Their amusements within doors are playing at chess, in which they are very expert, and a fort of backgammon, both borrowed from the _Persians_; draughts, mankala, tabuduk, and the play of the ring, as they call it, which is what the great men often amuse themselves with in the winter-evenings. It consists merely in guessing what coffee-cup, out of a number that are placed on a large salver, the ring is hid under. They have several engaged in the play on each side; and the parties that win have the privilege of blacking the faces of their antagonists, putting fools caps on their heads, and making them stand before them while they sing _extempore_ songs in their own praise, and in derision of the losers. But it is only their servants, or ordinary people, that they treat in this manner; and some of these, especially if they have any turn to buffoonry, are always of the party on purpose. Though some Christians have learned of the _Europeans_ to play for money; yet these games are only used by the _Turks_ for amusement, and chiefly to pass the long winter-evenings. Sometimes, ’tis true, they will go so far as to play for an entertainment. Dancing is not, as in _Europe_, reckoned an accomplishment for people of fashion, and is scarce practised, even among the vulgar, but by such as make a trade of it. Their dexterity does not consist in agility, but chiefly in the motion of the arms and body, putting themselves in different attitudes, many of which (particularly of the women) are none of the most decent. Their manner is not ill described by _Juvenal_[442]. At their festivals they have also wrestlers as a part of their entertainment. They have still a resemblance to the _athletæ_ of the ancients, in anointing their naked bodies, having nothing on but a pair of breeches, and strut and vaunt so much at their entry as seems to promise great matters; but they make but very sorry figures in their performance. I should not omit among their amusements to mention buffoons, who are the constant attendants at all merry-makings, and without whom their mirth and conversation would soon languish, or conclude. The music of the country is of two sorts; one for the field, the other for the chamber. The first makes part of the retinue of the _bashaws_, and other great military officers, and is used also in their garrisons. It consists of a sort of hautboy[443], shorter, but shriller than ours; trumpets[444], cymbals[445], large drums[446], the upper head of which is beat upon with a heavy drum-stick, the lower with a small switch. A _vizir-bashaw_ has nine of these large drums, while a _bashaw of two tails_ has but eight, the distinction by which the music of one may be known from that of the other. Besides these, they have small drums[447], beat after the manner of our kettle-drums. This music at a distance has a tolerable good effect.