ness. The janissaries would not hear of the slightest change or reform, and so, when a new military system, adapted to modern warfare, was necessary for Turkey, Sultan Mahmoud, early in the present century, had to clear them out of the way by a coup de main. At the time of which we are speaking they had deservedly won a great reputation, and were, in all probability, the best and most highly trained infantry in Europe.
Let us now see what resources the emperor, "the solitary and indigent prince," as Gibbon calls him, had for defence of his ancient and venerable city. One resource, as we have already seen, was conspicuously absent. Of genuine patriotic spirit among the Greeks there was scarce a spark. Rich men would swear they were penniless, rather than contribute to the pay of the mercenaries on whom in their dire extremity they had mainly to depend. In former sieges the luxurious pleasure-loving Byzantine could arm himself and serve on the ramparts, and even endure the miseries of a protracted blockade. But of all this hardly a trace was left. He could repeat prayers and wrangle about the bread in the sacrament and drink confusion to the pope and his satellites in his tavern, but, with the infidel at his gates, he could not shake off the wretched cowardice which he tried to dignify with the name of resignation to the Divine will. The emperor was indeed in a piteous plight. A good and brave man himself, uniting old Roman virtue with Christian faith and fortitude, he would have held his city against the foe, but for the scanty and miserable material with which he had to work. Some of the citizens, both
