more recent national disgraces. His eldest son, Abdul- 

 Hamid, perished by a fire which consumed a great portion 

 of the harem in 1817, and the Sultan Achmet, the heir to 

 the throne, is still in his minority : thus the life of Mahmoud 

 is still of great value to a nation unacquainted with regen- 

 cies, and whose chief link of union is the attachment to the 

 race of Osman. 



The affection of the Ottomans for the family of their 

 founder is not however sufficient to save the empire from 

 decline. A government which does not acknowledge the 

 good of society for its object, has no vis medicatrix to with- 

 stand the violence of casual shocks. The towering pride 

 of despotism has a wide shadow, but a narrow basis; all 

 that supports it is oppressed, all beneath it is in gloom, and, 

 if once it swerves from the perpendicular, ruin and dilapida- 

 tion speedily ensue. Towards the close of the last century, 

 the period of the dissolution of the Ottoman empire seemed 

 fully arrived. We. do not refer to the plans for its parti- 

 tion by the two imperial courts; those plans, we are con- 

 vinced, could never have succeeded; but the rebellious dis- 

 memberments were of the most formidable nature. Egypt 

 was divided among rebellious beys; almost all the pashas 

 from Bagdad to Aleppo refused obedience ; Central Greece 

 was in the power of the formidable Ali of Tepeleni : Servia 

 was in arms, and successfully withstood the whole force of 

 the empire : while Paswan Oglou, Pasha of Widdin, routed 

 an army of 100,000 men, and carried his arms to the gates 

 of Constantinople. The circumstances of these two last- 

 named rebellions exhibit more clearly the weakness of the 

 state : in both cases the leaders were obscure adventurers, 

 who at first had not perhaps any definite object, but who 

 knew the advantage of European tactics; and in both cases 

 the .rebels were completely successful. The effect of such 

 shocks cannot be soon recovered : the Porte endeavours to 

 preserve the calm by accepting a nominal submission, but 

 the Grand Signior is probably not obeyed in more than a 

 fourth of his dominions. Happily for mankind, experi- 

 ence has again confuted the authority of Machiavel, who 

 asserts, " a chi assalta il Turco & necessario pensare di 

 averlo a trovere unito." The possibility of disunion and 



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