The Egri Kapou through which I had come is identical with the famous Charsian gate used by Justinian when he made his triumphal entry into the city, and later by Alexius Comnenus when he seized the throne: before it lies a Mussulman cemetery, and here, during the early days of the siege, were placed the gigantic cannon of Orbano, which kept four hundred artillerymen employed and required a hundred oxen to move. The gate was defended by Teodoro di Caristo and Giovanni Greant against the attacks of the left wing of the Turkish army, which reached clear to the Golden Horn. From this point to the Sea of Marmora there are no longer any hamlets, not so much as a group of houses, and, as the road consequently runs between the walls and the open country, there is nothing whatever to distract one’s thoughts from the mighty ruins themselves. Setting forth on the road, I walked for some time between two cemeteries, a Christian one on my left, lying directly beneath the walls, and an enormous Mussulman one on my right, shaded by a forest of cypress trees; overhead the sun poured down in straight, direct rays; before me stretched the highway, white, solitary, and rising by a gentle incline, until on the summit of the opposite heights it divided the limpid horizon with a sharp, clear-cut line. On one hand tower succeeded tower, on the other tombstone followed tombstone; not a sound broke the stillness save my own measured tread and the occasional rustle of a lizard in the grass by the roadside. After walking thus for some distance, I suddenly found myself opposite a beautiful square gateway surmounted by a great arch in an excellent state of preservation, and flanked by two massive octagonal towers. This was the Adrianopolis Gate, the Polyandrion of the Greeks, which was made the principal point of attack when the Avars besieged Constantinople during the reign of Heraclius in 625. During the attack under Muhammad II. it was defended by the brothers Paoli and Antonino Troilo Bochiardi, and later on was the gate through which the Turks made their victorious exits and entries. Neither ahead nor about me was there a living soul to be seen: all at once a couple of Turkish cavalrymen came through the gate and disappeared down the Adrianopolis road at a full gallop, enveloped in a thick cloud of dust, after which everything returned to the same death-like stillness. Following their lead, I too took the Adrianopolis road, and, turning my back for a time upon the walls, descended into the valley of the Lycus, climbed the opposite ascent, and found myself looking out over the vast undulating and arid plain of Dahud-Pasha, where, during the siege of Constantinople, Muhammad II. established his head-quarters. Here I stood for some time, shading my eyes with my hand and searching about as if expecting to find some traces still of the imperial camp to aid me in picturing to myself the strange and imposing spectacle which that spot must