J.C.1574 inhabitants of the coaft of Africa love their li-
Heg. 982.
berty, and he had interest to please these people
Sinan ba- who within fo fhort a time had thrown off the

fhaw efta

republic at

blishes a yoke of different masters, the Turkish comTunis. mander refolved to found at Tunis a republic,

which fhould govern under the eyes of a bashaw and the protection of the emperor. He established a divan; officers whofe power and exercise were to laft but a limited time; franchises and duties which the people were to gather by their own agent, out of which they were to pay the emperor fixed fums; and a well difciplined, numerous, and permanent garrifon, in order to fecure this new republic from a furprise. It was fingular to fee a minifter who was a flave, and who had grown old under the rod of defpotifm, conceive republican ideas, and put them in execution; and what is ftill more extraordinary, these laws were adopted by the divan of Conftantinople. The ftate of Tunis continues at this day to be governed in the fame manner, with only fome variations produced by revolutions.

Though there were as many great atchievements performed in Selim's reign as in those of his predeceffors, yet they regarded the emperor no more than having paffed whilft he was inebriating himself with his favorites or forgetting himself with his women. His grand vizier, Mehemet, who had poffeffed himself of the fovereign power, and who had found but few obftacles in

the

Heg. 982.

Death of

the divan, without appearing himself at the head J.C. 1574 of the troops, had employed them ufefully for the glory of the empire. In the middle of this profperity, Selim was attacked by a fevere illnefs, caused by his intemperance and debaucheries, which carried him off in the fifty-fecond year of his age, in the month of December 1574, Di after a reign of eight years and fome months. The grand vizier, Mehemet, concealed the emperor's death, as he had done that of Solyman his father, in order to give Amurath III. his fon and fucceffor, time to arrive from Amafia where he refided.

Selim.

A MURATH III.

TWELFTH REIGN.

J.C. 1575. Heg. 982, *983.

afcends the

He has his

and the

lim had

AMURATH was thirty-one years old when Amurath he began to reign: he arrived at Conftan- throne. tinople in the middle of the night. His impa- brothers tience had made him pafs the ftraits of Gallipoli aakys in the dark, though the fea was at that time much whom Seagitated. This was the only danger he would left with ever run during his whole reign. On his arrival to death. at the door of the feraglio, it was with difficulty he could procure it to be opened; having at length difcovered himself to the boftangi pachi, A a 2

VOL. II,

the

child put

J.C.1575 the latter ran to infórm the grand vizier, Mehe

Heg. 982,

& 983. met, of it, who, not knowing his master's son, came to receive him, and conducted him with great respect into the fultanefs-mother or valid's apartment, whofe name history does not mention. Mehemet having afked the fultanefs if this was prince Amurath; on the teftimony of his mother, the grand vizier proftrated himself at his feet, and, raising his hands to Heaven, he offered up prayers for the profperity of his reign. All the officers of the feraglio crowded to pay their refpects, or rather adore, their fultan. Selim's death was published as foon as the fun appeared. The fame day was employed in burying the emperor and proclaiming his fucceffor; but this day was ftained by a crime which the Turks have termed an act of policy, and which the chief of their religion was not ashamed to authorife. The mufti, being confulted on what was proper to be done with the five princes fprung from the blood of Selim, the oldest of whom was not eight years of age, decided, conformably to the wishes of the new emperor, that it, was right to put them to death, left they should one day trouble their brother's reign. This cruel fentence was executed under Amurath's eyes, and in presence of the fultanefs-mothers, in order that they might not be able to doubt of their no longer having fons. One of them ftabbed herself with a poniard when The faw him ftrangled whom he had brought

into

into the world. Amurath, not fatisfied with all J.C. 1575
Heg. 982,
thefe cruelties, ordered two affakys,* whom his & 983.
father had left with child, to be thrown into the
fea, and he confined to the old feraglio the four
remaining fultaneffes, and all the odalifks that
had lived with the last emperor.

A Venetian lady, whom he paffionately loved,
was, for a long time, the only fultanefs. During
the first years of the reign of Amurath III. not
one odalifk fhared the bed, or even the fociety
of the fultan.

He was not fo conftant in his confidence to his ministers. He scarcely used his authority but to change them often. As he was thoroughly incapable of bufinefs, he contributed as much as his predeceffor to render the authority of the grand viziers abfolute. But his policy made him find his fecurity in depofing them often and on trifling occafions. He found motives for depofing them by making use of the only mean which the Ottoman emperors have in their power to know their fubjects, from whom they are too much feparated by the eastern manners.

Rencous

One day, as he was walking disguised in a market of Conftantinople, he met a man who ter he complained loudly, curfing the kiaia, or grand market. vizier's

*They call affakys the women who live with the emperor, and to whom he has affigned particular apartments in the haram; and odalisks those who fleep in the odas or common rooms. The fultanefles are but four in number; they must have had children by the emperor to enjoy that title.

has in a

Heg. 982,

J.C. 1575 vizier's lieutenant,* one of whose most important & 983. functions is to provifion the city. The emperor, having approached this man, asked what made

him angry, with an air fo interested, that it prevailed on the Turk to answer him: "You are "not able," fays he, "to alleviate my chagrin Converfa- or prevent my having to day fifty baftinades

tion of the

emperor with a cook of the janiffaries.

on the foles of my feet, which I certainly have not merited. I am the cook of an oda of janiffaries, and I come here every day to buy "what is neceffary for my divifion; though it is very early, I find almost every thing gone, and "what remains is fo dear that I have not found "enough to ferve all my people. The kiaia puts "fuch an impoft on the things, that there is "not brought to the market the half of what "is neceffary in order to have a plenty, and "that the janiffaries may live on what the

emperor gives them. The great men enrich "themselves whilft we are dying with hunger, "and we are befides beaten for their knavery." The fequel of the converfation convinced the emperor that there were really misdemeanors in the provisioning of Conftantinople, and that the man who had unvailed them to him was full of good fenfe. Amurath, on his return to the feraglio, fent for this cook, whose name he had taken

* This lieutenant is not the next in rank to the grand vizier; he is not even a bashaw; this officer is a fubftitute who has authority, and whe affifts the minifter in feveral of his functions.