Heg. 925.

J.C.1519. that recompenfing treachery is laying ones-felf open to become its victim. He returned to his capital to prepare for new conquests, and obliged a great number of families to come thither from Grand Cairo, Gaza, Aleppo, and Alexandria, for he would beyond every thing enrich his capital. Moreover, the eastern monarchs, who know much less how to improve than to deftroy, found their power on the weakness of their fubjects; and as the law of the strongest is almost the only one known in the Eaft, they think they have great intereft in depopulating the distant pro

vinces.

Selim, being arrived at Conftantinople, went in the greatest ftate to the principal mofque. After having ordered thanks to be returned to God for his fuccefs, he pronounced, before all the people, a folemn oath, that, for the future, he would never turn back, 'till he fhould have exterminated the power of the Perfians and the race of their kings. But the finances were so drained by the Egyptian war, that the emperor was obliged to lose a whole year, in order to give the defterdar, or fuperintendent of the finances, time to gather the tribute from the vaffals, the revenues of the customs, and the annual tax paid by all the Chriftians and Jews fubjects of the empire. This was what formed and ftill forms the treasure called exterior, employed in paying the troops and acquitting the ex-, pences

perces of the ftate. The treasure interior, which J.C. 1519. Heg. 925, is under the direction of the kafnadar pachi, one of the eunuchs of the feraglio, furnishes the maintenance of the grand feignior's houfe, his wives, his gardens, his ftables, and every thing that concerns his perfon. It arifes from the demefnes of the fultan let out to the profit of his highness, and, when he pleases to augment it, he joins to it the confifcation of the wealth of the great officers of the empire, who have enriched themselves in their governments, by feizing on every thing that belonged to thofe whom they have caufed to be executed. The grand feignior has a right, (which he makes ufe of more or less often, according to his character,) to profcribe the heads of fuch of his fubjects as may displease him, without the least ceremony, and without informing, either the people or the condemned perfon, of the reason of his condemnation. The bafhaws make ufe of it in their governments with the fame defpotifin.*

ment of

At the time when the finances of the ftate were Punishdrained, the fultan had recourfe to this odious Yonus baYonus bafhaw, one of the viziers of the the principal peo

mean.

002

fhaw, and

bench, ple of A

* In order to avoid thefe profcriptions, which are rarely made but with a view to confifcations, every one carefully conceals his riches, even the means and the talents which he has for getting them. From thence fprings that inaction, fo prejudicial to the fate, in which moft of the natives live. It is only foreigners, who enjoy with the Turks the protection of their fovereign, who dare leave the ftate of poverty; and they are often punished for it, by extortions which they are obliged to pay without prefuming to complain.

mafia.

J.C.1519. bench, who, in all Selim's wars, had ferved him Heg. 925. with more fidelity and fuccefs than any of his generals, was ordered to increase the pay of the gar

J.C. 1520
Heg. 926.

Death of
Selim.

This

rifons which he commanded in Natolia.
bashaw, in the impoffibility of obeying, caused to
be distributed, or at least offered, the pay on the
ancient footing; the troops tumultuously refused
it. On the news of this mutiny, Yonus bashaw
was ordered to the feraglio; this minister having
explained to the emperor, that the treasury of
his province, from which confiderable fums had
been already drawn for the preparations of the
war, was unable to furnish the additional ex-
pence: "Thy property fhall acquit it," replied
the cruel monarch, and he had Yonus bafhaw
ftrangled almost under his eyes. The laft,
and the bloodieft of thefe executions, was in
the town of Amafia. Selim learned that an im-
poftor had called himself the fon of Achmet
there, and had attempted to form a party. This
new adversary was foon repreffed and punished.
The emperor, on the declaration of one man
only, who had pretended that all the principal
inhabitants of Amafia were the accomplices of
this rebel, caufed more than four hundred per-
fons, who protefted their innocence, to be em-
paled with him or blooded to death.

At length the conqueror, or rather the destroyer
Selim, was stopped in the course of his cruelties,

as he was preparing to march against Perfia, He

was

Heg. 926,

was attacked by a severe illness in a village near J.C. 1520. Adrianople, where he went to visit the tomb of his fathers; he died in a few days of an abfcefs formed in the upper part of his thigh, reproaching himself, it is faid, with the blood that he had fo wantonly and abundantly fhed. This prince was the first of the Turkish emperors who went in disguise to the camps and towns, mixing with the people and foldiers. In the eaftern manners, the monarch is too much above his fubjects, to be able to have the leaft idea of the people that he governs, unlefs, under thefe difguifes, he fee the conduct of those who govern under him, and seek to know what effects the orders he gives produce, becoming, in fome respects, his own spy. Selim died aged fifty-four years, after having reigned eight, during which he greatly enlarged his empire. But he feemed willing to depopulate it, as he augmented it,

SOLYMAN I

SURNAMED THE MAGNIFICENT,

TENT H REIG N

Solyman

throne.

SOLYMAN, the fon of Selim, was thirty years afcends the old when he afcended the throne. He began He reftores his reign with acts of justice, permitting all his cati fubjects to reimburse themselves from the public his prede

treafury

the confif

cations made by

seffor.

of Gazel

fhaw of

Syria.

J.C. 1521.

Heg. 927.

J.C. 1520 treafury what had been wrefted from them withHeg. 926. out a caufe. This is the only example of the kind in the Turkish hiftory; but, as it was not extended to the defcendants of thofe that had been profcribed, and the greateft part had loft their lives with their fortunes, thefe reftitutions were neither numerous nor confiderable. The news of Selim's death excited troubles in the empire, He quells very common under a new reign. The Mamthe revolt meluke Gazelbek, this bashaw of Syria, who had bek, ba merited his government by deferting to the Turks, undertook to make himself sovereign of the country. which he had once already. wrefted from its lawful prince. He fent a delegate to Caitbek, the accomplice of his former treachery, who, like himself, had been rewarded with the fangiacate or government of Grand Cairo, to represent to him, that it was time to throw off the joke, and that, if they mutally affifted one another, their union would re-establish the empire of the Mammelukes. Whether Caitbek did not think himself strong enough to take Egypt from the Ottoman power, or that he was tired of betraying, far from liftening to the proposals of the bafhaw of Syria, he had his emiffary ftrangled, and immediately informed the Porte of every thing that it had to fear from Gazilbek. The latter, not feeing his emiffary return, did not doubt but his fecret was divulged, either by his confident, or by him to whom he had been fent.

The