THE DECLINE AND PALL

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CHAP.LX VIII.

sirous of sparing the blood of his soldiers; stillmore desirous of securing for his own use theByzantine treasures; and he accomplished a sa-cred duty in presenting to the gabours , the choiceof circumcision, of tribute, or of death. Theavarice of Mahomet might have been satisfiedwith an annual sum of one hundred thousandducats; but his ambition grasped the capital ofthe East: to the prince he offered a rich equiva-lent, to the people a free toleration, or a safe de-parture; but after some fruitless treaty, he de-clared his resolution of finding either a throne,or a grave under the walls of Constantinople .A sense of honour, and the fear of universal re-proach, forbade Palaeologus to resign the cityinto the hands of the Ottomans; and he deter-mined to abide the last extremities of war. Se-veral days were employed by the sultan in thepreparations of the assault; and a respite wasgranted by his favourite science of astrology,which had fixed on the twenty-ninth of May, asthe fortunate and fatal hour. On the eveningof the twenty-seventh, he issued his final orders ;assembled in his presence the military chiefs;and dispersed his heralds through the camp toproclaim the duty, and the motives, of the peril-ous enterprise. Fear is the first principle of adespotic government; and his menaces were ex-pressed in the Oriental style, that the fugitivesand deserters, had they the wings of a bird,*

* These wings (Chalcocondyles, I. viii, p. 208) are no more than anOriental figure; but in the tragedy of Irene, Mahomet’s passion soarsabove sense and reason :

Should