Page:Adventures of Baron Wenceslas Wratislaw of Mitrowitz (1862).djvu/91

 round which is a set of rings with lamps, and above a second set of rings with ostrich-eggs and balls of looking-glass. On the third and highest gallery is a set of iron rings, and lamps all round suspended from them. Highest of all, in the midst, hangs a gilt ball. All these galleries are adorned with remarkable marble pillars. In the lowest sits the Turkish emperor, where there is a kind of alcove. The Turks told us that these lamps, of which there are over 2,000, burn day and night, and that they require seventy pounds of olive oil a day. In the middle of the church are two handsome cisterns of white marble, into which water flows through pipes. Next to them is a pulpit of white marble, into which no one enters except their highest priest, who goes up twenty-five marble steps, and reads and expounds the Alcoran to them. Sultan Selim had this new church thus ornamentally built at the time when he wrested the kingdom of Cyprus from the Venetians. He assigned it large revenues from the resources of that kingdom, which are transmitted every year to Adrianople. There are four very high and slender towers, and in them three galleries, as in a church, one above the other, from which the priests summon the people to prayers; and when they hold the annual festival, called Bairam, lamps are hung out at night from the towers. From these towers we had a view of the whole city. In this city there is also a palace belonging to the Turkish emperor, on that side of the river on which Sultan Selim dwelt; but they would not allow us to enter it.

On Nov. 18 we started from Adrianople, and travelled to Hapsala, a small town, in which is a handsome temple,