat to the door, represented the trying of one or two causes, which lasted about a quarter of an hour, and was intended to impress us with a sense of their justice. In general, the Porte appoints the payment of the Janisaries to take place at the

They were sitting on the divan in the European manner; the Turks never sit in this way except when they sit in state.

audience of an ambassador, in whose presence piled bags of money are delivered to the troops, in order to impress foreigners with an exalted idea of Turkish opulence-but from this tedious ceremony, which lasts three or four hours, we were luckily spared.

Previously to their appearance, the kaimakam had sent a letter to the Sultan, stating, in what I was informed was the usual style, that an infidel ambassador was come to throw himself at his highness's feet; and at the end of the mock trials, the royal answer was announced, which the kaimakam rose and advanced to receive. It was enclosed in an envelope; and when this was stripped off, there appeared a quantity of muslin, in which the letter was wrapped. The kaimakam, as he took off the seals, gave them to the bearers of the letter, who kissed them, applied them to their forehead, and pocketed them. He himself, taking the letter out of its muslin folds, kissed it, and applied it to his forehead before he read it. The accustomed tenour of this letter was, as I was told, a command to "feed, wash, and clothe the infidels, and bring them to him." As soon as the kaimakam had finished reading (at half-past eight), two tables were laid (i. e., two very large plates of tin, laid on a reversed stool, round which we sat, with embroidered towels spread on our knees), one for the kaimakam and the ambassador, the other for the gentlemen of the embassy. The factory were accommodated in the next room. We sat down to a

collation, consisting of about thirty Turkish dishes, brought in one at a time, and rapidly removed, for no one was likely to feel an appetite, at such an hour, for sweet and savoury dishes. On the removal of the dinner, water was poured over our hands, according to the Turkish custom.

All this time the Sultan had been looking at us through a gilt lattice, over the kaimakam's seat, so thick, that we could only see that some one was there, without being able to distinguish the person. After this collation, we left the divan chamber, and went into the garden, where pelisses were distributed, of the same number and quality as at the audience of the kaimakam, the first dragoman calling over the names of those to whom they were assigned. Here we waited for half an hour under a tree, with nothing for the ambassador to sit on but a dirty wooden bench, till the kaimakam, who is supposed to have been detained by business in the divan chamber, had passed us and entered the palace. The path he walked on was lined on each side with attendants, who bowed low to him, and he kissed his hand to them, but took no notice of us.

The ambassador with a certain number (twenty) of his suite followed him, those only being admitted who wore pelisses; and this distinction shews that the pelisse is intended not to confer honour on the wearer, but to equip him in a dress as similar to the Turkish as a foreign embassy can be induced to wear. At the door each of us was seized by two Capigi

bashees, who held us by the arm; a precaution established, it is said, ever since the attack made on Bajazet II., by a dervisch, in 1510*. But as every Turk of distinction visiting another is received in the same manner, this might be taken as a compliment, if our conductors had not carefully banished such an idea by pinching the arm they held so unmercifully, that I was once or twice provoked to call out to them, in the Sultan's presence, to their extreme terror; and by the same means I resisted successfully their repeated attempts to bow my head by force. We had had the precaution to go without swords, as we should not have been permitted to enter the presence-chamber with them; and, indeed, the ambassador was asked if he had one on. We kept our hats on in the presence chamber, as the Turks think it the height of indecorum to uncover the head in public.

Thus led, we passed through an outer hall and a room splendidly furnished, with a carpet richly worked in gold, in which were drawn up lines, three deep, of the white eunuchs, of whom there were not less than two hundred. When we entered the throne room, we advanced bowing. The room (of which, and of the throne, D'Ohsson has given an accurate drawing in his Tableau de l'Empire Ottoman) was very small; and, indeed, I did not see a large room in the place.

*Mignot's Hist. of the Ottoman Empire. Busbequius ascribes the precaution to the assassination of Amurath I., by a Croat. Epistola I.