J.C.1526. Alection, preffed the moment of action; he drew Heg. 932. up the Hungarian army fo as to give it the greatest extent of front poffible; but the ranks were only clearer, and the files not fo deep. A corps was formed for the king's guard, and, according to ancient cuftom, they took off the fpurs of the officer who carried the ftandard of Hungary before the monarch, to put it out of his power to flee. All the artillery of Lewis II. confifted of eighteen pieces of cannon, which were difpofed fix on each flank and at the main battle. Sixteen thousand foot began the action with one common effort, and, at first, performed prodigies of valour; but this bravery, or rather rashness, only ferved to haften the carnage. These warriors prefented themselves to battalions more numerous, better clofed, and more difficult to be fhaken than theirs; the cavalry, which clofely followed them, fell likewife by the enemy's fword. Bishop Tomorri, and fix other bishops, armed by his example, loft their lives. for the obftinacy which they had opposed to the good reasons of the bishop of Waradin. This prelate was killed, as likewife five hundred barons or great vaffals, with most of the foldiers: in fine, the combat having begun at three in the afternoon, by feven, there were more than eighteen thoufand Hungarians dead or dying on the field of battle. The janiffaries cut off the heads of all they faw wounded, and expofed them on pikes at Heg. 932. facksBuda, having be He lays gary, and at the entrance of their tents. The king of J.C. 1526. Hungary, whom his guard had abandoned, was found dead, stuck with his horse in a morass at some distance from the field of battle. The few, who faved themfelves from this flaughter, owed their safety only to a precipitate flight. The next day, the fultan took the road to Buda, putting every thing that fell in his way to fire and pillage, more employed in ruining towns than reducing fortreffes. Solyman entered Buda without refiftance, and Solyman permitted the town to be pillaged as if it had without been taken by affault. As much as he had loved fieged it. order in his own country, fo much he authorised wasteHunplunder in Hungary. His intention was, rather returns to to drain this province, than to make himself ple. mafter of it. He left always on the right and left the fortreffes which he met with in his inroad, without taking the precaution to intrench himself in a country where he no longer met with fol diers. The grand feignior penetrated as far as a petty province defended by mountains and narrow paffes, where the Hungarians had collected all that remained of their fcattered forces. richest of them had brought thither their wives, their children, and the remains of their fortune; they flattered themselves with défending these defilés, and remaining sheltered from the fword of the Turks; but nothing refifted Solyman. He overthrew this barrier, which was confidered The Adriano as Heg. 932. 1.C. 1526. as impregnable; again bathed himself in blood; and fatiated the avidity of his janiffaries, which he had restrained at the fiege of Rhodes. At length, on the approach of winter, he brought back his foldiers to Adrianople, bending under the weight of their booty, without having left a garrifon in any Hungarian town. The fultan was well convinced, that, for a long time, the fituation of these people would not permit them to make use of the liberty which he left them. Marriage of the zier Ibra ཝཱ The grand feignior refolved to return to his grand vi- capital, where he married the grand vizier Ibrahim. him to one of his fifters. The alliances of the J.C.1527 minifters with the mafter are very common aHeg. 933. mong the Turks; but the pride of the Ottoman blood often renders this honor very burdenfome for the man who receives it. The husband of the princess must make his wife a jointure in proportion to her birth. Moreover, the brother-inlaw of the emperor renounces the right given him by his religion, of marrying four wives and having as many concubines as he pleases; he is obliged to obferve the ftricteft fidelity to his illuftrious fpoufe, who enjoys in her house an abfolute authority, of which a poniard, ornamented with diamonds, which fhe always wears by her fide, is the mark. It is true that the fultan's fiftersdoes not see the men any more than the other Mahometan women: all converfation with them is likewife forbidden; but they reign over their husbands, Heg. 933 husbands, and a troop of women and eunuchs. J.C.1527. They have the grief to fee all their male children put to death: the jealousy of the Ottoman princes not permitting them to fuffer men allied to their blood to live. Illuftrious births are unknown in Turkey. There is no other family than the house of Ottoman. The alliance with the princeffes of the blood does not place those whom the emperor admits to that honor out of the reach of the fatal bow-ftring. We have already seen that the grand vizier Muftapha Kirlou, who was fhot with arrows, had married another of Solyman's fifters. The Turkish emperors have been known even to give their fifters or daughters to great officers whom they had refolved to put to death, in order to make thefe princeffes the heirs of their great poffeffions. The grand vizier Ibrahim's nuptials were celebrated with a magnificence 'till then unknown in the Turkish empire. Tilting and wrestling were performed for the first time in presence of the people. But the total feparation of the two fexes, and the profound retirement of the women, render thefe diverfions dull throughout the Eaft, and deprive them of that exterior gaity and galantry which reign in the western nations. Solyman admitted his brotherin-law to his table, contrary to the general ufage, and would have all Conftantinople witness the distinguished affection with which he honored this minifter. Ibrahim's J.C. 1527. Ibrahim difperfes à Ibrahim's nuptials were hardly finished, when his prefence became again neceffary at the head troop ofen- whom they call calenders, more auftere and en thufiafts, the chief to death. and puts thufiaftical than the rest, and who profess a chaftity fo rigid, that they put steel rings through the parts which decency will not permit us to name; one of these fanaticks, whom the Turks venerate to adoration, conceived, at the extremity of Natolia, a defign of placing himself on the throne. We have feen thus far that the object of all thefe formers of fects has been to reign. The Orientals have no conception of being able to obey two authorities independent of each other. If the mufti is the premier Turkish priest, they regard him rather as the teacher than the chief of their religion. The emperor is always, for the Muffulmen, God's vicar on earth. This fiery calendar began to preach at Adana in Natolia, against voluptuoufnefs, and particularly the rapines of the bashaws. These two fubjects caufed him to be favorably attended to and foon followed by a crowd, particularly when he had announced in the public fquares, that the time was come for fhaking, off the yoke impofed by the flaves of the Ottoman race, and that it was requifite to flay all those tyrants fattened on the blood of the people, in order to recover thofe immenfe fums, with which the emperor's treafury increased every year. |