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This land quarantine, between Syria and Asia Minor, when the former country is free from any epidemic, seems a most absurd thing. We were detained at Adana three days and a half, to be purified, before proceeding further. Lately, the whole town was placed in quarantine for five days, because a Turkish Bey, who lives near Baias, entered the gates without being noticed, and was found in the bazaars.
The plan of the little town, which appears to have been all built at one time, is most admirable. The walls of circuit, including the fortress, cannot be more than 300 yards square, and yet none of the characteristics of a large Oriental city are omitted. Leaving Baias, we travelled northward, over a waste, though fertile plain.
It is bounded on the north by a low hill, separating it from the plain of Baias, and it is possible that Alexander may have made choice of this position, leaving the unwieldy forces of Darius to attack him from the plain.
What immortal buildings and what noble statues does this city still possess which I have not already stolen from it and carried away without carts or ships on thin paper? What painting, stucco, or grotesque has been discovered amongst these grottoes and antiquities of Rome, Puzol, and Baias, of which the most rare is not to be found in my sketch-books?
It is quite wrecked, beyond the power even of hendecasyllables to bring again its breath of beauty: Mecum si sapies, Gravina, mecum Baias, et placidos coles recessus, Quos ipsæ et veneres colunt, et illa Quæ mentes hominum regit voluptas. Hic vina et choreæ jocique regnant, Regnant et charites facetiæque. Has sedes amor, has colit cupido. Then Christian hired two open carriages for Naples.
This emboldened him to commit enormities too great to be overlooked, and in 1812 Baias was taken, and the atrocious nest of land-pirates broken up. I knew that the town had been sacked on this occasion, but was not prepared to find such a complete picture of desolation. The place is surrounded with a substantial wall, with two gateways, on the north and south.
We halted for the evening at a place called Kolue-Kushla -an immense fortress-village, resembling Baias, and like it, wholly deserted. Near it there is a small town of very neat houses, which is also deserted, the inhabitants having gone into the mountains with their flocks.
I gave one of them a cigar, which he was at a loss how to smoke, until our muleteer showed him. Baias was celebrated fifty years ago, as the residence of the robber chief, Kutchuk Ali, who, for a long time, braved the authority of the Porte itself.
Soon after leaving the field of Issus, we reached the town of Baias, which is pleasantly situated on the shore, at the mouth of a river whose course through the plain is marked with rows of tall poplar trees. The walls of the town, and the white dome and minaret of its mosque, rose dazzlingly against the dark blue of the sea, and the purple stretch of the mountains of Karamania.
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