Weekly Trinity journal., 1876-09-09
NUMBER 81.
DECAY OF THE HAREM.

Among the reforms promptly promised
by the new Sultan Murad is the sboli-
tion of the Seraglio." Should he really
have the nerve to do this, what sigh Of
relief will escape from the moral English,
who have been forced so long to wink at
the Sultanic polygamy, and give aid and
comfort to pasha with many wives -
The English have been very free to sneer
at the Americans for tolerating Brigham
Young but we do not hear that in all
the advice which has been conveyed from
st. James to Stamboul it was ever limited
that the English found it difficult to sup
port a sovereign who entertained wives by
the ship.load.
win the scraglio really be done away
with ? Visions arise OF lightly -attired
ladies', with smooth, dark skins, and long
shadowy eye -ashes, whom we have been
wont to imagine rs reclining on silken-
plllowed lounges, playing on lutes, eating
pomegranates, and putting lauguidly on
gilded chibouQueS, slipping black coffee,
and served by swarlhy serts with candies
and pastry, filing sadly out Of their won't
cd -plendor, and bctaking themselves no
one can tell whittier. Wa fancy the new
Sultan turning deaf ear to seductive
Circassian merchants, and resolutely pass
ing galaxies of newly imported beauties
with sternly head living indeed
like u Christian gentleman, with one fair
partner to share the cares of his crown
and the comforts of his wealth.
Much of the poetry of seraglio, 1t is
true, has been disspatod by the prying
eyes and unMncitIl descriptions of later
travellers, and Byron's description of it
turns out to have been to great degree
evolved out of his own sensuous imagin-
alton. Miss Pardoe gives us the idea that
the seraglio is very stupid place, full Of
gaud and glitter, but sleepy and uninter-
osting whilo Thackery thought he dis
covered that "the houris spend the best
part of the time in trying on new dresses,
eating sweet stun, talking to parrots and
winding up French clocks" Yet there
is something plcturesquey Oriental in tho
idea of the soraglio and even the tales Of
the laithless wives who used to be sewed
up in bags carried into boats aud let drop
IN tho swift current OF tho Bosphorus,
rather reused the interest Of the senti-
mental than shocked the merciful feelings
Of Humanity.
Society IN Constantinople must greatly
change If the soragio is abolished in
example of the Grand Turk himself
| What then will become Of those process
ions Of carriages, with oxen to draw them
aud yelled beauties peepng through their
shutters, which now wend their way on
/ pleasant afternoons to the Valley OF Sweet
Waters ? Where will bo those gay fcasts
their wives now so lavishly indulge
Whittier will vanish the army of ebony
attendants who now guard the harems
with SO fierce u fidelity Yet even tho
sentimentalists, who may regret tho OK
| tinction of the sort Of romance with which
polygnmy now surrounds the pinnaced
city Of the Eastern CAESARS, may be in
degree consoled by the fact that the SO
Agljo has had much to do with decay OF
| Turkish rule, aud bids fair to run II very
soon into utterruin. The extravaganza,
caprices and tyranny OF the hours have
brought more than one Grand Turk to
tgriet, aud the seragio has always been
She center Of the very worst aud most
corrupt sort Of political intrigue. So it Is
that even in Turkey, whore women are
apparently held in such light respect that
it takes shiptul of them to match the
dignity Of one man, they have been the
cause Of many wars, revolutions and MS
sassinations. A languishing Circassian
beauty has more than once upseta minis
try aud decided the fate Of aprince Of the
/ blood and has cried for the head Of hated
statesman rs child for a toy, and only
dried her eyes when her wish was grant
ed. With the seragio would disappear
one of the remaining relics Of Oriental
custom in Europe and should Murad
abolish it, be would give II very striking
| proof Of his sis@afe desire that his realm
shall be regenerated. But perhaps even
this will come too late. - 1ppteton's
JOuIHaL.