Ir, }

VISIT TO MEBEMET ALL

1G

to the gate which we had just passed; it was closed ; as 1826.
the first victim reached the gate, a hundred discharges of Zr. 82.
musketry from the walls on each side opened upon them.
They turned to retreat, but the gate behind was also
closed, and they were fast in the toils of their betrayer
and destroyer. Only one man is said to have escaped,
who rode his horse up a steep bank, and forced him
over the battlement and into a gulf seventy feet deep
below. The horse was killed, but the rider escaped, and
made his way to Europe. Such is the substance of a deed
of blood which had no provocation, no state necessity, nor
a semblance even of justice, to palliate its unmitigated
character of treachery, ard yet here am I—I recollected
with emotions of shame—passing over the scene of such a
bloody tragedy, to do obeisance to the principal actor!
“The citadel is in extent and appearance something like a
considerable town. As we proceeded through the steep and
winding avenue, we came upon a thoroughfare lighted up
like a bazaar with shops or stalls on each side, before which
the soldiers were loitering and buying fruit or other articles
from the lazy dealers, who sat cross-legged upon their mats,
enveloped in tobacco smoke. Having passed under another
gateway, and along a winding arched passage of massive
masonry, an abrupt turning or two brought us to a large
open square, the opposite sides of which were lighted up.
Here as we approached the centre of power from whence all
rank, wealth, and authority sre derived in this region of
despotism, the throng of military of all ranks became
more dense, just as the rays of light or the circles of water
are closest where the heat or motion which gives them existence
 has its origin. We dismounted at the principal entrance
and found ourselves in a hall, which, with the stairs that we
immediately ascended, was almost-impassable for the crowds
of military who lounged and loitered in no very orderly