of overflowing love, would not, in the East, appear unnatural or strange. Its costliness, however, was strange, and Iscariot, followed by some other of the disciples, began at once to complain. But Jesus checked their murmuring. The poorthey would have many an opportunity of helping them; and surely Mary did help them, had often done so, or Christ would not have passed away the objection so lightly. The poor-yes, let us help them when we can, and regret that they need our help so much; but shall we lavish nothing on our friendships? Shall no presents testify our love? Shall we be dead to beauty, and discard refinement? The poor Mary had thought of, and would think of again; but just now the crucifixion was at hand, and the deep agony of the garden; why should she not lavish her richest store to relieve a little such sorrow as poverty never brought? For perhaps the most wonderful part of the tale is this reason which Jesus gives: "Against the day of my burying hath she kept this." Not in vain, then, had she sat at the feet of Jesus and heard his word. While the disciples were all in doubt and darkness, and Peter scornfully rejected the thought of his Master's death, and the multitude cried Hosanna, and looked for a mighty monarch, this one woman had listened and thought and felt, and, rising above the prejudices of her time, beheld already in Jesus the crucified Saviour of the world, wept for his sufferings, and loved him for his love.

4. We have already casually alluded to a scene very similar, yet very different from this. In Luke vii, 36-50, there is an account of a supper, at which " a woman who was a sinner" came, like Mary of Bethany, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped them with her hair. The two stories are often confounded, but quite without reason; for though the principal act is the same, all the accessories are different. The one supper was given by "Simon the Pharisee," in Galilee, and at an earlier period in Christ's ministry. The other by "Simon the leper," at Bethany, and only a week before the crucifixion. But the most important point of contrast is in the character of the two women. Mary Magdalene was "a sinner," and Jesus justified her devotion on the ground that they to whom much is forgiven will love much, while he to "whom little is forgiven loveth little." And yet Mary of Bethany was

surely one who, in the Pharisee's view at least, needed little forgiveness. But her devotion also, rising above ordinary limits, showed itself in just the same way as that of the penitent Mary Magdalene. Was not her love then equally great? And may we not interpret the one case by the other, and see that Jesus was contrasting repentance from, perhaps, gross sin, not with a pure life, but with a self-righteous arrogance of purity? It is they who care but little, who ask but little, for forgiveness; not they whose life is most free from sin.

5. Let us say then, lastly, that people are mistaken when they think that the way to the highest virtue lies through guilt and penitence. Few ideas are more common; few, we think, more erroneous. It is thought that purity induces quiescence and repose, and leads us to be content with the excellence already attained. Thus even John Foster says of a friend, "I doubt if S is not too innocent to become sublimely excellent." But we should say rather that repose and acquiescence in a lower state of virtue is what we are all liable to; those who have reached that state through deep penitence, not less than those who have slowly grown into it. Some excitement is needed to correct this; but though that is often supplied by the bitterness of remorse, it may spring also from the promptings of a deeper love, from more earnest prayer, or more thoughtful benevolence.

| Let us then, if we have sinned, and sinned deeply-alas, how few of us have not!-let us attempt, as did Mary Magdalene, to rise boldly and swiftly through the clouds of penitence and remorse to the calm, clear regions of exalted virtue. But let us never look upon sin as something that can be wholly remedied by repentance; for the height which we have scaled with groans, and toil, and sweat, might have been more easily reached had we always striven to understand the teaching of our Saviour, to help the sufferings of our neighbors, to meet temptation manfully, to feel the deep sinfulness of sin, the high allurements of arduous virtue.

No man can always have the same spiritual pleasure in his prayers; for the greatest saints have sometimes suffered banishment of the heart; sometimes they feel a barrenness of devotion: for this spirit comes and goes.-Jeremy Taylor.

guests. The French are undoubtedly the most social nation. Their lofty residences, piling story upon story, or rather house upon house, prove their agglomerative character; while London, the exchange of the world, multiplies its docks, markets, and other places necessary to a commercial people, and preserves its individualism in its separate family residences. The exchange is the forum of London, while that of Rome is now in the temple; the superstitious devotion of the latter is manifested in the unnecessary multiplication of its churches.

The absolutism of Eastern government and the rigid character of the Mohammedan religion have not failed to produce a marked impression upon the physiognomy of Constantinople. It might be surprising, if it was not well known that one extreme leads to another, to find individualism the most striking feature of the city of the sultan. One act of despotism gives birth to a thousand others; and tyranny in the state can be endured only in times and places where tyranny is allowed in the family. The phenomenon is here witnessed of a political society where the citizen possesses no other right than that of being as tyrannical as he pleases in his own family. In the street the Turk belongs to the sultan, but within his own house each Turk becomes a sultan to all its inmates. His kingdom is comprised within his four walls, and his empire may extend over but a few individuals; but it is absolute while it exists. He rewards the docility of his subjects, or punishes their disobedience, as seems good to himself. His commands are irrevocable, and he may enforce them by beating, imprisonment, or death, without accountability to any one but his Maker. Even the sultan has no right to interfere with his domestic affairs in any way. "Effendi," said a friend of mine to a Turk of his acquaintance, whom he met with a pretty boy in the street, "is this your child?" "Yes, captain," he replied, "please God and the sultan, it is my son." But some time after, when visiting the home of the submissive Mussulman, the same question was answered with the omission of the sultan's permission. "Allah is great," said the happy father, "and this is my son." The houses of Constantinople are all built very low, because they never contain more than one family; the windows

are closely latticed, and so constructed that the interior is invisible from without. At intervals a single man, a slave, or a closely-vailed woman enters or emerges from this abode of mystery and inviolability, through the little door which is always carefully closed. A police spy could never cross a Mussulman's threshold alive, whatever grounds of suspicion he might possess: the Turk believes in the inviolability of his domicil as firmly as he believes in the unity of God. He barricades himself in his home as the nobles of Europe formerly intrenched themselves in their feudal castles. Every Mussulman's house in the city, however poor or small, contains its selamlick, or men's apartment, and its odalick, or women's apartment. The former, even in the residences of the wealthy, is a mere antechamber, furnished with extreme simplicity. No stranger ever passes beyond it, nor even the most intimate friend of the master of the house. He receives his guests in it, serves them with coffee and pipes, or with dinner if previously invited. The wealth of the possessor is lavished upon the odalick or harem, which contains every possible luxury in the shape of soft divans, rare flowers, odorous fountains, elegant furniture, inlaid with gold and pearl, and burning perfumes in gold and silver censers. The owner of all this luxury may at any time be excluded from its enjoyment by the presence of a pair of slippers at the door of the harem. This silently announces the presence of some lady visitor, and peremptorily forbids all male intrusion. No relative more remote than the father or brother can ever look upon the unvailed female face; so that a rigid Mussulman in middle life, of a limited family circle, may hence see only his mother, sister, and wife. They may gaze unrestricted, however, upon the Greeks, Armenians, and Jewesses of the city. The Turkish women themselves are much scandalized with the boldness of the Frank ladies, who go out with their faces uncovered! How many questions of virtue and vice are settled by latitude and longitude!

Any allusion to the females of the household is considered a great indelicacy. The wife of a French embassador presented Redschid Pasha with some elegant female fabrics, accompanied by a note begging his acceptance of the silks, "which," she added, “you will know bet

ter than any one how to use." Yet Redschid Pasha has spent much time abroad, and is so unpopular for his zeal in the introduction of reform movements that he is frequently styled "the Giaour" by the "old fogy" Mussulmans.

The multiplicity of wives is not universal in Turkey, as has been generally supposed. The Koran allows four to all true believers, but only the great dignitaries of the empire, or those possessed of large wealth, can avail themselves of this privilege. Every wife claims her separate apartments, and as many female slaves as her husband's means will afford; for these are considered as the representatives of rank or riches in the Orient. Many of the slaves are beautiful according to the Eastern standard, and, of course, the master's will is alike absolute over them all; but the Mussulman who wrongly uses his authority must brave the jealousy of his wife and the condemnation of public opinion as much as in more Christian nations. It must be admitted that the Turk rarely abuses his discretionary power. The slaves of both sexes are generally treated with kindness, and often with affection. The manhood of the sterner sex is seldom forgotten under the disguise of servitude. It is very common to hear them give their opinion and even advice to the master of the house, while their modes of expression show that they consider themselves a part of the family.

The state of female society in Constantinople is probably precisely what it has been for centuries. The hand of reform has left them untouched; and yet upon scarcely any other trait of Turkish life and character are foreigners in such ignorance. It is doubtless because the harem is still as impenetrably mysterious as ever. A few ladies have made their way across the charmed threshold, but only for a brief time, and they have then been such objects of curiosity to the fair inmates, that but little opportunity has been left for minute and careful observation.

Every one has a vague idea that Turkish women are imprisoned in splendid apartments, from whence they emerge in the course of the day to breathe the air of their high-walled gardens, where they are attended by frightful black eunuchs who tyrannize over them with capricious brutality. It is true that the ugliness of the eunuchs whom I have seen can scarcely

be exaggerated; but it must be remembered, as I have said, that only the wealthy dignitaries of the empire can afford the expense of many wives, and only those connected with the imperial family are attended by eunuchs. Within their own apartments the sultan's wives are guarded by an old woman, who is a kind of general of the fair troops. But all the women who are recognized as wives have separate rooms and slaves of their own, and they also enjoy the utmost freedom. Many of them are furnished with most elegant equipages, in which they drive out when and where they please, accompanied only by a single attendant, and never by their husbands.

The Turks have some ideas upon the subject of marriage which seem at first view somewhat peculiar to themselves, but, upon examination, they are not found so very unlike more professedly Christian nations.

The imperial harem contains several classes of females, some of them entering at the age of ten years to be trained up for the future, either as waiting women or odalisques. Those who become favorites are called kadines or wives, and any one of these who becomes the mother of a boy passes to the rank of an hasseki or sultana, and sometimes acquires unbounded influence. The number of his majesty's kadines seldom exceeds four. They are permitted to marry at the age of thirty. In order to make room for younger recruits, the sultan bestows them upon his ministers or officers as tokens of his approval. It is considered a high distinction, and is a most eagerly sought favor by the pashas, beys, or seraskiers, both on account of the court education which they have received and the court influence they are supposed to possess. The former consists generally of reading, writing, and music; but the latter is less distinctly defined. The political marriages of European nations are not so unlike these Mussulman arrangements as might at first

its supremacy. A friend of mine recently painted the portrait of one of the dignitaries of the realm, who was so delighted with its truthfulness, that overcoming for the once Mohammedan scrupulousness, he expressed a wish to have the picture of his favorite wife. At the appointed time the lady was led in, and the artist set himself gravely to work. But a few minutes had elapsed after the sketching commenced, before the noise of whispering and laughter was heard at the curtained door by which the sitter had entered: the curtain was furtively lifted, and bright eyes glanced timidly upon the novel scene. Emboldened by indulgence, the screen was held open; the noise and laughter and crowd increased till the conversation of the artist with his employer was quite interrupted by the clamorous troop; when the old Turk arose and hustled them away from the scene, very much as a brood of domestic fowls would be scattered from a measure of corn, and | with very much the same clamor.

After the sitting the artist ventured in careful terms to express his surprise at his employer's choice of a favorite; as his quick eye had discerned more striking beauties among the gay bevy who had lingered about the entrance. The Turk admitted the fact, but explained it by stating that the lady, who was by no means so young or so fair as the other inmates of his harem, was the only one among them who could converse with him upon subjects of interest. She alone had companionship for his mind, and the influence she had acquired was the result of this superiority as one of your poets says, "The glance of intellect, like stranger magic, had outshone them all."

The few glimpses which our lady tourists have given us of life in the harem, are pictures of a true Castle of Indolence. Sleep is the most important occupation of these luxurious abodes. The fair inmates invite their favored friends to come and take a sleep, precisely as our ladies request their intimate acquaintances to spend an evening and take their work. The interim between waking and sleeping is passed in the bath, smoking, regaling themselves with sweetmeats, (of which they eat immoderately,) shopping, riding, dressing, &c. Notwithstanding their invariable seclusion, they are as careful in the selection of their finery, and especially

of their jewels, as though the world was to witness the display. It was probably one of the stronger minded of these houris who nonplussed the English lady with her pert inquiry, when the latter expressed her surprise at their interest in their personal adornment, which, however rich and perfect, was to be seen only by the husband. "For whom then do you wear your ornaments?" inquired the fair but uneducated kadine; but I have never yet heard the reply.

The women decay very early, as the result of this idle and sensuous life; most of them wear false hair when quite young, and their lavish use of confectionery is ruinous to the teeth. Most of them are much more gross than the Graces, which constitute our beau-ideal. The constant use of the bath, and the idleness of their lives, probably give this development to the figure. Almost all the aristocracy of Constantinople are of prodigious bulk. Nearly all the great government officers must be men of extraordinary weight. They make a most laughable appearance in the public processions and ceremonies, which require a great deal of prostration, as it seems an impossibility for them to regain a perpendicular attitude.

Bathing is a religious prescription with the Turks, and the public baths are among the finest buildings of the city. Their interior arrangement is especially elegant. My Bucharest experience did not deter me from new experiments of the same kind. The baths of Soliman, as you will notice from the picture, are of the finest architectural proportions, though not as large or luxurious in their appointments as some others in Constantinople; suffice it to say, I went through nearly the same process of boiling, steaming, soaping, scraping, scouring, scrubbing, splashing, dashing, sleeping, and drinking as before described, and went forth as light and refreshed from the hands of my executioners.

Constantinople, like Rome, is a city of churches and fountains. There are upwards of five hundred of the latter, which furnish the inhabitants with all the water necessary for the frequent ablutions required by the Koran. No one who has seen a native at his meals-destitute as they are of eating implements, save those which were considered indispensable in Eden-can be insensible to the wisdom