5

dispelled by the final deliverance or destruction of the Roman empire. The single combats of the heroes of history or fable amuse our fancy and engage our affections: the skilful evolutions of war may inform the mind, and improve a necessary though pernicious science. But, in the uniform and odious pictures of a general assault, all is blood, and horror, and confusion; nor shall I strive, at the distance of three centuries and a thousand miles, to delineate a scene of which there could be no spectators, and of which the actors themselves were incapable of forming any just or adequate idea.

thread has been applied to the closeness
and continuity of their line of attack.
The foremost ranks consisted of the
refuse of the host, a voluntary crowd,
who fought without order or command;
of the feebleness of age or childhood, of
peasants and vagrants, and of all who
had joined the camp in the blind hope
of plunder and martyrdom. The com-
mon impulse drove them onwards to the o
wall; the most audacious to climb were
instantly precipitated; and not a dart, not
a bullet of the christians was idly wasted
on the accumulated throng. But their
strength and ammunition were exhausted 15
in this laborious defence; the ditch was
filled with the bodies of the slain; they
supported the footsteps of their com-
panions; and of this devoted van-
guard the death was more serviceable 20
than the life. Under their respective
bashaws and sanjaks, the troops of An-
atolia and Romania were successively
led to the charge: their progress was va-
rious and doubtful; but, after a conflict 25
of two hours, the Greeks still maintained
and improved their advantage; and the
voice of the emperor was heard, en-
couraging his soldiers to achieve, by a
last effort, the deliverance of their coun- 30
try. In that fatal moment, the Janizaries
arose, fresh, vigorous, and invincible.
The sultan himself on horseback, with
an iron mace in his hand, was the
spectator and judge of their valor; he 35
was surrounded by ten thousand of his
domestic troops, whom he reserved for
the decisive occasion; and the tide of
battle was directed and impelled by his
voice and eye. His numerous ministers 40 example was imitated by the greatest

of justice were posted behind the line,
to urge, to restrain, and to punish; and,
if danger was in the front, shame and
inevitable death were in the rear of the
fugitives. The cries of fear and of pain 45
were drowned in the martial music of
drums, trumpets, and attaballs; and ex-
perience has proved that the mechanical
operation of sounds, by quickening the
circulation of the blood and spirits, will 50
act on the human machine more forcibly
than the eloquence of reason and honor.
From the lines, the galleys, and the
bridge, the Ottoman artillery thundered
on all sides; and the camp and city, the 55
Greeks and the Turks, were involved in
a cloud of smoke, which could only be

The immediate loss of Constantinople may be ascribed to the bullet, or arrow, which pierced the gauntlet of John Justiniani. The sight of his blood, and the exquisite pain, appalled the courage of the chief, whose arms and counsel were the firmest rampart of the city. As he withdrew from his station in quest of a surgeon, his flight was perceived and stopped by the indefatigable emperor. 'Your wound,' exclaimed Palæologus, 'is slight; the danger is pressing; your presence is necessary; and whither will you retire?' 'I will retire,' said the trembling Genoese, by the same road which God has opened to the Turks; and at these words he hastily passed through one of the breaches of the inner wall. By this pusillanimous act, he stained the honors of a military life; and the few days which he survived in Galata, or the isle of Chios, were embittered by his own and the public reproach. His

part of the Latin auxiliaries, and the defence began to slacken when the attack was pressed with redoubled vigor. The number of Ottomans was fifty, perhaps an hundred, times superior to that of the christians; the double walls were reduced by the cannon to an heap of ruins; in a circuit of several miles, some places must be found more easy of access or more feebly guarded; and, if the besiegers could penetrate in a single point, the whole city was irrecoverably lost. The first who deserved the sultan's reward was Hassan, the Janizary, of gigantic stature and strength. With his scimitar in one hand and his buckler in the other, he ascended the outward forti

5

quarters might prolong, some moments, the happy ignorance of their ruin. But in the general consternation, in the feelings of selfish or social anxiety, in the tumult and thunder of the assault, a sleepless night and morning must have. elapsed; nor can I believe that many Grecian ladies were awakened by the Janizaries from a sound and tranquil

fication of the thirty Janizaries, who were emulous of his valor, eighteen perished in the bold adventure. Hassan and his twelve companions had reached the summit: the giant was precipitated from the rampart; he rose on one knee, and was again oppressed by a shower of darts and stones. But his success had proved that the achievement was possible: the walls and towers were instantly covered 10 slumber. On the assurance of the pub

with a swarm of Turks; and the Greeks, now driven from the vantage-ground, were overwhelmed by increasing multitudes. Amidst these multitudes, the emperor, who accomplished all the duties 15 of a general and a soldier, was long seen, and finally lost. The nobles who fought round his person sustained, till their last breath, the honorable names of Palæologus and Cantacuzene: his mournful ex- 20 clamation was heard, 'Cannot there be found a christian to cut off my head? and his last fear was that of falling alive into the hands of the infidels. The prudent despair of Constantine cast away 25 purple; amidst the tumult, he fell by an unknown hand, and his body was buried under a mountain of the slain. After his death, resistance and order were no more; the Greeks fled towards the city; and 30 many were pressed and stifled in the narrow pass of the gate of St. Romanus. The victorious Turks rushed through the breaches of the inner wall; and, as they advanced into the streets, they were soon 35 joined by their brethren, who had forced the gate Phenar on the side of the harbor. In the first heat of the pursuit, about two thousand christians were put to the sword; but avarice soon prevailed 40 over cruelty; and the victors acknowledged that they should immediately have given quarter, if the valor of the emperor and his chosen bands had not prepared them for a similar opposition in 45 every part of the capital. It was thus, after a siege of fifty-three days, that Constantinople, which had defied the power of Chosroes, the Chagan, and the caliphs, was irretrievably subdued by the arms 50 of Mahomet the Second. Her empire only had been subverted by the Latins: her religion was trampled in the dust by the Moslem conquerors.

The tidings of misfortune fly with a 55 rapid wing; yet such was the extent of Constantinople that the more distant

lic calamity, the houses and convents were instantly deserted; and the trembling inhabitants flocked together in the streets, like an herd of timid animals, as if accumulated weakness could be productive of strength, or in the vain hope that amid the crowd each individual might be safe and invisible. From every part of the capital, they flowed into the church of St. Sophia: in the space of an hour, the sanctuary, the choir, the nave, the upper and lower galleries, were filled with the multitudes of fathers and husbands, of women and children, of priests, monks, and religious virgins: the doors were barred on the inside, and they sought protection from the sacred dome which they had so lately abhorred as a profane and polluted edifice. Their confidence was founded on the prophecy of an enthusiast or impostor, that one day the Turks would enter Constantinople, and pursue the Romans as far as the column of Constantine in the square before St. Sophia; but that this would be the term of their calamities; that an angel would descend from heaven, with a sword in his hand, and would deliver the empire, with that celestial weapon, to a poor man seated at the foot of the column. Take this sword,' would he say, 'and avenge the people of the Lord.' At these animating words, the Turks would instantly fly, and the victorious Romans would drive them from the West, and from all Anatolia, as far as the frontiers of Persia. It is on this occasion that Ducas, with some fancy and much truth, upbraids the discord and obstinacy of the Greeks. Had that angel appeared,' exclaims the historian, had he offered to exterminate your foes if you would consent to the union of the church, even then, in that fatal moment, you would have rejected your safety or have deceived your God.'

.

While they expected the descent of the

with a suppliant and lamentable crowd; but the means of transportation were scanty; the Venetians and Genoese selected their countrymen; and, notwith5 standing the fairest promises of the sultan, the inhabitants of Galata evacuated their houses and embarked with their most precious effects.

tardy angel, the doors were broken with axes; and, as the Turks encountered no resistance, their bloodless hands were employed in selecting and securing the multitude of their prisoners. Youth, beauty, and the appearance of wealth attracted their choice; and the right of property was decided among themselves by a prior seizure, by personal strength, and by the authority of command. In 10 the space of an hour, the male captives were bounds with cords, the females with their veils and girdles. The senators were linked with their slaves; the prelates with the porters of the church; and young 15 men of a plebeian class with noble maids, whose faces had been invisible to the sun and their nearest kindred. In this common captivity, the ranks of society were confounded; the ties of nature were cut 20 cording to their maxims (the maxims of

asunder; and the inexorable soldier was careless of the father's groans, the tears of the mother, and the lamentations of the children. The loudest in their wailings were the nuns, who were torn from 25 the altar with naked bosoms, outstretched hands, and disheveled hair; and we should piously believe that few could be tempted to prefer the vigils of the haram to those of the monastery. Of 30 these unfortunate Greeks, of these domestic animals, whole strings were rudely driven through the streets; and, as the conquerors were eager to return for more prey, their trembling pace was quickened 35 with menaces and blows. At the same hour, a similar rapine was exercised in all the churches and monasteries, in all the palaces and habitations of the capital; nor could any palace, however sacred 40 or sequestered, protect the persons or the property of the Greeks. Above sixty thousand of this devoted people were transported from the city to the camp and fleet; exchanged or sold according to the 45 caprice or interest of their masters, and dispersed in remote servitude through the provinces of the Ottoman empire.

* * *

The chain and entrance of the outward 50 harbor was still occupied by the Italian ships of merchandise and war. They had signalized their valor in the siege: they embraced the moment of retreat, while the Turkish mariners were dis- 55 sipated in the pillage of the city. When they hoisted sail the beach was covered

In the fall and the sack of great cities, an historian is condemned to repeat the tale of uniform calamity: the same effects must be produced by the same passions; and, when those passions may be indulged without control, small, alas! is the difference between civilised and savage man. Amidst the vague exclamations of bigotry and hatred, the Turks are not accused of a wanton or immoderate effusion of christian blood; but, ac

antiquity), the lives of the vanquished were forfeited; and the legitimate reward of the conqueror was derived from the service, the sale, or the ransom, of his captives of both sexes. The wealth of Constantinople had been granted by the sultan to his victorious troops; and the rapine of an hour is more productive than the industry of years. But, as no regular division was attempted of the spoil, the respective shares were not determined by merit; and the rewards of valor were stolen away by the followers of the camp, who had declined the toil and the danger of the battle. The narrative of their depredations could not afford either amusement or instruction: the total amount, in the last poverty of the empire, has been valued at four millions of ducats; and of this sum a small part was the property of the Venetians, the Genoese, the Florentines, and the merchants of Ancona. Of these foreigners, the stock was improved in quick and perpetual circulation; but the riches of the Greeks were displayed in the idle ostentation of palaces and wardrobes, or deeply buried in treasures of ingots and old coin, lest it should be demanded at their hands for the defence of their country. The profanation and plunder of the monasteries and churches excited the most tragic complaints. The dome of St. Sophia itself, the earthly heaven, the second firmament, the vehicle of the cherubim, the throne of the glory of God, was despoiled of the oblations of ages;

wonder on the strange though splendid
appearance of the domes and palaces, so
dissimilar from the style of Oriental
architecture. In the hippodrome,

ог

and the gold and silver, the pearls and
jewels, the vases and sacerdotal orna-
ments, were most wickedly converted to
the service of mankind. After the divine
images had been stripped of all that could
be valuable to a profane eye, the canvas,
or the wood, was torn, or broken, or burnt,
or trod under foot, or applied, in the
stables or the kitchen, to the vilest uses.
The example of sacrilege was imitated, to
however, from the Latin conquerors of
Constantinople; and the treatment which
Christ, the Virgin, and the saints had
sustained from the guilty Catholic
might be inflicted by the zealous Mussul- 15 monument of his glory that, on observ-

5 atmeidan, his eye was attracted by the
twisted column of the three serpents;
and, as a trial of his strength, he shat-
tered with his iron mace or battle-axe
the under-jaw of one of these monsters,
which in the eye of the Turks were the
idols or talismans of the city. At the
principal door of St. Sophia, he alighted
from his horse and entered the dome;
and such was his jealous regard for that

ing a zealous Mussulman in the act of
breaking the marble pavement, he ad-
monished him with his scimitar that, if
the spoil and captives were granted to the
soldiers, the public and private buildings
had been reserved for the prince. By
his command the metropolis of the East-
ern church was transformed into a
mosque: the rich and portable instru-
ments of superstition had been. re-
moved; the crosses were thrown down;
and the walls, which were covered with
images and mosaics, were washed and
purified and restored to a state of naked
simplicity. On the same day, or on the
ensuing Friday, the muezin or crier as-
cended the most lofty turret, and pro-
claimed the ezan, or public invitation, in
the name of God and his prophet; the
imam preached; and Mahomet the Sec-
ond performed the namaz of prayer and
thanksgiving on the great altar, where
the christian mysteries had so lately been
celebrated before the last of the Cæsars.

man on the monuments of idolatry. Per-
haps, instead of joining the public clamor,
a philosopher will observe that in the
decline of the arts the workmanship
could not be more valuable than the work, 20
and that a fresh supply of visions and
miracles would speedily be renewed by
the craft of the priest and the credulity
of the people. He will more seriously
deplore the loss of the Byzantine libra- 25
ries, which were destroyed or scattered
in the general confusion: one hundred
and twenty thousand manuscripts are
said to have disappeared; ten volumes
might be purchased for a single ducat; and 30
the same ignominous price, too high per-
haps for a shelf of theology, included
the whole works of Aristotle and Homer,
the noblest productions of the science and
literature of ancient Greece. We may 35
reflect with pleasure that an inestimable
portion of our classic treasures was
safely deposited in Italy; and that the
mechanics of a German town had in-
vented an art which derides the havoc 40 From St. Sophia he proceeded to the
of time and barbarism.

From the first hour of the memorable twenty-ninth of May, disorder and rapine. prevailed in Constantinople till the eighth hour of the same day; when the sultan 45 himself passed in triumph through the gate of St. Romanus. He was attended by his vizirs, bashaws, and guards, each of whom (says a Byzantine historian) was robust as Hercules, dexterous as 50 Apollo, and equal in battle to any ten of the race of ordinary mortals. The conqueror gazed with satisfaction and

55

august but desolate mansion of an hun-
dred successors of the great Constantine;
but which, in a few hours, had been strip-
ped of the pomp of royalty. A melan-
choly reflection on the vicissitudes of
human greatness forced itself on his
mind; and he repeated an elegant distich
of Persian poetry, 'The spider has wove
his web in the imperial palace; and the
owl hath sung her watch-song on the
towers of Afrasiab.'

*

(1788)

OLIVER GOLDSMITH (1728-1774)

The author of The Vicar of Wakefield was the sixth of nine children of an Irish parson farmer and passed most of his boyhood in the little hamlet of Lissoy, which he afterward idealized in The Deserted Village. He was regarded as a stupid blockhead' in the village school and when, in 1749, he succeeded in taking a degree at Trinity College, Dublin, he was lowest on the list. For a number of years he showed little ability and still less inclination to fit himself to practical life. Rejected for holy orders, he taught school for a time and, soon disgusted, tried the law with the same result. He then spent several years in the nominal study of medicine, in the course of which, he made the grand tour of Europe, setting off it is said, with a guinea in his pocket, one shirt to his back, and a flute in his hand.' Finding his way to London, in 1756, he existed for a couple of years in a most haphazard manner, as chemist's' assistant, corrector of the press, struggling physician, usher in a school, and hack writer for the Monthly Review. The culmination of this period arrived when he borrowed a suit of clothes to present himself for examination as a hospital mate, failed in the examination. and pawned the clothes. Soon after this, his literary successes began. It was in 1764, that Johnson following close after a guinea with which he had responded to a message of distress, put the cork into the bottle' for which Goldsmith had promptly changed the guinea, carried off the manuscript of The Vicar of Wakefield to a bookseller, and relieved the author from arrest. The Traveler (1764) was now published and The Deserted Village (1770) confirmed the reputation which this had established. His two plays, The Good Natured Man (1768) and She Stoops to Conquer (1773) brought him five hundred pounds apiece; his History of Animated Nature, for which he had no qualification except the ability to write, secured him eight hundred pounds; and similar hack work was similarly paid; but such was his indiscretion that he was seldom long out of difficulty. He had in a high measure the prodigality, not uncommon among clever writers, of bestowing his entire stock of wisdom on the reader and reserving none for the conduct of life. Yet his follies, like those of Steele, were the indexes of a liberal and lovable nature. When he died, at the age of forty-six, leaving debts of two thousand pounds, there was as much tenderness as humor in Johnson's deep ejaculation: Was ever poet so trusted?'