Читать книгу Árminius Vambéry, his life and adventures - Armin Vambéry - Страница 7

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Who can describe the feelings of a young man, barely twenty-two years old, who up to this day had been buffeted about by fortune, finding himself all of a sudden hastening towards the goal of his most cherished wishes, with (say) fifteen Austrian florins in his pocket, and about to enter upon a life full of uncertainty, in a distant region, amongst a strange people, who were rude and savage, and were beginning only then to seek a closer acquaintanceship with the nations of the West? My soul was agitated alternately by feelings of fear and hope, of curiosity and pain. Nobody accompanied me to the landing-place to see me off, nobody was there waiting for me, no warm presence of a friendly hand nor a mother's loving kiss cheered me on in the journey on which I was to start.

I had, thus, reason enough to feel somewhat depressed; nor could I entirely shake off this feeling; but I had no sooner come on deck, and begun to mix with the people, forming the national kaleidoscope one is always sure to meet on a voyage along the Lower Danube, and got an opportunity of conversing in Servian, Italian, Turkish and other languages of which I had had hitherto only a theoretical knowledge, than every vestige of my former downheartedness gradually vanished. I was now in my element. Add to this that I soon became the object of general admiration owing to the fluency of my conversation in different languages; the crowd being always sure to stand in a sort of awe of every polyglot. They formed a ring around me, trying to guess at my nationality, and received rather sceptically my statement that I had never been abroad.

I was, of course, very much amused at the gaping crowd, but I managed to derive some more solid advantages from the manifestation of the good opinion which my fellow travellers entertained for me; for, when the dinner-bell was rung, and I preferred to remain behind on the deck with a perturbed expression of countenance, some enthusiastic disciple of Mercury was sure to get hold of the so-called youthful prodigy and pay him his meal.

In the absence of such well-disposed stomachic patrons, I would lounge about in the neighbourhood of the kitchen of the ship, the masters of which are for the most part Italians. A few stanzas from Petrarca or Tasso sufficed to attract the attention of the cuoco (cook). A conversation in pure Tuscan soon followed, and the upshot was a well-filled plate of maccaroni or risotto, capped by a piece of boiled or roasted meat. "Mille grazie, signore" (a thousand thanks, sir), meant that I would come in the evening, to claim a continuation of the favour shown me. The good Italian would shove his barrett of linen on one side, give a short laugh, and proved by his answer, "Come whenever you like," that the seed of my linguistic experiments had not fallen on a barren soil.

GALACZ.

My constant good-humour and happy disposition were of great help to me in all my straits, and, assisted by my tongue, were the means of procuring for me many a thing upon occasions when the attempts of others would have proved fruitless. AT GALACZ.In this manner I reached Galacz, a dirty, miserable place at this day even, but at that time much more so. During my voyage on the Lower Danube, the shore on the right-hand side, with its Turkish towns and Turkish population, entirely absorbed my attention. To me every turbaned traveller, adorned with a long beard, upon entering the ship became a novel and interesting page meant for my particular study, and, at the same time, a never failing object of pleasurable excitement.

When the sun was setting, and the truly faithful sat, or rather knelt down for prayer in the abject attitude peculiar to them on those occasions, I followed with my eyes every one of their movements with the most feverish and breathless attention; watching intensely the very motion of their lips, as they were uttering Arabic words, unintelligible even to them; and not until after they were done did I again breathe freely.

The interest which I so plainly showed could not escape the notice of the fanatic Moslem. We then lived in the era of the Hungarian refugees. Some hundreds of my countrymen made believe that they had been converted to Islam. A popular belief had got abroad that the whole Magyar people would acknowledge Mohammed as their prophet, and whenever a Mohammedan came across a Madjarli, the fire of the missionary was blazing fiercely in his heart.

Such an interest, or a kindred one, must have entered into the friendship shown to me during my voyage to Galacz by some Turks from Widdin, Rustchuk and Silistria. In this supposition of mine I may possibly be mistaken, and it is quite as likely that their sympathies were excited by the deep national feeling, which then manifested itself everywhere in the Ottoman empire, in favour of the Magyars, who had been defeated by the Russians. This state of affairs, at all events, was of excellent service to me, not only during this passage, but during my entire stay in Turkey.

I was drawn by curiosity towards the half-Asiatic Turks, my fellow travellers, and these very men were the first to introduce me into the Oriental world. I need not say that, after having been with them for a day or two, I improved in my Turkish, to such an extent, that at Galacz I was already able to serve a countryman of mine as an interpreter.

The Oriental, and, I may say, the Mohammedan element was decidedly preponderating amongst the passengers, in whose company I went from Galacz to Constantinople. The reader will not be surprised to learn that I was booked for the cheapest place on the ship, namely, the deck, and that, even for that place, I often paid only half fare. I placed my meagre knapsack near the luggage of the Turks, who were sitting apart from the others, and most of whom were on their pilgrimage to Mecca; I was impatiently looking out to catch a glimpse of the long-hoped-for sea, which I had never seen before.

He who has got his first impressions of the sea, through the reading of Byron's aquatic scenes, Camoen's "Lusiade," or Tegnér's "Legend of Frithjof," will be overcome by feelings of no common order in finding himself, for the first time in his life, on the boundless watery expanse, especially of the Euxine—gliding along its bosom and being rocked by its waves.

At an hour's distance from the mouths of the Sulina, I gazed, in a reverie, at the awful grandeur of the sea, not in the least disturbed by the deep guttural sounds and savage groans which came from the sea-sick people around me.

Father Poseidon had done no manner of harm to my health. I had rather reason to complain of an unusually keen appetite; the excessive chilliness of the evenings, too—we were then in the month of April—cooled my blood more than I thought it desirable. I began to shake with the cold, in spite of a surplus carpet, placed at my disposal for a covering by the kind care of a Turk; and after having feasted my eyes on the bright, star-covered sky for a considerable time, I fell, at length, asleep.

A STORM AT SEA.I was suddenly and rudely roused from my dreams towards midnight by peals of thunder and flashes of lightning, accompanied by a violent shower. I had been all day long wishing for a storm; I own my wish was gratified at night in such a thorough manner as fully to satisfy my romantic disposition.

How my heart throbbed upon seeing the ship dance up and down the towering, mountain-like waves, like a nimble gazelle! The creaking of beams, the howling of the wind, with which the shouts of despair from the passengers were mingling, the everlasting appeals to Allah, which resounded everywhere, could not destroy the halo of poetry with which I surrounded a scene, otherwise commonplace enough. Only after getting soaking wet with the chilly rain did I shift my place.

I got up and tried to keep myself warm by taking a walk, but the chaos of legs stretched out, of travelling-bags, bundles, firearms and turbans which were littering the ground rendered the walk well-nigh impracticable. I longingly looked at the open space close by the deck, reserved for the promenading of first-class passengers, where I observed, in the darkness of the night a man hurrying to and fro. I had at first thoughts of entering into a conversation with him; but, my courage to do so failing me, I hit upon another expedient to attract his attention. I commenced declaiming, in the midst of the violent storm, one of the epic poems I knew by heart. My choice fell on Voltaire's Henriade—

"Je chante ce héros qui régna sur la France

Et par droit de conquête et par droit de naissance!"1

[1] I sing of the hero who reigned in France, by right of conquest and by right of birth.

And having roared out, with a good will, into the darkness of the night, several verses, I had the satisfaction of seeing the much-envied first-class passenger stop, near a crowd of Turks, in a listening attitude; and after a while he joined me and began a conversation with me.

With Voltaire, acting as master of ceremonies, questions about rank and nationality seemed to be out of place. I discovered next morning that the figure, wrapped in the shadows of night, belonged to a gentleman, a Belgian by birth, a diplomat by his calling, who was going to Constantinople in the capacity of a Secretary of Legation. If the gentleman felt some surprise at the rage of declamation prompting a person wet to the skin to recite verses at night, his astonishment increased considerably upon seeing me next morning in broad daylight shabbily attired. He, nevertheless, seemed to have formed no mean opinion of me; he asked me to come and see him in Pera, and promised me his protection to the extent of his power.

We were favoured by the fairest weather from Varna to Constantinople, and nothing more charming could be imagined than this our voyage. The sailing through the most delightful sea road of the world, vulgarly called the Bosphorus, is apt to affect the dullest spirit, and roused—it is needless to say—the utmost enthusiasm in me. But upon looking about me, and seeing before me the dense forest of masts and flags in the Golden Horn, I fancied I was placed, as it were, in the very centre of the world; and as my fellow passengers were dropping away, one by one, all hurrying in different directions to the shore, a feeling of my forlornness burst upon me. My spirits were damped and I felt anxious and ill at ease.

THE BOSPHORUS.

PENNILESS IN PERA.Of the fifteen florins I had brought with me from Pesth, I had left just enough to pay my fare on the boat which took me to the shore. I now set my foot on Turkish ground, if not with a light heart, certainly with a very light purse, and sauntered pretty recklessly up the narrow street leading to the heights of Pera.

With a spirit less adventurous and at a more sensible age than mine, I should have asked myself: "Where will you sleep to-night, what will you eat—and, altogether, what will you begin to do?" But I never put these questions to myself—I was blind in my enthusiasm. I was quietly stopping to look at some signs, covered with Turkish inscriptions, and was busy deciphering them, when a stranger, a Hungarian, whose curiosity had been roused by the long ribbon which floated from my Hungarian hat, stepped up to me. He inquired in Italian about my nationality and my place of destination, and upon learning that I was a Hungarian he, as a countryman and a political refugee, of course, immediately addressed me in Hungarian, much to the delight of both of us.

Mr. Püspöki had been an honest mechanic in his own country; he was earning a living in Turkey by being, in turn, an officer of the line, a sutler during the Crimean war, an accounting clerk on board of a ship, and, finally, when I met him, a cook. He was occupying a small, poverty-stricken room, on the ground floor, in the dirty quarter of the town which lies in the rear of the walls of the palace of the English Embassy; its modest furniture consisting solely of a mattress, running along the wall, which he shared with me, like a brother.

I shall never forget my first night on this couch. My hospitable countryman had been fast asleep for some time, whilst I, unable to close my eyes, was still pondering over the strange beginning of life in Turkey. I became, all of a sudden, aware that now one, and again the other, of my boots were moving about, by themselves.

"Friend," I said, first in a whisper, and gradually raising my voice, "I think they are carrying away my boots."

He only muttered something unintelligible in reply. I repeated my remark, and the good man finally exclaimed with some ill-humour:

"Do sleep! It is nothing but rats playing."

A very amusing game, indeed, I thought, provided they do not chew up my boots; and I turned to sleep again.

I spent about three days in that miserable hole. I soon extended my acquaintance with my countrymen, and obtained, through them, permission to live in one of the rooms occupied by the "Magyar Club," which was at that time already nearly deserted. At this place I met with fewer frolicsome animals, but the skipping animals were all the more numerous; and one evening, when, suffering from the chilliness of the night, I ventured to ask the secretary of the club to give me something to cover myself with, that worthy gentleman took the tricolour off the flagstaff, and handed it to me, apostrophizing me in the following touching manner:

"Friend! this flag has fired the hearts of many in their heroic flights, it was itself once full of fire; wrap yourself up in it, dream of glorious battlefields, and maybe it will keep you warm too."

And, oddly enough, I wrapped the old rag around me, shivered yet for a little while, and then fell into a sound sleep.

Several days had passed in this manner. Day by day the circle of my acquaintances was increasing, and all of them were particularly struck with the varied knowledge I exhibited in the matter of languages, and my being able to speak fluently and read easily the language of the country, without having lived in Turkey, was to them a subject of special wonder.

A TEACHER OF LANGUAGES.To give instruction in the languages used in the country, with a view to earning my daily bread, suggested itself as the most natural thing. Written advertisements of my desire were distributed, and the first lesson I was to give was, oddly enough, in Danish.

Mr. Hübsch, a noble-minded gentleman of culture, whom I shall always remember with pleasure, had been for some time back in search of a Danish master, and was really glad to meet me; indeed, he made such rapid progress as to be able, in the course of a few months, to read, under my direction, Andersen's "Spilleman" and "Berlingske Tidninger."

Beginning with this odd lesson, I soon obtained other engagements as a teacher, which I should never have hoped to obtain. The all-promising advertisements did not fail to produce their effects; and one day, when I happened to be at the book-shop of Mr. S., a young Turk, whose large retinue showed him to be a man of means, came in and inquired after the Madjarli, whose name he had seen in the shop-window—and whom he wished to engage as a "Khodja," or teacher of the French language.

The young Bey was, as I had afterwards occasion to learn, a "Miraskhor," that is, a person who has just come into possession of a rich inheritance, and is trying to acquire the external attributes suitable to his wealth. In Turkey, at that time, these attributes were as follows: (1) a suit of the finest broadcloth, after the latest cut and fashion; (2) tight patent leather shoes; (3) a small, jaunty fez, rakishly worn on one side of the head, and, as a matter of course, gloves, too; (4) an easy, graceful step, accompanied by a fashionable carriage of the arms and hands; and (5) French conversation. European tradesmen had provided him with the first four ingredients for the make-up of a Turkish gentleman, and I was to furnish him with the fifth. TEACHING A TURK.I was, accordingly, engaged on the spot as his teacher, the remuneration stipulated for being ten piastres for one hour's lesson daily, besides my expenses of going to his house and returning, as our dandy was living at some distance in Skutari.

This lesson procured me the opportunity of gaining admission for the first time into a genuine Turkish house. I arrived every day punctually at the appointed hour, but generally found my pupil, who had just roused himself from his slumbers, still suffering from the effects of last night's debauch, and scarcely able to lift his heavy eyelids; nor did I discover in him the slightest disposition to acquire the language of the Gauls. It took him an entire month to master the alphabet.

I usually found my pupil in the company of a venerable mollah, who fairly shuddered whenever the sounds of a language of the Giaours reached his ears, for the father of my pupil was a notoriously pious Mussulman, and the walls of the room in which we sat had only re-echoed until now the canting recitals of the Koran, the sacred hymns, and other prayers.

I often heard the mollah muttering in his beard, "This is the way in which the spirit of infidelity is being smuggled into our houses."

I need not say that the instruction I imparted was highly profitable to myself. We did at first some French, but later on we glided from the French lesson into explanatory sketches of European life and European ideas. I told the Bey of our social, political, and scientific institutions, decking them out, as a matter of course, in their brightest colours, for the European, during his first stay in the East, is always looking back with fondness to the West he has just left, and the very things he used to condemn look to him charming at a distance.

My information was almost always received with approval and admiration. Turkey had just seen a good specimen of Europe in her Anglo-French allies who had come to her assistance against the Russians; the Turks were, therefore, eager to learn all the particulars having reference to the Western land, and if the descriptions of these excited now and then their envy, roused them to disapproval or called out their conceit, they were always listened to, and that with pleasure.

At the close of the lesson a well-prepared and abundant breakfast was always brought in, and I must own that from the very first the cooking of the better classes in Constantinople had enlisted my gastronomic partiality. It frequently happened, too, that we started immediately after breakfast for a ride on horseback, my pupil making his calls in my company; in short, I passed a considerable portion of the day in the society of Turks, and I used to return to Pera, that is, to European life, in the evening only.

My permanent stay amongst Turks dates, however, from the time when, at the recommendation of a countryman of mine, I was invited by Hussein Daim Pasha, general of a division, to enter his house as the teacher of his son, Hassan Bey.

I removed my quarters from Pera to the charmingly situated row of houses at Fyndykly; there I got a separate room, and enjoyed for the first time the amenities of Oriental quiet and Turkish comfort. The life in a strictly Mohammedan part of the town, in the vicinity of a mosque, from whose slender minaret the Ezan resounded with gloomy melancholy, affecting my ears with its weird-like sounds; the grand prospect from my window taking in the sea near by, with its thousand crafts, and the magnificent Beshikash palace; and the dignified and patriarchal air which pervaded the whole house—were all things which had the charm of novelty for me, and which I can never forget.

The figure of the major domo (Vekilkhardj), a gray-bearded Anatolian, however, has perhaps made the deepest impression upon my memory. The good man was particularly indulgent towards me upon all occasions when I happened to sin against the strictly Oriental customs; he took great pains to teach me how to sit decorously, that is, with crossed legs; he taught me to carry my head and to use my hands with propriety, and how I should yawn, sneeze, and so forth. His attention embraced the merest trifles.

"You are, for the first time, in a large city; you have just entered polite society," he benignly said, "and you must learn everything."

Of course the old man looked upon me as a person coming from the land of "black infidelity," a land to which, in his opinion, decency, good manners, and morals were utter strangers, and he seemed to think that a stranger hailing from those parts needed to be educated quite as much as a Turkish peasant from the neighbourhood of Kharput and Diarbekir.

HUSSEIN DAIM PASHA.The pasha himself, my chief, was a much more interesting personage. It was he who afterwards became known as the leader of the celebrated Kuleili conspiracy, a conspiracy whose object was nothing less than the removal of Sultan Abdul Medjid and of all his grandees; the conspirators flattering themselves with the belief that all the causes of the decay of Turkey would be thereby extirpated, and that, with one stroke, the old and infirm Ottoman Empire could be restored to its ancient power.

I was an inmate of his house at the time when this notorious conspiracy was being hatched and the plans for its consummation formed. AHMED EFFENDI.A mollah from Bagdad, by the name of Ahmed Effendi, a man of rare mental gifts, immense reading, ascetic life, and boundless fanaticism was the life and soul of the whole conspiracy. He had taken part in the whole of the Crimean war as a Gazi (a warrior for religion), bareheaded and barefooted, and clad in a garb whose austere simplicity recalled the primitive ages of Islam. His sword never left his lean loins, nor his lance the firm grasp of his clenched fist, either by day or by night, except when he said his prayers, five times a day. Through the snow, in the storm, in the thickest of the fight on the battlefield, during toilsome marches, everywhere could be discovered the ghost-like form of this zealot, his fiery eyes scattering flames, and always at the head of the division, under the command of my chief.

It was quite natural that such a man should please Hussein Daim Pasha. The acquaintance begun in the camp, had here grown into a sort of relationship by consanguinity; for the lean mollah, who was walking about barefoot in Constantinople, had the privilege of crossing even the threshold of the harem, where, under the protection of the sacredness of Turkish family life, unwelcome listeners could be most conveniently got rid of. There was something in the appearance of Ahmed Effendi which terrified me at first, and only, later, upon my allowing myself to be called by my pasha, for the sake of intimacy, Reshid (the brave, the discreet), came this terrible man near me, with some show of friendliness; he probably concluding, from my having adopted this name, that I was very near being converted to Islam. A very false inference! But I did not destroy the hopes of the zealot, gaining thereby his good-will, and getting him to give me instruction in Persian.

Ahmed Effendi allowed me even to visit him in his cell in the yard of the mosque. And oh! how interesting were those hours which I spent, sitting at his feet, with other youths who were eager to learn! It seemed as if I had got hold of a fairy key unlocking, to my dazzled eyes in one moment, the whole of Mohammedan Asia.

Ahmed Effendi had an astonishing, almost supernatural memory; he was a thorough Arabic and Persian scholar, and knew a whole series of classics by heart. I had only to begin with a line from Khakani Nizami or Djami, in Spiegel's Persian Chrestomathy, and he would at once continue to recite the whole piece to the end. Indeed he would have been able to go on with his declamation for hours.

To this Ahmed Effendi I was indebted, more than to anybody else, for my transformation from a European into an Asiatic. In speaking of my transformation, I trust the friendly reader will not suppose, for one moment, that a more intimate acquaintance with Asiatic modes of thought had led my mind away from the spirit of the West. A thousand times, no! Rather the reverse was the case. The more I studied the civilization of Islam and the views of the nations professing it, the higher rose, in my estimation, the value of western civilization.