of Central European TurTcey. 251 



of Europe : the fashion of shaving nearly the whole head is a 

 good one in this respect. The chief diseases are intermittent and 

 typhoid fevers, nervous affections, and inflammatory diseases 

 to these the plague is to be added in the maritime towns. 



As the Turks have more leisure and more factitious wants 

 than their Christian fellow-subjects, they are liable to lowness 

 of spirits and hypochondriacal and other nervous affections, 

 from which the Christians are quite exempted. On the other 

 hand, the stoicism and good temper of the well-bred Turk, and 

 his love for children, and all kinds of animals, are well known. 

 He also possesses the noble quality of faithfully keeping hi 

 promise, and to such an extent is this relied on, that the most 

 important transactions are settled by merely shaking hands 

 with each other ; a practice which has also been partly adopted 

 by the Christians in smaller matters. I may add that the ge- 

 neral ignorance of writing has induced the Turks to make use 

 of a particular apparatus for calculating sums of money, &c. 

 By means of small pieces of wood cut into various shapes, they 

 transact their business as well as our best writers. In many 

 of the inns, instead of a writing table, these pieces of wood are 

 to be seen hanging up at the corner of the innkeeper's room. 



In regard to the social life, in the interior of the country, at 

 a distance from the maritime towns, in which one finds, in a 

 greater or less degree, European fashions and entertainments, 

 each family is obliged to seek its chief pleasure in its own circle ; 

 for entertainments are seldom given, or only at certain fixed 

 times, or at marriages, &c. The men meet every day in coffee- 

 houses and public places, and take a walk together : the ladies 

 remain at home, visit each other, or occasionally walk toge- 

 ther. For these reasons an unmarried European finds him- 

 self too isolated, and has great difficulty in reconciling himself 

 to the different mode of life. * 



* In a late communication from Ur Bou^, there is an interesting sketch of 

 the Geology of Central European Turkey, which will appear in our next 

 Number. — Edit. 



