Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/27

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 7 or camels ; and the successful sieges of Tyana, Amorium, and Pergamus were of sufficient duration to exercise their skill and to elevate their hopes. At the well-known passage of Abydus, on the Hellespont, the Mahometan arms Avere transported, for the first time, ^2 from Asia to Europe. From thence, wheeling round the Thracian cities of the Propontis, Moslemah invested Constantinople on the land side, surrounded his camp with a ditch and rampart, prepared and planted his engines of assault, and declared, by words and actions, a patient resolution of ex- pecting the return of seed-time and harvest, should the obstinacy of the besieged pi-ove equal to his own. The Greeks would gladly have ransomed their religion and empire, by a fine or assessment of a piece of gold on the head of each inhabitant of the city ; but the liberal offer was rejected with disdain, and the presumption of Moslemah was exalted by the speedy ap- proach and invincible force of the navies of Egypt and Syria. They are said to have amounted to eighteen hundred ships ; the number betrays their inconsiderable size ; and of the twenty stout and capacious vessels, whose magnitude impeded their pro- gress, each was manned with no more than one hundred heavy armed soldiers. This huge armada pi'oceeded on a smooth sea and with a gentle gale, towards the mouth of the Bosphorus ; the surface of the strait was overshadowed, in the language of the Greeks, with a moving forest, and the same fatal night had been fixed by the Saracen chief for a general assault by sea and land. To allure the confidence of the enemy, the emperor had thrown aside the chain that usually guarded the entrance of the harbour ; but, while they hesitated whether they should seize the oppor- tunity or appi-ehend the snare, the ministers of destruction were at hand. The fireships of the Greeks were launched against them ; the Arabs, their arms, and vessels, were involved in the same flames, the disorderly fugitives were dashed against each other or overwhelmed in the waves ; and I no longer find a vestige of the fleet that had threatened to extirpate the Roman name. A still more fatal and irreparable loss was that of the caliph Soliman, who died of an indigestion ^^ in his camp !•* [At the previous siege, Saracens had also landed on European soil ; see above, P- 3-] I'' The caliph had emptied two baskets of eggs and of figs, which he swallowed alternately, and the repast was concluded with marrow and sugar. In one of his pilgrimages to Mecca, Soliman ate, at a single meal, seventy pomegranates, a kid, six fowls, and a huge quantity of the grapes of Tayef. If the bill of fare be correct, we must admire the appetite rather than the luxury of the sovereign of Asia (Abul-