Page:Constantinople by Brodribb.djvu/145

 history of an old woman's successive husbands, and the incapacity of two old women.

Romanus III. was sixty; his wife Zoe was forty-eight. There were no children. The emperor was indefatigable in all religious observances. He endowed monasteries, decorated churches, and obtained permission to rebuild the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, which had been destroyed by the Caliph Hakem in 1010. But there was no heir to the throne. Then there were jealousies about Theodora; there were conspiracies in the capital; there were defeats in the field; there were earthquakes, famines, and pestilences; and after six years of uneasy and anxious splendour, Romanus III. died.

Zoe, now fifty-four years of age, but still anxious for an heir, lost no time in placing a new emperor on the throne. Michael IV. was married to Zoe, and proclaimed emperor on the day of Romanus's death. Still there were no children, and the unhappy emperor, who had been a money-changer and a menial, suffered from epileptic fits. There were more seditions in this reign, though the military powder of the empire was maintained. Michael IV., who possessed many noble qualities, died after a reign of seven years.

Zoe was now in her sixty-second year. It was absurd to look any longer for the miraculous intervention of Heaven. She resolved to have no more husbands, and named as emperor the nephew of Michael IV. He repaid his benefactress by sending her to a monastery. And then the people rose in fury. Michael was de-