under
obligations.

I thoroughly enjoyed some days of careless loafing about Canea. I have
intimated my slight experience of Turkish towns; and if the critic
should think it worth while to remark that I should have seen
Constantinople and Cairo, Smyrna and Salonica, before attempting to
describe one, I admit the justice of the criticism, and pass over
readily all that is Turkish in Canea, the more that it is mainly of
negative or destructive character. What remains of interest in Canea is
Venetian, though of that there is almost nothing which represents the
great period of the sea-republic, except the fine, and in most parts
well-conditioned walls. Here and there a double-arched window, with a
bit of fine carving in the capitals, peeps out from the jutting
uglinesses of seraglio windows, close latticed and mysterious; one or
two fine doorways, neglected and battered as to their ornamentation,
some coats of arms, three or four arched gateways, and as many
fountains, are all that will catch the eye of the artist inside the
walls, unless it be the port, with its quaint and picturesque boats of
antique pattern.

Canea had its west-end in what is now known as the Castelli,--the slight
elevation on which, most probably, the ancient city was built, and on
which stood the Venetian citadel, and the aristocratic quarter, enclosed
and gated with an interior wall, whose circuit may still be traced in
occasional glimpses of the brown stone above and between the Turkish
houses. The Castelli of to-day is the principal street of this quarter,
running through its centre, and guarded by the gates whose arches
remain, valueless and without portcullis, but showing in their present
state how strong a defence was needed to assure the patricians in their
slumbers against any importunate attempts of their malcontent subjects
and fellow-townsmen to clear off the score which the infamous government
of the Republic accumulated. One doorway in this street struck me
particularly, from the exquisite ornamentation of its stone doorway; but
the palace to which it opened is abandoned, and in ruins. Most of the
better class of these houses are in the same state, modern repair being
only a shabby patching up and whitewashing. The quarter is inhabited
almost entirely by Mussulmans; and, though habitable houses are greatly
in demand in the business parts of Canea, and many of these old palaces
could be made available at a small cost, their owners have so