EYOUB       13

A wet-dock, handsomely enclosed within solid and well-made walls, and entered through a noble pair of iron gates, below Kassim Pasha, is succeeded by a hight covered with cypresses, which leans downwards to the water, where it terminates in a steep flight of steps, partly artificial and partly hewn in the rock, and designated the Meit-iskelli, or Ladder of the Dead. This gloomy forest is the "Little Cemetery," or lesser burial-ground of Pera, the faubourg inhabited by the Franks; and the jetty at the foot of the stair which has just been described, is principally used for the embarkation of the bodies of deceased Turks, whom their friends are conveying for burial to the Asian necropolis of Scutari.

Immediately beyond this jetty, a floating-bridge, stretching from the pier of Galata (the quarter of the Franks merchants, dominated by the hill on which Pera is built,) to the "Gate of Garden," near the Kiosque of Pearls, and immediately under the walls of the Seraglio, shuts in the harbour; while the line of shore in the distance, fringed with the houses and public buildings of Topp-hannè, gently recedes, until it disappears under the stately shadow of Bulgurlhu.

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TURKISH BATHS

Here beauty on her 'broidered cushion lies
With languid brow, and dreaming downcast eyes -
A rose o'ercharg'd with rain: beside the fair
A kneeling slave binds up the glossy hair;
Pours perfumed water o'er the drooping face,
And lends to loveliness another grace.
MS. POEM.

THERE IS, perhaps, no luxury throughout the luxurious East more perfect, or more complete, than the Baths. Those of the great and the wealthy in Constantinople embody the idea of a scene in the "Thousand and One Nights" - they are so bright and fairy-like in their magnificence - so light and gay with painted glass, white marble, brocade, and embroidery.

Every bath, however small may be its dimensions, consists of three apartments; the outer hall, in which the bathing-dress is arranged; the cooling-room, a well-cushioned and comfortable space, moderately heated, and intended for the temporary reception of the bathers before they venture to encounter the pure free air of the exterior apartment; and the bath itself, where the atmosphere is so laden with sulphuric vapour, that, for some seconds, the breath is impeded, and the suffocating sensation which ensues is positively painful.