EXAMPLES OF HIS CEUELTY 391 and the singularly dramatic story of the slaughter of Irene in order to demonstrate to his troops that though he loved the most beautiful woman in the world he was yet master of him self , justly remarking that the massacre of garrisons faithful to their trust, the execution of the members of the imperial family of Trebizond and of the king of Bosnia, cry sufficiently aloud without need of exaggeration. Kesist- ance to his lusts or even to his lawful desires was punished relentlessly by death. 1 He executed his grand vizier Mahmoud because of his independence. He tortured and then put to death his old tutor and vizier Halil Pasha. He sawed five hundred prisoners in halves whom he had captured in Achaia. ' He was more cruel than Nero, and delighted in bloodshed,' says Tetaldi. Probably it would be impossible to find a contemporary writer who does not employ similar language. Many of his acts are without the shadow of excuse. They are the result of wild impulse which had never been under control, and deserve to be classed as wanton cruelties inflicted by a man who was reckless of human suffering. There are others which may be put down to what he probably regarded as the exigencies of his position. If in his opinion the assassination of a brother, the slaughter of a great number of his enemies in war, and the murder of those of his subjects who opposed him were necessary to the accomplishment of his objects, he never hesitated. Like other great military rulers, Caesar yesterday, Napoleon to-day, Mahomet regarded men as so many counters, to be kept so long as they were useful in his game, to be cast aside when no longer wanted. Belonging to a family accustomed to absolute rule of the Eastern type, to a race which has never valued life as against military success, and having been reared amid dangers where his struggle for power and even for life was almost daily, he swept away every man who opposed him. His enemies would have dealt hardly with him, and he never appeared to doubt that he was justified in dealing hardly with or getting rid of them. It was part of the game of war. Vae victis ! And yet this 1 Von Hammer, iii. 232.
