THE HEIGHTS OF PHALEUE* 269 



last let out, that the Seraskier would make his appearance before them 

 on Sunday morning with 11,000 men. The Greeks replied, by saying, 

 that if the Pacha came they would make such a use of his beard, as, I 

 believe, beard was never put to yet, and they separated. That loaf fell 

 into the hands of the Pacha, and was afterwards sent by him in a sack to 

 Constantinople together with poor Bourkaki's head, and one of the 

 steamboat's sixty-eight pound shot, symbolically showing to the Sultan 

 the difficulties he had to contend with, and what he had already done 

 towards overcoming them. 



As the Albanians had promised us, down came the Roumelie Valisee 

 on the Sunday morning with all the power he could spare from before 

 Athens ; but we were prepared, and although we had no opportunity of 

 performing the threatened vengeance on his beard, yet we gave him and 

 his Delhis so warm a reception, that before nightfall he was glad to 

 decamp, leaving, however, a considerable force on the opposite hill of 

 Caritzena, which being just within range, we diverted ourselves by 

 observing the alacrity of their motions when we occasionally sent them 

 a messenger, in the shape of a six pound shot, which was done with 

 great glee and wonderful precision by a Piedmontese carbonaro, named 

 Rocka villa. 



The Greeks being somewhat inspirited by the negative success of not 

 being driven into the ocean, at last bethought them, that they had come 

 to Phalere for the purpose of relieving Athens ; and that, in order to 

 effect this, it would be necessary to shorten the distance between them 

 and the city. With this view, a tambouri was constructed in the plain, 

 defended on one side by a morass, and behind by the sea ; the only side 

 on which the Turks could approach it, being flanked at half range by a 

 battery of four six, and two eighteen pounders, on the extreme right of 

 one position. A tambouri is a field fortification ; the value of which is 

 fully understood by both Turk and Greek. It is, as its name implies, a 

 drum, or circle ; the area of which is proportioned to the number of its 

 defenders, inclosed by a wall of loose stones, breast high, having loop- 

 holes just above the level of the ground, and a ditch on the inside, in 

 which the defenders lie. An hour or two at most suffices for the con- 

 struction of this simple defence ; and unless cannon be brought against 

 it, it is adequate to protect its garrison against twenty times their num- 

 ber that is, of Turks : not that I mean to impugn their courage, but 

 their system of attack. The tambouri was garrisoned by one hundred 

 and fifty Cretans, commanded by Demetrius Kalergi, a young Greek of 

 good family, no less remarkable on account of his personal bravery, 

 than for his numerous escapes from the most perilous situations into 

 which his adventurous, chivalrous spirit was perpetually leading him. 

 The Cretans are men fit to be commanded by such a leader ; brave, 

 athletic, active as the antelopes of their own hills ; inured to war, and 

 better armed than either their compatriots or their enemies. Instead of 

 the weak, badly-mounted guns, only valued on account of the richness 

 of their ornaments, common to the Turks and Greeks, they carry the 

 long deadly barrel of the Spanish mountaineers : and such is their dex- 

 terity in the use of this weapon, that they kill, with almost unvarying 

 certainty, the smallest birds on the wing; and that with a single ball, 

 and at a considerable distance, The Pacha was too good a general not 

 to be aware of the advantages this post might give us ; and it was 

 scarcely established, before he sent against it a force, which he, no doubt, 



