CHAP. by the Barbarians 49, and who amused his hearers LXVII. with a tale of the wonders of India ", from whence

he had returned to Portugal by an unknown fea ". From this hofpitable land, Phranza proceeded to the court of Trebizond, where he was informed by the Greek prince of the recent deceafe of Amurath. Inftead of rejoicing in the deliverance, the experienced statesman expreffed his apprehenfion, that an ambitious youth would not long adhere to the fage and pacific fyftem of his father. After the fultan's decease, his Chriftian wife Maria ", the daughter of the Servian defpot, had been honourably restored to her parents on the fame of her beauty and merit, fhe was recommended by the ambaffador as the most

49 Suppofe him to have been captured in 1394, in Timour's first war in Georgia (Sherefeddin, l. iii. c. 50.); he might follow his Tartar mafter into Hindoftan in 1398, and from thence fail to the fpice islands.

750 The happy and pious Indians lived an hundred and fifty years, and enjoyed the moft perfect productions of the vegetable and mineral kingdoms. The animals were on a large scale; dragons feventy cubits, ants (the formica Indica) nine inches long, theep like elephants, elephants like fheep. Quidlibet audendi, &c.

cam,

51 He failed in a country veffel from the spice island to one of the ports of the exterior India; invenitque navem grandem Iberiquâ in Portugalliam eft delatus. This paffage, composed in 1477 (Phranza, l. iii c. 30.), twenty years before the discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, is fpurious or wonderful. But this new geography is fullied by the old and incompatible error which places the fource of the Nile in India.

52 Cantemir (p. 83.), who styles her the daughter of Lazarus Ogli, and the Helen of the Servians, places her marriage with Amurath in the year 1424. It will not easily be believed, that in fixand-twenty years cohabitation, the fultan corpus ejus non tetigit. After the taking of Conftantinople, fhe fled to Mahomet II. (Phranza, I. ii. c. 22.).

worthy

1

LXVII.

worthy object of the royal choice; and Phranza CHA P.
recapitulates and refutes the fpecious objections
that might be raised against the propofal. The
majefty of the purple would ennoble an unequal
alliance; the bar of affinity might be removed by
liberal alms and the difpenfation of the church;
the difgrace of Turkish nuptials had been re-
peatedly overlooked; and, though the fair Maria
was near fifty years of age, fhe might yet hope to
give an heir to the empire. Conftantine liftened
to the advice, which was tranfmitted in the first
ship that failed from Trebizond; but the factions
of the court oppofed his marriage; and it was
finally prevented by the pious vow of the fultana,
who ended her days in the monaftic profeffion.
Reduced to the first alternative, the choice of
Phranza was decided in favour of a Georgian
princefs; and the vanity of her father was dazzled
by the glorious alliance. Inftead of demanding,
according to the primitive and, national custom, a
price for his daughter ", he offered a portion of
fifty-fix thousand, with an annual penfion of five
thousand ducats; and the services of the ambas
fador were repaid by an affurance, that, as his fon
had been adopted in baptifm by the emperor, the
establishment of his daughter fhould be the pe
culiar care of the emprefs of Conftantinople. On
the return of Phranza, the treaty was ratified by
the Greek monarch, who with his own hand im-
preffed three vermillion croffes on the golden bull,
and affured the Georgian envoy, that in the

53

53 The claffical reader will recollect the offers of Agamemnon (Iliad l. v. 144), and the general practice of antiquity.

1

LXVII.

State of

the Byzan

tine court.

CHAP. fpring his gallies fhould conduct the bride to her Imperial palace. But Conftantine embraced his faithful fervant, not with the cold approbation of a fovereign, but with the warm confidence of a friend, who, after a long abfence, is impatient to pour his fecrets into the bofom of his friend. "Since the death of my mother and of Cantacuzene, who alone advised me without interest "or paffion", I am furrounded," faid the emperor, "by men whom I can neither love, nor trust, nor "esteem. You are not a stranger to Lucas No66 taras, the great admiral; obftinately attached "to his own fentiments, he declares, both in private and public, that his fentiments are the "abfolute measure of my thoughts and actions. The reft of the courtiers are fwayed by their perfonal or factious views; and how can I "confult the monks on questions of policy and "marriage? I have yet much employment for

66

your diligence and fidelity. In the spring you "fhall engage one of my brothers to folicit the "fuccour of the Western powers; from the "Morea you fhall fail to Cyprus on a particular "commiffion; and from thence proceed to Geor

gia to receive and conduct the future emprefs." "Your commands," replied Phranza, are ir. "resistible; but deign, great fir," he added, with a ferious fmile, " to confider that if I am "thus perpetually abfent from my family, my

54 Cantacuzene (I am ignorant of his relation to the emperor of that name) was great domestic, a firm afferter of the Greek creed, and a brother of the queen of Servia, whom he vifited with the character of ambaffador (Syropulus, p. 37, 38. 45.). « wife

66

LXVII.

"wife may be tempted either to feek another CHA P. husband, or to throw herself into a monastery." After laughing at his apprehenfions, the emperor more gravely confoled him by the pleafing affurance that this fhould be his last service abroad, and that he destined for his fon a wealthy and noble heiress; for himself, the important office of great logothete, or principal minister of state. The marriage was immediately ftipulated; but the office, however incompatible with his own, had been ufurped by the ambition of the admiral. Some delay was requifite to negociate a confent and an equivalent; and the nomination of Phranza was half declared, and half fuppreffed, left it might be displeasing to an infolent and powerful favourite. The winter was spent in the preparations of his embaffy; and Phranza had refolved, that the youth his fon fhould embrace this opportunity of foreign travel, and be left, on the appearance of danger, with his maternal kindred of the Morea. Such were the private and public designs, which were interrupted by a Turkish war, and finally buried in the ruins of the empire.

N 3

LXVIII.

Character of Mahomet II.

CHAP. LXVIII.

Reign and Character of Mahomet the Second.Siege, Affault, and final Conquest, of Conftantinople by the Turks.-Death of Conftantine Pa læologus.-Servitude of the Greeks.-Extinction of the Roman Empire in the Eaft.-Confternation of Europe. Conquests and Death of Mahomet

the Second.

THE

CHAP. HE fiege of Conftantinople by the Turks attracts our first attention to the person and character of the great destroyer. Mahomet the fecond' was the fon of the second Amurath; and though his mother has been decorated with the titles of Chriftian and princess, fhe is more probably confounded with the numerous concubines who peopled from every climate the haram of the fultan. His firft education and fentiments were thofe of a devout Musulman; and as often as he converfed with an infidel, he purified his hands and face by the legal rites of ablution. Age and empire appear to have relaxed this narrow bigotry ; his aspiring genius difdained to acknowledge a power above his own; and in his loofer hours he

For the character of Mahomet II. it is dangerous to truft either the Turks or the Chriftians. The moft moderate picture appears to be drawn by Phranza (I. i. c. 33-), whofe refentment had cooled in age and folitude; fee likewife Spondanus (A. D. 145, N° 11.), and the continuator of Fleury (tem. xxii. p. 552.), the Elegia of Paulus Jovius (1. iii. p. 164–166.), and the Dictionaire de Bayle (tom. iii, p, 272-279.).

prefumed