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Growing tired of waiting for promotion, he had decided on becoming a Muhammadan, obtained the rank of a captain, and instructed the sons of Ibrahim Pacha in modern languages and military science. It would have scarcely been believed at that time that this tall young man, who did not appear to be in the most flourishing circumstances, would eventually become the celebrated Omar Pacha, commander-in-chief of the Osmanli army, and whose bravery and strategic talent are recognised by the whole of Europe.

The continued insults to which our author was subjected by his superior officer in the commission, and the impossibility of obtaining redress, decided him on throwing up his charge, and he determined on proceeding, via Rustchuk, to Stamboul. He therefore went on board a salt vessel, which bore him to Rustchuk. His first business was to call on the Pacha, and obtain permission to continue his journey to Constantinople. The Pacha promised him a firman and post-horses to carry him to Varna, whence he could take ship to Stamboul. After some days' delay he again called on the pacha on the subject, but all the answer he could obtain was, "Bakalym, Inshallah-Allah Kerim !" At last, however, he succeeded, and with a piece of cold mutton and some bread in one saddle-bag, and several bottles of wine in the other, he passed through the gate of Rustchuk, en route for Schumla and the Balkan.

The Balkan, called by the Greeks Homus, by the Turks Eminèh Dagh, the chief chain of mountains in European Turkey, is a continuation of the Dinarie Alps, which themselves are a continuation of the Julian, which extend from Terglou to the neighbourhood of Zeng; to the Balkan, also, belongs the mountain range to the west of Dupnitza in Rumelia. From this point a branch, known by the name of Bora, anciently Bernus, runs southwards, and forms the frontier between Macedonia and Albania. A second branch of the Balkan divides itself from the main range at Pristina in Servia, forms the Servian Highlands, and ends near Belgrade on the Danube. A third runs from Orbelo to Orsova. A fourth also runs in a southerly direction to Salonichi in Macedonia, and forms Athos or Monte Santo in the Archipelago. A fifth extends from Dubnitza, in a south-western direction, to the Archipelago, and terminates near the Maritza, the ancient Hebrus. The sixth, the little Balkan, separates at no great distance from Gabrova, the former Nicopolis ad Hæmum, from the main range, and runs in a north-western direction towards Varna, and then in a northern to Isaktji, where it terminates near the mouths of the Danube. A seventh, commencing at Selimno in Rumelia, runs south-west, and divides at Burgos into two branches, of which one, known by the name of Tekiri, turns towards the south-west, and terminates at Sestos in the Dardanelles; while the other, under the name of Strandjea, extends to Constantinople and the Bosphorus. The principal chain of the Balkan, which extends constantly from east to west, terminates in Cape Eminèh to the north of Misivria in Rumelia, upon the Black Sea. In the west it terminates in the promontory of San Stephano, on the Adriatic Gulf.

The whole range of the Balkan forms a chain of precipitous rocky walls, full of terrible abysses and deep ravines, and presents the greatest difficulties to the passage of troops and artillery. The Balkan is most passable over the Eminèh Dagh towards the coast of the Euxine, but the roads there are merely rough footpaths, as indeed they are through the whole chain: the one, however, leading from Varna to Constantinople is

practicable for infantry and cavalry, as far as the village of Belgrade, fifteen miles from the capital. There are in the whole six roads across the Balkan, of which two lead to Stamboul, and are not everywhere practicable for artillery: the chief pass is near Schumla.

The Balkan affords an endless variety of natural beauties. The traveller passes first through gloomy valleys, which are inclosed by perpendicular walls of rock, then past terrible abysses, in whose depth a wild. mountain stream frets and foams; then he arrives among shadowy forests, behind which the valley suddenly extends into a wide mirror-like lake, which is surrounded by wooded hills, with their dark green foliage; then the road turns, you climb a wooded path, and when you have surmounted the peak, the Black Sea is visible in the distant mist. The path again descends, and a pleasant valley is reached, when the rising smoke and the barking of dogs announce the presence of human beings, who are found in a little sequestered village, surrounded by cultivated land and meadows. But the scene is soon changed into a romantic rocky district, with waterfalls and cascades. The whole is continually adorned with a luxuriant growth of forest vegetation.

After a pleasant ride through the Balkan the baron reached Schumla, a place at present so celebrated in the bulletins from the seat of war. We find the following description of it:

In and round Schumla there are a number of mesonais, or cemeteries, which in the distance look like gardens, so thickly are they strewn with gravestones, of which the majority are plain. To the left of the town there is a large magazine, built of brick, before which piles of cannon-balls and other ammunition are collected. There are a great number of such buildings, which have considerable claim to architectural beauty; they belong to the government, and serve for military or civil purposes. The streets are very uneven, extremely badly paved, and in a most dirty condition. Robberies take place in the most impudent fashion, and the kadi conceals himself in the Djamia that he may not be pestered by complaints. It seems as if the Turks of Schumla were different from the inhabitants of other Osmanli towns; cheating and villany, bigotry and hypocrisy, are in great fashion here. I made quite sufficient experience on this subject. The impertinence, begging, and curiosity of the lower classes is prevalent in all Turkish towns, but here they pass all bounds.

In our author's day the whole fortifications of Schumla consisted of a poor glacis surrounded with palisades and a moat with a few bastions, which are in communication with the entrenched lines of the camp; all the heights around Schumla are fortified, but the loose nature of the soil does not permit any permanent earthworks. Schumla, through its position, is remarkably valuable to the Osmanli, as its loss would open the passage over the Balkan, and consequently the road to the heart of the empire and Stamboul. Under the direction of an experienced engineer, who would take some of the commanding heights into the line of defence, and if the Osmanli government would defray the necessary expenses for erecting the works of stone, it might be rendered one of the strongest fortresses in the world, and almost impregnable. In addition to this, the situation is very healthy, and there is an abundance of good drinking water.

On arriving at Varna, nothing was to be seen all around except the Russian encampments-barracks intermixed with tents, broken carts and other vehicles in the wildest confusion. Destruction everywhere prevailed; the fortifications of Varna had been blown up by the Russians, and most of the houses had fallen in, partly from the terrible explosion, partly from their vicinity to the walls. It was a melancholy and a disgusting

sight; for all was full of filth, and even at a distance the olfactory nerves were painfully affected by the pestilential stenches. Wherever a Russian regiment has been encamped for a month the atmosphere is corrupted for a long time; and an old Russian soldier's proverb says, that no grass will grow there for two years. As our author rode through the gate he witnessed the following scene, which gives a good idea of the Russian character: The Russian sentinel had stopped a Turk who carried a large basket of pomegranates on his head; while the two were talking, another Russian was standing behind the Turk and lightening his basket by allowing one pomegranate after the other to slip into the pocket of his coarse cloak; when the thief had retired a sufficient distance not to excite suspicion, the sentry suffered the Turk to pass, who, in the zeal of his objections, had not noticed what had occurred.

What I saw in the interior of Varna made no pleasing impression upon me; these soldiers who, when off duty, wear their cloak winter and summer, and a cap without a peak, in which they look as if they were sewn up in a long hair sack-these officers, whose uniforms the long campaign and the bivouac had ruined, in their dark short undress coats, full of stains, frequently with holes at the elbows, with the high, stiff red collar up to the ears, fastened up to the chin, with copper epaulettes, whose gilding had been tarnished by wind and rain-with their worn-out ragged trousers, and the waists of their coats between their shoulders-these men, who seemed quite worn out by privations, long marches, and disease-the few sorrowful Turks-the destroyed and ruined houses-the desolated gardens-the narrow and dirty streets, made by no means a pleasant impression on me.

On the road to the town commandant's house the baron met a young man in European dress, of whom he inquired the way. It was a Greek, and as talkative as the rest of his countrymen; so our author soon discovered that his name was Leontides; that he belonged to Missivira, on the western shores of the Black Sea, and had come across to speculate in wood, which the Russians sold here for a mere trifle. He then begged him most earnestly to live with him in a house which had been halfdestroyed by the explosions; the house was quite uninhabited. This offer the baron accepted. The whole house was a picture of destruction and disorder; the walls and stairs shook at each wave as if it were an earthquake, for not only the wall of the fortress, which kept out the sea, but the front wall of the house had fallen into the sea at the time when the fortifications were blown up. Each of the two rooms in the first floor had consequently a window which was as broad and high as the entire room. They lived there as if in a large open lantern, into which the south-east wind blew violently, and they were washed by the spray of the

sea.

During the following days the departure of the Russian troops was expedited, which the author discovered by the loss of a new pair of boots :

I was sleeping on my blanket over the trap-door when I was suddenly wakened by loud steps coming up the stairs; the thief did not even take the trouble to walk on tip-toe, as the cunning vagabonds are generally accustomed to do. My sabre always lay ready by my side, and when I heard the trap-door opened I growled out a dozen Russian oaths and stabbed away at the opening beneath me. The trap-door again closed, and I fancied I had frightened away the robber; but I had reckoned without my host, and forgot that the thiet could easily get out of the way of my blows, which were given in the dark. It would have been the wisest plan to follow, seize him by the collar, and blow out his brains, but I was sleepy and tired. The approaching dawn furnished the

best proof of this. The worst was, that there was a silver étui in the boots, for I had not a better place, as I thought, to hide it.

At last the majority of the troops had departed, and the only restaurateur in the town, a Greek, who probably in the consciousness of his guilt would not await the return of the Turks, went with them.

The conse

quence of this was, that nothing eatable could be procured for love or money, and our author was forced to live on water-melons and hard cheese, which did not at all agree with him. This, together with the pestilential air, brought on a violent attack of cholera.

I struggled against it as long as I could, and visited several Russian surgeons. But there was no chance of procuring any medicine. The gentlemen pretended that the apothecaries' stores had been sent on in advance; and in addition these are not in such a condition that everything could be found in them suitable for such a critical disease as mine. Nor could I expect any assistance from the Russian surgeons, for the most of them, with the exception of those lately brought up at Dorpat, are only rough practitioners, with whom the only cure for a fever is sour decoction of barley at any rate, it has the advantage of being cheap. In the principal hospital of Bucharest I saw the sick soldiers walking about in long dressing-gowns and immense nightcaps, apparently because the doctors ascribe a secret curative power to the latter. But the Russians generally have a great opinion of dressing-gowns. Every officer has two or three, which he wears in barracks, or even underneath his cloak. If cold supervenes, they wrap several great shawls round their necks, and so walk about the town.

:

Monsieur Leontides, as soon as he heard of the nocturnal theft, had immediately removed to other lodgings, for he was terribly alarmed, and thus proved the truth of the proverb prevalent in Stamboul about the New Greeks:

Σαραντα παλλικάρια αρματομένα

Εισκοτώσαναι μία χρομίδια γαστρομὲνα

or "forty armed Pallikari have killed a seedy onion." After a long and harassing illness, through which the baron's strong constitution carried him in safety, he at length summoned up sufficient strength to crawl to the harbour to look for a ship to carry him to Stamboul; he eventually found a passage in a wood-ship, of which the skipper was a Turk, but the crew Greek. He was so weak that he had to be carried on board, and the Greeks took advantage of his weakness to steal his meat and his few bottles of rum, instead of which they placed half a bottle of English blacking. In the night he woke and thought a draught of rum would do him no harm; we can imagine how he felt when he had taken it. This, however, fills the measure of the baron's fury against the Greeks, and he ends his book with the following tremendous diatribe:

Had I not been fully convinced of the fact before, this would have furnished a fresh proof what a bad, miserable character these soi-disant descendants of Epaminondas, Socrates, Aristides, and other great men, possess. They are robbers by sea and land. Cheats and thieves. With them there is no magnanimity, no heroism, not even simple honesty, but cowardice, hypocrisy, and wickedness, in conjunction with the most unbounded impudence. And for such a nation Byron died! for the unbridled pirate and robber liberty of such men, so many worthy Germans quitted their happy homes, and rushed to battle! Yes, I too was such an idiot, and could believe that I was about to lend my arm to a noble, worthy, and unjustly oppressed nation. Truly does

Schiller say:

Doch der schrecklichste der Schrecken
Das ist der Mensch in seiner Wahn!

LITERARY LEAFLETS.

BY SIR NATHANIEL.

No. XX. PROFESSOR WILSON.

CHRISTOPHER NORTH dead! The old man eloquent, dumb henceforth and for aye! Consigned to the dishonours of the grave yet another of the old familiar faces! O passing bell, too often of late have we heard thee ring out the old-telling how one generation passeth away-how the strong man boweth down, and how Time changeth his countenance, and Death takes him away-even Death the Skeleton, and Time the Shadow.

"I sometimes wunner," said once the Shepherd of the Noctes, speaking the thoughts of a higher than himself (for what is Hogg but for Wilson, except in a few fragments of verse ?)" I sometimes wunner how the warld will gang on when I'm dead. It's no vanity, or ony notion that I gar the wheels o' the warld wark, that makes me think sae, but just an incapacity to separate my life frae the rest o' creation. Suns settin' and risin', and me no there to glower! Birds singin', the mavis in the wood, and the laverock in the lift, and me no there to list-list-listen! . . . Some ane lovelier than the lave, singin' ane o' my ain sangs, and me in the unhearin' grave!"

Never lived there, surely, a man more keenly susceptible to emotions of this kind, and more skilled in expressing their power, in tones that go straight to the heart of others, than was the largely-gifted John Wilson. Few have equalled him in the mastery, at will, of human feelings-in opening, by a touch of his rod, the sacred source of sympathetic tears. And he too is gone; whose hand was so familiar with our heartstrings. Twenty, thirty years ago, he played at being a very aged man; twenty years passed on, and the play was no longer a jest-thirty years, and it was no more a make-believe ;-and at last we read in the common obituary of the daily press, on such a day, and in his sixty-ninth year, the name of John Wilson.

What a fervid life was his-what a luxuriant nature how richly endowed, how broadly developed, how finely strung! We love to think of him in what he calls "bold, beautiful boyhood" in the "stormy sunshine" of his tumultuous youth-when first he wandered from the conventionalities of town life into the strange world of Nature—when, "like a roe,"

when

He bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,
'Wherever nature led :-

The sounding cataract

Haunted him like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms,

were to him surcharged with almost "aching joys" and "dizzy raptures." Mr. de Quincey says, in his " Lake Reminiscences" (bearing date 1834),

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