Constantinople painted by Warwick Goble Part 3

[Ill.u.s.tration: CRIMEAN MEMORIAL BRITISH CEMETERY, HAIDAR PASHA

Erected to the memory of the British soldiers and sailors who fell in the Crimean War.]

Fifteen years after the Turkish occupation, Sultan Mehemet the Conqueror transferred his residence from his palace on the hill now surmounted by the War Office to this quarter of the city, and for the security of his new abode built the wall that, on its way across the promontory, from the Sea of Marmora to the Golden Horn, pa.s.ses to the north of S. Sophia.

In its general plan the Seraglio was a series of three courts, opening one into the other; and around and within them, embowered in groves of plane-trees and of cypresses, rose the numerous and picturesque edifices which served the convenience of the imperial household. But however inferior in the magnificence created by art, no royal abode has ever been invested by nature with the beauty and lordliness surrounding that in which the Ottoman Sultans sat enthroned from Mehemet the Conqueror to Abdul Medjid, with its grand outlook over Asia, Europe, and the great waterway between the lands on the north and on the south.

"It was at once a royal palace, a fortress, and a sanctuary; here was the brain and heart of Islam, a city within a city, inhabited by a people, and guarded by an army, embracing within its walls an infinite variety of edifices, places of pleasure or of horror; where the Sultans were born, ascended the throne, were deposed, imprisoned, strangled; where all conspiracies began and the cry of rebellion was first heard; where for three centuries the eyes of anxious Europe, timid Asia, and frightened Africa were fixed, as on a smoking volcano, threatening ruin on all sides."

The slopes which descend from S. Sophia and the Hippodrome to the Sea of Marmora, immediately outside the Seraglio Enclosure, are also haunted by memories of splendour and power, for upon them stood the great palace of the Emperors of New Rome from the time of Constantine the Great to almost the end of the Byzantine Empire. The site did not command so extensive a view of the Bosporus as the Seraglio enjoyed, nor had it the outlook of the latter upon the Golden Horn and the busy life of the harbour. But its prospect over the Sea of Marmora and the hills and mountains of the Asiatic coast, rising to the snows of Mount Olympus or merged in the pale blue of the distant horizon, was wider. It had also the advantage of a sunnier and more temperate climate. The site was furthermore recommended by its proximity to the Hippodrome, as direct communication between the palace and that arena of the city's public life, in serious or gay mood, was of paramount importance in Constantinople as at Rome. We must therefore imagine these slopes wooded with trees, and crowded with stately buildings, often domed, for the accommodation of a Court which sought, in pomp and luxury never surpa.s.sed, to find all that power and pleasure can do to satisfy the human heart. As in the case of Byzantine churches, so in the edifices forming the "Sacred Palace," artistic effort was chiefly devoted to the decoration of the interior, and it was with similar means, marble revetments and mosaics, that artistic effects were produced.

The throne-room, for instance, was, as we shall find in the sequel, almost a facsimile of the Church of SS. Sergius and Bacchus. Like that church it was an octagonal hall enclosed in a square, and surmounted by a dome pierced by windows.

Each division of the octagon formed a bay under a semi-dome, and above the bays was a rich entablature, with a cornice that projected so as to const.i.tute a gallery. The floor was paved with slabs of porphyry and variegated marbles, arranged to form beautiful designs and set in borders of silver, while walls and vaults gleamed with mosaics. The hall was entered from the west, and in the bay directly opposite stood the throne, with an icon of Christ in mosaic in the conch above it. The bay immediately to the south of the throne was the emperor's robing-room, leading to a chapel in which his robes of state, his crowns and arms, and two enamelled gold s.h.i.+elds, studded with pearls and precious stones, were kept under the guardians.h.i.+p of S. Theodore. The other state rooms of the palace were all varieties of the same type, displaying more or less skill and taste, according to the fluctuations of art in Constantinople. Of all the magnificence that once adorned these slopes, nothing remains but unshapely ma.s.ses of brickwork, broken shafts, fallen capitals and empty sarcophagi! Slopes that vied with the Palatine as a seat of power, they are without a vestige of the grandeur that lingers around the ruined home of the Caesars! The higher part of the site of the palace is now occupied by the Mosque of Sultan Achmed, the six minarets of which, combined with the four minarets of S. Sophia, make so striking a feature in the aspect of this part of the city. Upon the lower slopes lives a Turkish population that never dreams of the splendour buried beneath its humble dwellings.

Close to Tchalady Kapou, and at the water's edge, are the ungainly ruins of the residence of Justinian the Great and Theodora, before their accession to the throne. Here began the romance of their lives. In course of time additional buildings were put up at this point, and the group thus formed became the Marine Residence attached to the Great Palace. Here was the little harbour at the service of the Court, with marble steps descending to the water from a quay paved with marble, and adorned with many marble figures of lions, bears, bulls, and ostriches.

Here the Emperor embarked or disembarked when moving in his imperial barge from one part of the city to another by water. One of the pieces of statuary, representing a lion attacking a bull, bestowed upon this Marine Residence the name Bucoleon (The Bull and Lion), under which designation it is frequently mentioned in Byzantine history. There was enacted the tragedy of the a.s.sa.s.sination of the n.o.ble Nicephorus Phocas by John Zimisces, with the connivance of the Empress Theophano, the victim's wife; a typical instance of the intrigues and crimes that often dishonoured the palace of the Byzantine emperors. The story has recently been told by the brilliant pen of Mr. Frederic Harrison, and therefore must not be repeated. But the visitor to the spot can recall the event with startling vividness, so well preserved is the stage on which the tragedy was acted. Directly opposite, on the Asiatic sh.o.r.e, is Chalcedon, where the conspirators joined Zimisces to proceed to the scene of their cruel work. The Sea of Marmora over which, on that fatal night, a snowstorm spread a veil to hide the boat which bore the conspirators across the sleeping waters, comes up to the very base of the palace. From one of the palace windows overhanging the sea, a basket, attached to a rope, was let down again and again to the boat, and again and again drawn up, with one conspirator in it at a time--Zimisces being the last--until the whole band stood within the imperial abode. And somewhere in the vaulted building we still find at the water's edge, and whose ruins seem haunted by evil ghosts, was the chamber in which the doomed emperor lay slumbering on the floor, and was rudely awakened to know all the bitterness of ingrat.i.tude and the sharpness of a cruel death. Geography and topography are certainly the eyes of history.

[Ill.u.s.tration: INTERIOR OF THE MOSQUE OF SULTAN AHMED I.

This mosque is beautifully decorated with blue and green tiles; on the right is the minber (pulpit) built of marble intricately carved and delicately tinted; behind it is one of the four great marble columns that support the roof.]

To the west of the Bucoleon is the beautiful Church of SS. Sergius and Bacchus, erected by Justinian the Great; for some account of which the reader is referred to the chapters on the churches of the city. The district extending thence to the ancient Gate of S. aemilia.n.u.s (Daoud Pasha Kapoussi) is remarkable for having been occupied by the artificial harbours, constructed, from time to time, on the southern side of the city in the interest of commerce, or for the use of the imperial navy.

They were four in number, and, notwithstanding the changes of centuries, they have left their impress upon the ground to a degree which allows their site and contour to be clearly identified. First in the order of position, though not of time, came the Harbour of the Emperor Julian, below the Hippodrome. It has already been noticed in the history of the making of Constantinople. It was used for some time even after the Turkish Conquest, but was ultimately abandoned for the deeper water found along the sh.o.r.es of the Golden Horn. The Harbour of the Kontoscalion followed; in the quarter which the Greek population still designates by that old name, but which is commonly known as Koum Kapoussi. It has been filled in, but the mole remains, as well as a considerable portion of the wall around the basin of the harbour. The entrance could be closed against an enemy by great gates of iron bars, and in bad weather three hundred galleys, of fifty or a hundred pairs of oars, might be seen taking refuge here, waiting for a favourable wind.

Next in order was the Harbour of Kaisarius, known also as the Neorion or Dockyard of the Heptascalon, which stood where the Turkish quarter of Tulbenkdji Djamissi is now situated. But few traces of it are left.

Indeed its position had been forgotten, and its distinctness from the other harbours along this sh.o.r.e ignored, until 1819, when a great fire in the district revealed the fact that the quarter of Tulbenkdji Djamissi stood in the basin of an old harbour, enclosed by a wall built in three tiers of huge blocks. This agreed with other indications of the presence of a harbour at this point hitherto left unexplained--a mole in front of the sh.o.r.e of the quarter, and a gap in the mole forming an entrance to which corresponded an old opening in the city walls, now closed by masonry of Turkish construction. It harmonised also with the description which the historian Pachymeres gives of a harbour constructed or restored by the Emperor Michael Palaeologus on this side of the city. Here Phocas placed troops to oppose the landing of Heraclius, and here also the Emperor Constantine Pogonatus, in 673, stationed his s.h.i.+ps, armed with Greek fire, to await the fleet of the Saracens in the first siege of Constantinople by that formidable foe.

Last in order of position was the harbour on the site of the vegetable gardens of Vlanga Bostan, a work, as we have seen, belonging to the time of the founder of the city, and known first as the Harbour of Eleutherius, its original constructor, and later as the Harbour of Theodosius I., who improved it. Its mole and extensive portions of the walls around it remain, and carry thought back to the city's earliest days.

These harbours are a monument to the great commercial activity of the city during the Middle Ages, and formed a feature in the life and aspect of the place which has disappeared. Occasionally, in the fruit-season, a considerable number of the s.h.i.+ps and large caques engaged in the coasting trade between the city and the ports of the Sea of Marmora anchor off the points once occupied by these harbours, and help the imagination to recall the animation, the busy crowds, the varied merchandise, the picturesque craft and strange crews that made what is now an almost silent sh.o.r.e one of the liveliest and most interesting quarters of New Rome. Owing to the sand thrown up against this coast, all these harbours demanded frequent cleaning and restoration, and had a hard struggle for existence. They were at length neglected, and, one after another, turned into dry land on which to plant market gardens, or build dwellings for the poor.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PRINKIPO (PRINCES ISLANDS)

A favourite summer resort of wealthy residents of Constantinople.]

The tract of the city extending from Vlanga Bostan to the landward walls was noted for the number and importance of its churches and monasteries.

Conspicuous among them was the Church and monastery of S. Mary Peribleptos in the district of Psamatia. It was destroyed by fire in 1782, and is represented by the modern Armenian Church of S. George, generally styled, after the cistern beneath the old edifice, Soulou Monastir.

The Church of S. John Studius, now a sad ruin, stood likewise in this part of the city. So did the Church and monastery of S. Diomed, upon whose steps one day, towards sunset, a way-worn youth in quest of fortune lay down to rest, after his long journey from Macedonia, and rose to become, in a capital where strange careers were possible, the Emperor Basil I. He founded a dynasty that occupied the throne of the Byzantine Empire for two centuries, and counted among its members such notable sovereigns as Basil II. the Slayer of the Bulgarians, Nicephorus Phocas the Conqueror of the Saracens, John Zimisces who drove the Russians out of Bulgaria across the Danube.

CHAPTER V

ALONG THE WALLS BESIDE THE GOLDEN HORN

THE fortifications which defended the side of the city along the Golden Horn consisted of a single line of wall placed, for the most part, close to the water's edge and flanked, it is said, by one hundred and ten square towers. Like the bulwarks along the Sea of Marmora, they attained their full length gradually, according as the northern extremity of the landward walls, which they were to join, was carried farther to the west, when Byzantium expanded into the City of Constantine, when the City of Constantine grew into the City of Theodosius II., and, finally, when, in 627, the outlying level portion of the suburb of Blachernae was brought within the bounds of the capital. The points along the sh.o.r.e of the Golden Horn thus reached were successively the Stamboul head of the Inner Bridge, the eastern border of the quarter of Aivan Serai, and the present point of junction with the landward walls on the west of that quarter. But the actual wall is, substantially, the work of the ninth century, when the Emperor Theophilus reconstructed the fortifications along both sh.o.r.es of the city, as the inscription, "Tower of Theophilus, Emperor in Christ," found until recently upon almost every tower of the line, proclaimed to the world. In the course of the improvements made in the quarters along the Golden Horn, extensive portions of the fortifications have disappeared, leaving scant remains to interest the visitor. It should be added that the safety of this side of the city was further secured by a chain stretched across the entrance of the harbour, from a tower near Yali Kiosk Kapoussi, the Gate of Eugenius, to a tower known as the Tower of Galata, somewhere near Kiretch Kapoussi on the opposite sh.o.r.e.

The view of Constantinople from the Golden Horn, whether seen from the bridges that cross the harbour, or from Pera, is universally admitted to be as impressive and beautiful a spectacle as any city in the world can present. The visitor of a day recognises its wonderful attractions at the first glance, and long familiarity never allows one to feel satisfied that he has given to the scene all the admiration which it deserves. The dominant feature of the view is lordliness, although beauty is almost equally manifest. Men spoke truly when they conferred upon New Rome the t.i.tle "The Queen of Cities," for the aspect of the city is not only lovely, but carries in its aspect the unmistakable air of the majesty and authority that befit the capital of a great Empire.

Here is an eye "to threaten and command." The city spreads itself before you for some three miles on both sides of the Golden Horn, seated upon hills that rise steeply from the water's edge, and lift the long and wide panorama high into view. The buildings are packed close together, and rise tier above tier from the sh.o.r.e to the summit of the hills.

Great mosques, rectangular buildings surmounted by domes and flanked by graceful minarets, occupy the most commanding positions, and crown the city with a diadem of oriental splendour. The Golden Horn, one of the finest harbours in the world, where the wars.h.i.+ps of a nation may ride at ease, and great merchantmen can moor along the sh.o.r.e, is so inwoven with the city as to be its princ.i.p.al thoroughfare, its "Grand Ca.n.a.l,"

alive with boats of every description, and spanned by bridges over which the population streams to and fro in great tides. The city is generally irradiated by an atmosphere of extraordinary clearness, brilliance, and warmth of colour. Sometimes the solid earth seems transfigured by the light into a glorious spiritual essence. Early in the morning, Constantinople is often shrouded in a thick veil of mist, and, as the sun gains strength, it is beautiful to see the veil gradually rent at different points, and the objects it covered emerge, piece by piece, one by one, now here now there, a dome, a minaret, a palace, a red-tiled roof, a group of cypresses, as though a magician was constructing the city anew in your presence, until the immense capital gleams before you in its mighty proportions and minute details. Nor is the vision less memorable towards sunset, when the lights and shadows paint this varied surface of hills and valleys, of land and water, while the long array of mosques and minarets upon the hills overhanging the Golden Horn rests against the deepening glory of the sky. It is the vision which Browning saw with a poet's eye:--

Over the waters in the vaporous West The sun goes down as in a sphere of gold Behind the arm of the city, which between, With all that length of domes and minarets, Athwart the splendour, black and crooked runs Like a Turk verse along a scimitar.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GOLDEN HORN, EARLY MORNING

Beyond the pile of buildings in the foreground a glimpse of the Golden Horn is seen with Stamboul partly shrouded in mist in the distance.]

The portion of the Golden Horn to the east of the Galata Bridge is crowded with foreign steams.h.i.+ps, among which those bearing the flags of Britain, France, Austria, Italy, Germany, Greece, and Roumania, are the most conspicuous. It may not be to the credit of the country, nor for its greatest advantage, that so much of the commerce of the place should be in foreign hands, but this gathering of the nations in the harbour of the city is imposing; it is an indication of the central position occupied by the city in the world's affairs, and contributes largely to form the cosmopolitan character for which Constantinople is distinguished. Here the nations a.s.semble to compete with one another as nowhere else in the world, at least in a way so manifest and decisive.

This was a feature of the life of the city also before Turkish days.

There was a time, indeed, during the Middle Ages when the commerce between the East and the West was exclusively in the hands of the subjects of the Byzantine Empire, when the merchants of Constantinople were the merchant princes of the civilised world. But not to speak of the interference of the Saracens with the trade of the city, the formidable compet.i.tion of the Italian Maritime States began to make itself felt towards the close of the eleventh century, and from that time onwards became more and more serious until it well-nigh destroyed the business carried on by the native inhabitants. This was due partly to the enterprise of the Italian merchants, and partly to the policy which purchased the aid of the Western States against the foes of the Empire by means of commercial concessions which proved detrimental to domestic trade. It was thus that Alexius Comnenus secured the help of Venice against the Normans, and that Michael Palaeologus obtained the support of the Genoese, when, in 1261, he undertook the task of recovering Constantinople from its Latin occupants. The attack upon Constantinople in 1203-1204 by the Fourth Crusade, at the instigation of the Doge Henrico Dandolo, was essentially a piratical expedition to capture the commerce of the East for the benefit of the merchants of Venice. In the course of time the foreign traders in Constantinople were allowed by the Byzantine emperors to occupy the territory extending along the southern sh.o.r.e of the Golden Horn from the Seraglio Point to Zindan Kapoussi. They were grouped according to their nationality, and placed beside one another in the following order, Saracens, Genoese, Pisans, traders from Amalfi, Venetians. After 1261, the Genoese were settled in Galata, where they have left a monument of their occupation in the strong and ma.s.sive Tower of Galata, that formed their watch-tower and citadel, and where they established, at the very gates of the capital, so strong a rival, that, as Gibbon observes, "The Roman Empire might soon have sunk into a province of Genoa, if the Republic had not been checked by the ruin of her freedom and naval power." These foreign communities were allowed to be self-governing, so far as the Byzantine Government was concerned. They had their own courts of justice, and their own places of wors.h.i.+p, even the Saracens being allowed to possess a mosque. A certain number of houses, a certain extent of territory, and particular piers at which their s.h.i.+ps could moor for discharging or receiving cargo, were a.s.signed to them, and, as a rule, they paid lower duties than native merchants did. Sometimes, it seems they were liable to render military service, as though feudal va.s.sals, but to all intents and purposes they enjoyed under the Byzantine emperors very much the position which foreigners in Turkey now occupy, in virtue of the Capitulations granted by Sultans to European residents. The original copies of several of the commercial treaties between the Empire and the Italian States are preserved in the archives of Venice, Genoa, and other cities of Italy, and furnish an interesting chapter in the history of diplomacy and commerce.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BRIDGE FROM GALATA

The sailing boats used in these waters are constructed so that the mast and sail can be lowered in a few seconds to shoot the arches of the bridge.]

The most picturesque portion of the Golden Horn is that which lies between the two bridges. Along the Galata sh.o.r.e, a large flotilla of gaunt native barges, with short masts and long oblique yards, is generally moored, waiting to be employed in the trans.h.i.+pment of the cargoes that leave or reach the port. Here also a ma.s.s of native s.h.i.+pping is laid up for the winter, after the fas.h.i.+on of the early days of navigation. It is a dense forest of bare masts and poles involved in a network of cordage, with the steep hill, upon which the stone houses of Galata and Pera are built, as a rocky background. After a night of rain, the scene changes. Then from every yard and mast, heavy, damp sails are spread in the warm, misty, morning air, and you seem to look upon a flock of great sea-birds opening their wings to bask in the suns.h.i.+ne. Along the opposite sh.o.r.e, surmounted by the domes and minarets of the Mosque of Sultan Suleiman, the bank is fringed with native craft, laden with fruit or oil from the islands of the aegean Sea, or bringing planks and beams to the timber-yards at Odoun Kapan from the lands beside the Danube. Timber has been stored at that point ever since the days of Justinian the Great, if not ever since the city was founded.

Caiques flit to and fro, as if shuttles weaving the sundered parts of the city together. While companies of fearless sea-gulls spread grey wings and white b.r.e.a.s.t.s over the blue waters, and dance around in every graceful form that motion can a.s.sume. It is the portion of the harbour in which the world of the East is still most clearly reflected. The reach of the Golden Horn beyond the Inner Bridge is specially devoted to the service of the Turkish navy, and there may be seen such modern things as ironclads, torpedo boats, and torpedo destroyers. The time was when the Ottoman fleet which gathered here formed an imposing display of naval strength. The Admiralty, Naval Hospital, and Dockyard are situated on the northern bank. On the hill above the Dockyard is the Okmeidan, the field to which the Sultans whose strong arms built up the Ottoman Power came to exercise themselves in the use of the bow. It is studded with pillars commemorating the long shots made by the imperial archers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GOLDEN HORN

Seen from the water's edge on a misty morning; crowning the distant heights is the Mosque of Suleiman the Magnificent.]

The southern bank, with its steep slopes crowded with konaks, gardens, mosques, minarets, is noteworthy for the number of Byzantine churches still found beside the sh.o.r.e or upon the hill-sides, preserving the memory and something of the aspect of the ancient city. Among them are, S. Theodosia (Gul Djamissi), Pantocrator (Kilisse Djamissi), Pantepoptes (Eski Imaret Djamissi), Pammakeristos (Fetiyeh Djamissi), Chora (Kahriyeh Djamissi), SS. Peter and Mark (Atik Mustapha Pasha Djamissi).

Close to the western extremity of the sh.o.r.e stood the Church of S. Mary of Blachernae, once the object of profoundest reverence on account of the wonder-working power attributed to the reputed girdle and mantle of the Mother of the Lord, enshrined among its relics. The site is marked by the Holy Well formerly attached to the sanctuary. On the hill above the Well are the scanty remains of the famous Palace of Blachernae, once the favourite residence of the Byzantine Court. In the quarter of Phanar the humble residence and the cathedral of the Patriarch of Constantinople are found. What a contrast to the days when the chiefs of the Eastern Church were enthroned under the dome of S. Sophia! In the quarter of Balat, and at Haskeui on the opposite sh.o.r.e, are large settlements of Jews, to whose lowly dwellings belongs the historical interest that they are the homes of the descendants of the Jews who were expelled from Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella, and found refuge here among Moslems from persecution by Christians. They still use the Spanish language, although not with the music of the speech of Castile. The suburb of Eyoub at the foot of the hills at the head of the Golden Horn, and the meadows beside the fresh-water streams which enter the harbour at that point (the Sweet Waters of Europe) are interesting to all who delight in Oriental scenes. No quarter in or around the city is so Turkish in its appearance and spirit as the suburb of Eyoub. It contains the reputed grave of Eyoub, the standard-bearer of Mahomet, who was present at the first siege of Constantinople (673-678) by the Saracens, and who died during its course. The grave was identified, so it is believed, in 1453, when the city fell at last into Turkish hands, and the mosque erected over the tomb is the sanctuary in which Sultans, upon their accession to the throne, gird on the sword which const.i.tutes them sovereigns of the Ottoman Empire, and standard-hearers of Islam. It is a ceremony which embodies the inmost idea of a Moslem State. No Christian is permitted to enter the mosque. On a recent occasion the veneration in which the edifice is held served a n.o.ble purpose. During the ma.s.sacres of 1896, a crowd of Armenians took refuge in the court of the mosque, with the courage of despair. A wild mob followed, intent upon the death of the fugitives. A terrible scene seemed inevitable. When, at the critical moment, the imaum of the mosque appeared, and forbade the desecration of the holy ground by the shedding of blood upon it. The appeal was irresistible. The horde of murderers bowed to the command to be gone, and their intended victims were allowed to escape. The sacred a.s.sociations of the suburb have made burial in its soil to be esteemed a great honour, and, accordingly, many distinguished Turkish personages have been laid to rest here from early times. The old turbaned tombstones, inscribed with Arabic letters, painted with floral designs, shaded by trees and overrun by climbing plants, form as picturesque a cemetery as one can wish to see. The influence of the suburb is not weakened by the fact that it enters into the life of Turkish children by being a great factory of their toys. The hill above Eyoub commands a magnificent view of the Golden Horn and the city. As to the scene in the valley of the Sweet Waters, where Turkish ladies gather on Fridays in early spring, it is no longer what it once was. The exchange of native vehicles for carriages such as may be seen in Paris or London, and the general use by Turkish ladies of quiet colours in their mantles and head-dress instead of bright hues, have robbed the spectacle of almost all its gaiety, originality, and decorative effect. The scene offers now rather a study in the transformation of the Turkish woman, than a presentation of her peculiar aspect and character. Still, as the change is not complete, a stranger may yet find pleasure in seeing what vestiges of former manners and customs have not disappeared.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SULEIMANIYEH AT SUNRISE

The Mosque of Suleiman the Magnificent, occupying one of the finest sites in the city, is seen here at early sunrise emerging from the mist on the Golden Horn.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: CEMETERY AT EYOUB

A cobble-paved pathway in the most picturesque cemetery in Constantinople.]

Of the historical events of which the Golden Horn has been the theatre, the most important are: first, the attack upon the walls along this side of the city, in 1203, and again in 1204, by the Venetian fleet which accompanied the Fourth Crusade; second, the transportation by Sultan Mehemet into its waters in 1453, of wars.h.i.+ps over the hill that separates the harbour from the Bosporus. The movements of the Venetian fleet and of the army which accompanied it can be followed step by step, so minute is the description of Ville-Hardouin and so unaltered the topography of the country. Upon approaching the city the invaders put in at San Stefano, now a favourite suburban resort upon the Sea of Marmora.

A south wind carried them next to Scutari. From that point they crossed to the bay now occupied by the Palace of Dolma Bagtche, near Bes.h.i.+ktash.

There the army landed, and advancing along the sh.o.r.e attacked the tower to which the northern end of the chain across the harbour's mouth was fastened. Upon the capture of the tower after a feeble resistance, the chain was cut, and the fleet of Venice under the command of Dandolo, flying the ensign of S. Mark, rode into the Golden Horn and made for the head of the harbour. At the same time, the troops marched towards the same point, along the northern sh.o.r.e, where Ca.s.sim Pasha and Haskeui are now situated. At the latter suburb they crossed the stone bridge that led to Eyoub on the southern bank. Then turning eastwards, they seized the hill facing the portion of the city walls above which the windows and domes of the Palace of Blachernae looked towards the west. While the army prepared to attack that point, the s.h.i.+ps of Dandolo stood before the harbour walls, in a long line from Aivan Serai to the Phanar and the neighbourhood of the present Inner Bridge. A desperate a.s.sault followed, in which twenty-five towers were carried by the Venetians, and the day would have been won, but for the repulse of the land forces and the necessity to hasten to their relief. Soon a revolution within the city against the usurper whom the Crusaders had come to depose, and in favour of the restoration of Isaac Angelus, whose claim to the throne they supported, seemed to bring the struggle to an end. As a sign that amicable relations had been established, and to avoid the danger of angry collisions with the citizens, the invaders removed their forces to the northern side of the Golden Horn. But the conditions on which help had been rendered to Isaac Angelus were too hard to be fulfilled; and insistence upon them provoked the national feeling against the foreign intruders. The imperial proteges of the Crusaders were murdered, or died from fear, and the smouldering embers of the strife burst once more into flames. The army of the Crusade was therefore taken on board the fleet, and proceeded to make a joint attack upon the portion of the harbour walls which Dandolo had once before captured. Victory wavered from side to side. At length, on Easter Monday 1204, Venetian s.h.i.+ps approached so near to the walls in the Phanar quarter that bridges attached to the masts settled upon the parapet of the fortifications. Brave knights rushed across, cut down the defenders, clambered down into the city, and threw open the nearest gates. The blind Doge, ninety years old, leaped upon the beach, with the banner of S. Mark in his hands, and summoned his men to follow. The Emperor Murtzuphlus, who watched these operations from the terrace of the Church of Pantepoptes, fled, and for the first time in its history, Constantinople became the prize of a foreign foe.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GALATA AND STAMBOUL FROM EYOUB

From the cemetery at Eyoub, overhanging the Golden Horn at the upper end, an attractive panorama is presented. On the right are the domes and minarets of Stamboul stretching away to Seraglio Point; in the distance is Mount Olympus on the Asiatic coast, while on the right are Galata, Pera, and the a.r.s.enal.]

The transportation of a fleet over the hill that rises some two hundred and fifty feet between the Bosporus and the Golden Horn was a skilful piece of strategy, and formed one of the most striking incidents in the siege of 1453. By compelling attention to the safety of the walls along the harbour, it extended the line of attack, and weakened the defence of the landward walls. To effect the pa.s.sage, a road was made through the ravines leading from Bes.h.i.+ktash on the straits to Ca.s.sim Pasha on the Golden Horn. On that road well-greased logs were laid, like the sleepers on a railway, and then some seventy or eighty galleys, of fifteen, twenty, or twenty-two pairs of oars, were placed in s.h.i.+ps' cradles and dragged by men, oxen, and buffaloes, in the course of a single night, up one slope and down the other, from sea to sea. The incongruous form of navigation put everybody concerned in making the voyage into good humour. Drums beat, fifes sounded, and to add to the zest of the enterprise, the sails were unfurled, the oars were pulled, the rudders set, as if the vessels were proceeding over their native element. But the apparition of the enemy's s.h.i.+ps in the Golden Horn afforded no amus.e.m.e.nt to the besieged. It increased immensely their anxiety and the difficulties of their task. A brave attempt to burn the Turkish vessels failed, and though the flotilla actually did little in the way of direct attack, it remained a standing menace to the northern side of the city until the close of the siege, a thunder-cloud keeping men in constant dread of the bolts that might dart from its black bosom. Very appropriately, the Turkish Admiralty stands on the sh.o.r.e of the bay in which an Ottoman fleet first rode the waters of the Golden Horn.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GOLDEN HORN AFTER SUNSET