BEAUTIES OF THE BOSPHORUS. 113
PLATE: THE ARSENAL FROM PERA.
THE ARSENAL,
FROM PERA
The sunshine fell not on that place of graves,
But wantoned with the waves, and with the hills,
Blushed on the rose, and turned the leaves to gold:
While shadows stretched in darkness o'er the dead.
THE spot whence the artist has obtained his view of the Turkish Arsenal at Pieri Pasha, commands the harbour about midway, and, consequently, presents it to the eye under an essentially different character from that of any of his preceding sketches. The building itself terminates the long line of docks, warehouses, rope-walks, and workshops, appertaining to the Imperial establishment, which extends from Galata for a mile and a half along the lip of the water; and which, in whatever point of view it is considered, must be admitted to be highly creditable to the government. The wet docks are very ably constructed and are enclosed within high walls of stone, whence a pair of noble gates open upon the harbour. The dry docks are also on a very magnificent scale, one of them (constructed by a French engineer) being nearly three hundred and fifty feet in length. The Tershana, or Admiralty, independently of its position, standing, as it does upon a point of land projecting into the harbour, is in itself a very pleasing object; it is in the Russian taste, gaily and carefully painted, and ha a noble entrance. It commands from its different casements the whole extent of the Golden Horn, which it sweeps from the village of Eyoub to the entrance of the sea of Marmora and the Bosphorus; and an upper suite of apartments have been richly fitted up for the occasional occupation of the Sultan, who frequently amuses himself by watching the progress of the magnificent ships built for his navy, ant the business-like bustle of the workmen.
The vessels which are constructed at Pieri Pasha are worthy of the Arsenal from which they emanate, being finely built, and perfectly equipped. The superintendent of the establishment is an American, in high favour with the Sultan, who in order to preserve the brigs an ships of the line, only suffers them to cruise during the summer, and at the fall of each year causes them to be anchored in the Bosphorus, where they produce a beautiful effect from the shore.