By a prescription, some time established, the islands have been entirely abandoned to the Greeks, and no Turk is allowed to take up his residence there, except temporarily, on official business. Even the aga who superintends them, resides on the opposite coast of Asia, and never visits them except to collect the haratch. No mosque or other Moslem edifice was allowed to raise its crescent-head; but the larger islands had one or more Greek monasteries crowning their summits, and forming the most conspicuous objects. They were erected in the time of the Lower Empire, and were the asylums to which the sovereigns retired when compelled to abdicate the throne: many of them were the retreats of those who were mutilated or blinded by their successors; many were the receptacles where guilt and remorse sought, by solitude and penance, to atone for past crimes. Some of these monasteries are now in ruins, and their “ivy-mantled towers” add to the picturesque scenery; some are still kept in good repair, and the residence of Caloyers, having chapels eminent for their sanctity, to which not only the people of the islands, but many families of the Fanal, resort, and celebrate their festivals with much pomp and devotion. On the greater islands are towns called by the same names. They possess fleets of caïques of a larger size than ordinary, which keep up a daily communication with the capital in conveying goods and passengers. Every morning these fleets leave the islands at sunrise, and return by sunset. The merry disposition of the people is nowhere more displayed than in these passage-boats, which the gravity and taciturnity of a Turk, who is an occasional passenger, cannot suppress. It sometimes happens that this levity is severely punished: on a charge of some real or supposed delinquency, the crews are cited before the cadi, when they land at Tophana. His carpet is spread on the ground, and where he sits cross-legged smoking his nargillai, the laughing culprits are brought before him, and he dispenses justice in a summary manner. He waves his hand−-the delinquent is seized by two men who throw him on his back, while two more raise his feet between poles, presenting their soles. Executioners then, provided with angular rods as thick as a man’s thumb, lay on the shrieking wretch till he faints, or the cadi, by another wave of his hand, intimates to them to cease: this punishment of the unfortunate caïquegees of the islands, is very frequent, and sometimes is inflicted on the whole of the boats’ crews. It often happens to be so severe, that the legs swell as high as the hips, and the victim is in danger of dying of a mortification; notwithstanding, it is soon forgotten by the sufferers. On their return, they only laugh at each other, and the next day repeat the fault for which they were punished.