Notwithstanding the doubt thrown upon the subject, the living female supposes that, in this life at least, she is permitted to hold communication with those who have passed to another, and render such service as may please them. In our illustration, a woman is represented enveloped in her yasmak and feridgē, performing this duty. On the grave is usually a trough or cavity, for the reception of plants or flowers, offerings of pious affection to the dead. Sometimes lattices of gilt wire form aviaries over the grave of a beloved person. Flowers and birds are among the elegant and innocent enjoyments of a Turk; and the amiable superstition of the survivor hopes to gratify her departed friend by the odour of one and the song of the other, even in his grave. In the distance is a Turkish funeral, winding its ways through the solitude of this cypress forest. It is a group of men, for such processions are rarely attended by women, except those hired to lament the dead: as it is a belief that the body is sentient after death, and suffers torment till committed to the repose of the tomb, funerals are generally hurried, and sometimes with indecent haste: so, in this as in other things, the Turk is entirely opposed to European habits; the only hurry in which he is ever seen, is when going to his grave. [Illustration: T. Allom. E. Challis. THE CISTERN OF BIN-BIR-DEREK. CALLED, THE THOUSAND AND ONE PILLARS.] The shores of the Black Sea, among the forest-covered ramifications of the great Balkan, is a region of constant showers and copious streams, filling, naturally, small reservoirs in the mountains. Wherever such rills poured down, and became confluent, they were stopped by a mound thrown across the valley, and in this way formed into various triangular lakes at an elevation above the summit-level of the city. These reservoirs, called _Hydralea_, were highly prized by the Greek emperors. The embankments were faced with marble, adorned with sculpture, and dignified by the name of the sovereign who formed them. They were deemed so sacred, and of such vital importance to the city, that severe edicts were enacted to preserve them; some regulating the planting of trees, some the abstraction of water, and one exacting a penalty of an ounce of gold for every ounce of the crystal fluid. As water is more precious to the Turks than it was to the Greeks, they watch these reservoirs with even more anxiety and vigilant precaution. They call them _Bendts_, and have increased the number left by the Roman emperors. One of the largest and most magnificent is called _Valadi_ Bendt, from the mother of the present sovereign, at whose expense it was erected.