DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5541#0086
58
VARIETY OF COSTUME.
[Chap. iv.
But perhaps the most striking object there is the great
variety of curious and gay costumes, various even amongst
the different classes of Turks; but still more so from the
heterogeneous nations that swarm and congregate in this
busy quarter. The grave and stately Turkish merchant
or shopkeeper, in his ample robes, and squatting on his
shop-board, contrasts with the strong, active, and almost
gigantic hernial or porter, bending beneath a burthen
which it seems scarcely possible for the human back to
sustain; though I have been informed that it is not un-
usual for them to carry a load of twelve or fourteen cwt.
Their dress is as simple as that of the other is ostentatious,
with bare legs and white drawers, and a wisp of cotton-cloth
rolled round their dirty fez or red skull-cap. Again, the
Xcbeque from the mountains, and the banks of the Mfean-
der, with bare legs and white drawers fitting tight to his
thighs, but made preposterously loose behind, with his high
and gaudy turban bedecked with tassels and fringes, is a
very different being from the E unique or Turcoman, clad
in sombre brown, tramping along in heavy-shod iron boots,
and driving on his camels and asses laden with charcoal for
sale. Then the Armenians and Levantines, with their huge
kalpaks and flowing robes, their dark complexions, and
clean-shaved chins, are as different from the mean-looking
fair-haired Jews, with bare foreheads, long-pointed beards,
and rather open necks, as anything can well be imagined :
it is extraordinary how many fair effeminate-looking persons
there are amongst the Jews of Smyrna. Again, what a
striking difference Ave see between the proud chavasse with
his splendid arms, his dagger, pistols, and silver-mounted
yataghan, and the bandy-legged, half-starved tactico (regu-
lar infantry soldier), with his ugly, useless fez and blue
tassel, looking half angry and half ashamed of his ill-made
and unmahometan dress ! Hard by is a long train of Turkish
women, silently shuffling along in their yellow slippers,
whose spectral dress forms a striking variety to the party-
coloured figures by which they are surrounded. Their faces
are invisible, being- concealed by a black silk mask, which
VARIETY OF COSTUME.
[Chap. iv.
But perhaps the most striking object there is the great
variety of curious and gay costumes, various even amongst
the different classes of Turks; but still more so from the
heterogeneous nations that swarm and congregate in this
busy quarter. The grave and stately Turkish merchant
or shopkeeper, in his ample robes, and squatting on his
shop-board, contrasts with the strong, active, and almost
gigantic hernial or porter, bending beneath a burthen
which it seems scarcely possible for the human back to
sustain; though I have been informed that it is not un-
usual for them to carry a load of twelve or fourteen cwt.
Their dress is as simple as that of the other is ostentatious,
with bare legs and white drawers, and a wisp of cotton-cloth
rolled round their dirty fez or red skull-cap. Again, the
Xcbeque from the mountains, and the banks of the Mfean-
der, with bare legs and white drawers fitting tight to his
thighs, but made preposterously loose behind, with his high
and gaudy turban bedecked with tassels and fringes, is a
very different being from the E unique or Turcoman, clad
in sombre brown, tramping along in heavy-shod iron boots,
and driving on his camels and asses laden with charcoal for
sale. Then the Armenians and Levantines, with their huge
kalpaks and flowing robes, their dark complexions, and
clean-shaved chins, are as different from the mean-looking
fair-haired Jews, with bare foreheads, long-pointed beards,
and rather open necks, as anything can well be imagined :
it is extraordinary how many fair effeminate-looking persons
there are amongst the Jews of Smyrna. Again, what a
striking difference Ave see between the proud chavasse with
his splendid arms, his dagger, pistols, and silver-mounted
yataghan, and the bandy-legged, half-starved tactico (regu-
lar infantry soldier), with his ugly, useless fez and blue
tassel, looking half angry and half ashamed of his ill-made
and unmahometan dress ! Hard by is a long train of Turkish
women, silently shuffling along in their yellow slippers,
whose spectral dress forms a striking variety to the party-
coloured figures by which they are surrounded. Their faces
are invisible, being- concealed by a black silk mask, which