Page:Constantinople by Brodribb.djvu/281

 would be the ruin of his race. Mahomet's counsellors were depressed and anxious. One of them, Khalil, the chief vizier, we have had occasion to mention. He was at first glad to see the changed temper of his master, and he urged him finally to abandon his design, which, he hinted, would be soon baffled and confounded by a combination of the Western powers. Khalil is said at this time to have been still carrying on a correspondence with the imperial court. This may have been known, or at least suspected, by another minister in the sultan's service, Zagan, a fierce enemy of all Christians, whose steadily warlike counsels in the end prevailed. "Your arms," he is reported to have said to Mahomet, "are far greater than Alexander's ever were. I do not believe in the fleet from Italy which Khalil has said is on the way, nor is there any chance of union among the Western princes, who, from their numbers and clashing interests, cannot agree long together." This was advice much more to the sultan's heart, though for the time he was wavering, than that of the rather timid, if not actually treacherous, Khalil.

Some new mode of attack must, it was clear, be devised. The attempts on the land fortifications had been disastrously repulsed. To penetrate the harbour, defended as it was by a strong chain and several ships, would seem, after the Turks' recent experience of sea fighting, an utter impossibility. It occurred to Mahomet, however, that it might be possible to convey some of his light vessels overland, and launch them in the inner part of the harbour, where, in the smooth and narrow waters