October 30th, Sunday.—A day of rest much needed, for since we landed at the Dardanelles we had been a good deal knocked about, far more than appears in these pages, so after church we lounged lazily about Smyrna and drank in the glory of the view from the citadel, where the old Genoese towers stand among the ruins that were once a stronghold built by some Cyclopean Vauban. Here, too, is a small mosque on a site where the Christian Church of the Revelation is said to have stood; hard by must have been “the synagogue of Satan.”[50] Very impressive, moreover, is the Turkish cemetery with its old and stately cypresses, finer even, as it seemed to us, than those of Constantinople. As we wandered homeward we came down upon the track of the Smyrna and Aidin Railway. Wonderful are the caprices of fashion! What the Sweet Waters of Europe are to the ladies of Constantinople, that to the fair dames of Smyrna were the less romantic rails of the new road. They were the fashionable promenade of the Sabbath-keeping _bourgeoisie_—the line was thronged by numbers of Turkish ladies in many-coloured dresses; far more closely veiled in their ghostly white yashmaks than their more emancipated sisters in Stamboul. Greek, Armenian and Frankish beauties, in bright French or pseudo-French raiment—many of them radiant with the beauty for which Ismir is famous—made a motley crowd; while sedate old Turks sat sipping their coffee and smoking their narghilehs in silent dignity under the orange and citron trees which fringe the cafés, watching from under their sleepy lids the brilliant colouring and glowing eyes of the Ionian dames and damsels. Waiting for a ship, or indeed for anything, is but dreary work, but there was no feeling dull at Smyrna, for there was much to be seen and done, and we lingered luxuriously over the little that was left of a joyous holiday. Of course we went to Ephesus, where Mr. Wood, acting for the British Museum, had not yet made his great discoveries, though in his first year’s work he had unearthed much that was of interest. The modern village of Ayazaluk is almost entirely built up of the stones of the old city all huddled together higgledy-piggledy. Rarely carved capitals of pillars turned topsy-turvy form incongruous bases for fir posts, supporting the verandahs of mud-built shops in which fruiterers, pastry cooks and tobacconists ply their trade. A ruined mosque is a beautiful relic of old Moorish architecture, inside of which ancient Greek pillars have been adapted. The very stones in the graveyard are fragments of old columns and Turkish marbles of the middle ages. But what a noble position! And how glorious must Ephesus have been in the days of St. Paul, when it was a seaport and its imposing citadel overlooked the sea, now (in 1864) owing to alluvial deposits some four miles away!