The circumstances already related under which I went to Constantinople made me a frequent visitor at the Imperial Palace of Yildiz. The so-called Palace (recently dismantled) consisted of an extensive stretch of park-land surrounded by high walls in which were fair gardens, woodlands, lakes, interspersed with different buildings of the most varied types and kinds. There were mansions, country-houses, stables, stud establishments, military barracks, a theatre—even a zoological garden and a china factory being thrown into the hotch-potch. Several thousand people were gathered here, consisting of the members of the Sultan’s family, their separate establishments and their dependents, besides a horde of Palace officials of every imaginable type and denomination.

During thirty years the Sultan of Turkey directed, single-handed, the destinies of his Empire from this place, paralysing every other authority, the official channels of Government included; working as hard as any nigger, yet with chaos in the end.

On a warm summer day there was an element of repose about the surroundings of the Palace soothing to the jaded nerves of the Western European, and quite different from what fancy would conjure up in connexion with the spiritual head of three hundred millions of human beings. A solitary Albanian soldier stood on guard at the entrance of the Palace, close to which on either side were unpretentious-looking porters’ lodges, whose inmates, without any uniform or other distinctive mark of their responsible position, asked you your business. If your face was known to them and a small douceur quickened their memory, you passed through without any further ado. If not, a polite request for your card and a query as to whom you wished to see might bring the request to wait whilst inquiry was made. Or it might be that merely giving the name of some influential official would suffice and you were allowed to proceed on your way.

On passing the porter’s lodge into the wall-surrounded precincts of Yildiz and turning to the left, the eye was arrested by a low-lying, bungalow-like building in which a staff was employed to peruse a promiscuous mass of European newspapers, and to translate extracts which were deemed suitable for submission to the Sultan. In the same building the stock of the various Turkish decorations was kept in a cupboard, to which, as occasion arose, the officials would come and take out those that might be wanted for bestowal.

Immediately in front of you was another building of a similar, though superior, type. Here the ground floor was devoted to the offices of the Grand Master of Ceremonies; on the first floor was that of the Sultan’s First Secretary, Tahsim Pasha. You passed on to the right towards a slight incline, up which many a fat Turk has toiled breathless, and beheld further to the right a more pretentious and massive structure in that peculiar bastard Oriental style of French design which apparently came into fashion in Turkey in Abdul Aziz’s time, and which, on a larger scale, is represented on the European shores of the Bosphorus by the palaces of Dolma-BaghtchÈ and Tcheragan, and on the Asiatic side by Begler-Bey, the villa farther away, in which once upon a time the Empress EugÉnie had been the Sultan’s guest. In this particular building, in the Palace at Yildiz, Ghazi Osman Pasha had his office and several of the Sultan’s chamberlains had their rooms. There also the sittings of the Supreme Military Commission, over which Osman Pasha presided, were occasionally held.

Immediately on the left was another white structure, with a richly ornamented glass door in the centre. This was the Sultan’s own kiosk, where he was much during the day and where he granted audiences. Rarely was a soldier, or indeed any other person, to be seen there, for the military guard-house was hidden from view farther away to the right. There a solitary soldier stood on guard, and the chances were that a stray officer would be sitting on a camp-stool close by smoking a cigarette. But no challenge came as you passed on to enter another unpretentious two-storied bungalow type of building. A number of dirty goloshes in the hall denoted that the official residing here must be a personage who had many callers and was much sought after, and no wonder! It was the office of the notorious Izzet Pasha, the Sultan’s Second Secretary, his favourite, and reputed to be the most influential personage in the Turkish Empire. You walk upstairs and take a seat in his room, where already a number of persons are awaiting his arrival—indeed, several rooms are full of callers waiting to see him.

A cat moves along the corridor rubbing its sides against the wall. Nobody thinks of disturbing it. Izzet Pasha’s little son is playing about the room. The white buildings of Constantinople are seen in the distance from the window, indistinct in the mist rising from the blue waters of the Bosphorus on a sunny morning. A few pigeons coo and play on the leads immediately under the window. Undisturbed, they too are apparently safe from intrusion. In the garden immediately in front some gardeners are peacefully at work. In the room itself a Turk takes a small rug which had lain rolled up in a corner and places it on the floor so that at the further end it is supposed to point in the direction of Mecca. Thereon he murmurs his prayers. Only his lips move, at times almost convulsively. He kneels down, bends backwards and forwards, repeatedly bringing his forehead down into contact with the carpet; he folds his hands on his breast, then rises upright and stretches them out with palms upward. This continues for fifteen or twenty minutes, and nobody takes the least notice of him or his proceedings. Then he picks up the rug, folds it carelessly, throws it into a corner of the room, and begins talking unconcernedly with those present. “Il a fait ses priÈres, il a fait son devoir,” and within five minutes he is as blithe as the rest of the company.

We are still waiting, for one and all are anxious to have a few words with the powerful favourite. He is expected, but he has not arrived yet, and, as far as any distinct obligation to put in an appearance is concerned, may not appear at all this day or the next. For among the possibilities of his position is that of having fallen into temporary disgrace overnight and being ordered like some naughty school-boy to stay at home and not to quit his konak for days together. Sometimes he would not leave the Palace at all, but work half through the night, for which eventuality a bedstead stood in one of the waiting-rooms. On this particular occasion he has been attending an important meeting of the Conseil des Ministres—a Cabinet Council, we should say—at the Sublime Porte in Stamboul. He is already on his way to Yildiz, leaning back in his closed brougham, for he is not popular, and consequently not anxious to be recognized. His carriage has thundered across the rickety old wooden planks of the Galata Bridge, he has driven along the shores of the Bosphorus, past the arsenal, TophanÈ, past the Palace of Dolma-BaghtchÈ, and is now driving up the steep hill from Beschiktasch towards the Palace at a sharp trot. The heavy gilt harness of the two magnificent black carriage horses gleams in the sun as the white foam starts from their coat. It is as if instinct had revealed to the very walls that the great man is coming, for everybody is on the alert; even the cat in the corridor, still rubbing its sides against the wall, curls up its tail higher than before in purring glee. I look out of the window, and am just in time to see Izzet’s slim figure coming through the narrow passage at the back of the building. He is surrounded by several secretaries and attendants and followed by a crowd of suppliants, who are anxious to interview him and put their claims before him even before he has reached his sanctum. There is a rush to the door, and half a dozen dark-eyed servants simultaneously offer their services to divest the great man of his overcoat. He takes his seat at his desk, upon which lies a heap of letters. They have arrived overnight, most of them addressed in Turkish characters, but one of stout dimensions has a boldly printed address in Latin characters to his Excellency scrupulously enumerating all his titles and dignities. It is from the Deutsche Bank in Berlin, where he keeps his banking account, and through which institution he invests his securities—the harvest of the favours bestowed upon him by his master, the sum of which, according to rumour, is a private fortune of several millions. He bows distantly to those present and goes through the stately Turkish salute, termed “temena,” to each one in turn of the visitors who are seated on the couches or all round the room, and who return his greeting with the same dignified motion of hands and head, though with an extra degree of deferential eagerness. He hands cigarettes round, and even throws some across the room to one or two of his more familiarly known visitors, and then proceeds to open the most important of his letters. Coffee is brought in, smoking is indulged in, and there is a distinct air of relief and ease among those present; but still not a word is spoken.

A fine, dignified-looking man in the prime of life, wearing the garb of a Sheikh or a Ulema or Mollah, crosses the room and takes a seat quite close to Izzet Pasha. He is evidently a personage of importance, for the two converse a long time in whispers, and whereas the Sultan’s favourite is most courteous to his interlocutor, the latter maintains a dignified, almost severe demeanour. As I was told afterwards, he is one of the most influential of Ulemas in Constantinople, learned in law, and of high standing as regards personal character. Izzet assured me that this man was able to trace his descent from Mohammed, if not even back to Abraham. He enjoys high consideration in the Mohammedan world, beyond that of any pasha or even the Grand Vizier himself. There is an evident reflex of his high standing in the deference with which Izzet listens to what he has to say, and with good reason, for the chances are that he will remain a great personage in Turkey long after the favourite has fallen into disgrace or the Sultan himself has passed away. The men of this type are among the most distinguished visitors at Yildiz—these Sheikhs, Mollahs, and Ulemas, who, in their white and green turbans and flowing garments, come occasionally from distant parts of the Turkish dominions and look in to have a chat with the Sultan’s Second Secretary, by whom they are treated with greater distinction than any other visitor. They are in fact the only callers with regard to whom the word deference can justly be used; for they are almost the only visitors who do not come to ask for personal favours. They stand for the ideals of conduct of the Mohammedan world.

As the sunflower turns naturally towards the sun, so also every hope of worldly advantage, every hope of preferment, turned at that time towards the Imperial Palace of Yildiz and the august person of the Sultan. Only those who have had personal experience of the conditions prevailing at this centre of intrigue can form a conception of what is conveyed in so simple a statement. The prestige of being in Imperial favour could raise the humblest to a position of influence over and above the Grand Vizier himself, not to mention such minor satellites as Ambassadors or Ministers of State. The Turkish Ambassador on leave might be obliged to loiter about antechambers for weeks and months together without being admitted to an audience of the Sultan, whereas the favourite would go in and out daily, even hourly. Thus “to be received” was the first stage on the road to fortune; to be granted a favour the second step, the culmination of which lay in the magic word “IradÈ,” meaning the Imperial decree by which a favour promised and granted, whether a high appointment or a valuable concession, had become law.

Sheikhs, Ulemas, Mollahs, Softas, even the Muezzin of the Minaret (the caller to prayer), Armenian Patriarchs, Archbishops, Archimandrites, Grand Rabbis, Ministers-Plenipotentiary, Turkish Ambassadors awaiting their final instructions, Pashas, Generals, Admirals, Ministers, were to be met here doing antechamber service and sitting round the room in silence for hours, even days together. I have even met here a deputation of Kurdish chiefs of the Milli tribe, with Ibrahim Pasha, their leader, a right jovial fellow, and as mild-mannered a man as ever cut a throat, whose advent at Constantinople with a regiment of HamidiÈ cavalry shortly after the Armenian outbreak caused quite a panic among the nervous members of the foreign colony in Constantinople.

Traders called for their accounts and sat down sipping coffee with the rest: imagine the collector of Marshall and Snelgrove or Whiteley walking into Buckingham Palace and sipping tea with one of the King’s chamberlains! Officials came begging for their overdue salaries. The Hebrew Court jeweller from Stamboul was a regular caller. One day he brought a beautiful coronet of diamonds and pearls which he drew from a bag, and which Izzet Pasha took in to the Sultan, probably destined as a gift for one of His Majesty’s many wives. He too, like the rest, I was told, was unable to do business on a cash basis, the Sultan being in his debt to the amount of some £T20,000 or £T30,000.

Those who are familiar only with the social effulgence, the mystery surrounding Turkish diplomatists abroad, from the full-blown Ambassador accredited to the Great Powers to the Minister-Plenipotentiary and Envoy-Extraordinary, can scarcely form an idea of the everlasting delays, tracasseries, humiliations, and heart-burnings which often preceded their appointment under the Hamidian rÉgime. Sometimes the suspense dragged on for months, and nearly wore out the heart of the suitor for the post. Even more aggravating were the circumstances which followed upon the recall of a diplomatist who might not have satisfied the Sultan. I knew a Minister-Plenipotentiary and Envoy-Extraordinary of distinguished family and high intellectual attainments who, after being summarily recalled from his post, haunted the antechamber of the Sultans secretaries at the Palace for ten years without obtaining another appointment in all that period; nearly half a lifetime wasted in idleness, chewing the bitter cud of hope deferred. No wonder that such a man became disgusted with Hamidian conditions and longed for the introduction of European institutions. “How can you hope to carry on a Government,” he once said to me, “which does not even pretend to furnish a Budget?” He was one of many who were great admirers of England, and longed for English influence to regain a foothold in Turkey. The whims of the autocrat, the intrigues of his surroundings, sounded the funeral knell of every form of honesty, as they shut the door to every chance of ability coming to the fore. For all that, such conditions having been more or less traditional features of Oriental life from Byzantine times down to the present day, their effects were less disastrous to the Turks themselves than to some alien elements in the service of the Sultan; upon these they acted in some cases like fire and sword, extirpating the last vestige of self-respect.

Solicitants for favours of every kind—place, office, appointment, contributions in money—used to swarm into the Palace. The applicants embraced nearly every nationality that was represented at Constantinople, with the one, and I cannot help saying striking, exception of Russia. Whatever may be averred in connexion with bribery and corruption, official or otherwise, in Russia itself, or of the ruthless policy towards the Ottoman Empire pursued by Russia for generations past, I can say that during my many visits to Constantinople I never met a single Russian either at the Palace or elsewhere asking anything of the Turk, and the Russians are the only nation of which I can say as much; for even the Americans were not above seeking favours in the missionary interest. The only Russian I ever knew to call at Yildiz was the chief dragoman of the Russian Embassy, M. Maximow. It was during the Armenian trouble, and he came to rage and threaten. “Go in to your master and tell him to go to ...!” he shouted, to the dismay of the stately Turks present, whose voices never rose above a whisper in the hallowed precincts of the Palace.

Those unfamiliar with the Turkish character can scarcely form an idea of the importance attached by the Turk, and more particularly the ex-Sultan, to the power of the pen—the eagerness with which the expression of European public opinion used to be scrutinized by the authorities in Abdul Hamid’s time under a rÉgime which was popularly supposed to be carried on in open defiance of the spirit of the age. One of the means by which those eager to curry favour with the authorities sought to gain their object used to be to defend the Sultan in the Press. At times a ray of naive humour would mingle in the game. Thus, on one occasion, a pasha of my acquaintance had taken up the cudgels and written a dissertation in defence of the Sultan’s claim to the Khalifate. He may have thought that he had thereby given proof of his zeal, and perhaps even expected some recognition in return. What was his surprise, after receiving a curt summons to appear at the Palace, to be met in a cool manner by one of the Sultan’s secretaries. The latter took him aside and, pointing to the sun which shone through the window, said: “You see the sun? Well, there it is! No argument is necessary to prove its existence. So it is with the Khalifate of the Sultan. It needs no demonstration, no defence. His Majesty does not wish you to write about the Khalifate any more.”

The Sultan’s extreme sensitiveness to European newspaper opinion afforded a wide scope for intrigue at the Palace, inasmuch as Abdul Hamid attached exaggerated importance to newspaper articles the relative value of which he had no means of verifying. This idiosyncrasy was traded upon by a cohort of adventurers of different nationalities, some of them of most shady antecedents. They were supplied with funds in return for their supposed influence with the Press in England, France, and Germany. Some were paid a fixed salary by the Sultan; others were fed by occasional doles from his different favourites, acting on the supposition that they—the favourites in question—would be credited with the effusions of these minions as proofs of their own zeal in the interests of his Imperial Majesty. Rarely could Oriental astuteness be found together with such childlike gullibility as was evident in this connexion. The representative of a powerful journal would be snubbed, whilst the correspondent of some obscure sheet would be extravagantly rewarded for some supposed service rendered to the cause of Islam. It has been stated that European newspapers were regularly subsidized by the Palace; but, except in the case of an obscure periodical, L’Orient, which appeared in Paris, and a Vienna compilation of news items drawn from telegraphic agencies and called the Courrier de L’Est, I never met with any tangible evidence in support of this assertion.

Another feature of lavish expenditure was connected with the Ramadan festival. On this occasion every official at the Palace, including all the pashas in Constantinople, received an extra month’s salary, which amounted to about one hundred and fifty thousand Turkish pounds. It was sometimes necessary to borrow this amount from one of the banks or to withdraw it from the funds of the customs. The more one saw of this state of things, the easier it was to understand the eternal impecuniosity at the Palace, and the more one wondered how the Sultan ever managed to make both ends meet.

Towards mid-day an endless stream of Turkish visitors, fat and lean intermingled, dressed in the black frock-coat termed stambolin, could be seen toiling up the hill in the broiling sun to partake of the hospitality indiscriminately offered to the thousands feasting daily at the Sultan’s expense.

Some of the parasites of the Palace used to be on the look-out to be sent by the Sultan “en mission spÉciale” on some quixotic errand, at times of a rather undignified nature. Lavish expenses were allowed in the shape of a little bag of gold, and if successful there were chances besides of subsequent preferment. The case of a Field-Marshal who was sent to Berlin to engage a cook for the Sultan has occupied the Berlin courts of law since the deposition of Abdul Hamid. I recollect an engineer of the Hedjas Railway returning from Budapest, whither he had been sent on a similar errand on behalf of a pasha. The latter introduced this official to me with the words: “Il est Juif de race, Allemand par nationalitÉ, et Turc par son emploi.”

An amusing feature of life at the Yildiz Palace was the arrival of a certain military element on the scene whenever there was a chance of baksheesh or preferment. The poem in Heine’s “Buch der Lieder” comes to mind in which he depicts himself as being a god and distributing largess broadcast, causing champagne to flow in the streets:

There was something of the comic-opera order, not to say of Christmas pantomime, in this feature of life at the Palace. The transformation scene in “Cinderella” is not more kaleidoscopic in its changes. The obscure little pill-man, once happy at home in his strenuous vocation, passing his evenings in a beer-house, is suddenly called to Constantinople and driven about in a carriage and pair, dressed in a Turkish uniform “made in Germany,” with a jewelled bauble dangling from his collar. Just as suddenly the carriage and its black horses are gone, and the worthy doctor has to appeal to the law courts of Berlin for the salary owing to him by the dethroned Sultan.

Bobadil Pasha, Bombastes, Swashbuckler Pasha, Boule-qui-Roule Pasha (a French importation who was said to have owed his successful career to the sirenical attractions of Madame Boule-qui-Roule), Birra (beer) Pasha from the Fatherland—one and all of them enter upon the scene, play their little parts, and disappear through the trap-door exactly as in a pantomime. Alexander of Battenberg, the Prince of Bulgaria, is presented with an Arab steed by the Sultan, but goes away without it, for Marshal Bombastes, the Master of the Horse, who was entrusted with the task of its delivery, had lost or otherwise disposed of it. There were some truculent personages among these gentry.

Calling one day on Ibrahim Pasha, who had succeeded the late Munir Pasha as Grand Master of Ceremonies and Introducer of Ambassadors, I saw a tall, pompous personage in the uniform of a Turkish General engaged in conversation with his Excellency. To judge by appearances he was a very Bobadil, a swashbuckler sort of man, one of the grasping, cunning windbag variety which Abdul Hamid’s promiscuous generosity tempted from the barrack-room of his native country to a palace on the Bosphorus, to the dismay and disgust of many a loyal Turkish heart. Six feet of coloured cloth surmounted by an almost round bullet head, bobbing up and down mechanically as if set in motion by wires, the features of the man were commonplace, if not downright plebeian. A hectoring, flamboyant mien stamped the whole personage, breathing the soldier’s contempt for the civilian, which is one of the most ominous phenomena of contemporary Europe. And yet he was by no means one calculated to inspire fear: the sort of man that an American cowboy would throw out of a bar-room without taking his pipe out of his mouth.

I took a seat, awaiting my turn to approach his Excellency, and, as is customary, bowed right and left in doing so. The tall man drew himself up and seemed to resent the courtesy of a mere civilian. But what particularly attracted my attention was that he pestered Ibrahim Pasha with details, given in execrable French, about the ailments of his wife, whom he had recently conveyed to a European sanatorium. It was a sight to note the courtly patience with which Ibrahim Pasha listened to the narrative of Miles Gloriosus, for it is the very worst form of breeding in the eyes of a Turk to refer to one’s womenkind. This edifying tÊte-À-tÊte went on for some time. At last pomposity was about to take his leave. I held up a newspaper in front of me so as to spare him the trouble of making up his mind whether he was to notice me on quitting the apartment or not. Ibrahim Pasha accompanied his visitor to the door of the ante-room leading out of the building. It was a most amusing sight as I peered over the newspaper through the open door. I saw the two engaged in conversation, the loquacious officer indulging in lively gesticulations. On Ibrahim Pasha returning to the room I said to him: “If I might venture to put it to your Excellency, I would be prepared to wager that the pasha who has just left the room gave way to an impulse of effeminate curiosity and asked you who I am.”

“Yes, to be sure he did,” Ibrahim Pasha smilingly replied. “But I did not gratify him. I merely told him that you were an American.” “Well then,” I rejoined, “if he should ever ask you the same question again, pray tell him, with my compliments, that my name is perhaps better known than his own in the country of his birth.”

The sun shines through the window and lights up the faces of the grave, swarthy-featured Turks. Officers in full dress, decked out in all their stars and sashes, are pouring into the Palace, for it is Friday. The Sultan has had a good night. Everything is couleur de rose, and the Palace officials are getting ready for the Selamlik. Izzet Pasha divests himself of his black frock-coat with the help of a dark manservant, and dons a gorgeous gold brocaded and wadded uniform covered with Turkish and German decorations, doubling the size of his little, attenuated Syrian figure. There was something almost childlike about it all in its contrast to the grim realities of life. The diplomatic loggia was filling. Some of the foreign Ambassadors, eager de faire acte de prÉsence, were rarely absent on such occasions and would bring some officers of their respective nationalities to see the show. These had generally just arrived at Constantinople, with a keen scent for favours which would be showered upon them after the ceremony in the shape of commanderships of the MedjediÈ or OsmaniÈ Order, for an inferior class of which a poor Turkish officer might wait a lifetime in vain.

The great Officers of State, the Grand Master of Artillery, the fat Minister of War, the Minister of Marine, a little humpback, a notorious personage, and the rest of the pashas—military and civil—are all gathered together in the inner courtyard of the Palace in anticipation of the Sultan starting for the Selamlik ceremony. A military band is heard in the distance. It is playing the “HamidiÈ March,” composed in honour of His Majesty, a somewhat thin and commonplace production. And here I may mention a fact which is not generally known, that military bands as such are quite a modern feature in Europe, and owe their origin to the Janissaries. “Janitscharenmusik” is still to this day the term used in Germany for an infernal din of tin kettles, pipes, and brass. To the Turk, then, is due all the noise which has become such a public nuisance in our time on the continent of Europe; a heavy responsibility before the tribunal of decency and decorum!

We crane our necks, looking towards the left, when from the rising ground we see the military pageant coming along: first of all the Ortogrul Cavalry, followed by the Sultan’s Albanian Guard, trained to the mechanical Prussian goose-step, singularly out of character with the whole bearing and appearance of these untamed sons of the Albanian hills. Then the Sultan himself appears and drives past in an open carriage, with Ghazi Osman Pasha, the hero of Plevna, sitting opposite him.

The Sultan alights, enters the HamidiÈ Mosque, and the muezzin from the top of the adjacent minaret calls the Faithful to prayer. An interval of about half an hour follows, in which tea and cigarettes are served to the Sultan’s guests. At last a slight stir is noticeable at the entrance of the mosque. The Sultan reappears, enters an open victoria, the reins of which he handles himself, and drives back to the Palace up the hill, followed by a throng of gaudily attired functionaries—old, white-bearded men among them—running after the carriage as best they may: a somewhat undignified sight to a European.