INTERLUDE
Despite his forebodings, Sir John during the year 1678 had no
oppression to complain of.
Hussein Aga, whom our Ambassador considered, in point of influence
with the Grand Vizir, to be the third man in the Empire, continued
most friendly. He swore by his head that he would make the Pasha of
Aleppo refund the sum he had extorted from our Factory, and, in the
event of a new importation of specie by the English, he promised
all possible favour. The first of these pledges could not be taken
seriously: as a predecessor of Sir John’s had observed long ago,
“Restitution of money was never yet procured from a Turk; his head
more easily.”[208] But with regard to the second, the Customer
proved as good as his word. A consignment of 30,000 dollars that
reached Constantinople was, thanks to him, brought off for nothing;
while a much larger sum (200,000 dollars) was landed at Smyrna
for a trifle--2180 dollars: “as Times goe, no ill Bargain.” Nay,
in another matter, the Customer proved even better than his word:
though he threatened, in pursuance of his old policy, to raise
the duty upon the finer cloth we now imported, “yet,” says our
Ambassador, “I have brought Him to Acquiesce with those very duty’s
I had ascertaind upon our Cloth by the New Capitulations I made;
to the grief of heart of them who have reason to envy our Great
and Vast Trade, because it Ruines Theirs.” In truth, both French
and Dutch had cause to gnash their teeth. The rigour with which
Hussein Aga treated them seemed to keep pace with the favour he
showed to us: he made both pay for goods that came from Smyrna to
Constantinople the difference between the duty levied at the former
and the latter port, while he ostentatiously let our goods, once
taxed at Smyrna, enter Constantinople scot free. This in addition
to the preferential tariff we enjoyed under the New Capitulations.
No wonder both the French Ambassador and the Dutch Resident
struggled by might and money at the Porte to resist the intolerable
tyranny of the Custom House. But nothing availed. They had “a hard
head to deal with, and one whose obstinacy is powerfully backd’
at Court.” All they gained was Hussein Aga’s anger: irritated by
these attempts to undermine his position, the Customer detained
the French merchants’ cloth till they paid up, and let that of the
Dutch rot in the Custom-House.[209]
What Frenchmen and Dutchmen thought of Hussein Aga’s partiality for
the English may be imagined. But it is to be noted that neither
our Ambassador’s despatches nor our Treasurer’s comments contain
any hint that the motives which dictated the Customer’s attitude
towards us were of a mercenary nature. In the absence of evidence
to the contrary, we must assume that he spared us because he liked
us. Hussein and Dudley North were fast friends: they often dined
together at each other’s houses, the Turk even partaking of the
Giaour’s pork and getting drunk on his wine like a good Christian.
From Finch, too, he had received more than once samples of his
cellar, as well as other civilities.[210] That seems to have been
the extent of his obligations to us; and he repaid us with interest.
Equally satisfactory was the attitude of some other Turkish
grandees. By the new Bostanji-bashi, to whom Sir John paid a visit,
he was received “with all possible demonstrations of respect and
kindnesse,” while he was captivated by the affability of the new
Capitan Pasha--a personage who by his place was the second man in
the Empire, and by his intimacy with the Grand Vizir certainly
the first. At the audience which he granted to the Ambassador he
was very polite, and they had “many pleasant Reparty’s upon each
other;” and what seemed more significant, he honoured the visitor
with six vests. Now, as Kara Mustafa made a practice of vesting no
man, and as the Capitan Pasha was Kara Mustafa’s prime favourite,
Sir John could not but think “that this was done by the Visir’s
Privity,” and drew therefrom the hope that maybe Kara Mustafa at
last “_Malis nostris mitescere discit_.”
As regards the pretensions of the Pasha of Tunis also Sir John’s
fears went off like other forebodings; and the emergency he
apprehended from Narbrough’s operations did not arise: the Admiral
managed to wage a successful war of reprisals against the Algerine
pirates--seizing their ships and blockading their ports--without
any infringement of the Sultan’s suzerain rights.
“In short,” Finch sums up, “though wee cannot bragg of our usage,
yet wee may justly say wee have fard’ better then any other Nation.
For hitherto though in the worst of Times, I have maintaind’ all
the Capitulations Inviolable.” He knew that he was well off, and
meant to continue so. He had had his lesson. If his cherished
Capitulations were attacked, he would indeed defend them to
the utmost of his ability. But as to matters of etiquette, the
King having graciously granted him his “dispensation for that
complyance” on the point of the Soffah, he registered a vow to “be
caught no more in a Ceremoniall Nett.”[211] Acquiescence, after
all, has this merit: it prevents noise and saves time.
In the absence of personal history, the Ambassador gives us the
history of others. Time was when Sir John, as we have seen, could
not find “materialls enough to furnish a Dispatch.” Now it is
“conveyances, not matter” that he wants, in order to keep abreast
of the “variety’s of change and newes” which crowd upon him.
Whatever else Kara Mustafa could not make, he could make things
move; and, under his rule, Turkey found herself transformed from
a placid lake into a foaming torrent. This transformation is well
depicted in our Ambassador’s despatches. A rich chronicle, alive
with events, domestic and foreign, civil and military, supplying
abundant food for reflection to those who have accustomed
themselves to meditate on the characters of men and the fortunes of
nations. A thoroughly honest chronicle too. Sir John scrupulously
discriminates between reliable intelligence and irresponsible
rumour. When dealing with first-hand information, he gives us its
sources; when not, his favourite expression, “Tis said,” serves us
as a warning that the writer relates what he has heard, but cannot
vouch for. He is deeply conscious of the extreme difficulty of
getting at the truth of things in Turkey, and does not by any means
profess always to believe the reports he transmits.[212] We have
variant accounts set forth with perfect candour, and statements
previously made corrected as the result of further inquiry. Fond
though he is of speculating on the causes and consequences of
events, our chronicler takes care to keep surmise severely distinct
from certainty. He never pretends to do more than present to the
Secretary of State the most plausible conjectures he can form, with
the proviso, “Time will make all things plain.”
Not the least interesting, or the least melancholy, of these
events is the conduct of Kara Mustafa--the ruler of a mighty
Empire--towards the representatives of the little tributary
Republic of Ragusa: one of them, Signor Caboga, the “lusty,
gallant fellow” whom we saw in happier days disporting himself
at Adrianople with our gay Chaplain. The Vizir had consented to
treat for an adjustment upon payment of a preliminary instalment
of 200,000 dollars, and despatched an Aga to collect this sum,
threatening that, in case of refusal, he would order the Pasha
of Bosnia to seize the City and territory of the Republic and
make slaves of the inhabitants. The messenger returned with the
answer that the Ragusans offered 100 purses (50,000 dollars) as a
ransom. This offer was rejected, and the Ambassadors were summoned
before the Divan, where they were asked whether they would pay
the sum demanded or not. On their replying that they could not,
Kara Mustafa “calld’ them Doggs, Infidells, Hoggs, and Atheists;
commanding them to be carryd’ to prison.” By and by one of their
pretended creditors visited them, and finding them sitting upon
their beds, cried out that this was not the way to pay their debts.
Signor Caboga was unwise enough to retort, “You see us on our beds,
but wee hope ere long to see you impald’ upon stakes.” For this
speech they were removed, by order of the Vizir, “into a common and
filthy gaole.” While they lay in that “infamous prison,” among the
vilest criminals, two more envoys arrived from Ragusa “to mitigate
the implacable mind of the Visir. But they no sooner came to
Silistria where the Gran Signor was, but they were suddainly clapt
in chaines and one of them dyd with the insupportable weight of the
chaines about his neck.”[213]
Hardly less drastic was Kara Mustafa’s treatment of the
representative of a much greater State than Ragusa. In the
previous autumn the Palatine of Kulm had come from Poland, with a
magnificent suite of at least three hundred persons, as Ambassador
Extraordinary, to conclude the long-drawn-out negotiations for
peace. On his arrival, Sir John had showered upon the newcomer
those tokens of friendship which he had never known to fail of
their effect: “I presented him with five chests of Florence and
other choice Wines out of Christendome, amongst which was one chest
of the Pope’s Wine; which he never drank of but that he first
signd’ himselfe with the crosse and rose up and was uncoverd!” But
Kara Mustafa nipped this friendship in its juicy bud. For reasons
which Sir John could not fathom, the Vizir forbade all further
intercourse with the Pole, at the same time ordering our Ambassador
to keep the prohibition secret. This embargo placed Sir John in
a very awkward position: the world wondered why he paid no visit
to his colleague, and Sir John had to dissemble until the Plague
breaking out in the Pole’s house afforded him a plausible excuse
for holding aloof.[214] But though he had no direct communication
with the Palatine, he kept himself informed of all that passed
between him and the Porte.
It is by no means our intention to recite the Iliad of miseries,
the humiliations, the terrors and utter harrowing to despair,
which the poor Palatine underwent incessantly till the end of his
mission. Let the following extracts from Sir John’s despatches
speak for themselves.
_Dec. 15-25, 1677._--“The Polish Ambassadour has the Plague very
hott in his house, 14 persons of quality being dead out of it
(for the Visir would suffer none of the Nobility to depart), and
two particularly last night; and yet I found one Druggerman who
had the courage to goe to him and wish him in my name a happy
Christmas: He sent me word that he intended to visit me before he
left this place; not knowing, good gentleman, the restraint that I
am under: tis hard really that in all this danger the Visir will
not permitt him to change his house, calling the motion when it was
made by him, a Christian Panick fear.”
_Jan. 19-29, 1677-78._--“The Polish Ambassadour is here still and
yet alive, though the Plague was very hott in his house, he could
not get leave to remove to another, having no other answer but
this, Let him run his destiny.”
_March 1-11, 1677-78._--“At last the Peace between the Port and the
Poles is concluded; which was effected three dayes since but is
not yet underwritten.... The Ambassadour was so long inflexible,
but he gott nothing by his standing out thus long but bad words
and worse Treatment, a great part of his trayn being dead of the
Plague by ill accommodation when Infection was gott amongst them.”
So if this treatment, as seems probable, was the result of policy
rather than of mere cruelty, it proved efficacious. “The Peace
was patchd’ up by the Tartar Han or Crim Tartar ... the Polish
Ambassadour applying himselfe to the Mediation of this Prince with
such Humility that though His Principality is so qualifyd’ ... He
kissd’ the very Hem of his Garment that touchd’ the Ground.”
_March 2-12, 1677-78._--“The Peace with Poland is subscribd’ on
both sides ... the Poles have deliverd’ up not onely a great part
of Ukrania, two places there onely remaining to them, but what is
of worse consequence to them, they have surrenderd’ all Podolia
entirely, the richest province they had.”
In return for these territorial sacrifices, the Ambassador
expected some religious concessions, among them the restoration
of our old friends, the Latin Fathers, to the possession of the
Holy Sepulchre. The Poles set immense store by this point, “for
their wisedome tells them, that if the Restitution of the Holy
Sepulchre depends upon the Peace with that Crowne, they shall be
sure hereafter of the assistance of all Christian Princes upon any
new warr with the Turk.” And in fact they had managed to insert an
Article to such effect in the Treaty. But it was not for nothing
that the Porte had for its chief Interpreter a Greek. The Treaty
had been drawn up in two languages--Latin and Turkish. Now, in the
Turkish version, that Article, from possession and guardianship of
the Holy Sepulchre--the form under which it figured in the Latin
text--had been whittled down to mere access to it: a privilege that
the Latin Fathers already enjoyed. The Ambassador demanded that
the Article should be interpreted according to the Latin text; the
Porte adhered to the letter of the Turkish text. Hence several
stormy conferences, in the course of which the Grand Vizir’s
Kehayah and the Rais Effendi told the Pole that they would give
him war if he would not have peace on their terms, called him a
faithless Giaour who would fly from what he had signed, and reviled
him with such violence that at length the poor Palatine, terrified
for his liberty, if not for his life, fairly gave in.
Immediately messengers were despatched to Jerusalem to acquaint the
Cordeliers “with to them most dreadfull Newes.” What made the news
exceptionally dreadful was the sinister circumstance that, as this
year the Latin and Greek Easter fell on the same day, the Greek
Patriarch had an opportunity of celebrating his victory with a _Te
Deum_ at which they themselves, as well as all Eastern Christians,
would of necessity be present. Sir John, who describes all these
diplomatic manœuvres in detail, could not have been very sorry to
see another foiled where he himself had striven in vain. So much at
least may be inferred from his sardonic comment on the sole favour
for the Faith his unhappy colleague seemed likely to secure: “He
shall have the honour of rebuilding two churches that have bin
burnt down: so wee encrease our churches here though the number of
Christians decreases dayly; and the Pastours are here equall in
number allmost to their sheep.”[215]
It should be mentioned that, apart from the other forces that
compelled the Palatine to an over-hasty signature of Articles
he did not fully understand, there was the fear of an agreement
between Turkey and Russia, which appeared imminent. Yet the envoy
from Muscovy, whose advent at that critical hour hastened the
Polish surrender, had little reason to feel pleased with the good
turn he had unwittingly done the Turks. He came from a Power which
by its military resources, its proximity to the Sultan’s Persian
enemies, and its influence over his Orthodox subjects, inspired
respect in the Turks. But he came at a moment when respect was
eclipsed by resentment.
In the preceding autumn, when peace with one country had come in
sight, Kara Mustafa had begun provoking war with another. Turkish
troops attacked the Russian fort of Zechrin, were badly beaten,
and only escaped a total rout by a speedy retreat. The news of
this disaster had been the signal for an Ottoman mobilisation on
a colossal scale and accompanied with commensurate squeezing. No
class or creed was spared: Moslems, Christians, and Jews, high
and low, laity and clergy, were all mulcted indiscriminately. The
Turkish ecclesiastics had to give up one-third of their income.
The feudal land magnates had to renew their ancient conveyances at
great expense, under pain of forfeiting their fiefs. The Prince of
Moldavia was ordered to contribute 150 purses, and the Prince of
Wallachia 300 purses, besides enormous quantities of provisions.
Throughout the Empire old taxes were increased and new ones
imposed: “All which things,” says Sir John, “make the people of
the Country ready to hang themselves.” The Janissaries alone were
left untouched by Kara Mustafa’s lash; for they alone could make
a revolution. Before the Muscovite envoy had crossed the frontier
the mobilised bodies had begun to move from the various provinces
to the place of rendezvous three miles outside the capital, where
the Grand Signor and Grand Vizir joined them about the middle of
March, with more than the parade usual on such occasions. It was
an astonishing sight. It lasted four days, and each day had its
peculiar pageant. Sir John was present at the most important parts
of the ceremony, and he sent to the Secretary of State a minute
description of what he saw.
On the first day the Grand Vizir’s retinue marched out under the
command of his Kehayah--over one hundred pages clad in cloth of
gold and coats of mail. On the second day there was a solemn
procession of the Guilds--weavers, tailors, shoe-makers, bakers,
blacksmiths, and so forth, about 12,000 men in all--one-third of
whom would accompany the Army on its campaign and minister to its
wants. Some of them rode past in glittering coats of mail with long
lances in their hands and swords at their sides, while musketeers
of the same trade marched on either side of the mounted squadrons.
In the middle of each squadron there were representatives of each
Guild engaged in their peculiar craft either on foot or perched
on the backs of camels, according to the exigencies of their
occupation. In this fashion they went on, fifty-three companies of
warrior-workers, with their kettle-drums, their great drums, their
trumpets and other instruments of barbaric music: “So the Turkish
Military Camp,” comments the chronicler, “is nothing else but a
civil camp being furnishd’ with all the Arts of Peace in Time of
Warr.” The third day witnessed the exodus of the Janissary Aga at
the head of his Janissaries--about 20,000 of the best Infantry in
the whole world. And then, on the fourth day, the Grand Signor in
person made his _Alloy_, as the Turks called this marching out in
state.
He went forth accompanied by his son, his son-in-law, the Grand
Vizir, the Vizirs of the Bench, the Capitan Pasha, and all the
other great pashas of the Empire with their retinues “most proudly
clad, jackd’, and mounted.” Here was, indeed, the grandeur of which
Sir John had dreamed. He gazed on, dumbfounded by the profusion
of wealth that met his eyes; the Sultan’s led horses were almost
hidden under embroideries of gold, thick-set with jewels of
fabulous value. Behind them came a camel on the back of which
was strapped a chest of beaten gold, made in the form of a square
tower, richly encrusted with precious stones, and enclosing the
Alcoran. Immediately after rode the young Prince on “as fine a
Horse as Nature ever producd’”--bridle and trappings aglow with
diamonds. Last of all came the Grand Signor himself, attired in
a vest lined with black fox fur worth ten thousand crowns, and
bestriding a steed the furniture of which was “all over besett with
Jewells of Immense Price”--“really He appeard like an Emperour.” He
was followed by a numerous body of royal attendants of all ranks
and stalwart Spahis.
The procession closed with a caravan of camels, some laden with the
Imperial baggage, others carrying the Treasure--“a Million and a
halfe in Gold, and as much more in Silver: every cammel carrying
fifty thousand Zecchins, or ten Purses of silver”--under a guard of
trusty Janissaries.
“I do not know,” says the Ambassador, “whether what in the sight
gave so much divertisement, can afford any in the reading.”
The actual description of the pageant may not--descriptions
seldom do. But it is enlivened by notes which are certainly more
diverting than they could have been intended by the writer. One
of them reveals the diplomat’s keen eye for points of etiquette;
he observes that the Vizir rode with the Sultan’s son-in-law on
his left; “which seems to me to evidence that the right hand is
amongst the Turkes the Place of Precedence; though even in Turky
tis generally thought otherwise.” Another reveals his credulity:
in the train of the Sultan’s son-in-law Sir John saw, or imagined
that he saw, eight tamed tigers warmly clad, carried behind eight
horsemen: “of these I am informd’ the Gran Signor makes use when He
Hunts Hares and other Animals; They having gott their prey, leap
again upon the Horses behind their Masters.” What wag supplied
His Excellency with this valuable information must remain matter
of conjecture--one suspects the Honourable Dudley. A third note
reveals the Ambassador’s vanity. Speaking of the Guilds, he says:
“T was pretty to see the Respect of the Blacksmiths towards me;
for seeing me they layd one of their companions upon His back; and
placing Boards upon His Belly they layd’ a Great Stone upon them
for an Anvill and putting a Red Hott Iron upon the Stone, eight
of them with their Great Hammers fell to worke.” Another tribute
of respect paid to Sir John on the same occasion makes a less
severe demand on our faith: a large boat, like a brigantine, armed
with half-a-dozen small guns was drawn along on sledges: when it
passed by the Ambassador, the commander stopped and fired all the
guns for a salute--“a thing,” his Excellency adds modestly, “of
no great moment, but that any Civility is so when Turkes make a
solemnity; and especially No others having receivd the like.” For
all that, Sir John was very glad to see the backs of Kara Mustafa
and his satellites: “T’ is sayd that they cannot returne hither this
following winter. If so, t’ is very good new’s for me, for from
thence I hope for some quiett and repose after the turmoyls and
vexations I and all others have bin under.”[216]
It was shortly after this exit that the envoy from Muscovy arrived
and met with a reception which showed how little reasonable
accommodation was to the Grand Vizir’s taste. The first thing Kara
Mustafa did was to ask the envoy to hand over to him the letters
he had for the Grand Signor, and as the envoy refused to deliver
them into any but the Grand Signor’s hands, he had recourse to a
ruse. A day was appointed as if for an Imperial Audience, and the
Russian set out holding up his letters before his forehead, after
the Muscovite manner. On the way, the chaoushes who pretended to
be conducting him to the Sultan snatched the letters from him
and carried them to the Grand Vizir, who, on finding that they
contained expostulations for his hostile designs and expressions
of a desire for an amicable settlement, informed the envoy that it
was too late; the army was ready for a campaign; only if, before
it crossed the frontier, Muscovy would give satisfaction war could
be averted; the price of peace being a cession of the object under
dispute. With this message and without “any Testimony from the Port
of the least imaginable respect,” the envoy was dismissed. And the
march towards the Danube began.[217]
At this point Sir John ceases to be a mere spectator of the
international drama and becomes for a moment an actor. For
some time past a strong feeling of opposition to Charles II.’s
Francophile policy had been growing up in England; and at last the
King, yielding to public opinion, made an attempt to curb the power
of Louis, who so far had carried everything before him against the
whole Continental Alliance. France was asked to come to terms, and
as she returned an evasive answer England began preparations for
forcing her. News of the crisis had reached Turkey early in March,
and created a considerable flutter in the diplomatic dovecote;
but it was not until the end of April that the consequences of an
Anglo-French conflict, should it arise, were brought home to our
Ambassador.
A drunken English sailor at Smyrna met some Frenchmen in the
street and, addressing them as “French dogs,” cried out that he
hoped ere long to get one of their jackets and be “Allamode.” The
Frenchmen fell upon him and wounded him in the head. Thereupon a
body of about thirty English seamen gathered together and rushed
to the French Consul’s house, breathing vengeance. The French
merchants hastened to the defence of their Consul, and tried to
repel the attack with stones and cudgels; but with no success. The
English, after breaking all the windows, climbed up into the outer
gallery, drove the defenders into the inner rooms, and were already
beginning to pull down the house, when our Consul, accompanied
by Sir Richard Munden, who was then in the Levant with H.M.S.
_St. David_ for the protection of English trade, and the other
Commanders then in port, arrived upon the scene. The assailants
at first refused to obey; “one of them swearing a desperate oath
that He would not give over till He had drunke the Bloud of a
Frenchman.” But in the end they were induced by threats of martial
law to abandon their sanguinary design.
This incident filled Sir John with alarm as to what might have
happened, “had these Mad fellows executed their fury according to
their Intentions either in Murdring the Consul or pulling down His
house.” Even in normal times the mutual animosities of the Franks
exposed them to rapine on the part of the Turks; in time of war,
and under a government like Kara Mustafa’s, such animosities might
lead to utter ruin; and the English, whose property in Turkey
was twenty times greater than that of the French, would suffer
in proportion: “where most mony is, the most will be extorted
even in a Parity of Crime.” Prompted by these considerations, Sir
John took a step never before taken in Turkey: he invited the
French Ambassador to a frank and free discussion of a situation
which was disagreeable for the present and might in the future
prove extremely dangerous. The result was as pleasing an example
of sweet reasonableness as is to be found in the whole domain of
Anglo-French diplomacy. The two ambassadors, after recalling to
each other’s mind what quarrels of this nature had cost in the
past (the Cancellarias of both Embassies abounded with cases in
point)--“when sometimes one Nation, sometimes the other sufferd’
highest under Avanias that arose from thence; though in the
Conclusion neither scapd’ without severe payments,”--agreed, if
war broke out between their Governments in Europe, to continue
living in Turkey “with all the same Circumstances of Civility and
formality as also respects towards each other; as if there was no
Warr: That by our Example the Factory’s under us might practise
the same.” Further, “considering that Example without Precept
is little, as Precept without Example is lesse,” they agreed to
send to their respective Consuls and Factories orders couched in
identical terms, requiring them to conform unswervingly to the line
of conduct pursued by the Ambassadors themselves.[218]
So unprecedented an action, taken by the Ambassador on his own
initiative, needed justification; and Sir John, in reporting it
to Whitehall, explains his motives at length, adding that, when
all the circumstances are weighed, he has reason to hope that the
King will be pleased to think that what he has done is “for His
Majesty’s Honour, and for the Interest of His Subjects.” As a
matter of fact, there was every reason to believe (and both Finch
and Nointel must have known it) that Charles, in his heart, had no
desire to fall out with France; and in due course Sir John received
His Majesty’s approval. But long before that approval reached him
all danger of war had blown over. The English Parliament, while
urging Charles to fight Louis, refused him the means of doing so,
for fear lest the arms placed in his hands for the humiliation of
France should be turned against the liberties of England. The only
practical fruit of the agitation was an interdiction of trade with
our rival. And so Louis, profiting by England’s neutrality, made a
peace (Treaty of Nimeguen, 1678) which put the coping-stone on his
power.
After this little ferment Sir John relapsed into his rôle of
chronicler. At the beginning of summer a German Internuncio,
Hoffmann, arrived from Vienna, with a new Imperial Resident,
Sattler. Whereupon the old Resident, Kindsberg, broke up his
household, took leave of his colleagues, and set out, with the
newcomers, for the Vizir’s camp. But they had scarcely gone three
days when an express command from Kara Mustafa obliged them to
return to Constantinople and stay there till further orders.
Kara Mustafa had his reasons for postponing an interview: the
Internuncio’s business was to renew the truce between the Ottoman
and the German Empires, which was about to expire, and Kara Mustafa
wanted to see how the Polish Treaty was observed and how the
Russian campaign went, before he committed himself to peace or
war with Germany. The consequences were ghastly for the Caesarean
diplomats: Sattler died of the plague, Hoffmann was seized with an
apoplexy which paralysed him, Kindsberg, after losing his brother
and a number of his attendants through the plague, himself fell
victim either to the disease or to poison. The plague also carried
off the Venetian Bailo’s chief Dragoman and Treasurer. Sir John,
however, in his summer resort at St. Demetrius, was safe from
the terrible epidemic. As for that other pest, he reckoned that,
what with Muscovy and Germany, the Vizir was certain to be away
for two years at least, and his reckonings seemed confirmed by a
reported resolution of the Grand Signor’s to build a palace on the
Danube--“a sign there’s no quick Dispatch expected either with the
Muscovite or the Emperour. So that during the short remainder of
my Time, I have now a Probable prospect of Quietnesse and a Calm,
which I have not enjoyd hitherto One Moment Since my Arrivall.”
He could now take a dispassionate, even an amused, view of his
past calamities and cap Latin verses thereon with the Secretary of
State, sending him, in return for a line out of a Comedian, two out
of a Tragedian.[219]
But alas for the futility of human calculations! In the very
midst of his self-gratulation, Sir John received the news “that
Zechrin is taken by storm, And that the Triumphant Visir will
return hither this winter. When that Lion comes, if successe don’t
make Him milder, the contrary of which is to be feard, God direct
me.”[220]
FOOTNOTES:
[208] Sir Peter Wyche to Lord Conway, Constantinople, July 26/Aug.
5, 1628, _S.P. Turkey_, 14. The occasion for this apophthegm was
supplied by another predatory Pasha of Aleppo.
[209] Finch to Coventry, March 1-11, April 12-22, May 14-24, 1678,
_Coventry Papers_.
[210] _Life of Dudley North_, pp. 60-1, 107.
[211] Finch to Coventry, March 1-11, May 14-24, 1678.
[212] “I doe not find it easy to arrive to a true knowledge of
them; For things passe here under Great Taciturnity.”--Finch
to Williamson, May 31, 1676, _S.P. Turkey_, 19. “The New’s of
this Court (which would to God Christendome could imitate) is
secrecy.”--The Same to Coventry, June 20-30, 1676; “Things are so
secretly transacted at this Court that there is no certainty to be
had.”--The Same to the Same, March 9-19, 1677-78, _Coventry Papers_.
[213] Finch to Coventry, Jan. 19-29, March 1-11, 9-19, April 12-22,
Sept. 2-12, 1678.
[214] The Same to the Same, Nov. 29, S.V. 1677.
[215] The Same to the Same, March 2-12, 9-19, 16-26, 1678.
[216] The Same to the Same, March 9-19; 16-26, 1677-78.
[217] The Same to the Same, April 12-22, 1678.
[218] The Same to the Same, May 14-24, 1678, and inclosures: Two
Orders from Finch to the English Consuls of Smyrna and Aleppo (in
Italian), dated April 20-30 and May 2-12; and two from Nointel to
the French Consuls of the same places (in French), dated May 1 and
9.
[219] The Same to the Same, June 20-30; Sept. 2-12, 1678.
[220] The Same to the Same, Sept. 2-12, 1678.