also visited Italy had he not been recalled to Russia by intelligence of a very formidable revolt of the Strelitz, the Russian militia, the same year, 1698. The Strelitz had made several attempts upon Peter's life, in obedience to the orders of his half-sister Sophia; and Peter had commenced during his boyhood to train a body of infantry according to the German tactics, to supersede his formidable and turbulent militia. Peter now considered that the time had arrived for the extermination of the Strelitz. While still abroad he gave directions to his generals, and the ringleaders of the revolt were soon in irons. The revolt was speedily suppressed, and seven thousand prisoners were taken. Upon his return to Moscow, in September, 1698, the Czar caused every one of these prisoners to be put to death, himself beheading many of them. He thus dissolved the Strelitz forever. His half-sister Sophia, whom the malcontents had intended to place on the Russian throne, and who was believed to have instigated and directed the plot, was imprisoned in a convent. After restoring order and securing his power by his prompt and bloody suppression of the revolt of the Strelitz, Peter the Great began to execute his cherished plans for the civilization of his empire by putting in force the measures by which he hope to bring Russia into direct intercourse with the rest of Europe and to fit her for the position which he intended that she should assume. He changed the titles of the nobility, and greatly curtailed their powers. He permitted the free circulation of the Bible among his subjects, and granted perfect religious toleration. He encouraged immigration by inviting into Russia foreign officers, generals, mariners, artists and literary men whose talents could assist him in the formation of his plans, as well as those skilled artisans whose industries he patronized and sought to introduce into his dominions. By the Czar's order, arsenals, factories, and schools of navigation were established in Russia. Competent experts and engineers made maps and charts of different portions of the Russian Empire, and also a general survey of the mines. Peter the Great found greater difficulty in introducing European domestic customs among his subjects. The Czar himself set the example by laying aside the old Russian national dress and adopting the European costume. He required all Russians, except the priests and the peasants, to follow his example. He imposed a heavy tax upon beards in order to abolish them. The long robes and the unkempt beards of the men, and the Oriental seclusion of the women, gradually gave way to European costumes and social customs; but a brutal indulgence still prevailed at the Russian court as well as among the common people. His Vices and Faults. His Great ness as a Czar. Although Peter the Great could civilize his subjects he could not civilize himself; and he remained a cruel barbarian all his life, devoted to brandy and guilty of some shocking crimes. He busied himself daily with the cares of state; and every evening after resting from his labors he would have a big bottle of brandy set before him, and drink until his reason was gone for the time. He often said that he could correct the faults of his subjects, but could not reform himself. Yet his name stands deservedly among the first of those sovereigns who have labored for the good of their subjects, as he did more for the civilization and welfare of the Russian people than all his predecessors and successors. Decline of the SECTION IV.-TURKEY'S WARS WITH GERMANY AND THE Ottoman, or Turkish Empire, which had once been so formidOttoman able, had gradually fallen from the summit of its grandeur and steadily Empire. declined. Its resources were exhausted, and its history was marked only by misfortunes. The effeminacy and incapacity of the Sultans, their contempt for the arts of the nations of Christendom, and the evils of a purely military and despotic government, gradually underPower mined the strength of the Empire, and eclipsed its glory as a conquering power. The Janizaries became the real arbiters of the destinies of the Empire, raising up and deposing or murdering Sultans at will; thus following the example of the Prætorian Guards of ancient Rome, who made and unmade Emperors at pleasure. Most of the provinces were ruled by pashas, who oppressed the inhabitants with burdensome taxes for the purpose of enriching themselves. of the Janizaries. Achmet III., A. D. 16031617. ACHMET I., the son and successor of Mohammed III., who died of the plague in 1603, was a youth of fifteen when he became Sultan of Turkey, and had been shut up in prison during his father's reign. The Hungarians and the Persians waged war against Turkey during His Rule the reign of Achmet I., who did not lead his own troops, but passed and Wars. most of his time in his harem, which contained over three thousand females. Achmet I. erected a stately mosque near the Church of St. Peace of Sophia, which still constitutes one of the principal architectural ornaments of Constantinople. During the reign of Achmet I. the Peace of Sitvatorok, in 1607, ended the war with the German Empire begun in 1594. Sitvatorok. Mustapha Achmet I. died in 1617, and was succeeded as Sultan of Turkey by I., A. D. his brother MUSTAPHA I., who was unfit for government, and was 1617 1618. therefore deposed and imprisoned by the Janizaries in 1618, after a reign of four months. The Janizaries placed OTHMAN II., the youthful son of Achmet I., upon the Turkish throne. War broke out between Turkey and Poland in 1620; and Sultan Othman II. defeated the Poles with great loss at Jassy, in Moldavia, in September, 1620; but the young Sultan, presuming on his great victory to attempt the conquest of Poland, was defeated with the loss of eighty thousand men in 1621, and was forced to consent to an ignominious peace. This disastrous failure so enraged the Janizaries that they rose in insurrection at the close of the war, in 1622, and assassinated the youthfol Othman II. by strangling him in the castle of the Seven Towers, a state prison belonging to the Seraglio, after a reign of four years, and when he was only eighteen years of age. I. Restored and again Deposed, A. D. 1622 1623. IV., A. D. 1623 1640. His and The murdered Othman's imbecile uncle, the deposed MUSTAPHA I., Mustapha was then dragged from his dungeon and restored to his throne. The pashas of the various provinces of the Empire took advantage of the confusion to rebel, thus causing such a scene of anarchy that the chief men of Constantinople met together and deposed Mustapha I. a second time, A. D. 1623, in less than a year after his restoration of the Ottoman throne, and again imprisoned him in the Seven Towers. AMURATH IV., a younger brother of Othman II., was then placed Amurath upon the Turkish throne. He was arbitrary, tyrannical, fierce and cruel; but he restored order to the Ottoman Empire, and punished the rebellious Janizaries. His extravagant acts of folly have furnished subjects for many an Oriental tale. He was immoderately fond of wine-an indulgence expressly forbidden by the Koran. When in- Tyranny toxicated he committed all kinds of absurd and furious actions. He Cruelty. sometimes traversed the streets of the Turkish capital with a drawn sword, to kill any one whom he might see smoking-a practice which he had forbidden, because he disliked the smell of tobacco. Occa- Capture sionally he amused himself by discharging arrows from a bow in all directions, utterly regardless of whom he might kill. His attendants trembled at the very sound of his footsteps, and the people in the streets would conceal themselves at his approach. He defeated the Persians, captured Bagdad, and massacred its inhabitants in 1638. Sultan Amurath IV. died in 1640, from excessive drinking, and was Ibrahim, succeeded on the Turkish throne by his brother IBRAHIM, whose intellect had been so impaired by the close confinement in which he had been kept that he was wholly unable to direct the affairs of state. 1645 the Turks began a war with Venice for the conquest of the island of Candia, the ancient Crete, and one of the most valuable of the possessions of the Venetian Republic. While this War of Candia was still in progress, Sultan Ibrahim was deposed by the turbulent Janizaries, in 1649, after a reign of nine years, and was strangled. In and Massacre of Bagdad. A. D. 16401649. War of Candia with Venice Moham A. D. Ibrahim's son, MOHAMMED IV., a child of seven years, then became med Sultan of Turkey. As soon as he had arrived at an age of discretion he removed his court to Adrianople. He supported the Cossacks of the Ukraine in their revolt against Poland from 1647 to 1654. 16491687. Hunga rian Revolts the House of Hapsburg. The civil oppressions and religious persecutions of the Hungarians led to frequent efforts at revolt against the House of Hapsburg. The against precautions which the Hungarian Diet at Pressburg had taken to establish civil and religious liberty on a solid basis did not avert disturbances in the Hungarian kingdom. The Hapsburgs perceived the necessity of consolidating their dominions, whose heterogeneous elements were suffering for lack of unity, and they eagerly seized these occasions to extend their power in Hungary, where their authority was vastly circumscribed by the constitution and laws of that kingdom. Thus the Hungarians complained of perpetual infringements on the part of the court of Vienna, and thus arose repeated disturbances in Hungary, the dominion of which was shared by Austria and Turkey. Emperor The Turks then ruled Transylvania, as well as a great part of and the Hungary. The Emperor Leopold I. of Germany, as King of HunHunga- gary, granted protection to John Kemeny, Prince of Transylvania, against Michael Abaffi, a protegé of the Turks; thus rendering a war between the Ottoman and German Empires inevitable. Leopold I., as King of Hungary, convened the Hungarian Diet at Pressburg in 1662 to take action in this crisis. But before giving any opinion concerning the war with the Turks, the Hungarian Diet demanded from Leopold I. a redress of grievances, and adjourned without any decision as to the impending war. Leopold I. rian Diet. Turkish Invasion of The Turks profited by these dissensions in the Austrian dominions, and a Turkish army of two hundred thousand men under the Grand Austrian Vizier Achmet Köproli invaded Austrian Hungary in 1663, thus Hungary. bringing on another war between the Ottoman and German Empires. The Turkish invaders speedily captured Neuhäusel and several other Foreign In this crisis of peril which menaced all Christendom, Sweden, France, Battle of St. Gotthard. Vasvar. XIV. Montecuculi routed the Turks in the great battle of St. Gotthard, near the frontier of Hungary and Styria, in 1664; the French auxiliaries signalizing their bravery. Instead of making use of this advantage to prosecute hostilities with Truce of increased energy and vigor, the Emperor Leopold I. of Germany concluded the twenty years' Truce of Vasvar with the Turks, in August, 1664; permitting them to retain all their conquests in Austrian Hungary, continuing their protegé and tributary Michael Abaffi in Transylvania, and even paying them a tribute of two hundred thousand florins, disguised under the name of a gift. The Emperor Leopold I. had been largely forced to this humiliating treaty by the enmity of the Hungarians against the imperial House of Hapsburg. In 1669 the Turks finally conquered the island of Candia, after a war of twenty-four years with Venice, and after a siege of two years and four months, during which they lost one hundred thousand lives. The French had vainly endeavored to relieve the beleaguered island. The island of Candia has ever since remained in the possession of the Turks. Turkish Conquest of Candia. Defeats in Sobieski. In 1672 the Turks invaded Poland, as allies of the revolted Cossacks, Turkish and seized the city of Kaminiec; but the next year an army of eighty thousand Turks was utterly defeated with the loss of forty thousand by John killed by a small Polish force under the valiant John Sobieski at Kotzim, November 11, 1673. This brilliant victory of the Polish hero checked the progress of the Turkish invaders of Poland, and electrified all Christendom. By the Peace of Zarowno, October 26, 1676, the Peace of Turks retained the city of Kaminiec with a considerable part of the Ukraine and Podolia, but restored some portions of the Ukraine to Poland. The Truce of Vasvar was highly displeasing to the Hungarians, as it had been concluded without their concurrence. The complaints of the Hungarians against the court of Vienna grew louder. They complained of the Emperor Leopold's action in quartering German troops among them, in occupying the principal fortresses of Hungary with German troops, and in imposing shackles on their religious liberties, thus oppressing the Protestants of Hungary. Zarowno. Continued Austro- sions. Hunga rian Revolt and Execution As Leopold I. paid no regard to their complaints, several of the Hungarian magnates headed an armed revolt for the preservation of the civil and religious liberties of Hungary. Leopold hoped to suppress the Hungarian rising by severity. The magnates who led the insur- of Hungarection were accused of holding a treasonable correspondence with the Turks, and of conspiring against the life of their king, the Emperor Leopold I. Accordingly such magnates as the Counts Zrini, Nadaschdi, Frangepan and Tattenbach were condemned as guilty of high rian Magnates. |