Though The
Janissaries Extort From The Public, By Direct And Indirect Means, More
Than The Pashas Ever Did By Their
Avanies, each individual discharges
the burthen imposed upon him more readily, because he is confident that
it insures the remainder
Of his fortune; in the Pasha’s time, living was
cheaper, and regular taxes not oppressive; but the Pasha would upon the
most frivolous pretexts order a man of property to be thrown into prison
and demand the sacrifice of one fourth of his fortune to grant him his
deliverance. Notwithstanding the immense income of the chief
Janissaries, they live poorly, without indulging themselves in the usual
luxuries of Turks-women and horses. Their gains are hoarded in gold
coin, and it is easy to calculate, such is the publicity with which all
sort of business is conducted, that the yearly income of several of them
cannot amount to less than thirty or forty thousand pounds sterling.
It is necessary to have lived for some time among the Turks, and to have
experienced the mildness and peacefulness of their character, and the
sobriety and regularity of their habits, to conceive it possible that
the inhabitants of a town like Aleppo, should continue to live for years
without any legal master, or administration of justice, protected only
by a miserable guard of police, and yet that the town should be a safe
and quiet residence. No disorders, or nightly tumults occur; and
instances of murder and robbery are extremely rare. If serious quarrels
sometimes happen, it is chiefly among the young Janissaries heated with
brandy and amorous passion, who after sunset fight their rivals at the
door of some prostitute. This precarious security is however enjoyed
only within the walls of the city; the whole neighbourhood of Aleppo is
infested by obscure tribes of Arab and Kurdine robbers, who through the
negligence of the Janissaries, acquire every day more insolence and more
confidence in the [p.655] success of their enterprises. Caravans of
forty or fifty camels have in the course of last winter been several
times attacked and plundered at five hundred yards from the city gate,
not a week passes without somebody being ill-treated and stripped in the
gardens near the town; and the robbers have even sometimes taken their
night’s rest in one of the suburbs of the city, and there sold their
cheaply acquired booty. In the time of Ibrahim Pasha, the neighbourhood
of Aleppo to the distance of four or five hours, was kept in perfect
security from all hostile inroads of the Arabs, by the Pasha’s cavalry
guard of Deli Bashi. But the Janissaries are very averse from exposing
themselves to danger; there is moreover no head among them to command,
no common purse to pay the necessary expences, nor any individual to
whose hands the public money might be trusted.
[p.656] APPENDIX. No. III. The Hadj Route from Damascus to Mekka.
IN later times the Hadj has been accustomed to leave Damascus on the
15th Shauwal.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 440 of 453
Words from 229491 to 229996
of 236498
