James M. Ludlow

“ Can men thwart His plans? Shall we then believe that the infidel Jews crucified the Son of God?"
"God is great, and Mahomet is His Prophet," would roll up from the lips of the scholars.
"Shall we, then, kiss the toe of the pope because he calls himself the grand vizier of Allah, when our Janizaries can cut the throats of his soldiers, as our brethren of Arabia destroyed the crusaders? Or shall we kiss the hand of the patriarch of the Greeks, who claims supremacy in the name of Allah, when already our arms have shut up the whole Greek empire within the walls of Constantinople? ”

“ For her words about the stars above the Balkans, the snows of Slatiza, and Elizabeth Morsiney, were not accidental. He had no doubt that the Albanian odalisk was the little lady to whom he once made love in the bowers of blackberry bushes, and vowed to defend like a true knight, waving his wooden sword over the head of the goat he rode as a steed. In the midst of such thoughts and emotions, Captain Ballaban awoke to full self-consciousness, and said to himself——
"I am in love! But I am a fool! For a man with ambition must never be in love, except with himself. ”

“ In the mountains of Macedonia, in the pass of the Balkans, have I kept watch over my sacred charge. I want not to see Albania, but as I can see justice done in Albania. Therefore I said I would go only if the lass might go with me, and under the strong protection of a Castriot who knows the truth, whose very soul recognized the child of Mara."
"The child's life shall be as sacred to me as if Mara had become my wife as she vowed in her play, and the child were my own," said Scanderbeg. "But this perplexes our cause. Amesa is one of our bravest, wiliest voivodes. ”

“ Allah! Allah! Allah!" rolled like a hurricane along the streets of Sfetigrade. The gates had been thrown open by some Dibrian, whom superstition and a thirst-fevered brain had transformed into a traitor.
"Quick!" cried Constantine. "Fire three powder flashes from the bastion, and follow me."
"Brave girl!" said he to Morsinia, grasping her hand and drawing her toward the citadel.
"It is too late!" replied the commandant. "All the ports are occupied by the enemy. We can but die in the streets."
"To the north gate, then! Burst it open, and cut your way to the east. Castriot will meet you there. ”

“ The sight of the Turkish ensign floating from the citadel of Sfetigrade disheartened the patriots. The tramp of fresh legions from almost all parts of the Moslem world was not so ominous of further disaster as were the whispers of discontent from more than one who, like Amesa, had ambitions of their own, or, like brave Moses Goleme, were discouraged regarding ultimate success. But the great heart of Castriot sustained the courage of his people, and his genius devised plans for the defence of his land which, for sixteen years yet, were to baffle the skill and weary the energies of the foe. ”

“ The Fate that directs all affairs has indubitably decreed that all this vast peninsula between Adria and Ægea shall lie beneath the shadow of the Padishah's sceptre; for he is Zil-Ullah, the shadow of God. Who can resist the conqueror of the capital of your Eastern Christian Empire; the conqueror of Athens, and of the islands of the sea?"
"Let us then speak no more of this," said Constantine. "Our training has been so different, that we can not hope to agree. But we can be one in the kindliness of our thoughts, as we are of one blood. Jesu bless you, my brother!" ”

“ Think you there is nothing better in this world than to please the Padishah? Ah! it is worth a kingdom to hear that from a man like you, Ballaban. Women say it; but they can do nothing for me. They dissipate my thoughts with their pleasuring me. They make me weak. I have a mind to abolish the whole harem. But to have a man, a strong man, a man with a head to plot for empire and to marshal armies, a man with an arm like thine to make love to me! Ah, that is glorious, comrade. ”

“ The scene within the tent was interrupted by a noise without. A crowd of soldiers had gathered, and were gazing from a respectful distance at a strange-looking man: "A man of heaviness and eaten up with cares." He was clad in the coarsest garments; his beard untrimmed; hatless; a rope about his neck. As Scanderbeg came out of the tent, the man threw himself at his feet, and cried, as he bowed his head upon the ground:
"Strike, Sire! I have sold my country. I have returned to die under the sword of my true chief, rather than live with the blessing of his enemies. ”

“ She was not born in your neighbor's cot on the mountains? Will you swear that she was? No? Then I will swear that she was not. And the boy? Ah!" said he, scanning Constantine's face. "I know his stock. He is a sprig of the same rough thorn-tree that came near to tearing me to pieces just now. But his face is gentler than yours. Yet, it is a strong one; very bold; broad-thoughted; deep-souled; a sprig that may bear even better fruit than the old one."
"Heaven grant it may!" said Milosch, fervently. ”

“ Sophia flashed its benediction upon the travelers, and its challenge of a better faith far across the Bosphorus to the Asiatic Moslem, whose minarets gleamed like spear-heads from beside their mosques. From the point where the Golden Horn meets the strait of the Bosphorus and the sea of Marmora, rose the palace of the emperor, embowered in trees, and surrounded with gardens which loaded the air with the perfume of rarest flowers and the song of birds. Rounding the point into the Golden Horn, the grim old Genoese tower of Galata, on the opposite bank, saluted them with its drooping banner. ”

“ The empire's misfortunes have not been greater than its crimes. As the rising mists return in rain, so the sins of Constantinople, rising for centuries, will return with storms of righteous retribution. And I fear it will be in our day; for the clouds hang low, and mutter ominously, and there is no bright spot within the horizon."
"Say not so, my Emperor!" cried Morsinia earnestly. "A breath of wind is now scattering yonder cloud over Olympus; and the lightest moving of God's will can do more. ”

“ As the sun was setting, the huge mass of the citadel rose like a mighty altar from the bosom of the gloom which had already settled about its base. Slowly the shadow had climbed its side, crowding the last bright ray until it vanished from the top of the parapet. It was at this instant that Morsinia appeared. The citadel beneath her was sombre as the coming night which enwrapped it, but her form was radiant in the lingering splendor of the departing day. As she raised her hand in response to the grateful clamor of the people, she seemed the impersonation of a heavenly benediction. ”

“ He measured with his eye the space which once blazed with the splendor of fashion, when, beneath the imperial eye of a Justinian or Theodosius, the horses of Araby and Thracia ran, and the factions of "the Blues" and "the Greens" shouted, and the whirling wheels of the golden chariots sprinkled the dust upon the multitudes.
The man paused to gaze at the bronze column of three intertwined serpents, with silver-crested heads, which was believed to have been brought from the temple at Delphi to his new city by the great Constantine. ”

“ Have I not heard thee say, Sire, 'Blessed is the one who can invent a new recreation?' That requires thinking."
"Right, Tamlich! can she sing?"
"Ay! your Majesty, to the Greek cythera; and such songs that, though they know not a word of them—for the songs are in her own Arnaout tongue—the odalisks all fall to weeping."
"I like not such singing," said Mahomet. "To make people think with her thoughtful eyes is bad enough in a woman. To make them weep with her voice is wicked, is Christian. I will give her away to some one who wants a wife that thinks. ”

“ This may explain something. The girl that I captured at the Giaour village was no common peasant, by the cheek of Ayesha! Her face, as lit by the blazing konak, was of such beauty as I have never seen except in some dreams of my childhood. Her voice and manner in commanding me to liberate her were those of one well-born or used to authority. It was well that I bethought me to give her into the keeping of that dull-headed Koremi, or she might have bewitched me into obeying her and letting her go. ”

“ Thousands, impelled by the commands of the Sultan, and more, perhaps, by the prospect of reward in this world, and in another, out of which bright-eyed houris were watching their prospective lords, mounted the scaling ladders only to fill with their bodies the moat beneath. At the point of greatest danger the besieged were inspired with the courage of their Emperor, and by the aid of the bands of Italians whom the purse and the appeals of John Giustiniani had brought as the last offering of the common faith of Christendom upon the great altar already dripping with a nation's blood. ”

“ Constantine cut the rope, and, at a push of his hand the dog crawled a few feet until he was clear of the copse; then sprang into the air. There was a hardly audible exclamation of surprise and terror; a low growl of satisfied rage, as when a tiger seizes the food thrown to him in his cage. One man is down in death grapple with his strange assailant whose teeth are at his throat. A sharp whiz and a cry of pain tell that the arrow of Constantine has not missed its mark. ”

“ A Castriot forever!"
Scanderbeg gazed silently for a moment upon the faithful group. There was no doubt of their loyalty: for they had proved it by an adventure of rare daring in penetrating the Turkish camp. The face of the great general, usually masking so completely his strongest feelings, lost now its rigidity. His eyes were moist; his lips trembled; every lineament was eloquent with the emotion he could neither conceal nor tell in words. After a few moments' impressive silence, he returned the sword to the officer, and, pointing westward, cried,
"Forward to Albania!" ”

“ Allah has given one mind to the Padishah and to his faithful Yeni-Tscheri. Ballaban forever! Yes, take him! Take him for your Aga! The will of the corps and the will of the sovereign are one, for it is the will of Allah that sways us all!"
The soldiers, caught by the enthusiasm of the instant, repeated the shout, drowning the voices of the few who were clear-headed enough to remember that the firman had not been withdrawn.
"Ballaban! Long live Ballaban Aga! Long live Mahomet Padishah!" ”

“ I am Emperor, but my empire is doomed. I live no longer for earthly hope, but solely to do duty; nothing but duty, stern duty, painful every instant, crushing always, but a burden heaven imposed on a breaking heart. That heaven appoints it—that, and that alone—makes me willing to live and do it. When the time comes I shall seek death where the slain lie the thickest. ”

“ They studied each other's faces with agreeable surprise as the glories about them drew from their lips vivid outbursts of descriptive eloquence, in which, speaking the Latin or Greek with almost equal facility, they quoted from the classic poets with which they were equally familiar.
As the galley turned eastward into the Corinthian gulf there burst upon them a panorama of natural splendor combined with classic enchantment, such as no other spot on the earth presents. The mountainous shores lay about the long and narrow sea, like sleeping giants guarding the outflow of some sacred fountain. ”

“ History, as we make it in events, is an ever-widening river, but, as remembered, it is like a stream bursting eastward from the Lebanons, growing less as it flows until it is drained away in the desert.
Though our story is in the form of romance, it is more than "founded upon fact." The details are drawn from historical records, such as the chronicles of the vi monk Barletius—a contemporary, though perhaps a prejudiced admirer, of Scanderbeg—the later Byzantine annals, the customs of the Albanian people, and scenes observed while travelling in the East. ”