Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/526

 504 THE DECLINE AND FALL thirst of revenge was concealed by a tender concern for the succession, and even the safety, of her son. They were justly alarmed by a petition of the friends of Cantacuzene, that they might be released from their oath of allegiance to the Palaeologi and entrusted with the defence of some cautionary towns : a measure supported with argument and eloquence ; and which was rejected (says the Imperial historian) "by my sublime and almost incredible virtue ''. His repose was disturbed by the sound of plots and seditions ; and he trembled lest the lawful prince should be stolen away by some foreign or domestic enemy, who would inscribe his name and his wrongs in the banners of rebellion. As the son of Andronicus advanced in the years of manhood, he began to feel and to act for himself ; and his rising ambition was rather stimulated than checked by the imitation of his father's vices. If we may trust his own professions, Canta- cuzene laboured with honest industry to correct these sordid and sensual appetites, and to raise the mind of the young prince to a level with his foi'tune. In the Servian expedition ^^ the two emperors shoAved themselves in cordial harmony to the troops and provinces ; and the younger colleague was initiated by the elder in the mysteries of war and government. After the con- clusion of the peace, Palteologus was left at Thessalonica, a royal residence and a frontier station, to secure by his absence the peace of Constantinople, and to withdraw his youth from the temptations of a luxurious capital. But the distance weakened the powers of control, and the son of Andronicus was surrounded with artful or unthinking companions, who taught him to hate his guardian, to deplore his exile, and to vindicate his rights. A private treaty with the cral or despot of Servia was soon fol- lowed by an open revolt ; and Cantacuzene, on the throne of the elder Andronicus, defended the cause of age and prerogative, Avhich in his youth he had so vigorously attacked. At his re- quest, the empress-mother undertook the voyage of Thessalonica, and the office of mediation : she returned without success ; and 39 rOne important consequence of the Servian conquests, and the wars connected therewith, may be noticed here, — the Albanian invasion of Greece. The hi,s;h- landers of northern Epirus, descendants of the ancient Illyrians, and speaking an idiom which represents the old Illyrian language, descended into Thessaly, laid it waste, and were a terror to the Catalan adventurers themselves. They settled in the Thessalian mountains and spread over Greece, where they formed a new element in the population. The Albanian settlers speak their own language, amid the surrounding Greeks, to the present day, therein differing remarkably from the Slavonic settlers, who adopted the Greek tongue. For the Albanians, see Hahn^ Albanesische Studien.]