Knighthood Is Gone - Amen; It Expired With Dignity, Its Face
To The Foe:
And old Mahometanism is lingering about just ready to
drop.
But it is unseemly to see such a Grand Potentate in such a
state of decay: the son of Bajazet Ilderim insolvent; the
descendants of the Prophet bullied by Calmucs and English and
whipper-snapper Frenchmen; the Fountain of Magnificence done up,
and obliged to coin pewter! Think of the poor dear houris in
Paradise, how sad they must look as the arrivals of the Faithful
become less and less frequent every day. I can fancy the place
beginning to wear the fatal Vauxhall look of the Seraglio, and
which has pursued me ever since I saw it: the fountains of eternal
wine are beginning to run rather dry, and of a questionable liquor;
the ready-roasted-meat trees may cry, "Come eat me," every now and
then, in a faint voice, without any gravy in it - but the Faithful
begin to doubt about the quality of the victuals. Of nights you
may see the houris sitting sadly under them, darning their faded
muslins: Ali, Omar, and the Imaums are reconciled and have gloomy
consultations: and the Chief of the Faithful himself, the awful
camel-driver, the supernatural husband of Khadijah, sits alone in a
tumbledown kiosk, thinking moodily of the destiny that is impending
over him; and of the day when his gardens of bliss shall be as
vacant as the bankrupt Olympus.
All the town of Rhodes has this appearance of decay and ruin,
except a few consuls' houses planted on the sea-side, here and
there, with bright flags flaunting in the sun; fresh paint; English
crockery; shining mahogany, &c., - so many emblems of the new
prosperity of their trade, while the old inhabitants were going to
rack - the fine Church of St. John, converted into a mosque, is a
ruined church, with a ruined mosque inside; the fortifications are
mouldering away, as much as time will let them. There was
considerable bustle and stir about the little port; but it was the
bustle of people who looked for the most part to be beggars; and I
saw no shop in the bazaar that seemed to have the value of a
pedlar's pack.
I took, by way of guide, a young fellow from Berlin, a journeyman
shoemaker, who had just been making a tour in Syria, and who
professed to speak both Arabic and Turkish quite fluently - which I
thought he might have learned when he was a student at college,
before he began his profession of shoemaking; but I found he only
knew about three words of Turkish, which were produced on every
occasion, as I walked under his guidance through the desolate
streets of the noble old town. We went out upon the lines of
fortification, through an ancient gate and guard-house, where once
a chapel probably stood, and of which the roofs were richly carved
and gilded. A ragged squad of Turkish soldiers lolled about the
gate now; a couple of boys on a donkey; a grinning slave on a mule;
a pair of women flapping along in yellow papooshes; a basket-maker
sitting under an antique carved portal, and chanting or howling as
he plaited his osiers:
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