The Sultan was silent. The Grand Vizier, answering for him, replied that Hungary had long since belonged to the Sultan, and no doubt Vienna and Poland would shortly share the same fate. The Sultan could only suffer tributary kings on the earth.
The ambassador drew a somewhat wry face at these words, reflecting that France also was on the earth; then he withdrew.
After him came the envoys of Emeric Tököly, offering the blood and the swords of the Hungarian malcontents to the Sultan if he would help them to win back Hungary.
This time the Sultan replied instead of Mustafa.
“The Grand Seignior greets his servants, and will be gracious to them if they will help him to win back Hungary.”
The envoys noticed that their words had ingeniously been twisted, but as they also had their own arrière-pensées in regard to the Turks, they only looked at each other with a smile and withdrew.
Then came the Transylvanian embassy—gentle, mild-looking men, whose orator delivered an extraordinarily florid discourse. His Highness, Michael Apafi, they said, and all the estates of Transylvania, were ready to draw their swords for the glory of the Grand Seignior and invade Hungary.
Mustafa replied:
“The Grand Seignior permits you to help your comrades in Hungary.”
The orator would like to have heard something different—for example, that the crown of Hungary was reserved for Michael Apafi, the dignity of Palatine for Teleki, etc., etc., and there he stood scratching his ear till the Grand Vizier told him he might go.
Ha, ha! the Turkish policy was written in Turkish.
After the foreign envoys came the messengers from the various pashas and commandants in Hungary, who brought terrible tidings of raids, incursions, and outrages on the part of the Magyar population against the Turks. The Grand Vizier exclaimed angrily at every fresh report, only the Sultan was silent. Last of all came the ulemas.
On their decisions everything depended.
Very solemnly they appeared before the Divan. First of all advanced the Chief Mufti in a long mantle reaching to his heels, and with a large beehive-shaped hat upon his head; his white beard reached to his girdle. After him came two imams, one of whom carried a large document in a velvet case, whose pendant seal swung to and fro beneath its long golden cord; the other bent beneath the weight of an enormous book—it was the Alkoran.
The Alkoran is a very nice large book, larger than our corpus juris of former days, and in it may be found everything which everyone requires: accusatory, condemnatory, and absolvatory texts for one and the same thing.
The Mufti presented the Alkoran to the Sultan and all the Viziers in turn, and each one of them kissed it with deep reverence; then he beckoned to one of the imams to kneel down on a stool before the Divan and remain there resting on his hands and knees, and placing the Koran on his back, began to select expressly marked texts.
For seventy years he had thoroughly studied the sacred volume, and could say that he had read it through seven hundred and ninety-three times. He, therefore, knew all its secrets, and could turn at once to the leaf on which the text he wanted to read aloud could be found.
“The Alkoran saith,” he read with unctuous devotion, “ ‘the knot which hath been tied in the name of Allah the hand of Allah can unloose!’ The Alkoran saith moreover: ‘Wherever we may be, and whatever we may be, everywhere we are all of us in the hand of Allah.’ Therefore this treaty of peace is also in the hand of Allah, and the hand of Allah can unloose everything. Furthermore, the Alkoran saith: ‘If any among thy suffering father’s children implore help from thee, answer him not: come to me tomorrow, for my vow forbids me to rise up today; or, if any ask an alms of thee answer him not: today it cannot be, for my vow forbids me to touch money; or, if anyone beg thee to slay someone, answer him not: tomorrow I will help thee, for my vow forbids me to draw the sword today; verily the observance of thy vow will be a greater sin to thee than its violation.’ Moreover, thus saith the Alkoran: ‘The happiness of the nations is the first duty of the rulers of the earth, yet the glory of Allah comes before it.’ And finally it is written: ‘Whoso formeth a league with the infidel bindeth himself to wage war upon Allah, yet vainly do the nations of the earth bind themselves together that they may live long, for let Allah send his breath upon them and more of them are destroyed in one day than in ten years of warfare: kings and beggars—it is all one.’ ”
At each fresh sentence the viziers and the ulemas bowed their heads to the ground. Mustafa could not restrain a bloodthirsty smile, which distorted his face more and more at each fresh sentence, and at the last word, with a fanatical outburst, he threw off the mask altogether, and with a howl of joy kissed repeatedly the hem of the Chief Mufti’s mantle.
The Mufti then unclasped the velvet case which contained the treaty of peace, and drawing forth the parchment, which was folded fourfold, he unfolded it with great ceremony, and placing it in the hands of the second imam that he might hold it spread open at both ends, he exhibited the document to the viziers.
It was a long and beautiful script. The initial letter was as big as a painted castle and wreathed around with a pattern of birds and flowers. The whole of the first line of it was in ultramarine letters, the other lines
