On issuing from the _Egri Kapou_ I turned to the left, and came quite unexpectedly upon a long stretch of those famous walls which formed Stambul’s defences upon the land side. Three years have elapsed since that moment, but to this day I can never recall it without a fresh sensation of wonder. There is no other spot in the East, so far as I know, which presents so vividly before the mind the memories of the past, the grandeur of human achievement, the majesty of power, the glory of the centuries, the mystery of decay, and the beauties of nature. You are filled with awe and terror and admiration at this sight, worthy of a canto of Homer, and involuntarily uncover, exclaiming “All honor!” as though called upon to salute the mutilated ranks of some mighty band of heroes. The line of walls and lofty towers extends as far as the eye can reach, rising and falling according to the natural character of the land, at some points seeming to sink into the earth, and at others to crown the summit of a mountain: it is diversified by an endless variety of color, and ruin in every stage of advancement, in some places nearly black, in others almost as yellow as gold, and overgrown by a rich, deep-green vegetation, which, scaling the walls to their very summits, falls back in waving garlands from the battlements and loopholes, rears itself in feathery plumes upon the tops of the towers, and overflows in green cascades from curtain and crumbling breach, its billowy waves filling the moat and lapping the very roadside.