Both walls of the gorge in which Inkerman sits are honeycombed with artificial caves, supposed to have been the dwellings of the troglodytes of mythology in prehistoric ages, and afterward the refuge of the early Christians during the persecutions of the emperor Justinian. Some of the caves were converted into chapels and are used as such still. There is a monastery of twelve or fifteen monks entirely underground, occupying the cliff dwellings of the troglodytes, and on the opposite side of the gorge is a chapel that will accommodate a hundred and fifty or two hundred people, where service is held every Sabbath and mass is sung every morning. In the vestibule are niches for coflSns, and only clean skeletons are lying in three open graves which were chiselled out of the stone. They were uncovered only a few years ago and are supposed to be the remains of early bishops or priests.
Pope Clement I was sentenced by the emperor Trajan of Rome, to hard labour in these quarries and was brought here in the year 94 A. D. He was afterward condemned to death for trying to convert the natives to Christianity and suffered martyrdom by being thrown from the cliffs into the sea in the year 100. Until the ninth century, on each anniversary of his death, the sea receded from the shore for the space of seven days, leaving his petrified body exposed upon the sands, and multitudes of pilgrims came he»e on these occasions to venerate him and to be relieved of deformities, disease, and distress. Pope Clement was subsequently canonized.
CHAPTER XVI ODESSA —
WE CROSSED from Sevastopol to Odessa by steamer in about eighteen hours, stopping to discharge cargo and passengers at the ancient port of Eupatoria. The Greek name denotes the origin of that town, which flourished centuries before the Christian era, but is now of comparative insignificance. In the morning we found ourselves in a crowded harbour under a bluff 200 or 250 feet high, crowned with several monumental buildings and presenting a noble front to the sea. At the extreme western end of the town, beyond the expanse of foliage of Alexander II Park, are the buildings of the industrial exposition, which is now in progress. Their fantastic forms are so white that they look like the fancy ornaments with which confectioners decorate wedding cake.
Odessa is comparatively a new town, being only a little more than a hundred years old, and entirely a Russian creation. The Turks had a fortress here called Khodja-bey, which was carried by assault in 1778 by the Russian forces under General Ribas during the war with Turkey, which Catherine II provoked for conquest. The title to the property was conveyed by the Great Turk to the czar of all the Russias by the treaty of Jassy, December 29, 1791. It graciously pleased her imperial majesty to utilize
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the natural advantages of the location for defence of commerce, and she ordered a town created here. General Ribas laid it out and built the first house, and her majesty, who was always fond of classical names, commanded that it should be called Odessus, from the Odyssey of Homer, which mentions this place.
In 1803 the Duke de Richelieu, a refugee from the French Revolution, who came to Russia and was given an important commission in the army, was appointed governor. The population then numbered only a few thousand, but his enterprise and taste made it a beautiful and important city. Upon his death, Count Woronzoff, afterward prince, to whom I have alluded several times in connection with the Crimea, took up the work where Richelieu left it off, and proved himself a remarkable builder. He founded the university, the public library, the museum, the municipal opera house; and schools of medicine attached to the hospitals were encouraged and subsidized by him. He gave an impetus to trade and commerce which lasted for half a century; he built roads into the interior, dredged the harbour, created docks, and encouraged the introduction of profitable industries.
Woronzoff was born in St. Petersburg in 1782, and was the son of a distinguished statesman. His father was ambassador to London during his boyhood, which caused him to be educated there, and he took a degree at Cambridge University. Returning to Russia be obtained a commission in the army and commenced his military career as a subaltern in a Caucasian regiment commanded by a famous Georgian, Prince Tzytzyanoff. He proved a brilliant soldier, was promoted rapidly and wore the epaulets of a major
ODESSA general before he was thirty years old. In the war with Napoleon he commanded a division of grenadiers and during the retreat of the French, followed closely upon their flank to the German frontier.