Rutland herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1823-1847, 1843-08-17

The CEMETERIES OF CoNsTANTiNoPLE.-l
A dense and molloless cloud OF sagnant vapors
ever shrouds these drcary realms From aiar
chilling sensation informs the traveller that he
approaches their dark and dismal precincts and
as he approaches them, an icy blast rising from
their Utmost bosom rushes forth to NEE, his breath
suddenly strikes his chest and seems 10 oppose
his progress. HIS very horse snuils up the dead
ly eiuva with signs Of manifest terror, and ex.
haling cold sweat advances reluctantly over
hollow shaking ground, which loudly rc'echoes
his slow and fearful step. So long aud SO busily
has time been to work to ill up this spot with the
sad relics of mortallty-so repeatedly has Con
stantino pie poured into this ultimate receptacle,
almost its whole contents, that the capital oil
the living, spite of its immence population, scarce
counts single inhabtant for every Ten sllen, in.
mates OF this city of the dead. Already do lis
fields of Wondering bones and It's gardens oil
blooming sepuchres, IN every direction stretch
far away across the brow of the hills and the
hollow of the valleys: already are the avenues
which cross each other on every side liz tins do
main of death, so heightened that the weary s,ran-
ger, from whatever point he comes, has TO travel
many a mile between endless rows of marshalled
tombs, shaded by mourniul expresses, ere he
reaches his journeys seemingly receed'ng end J
and yet every year does this common pa,rimony
of all the heirs to decay still exhibit rapidly IN
creasing size, fresh and wider line of boundary,
and new bel, Of young plantations, growing up
between new flower beds of graves.
As sped through this awful repository, the
ranges of sepulchres terminating in evanesccnt
points, rose to the RICH, and to the left on my
passage-only for an instant to strike my sight,
and then to disappear and to make room for new
ones--in such rapid and yet such unceasing sue.
cession, that last fanced some spell possessed
nv soul, some fascination kept locked my senses
and hurried on with accelerated rapdity, as the
end of these melancholy alb DIES was to be the end
of my walking delusion Nor was it until near
the verge of the funerea forest through which
had been pacing for full hour, and the brighter
light of a gayer landscape again CLEANED ath
war the ghos,-like trees, that stopped to look
round, and to take more leisurely survey OF The
ground | had traversed.
There said | TO to myself lie, scarce one FOO
beneath the surface of a soil, swelling, and read,
on every point to burst with its fostering contents
more than half the generations whom death has
continued for four centuries to NOV down in the
capital of the Turkish empire. There lie sid,
by side, on the same level in cells the size oftheil
bodies, and the only distinguished by marble
turban somewhat longer or deeper -somewha
rounder or squarer--personage in life far as heav
en- and earth asunder, in birth, IN station, IN giil
of nature and in long abored requirements. -
There lie, sunk alike in their las, sleep: alike
food for the loathsome wormthe conqueror who
filled the universe with his name, and the peasan
scarce known in his own hamlet; Sultan Nah
moud, and Snl,an Mahmoud,s perhaps more de
serving horse;' elders bending under the weigh
Of years, and infants Of single hour men with
intellccts Of angels, and men with understanding
inferior TO those of brntes the beauty Of Geor
( gia and the black Of SEMINAR; vizers, beggars
heroes and women. There, perhaps mingle thei
insensible dust, the corrupt Judge and the nnocen
condemned, the murdered man and bis murderer
the adu,ercss and her injured husband, the MAJ
: ter and his meanest slave There vile insect
consume the hand Of the artist the brain OF tn
philosopher the eye which sparklcd with celcsta
fire, and the lip from which flowed irresistible 81
/ oquencel All the soil pressed by me for tn
2 las, two hours once was animated like myself
all the mould which clings TO my feet, once form
ed limbs and features like my own Like my
self all this black unseemly dust once thought
and wlled, and moved !'--Hopss 'Anastatiua
.Sul,an Mamoud's horse-actually inferred II
the cemetery Of ScutaH, under a dome suPpore
= by eight pillars.