116 FROM THE COUNTRY OF THE CICONES, 
CHAP. There are many virtues common to the Turks 
III 
i -' . which would do honour to any nation; and 
above all, that reverence for the Deity, which 
renders the taking of his name in vain to be a 
thing unheard-of among them : add to this, 
their private and their public charities; their 
general temperance and sobriety ; their dona- 
tions for the repose and refreshment of travel- 
lers \ and for the establishment of public baths 
and fountains ; their endowment of hospitals ; 
their compassion for animals ; the strict fidelity 
with which they fulfil their engagements ; their 
hospitality; the attention shewn to clean- 
liness in their frequent ablutions; and many 
other of their characteristics, which forcibly 
contrast them with their neighbours; — and we 
shall be constrained to allow that there can 
hardly be found a people, without the pale of 
Christianity, better disposed towards its most 
essential precepts. That they have qualities 
which least deserve our approbation ; and that 
these are the most predominant, must be 
(0 In some parts of the Empire there are Klians for the reception 
of travellers, which are so endowed, that every night the guests are 
entertained, at free cost, with a convenitnt supper, be their number 
more or less, according to the capacity of the building. See Rycaut's 
Ottoman Empire, p. 167. Land. 1670. 
