pavement, he admonished him, with his cimeter, that, if the spoil and captives were granted to the soldiers, the public and private buildings had been reserved for the Prince. By his command, the metropolis of the Eastern Church was transformed into a mosque; the rich and portable instruments of superstition had been removed; the crosses were thrown down; and the walls, which were covered with images and mosaics, were washed and purified, and restored to a state of naked simplicity.

On the same day, or on the ensuing Friday, the muezzin, or crier, ascended the most lofty turret, and proclaimed the ezan, or public invitation in the name of God and his Prophet; the imam preached; and Mohammed the Second performed the namaz of prayer and thanksgiving, on the great altar, where the Christian mysteries had so lately been celebrated before the last of the Cæsars. From St. Sophia he proceeded to the august but desolate mansion of a hundred successors of the great Constantine; but which, in a few hours, had been stripped of the pomp of royalty. A melancholy reflection, on the vicissitudes of human greatness, forced itself on his mind; and he repeated an elegant distich of Persian poetry: "The spider has wove his web in the Imperial palace; and the owl hath sung her watch-song on the towers of Afrasiab."

Yet his mind was not satisfied, nor did the victory seem complete, till he was informed of the fate of Constantine; whether he had escaped, or been made prisoner, or had fallen in the battle. Two Janizaries claimed the honor and reward of his death; the body, under a heap of slain, was discovered by the golden eagles embroidered on his shoes. The Greeks acknowledged, with tears, the head of their late Emperor; and, after exposing the bloody trophy, Mohammed bestowed on his rival the honors of a decent funeral. After his decease, Lucas Notaras, great duke, and first minister of the Empire, was the most important prisoner. When he offered his person and his treasures at the foot of the throne,-" And why," said the indignant Sultan, "did you not employ these treasures in the defence of your prince and country?" "They were yours, answered the slave; "God had reserved them for your

hands." "If he reserved them for me," replied the despot, "how have you presumed to withhold them so long, by a fruitless and fatal resistance ?" The great duke alleged the obstinacy of the strangers, and some secret encouragement from the Turkish vizier; and, from this perilous interview, he was at length dismissed, with the assurance of pardon and protection. Mohammed condescended to visit his wife, a venerable princess, oppressed with sickness and grief; and his consolation for her misfortunes was in the most tender strain of humanity and filial reverence.

A similar clemency was extended to the principal officers of state, of whom, several were ransomed at his expense; and, during some days, he declared himself the friend and father of the vanquished people. But the scene was soon changed; and, before his departure, the hippodrome streamed with the blood of his noblest captives. His perfidious cruelty is execrated by the Christians; they adorn, with the colors of heroic martyrdom, the execution of the great duke, and his two sons; and his death is ascribed to the generous refusal of delivering his children to the tyrant's lust. Yet a Byzantine historian has dropped an unguarded word of conspiracy, deliverance, and Italian succor. Such treason may be glorious; but the rebel, who bravely ventures, has justly forfeited his life; nor should we blame a conqueror, for destroying the enemies, whom he can no longer trust. On the eighteenth of June, the victorious Sultan returned to Adrianople; and smiled at the base and hollow embassies of the Christian princes, who viewed their approaching ruin in the fall of the Eastern empire.

Constantinople had been left naked and desolate, without a prince or a people. But she could not be despoiled of the incomparable situation which marks her for the metropolis of a great empire; and the genius of the place will ever triumph over the accidents of time and fortune. Boursa and Adrianople, the ancient seats of the Ottomans, surk into provincial towns; and Mohammed the Second established his own residence, and that of his successors, on the same commanding spot, which had been chosen by

Constantine. The fortifications of Galata, which might afford a shelter to the Latins, were prudently destroyed; but the damage of the Turkish cannon was soon repaired; and, before the month of August, great quantities of lime had been burnt, for the restoration of the walls of the capital. As the entire property of the soil and buildings, whether public or private, profane or sacred, was now transferred to the conqueror, he first separated a space of eight furlongs from the point of the triangle for the establishment of his seraglio, or palace. It is here, in the bosom of luxury, that the grand signior (as he has been emphatically named, by the Italians) appears to reign over Europe and Asia; but his person on the shores of the Bosphorus may not always be secure from the insults of a hostile navy. In the new character of a mosque, the cathedral of St. Sophia was endowed with an ample revenue, crowned with lofty minarets, and surrounded with groves and fountains, for the devotion and refreshment of the Moslems. The same model was imitated in the jami, or royal mosques; and the first of these was built, by Mohammed himself, on the ruins of the church of the holy apostles, and the tombs of the Greek emperors. On the third day after the conquest, the grave of Abou Ayub, or Job, who had fallen in the first siege of the Arabs, was revealed in a vision; and it is before the sepulchre of the martyr, that the new Sultans are girded with the sword of empire. Constantinople no longer appertains to the Roman historian; nor shall I enumerate the civil and religious edifices that were profaned or erected by its Turkish masters. The population was speedily renewed; and, before the end of September, five thousand families of Anatolia and Romania had obeyed the royal mandate, which enjoined them, under pain of death, to occupy their new habitations in the capital. The throne of Mohammed was guarded by the numbers and fidelity of his Moslem subjects. But his rational policy aspired to collect the remnant of the Greeks; and they returned, in crowds, as soon as they were assured of their lives, their liberties, and the free exercise of their religion. In the election and investiture of a Patriarch, the ceremonial of the By

zantine court was revived and imitated. With a mixture of satisfaction and horror, they beheld the Sultan on his throne; who delivered into the hands of Gennadius the crosier, or pastoral staff, the symbol of his ecclesiastical office; who conducted the Patriarch to the gate of the seraglio, presented him with a horse, richly caparisoned, and directed the viziers and bashaws, to lead him to the palace, which had been allotted for his residence. The churches of Constantinople were shared between the two religions; their limits were marked; and, till it was infringed by Selim, the grandson of Mohammed, the Greeks enjoyed, above sixty years, the benefit of this equal partition. Encouraged by the ministers of the divan, who wished to elude the fanaticism of the Sultan, the Christian advocates presumed to allege, that this division had been an act, not of generosity, but of justice; not a concession, but a compact; and that, if one-half of the city had been taken by storm, the other moiety had surrendered on the faith of a sacred capitulation. The original grant had indeed been consumed by fire; but the loss was supplied by the testimony of three aged Janizaries, who remembered the transaction; and their venal oaths are of more weight in the opinion of Cantemir, than the positive and unanimous consent of the history of the times.

THE APPEARANCE OF MARTIN LUTHER BEFORE THE DIET OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE, AT WORMS, IN THE YEAR 1521.

THIS account is taken from the History of the German Reformation, by Philip Marheinecke, D. D. Professor of Theology in the University of Berlin, 2 vols. Berlin, 1816. The work relates the various events, as far as possible, in the words of eye-witnesses, correspondents, or other contemporaries. It has, therefore, a peculiar intrinsic as well as external character of originality, which gives to the passage relating to Luther's appearance at Worms, a very lively interest. Every reader, whether Protestant or Roman Catholic, will admit, that Luther's Declaration, at Worms, was an act of great historical importance. It is one of those events, to which we must necessarily recur, in contemplating the main features of the history of mankind; -one of those acts, for which preparation has been made, by a long succession of changes and movements, and the effects of which, in turn, are visible for centuries ;-one of those acts, in fine, by which a new order of things comes to be irrevocably established, and a portion of mankind pledged to its support. Such acts can sometimes be traced by the shrewd historian, only; for it is not necessary, that they should manifest themselves as striking events, speaking directly to every mind. When, however, they unite with their historical importance a dramatic interest, as is the case with the present one; when mighty interests are personated by emperors, and cardinals, and a humble monk, or a nation is visibly represented by an august Diet, and we not only feel convinced of the great importance of the event, but see it acted out before us, in distinct, contrasting forms; then, indeed, they acquire the highest interest of which history admits.

The Reformation had begun to extend widely over Germany; the writings of Luther were anxiously read, the more so, perhaps, since they had been prohibited by the Pope. Luther had been excommunicated. The Emperor Charles V. had proposed to the Diet, (that is, to the assembled estates of the Germanic empire,-the electors, dukes, princes, counts, and barons, as well as the prelates,