Any information derived from personal knowledge of the countries described in the Hand-Book for the East, calculated to correct errors and supply deficiencies, is earnestly requested from all those into whose hands this volume may chance to fall. Notices of new routes, and of improved means of communication and accommodation, will be particularly acceptable. As a general rule, the pages to which the corrections apply should invariably be given. Such communications may be addressed to the Editor of the Hand-Books for Travellers, care of Mr. MURRAY, Albemarle Street. September, 1844. A HAND-BOOK FOR TRAVELLERS IN GREECE, TURKEY, ASIA MINOR, AND CONSTANTINOPLE. INTRODUCTION. a. Maxims and Hints for Travelling.-b. Language.—c. Money.— Passports.-e. Travelling Servant.-f. Requisites for Travelling. -g. Mode of Travelling.-h. Letters of Introduction.-i. Presents. ―j. Seasons and Climates.—k. Quarantine.—l. Hint before Starting.-m. Steam-boats. INTRODUCTION. a. MAXIMS AND HINTS FOR TRAVELLING IN THE EAST. "THROUGHOUT European, and a great portion of Asiatic Turkey, as also in Persia and Central Asia, people travel on horseback. With the same horses the average rate may be twenty to twentyfive miles a day. With post-horses, changing at stages varying from ten to eighteen miles, sixty miles a day may be easily accomplished; 100 is fast travelling; 150 the fastest; 600 miles in four days and a half, and 1200 in ten, are, indeed, feats, but not very common ones. "This mode of travelling, even when not going at such a pace as that just mentioned, involves hardships, exposure, and fatigue. It is not a recreation suited to all men, and is trying even to those who are vigorous and indifferent to luxuries and comforts; yet there is none of that languor and feverishness that so generally result from travelling on wheels, but in their stead invigorated health, braced nerves, and elevated spirits. You are in immediate contact with nature. Every circumstance of scenery and climate becomes of interest and value, and the minutest incident of country or of local habits cannot escape observation. A burning sun may sometimes exhaust, or a summer-storm may drench you, but what can be more exhilarating than the sight of the lengthened troop of variegated and gay costumes dashing at full speed along to the crack of the Tartar whip and the wild whoop of the surugee? What more picturesque than to watch their reckless career over upland or dale, or along the waving line of the landscape,—bursting away on a dewy morn, or racing 'home' on a rosy eve? "You are constantly in the full enjoyment of the open air of a heavenly climate,—its lightness passes to the spirits, its serenity sinks into the mind. You are prepared to be satisfied with little, to support the bad without repining, to enjoy the good as a gain, and to be pleased with all things. You are fit for work and glad of rest; you are, above all things, ready for your food, which is always savoury when it can be got, and never unseasonable when forthcoming. But here it will be seen that no small portion of the pleasures of eastern travel arises from sheer hardship and privation, which increase so much our real enjoyments, by endowing us with a frame of mind and body at once to enjoy and to endure. It is also from such contingencies alone that those amongst us who have not to labour for their daily bread can obtain an insight into the real happiness enjoyed three times a-day by the whole mass of mankind who labour for their bread and hunger for their meals. "To travel in the East with comfort or advantage, it is necessary to do so according to the rule and custom of the country. This it is easy to lay down as a rule, but very difficult to put in practice, because it supposes long experience and perfect acquaintance with a subject. when you enter only on its threshold. But, supposing that this can be effected, you will proceed on your rambles, accompanied by attendants who perform the various functions of your establishment as they would do in a fixed abode; you carry also along with you every requisite and comfort, and feel yourself almost entirely independent of circumstance or assistance; and thus, in the desert, as in the peopled city, the associations of home pursue you, and practically inform you of those feelings of locomotive independence, and of that combination of family ties and nomade existence, which are the basis of Eastern character. How do these inquiries, which appear at a distance so abstruse, become homely and simple when you surround yourself with the atmosphere of custom? You can at once lay your hand on motives; you spring at once to conclusions without the trouble of reflection, or the risks which so unfortunately attend the parturitions of logic. Placed among a strange people, if you inquire, you must use language not applicable to their ideas; if you argue, you deal with your impressions, not theirs; but when you put yourself in a position similar to theirs, you can feel as they do, and that is the final result of useful investigation. Burke, in his essay on the Sublime and Beautiful,' mentions an ancient philosopher who, when he wished to understand the character of a man, used to imitate him in every thing, endeavoured to catch the tone of his voice, and even tried to look like him: never was a better rule laid down for a traveller. "If I might recal one hour from this simple and nomade existence more delicious than the rest, it would be that of the evening bivouac, when you choose your ground as fancy or caprice may decide, on a mountain-brow, or in a secluded vale, by a running brook, or in a sombre forest; where, become familiar with mother earth, you lay yourself down on her naked bosom. There you may establish sudden community with her other children-the forester, the lowland ploughman, or the mountain shepherd; or call in, to share your evening repast, some weary traveller, whose name, race, and land of birth may be equally unknown, and who may, in the pleasing uncertainty but certain instruction of such intercourse, wile the evening hour away with tales of the desert or stories of the capital, and may have visited, in this land of pilgrims, the streams of Cashmere, or the parched Sahara. "But though never can you better enjoy, still nowhere can you more easily dispense with, man's society than in your tent, after a long day's fatigue. It is a pleasure which words cannot tell to watch that portable home, everywhere the same-spreading around its magic circle, and rearing on high its gilded ball; as cord by cord is picketed down, it assumes its wonted forms, and then spreads wide its festooned porch, displaying within mosaic carpets and piled cushions. There the traveller reclines, after the labour of the day and the toil of the road, his ablutions first performed at the running stream, and his namaz recited,—to gaze away the last gleam of twilight, in that absorbed repose which is not reflection, which is not vacancy, but a calm communing with nature, and a silent observation of men and things. Thus that pensive mood is fostered, and that soberness of mind acquired, which, though not morose, is never trivial, and, though not profound, is natural and true. Thus, at home in the wilds, should the Mussulman be seen, picturesque in his attire, sculpturesque in his attitude, with dignity on his forehead, welcome on his lips, and poetry in all around. With such a picture before him, the ever-busy Western may guess at the frame of mind of those to whom such existence is habitual, and who thence carry into the business of life the calm we can only find in solitude, when, escaping from our self-created world of circumstance, we can visit and dwell for a moment with the universe, and converse with it in a language without words."— Urquhart. b. LANGUAGE. It is in general desirable that a traveller should have made some progress in the language of the countries in which he means to travel before he commences his tour. But the modern Greek and Turkish languages are so little studied, that a traveller will in general be obliged to supply his own deficiencies by the superior knowledge of his servant. It is therefore most especially necessary that this travelling servant should be perfectly acquainted with the language of the countries through which his route lies. Next to the language of the country, Italian will be found the most useful language, both in Greece and Turkey. C. MONEY.-CIRCULAR NOTES. The circular notes of Herries, Coutts, and other London banks, the most convenient and best mode of taking money abroad, are |