The Press. — London, England, 1854-02-11 00:00:00

FEBRUARY 1 1 1854. Turkish morality, and undid the frigate's canopying more than once. At length the heavens cieared, also long faces, and by nine o'clock p.m. the distinguished three-tailed, and two-tailed, and no-tailed, company assembled beneath the ensigns of England, of Turkey, and of Russia; the two latter amicably joining, and forming, it might have been supposed, a galling sight for the Osmanleys, as well as the wo rd peace, which was multiplied in transparencies round the quarter-deck. If it was so, they concealed their feel ings ; looked at both with their usual apathy, and leant, as might be, on the arms of some of Diebitsch's aides-de camp present. Abaft the mizenmast a superb divan was arranged where their excellencies the pachas sat by their excellencies the ambassadors—cashmeres vying with stars. The ladies were ranged opposite, prim and prude, to be eyed by these terrible four-waved fellows, who made them selves as perfectly at home as in their own harems, smoking chibouques, and caressing their stockingless feet, which for greater ease they took out of their slippers and put on the sofa , ac cordin g to custom; the y probably would have liked the fair Franks to have rendered them the titillating process on the cranium, that minor vet cherished luxury of the harem —though, if they had the wish, it was not evpressed. Coffee was sipped, tea drunk, and the dancing then commenced between the fore and main masts. The music was excellent, and a gentle breeze brought waves of perfume from a bosquet on the fore castle. The Osmanleys left their sofas and their pipes to gloat their eyes on the mazes of the waltzers, and, but for their pelisses, might have joined them. The old Capidgi Bashi was in a state of ravishment, which the sameness of his harem had failed to produce " Wonderful !" he emphatically exclaimed; " I have lived fifty-seven years and seen nothing like this ; now that I have seen a kilo 1 will die content." The Capitan Pacha was more mode rate; lie sat himself down to learn ecarte, and succeeded in losing his money. His brother pacha, the little, lame, roundhacked, sanguinary Seraskier, Khosrew, he whom we so lately saw chief head-cutter and limb-racker in Con stantinople, was as • merry as ri buffo. • • • The entertainment went off admirably, as may be sup posed, with so much variety and novelty. Even the fair prudes became disposed to take the circumstance of having bearded spectators as a joke, and did not show off the less because avidly gazed on. Supper was announced. Each noble Osmanley then took a lady under his arm, and led her down on the maindeck, where it was served in perfect style, with a liberality which did honour to the representative of a great nation. The coup dieil was good: knives and cutlasses, forks and tomahawks, spoons and sponges, glasses and rammers, bottles and guns, napkins and aprons, flags and flounces, sparkling eyes and sparkling liquors, were all together in a narrow apace, relieving, not perplexing. Champagne flowed like fountains, other liquids like rivers. The Ostnanleys laid aside their g -avity, and dispensed for that night with the orthodox use of their fingers, though we feared that sundry man slaughters would have taken place in consequence of their awkwardness with those "accursed contrivances," knives and forks. There was never a more jovial or a more noisy banquet. They pledged the sovereigns of Europe, they pledged the ambassadresses, and they pledged each other in repeated bumpers , and talked much nonsense. The ladies fortunately did not understand Turkish. Some of them, it must be said, by repeated doses, were brought very near the verge of inebriety. Nourrey Bey /the Capitan Pacha's kinisnadar, captain of the Scherif reran, to whom I have before alluded) drank immoderately, partly from complaisance, and partly from good taste. At length, he told me, putting down his glass, filled alternately with champagne and porter, and taking my hand, that he could drink no more; I believed hint, for he had already swallowed what no one but an habitual water drinker could have done without being speechless; hit, p 'Mang to a young belle, he discreetly expressed another idea, in a tone which showed that he thought he was in the right sphere. I endeavoured, iufinitely amused, to make hint comprehend the difference between clench)/ ladies and " dancing girls." He smiled incredulously, and stroked his beard, then said," Very good ; you Franks are right to keep them for yourselves." This calumnious opinion, derived from seeing them waltz, was not con fined to honest Nourrey. More than one other grave Effendi thought there would be no harm in making proposals to ladies who they saw allowed themselves to be embraced in public. The warmth of the Seraskier's language to a beauty obliged her to appeal to an ambassa dor, who gently remonstrated with the old sinner. How ever, nothing unpleasant occurred : they were all attentively polite, and after supper consented to lower themselves, by walking a polonaise with the ladies They then took leave, having thus. in a few hours, made three giant strides in civilisation—danced with females. drank pub licly, and gamed ; and were so much pleased, that the Capitan Pacha expressed his intention of giving a ball on board the &limier, and the Seraskier Pacha of having one at his palace : of course neither one or the other took place. The Icnig stay of Captain Slade at Constanti nople enabled him fully to depict its beauties and singular fascination. Here is a piece of odd information on one of its street economies, the dogs : The dogs of Constantinople belong to everybody and to nobody ; the streets are their homes; their appearance is between a wolf and a jackal. It is astonishing how they continue their species, exposed to a rigorous winter and the casualties of a large city. They are littered and reared in the streets. In the summer several die of thirst, but none have ever been known to go mad. Though a worrying nuisance to walkers, their general utility is ob vious, for, as the Turks throw the leavings of theirkitchens nut of doors, the streets would very soon be impassable but for the scavenger-like propensities of the dogs and the storks, assisted occasionally by vultures. M they subsist THE PRESS. entirely on charity and what they pick up, instinct teaches them the necessity of a division of labour• ; and therefore, in the same manlier as a well•regulated society of beggars has separate walks for its members, they divide the city and its suburbs into districts. Were a dog found in a strange quarter he would infallibly be torn to pieces by the r. , sident dogs ; and so well are they aware of this, that no argument, not even a bone of roast meat, will induce a dog to follow a person beyond his district ; a singular and ►uthenticated fact. We caressed, for experiment, one of these animals, whose post, with many others, was near the Mevlevi Khan ; we daily fed him till he became fat and sleek, and earned his tail high, and was no longer to be recognised fur his former self. With his physical, his moral qualities improved. He lost his currishness, and when his patrons approached expressed gratitude by licking their hands, itc.; yet he would never follow them beyond an imaginary limit, either way, where he would stop, wag his tail, and look wistfully after them till they were out of sight, then return to his post. Once only I saw him over• step his limit : be was very hungry, and we were alluring him with tempting food ; but he had not exceeded twenty yards when he recollected himself, and ran hastily back. 1 cannot say if any order of precedency is observed in gaining the best stations, as near a butcher's shop, or a khan. Captain Slade met with various inconve niences in his travels, of which he includes a list. Here is item No. 1:- 1. After making a complaint to a Paella of an inferior officer ; with the intention of getting him reprimanded, or, at most, bastinadoed, to have his head brought in to you on a wooden dish, with a polite message to know if you are satisfied. We must close our extracts from a book which all will read, and which we do not affect to criticise, because its merits are obvious, with the following estimate of the peace of Adrianople and the errors of certain " antiquated" diplomatists The peace of Adrianople undeceived the Austrian Cabinet, which had constantly buoyed up the Sultan with the prospect of assistance from England. Metternich was wrong for once, but he cannot be accused of want of judgment. He knew England's trice interests, and he conjectured that her minister would have acted as be would have done iu his place. It is melancholy to think what an opportunity was lost of checking Russia in her aggrandising career ; and that the Russian Cabinet expected that England would take advantage of it was proved by Diebitsch having orders to halt the moment an English fleet should appear in the Black Sea. How nobly might England have proclaimed, "We destroyed the Turkish fleet for the sake of humanity, but we will not permit that another take advantage of that act to ruin the Sultan !" How justly would she have entered on the con test; how Europe would have appreciated it! France would have cheered her on; Austria and Prussia would have gratefully thanked her. The most satisfactory results would have been obtained, without any cost to speak of, by the gentle pressure of her peculiar and powerful arm. Two English line-of-battle ships and three frigates, joined to the Sultan's fleet, would have turned the scale of superiority on the Euxine. Six English line-otbattle ships with frigates, leaving the Turks on one side, would have been more than sufficient to keep every Russian ship in port, in which case, instead of having imposed a peace at Adrianople, the Emperor would have had to regret the destruction of his fleet and arsenal at Sevastopol. Had the Turks had the command of the sea, Varna would not have been taken in 1828; neither in 1829 would ten thousand Russian troops, with magazines and artillery, have been landed at Sizepolis, without which important appal Diebitsch would not have ventured to cross the Balkans. John Railton; or, Read and Think. By Wm. Robson. London: Routledge and Co. THE author of this little book has been en gaged in the education of the young, a fact which we learn not alone from his avowal to that effect, but from the general tone of his very didactic volume. In nearly all of its pages we can detect the hand of a school master. It has too much of dogmatic decision on the merits of a number of characters, his torical, literary, and political. Mr. Robson has evidently been prone to challenging the pretensions of those who have gained celebrity and influence ; and much of what has come from his pen has the freshness resulting from individual thought and independent opinion. He displays considerable reading, much frank ness of speaking, and not a little thinking ; but Mr. Robson has not yet arrived at the ert of producing an educational work like Joyce's Scientific Dialogues," or "Aikin's ivenings at Home." He knows books better tan things, and is more sentimental than soientific. He appears to agree with Addison in thinking that the pleasures of the imagina tion are superior to those which can be gained from science, as the first are communicative, while the last are confined to those who are technically versed in their principles and de tails. 'We will extract a specimen or two of 137 Mr. Robson's style, and let us hear him hold ing forth against an English love of money : In these reigns a new aristocracy—the aristocracy of wealth—has sprung up amongst us, and endangered every liberal opinion and feeling. Such is the power and extent of this love of money that it pervades all classes and ages. It has drawn upon us the ridicule of the whole world. I heard it remarked by a very sensible lady, long resident on the Continent, that it constitutes the principal difference between the conversation of the French and that of the English. From the peer to the peasant, all are absorbed in money, or money's worth. It has reached even our young men ; everything is to be decided by a bet ; argu ment, reason, are nothing; if you don't agree with nit, will you back your opinion? If a young man buy a fine horse, which proves to be a good hunter, the consequence is, not for him to tell you how much he likes him, and how long he means to keep him, but how much he is worth in the field, or how much he will fetch " at the Corner " (Tat tersall's 1. The worship of Mammon is entirely lest active of the character of the gentleman. J care not what the political economista tell us of the improvement money makes in a state, nor what they say of its being the symbol of the necessaries, comforts, and luxuries of life. lam quite satisfied that, where the spirit of gain exclusively prevails, all the better feelings of humanity decline. Our great enemy Bonaparte used to ridicule us as a "nation of shopkeepers ;" the shopkeepers, an industrious, perse vering class, withstood him, and beat hint; but now, alas ! I fear we little merit that honourable distinction : we have become a " nation of gamblers." Mr. Robson is no enthusiast about the " Fine Arts," and frankly confesses that he is "a little of a heretic in these matters." For " a little " we should read rather " very much "of one." Echoing what came from the Abbe de St. Pierre, one of his dialogues runs on thus : " But these opinions," said John, " were all very wrong, were they not?' " That is a question not to be easily answered," replied Mr. Railton " They are doubtful; but his illustration is correct: Italy has never been a nation of men since it became a nation of artists. I am a little of a heretic iu these matters ; much may be said for, much against, these opinions. St. Pierre in such a Court must have been like Apemantus in the splendid mansion and among the extra vagances of Timon. Louis IV. was possessed with the idea of some of the great ancients—finding a city of brick, and leaving one of marble." " And is not that right and patriotic, father?" asked John. It is but a hackneyed phrase, often used, and necer well," replied Mr. Railton. " All who have employed it have been actuated more by personal vanity than by public spirit." " What, the great Pericles, who, I think I have read, w as the first to use it ?" " Ay," replied his father, " from the senseless and cruel builders of the Pyramids to the as senseless erector of the gewgaws of the Brighton Pavilion. The Egyptian rulers, the Pericles, the Roman emperors. the Medici, the Louis XIV., the Georges IV., all had but one view, and but one end. Few gain from posterity the admiration they expected ; and the pyramidical gentlemen quite missed their mark, for even their names are unknown. What is the history of Athens since Pericles fulfilled his boast, and left it of marble ? What of Rome, since the emperors acted up to the vain ideas of Augustus, and filled it with such buildings as the Colosseum, the hideous arena of gladiators? What of Florence, since the magnificent Lorenzo? or of the Pontifical city, since his son Leo, to carry out the grand ideas inculcated by his father, and to marblify the mistress of the Christian world, dethroned her, and destroyed the Church which supported her great ness ? What of France, since Le Grand Monarque planted vices in a hotbed of magnificence, which produced the blood-stained fruits of the Revolution ? No, John ; Cob bett's ' good, plain, brick buildings' ought to be more a monarch's care than marble palaces." This is at all events frank, if it be heretical. The Cross and the Dragon ; or, the Fortunes of Christianity in China. By John Kesson, of the British Museum. London : Smith and Elder. WE cannot accept this volume as being at all an adequate discussion of its important sub ject. Mr. Dickens describes a person writing on " Chinese metaphysics " looking out first for " China " in a gazetteer. and then getting up metaphysics from a cyclopedia! " The Cross and the Dragon " seems constructed upon that system. It is really little better than a dull review of what Protestant and Roman Catholic missionaries have done, or trust to do, iu China. It has neither Oriental scholarship nor wide historical research, and is at once defi cient in subject matter and in style. In her novel of " Mansfield Park" Miss Austen describes the heroine, Fanny Price, as being lost in the perusal of " Macartney's Embassy to China," at a time when that work was ex citing interest of a kind not very dissimilar from Mr. Layard's " Nineveh." Though dis• figured with the affectation of Parisian levity, Lord Macartney wrote with the vividness