thinking
of the famous Balkan lands which extend to the south--Albania, with its
warlike people among its mountains and dales; Macedonia, the country of
Alexander the Great; Greece, in ancient times the centre of learning and
art. When day dawns we are in Turkey, and the sun is high when the train
comes to a standstill in Constantinople.

CONSTANTINOPLE

[Illustration: PLATE II. CONSTANTINOPLE.]

From the highest platform of the lofty tower which rises from the square
in the centre of the promontory of Stambul a wonderful view can be
obtained of the city and its surroundings--a singular blending of great
masses of houses and glittering sheets of blue water. Stambul is the
Turkish quarter. It consists of a sea of closely-built wooden houses of
many colours. Out of the confusion rise the graceful spires of minarets
and the round domes of mosques (Plate II.). Just below your feet is the
great bazaar--the merchants' town; and farther off is St. Sophia, the
principal mosque. Like Rome, the city is built on seven hills. In the
valleys between, shady trees and gardens have found a site. Far to the
west are seen the towers on the old wall of Stambul.

[Illustration: PLAN OF CONSTANTINOPLE.]

Before you to the north, on the point of a blunt promontory, stand the
two quarters called Galata and Pera. There Europeans dwell, and there
are found Greeks and Italians, Jews and Armenians, and other men of
races living in the adjacent countries--in the Balkan Peninsula, in Asia
Minor and Caucasia.

Between this blunt peninsula and Stambul an inlet runs north-westwards
deep into the land. Its name is the Golden Horn, and over its water
priceless treasures have from time immemorial been transported in ships.

Turn to the north-east. There you see a sound varying little in breadth.
Its surface is as blue as sapphire, its shores are crowned by a whole
chaplet of villages and white villas among luxuriant groves. This sound
is the Bosporus, and through it is the way to the Black Sea. Due east,
on the other side of the Bosporus, Scutari rises from the shore to the
top of low hills. Scutari is the third of the three main divisions of
Constantinople. You stand in Europe and look over the great city
intersected by broad waterways and almost forget that Scutari is
situated in Asia.

Turn to the south. Before your eyes lies the Sea of Marmora, a curious
sheet of water which is neither a lake nor a sea, neither a bay nor a
sound. It is a