TO CAFFA. 
131 
placed along the second barrier of the Bospo- 
rians. In all this route, we found no other 
CHAP. 
iii. 
out of different parts of the higher town, which, excepting the north- 
east quarter, where the Karaites live, is entirely waste and ruinous. 
The springs have all been carefully preserved in cisterns, some of them 
ornamented and arched over, with Turkish inscriptions ; and one of 
them in particular, which is near the south-west angle of the walls, is 
a delightful bath, though small, being surrouuded by picturesque 
mins, and overhung with ivy and brushwood. The ruins of Kaffa 
ere mostly of free-stone : the greater part of the houses were, I 
understood, of mud and ill-baked bricks ; but of these hardly any 
traces are left. None of those still standing have flat roofs, but are 
all tiled, with very projecting eaves, and in the same style of archi- 
tecture as the palace at Bntchiserai. The best of these adjoin to the 
fluay, and are inhabited by the merchants. There are a few buildings 
lately erected ; one a tavern, by a French emigrant; and another a 
house intended for the governor, Fanshaw. All these are of slight 
timber frames, covered with plaister. 
“ Kalla was called by the Tahtars, in its better days, Kutchuk Stam- 
boul (Little Constantinople). I often asked different persons what its 
former population was; particularly an old Italian, who had been inter- 
preter to the Khans ; but the answers I obtained were not such as I could 
credit. Yet he and the Tahtar peasants were in the same story, that it 
had formerly consisted of sixteen thousand houses. All the Tahtars 
attributed its desolation to the calamities brought on it by the Russian 
garrison, who tore ofl' the roofs of the houses, where they were quartered, 
for fire-wood. I was told by a Suabian settler, that wood was chiefly 
brought from Old Krim, and was very dear : the winters he complained 
of, as very cold. Corn is very dear, and comes chiefly from the Don. 
Animal food is not so plentiful as I should have supposed. A young 
man, who was employed to buy stores for Mr. Katon the contractor, 
stated tire price of beef, in the market of Kalfa, to be ten or fifteen copeeks 
the pound, or sometimes more, and the supply irregular. About three 
miles from Kaffa is a small village of German colonists, who were very 
poor and desponding: the number might be twelve families, who were 
then on their farms, the rest having gone into service, or to sea. General 
Fanshaw, to whom we had a letter, was at Petersburg ; so that I am 
unable to give so good an account of Kaffa as if I had the means of 
deriving information from him. His object was, to establish a Bank at 
VOL. It. K Kaffa, 
