Our coming has already been witnessed by the monks; and as we slowly climb the steps, the iron door ahead half opens for a moment, in sign of recognition, then closes again, while consultation goes on within as to our admittance. After a short interval the portal reopens, and displays an old monk, in the dirty blue dress and black head-gear of his order, that of St. Basil-I may as well remark here that the orthodox Greek Church recognises this one order only; a silent protest against the more modern multiplicity of Latin discipline-standing in the entry, while other brethren group behind him in the dim perspective of the narrow vaulted passage. Glancing at us, he notices the dagger and silvermounted pistol of our principal negro attendant, and requests him to consign these ornaments to monastic keeping before crossing the threshold. To this preliminary ceremony the Darfooree objects; nor does the argument that such is the rule of St. Basil, with which the Sultan himself, were he present in person, must, under penalty of non-admittance, comply, produce any effect on African obstinacy. So, armed as he is, he turns back to look after the horses; while the monks obligingly assure us that neither animals nor groom shall want for anything during our stay here.

We enter the passage. The 'Economos' or Accountant of the monastery, an elderly man, longbearded and long-vested, at his side a stout, jovial, gray-haired, redcheeked old monk, apparently verging on the seventies, but hale and active, our destined 'bear-leader,' and several other brethren, all blue-dressed, bearded, and dirty, come forward to greet us; and conduct us up and down by a labyrinth of little corridors, ruinous flights of stairs, dingy cells, and unsavoury well-like courtyards, all squeezed

up close between the rock on one side and the precipice on the other; till, having thus traversed the 'old buildings,' which form an irregular parallelogram about two hundred feet in length by forty in breadth, we emerge on a little flagged space, neater kept than the rest; and find ourselves in presence of the famous shrine of the Panagia herself.

The body of the church, a cavern natural in its origin, but probably enlarged by art, is hollowed out in the rock, which here faces due east. The sanctuary, which in accordance with the prescription of ecclesiastical tradition also points eastwards, is here represented by a small construction, double staged, about fourteen feet in total height, and sixteen in length; its general appearance from without brings to mind the conventional ark of Biblical pictures and children's toy-shops. It projects at right angles from the stone wall with which the entrance of the cavern all round it has been closed; and, like that wall, is covered with the most appalling specimens of modern Greek mural painting; impossible saints with plate-like halos; crowded days of judgment where naked but sexless souls are being dragged by diabolical hooks into the jaws of a huge dragon, which is hell; Scriptural scenes from the stories of Moses, Elijah, &c., where large heads, no perspective, and a stiffness unrivalled by any board are the chief artistic recommendations; red, yellow, and brown the favourite colours; the whole delicately touched up with the names of innumerable pilgrims, mostly terminating in 'aki' or 'ides,' scratched, with no respect of persons, across saints, souls, demons, and deities alike. The entrance door is close alongside of the sanctuary; and three square grated windows admit the light above. The roofing of the sanctuary is sheet copper, thick encrusted with dirt; so thick, indeed, as to enable

the monks to assure you, without too violent a contradiction of your own ocular evidence, that it is not copper, but silver; the costly giftso continue the same chroniclersof the famous Sultan Murad IV. himself; who, when on his way from Constantinople to Bagdad to fight the Persians, seems to have led his army-Heaven only knows how or why-across the Kolat mountains, and to have encamped, horse, foot, and artillery, on the goat's perch of the ravine here opposite. That Sumelas lies hundreds of miles away from the route which the said Sultan really took, and that Hannibal or Napoleon I. himself would have been puzzled to drag the smallest field-piece among these precipices, are considerations which matter nothing in legend. Accordingly, so continues the tale, when the ferocious Murad first turned his bloodshot eyes on the convent, he enquired of his Begs and Pashas what that building might be; and, on their answer that it was the abode of Christian monks, gave immediate orders to his artillerymen to batter it down. But lo! no sooner were the cannon pointed at the consecrated edifice than they spun round self-moved, and began firing among the Sultan's own troops. Hereon Imperial amazement and further enquiry; met by the information that all this was the doing of the miraculous Virgin, the Panagia, who, or whose picture for in popular orthodox as in Roman devotion the distinction between the symbol and the original is inappreciable to any but a controversialist-tenanted the monastery. Murad, deeply impressed, and no wonder, by the miracle and its explanation, at once abandoned his destructive intentions, did due honour to the Panagia and her ministers, and amongst other offerings presented the silver roof in question only he never did anything of the sort, and it is really copper.

Looking up, we now perceive that the rock above, which here overhangs sanctuary and court in an almost threatening manner, supports in one of its darkest recesses a little Byzantine picture, the Theotokos of course. Dingy and faded, till at first sight hardly discernible from the damp stone against which it rests, this painting occupies the exact spot-we have the monks' word for it-where in the fifth century some goatherds discovered the original Panagia, the work of St. Luke, here placed by angelic agency seemingly in order to keep it out of the way. Now, however, it is deposited for more convenient veneration in the sanctuary below, where we will visit it a little later; but the copy has itself, like iron near a magnet, acquired a good share of useful efficacy by juxtaposition. From the rocky brow above, in front of the picture, fall without ceasing drops of water, which to the eyes of faith are always three at a time, neither more nor less; but for all I looked I could not detect any special numerical system in their fall; these drops carefully collected in a little cistern below possess miraculous virtues equal to any recorded of the same element in the veracious pages of Monseigneur Gaume.

While we have been thus gazing and listening, the four church bells, hung outside in a pretty little open belfry of four light columns and graceful arching-the work and its costs having been alike furnished by the devotion of a wealthy Russian pilgrim-have been ringing a very hospitable though untuneable peal in honour of our arrival; and the monks invite us to enter the sanctuary without further delay. But it is near sunset; and the monotonous chanting of the priests inside warns us that vespers are even now going on, and the church full of worshippers. Unwilling to disturb the congregation, we defer our visit;

and, adding that we are somewhat tired by our day's journey, we are conducted by our hosts across the courtyard, and up a neat stone staircase to our evening quarters, namely, the chief apartment in the 'new buildings.'

These, completed only three years since, rise seven stages in total height, vaults included, from the precipice below to the beetling crag above; the front faces east; and its white-painted masonry, its four tiers of large square windows, and its handsome open gallery supported on slender stone pillarets that run along the whole length of the top most storey, are what first attract the admiration of the traveller as he reaches the opposite point of the ravine. The edifice is eight rooms in length and only one in thickness throughout; but the great solidity of the stone work, and the shelter of the hollow rock in which it nestles, neutralise the danger of over-height. From foundation to roof a narrow space, protected from the weather by the wide eaves above, is left between the building and the crag behind; and here winds an ingenious zigzag of galleries and staircases, all stone, that afford entrance to the several chambers of each storey. Beneath, and partly hollowed out in the living rock, are cellars and store-caverns to which the monks alone have access; besides a large reservoir of excellent water, filled from the oozings of the inner mountain. The entire work, whether considered in itself or in the difficulties of scaffolding and construction where not a spare inch is left of the narrow shelf on which the building stands balanced as it were hundreds of feet in mid-air, is one of no small skill; and its wellconsidered proportion of wall, window, and gallery, with the just adaptation of every part to the practical exigencies of domestic use, claim high constructive praise, and evince a degree of good taste not

always to be found among the house-architects of Western Europe. Yet the builders of 'Mariamana' were from no European, not even from the Constantinopolitan school; they were mere indigenous stonecutters, 'Greek' the most, from the adjoining villages of Koroom, Mejid, and Stavros.

We stroll along the top-storey corridor, the openings of which are guarded by high iron railings, and look across the dizzy depths below, whence rises the ceaseless roar of the Melas torrent, and beyond the dense masses of beech and pine that cluster on the ravine side opposite, to the lonely peaks of KolatDagh, seemingly close in front, and rose-tinted with the last rays of the setting sun. Soon the evening air blows cool; at this elevation 4,100 feet above the sea, as my aneroid informs me - - the night temperature is rarely such as to detain one long out of doors. Five months of the year on an average the convent snow lies unmelted, and for five more of the remaining seven mist and rain are the rule, not the exceptions. The very cats of the establishment, large, tame, and well fed, bear witness by their long fur and bushy fox-like tails to the general coldness of the atmosphere in which they live. Still the site is healthy, and in proof of this an old centagenarian monk presents himself to view hale and hearty among his comrades, who, to judge by appearances, are mostly themselves in a fair way to rival his longevity. But besides, absence of care, and indeed of brain-work in general, has doubtless something to do with this prolonged and vigorous vitality. Nor have they many privations to endure, except what the numerous fasts and abstinences of their antique ritual impose; the convent is wealthy to a degree that might have long since moved the greed of any but a Turkish Government, while the monks in residence

are not over numerous-fifteen indeed is their average. However, besides its regular inmates, this convent contains also several members of distant monasteries from different parts of Anatolia, Roumelia, and even Syria, sent hither to a quiet retreat, or mitigated prison, or both, thus to expiate some past breach of discipline or to prevent some menaced scandal. Lastly, a large number of the monks -though how many my grizzled informant could not, or perhaps would not, say-are scattered on longer or shorter leave of absence without the walls, in quest of the temporal welfare of the community, or superintending the numerous farms belong ing to it, some by purchase, more by legacy. For in the Orthodox, no less than in the Latin Church, the passports of the rich to a better world are seldom countersigned 'gratis.' As a natural consequence, the fields and havings of the Sumelas Panagia lie thick scattered along the entire South Euxine coast from Trebizond to Constantinople, and bring in revenues sufficient for a moderate-sized duchy. Nor is all this wealth consumed in selfish indulgence, or hoarded up by miserly precaution. While the monks still, as before, content themselves with the narrow and cranky buildings of the original convent, the handsome and commodious lodgings of newer construction, the cost of which cannot have fallen short of 4,000l. at least, are freely abandoned to the eight thousand pilgrims or guests who, on a rough calculation, pass from twenty-four hours to fifteen days, some more, some less, year by year within these walls, free of board as of shelter. Nor should we forget the neat pathway, solidly constructed and sedulously repaired by the sole care and cost of the monks, along many difficult miles of mountain ravine, which else would be not only dangerous but almost inaccessible; a path, thanks to the

self-taught workmen of Mariamana, now safe, and even, comparatively speaking, commodious qualities estimable in roads and creditable to the road makers anywhere; most creditable, because most rare, in Anatolia.

Escorted by our hosts we re-enter our night's lodging. The large and handsome room-neat still, because newis garnished with divans, carpets, and a supplementary stove for cold weather in the centre; over the fireplace hangs conspicuously a photographic print of Russian manufacture, representing an apocryphal act of Cretan heroism, wherein a priest is enacting, torch in hand, an imitation of Old Minotti's' suicidal exploit in Byron's Siege of Corinth. Perhaps it is meant as a hint on occasion for the Economos' of Sumelas: if so, let us hope that he will be slow to take it. The period of strict abstinence, which among the 'orthodox' precodes the great festival of the Virgin, has already commenced; and as the hour for supper draws on, we own to a horrible anticipation of finding ourselves included among the caters of olives and unseasoned vegetables-poor restoratives after a long day's ride. But such treatment of their guests forms no part of our hospitable entertainers' programme. Soup, flesh, fowl, eggs, caviare, butter, and so forth, soon cover the table; and the wine, produce of conventual vineyards, is good enough to show how excellent a liquor might be afforded by the Anatolian grape under more skilful culture. Coffee and tea follow, and when time comes to rest we recline on well-stuffed mattresses beneath quilted coverings of silk, embroidered with gold and silver thread, not unworthy of the statebed of Elizabeth at Kenilworth, or of James at Hatfield.

Next morning we pay our promised visit to the church, and entering by the narrow door at the

angle of the sanctuary, find ourselves in a cavern about forty feet in length and breadth, scarcely sixteen in height, lighted up by the three east windows in the outer wall. Sides and roof are decorated with paintings in the style already described, where to disjoin art from devotion, and to throw ridicu'e on both, seems the principal aim; damp and incense smoke have, however, charitably done much to cover the multitude of pictorial sins. Within the church are many other objects worthier of observation, and some even of real interest. At the entrance of the sanctuary hang, one over the other, two small silk curtains, richly worked; which being withdrawn disclose to our view the identical Panagia, the likeness (Heaven forefend it!)-of the Virgin, by St. Luke-of equal merit in all respects, natural and supernatural, as of equal antiquity, it would scem, and certainly of equal authenticity, with the Madonna of Santa Maria Maggiore at Rome. A blackish outline, chiefly defined by the gold-leaf ground that limits head and shoulders, indicates the figure. Close beside it hang, obliquely from the ceiling, like masts in slings, two huge wax tapers, wrapped in some material, costly, but now undistinguishable through its dingy encrustments; these form part of the præter-historical peaceoffering of Sultan Murad IV., mentioned farther back. Near the tapers is also suspended an enormous circular chandelier of silver gilt, with a quantity of little ex-votos, silver boats, gold filagree ornaments, coins, and the like, dangling from its rim: this too, if we credit the monks, is the memorial of the repentance of another Sultan, Selim II.-on what occasion shall be related in its place. Meanwhile we deposit the offering that courtesy requires in the allreceiving platter before the Panagia; and are next called on to revere the special object of devout pilgrimage, a

small silver rocking-cradle, of pretty but not ancient workmanship, consecrated to the goddess of the shrine. Into this cradle a piece of money (the more precious the metal, the greater its efficacy) is to be laid; after which the pilgrim, having thrice raised and lowered the toy and its contents on the palm of his or her hand, before the unveiled Panagia, deposits it on the plate of offerings. Should the cradle when thus set down continue to rock, the happy votary will infallibly become before long a father or a mother, as the case may be; its immobility on the contrary is a sad but conclusive presage of married sterility. Now barrenness is at the present day no less an opprobrium in the East than it was in the age of Hannah and Pheninnah; and its prevention or cure is the motive of far the greater number of pilgrimages to Mariamana; even newlymarried Mahometans, not to mention Armenians, Latins, and other unorthodox Christians of either sex, prove by their frequent visits to the cradle of Sumelas how catching a thing is superstition. The residue of the pilgrims are mostly petitioners for the recovery of a sick child, or relative, or self, and for them also the cradle obligingly extends the subject matter of its oracles. The origin of this particular observance probably does not. go back farther than Comnenian times; though the monks refer it, like the foundation of the convent itself, to the fifth century.

Passing rapidly over the inspection of a copious store of ecclesias-tical vestments and gewgaws, that might call forth the raptures of a ritualist or a pawnbroker, we come in front of a small wooden cabinet, placed in a recess of the cavern, and carefully locked. This the monks now open, and draw forth from its nook the famous Golden Bull of Alexios III., Emperor of Trebizond, who in 1365 confirmed