The Bosphorus.]

BUYUKDERE.

53

Gliding now past Kyparodis-"The Place of Cypresses"-where once was a Temple of Diana, we come to the Greek town of Istenia. In the lovely bay of the same name, where many a bloody sea-fight has taken place, the Argonauts, according to the legend, were brought into conflict with Amycus, King of Bebrice, and, aided by a spirit, or winged genius, conquered him. And now we gaze with infinite delight on one of the most celebrated as well as the most

beautiful spots on the Bosphorus, the large and prosperous town of Therapia, where costly palaces of Greeks, and embassies of some of the European nations, are scattered among exquisite gardens and scenery of the most enchanting description, a perfect vision of beauty only eclipsed by the crowning glories of Buyukderé. It was at the spot now called Therapia that Medea put to sleep the dragon which kept guard over the Golden Fleece, and after spreading her poisonous drugs upon the shore, fled in pursuit of Jason, from which circumstance the place was called Pharmacia-"Poison "-until Atticus, a Greek patriarch, having received much benefit to his health from the air of the place, altered its name to Therapia, signifying "Cure."

Buyukderé is a city spread upon the slopes of a graceful hill, "vast and varied in colours like a bouquet of flowers." It has wide quays, handsome houses, palaces, churches, and temples, charming meadows, seven gigantic old plane-trees, a picturesque mosque, and a meadowy valley, in which it is said the Crusaders under Godfrey de Bouillon camped in 1096. Buyukderé not only stands high in the estimation of every traveller who visits it for the sake of its own exquisite beauty, but it is famous in modern history; for here are the embassies of almost all the Christian nations, and of late years many a plot and scheme hatched here, many a telegram of startling intelligence sent hence, many a visit of distinguished politicians has carried significance to every merchant and tax-payer in all civilised lands.

Continuing past Sarijari, or Saryer, surrounded by cemeteries, we have in front of us the promontory of Simas, where stood the statue of Venus Meretrix, to which Greek sailors offered sacrifices; and beyond is the point where the Bosphorus narrows for the last time, with the ruined Genoese fortresses on the hills, between which an iron chain was formerly thrown to guard the mouth of the strait and to levy the toll. There the waters widen to the sea, yet still we have objects of interest to gaze upon-the village of Buyuk-Liman; the great rocky mass of Gipopolis, where once stood the palace of Phineus, infested with Harpies; Fanarki, the village of the European Lighthouse; and opposite, the celebrated Cyanean Rocks, or Symplegades, so called because seen from one side they appear to be joined together.

Fables innumerable cluster around these celebrated rocks, standing as sentinels to guard the entrance of the Bosphorus. They start up from the sea to a considerable height, and on one of them is an altar of pure white Parian marble with sculptured bulls' heads-emblems among the Romans of Agriculture and Fertility. It is not known for certain who raised this strange altar on this strange island; it might have been "the votive offering of some rescued mariner in the time when Argo sailed these seas;" it might have been, as others suppose, the pedestal of a column raised in honour of Apollo; it might have been the base of Pompey's Column, although there is no record of Pompey erecting any trophy in these parts after his defeat of Mithridates; certain it is that there stands the antique monument still, and no one can gaze upon it without some feeling of emotion, whatever theory concerning it he may accept.

Taking a good look out to the Pontus Euxinus, that gloomy and turbulent sea so celebrated in the songs of the sunny Archipelago, and then to the immediate surroundings of lighthouses, rocks, and strong fortresses, we cross to the Asiatic side, taking care to avoid the Asian Cyanean islands, in the midst of which the Argo would have come to grief but for Minerva, who "pushed it off with her right hand while she strengthened herself with her left against the points of the rocks."

The promontory of Ancyræum, or Anchor-Cape, is the spot where the Argonauts, during their expedition to Colchis, took-according to the oracle-a stone anchor, and abandoned the one which they had taken from Cyzicus. The Tower of Medea is now a modern lighthouse, but the Genoese towers remain in a fair state of preservation. At Ieron Polichnion there was once the Temple of the Twelve Gods-Jupiter, Juno, Neptune, Ceres, Mercury, Vulcan, Apollo, Piana, Vesta, Mars, Venus, and Minerva-all of whom the ancient mariners endeavoured to appease by purifications, so as to render them propitious

The Bosphorus.]

THE SHORES OF THE BOSPHORUS.

55

to their voyages. There is still to be seen here the remains of an ancient temple, or fortress, probably from the celebrated Temple of Jupiter Urius. Some Englishmen found here an ancient marble bearing the following inscription, and with English prudence they bore it off as a trophy :

"The sailor who invokes Jupiter Urius for a propitious voyage across the sea (Ægean) and among the Cyanean rocks filled with a multitude of sandbanks will have his prayers answered if beforehand he sacrifices to the god (Neptune), whose statue has been erected here by Philo Antipater."

The Giant's Mountain is the highest on the shores of the Bosphorus. It was once called the Back of Hercules, but has long been known by the Turks as Yusha Dagh (Mount Joshua). In the garden behind the mosque on the summit is a grave, the "Tomb of the Giant," a tomb which the Greeks called the Bed of Hercules, but which the Turks call the Tomb of the Hebrew Prophet Joshua! An Arabic inscription in the mosque gives the legend thus: "This is the place where Joshua, one of the prophets, resided. Moses sent him into Roumelia. One day while waging war with the inhabitants of those parts the sun went down in the midst of the battle. Another time the sun after setting rose again, and the people of Roumelia were not able to escape. This miracle proved Joshua to have been a prophet." This would appear to be an absurd jumble of Joshua with the giant Amycus, whose arm is supposed to be buried in the tomb, which is twenty-six feet long! A laurel-tree (Laurus insana) was planted over this tomb, the leaves of which, thrown on board a ship, would, according to the legend, spread discord among the sailors.

At Hunkiar Skelessi, "The Landing-Place of the Great Lord," or Imperial Wharf, once stood the autumn palace of the Greek emperors; it was here that the treaty was signed between Turkey and Russia, by which for a little while they tried to pass for friends. We will not tarry at Beycos to discuss whether the "insensate laurel" grew there or on the Giant's Mountain; it will be enough for us to notice that Beycos is one of the prettiest towns on the Asiatic shore of the Bosphorus.

Sailing now past two or three villages, all fertile and more or less interesting, we must stop at Anadoli Hissar to look at the Towers of Asia, built by Mohammed II. before the siege of Constantinople, at the same time that he caused the European Towers opposite to be erected, thus securing the passage of the straits. Not far from here are the Sweet Waters of Asia, a favourite resort of the Turkish ladies, and in fact of all the fashion of Constantinople every Friday in summer, as the Sweet Waters of Europe at the end of the Golden Horn are on Tuesdays.

A few minutes more and we arrive at Scutari, which we have already attempted to describe, and our tour of the Bosphorus and our rambles in Constantinople are over.

As Others see it-Manhattan Island-The Constituents of the City-A Hundred Religions-An Italian Sea-Rover-The Dutch Discoverers-New Amsterdam-The English Conquest-The Americans take their Own-The RebellionThe Harbour-The Narrows-Fortifications-The Inner Islands-Scenic Charms-The Piers and Wharves-Trade of the City-The Battery-Immigrant Hordes-Bowling-Green-Broadway-Trinity Church-Wall Street-The Treasury -Custom House-Commercial Rivalries-Post-Office-St. Paul's-City Hall-Court House-East-River Bridge-Broadway again-Five Points-The Bowery-A Dutch Captain-General-The Fire Brigade-The Literary Quarter-Union Square-Tammany-Madison Square-The Clubs-Restaurants and Theatres-The National Academy-Fifth Avenue -The Jeunesse Dorée-Merchant Princes-Fashionable Churches-The Cathedral-The Great Synagogue-Columbia College-Central Park-The Museums-Cleopatra's Needle-Lenox Library-Heavenly Charities-Normal CollegeThe Militia-Brooklyn-Prospect Park-Greenwood Cemetery-Blackwell's IslandHell Gate-Suburban Joys-Long Branch-Neversink and Elberon-Saratoga and Newport-Coney Island, Brighton and Manhattan Beaches.

EW YORK is the western terminus of the chief ocean-ferries between the two Christian continents, the greatest city in the Western Hemisphere, the commercial and financial centre of the United States, and one of the most cosmopolitan and heterogeneous communities in Christendom. Situated well up on the Atlantic border of the Union, near the centre of the coast-line of the wealthy and populous Northern States, and on the direct route between Europe and the vast granaries of the West, the commercial strategic position of New York and its unrivalled harbour have combined to establish here the metropolis of the New World. Some one has happily characterised the city as a new Paris, with a high flavour of the backwoods; and another has likened it to an Indian warrior, erect and valiant, covered with brilliant trappings, but reproachable for much in neglect of person and of manners.

New York.]

THE ISLAND OF MANHATTAN.

57

No description of New York can be perfect which omits the superlative adjectives; for one of the foremost ambitions of the builders of the city has been to secure superlative effects. Nor are the standards of comparison American only; for the harbour is more beautiful, the streets more unclean, Broadway more brilliant, the municipality more corrupt, the commercial buildings more pretentious, the tenement-houses more crowded, the parks more lovely, than the similar appurtenances of the cities of Europe and Asia, with but a few exceptions. Pope's celebrated characterisation of Lord Bacon, superlative in praise and in censure, wisest, brightest, meanest, might be paraphrased as an epigram on New York. It is popularly known as the Empire City; but Irving, its most honoured son, also called it Gotham, the "Home of Wiseacres," after the stupid old village of Nottinghamshire, and this title, too, is in common use. As Mr. G. J. Holyoake has expressed it: "New York itself is a miracle which a large book would not be sufficient to explain. When I stepped ashore there I thought I was in a larger Rotterdam; when I found my way to Broadway, it seemed to me as though I was in Paris, and that Paris had taken to business. There were quaintness, grace and gaiety, brightness and grimness, all about." Mr. Moncure D. Conway says: "There isn't a city so attractive elsewhere on earth. 'See Naples and die' was an adage before New York became so beautiful, but it should be changed to 'See New York and live."" As Colley Grattan saw the town, it "looked half Dutch, half French, something between Paris and Rotterdam." In the quieter streets, M. Ampère fancied that he "found once more the ancient little Hollandish city, as calm, as phlegmatic, as the American city is active and ardent." The Marquis of Lorne saw it as "an odd mixture of all sorts of European towns, but unlike any one of them." Anthony Trollope wrote that "no other American city is so intensely American as New York."

The Island of Manhattan, upon which the city stands, is formed by the North (or Hudson) River, a deep and straight stream of noble breadth, which rises 300 miles to the northward, in the deer-haunted Adirondack Mountains; by the East River, a navigable strait nearly a mile wide and twelve miles long, joining Long-Island Sound to the harbour; and by Harlem River and Spuyten-Duyvil Creek, confluent tidal channels connecting the North and East Rivers and about seven miles long. The two chief streets, Broadway and Fifth Avenue-the one devoted to business, the other to residences-occupy positions nearly central on the island, running along its greatest length, and intersecting hundreds of shorter streets which diverge to the broad rivers on either side. In the lower part of the city these side-streets are irregular and devious; in the upper part they are equi-distant and rectangular, from sixty to one hundred feet wide, running from river to river, and crossed by thirteen avenues, each a hundred feet wide and from seven to ten miles in length. The island is thirteen and a half miles long, and from half a mile to two and a quarter miles wide, covering an area of 14,000 acres, the lower half densely crowded, and the remainder occupied by parks and villas, public and charitable institutions, and clusters of houses which form urban hamlets. In 1874 an area of 12,500 acres on the adjacent mainland, including twenty villages, was annexed to the city. The actual value of the property owned in the Island of Manhattan was more than £700,000,000 ten years ago. The census of 1875 showed that out of 1,021,000 inhabitants, 202,000 were Irish, 151,222