After his peaceful establishment on the throne
of Constantinople, the Greek emperor visited his Turkish ally, who with
four sons, by various wives, expected him at Scutari, on the Asiatic
shore. The two princes partook, with seeming cordiality, of the
pleasures of the banquet and the chase; and Theodora was permitted
to repass the Bosphorus, and to enjoy some days in the society of her
mother. But the friendship of Orchan was subservient to his religion and
interest; and in the Genoese war he joined without a blush the enemies
of Cantacuzene.

[Footnote 47: Nicephorus Gregoras has expatiated with pleasure on
this amiable character, (l. xii. 7, xiii. 4, 10, xiv. 1, 9, xvi. 6.)
Cantacuzene speaks with honor and esteem of his ally, (l. iii. c. 56,
57, 63, 64, 66, 67, 68, 86, 89, 95, 96;) but he seems ignorant of
his own sentimental passion for the Turks, and indirectly denies the
possibility of such unnatural friendship, (l. iv. c. 40.)]

[Footnote 48: After the conquest of Smyrna by the Latins, the defence of
this fortress was imposed by Pope Gregory XI. on the knights of Rhodes,
(see Vertot, l. v.)]

[Footnote 49: See Cantacuzenus, l. iii. c. 95. Nicephorus Gregoras,
who, for the light of Mount Thabor, brands the emperor with the names
of tyrant and Herod, excuses, rather than blames, this Turkish marriage,
and alleges the passion and power of Orchan, eggutatoV, kai th dunamo?
touV kat' auton hdh PersikouV (Turkish) uperairwn SatrapaV, (l. xv.
5.) He afterwards celebrates his kingdom and armies. See his reign in
Cantemir, p. 24--30.]

In the treaty with the empress Anne, the Ottoman prince had inserted
a singular condition, that it should be lawful for him to sell his
prisoners at Constantinople, or transport them into Asia. A naked crowd
of Christians of both sexes and every age, of priests and monks, of
matrons and virgins, was exposed in the public market; the whip was
frequently used to quicken the charity of redemption; and the indigent
Greeks deplored the fate of their brethren, who were led away to the
worst evils of temporal and spiritual bondage [50] Cantacuzene was
reduced to subscribe the same terms; and their execution must have been
still more pernicious to the empire: a body of ten thousand Turks had
been detached to the assistance of the empress Anne; but the entire
forces of Orchan were exerted in the service of his father. Yet these
calamities were of a transient nature; as soon as the storm had pass