Page:The Fall of Constantinople.djvu/123

Rh pus. His sole object was to render his position secure, and he had reason to believe that all his efforts were necessary if that end were to be attained. His first measure was to disband the army. Then he set out by easy stages for Constantinople, where his wife was preparing for him a triumphal entry. The senate was content with his accession, although there were some dissentients, and the people of the capital did not oppose or show any indignation or resentment, notwithstanding, says Nicetas, that it had been deprived by the army of the privilege which belonged to it of electing the emperor. The only opposition, indeed, which was made was by a knot of workmen and rabble, who when Euphrosyne, the wife of Alexis, went to take possession of the Great Palace adjoining the Great Church, proclaimed an astrologer named Alexis Contostephanos. Her partisans, however, attacked the mob, declared that they were tired of the family of Comnenos, to which the pretender belonged, and would have no more of them, caught the would-be emperor and imprisoned him. The ecclesiastics, seeing how the popular feeling went, declared in favor of Alexis. Some of the nobles and a priest, with a few of the judges, though without the consent of the patriarch, proclaimed him.

Takes the name of Comuenos

Alexis Angelos, who arrived a few days afterwards in the capital, was crowned with the usual ceremonies in Hagia Sopliia, and, discarding: the name of Anfrelos, assumed that of Comnenos. We have already seen that among at least a portion of the populace the name Comnenos had been unpopular, but, remembering the able rulers of that house, this sentiment can hardly have been general. Nicetas suggests that the new emperor made the change in order to divert attention from the fact that the deposed emperor was his own brother, and the suggestion is plausible. Alexis took quiet possession of the throne. There was, however, a strong party in the city which was dissatisfied with the events of the last few days. The treachery of one brother to another, the abandonment of the enterprise against the ene-