Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M--y W---y M---e : written during her travels in Europe, Asia and Africa ... Which contain ... accounts of the policy and manners of the Turks / [Mary Wortley Montagu].

  • Mary Wortley Montagu
Date:
1790
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M--y W---y M---e : written during her travels in Europe, Asia and Africa ... Which contain ... accounts of the policy and manners of the Turks / [Mary Wortley Montagu]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    delightful parts of the canal, witli a fine wood on the fide of a hill behind it. The extent of it is prodigious j the guardian affurci me, there are eight hundred rooms in it; I will not, however, anfwer ibr that number, fince I did not count them ; but ’tis certain the number is veiy large, and the whole adorned with a proful'ion of marble, gilding, and the mod exquiflte painting of fruit and flowers. The windows are all faflicd with the flncll cryflal- llne glafo brought from England ; and here is all the ex- penfive magnificence that you can fuppofe in a palace ibunded by a vain luxurious young man, with the wealth of a vafl. empire at his command. Sut no part of it pica- fed me better tlian the apartments deflined for the bag- nios. There are two built exablly in the fame manner, anfwcring to one another; tlie batlis, fountains, and pavements, all of white marble, the roofs gilt, and the walls, covered with Japan china. Adjoining to them are two rooms, the uppermofl of which is divided into a fofn, and in the four corners are falls of ivater from the very roof, from flrell to fliell, of white marble, to the lower end of the room, where it falls into a large bafin, furrounded with pipes, that throw up the water as high as the roof. The walls are in the nature of lattices ; and, on the out- fje of them, tlicre are vines and woodbines planted, that form a fort of green tapeflry, and give an agree- able obfeurity to thofe delightful chambers. I fliould go on and let you into fonie of the other apartments (all worthy your curiofity) ; but ’tis yet harder to deferibe a Turkifli palace than any other, being built entirely irregu- lar. There is nothing that can be ])roperh* called front or tvings; and though fuch a confufion is, I think, pleafingto the fight, yet it would be very unintelligible ii> a letter. 1 fli.iil only add, tliat the clicmber deflined for the ful- tan, when he vliits his daughter, is wainfeotted with mo- ther of pearl, faftened with emeralds like nails. There are others of mother of pearl and olive wood inlaid, and feweral of Japan ciiina. The galleries, which are numerous, and vciy large, are adomed with jars of flowers, and porcelain diflies of fntit of all forts, fo w’^cll ^one in plafter, and coloured in fo lively a manner, that it