hat of September, on the approach of
winter they retreated fourscore miles from the capital, to the Isle
of Cyzicus, in which they had established their magazine of spoil and
provisions. So patient was their perseverance, or so languid were their
operations, that they repeated in the six following summers the same
attack and retreat, with a gradual abatement of hope and vigor, till the
mischances of shipwreck and disease, of the sword and of fire, compelled
them to relinquish the fruitless enterprise. They might bewail the loss,
or commemorate the martyrdom, of thirty thousand Moslems, who fell in
the siege of Constantinople; and the solemn funeral of Abu Ayub, or Job,
excited the curiosity of the Christians themselves. That venerable Arab,
one of the last of the companions of Mahomet, was numbered among the
_ansars_, or auxiliaries, of Medina, who sheltered the head of the
flying prophet. In his youth he fought, at Beder and Ohud, under the
holy standard: in his mature age he was the friend and follower of Ali;
and the last remnant of his strength and life was consumed in a distant
and dangerous war against the enemies of the Koran. His memory was
revered; but the place of his burial was neglected and unknown, during
a period of seven hundred and eighty years, till the conquest of
Constantinople by Mahomet the Second. A seasonable vision (for such are
the manufacture of every religion) revealed the holy spot at the foot of
the walls and the bottom of the harbor; and the mosch of Ayub has been
deservedly chosen for the simple and martial inauguration of the Turkish
sultans.

The event of the siege revived, both in the East and West, the
reputation of the Roman arms, and cast a momentary shade over the
glories of the Saracens. The Greek ambassador was favorably received at
Damascus, a general council of the emirs or Koreish: a peace, or
truce, of thirty years was ratified between the two empires; and the
stipulation of an annual tribute, fifty horses of a noble breed, fifty
slaves, and three thousand pieces of gold, degraded the majesty of the
commander of the faithful. The aged caliph was desirous of possessing
his dominions, and ending his days in tranquillity and repose: while the
Moors and Indians trembled at his name, his palace and city of Damascus
was insulted by the Mardaites, or Maronites, of Mount Libanus, the
firmest barrier of the empire, till they were disarmed and transplanted
by the suspicious policy of th