{231}[283] "Many of the seraï and summer-houses [on the Bosphorus] have received these significant, or rather fantastic names: one is the Pearl Pavilion; another is the Star Palace; a third the Mansion of Looking-glasses."--_Travels in Albania_, 1858, ii. 243. {232}[fa] _Of speeches, beauty, flattery--there is no_ _Method more sure_----.--[MS.] {233}[284] [_Guide des Voyageurs_; _Directions for Travellers_, etc.--_Rhymes, Incidental and Humorous_; _Rhyming Reminiscences_; _Effusions in Rhyme_, etc.--Lady Morgan's _Tour in Italy_; _Tour through Istria_, etc., etc.--_Sketches of Italy_; _Sketches of Modern Greece_, etc., etc.--_Historical Illustrations of the Fourth Canto of Childe Harold_, by J.C. Hobhouse, 1818.] [285] In Turkey nothing is more common than for the Mussulmans to take several glasses of strong spirits by way of appetiser. I have seen them take as many as six of raki before dinner, and swear that they dined the better for it: I tried the experiment, but fared like the Scotchman, who having heard that the birds called kittiwakes were admirable whets, ate six of them, and complained that "he was no hungrier than when he began." [286] ["Everything is so still [in the court of the Seraglio], that the motion of a fly might be heard, in a manner; and if any one should presume to raise his voice ever so little, or show the least want of respect to the Mansion-place of their Emperor, he would instantly have the bastinado by the officers that go the rounds."-_A Voyage in the Levant_, by M. Tournefort, 1741, ii. 183.] {234}[287] _A common furniture. I recollect being received by Ali Pacha, in a large room, paved with marble, containing a marble basin, and fountain playing in the centre, etc., etc._ [Compare Childe Harold, Canto II. stanza lxii.-- "In marble-paved pavilion, where a spring Of living water from the centre rose, Whose bubbling did a genial freshness fling, And soft voluptuous couches breathed repose, Ali reclined, a man of war and woes," etc.] [288] [A reminiscence of Newstead. Compare Moore's song, "Oft in the Stilly Night"-- "I feel like one Who treads alone Some banquet-hall deserted."] {235}[fb] _A small, snug chamber on a winter's night_, _Well furnished with a book, friend, girl, or glass, etc_.--[MS.] [fc] _I pass my days in long dull galleries solely_.--[MS. erased.] [289] [When this stanza was written Byron was domiciled in the Palazzo Guiccioli (in the Via di Porta Adriana) at Ravenna; but he may have had in his mind the monks' refectory at Newstead Abbey, "the dark gallery, where his fathers frowned" (_Lara_, Canto I. line 137), or the corridors which form the upper story of the cloisters.] [290] ["Nabuch_o_donosor," here used _metri gratiâ_, is Latin (see the Vulgate) and French (see J.P. De Béranger, _Chansons Inédites_, 1828, p. 48) for Nebuchadnezzar.] [291] [See Ovid's _Metamorphoses_, lib. iv. lines 55-58--