226 DESTRUCTION OF THE GREEK EMPIRE but no disgrace was attached to this act of discipline. The boy who was admitted into the brotherhood of the Janissaries was provided for as completely as if he had become a monk. When by reason of age or wounds he became weak, he was retired from active service and received a pension of three aspers daily more than he had received when on service. In times of warfare the sternest features of the barracks were relaxed. Camp life was the recreation, and furnished the joy and hope, of the Janissary. War was for him a delight. His regiment marched to battle with every sign of rejoicing and of military display compatible with discipline. The effect of the long training, with its strictness on the one hand and its relaxations on the other, was to develop an esprit de corps among them such as has rarely existed in any other army. Everything was done that could be done to cultivate this spirit. Every means was employed to make the Janissary live his life in and look only to the interests of his regiment. He was forbidden to exercise any trade or occupation whatever, lest he should possess an interest out- side his regiment. In the time of Suliman the sultan ordered the aga of a regiment of Janissaries to be beheaded because one of his men was found mending his clothes. The officer was spared at the request of his comrades, but the private soldier was dismissed from the service. The regiment was to be everything to the Janissary; the out- side world nothing. No man was allowed to accumulate wealth, although his regiment could do so. Each man followed the good or ill fortune of the powerful body of which he was a member. The result was that the regiment represented to the Janissary everything that he held dear. He became jealous of its honour, and the regiment in its turn became exclusive towards outsiders. The Janissary came before long to think of his position as privileged and to regard entrance into his corps as only to be allowed under severe restrictions. So careful indeed did he become of the rights of his regiment that before long no person ^orn of Mahometan parents was
