anissaries made ready for their
last desperate combat. It was now late. Ibrahim the Infernal began to
bombard the barracks with red-hot bullets, and within an hour's time
the whole of the enormous building was in flames. Those who were
inside the gates remained there, for there they were doomed to perish
together. Amidst the roaring of the flames their death-cries were
audible, but the flames grew stronger every moment and the cry of
their mortal anguish waxed fainter. The generals stood around the
building, and tears glittered in more eyes than one; after all, it had
been a valiant host!

Had been! Those words explain their doom.

On that day twenty thousand Janissaries fell by the command of the
Padishah. Those whom the bullet and the sword did not reach perished
by the axe and the bowstring. Their bodies were given to the
Bosphorus, and for a long time afterwards the billows of distant seas
cast their headless trunks on the shores of countries far away. These
were the flowers of Begtash.

And so the name of the Janissaries was blotted out of the annals of
Ottoman history.

The wearing of their uniforms and their insignia was forbidden under
sentence of death. Their barracks were levelled with the ground, their
banners were torn to bits, their kettles were smashed to pieces, their
memory was made accursed.

The order of the Priests of Begtash was abolished forever, their
religious homes were destroyed, their possessions confiscated.

Thus came to an end a soldiery which had existed for centuries, which
the wise Chendereli founded, and which had won so many glorious
triumphs for the Ottoman arms. It was now unlawful to mention its very
name.

But when the bloody work was done, the Ottoman nation arose again full
of fresh vigor, and it owed a new life, full of glorious days, to the
hand which delivered the empire from its two greatest
enemies--Tepelenti and the Janissaries.

GLOSSARY OF THE TURKISH WORDS USED IN THIS STORY

AGA--a military and aulic title.

AKINJI--a sort of irregular cavalry.

ANADOLI HISSAR--eastern castle.

AZAB--irregular infantry.

BAIRAM--the great Muhammadan ecclesiastical feast.

BAYADERE--a dancing-girl.

BEY--a dignitary next below a pasha.

BOSTANJI--originally the gardeners of the Seraglio, subsequently
attendants, body-guards.

CHORBAJI--a Janissary officer.

CIAUS--palace officials employed as attendants, messengers, envoys.

DERBEND AGA--the chief of the