CHAPTER VI.

Difficulty of Obtaining an Insight into Turkish Character—Inconvenience of Interpreters—Errors of Travellers—Ignorance of Resident Europeans—Fables and Fable-mongers—Turkey, Local and Moral—Absence of Capital Crime—Police of Constantinople—Quiet Streets—Sedate Mirth—Practical Philosophy of the Turks—National Emulation—Impossibility of Revolution—Mahmoud and his People—Unpopularity of the Sultan—Russian Interference—Vanity of the Turks—Russian Gold—Tenderness of the Turks to Animals—Penalty for Destroying a Dog—The English Sportsman—Fondness of the Turks for Children—Anecdote of the Reiss Effendi—Adopted Children—Love of the Musselmauns for their Mothers—Turkish indifference to Death—Their Burial-places—Fasts—The Turks in the Mosque—Contempt of the Natives for Europeans—Freedom of the Turkish Women—Inviolability of the Harem—Domestic Economy of the Harem—Turkish Slaves—Anecdote of a Slave of Achmet Pasha—Cleanliness of Turkish Houses—The Real Romance of the East 86