WOMEN UNDER POLYGAMY
always maintained plural marriage, and their harems have sheltered a large number of mistresses of all grades, besides the legal wives. A sovereign in Turkey is allowed to wed seven women. There is no restriction upon the number of his concubines and slaves; and some of the rulers have kept as many as a thousand women in their palaces.
Five thousand pounds a day has been stated as the cost of supporting a royal harem in Turkey. The pomp and grandeur of a sultan's court are beyond comparison. The ruler of the empire is a mighty autocrat to whom the utmost deference and obedience must be yielded. He must live in a truly regal state, befitting his exalted position.
For the sultans are not ordinary monarchs; they have despotic control of the souls and bodies of their subjects. They are the chiefs of the army, the supreme judges, and the kings. Behind the towering white walls of the Imperial Harem at Constantinople live thousands of persons of both sexes, all of them ministers and servitors to the pleasures of the Sultan. There is an army of eunuchs, and several hundred cooks, besides a multitude of slaves. The eunuchs who guard the approaches to the palace are all white men, who are not permitted to enter within. Negroes are the personal attendants upon the ladies of the court and the harem.
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