RHODES, the capital of the above island of the same name, is agreeably situated at the extremity of a promontory, and on the side of a hill. The streets and houses are disposed in the form of an amphitheatre, and when seen from the harbour (a view which Dr. Clark has given,) it has a most imposing appearance, from the apparent massiveness oL its walls, and from its lofty towers situated upon rocks. The traveller, however, is disappointed on entering the town. The streets are narrow and irregular, and the edifices desti tute of elegance and symmetry. One half of the houses are in ruins in the city, and as many in the suburbs are uninhabited. Among the modern streets, the best and the most spacious one is the Jews' quarter. The suburbs, inhabited by the Greeks, are very fine, and consist of good stone houses, with gardens. The prin cipal public buildings are the church of St. John, the palace of the Grand Master, and a Convent, all Gothic. The churches are of course turned into mosques, and a large hospital into a granary. The old palace is a large and handsome building.
" The principal ruins at Rhodes," says Dr. Clarke, "arc not of earlier date than the residence of the Knights of Malta. The remains of their fine old for tresses still exhibit a venerable moated castle, of great size and strength, so fortified as to seem almost im pregnable. It appears a complete system of fortifica tion, combining dikes and drawbridges, battlements and bastions. The cells of the Knights are yet entire, forming a street within the works ; and near these cells is the cathedral or chapel, whose wooden doors, curi ously carved, and said to have been wrought of an in corruptible kind of cedar, have been preserved in their orginal state. The arms of England and France ap pear sculptured upon the wall. The Turks have con verted the sanctuary into a magazine for military stores." Dr. Clarke has published various inscriptions of Rhodes, which he noticed principally on marble al tars.
There occurs annually at Rhodes the ceremony of carrying Silenus in procession. A troop of boys co vered with garlands, draw along in a car a fat old man, attended with great pomp. Rhodes has two harbours, the old and the new. Dr. Clarke describes the mouth
of the old harbour as so choked with suits that small vessels alone arc able to enter. The two of the harbour are defended by towers about 800 feet distant ; and in the centre of the mole there is a square touter 120 feet high. There arc here ) aids for ship building, but they are little used. The timber isbrought from the fine forests of Caramania. .1 he most north ern of the inner harbours is called Ters-haneb, or the arsenal, and is reserved for the bey's vessels. It has two transverse piers, but they are in a ruinous state ; and in the narrow entrance between them there are only eight or nine feet of water, though they are three fathoms wide. In 1811, Captain Beaufort saw a thirty six gun frigate on the stocks, built of fir from the mountains near Makry. The other harbour is general ly full of merchant ships, which moor with a hawser to the quays, and an outer anchor in four or five fa thorns; but a north-east wind sends in a heavy sea. This harbour has also a transverse pier, with an open ing at each end; but the water in that part of it is very shallow. There is here a convenient fountain for watering. Rusk, wine, and other refreshments are easily procured through the consul. The principal source of wealth among the inhabitants consists in the number of vessels which land here in coming from the Archipelago to the eastward.
The great colossal statue of Rhodes is supposed by M. de Caylus and others to have stood at some dis tance from the sea. Pliny mentions a hundred other colossuses which were placed in different quarters of the city. The colosslis of the sun, as the principal one was called, was the production of an artist of Lindus. It was above 100 feet high and 720,000 lb. weight. It was thrown down by an earthquake ; and it was not till the year 672 that the bronze was carried off by the Arabs after taking it to pieces. East long. 28° 12' 15" ; North lat. 26'.
See Savary's Letters on Greeee ; and Sonnini's Tra vels in Greece and Turkey, p. 88-108; Clarke's Tra -vel.s., vol. ii. p. 221-230 ; and Captain Beaufort's Me moir of a Survey of the Coast of Caramania, 1820, p. I.