BENDER, T.EGIN, or TEKIN, a fortified town of European Turkey, and the capital of Bessarabia, is situated on the right bank of the Dniester, and is celebrated as the residence of Charles XII., when he threw himself on the protection of the Turks after the battle of Pultowa. Bender received its name from .Bajazet II., when, on his death-bed, he commanded his successor Selim 1. to erect a fortress in this place, laving ended his exhortation with the words Ben .Dcrim, or I command thee. The fortress, which is .only remarkable for the immense ditch which encom passes it, contains 300 cannon, 525 mortars, and three -howitzers, beside an abundant supply ofpowder, balls, rice, meal, &c. &c. Or the inner wall of the castle, or old fortress, Campenhausen observed two inscrip tions, one of which was effaced,and the other written in Arabian, of which the following is a translation : Built by order of the " Stambulian Padischa Beyza Devoly, by the powerful Padischa Sultan Selim Hazy. ' There are two suburbs, twelve mosques, six inns, or khauns, and seven gates ; viz. the gate of Constantinople, the tanners gate, the gate of Varna, the water gate, the Uul gate, the Orda gate, and the stone gate ; two of these gates are marked with inscrip t ions, One (if which is peculiarly important, as it proves, in opposition to the testimony of the Hungarian his torian, that Tegin was taken by storm, and not by trcachery. The following is a literal translation : " I, by the grace of the Highest, the first of all emperors in the world, Sultan, form of God, and of his prophet Muliamed, companion of the Lord, con queror of the world, and of the Woywod Peter, and of Bogdania, I, Solyman, seal bearer of the temple of the only God, I, I have wrested the fortress of l'egin and its garrison from the King of Germany ; I have taken it by storm, in the presence of all the chiefs of my ever invincible army ; and 1 have given orders to have the stones taken from the castle of Palanka, to build this wall and gate; and the fortress shall be named Ben-Derim. In the year of the Hegira 965." Tho principal mosque, called Muynkar-Dgammid, is a kind of cathedral where the people assemble on Fridays only, in which alone it is lawful to pray for the Sultan. The streets of Bender are narrow, gloomy, and dirty, and the carcases of horses, oxen, dogs, &c. lie putrifying in the streets. The inns are large square buildings resembling convents ; the win dows look into a court yard, encircled with a high wall ; and there is a number of small chambers with out furniture, in which travellers lodge, and foreign merchants expose their goods to sale.
The large metsched, or mosque, is a building 58 pa ces square, and is the finest edifice in Bender. Over the principal entry, is a cornice containing a verse of the Koran, written in golden letters. A metal bason is suspended by a chain in a niche, opposite the door ; and on the left of this, there is a recess with a repre sentation of the Kaba, and the tomb of Mahoinet.
To the right of the metal bason is a small pulpit, with ten steps covered with red cloth, from which the Iman reads the Koran. The floor is adorned with rich carpets, and divans are placed round the walls. There is a cupola in the middle of the build ing, ornamented with a red star, from the centre of which is suspended a lustre, having its branches load ed with several hundreds of glass lamps of various co lours. Several ostrich eggs are suspended above this lustre. A prayer against the plague is written on the wall, and on one side is a painting of the sabre of Ali. The ruins of the house where Charles XII. resided, and the remains of his entrenchment at Varnitza, are still to be seen ; but the inhabitants are completely ignorant that their town was honoured with the pre Bence of this distinguished hero.
There is a great number of tanners in Bender, three paper manufacturers, several smiths, and a watch maker. The paper is made of cotton, and smoothed with glass, and the ink is obtained from the bark of the alder. Bender is the residence of the principal tandgiack of Bessarabia, who has an yearly salary of £3000 sterling, and a number of provincial gover nors under him.
Bender is celebrated for the famous siege which it underwent in the year 1770. On the 30th of July, the Russian army under Count Panin, opened their trenches and bombarded the town, but the gar rison and the inhabitants defended themselves with great bravery, and annoyed the besiegers by nume rows sorties. A new species of mine, called the globe of compression, invented by a French engineer, was tried on this occasion for the first time. It was charged with 16 poulids of powder, and blew up at ten o'clock at night with most tremendous effect. Amidst the ter ror and uproar which attended this fatal explosion, the Russian soldiers began their assault. Having gdt possession of all the out-works, they climbed the in every quarter ; a furious contest ensued, and the streets, and even the houses, were tilled with the bodies of the besiegers, and the brave inhabitants. Irritated at the resistance of the garrison, the Russians set fire to the town ; but they were still unable to subdue the fe rocious spirit of the Turks, which displayed itself even amidst the ruins of their houses, and their walls. A cho sen band of 1500 cavalry, and 500 infantry, were cut to pieces in attempting to force their way through the besiegers. The Seraskier, who had retired to the ci tadel, did not surrender till every thing around him was in flames. The number of prisoners, including the inhabitants, amounted to 11,749, the remains of a population oe30,000, the rest of whom perished during the siege. Population 8200. East Long. 29° 57', North Lat. 47°. (