The French commander Nicole, surnamed the "Pilgrim," on account of a
journey he had once made to Mecca, had spent six months at Janina with a
brigade of artillery which General Marmont, then commanding in the
Illyrian provinces, had for a time placed at Ali's disposal. The old
officer had acquired the esteem and friendship of the pacha, whose
leisure he had often amused by stories of his campaigns and various
adventures, and although it was now long since they had met, he still
had the reputation of being Ali's friend. Ali prepared his plans
accordingly. He wrote a letter to Colonel Nicole, apparently in
continuation of a regular correspondence between them, in which he
thanked the colonel for his continued affection, and besought him by
various powerful motives to surrender Parga, of which he promised him
the governorship during the rest of his life. He took good care to
complete his treason by allowing the letter to fall into the hands of
the chief ecclesiastics of Parga, who fell head-foremost into the trap.
Seeing that the tone of the letter was in perfect accordance with the
former friendly relations between their French governor and the pacha,
they were convinced of the former's treachery. But the result was not as
Ali had hoped: the Parganiotes resumed their former negotiations with
the English, preferring to place their freedom in the hands of a
Christian nation rather than to fall under the rule of a Mohammedan
satrap.... The English immediately sent a messenger to Colonel Nicole,
offering honourable conditions of capitulation. The colonel returned a
decided refusal, and threatened to blow up the place if the inhabitants,
whose intentions he guessed, made the slightest hostile movement.
However, a few days later, the citadel was taken at night, owing to the
treachery of a woman who admitted an English detachment; and the next
day, to the general astonishment, the British standard floated over the
Acropolis of Parga.
All Greece was then profoundly stirred by a faint gleam of the dawn of
liberty, and shaken by a suppressed agitation. The Bourbons again
reigned in France, and the Greeks built a thousand hopes on an event
which changed the basis of the whole European policy. Above all, they
reckoned on powerful assistance from Russia. But England had already
begun to dread anything which could increase either the possessions or
the influence of this formidable power. Above all, she was determined
that the Ottoman Empire should remain intact, and that the Greek navy,
beginning to be formidable, must be destroyed. With these objects in
view, negotiations with Ali Pacha were resumed. The latter was still
smarting under his recent disappointment, and to all overtures answered
only, "Parga! I must have Parga."--And the English were compelled to
yield it!
Trusting to the word of General Campbell, who had formally promised, on
its surrender, that Parga should be classed along with the seven Ionian
Isles; its grateful inhabitants were enjoying a delicious rest after the
storm, when a letter from the Lord High Commissioner, addressed to
Lieutenant-Colonel de Bosset, undeceived them, and gave warning of the
evils which were to burst on the unhappy town.
On the 25th of March, 1817, notwithstanding the solemn promise made to
the Parganiotes, when they admitted the British troops, that they should
always be on the same footing as the Ionian Isles, a treaty was signed
at Constantinople by the British Plenipotentiary, which stipulated the
complete and stipulated cession of Parga and all its territory to, the
Ottoman Empire. Soon there arrived at Janine Sir John Cartwright, the
English Consul at Patras, to arrange for the sale of the lands of the
Parganiotes and discuss the conditions of their emigration. Never before
had any such compact disgraced European diplomacy, accustomed hitherto
to regard Turkish encroachments as simple sacrilege. But Ali Pacha
fascinated the English agents, overwhelming them with favours, honours,
and feasts, carefully watching them all the while. Their correspondence
was intercepted, and he endeavoured by means of his agents to rouse the
Parganiotes against them. The latter lamented bitterly, and appealed to
Christian Europe, which remained deaf to their cries. In the name of
their ancestors, they demanded the rights which had been guaranteed
them. "They will buy our lands," they said; "have we asked to sell them?
And even if we received their value, can gold give us a country and the
tombs of our ancestors?"
Ali Pacha invited the Lord High Commissioner of Great Britain, Sir
Thomas Maitland, to a conference at Prevesa, and complained of the
exorbitant price of 1,500,000, at which the commissioners had estimated
Parga and its territory, including private property and church
furniture. It had been hoped that Ali's avarice would hesitate at this
high price, but he was not so easily discouraged. He give a banquet for
the Lord High Commissioner, which degenerated into a shameless orgy. In
the midst of this drunken hilarity the Turk and the Englishman disposed
of the territory of Parga; agreeing that a fresh estimate should be made
on the spot by experts chosen by both English and Turks. The result of
this valuation was that the indemnity granted to the Christians was
reduced by the English to the sum of 276,075 sterling, instead of the
original 500,000. And as Ali's agents only arrived at the sum of 56,750,
a final conference was held at Buthrotum between Ali and the Lord High
Commissioner. The latter then informed the Parganiotes that the
indemnity allowed them was irrevocably fixed at 150,000! The transaction
is a disgrace to the egotistical and venal nation which thus allowed the
life and liberty of a people to be trifled with, a lasting blot on the
honour of England!
The Parganiotes at first could believe neither in the infamy of their
protectors nor in their own misfortune; but both were soon confirmed by
a proclamation of the Lord High Commissioner, informing them that the
pacha's army was marching to take possession of the territory which, by
May 10th, must be abandoned for ever.
The fields were then in full bearing. In the midst of plains ripening
for a rich harvest were 80,000 square feet of olive trees, alone
estimated at two hundred thousand guineas. The sun shone in cloudless
azure, the air was balmy with the scent of orange trees, of pomegranates
and citrons. But the lovely country might have been inhabited by
phantoms; only hands raised to heaven and brows bent to the dust met
one's eye. Even the very dust belonged no more to the wretched
inhabitants; they were forbidden to take a fruit or a flower, the
priests might not remove either relics or sacred images. Church,
ornaments, torches, tapers, pyxes, had by this treaty all become
Mahommedan property. The English had sold everything, even to the Host!
Two days more, and all must be left. Each was silently marking the door
of the dwelling destined so soon to shelter an enemy, with a red cross,
when suddenly a terrible cry echoed from street to street, for the Turks
had been perceived on the heights overlooking the town. Terrified and
despairing, the whole population hastened to fall prostrate before the
Virgin of Parga, the ancient guardian of their citadel. A mysterious
voice, proceeding from the sanctuary, reminded them that the English
had, in their iniquitous treaty, forgotten to include the ashes of those
whom a happier fate had spared the sight of the ruin of Parga. Instantly
they rushed to the graveyards, tore open the tombs, and collected the
bones and putrefying corpses. The beautiful olive trees were felled, an
enormous funeral pyre arose, and in the general excitement the orders of
the English chief were defied. With naked daggers in their hands,
standing in the crimson light of the flames which were consuming the
bones of their ancestors, the people of Parga vowed to slay their wives
and children, and to kill themselves to the last man, if the infidels
dared to set foot in the town before the appointed hour. Xenocles, the
last of the Greek poets, inspired by this sublime manifestation of
despair, even as Jeremiah by the fall of Jerusalem, improvised a hymn
which expresses all the grief of the exiles, and which the exiles
interrupted by their tears and sobs.
A messenger, crossing the sea in all haste, informed the Lord High
Commissioner of the terrible threat of the Parganiotes. He started at
once, accompanied by General Sir Frederic Adams, and landed at Parga by
the light of the funeral pyre. He was received with ill-concealed
indignation, and with assurances that the sacrifice would be at once
consummated unless Ali's troops were held back. The general endeavoured
to console and to reassure the unhappy people, and then proceeded to the
outposts, traversing silent streets in which armed men stood at each
door only waiting a signal before slaying their families, and then
turning their weapons against the English and themselves. He implored
them to have patience, and they answered by pointing to the approaching
Turkish army and bidding him hasten. He arrived at last and commenced
negotiations, and the Turkish officers, no less uneasy than the English
garrison, promised to wait till the appointed hour. The next day passed
in mournful silence, quiet as death, At sunset on the following day, May
9, 1819, the English standard on the castle of Parga was hauled down,
and after a night spent in prayer and weeping, the Christians demanded
the signal of departure.
They had left their dwellings at break of day, and scattering on the
shore, endeavoured to collect some relics of their country. Some filled
little bags with ashes withdrawn from the funeral pile; others took
handfuls of earth, while the women and children picked up pebbles which
they hid in their clothing and pressed to their bosoms, as if fearing to
be deprived of them. Meanwhile, the ships intended to transport them
arrived, and armed English soldiers superintended the embarkation, which
the Turks hailed from afar with, ferocious cries. The Parganiotes were
landed in Corfu, where they suffered yet more injustice. Under various
pretexts the money promised them was reduced and withheld, until
destitution compelled them to accept the little that was offered. Thus
closed one of the most odious transactions which modern history has been
compelled to record.
The satrap of Janina had arrived at the fulfilment of his wishes. In the
retirement of his fairy-like palace by the lake he could enjoy
voluptuous pleasures to the full. But already seventy-eight years had
passed over his head, and old age had laid the burden of infirmity upon
him. His dreams were dreams of blood, and vainly he sought refuge in
chambers glittering with gold, adorned with arabesques, decorated with
costly armour and covered with the richest of Oriental carpets, remorse
stood ever beside him. Through the magnificence which surrounded him
there constantly passed the gale spectre of Emineh, leading onwards a
vast procession of mournful phantoms, and the guilty pasha buried his
face in his hands and shrieked aloud for help. Sometimes, ashamed of his
weakness, he endeavoured to defy both the reproaches of his conscience
and the opinion of the multitude, and sought to encounter criticism with
bravado. If, by chance, he overheard some blind singer chanting in the
streets the satirical verses which, faithful to the poetical and mocking
genius of them ancestors, the Greeks frequently composed about him, he
would order the singer to be brought, would bid him repeat his verses,
and, applauding him, would relate some fresh anecdote of cruelty,
saying, "Go, add that to thy tale; let thy hearers know what I can do;
let them understand that I stop at nothing in order to overcome my foes!
If I reproach myself with anything, it is only with the deeds I have
sometimes failed to carry out."
Sometimes it was the terrors of the life after death which assailed him.
The thought of eternity brought terrible visions in its train, and Ali
shuddered at the prospect of Al-Sirat, that awful bridge, narrow as a
spider's thread and hanging over the furnaces of Hell; which a Mussulman
must cross in order to arrive at the gate of Paradise. He ceased to joke
about Eblis, the Prince of Evil, and sank by degrees into profound
superstition. He was surrounded by magicians and soothsayers; he
consulted omens, and demanded talismans and charms from the dervishes,
which he had either sewn into his garments, or suspended in the most
secret parts of his palace, in order to avert evil influences. A Koran
was hung about his neck as a defence against the evil eye, and
frequently he removed it and knelt before it, as did Louis XI before the
leaden figures of saints which adorned his hat. He ordered a complete
chemical laboratory from Venice, and engaged alchemists to distill the
water of immortality, by the help of which he hoped to ascend to the
planets and discover the Philosopher's Stone. Not perceiving any
practical result of their labours, he ordered, the laboratory to be
burnt and the alchemists to be hung.
Ali hated his fellow-men. He would have liked to leave no survivors, and
often regretted his inability to destroy all those who would have cause
to rejoice at his death, Consequently he sought to accomplish as much
harm as he could during the time which remained to him, and for no
possible reason but that of hatred, he caused the arrest of both Ibrahim
Pasha, who had already suffered so much at his hands, and his son, and
confined them both in a dungeon purposely constructed under the grand
staircase of the castle by the lake, in order that he might have the
pleasure of passing over their heads each time he left his apartments or
returned to them.
It was not enough for Ali merely to put to death those who displeased
him, the form of punishment must be constantly varied in order to
produce a fresh mode of suffering, therefore new tortures had to be
constantly invented. Now it was a servant, guilty of absence without
leave, who was bound to a stake in the presence of his sister, and
destroyed by a cannon placed six paces off, but only loaded with powder,
in order to prolong the agony; now, a Christian accused of having tried
to blow up Janina by introducing mice with tinder fastened to their
tails into the powder magazine, who was shut up in the cage of Ali's
favourite tiger and devoured by it.
The pasha despised the human race as much as he hated it. A European
having reproached him with the cruelty shown to his subjects, Ali
replied:--
"You do not understand the race with which I have to deal. Were I to
hang a criminal on yonder tree, the sight would not deter even his own
brother from stealing in the crowd at its foot. If I had an old man
burnt alive, his son would steal the ashes and sell them. The rabble can
be governed by fear only, and I am the one man who does it
successfully."
His conduct perfectly corresponded to his ideas. One great feast-day,
two gipsies devoted their lives in order to avert the evil destiny of
the pasha; and, solemnly convoking on their own heads all misfortunes
which might possibly befall him, cast themselves down from the palace
roof. One arose with difficulty, stunned and suffering, the other
remained on the ground with a broken leg. Ali gave them each forty
francs and an annuity of two pounds of maize daily, and considering this
sufficient, took no further trouble about them.
Every year, at Ramadan, a large sum was distributed in alms among poor
women without distinction of sect. But Ali contrived to change this act
of benevolence into a barbarous form of amusement.
As he possessed several palaces in Janina at a considerable distance
from each other, the one at which a distribution was to take place was
each day publicly announced, and when the women had waited there for an
hour or two, exposed to sun, rain or cold, as the case might be, they
were suddenly informed that they must go to some other palace, at the
opposite end of the town. When they got there, they usually had to wait
for another hour, fortunate if they were not sent off to a third place
of meeting. When the time at length arrived, an eunuch appeared,
followed by Albanian soldiers armed with staves, carrying a bag of
money, which he threw by handfuls right into the midst of the assembly.
Then began a terrible uproar. The women rushed to catch it, upsetting
each other, quarreling, fighting, and uttering cries of terror and pain,
while the Albanians, pretending to enforce order, pushed into the crowd,
striking right and left with their batons. The pacha meanwhile sat at a
window enjoying the spectacle, and impartially applauding all well
delivered blows, no matter whence they came. During these distributions,
which really benefitted no one, many women were always severely hurt,
and some died from the blows they had received.
Ali maintained several carriages for himself and his family, but allowed
no one else to share in this prerogative. To avoid being jolted, he
simply took up the pavement in Janina and the neighbouring towns, with
the result that in summer one was choked by dust, and in winter could
hardly get through the mud. He rejoiced in the public inconvenience, and
one day having to go out in heavy rain, he remarked to one of the
officers of his escort, "How delightful to be driven through this in a
carriage, while you will have the pleasure of following on horseback!
You will be wet and dirty, whilst I smoke my pipe and laugh at your
condition."
He could not understand why Western sovereigns should permit their
subjects to enjoy the same conveniences and amusements as themselves.
"If I had a theatre," he said, "I would allow no one to be present at
performances except my own children; but these idiotic Christians do not
know how to uphold their own dignity."
There was no end to the mystifications which it amused the pacha to
carry out with those who approached him.
One day he chose to speak Turkish to a Maltese merchant who came to
display some jewels. He was informed that the merchant understood only
Greek and Italian. He none the less continued his discourse without
allowing anyone to translate what he said into Greek. The Maltese at
length lost patience, shut up his cases, and departed. Ali watched him
with the utmost calm, and as he went out told him, still in Turkish, to
come again the next day.
An unexpected occurrence seemed, like the warning finger of Destiny, to
indicate an evil omen for the pacha's future. "Misfortunes arrive in
troops," says the forcible Turkish proverb, and a forerunner of
disasters came to Ali Dacha.
One morning he was suddenly roused by the Sheik Yussuf, who had forced
his way in, in spite of the guards. "Behold!" said he, handing Ali a
letter, "Allah, who punishes the guilty, has permitted thy seraglio of
Tepelen to be burnt. Thy splendid palace, thy beautiful furniture,
costly stuffs, cashmeers, furs, arms, all are destroyed! And it is thy
youngest and best beloved son, Salik Bey himself, whose hand kindled the
flames!" So saying; Yussuf turned and departed, crying with a triumphant
voice, "Fire! fire! fire!"
Ali instantly ordered his horse, and, followed by his guards, rode
without drawing rein to Tepelen. As soon as he arrived at the place
where his palace had formerly insulted the public misery, he hastened to
examine the cellars where his treasures were deposited. All was intact,
silver plate, jewels, and fifty millions of francs in gold, enclosed in
a well over which he had caused a tower to be built. After this
examination he ordered all the ashes to be carefully sifted in hopes of
recovering the gold in the tassels and fringes of the sofas, and the
silver from the plate and the armour. He next proclaimed through the
length and breadth of the land, that, being by the hand of Allah
deprived of his house, and no longer possessing anything in his native
town, he requested all who loved him to prove their affection by
bringing help in proportion. He fixed the day of reception for each
commune, and for almost each individual of any rank, however small,
according to their distance from Tepelen, whither these evidences of
loyalty were to be brought.
During five days Ali received these forced benevolences from all parts.
He sat, covered with rags, on a shabby palm-leaf mat placed at the outer
gate of his ruined palace, holding in his left hand a villainous pipe of
the kind used by the lowest people, and in his right an old red cap,
which he extended for the donations of the passers-by. Behind stood a
Jew from Janina, charged with the office of testing each piece of gold
and valuing jewels which were offered instead of money; for, in terror,
each endeavoured to appear generous. No means of obtaining a rich
harvest were neglected; for instance, Ali distributed secretly large
sums among poor and obscure people, such as servants, mechanics, and
soldiers, in order that by returning them in public they might appear to
be making great sacrifices, so that richer and more distinguished
persons could not, without appearing ill-disposed towards the pacha,
offer only the same amount as did the poor, but were obliged to present
gifts of enormous value.
After this charity extorted from their fears, the pacha's subjects hoped
to be at peace. But a new decree proclaimed throughout Albania required
them to rebuild and refurnish the formidable palace of Tepelen entirely
at the public expense. Ali then returned to Janina, followed by his
treasure and a few women who had escaped from the flames, and whom he
disposed of amongst his friends, saying that he was no longer
sufficiently wealthy to maintain so many slaves.
Fate soon provided him with a second opportunity for amassing wealth.
Arta, a wealthy town with a Christian population, was ravaged by the
plague, and out of eight thousand inhabitants, seven thousand were swept
away. Hearing this, Ali hastened to send commissioners to prepare an
account of furniture and lands which the pacha claimed as being heir to
his subjects. A few livid and emaciated spectres were yet to be found in
the streets of Arta. In order that the inventory might be more complete,
these unhappy beings were compelled to wash in the Inachus blankets,
sheets, and clothes steeped in bubonic infection, while the collectors
were hunting everywhere for imaginary hidden treasure. Hollow trees were
sounded, walls pulled down, the most unlikely corners examined, and a
skeleton which was discovered still girt with a belt containing Venetian
sequins was gathered up with the utmost care. The archons of the town
were arrested and tortured in the hope of discovering buried treasure,
the clue to which had disappeared along with the owners. One of these
magistrates, accused of having hidden some valuable objects, was plunged
up to his shoulders in a boiler full of melted lead and boiling oil. Old
men, women, children, rich and poor alike, were interrogated, beaten,
and compelled to abandon the last remains of their property in order to
save their lives.
Having thus decimated the few inhabitants remaining to the town, it
became necessary to repeople it. With this object in view, Ali's
emissaries overran the villages of Thessaly, driving before them all the
people they met in flocks, and compelling them to settle in Arta. These
unfortunate colonists were also obliged to find money to pay the pacha
for the houses they were forced to occupy.
This business being settled, Ali turned to another which had long been
on his mind. We have seen how Ismail Pacho Bey escaped the assassins
sent to murder him. A ship, despatched secretly from Prevesa, arrived at
the place of his retreat. The captain, posing as a merchant, invited
Ismail to come on board and inspect his goods. But the latter, guessing
a trap, fled promptly, and for some time all trace of him was lost. Ali,
in revenge, turned his wife out of the palace at Janina which she still
occupied, and placed her in a cottage, where she was obliged to earn a
living by spinning. But he did not stop there, and learning after some
time that Pacho Bey had sought refuge with the Nazir of Drama, who had
taken him into favour, he resolved to strike a last blow, more sure and
more terrible than the others. Again Ismail's lucky star saved him from
the plots of his enemy. During a hunting party he encountered a
kapidgi-bachi, or messenger from the sultan, who asked him where he
could find the Nazir, to whom he was charged with an important
communication. As kapidgi-bachis are frequently bearers of evil tidings,
which it is well to ascertain at once, and as the Nazir was at some
distance, Pacho Bey assumed the latter's part, and the sultan's
confidential messenger informed him that he was the bearer of a firman
granted at the request of Ali Pacha of Janina.
"Ali of Tepelenir. He is my friend. How can I serve him?"
"By executing the present order, sent you by the Divan, desiring you to
behead a traitor, named Pacho Bey, who crept into your service a short
time ago.
"Willingly I but he is not an easy man to seize being brave, vigorous,
clever, and cunning. Craft will be necessary in this case. He may appear
at any moment, and it is advisable that he should not see you. Let no
one suspect who you are, but go to Drama, which is only two hours
distant, and await me there. I shall return this evening, and you can
consider your errand as accomplished."
The kapidgi-bachi made a sign of comprehension, and directed his course
towards Drama; while Ismail, fearing that the Nazir, who had only known
him a short time, would sacrifice him with the usual Turkish
indifference, fled in the opposite direction. At the end of an hour he
encountered a Bulgarian monk, with whom he exchanged clothes--a disguise
which enabled him to traverse Upper Macedonia in safety. Arriving at the
great Servian convent in the mountains whence the Axius takes its rise,
he obtained admission under an assumed name. But feeling sure of the
discretion of the monks, after a few days he explained his situation to
them.
Ali, learning the ill-success of his latest stratagem, accused the Nazir
of conniving at Paeho Bey's escape. But the latter easily justified
himself with the Divan by giving precise information of what had really
occurred. This was what Ali wanted, who profited thereby in having the
fugitive's track followed up, and soon got wind of his retreat. As Pacho
Bey's innocence had been proved in the explanations given to the Porte,
the death firman obtained against him became useless, and Ali affected
to abandon him to his fate, in order the better to conceal the new plot
he was conceiving against him.
Athanasius Vaya, chief assassin of the Kardikiotes, to whom Ali imparted
his present plan for the destruction of Ismail, begged for the honour of
putting it into execution, swearing that this time Ismail should not
escape. The master and the instrument disguised their scheme under the
appearance of a quarrel, which astonished the whole town. At the end of
a terrible scene which took place in public, Ali drove the confidant of
his crimes from the palace, overwhelming him with insults, and declaring
that were Athanasius not the son of his children's foster-mother, he
would have sent him to the gibbet. He enforced his words by the
application of a stick, and Vaya, apparently overwhelmed by terror and
affliction, went round to all the nobles of the town, vainly entreating
them to intercede for him. The only favour which Mouktar Pacha could
obtain for him was a sentence of exile allowing him to retreat to
Macedonia.
Athanasius departed from Janina with all the demonstrations of utter
despair, and continued his route with the haste of one who fears
pursuit. Arrived in Macedonia, he assumed the habit of a monk, and
undertook a pilgrimage to Mount Athos, saying that both the disguise and
the journey were necessary to his safety. On the way he encountered one
of the itinerant friars of the great Servian convent, to whom he
described his disgrace in energetic terms, begging him to obtain his
admission among the lay brethren of his monastery.
Delighted at the prospect of bringing back to the fold of the Church a
man so notorious for his crimes, the friar hastened to inform his
superior, who in his turn lost no time in announcing to Pacho Bey that
his compatriot and companion in misfortune was to be received among the
lay brethren, and in relating the history of Athanasius as he himself
had heard it. Pacho Bey, however, was not easily deceived, and at once
guessing that Vaya's real object was his own assassination, told his
doubts to the superior, who had already received him as a friend. The
latter retarded the reception of Vaya so as to give Pacho time to escape
and take the road to Constantinople. Once arrived there, he determined
to brave the storm and encounter Ali openly.
Endowed by nature with a noble presence and with masculine firmness,
Pacho Bey possessed also the valuable gift of speaking all the various
tongues of the Ottoman Empire. He could not fail to distinguish himself
in the capital and to find an opening for his great talents. But his
inclination drove him at first to seek his fellow-exiles from Epirus,
who were either his old companions in arms, friends, of relations, for
he was allied to all the principal families, and was even, through his
wife, nearly connected with his enemy, Ali Pacha himself.
He had learnt what this unfortunate lady had already endured on his
account, and feared that she would suffer yet more if he took active
measures against the pacha. While he yet hesitated between affection and
revenge, he heard that she had died of grief and misery. Now that
despair had put an end to uncertainty, he set his hand to the work.
At this precise moment Heaven sent him a friend to console and aid him
in his vengeance, a Christian from OEtolia, Paleopoulo by name. This man
was on the point of establishing himself in Russian Bessarabia, when he
met Pacho Bey and joined with him in the singular coalition which was to
change the fate of the Tepelenian dynasty.
Paleopoulo reminded his companion in misfortune of a memorial presented
to the Divan in 1812, which had brought upon Ali a disgrace from which
he only escaped in consequence of the overwhelming political events
which just then absorbed the attention of the Ottoman Government. The
Grand Seigneur had sworn by the tombs of his ancestors to attend to the
matter as soon as he was able, and it was only requisite to remind him
of his vow. Pacho Hey and his friend drew up a new memorial, and knowing
the sultan's avarice, took care to dwell on the immense wealth possessed
by Ali, on his scandalous exactions, and on the enormous sums diverted
from the Imperial Treasury. By overhauling the accounts of his
administration, millions might be recovered. To these financial
considerations Pacho Bey added some practical ones. Speaking as a man
sure of his facts and well acquainted with the ground, he pledged his
head that with twenty thousand men he would, in spite of Ali's troops
and strongholds, arrive before Janina without firing a musket.
However good these plans appeared, they were by no means to the taste of
the sultan's ministers, who were each and all in receipt of large
pensions from the man at whom they struck. Besides, as in Turkey it is
customary for the great fortunes of Government officials to be absorbed
on their death by the Imperial Treasury, it of course appeared easier to
await the natural inheritance of Ali's treasures than to attempt to
seize them by a war which would certainly absorb part of them.
Therefore, while Pacho Bey's zeal was commended, he obtained only
dilatory answers, followed at length by a formal refusal.
Meanwhile, the old OEtolian, Paleopoulo, died, having prophesied the
approaching Greek insurrection among his friends, and pledged Pacho Bey
to persevere in his plans of vengeance, assuring him that before long
Ali would certainly fall a victim to them. Thus left alone, Pacho,
before taking any active steps in his work of vengeance, affected to
give himself up to the strictest observances of the Mohammedan religion.
Ali, who had established a most minute surveillance over his actions,
finding that his time was spent with ulemas and dervishes, imagined that
he had ceased to be dangerous, and took no further trouble about him.