ns you ask me, though I am utterly incapable of answering
them. And, indeed, were I as good a mathematician as Euclid himself,
it requires an age's stay to make just observations on the air and
vapours. I have not been yet a full year here, and am on the point
of removing. Such is my rambling destiny. This will surprise you,
and can surprise no body so much as myself. Perhaps you will accuse
me of laziness, or dulness (sic), or both together, that can leave
this place, without giving you some account of the Turkish court. I
can only tell you, that if you please to read Sir Paul Rycaut, you
will there find a full and true account of the vizier's, the
_beglerbys_, the civil and spiritual government, the officers of the
seraglio, &c. things that 'tis very easy to procure lists of, and
therefore may be depended on; though other stories, God knows--I say
no more--every body is at liberty to write their own remarks; the
manners of people may change; or some of them escape the observation
of travellers; but 'tis not the same of the government; and, for that
reason, since I can tell you nothing new, I will tell you nothing of
it. In the same silence shall be passed over the arsenal and seven
towers; and for mosques, I have already described one of the noblest
to you very particularly. But I cannot forbear taking notice to you
of a mistake of Gemelli, (though I honour him in a much higher degree
than any other voyage-writer:) he says that there are no remains of
Calcedon; this is certainly a mistake: I was there, yesterday, and
went cross the canal in my galley, the sea being very narrow between
that city and Constantinople. 'Tis still a large town, and has
several mosques in it. The Christians still call it Calcedonia, and
the Turks give it a name I forgot, but which is only a corruption of
the same word. I suppose this is an error of his guide, which his
short stay hindered him from rectifying, for I have, in other
matters, a very just esteem for his veracity. Nothing can be
pleasanter than the canal; and the Turks are so well acquainted with
its beauties, that all their pleasure-seats are built on its banks,
where they have, at the same time, the most beautiful prospects in
Europe and Asia; there are near one another some hundreds of
magnificent palaces. Human grandeur being here yet more unstable
than any where else, 'tis common for the heirs of a great
three-tailed bassa, not to be rich enough to keep in repair