e ideas which the
former had vainly attempted to carry out at the point of the sword.

The mob tore the dervish to pieces and distributed his bleeding limbs
as trophies, and then, like wild beasts who have scented blood, they
attacked the castles of the great men. Whom should they fall upon
first? That was the only question.

Suddenly one of the priests of Begtash tore down from the corner of
the street a copy of the fetva which proclaimed the reform and showed
it to the mob. "Behold!" cried he, "here, foremost amongst the names
of the destroyers of the Faith stands the name of the Janissary Aga!
The leader of the Janissaries has himself betrayed his own children.
Death to him!"

"Death to him!" howled the mob, and, seizing their torches, they
rushed towards the palace of the Janissary Aga.

The Janissary Aga heard the tumult, and, quickly dressing a slave in
his robes, mingled with the crowd, and, without being noticed, reached
the palace of the Grand Vizier in safety.

The Grand Vizier was sitting down to supper when the Janissary Aga
rushed in and informed him of his danger. He lost no time in
barricading the gates, and, slipping through his garden with his
servants and his family, escaped across the Bosphorus to the Jali
Kiosk, on the other side of the water. The besieging mob, therefore,
only found empty walls upon which to wreak their fury, and these they
levelled with the ground.

But the Janissary Aga had left his wives and children in his palace,
and these the rioters seized and murdered with the most excruciating
tortures. In the evening twilight the Aga, from his place of safety on
the other side of the water, could see the flames of his palace
shooting up towards the sky, and heard perchance the agonized
death-cries of those he loved best.

A few moments later they were joined by Nedjib Effendi, the
representative of the Viceroy of Egypt, who also took refuge with them
and brought the tidings that the insurgents were in possession of the
whole of Stambul, and had wreaked their savage fury on the families of
the refugee magnates.

The Sultan was standing on the roof of his palace, whence he could
view far away the spreading scarlet glow of the conflagration which
lit up the night with a terrifying glare, whose fiery columns were
reflected in the black Bosphorus.

Panic-stricken fugitives spread the report that the Seraglio itself
was in flames, and indeed it looked in the distance as if the fiery