The déjeûner was excellent, but immensely long, for after the cinnamon, vegetable, white, and other soups, came an apparently endless procession of meats, boiled, baked, roasted, and stewed. There were whole animals and minced ones, also chickens and other poultry, stewed with pistachios and olives, fish rolled into balls and cooked with raisins, little birds wrapped in leaves, rice in many ways, pillau, caviare, fish known and unknown, innumerable vegetables and cheeses, and upwards of twenty sorts of sweets. The cookery was very good, though some of the dishes were overabundantly spiced for a Western palate. The pastry was admirable, and the conserves quite the perfection of culinary art, for not only were the fruit and flowers excellent to eat, but they were beautiful to look at, the orange-flowers, rose-buds, and violets retaining their shape and colour as well as their flavour. The Armenians, who are the principal confectioners, jealously guard their most celebrated recipes, that descend in many families as precious heirlooms from father to son. I was so fortunate as to be seated next a diplomat who thoroughly understands and appreciates both Turkish and French cookery in all their minutest branches. He was kind enough to superintend my dinner, and an admirable selection he made, though at the same time it must be confessed that he seasoned the "plats" by such brilliant conversation that the contents of the plate before me were often unnoticed. To eat of such an army of dishes was impossible; some of the unlearned attempted it, not knowing, luckless creatures, what was before them, but broke down early in the day, and were "nowhere" when the fruit came. This was really a loss, for a murmur of admiration passed round the table, even the most trained and hardened old gourmands not being able to refrain from praise when the immense piles of fruit, in the perfection of their delicate beauty, were brought in--grapes, pines, peaches, apricots, figs, pomegranates, Japanese medlars, dates, almonds, nectarines, melons, citrons, oranges, sweet lemons--it is impossible to recollect even the names, but each fruit was so beautiful that an artist would have said it was a picture. However, its fair loveliness did not preserve it from being eaten, for Constantinople is a climate which makes fruit a necessary of life; without it one would really have fever. There were two bands, one instrumental and one vocal, that performed alternately during breakfast. The voices in the latter were not bad, though rather nasal, but the pieces they sang were pitched too high, and in consequence sounded monotonous and strained. The instrumental music was infinitely better. There were some Wallachian gipsy airs which were perfectly charming. Wild and mournful, like most national music, they were full of character, and every now and then a tender melody broke forth that was inexpressibly touching.