of the Byzantine
Caesars.

At daybreak on May 29 the Turks assaulted the city by sea and land. For
two hours the Greeks maintained the defence with advantage, and the
voice of the emperor was heard encouraging the soldiers to achieve by a
last effort the deliverance of their country. The new and fresh forces
of the Turks supplied the places of their wearied associates. From all
sides the attack was pressed.

The number of the Ottomans was fifty, perhaps one hundred, times
superior to that of the Christians, the double walls were reduced by the
cannons to a heap of ruins, and at last one point was found which the
besiegers could penetrate. Hasan, the Janizary, of gigantic stature and
strength, ascended the outward fortification. The walls and towers were
instantly covered with a swarm of Turks, and the Greeks, now driven from
the vantage ground, were overwhelmed by increasing multitudes.

Amidst these multitudes, the emperor, who accomplished all the duties of
a general and a soldier, was long seen and finally lost. His mournful
exclamation was heard, "Cannot there be found a Christian to cut off my
head?" and his last fear was that of falling alive into the hands of the
infidels. The prudent despair of Constantine cast away the purple.
Amidst the tumult he fell by an unknown hand, and his body was buried
under a mountain of the slain.

After his death, resistance and order were no more. Two thousand Greeks
were put to the sword, and more would have perished had not avarice soon
prevailed over cruelty.

It was thus, after a siege of fifty-three days, that Constantinople,
which had defied the power of Chosroes and the caliphs, was
irretrievably subdued by the arms of Mahomet II. Sixty thousand Greeks
were driven through the streets like cattle and sold as slaves. The nuns
were torn from the monasteries and compelled to enter the harems of
their conquerors. The churches were plundered, and the gold and silver,
the pearls and jewels, the vases and sacerdotal ornaments of St. Sofia
were most wickedly converted to the service of mankind.

The cathedral itself, despoiled of its images and ornaments, was
converted into a mosque, and Mahomet II. performed the _namaz_ of prayer
and thanksgiving at the great altar, where the Christian mysteries had
so lately been celebrated before the last of the Caesars. The body of
Constantine was discovered under a heap of slain, by the golden eagles
embroidered on his shoes, and after