Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/512

 490 THE DECLINE AND FALL son. The son of Michael was named Andronicus from his grand- father, to whose early favour he was introduced by that nominal resemblance. The blossoms of wit and beauty increased the fondness of the elder Andronicus ; and, with the common vanity of the age, he expected to realise in the second, the hope which had been disappointed in the first, generation. The boy was educated in the palace as an heir and a favourite ; and, in the oaths and acclamations of the people, the august triad was foi'med by the names of the father, the son, and the grandson. But the younger Andronicus was speedily corrupted by his infant greatness, while he beheld, with puerile impatience, the double obstacle that hung, and might long hang, over his rising ambition. It was not to acquire fame, or to diffuse happiness, that he so eagerly aspired; wealth and impunity were in his eyes the most precious attributes of a monarch ; and his first indiscreet demand was the sovereignty of some rich and fertile island, where he might lead a life of independence and pleasm-e. The emperor was offended by the loud and frequent intem- perance which disturbed his capital ; the sums which his parsi- mony denied were supplied by the Genoese usurers of Pera ; and the oppressive debt, which consolidated the interest of a faction, could be discharged only by a revolution. A beautiful female, a matron in rank, a prostitute in manners, had in- structed the younger Andronicus in the rudiments of love ; but he had reason to suspect the nocturnal visits of a rival ; and a stranger passing through the street was pierced by the arrows of his guards, who were placed in ambush at her door. That stranger was his brother, prince Manuel, who languished and died of his wound ; and the emperor Michael, their common father, whose health was in a declining state, expired on the [A.D. 1320] eighth day, lamenting the loss of both his children.'' However guiltless in his intention, the younger Andronicus might impute a brother's and a father's death to the consequence of his own vices ; and deep was the sigh of thinking and feeling men, when they perceived, instead of sorrow and repentance, his ill- dissembled joy on the removal of two odious competitors. By these melancholy events, and the increase of his disorders, the mind of the elder emperor was gradually alienated ; and, after ^ We are indebted to Nicephorus Gregoras (1. viii. c. i) for the knowledge of this tragic adventure ; while Cantacuzene more discreetly conceals the vices of Andronicus the Younger, of which he was the witness and perhaps the associate (1. i. c. I, &c. ).