Page:Walter Matthew Gallichan - Women under Polygamy (1914).djvu/155

 the presage of good fortune, and she is set aside to await a summons to the royal chamber.

Many are the stories of crimes and cruelties perpetrated behind the forbidding walls of the harem. In byegone days, no doubt there were tragedies and horrors, though probably their frequency has been grossly exaggerated by foreign writers. I shall show presently that the Turk is not a truculent tyrant of women, and that the Turkish lust for cruelty has been overstated. Mahommed taught explicitly that servants should be treated with consideration and sympathy. The Prophet did not sanction slavery. Most probably the system was derived from the Hebrews. Turkish women of rank, who own slaves, are notably fair and kindly in their control of these attendants. Frequently the slave girl is a confidential companion, and a real affection exists between mistress and servitor.

At Garden Point, in Constantinople, the tourist is shown the spot where offending wives of the royal serai, or harem, were formerly cast into the Bosphorus, sewn up in a sack. "Thousands of women" are said to have received this capital punishment for adultery. Upon what authority are these accounts based? It is well-known that the affairs of the seraglio are conducted in the utmost secrecy. Who was present when hundreds of women were drowned at the same time?