reply was, however, that he would "return by the same way which God had opened for the Turks." Certain it is that the Greeks ascribed this calamity to the cowardice of Giustiniani at this critical moment. The story was that he died in disgrace soon afterwards, a broken-hearted man, in the island of Chios. It is hardly possible for us to arrive at the truth. Gibbon takes the unfavourable view of his conduct which commended itself to Phranza and the Greeks generally, while Finlay maintains that we ought to be slow to charge a man of well-proved courage with pusillanimity. Phranza himself even speaks of him as "hard as adamant." The matter is one which cannot be explained. But had the brave Genoese still stood at his post, he never could have sustained for any length of time an attack made with such overwhelming numbers on the feeble, worn-out garrison. The fight possibly might have been prolonged. As it was, a panic seems quickly to have showed itself as the Turks rushed on with greater fury. A gigantic janissary, Hassan by name, is said to have been the first to climb the ramparts and to lead them to victory. The emperor died, we know, the death of a hero in endeavouring along with a few of his nobles to stem the advancing tide. This is all we know. The exact circumstances of his death are variously reported. His faithful Phranza was in another part of the city, and did not witness his master's end. He represents him as performing prodigies of valour and slaughtering multitudes of the foe with his own hand—like another Samson. His body lay buried under a heap of slain, but the head, says Phranza, was never found,
