battle-flags of a hundred fields, the arms and trophies of the martial period of the Turks; the sarcophagus of Alexander, which is but one of the glories of the museum; the imperial library, where the MS. of Critobulus was discovered; the imperial treasury, with its jewels, coins, rare stuffs, gemmed furniture, the gifts and spoil of kings, in vaults too dim and crowded for their splendour to be seen; the sacred relics of the Prophet which Selim I captured with Egypt and which constitute the credentials of the sultans to the caliphate of Islam. The structure in which these are preserved, its broad eaves and crusting of flowered tiles reflected in a pool bordered by lanterns to be lit on holy nights, is one of the things that make that garden incomparable. Then there are quaint turrets and doorways; there are kiosks; there are terraces; there are white cloisters a little grassy and neglected; there are black cypresses and monstrous plane-trees into which the sun looks with such an air of antique familiarity. Of all this every one has written who has ever been to Constantinople. But not many have written of a part of the garden which until the fall of Abd ül Hamid almost no outsider had visited. A few wrote then of the strange scene which took place there when the slaves of the deposed Sultan were set at liberty, and any Circassian who believed himself to have a relative in the imperial harem was invited to come and take her away. The dramatic contrasts and disappointments one could imagine made a true term to all the passionate associations of that place. No one lives there now. When a few more years have passed and no breathing person has any vital memory connected with it, the harem of the old Seraglio will be, like how many other places devised by a man to house his own life, a resort for sightseers at so much a head, a mere piece of the taste of a time. As it is, the Gate of Felicity does not open too easily, and one can still feel the irony of its name. [Illustration: In the harem of the Seraglio Photograph by Abdullah Frères, Constantinople]