principal officers as sewers caterers such like all which are carefully to look to their several Kitchins and not any one to trust another with his business The Sultans Kitchin Meals The Kings Kitchin begins to work ordinarily before break of day For his Highness rising betimes there must be always somewhat ready for him because commonly he eateth three or four times a day He dines usually at ten of the clock in the forenoon and sups about six at night as well in the Summer as in the Winter When he hath a will to eat he tells the Capee Aga of it who forth-with sends an Eunuch to give notice of the same to the chief Sewer and he having caused the meat to be dished up brings it in dish by dish to the Kings Table so his Majesty sits down after the common Turkish fashion with his legs across His sitting at meat having a very rich wrought towel cast before him upon his knees to save his cloaths another hanging upon his left arm which he useth for his Napkin to wipe his mouth fingers He is not carved unto as other Princes are but helps himself having before him upon a peece of Bulgar Leather which is instead of a table cloath fine white bread of three or four sorts well relished and always very new as indeed all Turks love their bread best when it is warm newly come forth of the Oven He neither useth Knife nor Fork but onely a wooden Spoon of which there are two always layd before him the one serving him to eat his pottage and the other to sup up certain delicate Sirrups made of divers fruits compounded with the juice of Lemmons and Sugar to quench his thirst He tasteth of his dishes one by one and as he hath done with them they are taken off His meat is so tender and so delicately dressed that as I said before he needs no knife but puls the flesh from the bones very easily with his fingers He useth no salt at his Table neither hath he any Antepaste but immediately falls aboard the flesh and having well fed closeth up his stomack with a Bocklava A Tart. or some such like thing And so his Dinner or Supper being ended he washeth his hands in a Basen of gold with the Ewer all set with precious stones His Majesties ordinary diet as I have been told by some of the Aschees is half a score rosted Pigeons in a dish two or three Geese in a dish Lamb Hens Chickens Mutton and sometimes wild fowl but very seldom and look what he hath rosted for him so he hath the same quantity boiled almost of every thing there being very good sauce for every dish and other ingredients very pleasing to the pallat He hath likewise broaths of all sorts and divers Purcelain dishes full of Preserves and sirrups and some Tarts Little pies and Burecks after their fashion made of flesh covered with paste And having made an end of eating he drinks one draught of Sherbet seldom or never drinking above once at a meal which is brought unto him by one of his Agas in a deep Purcelane dish covered It is an Arabian word and signifies drinks standing upon a flat under dish of the same mettal All the while that he is at Table he very seldom or never speaks to any man albeit there stands before him many Mutes and Buffones to make him merry playing tricks and sporting one with another alla mutescha which the King understands very well For by signes their meaning is easily conceived and if peradventure he should vouchsafe to speak a word or two it is to grace some one of his Agas standing by him whom he highly favoureth 〈◊〉 throwing unto him a loaf of bread from his own table and this is held for a singular grace especial favour and he distributing part of it amongst his companions they likewise accept of it at the second hand and account it as a great Honour done unto them in regard it came from their Lord and King The dishes for his Highness Table are all of gold Dishes Covers of gold and so likewise are their Covers they are in the custody of the Keelergee Bashaw who attends at the Kitchin at Dinner and Supper time Yellow purcelane for the Ramazan or Lent and so are all the Purcelane Dishes which are very costly and scarcely to be had for money in which the Grand Siguior eats in the Ramazan time which is their Lent and lasteth a whole moon and the month it self is so called Now at that time the Turks never eat in the day but onely in the night not making any difference at all in meats except Swines flesh and things strangled of which they are forbidden by their Law to eat at any time The King seldom eats fish unless it be when he is abroad at some Garden House by the Sea side with his women where he may sit and see it taken himself CHAP. VIII The common Customs and Manners of the Turks THe Fabricks of their Churches are sufficiently large and sumptuous and called by the name of Meschites in which I never could perceive any sort of fancies or imageries for Idolatry is held by them the worst of abominations but only these or one of these inscriptions following in the Arabick Language There is no God but one and Mahomet his Prophet or One Creator and Prophets equal or None is strong as God Then there is seen a great abundance of burning Lamps the whole Church whited the Pavement covered with Mattresses and on them the Ornaments of Tapestries Near the Church is erected a Tower of great height to the top whereof the Priest ascends before the time of Prayers and with a loud voice his earr stopped with his fingers he thrice pro-proclaims these words God True One which Clamour or Out-cry for they have no Bells being heard the Nobility and all unbusied persons repair to Church as bound to that devotion Afterwards the said Priest descending prayes with them and then they turn their faces towards Mecca And this he is tyed to do by his Office five times day and night But whosoever cometh to these Prayers must wash his hands his feet and privities and his head thrice sprinkled with water and these words pronounced Glory to my God Then their shooes put off and left at the Church-door they enter in some bare-footed others having new shooes or socks and so tenderly touch the ground Women come not into Churches as being not excis'd and for fear of disturbing mens devotions but meet apart in severed places altogether shut off from eyes and ears of men and more seldom frequent their Churches except in time of Passeover or Easter and on Fridays which dayes from Mahomets Traditions for distinction and imitation they almost respect as much as Jews their Sabbaths or Christians the Lords day They pray from nine a clock at night till twelve and in their praying their bodies are ever in great motion and agitation wherewith they marvellously afflict themselves with loud cryings and fierce ejaculations so as oftentimes their strengths and spirits failing they sink unto the ground and
adjoyning Northward to Phenicia famous to our acquaintance for Laodicea as is mentioned in the Revelations of St. John Antioch the place where Christians were first so called Antioch but now hath no name it self either Turkish or Christian to be called by being sunk into most obscure and ignote Rubbish It was finally lost from the Christians in 1381. when it came to Saladine the Victorious Sultan of Egypt and Damascus Thirdly Comagena bordering upon Euphrates towards the East with which it is wetered Aleppo in it Aleppo scituated in the midst betwixt Tripolis Beritus and Alexandretta the three prime ports of Turkey and on the further side it adjoyns to the Persian Territories it hath been of long time a factory of the English Nation governed by a Consul who maintain thence correspondence with the East Indies several goods coming over land upon Camels The English are here well beloved and our Tutelar or National Saint George whose Sepulchre is feigned here is had in great veneration It over-looks by its scituation upon a Hill six Villages to be seen no where else in these depopulated uncultivated places of this Empire and is governed by a Bashaw which Dignity hath of late years been troublesome to the Turkish State as was mentioned in the following Treatise It was taken in by Selymus the first of which more presently Fourthly Palmyrene a Country never conquered in the Holy-Land expedition as the other parts were Fifthly Coelosyria bounded on the West with Palestine whither we are next to pass and on the South-East with Arabia Deserta and on the North with Palmyrene remarquable for the famous City of Damascus Damascus and the Imperial and regal Seat of many Kings who have been celebrated as well in Divine as humane writ A most fruitful delightful place even to surfeit being stored with wine to superfluity for which reason as is excellently observed the vile Impostor Mahomet would not be perswaded to come to it lest being inescated with its pleasure he should forget the business he came about but his Successors were not so abstemious it being the seat of one of his Caliphs while Babylon or Badgat was re-edified Here are many ingenuous workmen in most Arts and hence come our Damask Satins and Linnens wrought with curious Branches It is now the Seat of one of the principal Turkish Bashaws and who is had in great estimation and beloved by the Grand Signior It was held in modern times by the Mamalukes who piece-meal recovered Syria from the Tartars who under Tamberlane terribly sacked this City but in the year 1516. when the victorious Selymus the first discomfited Campson Gaurus the Egyptian Sultan in the fields of Aleppo this City fearing the Spoyl and ruine thereof then very opulent by trade set open their Gates as did all the other Cities by their example By means whereof the Turks became Lords of all this Country without any more blows as they were next year of Egypt also by their victory over Tomombeius in whom perished the Name and Empire of the Mamalukes In our way to Palestine on the Holy Land we must pass over Mount Hermon a ledge of Hills Mount Hermon which beginning Eastward run directly South by which Palestine is bounded on the East and parted from Coelosyria and Arabia Deserta on the West with the Mediterranean Sea and some part of Phaenicia On the North it is divided with the Hill Anti-Libanus from Syria and on the South with part of Arabia Patraea a most fertile Land even to admiration flowing with milk and Honey as it is elegantly expressed in the eight of Deuteronomy by its former division it was cantoned into six Provinces 1. Berea 2. Iturea 3. Galilee 4. Samaria 5. Judea and 6. Idumea but made one Province of the Roman Empire as it is now of the Turkish the chief Cities were Coesaria Samaria and Jerusalem of which a little must needs bespoken For to speak nothing of ancient times in the 73. year after Christ Jerusalem was taken and destroyed by Titus with the slaughter and captivity of infinite thousands In the year 136. it was restored by Aelius Adrianus new-named Aelia and given in possession to the Jews In the time of Constantine and Helena his Mother it fell into the hands of the Christians and so continued until the dayes of our Henry the fourth at which time it was again taken by the Sultan of the Sarazens and the Christians clean banishment In the year 1097. in a general Council for the delivery of the Holy-Land Holyland the Crossed Knights were instituted throughout Christendom and Godfrey of Bulloygne chosen General of three hundred thousand footmen and one hundred thousand horse These Knights did many famous acts recovered the Land instituted a Monarchy and though sometime with loss continued some defence thereof until the year of our Lord 1517. and then was it overcome by the Turkish Armies of the aforesaid victorious Selymus who at this day retain it in miserable servitude under a certain Tribute or imposition upon such Christians as are permitted to live here There are now therefore two or more Monasteries or Religious Houses where Fryars do abide and make a good commodity of shewing the Sepulchre of Christ and other Monuments unto such Christian Pilgrims as do use superstitiously to go in Pilgrimage to the Holy Land And so it resteth peopled with men of divers Nations and Sects as Saracens Arabians Turks Hebrews and Christians whereof some follow the Latine Church some the Greek as the Graecians Syrians Armenians Georgians Nestorians Jasâ—bites Nubians Marodits Abessines Indians and Egyptians every one having their peculiar Bishops whom they obey But to particularize a little further GALILIE upon the North is invironed with the steep hills of Libanus and Antilibanus upon the West with Phenicia upon the East with Coelosyria and upon the South with Samaria and Arabia the desart The soil is most fruitful yielding all sorts of Trees and divided by Jordan upon whose banks stand very many Towns and Villages and so well watered either with mountain Torrents or Springs that no part thereof lyeth unmanured The Country is the more famous for that in it standeth amongst the rude mountains the small Villages of Nazareth Nazareth the place of our Lords conception And at this day there is a small Chappel archt and built under ground whereinto a man must descend by stairs Here some say the Angel appeared unto Mary and foretold her that she should conceive and bring forth our Lord. The Inhabitants are Arabians short and thick men rudely apparelled and weaponed with Bows Swords and Daggers In this Region likewise standeth the Mount Thabor whose North part is inaccessible and whereon our Lord was transfigured according to the blessed Evangelist SAMARIA lyeth in a most delicate plot of Palestine Samaria but in bigness not comparable to Judea or Galilie The soil is partly mountainous partly champian pleasant fruitful and very well watered
Fate shewing herein how desperate a folly it is for Princes or to descend to private men to undertake any unjust though advantageous design upon another while there is a Superiour Enemy thereby invited to the umperage of the quarrel These Rascians do yet so retain their primitive hatred against the Turks that upon all occasions they have been ready to wreak themselves but to very little purpose more then to show their more noble extract and ancestry The three Provinces mentioned before Rascia do and have enjoyed more liberty then any people under the Turkish Dominions because first the Turk hath not Colonies to plant them being not so numerous as his Armie speaks him for all his Polygamy and secondly because their often overthrows as they have infeebled their Natives and in their long resistance desolated the Country so that a man cannot find an Inn or Harbour in a days riding have disheartned an expedition on purpose Mahomet the Great who first attempted them saying in great anger that he came not to fight with Beasts or which was more unequal against Nature it self who had by so many abrupt or uncouth ways hindred the progress of his most industrious and eager Ambition which his successors notwithstanding from that kind of precarious Soveraignty have improved into an awful submission and address to the Port with two hundred thousand Chequins yearly which makes some 45 thou-pounds sterling besides the Fees and Presents of the respective Princes But what their condition is now like to be the event of this present enterprise will best declare but as now they are not fit for or else not worth his fury onely miserable Rascia not honoured with a Governour suffers all extremity And so we must pass the Danow to its Southern shore the two Kingdoms or despotical Provinces of Servia and Bulgaria Servia surveyed SERVIA is bounded on the East with Bulgaria on the West with Bosnia on the North with the Danubius on the South with Albania and part of Macedon a rich and fruitful country for grain and gain concealed in the repositories of several mines of Gold and Silver and therefore much peopled by the Turks after their general Excision and Massacre in a manner of the Christian Inhabitants by Amurath in the year 1367. when he took Nissa their Capital City and Key of the Country in revenge of their Despots assisting the Hungarians in the siege of Adrianople but after the death of Lazarus the last Despot Mahomet the great seizeth it Mahomet the Great not satisfied with a Tribute which Amurath had imposed dispossessed his three Orphans Peter John and Martyn who fled to the Hungarian protection in title of Lazarus's two other brothers who craved his assistance and thereby with dread and Terror destroyed most of the Natives by empaling gaunching fleaing and all other devices of Torture so that he quickly tamed their courage and made them the second province of the Eastern or Greek Empire that acknowledged and humbled it self to his Conquest and Dominion in the year 1460. Bulgaria described BVLGARIA is bounded on the East with the Euxine Sea West with Servia on the North with the River Danow which is here called Ister and on the South with Thrace It was governed by Kings till Amurath the first reduced it by his Arms and the abject submission of Sasmenos the last Prince who humbled himself in a winding-sheet before that Tyrant in 1369. after by Bajazet his Son not content therewith made a Province under the absolute Government of the Turks who in Nicopolis Sophia and Silistria have three Sanjacks or Major Generals under the command of the Beglerbeg or Vice-Roy of Greece It is a mountainous and woody Country the Plains thereof being thick planted with tall Trees so that it furnisheth Constantinople with fewel and is a good defence against any sudden irruptions into the more inward part of Romania famous for the many Battels fought herein by Trajan the Emperor who built Nicopolis interpreted The City of victory in memory of his Conquest of Dacia and by modern Potentates Sigismond Emperor and Bajazet the first which was fatal to the Christians and Michael the brave Vayvod of Valachia against Mahomet the third as calamitous and destructive to the Turks Not to mention the plains of Cossova where Miles Cobelitz a private Souldier rising from among the dead slew Amurath the first and for that three days incounter betwixt Huniades and Amurath the second both of them with the adversest fortune that Christians ever fought with which is to this day alledged as an argument against any Invasion upon the Mahometan Territory how fondly the encroachments of that enemy so many miles upon Christian ground doth sadly evince And so we have finished the survey of Dacia sometimes possessed by the Romans afterwards by the Scythians then by the Greek Emperors lastly swallowed by the Turks who keep it so fettered that it will hardly know another Master Our next aspect tends towards Graecia but in our way thither we must pass over Mount Haemus Mount Haemus so high and open to the weather that it is said of it that for eight months in the year it is alwayes cold for the other four winter There are but two passes and those thought so impregnable by their abruptness that with little defence they are the invincible security of the Turkish dominion on the other side as Huniades in his expedition to the siege of Hadrianople sadly experimented but our Survey shall have leave and license to descend Graecia GRAECIA thus entertains our sight which from the glorious and most noble structure of Empire in the third universal Monarchy abridged afterwards by civil Fate and the unwilling disrespect of time into the Empire of the East is crept into most petty and despised Cantons of this barbarous Signiory cut out and partitioned under the commands of several inferiours but most cruel Governours all subjected to the Beglerbeg of Romania so called by us but by them Rum Ili In the present Latitude and extent thereof it is bounded on the East with the Propaentick Hellespont and Aegean Seas on the West with the Adriatick on the North with Mount Haemus which parteth it from Bulgaria Servia and part of Illyrium on the South with the Sea Jonian so that it is in a manner a Peninsula or Demy Island environ'd on three sides by the Sea and on the fourth with the rest of Europe To give precedency to Christianity in the brief description of this Region it will be satisfactory to give a little account of the Greek Church before-hand in this part The Patriarch of Constantinople who was reckoned the last in order and dignity is now notwithstanding the principal and chief of all in point of latitude power which hath engrossed the most concerning affairs of the Church to it self for he presides over all Greece Russia Dacia Sclavonia part of Poland and all the Islands in the Adriatick adjacent
days spent before he could entirely possess himself of the City It is nobly scited and is between thirty and forty English Miles in compass divided into seven burgs built after the Egyptian manner high and of large rough stone part also of Brick the streets are narrow of late there are new buildings made of the Turkish fashion as the former decay poor low much of Wood and Timber except some modern stately Palaceâ— of both Nations There are in it as are reckoned five and thirty thousand Moschets four and twenty thousand noted streets besides lanes and turnings some of those streets are two miles in length some not half a mile all of them every night are lockt up with a Door or Gate at each end and Guarded by a Musketier to prevent Tumults Fire or outrages It s Government Without the City on horse-back there warch every night to prevent any attempts of the Arabs four Sanjacks with each a thousand Horsemen under his command so that in all as it is easily computable by the individual Guardians of the streets there watch every night no less then twenty eight thousand persons The Castle is the place where the Bashaw resides who is always one of the most avaricious and ravenous Viziers sent thither on purpose to squeeze and oppress the Aegyptians and is frequently made a Spunge to refund his wealth with his life into the grand Seigniors Exchequer in which act the slavish Aegyptians can discern nothing but his justice and are saisfied with it as their revenge This Castle is founded upon a Rocky ascent on the East side of the City nor well repayred nor quite decayed at the foot of this ascent is a place half a Mile long wherein they ride the great horse and by that a little House and Garden wherein the old Bashaws of this place when disauthorised till the coming of a new one are keptuntil they are strangled or restored to the Grand Signiors favour Things of remarque and note herein The famous River Nile are first the River Nile running along the South of the Town to the West making as it leaves it a little dainty Island whose fertile and wonderful inundation begins constantly about the middle of June and increaseth to between eighty and a hundred days then it abates and by the end of November comes within its narrowest banks about a quarter of a mile broad by reason of this flood they have four Harvests in a year the ground adjacent to this River being before a white Sand without a sprig of any green thing but two weeds which carried to Venice makes the finest Chrystal Glass becomes a fat black mould and bears Flax and Rice with Sugar-Canes in abundance Not to omit the number of Crocodiles that infest this River nor the Nilscope in the Isle where stands a Pillar with several marks declaring the height of the flood all over Egypt The next are the Pyramids so much famed in History The Pyramids and the granaries or store-houses which Joseph built three of which Pyramids stand twelve miles South-west of the City on the other side of the River and are yet almost entire their form is quadrangular lessening by equal degrees from a quarter of a mile flat at bottom to a square at top a little more then four yards angular there are sixteen or eighteen other Pyramids some twelve miles to the Southward but ruined extreamly It rains not here but once in three or four years so that bodies buried in that sand will keep without putrefaction by reason no moysture is near them but what is in themselves Cairo subject to plagues yet populous Plagues are here very rife in Winter by one whereof eighteen hundred thousand persons died in six moneth yet was the City presently as populous as before and continues so thronged that persons of quality have one going before their Mules to make way for them by bidding people make room this is caused by the confluent multitude of the Arabs and Indians too that flock to the pleasures and plenty of this place There are a great many Christians also Venetians Dutch Genoese and some English the Ayr sometimes in Summer is like any sweet perfume and almost suffocates the Spirits caused by the Wind that brings the Odours of the Arabian Spices in a full Flavour There is also a sort of rare Horses but of tender hoofs yet fit for that sandy and soft ground which will run four days and nights together without eating or drinking and some Egyptians with a little provant and less sleep their body being wound about with a Linnen will ride them so upon business to which this is the onely convenience over those sandy deserts where there is neither house or inhabitants The sandy playns about it but the Theiving Murderous Arabs For the direction of the way over those Vastitudes the wind blowing the Sand and losing the track of any beaten way and sometimes burying the Travellers in Sheats of it unless they be wary are Pillars of brick set up a mile distant from one another The Revenue that the Grand Signior receives from Aegypt amounts to eight hundred thousand pound sterling a third part whereof comes onely clear to the Exchequer at Constantinople all ariseth out of certain farms of the Land belonging to the Crown The revenue of Egypt let out to the Aegyptians the least farms pays two hundred pound a year But the Bashaw hath other ways to make profit to himself nor is any invention of oppression thought envious or dangerous for the Aegyptians naturally effemenate and having suffered under a lasting Tyranny from slavery to slavery are in no likelihood of endeavouring a revolt the Grand Signior hath of them no more then fourteen thousand enrolled in his pay and that for show onely The other two parts of the Revenue are disposed thus the one to furnish the Expence of the Caravan and Pilgrimage to Mecha whither the Grand Seignior sends presents yearly especially a green Velvet Pall for Mahomets Coffin and the other third part of the revenue towards the defraying the charges of the Government viz. all Officers and publique services besides that of the Timariots who do theirs for their Tenure and enjoy almost a half of that Kingdom It is a rare felicity for any Bashaw of this place to escape with life fortunes and liberty yet there are few of the Visiers who do not ambitiously affect this ominous Government The Nile descends from Cairo in a length of 360. miles to Canopus now called Rosetta where it imbogues it self into the Sea from whence by Land to Alexandria Alexandria the Port where goods are landed for Cairo famous for its founder Alexander the Great and for the Monument and Tomb of red Marble of its beautifier Pompey the Great likewise and for its new Castle built since by the Turks being their onely Emporium or scale of Trade in Egypt The description of Arabia ARABIA TRIPLEX