Selim I

“ Bazeen shall be my secretary, for he has learning; and his mind, which is the noblest part of man, fits him to be the companion of princes. Selim despises learning, and shows that while the body—​the inferior part—​is glittering with jewels, he has still a base and grovelling mind! Selim is at heart a slave, and slavery shall be his doom. ”

“ Selim cast a look of compassion upon the guilty pair, and tried to tear the star from his bosom to throw to them, but the more he strove, the brighter the star became—it illuminated his ascending spirit—and finding his efforts fruitless, he raised his radiant face toward the boundless blue canopy, cheered onward by the hymns of his little choristers through regions of light, and the teeming earth smiled as she poured forth her grateful incense, as if jealous that the disembodied spirit might forget the fragrance of this world while reveling in the atmosphere of heaven. ”

“ Shall we pass our whole lives in service to our brother Jouder? We shall never enjoy lordship or fortune whilst he lives: so how shall we do to kill him and take the ring and the saddle-bags?’ ‘Thou art craftier than I,’ answered Selim; ‘do thou contrive us a device, whereby we may kill him.’ ‘If I do this,’ said Salim, ‘wilt thou agree that I be Sultan and have the ring and that thou be my right-hand Vizier and have the saddle-bags?’ ‘I consent to this,’ replied Selim, and they agreed to kill their brother for love of the world and of dominion. ”

“ There were the people dressed in silks and satins and jewels, just as Selim the Baker had found them, and they shouted and hurrahed for Selim the Fisherman just as they had shouted and hurrahed for the other. There were the princes and the nobles and the white horse, and Selim the Fisherman got on his back and rode up to the dazzling snow-white palace, and they put a crown on his head and made a king of him, just as they had made a king of Selim the Baker. ”

“ Twenty -one out of the thirty -four sovereigns who have occupied the throne of Osman have left verses, and among these Selim I. stands out, not merely as the greatest ruler, warrior, and statesman, but also as the most gifted and most original poet. His work is unhappily for the greater part in the Persian language ; the excellence of what he has done in Turkish makes us regret that he did so little. The most prominent man of letters under Selim 1. was the legist Kemal Pasha-zada, fre quently called Ibn-Kemal, who distinguished himself in both prose and verse. ”

“ He was the heir to the throne, however."
"What made the trouble, papa?"
"Sultan Selim III. was a wise ruler. He wished to improve his country. At one time the janizaries were the best trained and most useful troops. They were chosen from the Christians who were taken captive in war.
"But after awhile, men with no training and with selfish motives managed to get into their ranks. Sultan Selim knew they were harmful to the Empire, and intended to disband them. They found out what he was about to do, took the city and palace by surprise, and killed the good Selim. ”

“ Selim I., a warlike sultan of Turkey, who, having dethroned and put to death his father, Bajazet II., entered upon a victorious career of military aggrandisement, overcoming the Persians in 1515, conquering and annexing Egypt, Syria, and the Hejaz in 1517, finally winning for himself the position of Imâm or head of the Mohammedan world; greatly strengthened his country, and strove according to his lights to deal justly with and ameliorate the condition of the peoples whom he conquered (1467-1520) . ”

“ The two boys rose up, blushing gratefully, and Abdullah said to Selim:
“Thy heart is as soft as fine gold. The cloth is not six inches wide, but I feel more grateful to thee than ever I did when I received fine daoles (rich gold-worked cloth) at the hand of my father, Mohammed, whom may God preserve! A pure heart like thine will not long go unrewarded at the hand of Allah.”
“Thou mightest have given me a piece,” said Isa to Selim, in a complaining tone.
“How can you talk so, Master Isa?” asked Niani. “Your skin is as black as mine; sure, you look as though you were clothed already. ”

“ Selim's name is well known by every body who has ever seen an Arab, but Selim has the reputation of being the most cruel and relentless robber on the desert, and you pretend to say that you killed his son and was not at once hacked to pieces; yes, you even pushed your impudence so far as to state the impossible,--that Selim had protected you against his own tribe, had taken you into his own tent, and let you go without a ransom, instead of hanging you up to the first good tree; he who has often hanged travellers just to see what kind of faces they would make when they were hung up. ”

“ Selim was a brisk, lively little person, who conducted conversation, you would say, more by a series of birdlike, intelligible chirrupings than by human talk, and, more abstemious in his ordinary life than his countrymen, he had suffered less from the sparing rations they had been on for the last fortnight. The gate was opened as soon as Mitsos approached it, and Selim came trotting out, as pleased with his flag of truce as a child with a new toy, and twittered away to Mitsos, as they went back to Hypsilantes' quarters, with the utmost vivacity in rather imperfect Greek. ”

“ The first of the Turkish sultans to imitate this pious custom was Mehmed I, builder of the beautiful Green Mosque in Broussa. His great-great-grandson Selim I conquered Egypt in 1517, and with Egypt the relics of the Prophet and the insignia of the caliphate, which were removed to Constantinople. Having become by virtue of his conquest Protector and Servitor of the Holy Cities, Selim largely increased the generosity of his fathers. His descendants of to-day are unable to display the same munificence, but the annual sourreh still forms the strongest material bond between Turkey and Arabia. ”

“ The learned Selim was soon sent for and the Caliph addressed him thus: “Selim, it is said of you that you are a very learned man; look well at this writing, and see if you can read it. If you are able to do so, I will give you a new robe for feast days, but if you are unable to do so you will receive twelve strokes upon the back and five-and-twenty upon the soles of your feet, because you have masqueraded under the name of Selim the Learned.” ”

“ Then Selim laughed outright, and the birds stopped their hymns, and seemed to laugh with Selim, and the poor dog slunk away abashed, and slyly laughed at his miserable failure.
He married the dark-eyed Biribi. Selim was a poet; his soul reveled alike in tempest or sunshine, and his voice was as musical as the wings of the bee when he distills honey. He possessed the sweets of the bee, and his sting also. Biribi was abjectly poor, but in Selim’s eyes as full of truth and as beautiful as the houries. ”

“ The earth began to shake and to rock, and the houses began to topple and fall, and the people began to scream and to yell and to shout, and the waters of the sea began to lash and to roar, and the wind began to bellow and howl. Then it was a good thing for King Selim that he wore Luck’s Ring; for, though all the beautiful snow-white palace about him and above him began to crumble to pieces like slaked lime, the sticks and the stones and the beams to fall this side of him and that, he crawled out from under it without a scratch or a bruise, like a rat out of a cellar. ”

“ When Selim found himself in that sorry plight and considered that wherewith he was afflicted of tribulation and the contrariness of his fortune, in that he had been a king and was now returned to shackles and prison and hunger, he wept and groaned and lamented and recited the following verses:
My fortitude fails, my endeavour is vain; My bosom is straitened.
To Thee, I complain,
O my God! Who is stronger than Thou in resource? The Subtle, Thou
knowest my plight and my pain. ”

“ Yes, Captain Selim, the gallant officer who had saved Aphiz's life, and liberated Komel from the Sultan's harem, was her own dear brother, but who had been counted as dead years and years gone by. Could a happier consummation have been devised? and Zillah, who loved Selim so tenderly before, now found fresh cause for joy, delight and tenderness in the new page in her husband's history. ”

“ Selim prostrated himself and said, ‘Be it according to your will, oh master!’ Then he gazed long at the scroll. Suddenly he exclaimed; ‘May I die, oh, my Lord, if this isn’t Latin!’
‘Well,’ said the Caliph, ‘if it is Latin, let us hear what it means.”
So Selim began to translate: ‘Thou who mayest find this, praise Allah for his mercy. Whoever shall snuff the powder in this box, and at the same time shall pronounce the word “Mutabor!” can transform himself into any creature he likes, and will understand the language of all animals. ”

“ He was eminently successful in this, and the two provinces were permanently annexed to the Ottoman Empire. The whole campaign of Selim must be considered as a most striking success. To have marched a hundred and forty thousand men, with eighty thousand horses and three hundred guns, over twelve hundred miles, and to have defeated a powerful army, backed by all the resources of a great country, was an achievement which earned for Selim a place in the first rank of great generals. Selim does not appear to have been anxious to include Persia in his Empire. ”

“ How many days it will continue to sit there is another matter, for its long water-front may become more valuable for commercial purposes than for those of a modern shipyard. It was founded by Sultan Selim I in 1515, was enlarged by his son Süleïman the Magnificent, and reached the climax of its importance under his grandson Selim II. Those were the great days when the Captains of the White Sea were the terror of the Mediterranean, and when a disaster like the battle of Lepanto, in which the Turks lost two hundred and twenty-four ships and thirty thousand men, could not shake the empire. ”

“ Whereas the reign of every Sultan preceding Selim{204} had been impressed with the ruler’s personality, the only quality to which a Turk is capable of responding, the rule of Selim showed no such strengthening influence. His mother, Roxalana, was all-powerful, but her bloody intrigues led to many dissensions in the harem, and these reacted on the life of the nation. In order to pursue a course of conquest in Asia, Selim called an armistice with Emperor Maximilian, and turned his attention towards Astrachan. ”

“ Selim was no warrior, and he was glad to send his troops without him. He preferred, the ambassadors say, "the society of eunuchs and of women, and the habits of the serai to the camp:" he "wore away his days in sensual enjoyments, in drunkenness and indolence." "Whoever beheld him and saw his face inflamed with Cyprus wine, and his short figure rendered corpulent by slothful indulgence, expected in him neither the warrior nor the leader of warriors. In fact, nature and habit unfitted him to be the supreme head, that is the life and soul, of that warlike State." ”

“ The next remarkable event in Ismaʽil’s reign is his war with Sultan Selim I. Its origin may be traced to the Ottoman emperor’s hatred and persecution of all heretical Moslems in his dominions, and the shah’s anger at the fanaticism which had urged him to the slaughter of 40,000 Turks suspected to have thrown off the orthodox War with Selim. Sunnite doctrines. The sultan’s army advanced into Azerbaijan and western Persia through Tokat and Erzingan. ”

“ He mustered fresh troops. A hundred and fifty thousand men were marched against the Turkish frontier, early in the year of 1789, in different divisions. It was a circumstance very much in their favour that the able Sultan, Abdul Hamid, died suddenly in April, and was succeeded by his nephew, Selim, a young, rash, and unprincipled man. The acts of Selim, in murdering and dismissing his father's best ministers and commanders, and the unruly condition of the janissaries, rendered Turkey especially open to the attacks of its enemies. ”

“ His first improvements were military: a corps was formed, adopting the European discipline, and called the nizam dgeddit, or “new regulation.” Against this innovation the Janissaries revolted: they spurned with indignation all customs but their own; they thought their institutions the perfection of human nature, and that any change must be a degradation. They therefore deposed Selim in 1807, and called to the throne his cousin, Mustapha IV., the son of Abdul Hamed Khan, who had now arrived at adult years. ”

“ The two great dis asters, at Vienna and Malta, were eclipsed by the number and brilliancy of the sultan s victories, by which large and important additions were made to the empire in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Selim Selim II., the unworthy son and successor of the Magni- n - ficent Suleyman, was the first Ottoman monarch who shrank from leading his army in person. He was a man of mean and ignoble character, whose sole pleasure seems to have consisted in the indulgence of his degraded tastes and vicious appetites. The first conflict between the Turks and the Russians occurred in his reign. ”

“ When Selim had finished reading, the Caliph was beside himself with joy. He made Selim take an oath that he would not reveal the secret, gave him a handsome robe, and sent him away.
“I call that a first-rate purchase,” said he to Mansor. “How I long to become an animal! Early to-morrow morning you shall come with me, we will go out into the fields, take a pinch of snuff from my box, and then listen to all that is being said in the air and in the water, in the field and in the woodland.” ”