'Suddenly we are summoned to the awful presence of the pillar of the Turkish Empire, the renowned Redshid; an approved warrior, a consummate politician, unrivalled as a dissembler in a country where dissimulation is part of the moral culture.... The hall was vast, covered with gilding and arabesques.... Here, squatted up in a corner of a large divan, I bowed with all the nonchalance of St. James's Street to a little ferocious-looking, shrivelled, careworn man, plainly dressed, with a brow covered with wrinkles and a countenance clouded with anxiety and thought.... I seated myself on the divan of the Grand Vizier, who, the Austrian consul observed, "had destroyed in the course of the last three months, not in war, upwards of 4,000 of my acquaintance," with the self-possession of a morning call. Some compliments passed between us. Pipes and coffee were brought. Then his Highness waved his hand, and in an instant the chambers were cleared. Our conversation I need not repeat. We congratulated him on the pacification of Albania. He rejoined that the peace of the world was his only object and the happiness of mankind his only wish. This went on for the usual time. He asked us no questions about ourselves or our country, as the other Turks did, but seemed quite overwhelmed with business, moody and anxious. While we were with him three separate Tartars arrived with despatches. What a life!... I forgot to tell you that with the united assistance of my English, Spanish, and fancy wardrobe I sported a costume in Yanina which produced a most extraordinary effect on that costume-loving people. A great many Turks called on purpose to see it. "Questo vestito Inglese, o di fantasia?" asked a little Greek physician. I oracularly replied, "Inglese e fantastico."' Had the Greek physician enquired not about the _vestito_, but about the wearer of it, the answer might have been the same. The account of this visit to Yanina was composed after the return of the party to the yacht. Here is a description in Disraeli's other manner:-- 'I write you this from that Ambracian gulf where the soft triumvir gained more glory by defeat than attends the victory of harsher warriors. The site is not unworthy of the beauty of Cleopatra. From the summit of the land the gulf appears like a vast lake walled in on all sides by mountains more or less distant. The dying glory of a Grecian eve bathes with warm light promontories and gentle bays and infinite modulation of purple outline. Before me is Olympus, whose austere peak glitters yet in the sun. A bend in the land alone hides from me the islands of Ulysses and Sappho. When I gaze upon this scene, and remember the barbaric splendour and turbulent existence which I have just quitted with disgust, I recur to the feelings in the indulgence of which I can alone find happiness and from which an inexorable destiny seems resolved to shut me out.'