supple
according to circumstances, always and entirely logical in his egotism,
he is Cesar Borgia reborn as a Mussulman; he is the incarnate ideal of
Florentine policy, the Italian prince converted into a satrap.

Age had as yet in no way impaired Ali's strength and activity, and
nothing prevented his profiting by the advantages of his position.
Already possessing great riches, which every day saw increasing under his
management, he maintained a large body of warlike and devoted troops, he
united the offices of Pacha of two tails of Janina, of Toparch of
Thessaly, and of Provost Marshal of the Highway. As influential aids
both to his reputation for general ability and the terror of his' arms,
and his authority as ruler, there stood by his side two sons, Mouktar and
Veli, offspring of his wife Emineh, both fully grown and carefully
educated in the principles of their father.

Ali's first care, once master of Janina, was to annihilate the beys
forming the aristocracy of the place, whose hatred he was well aware of,
and whose plots he dreaded. He ruined them all, banishing many and
putting others to death. Knowing that he must make friends to supply the
vacancy caused by the destruction of his foes, he enriched with the spoil
the Albanian mountaineers in his pay, known by the name of Skipetars, on
whom he conferred most of the vacant employments. But much too prudent
to allow all the power to fall into the hands of a single caste, although
a foreign one to the capital, he, by a singular innovation, added to and
mixed with them an infusion of Orthodox Greeks, a skilful but despised
race, whose talents he could use without having to dread their influence.
While thus endeavouring on one side to destroy the power of his enemies
by depriving them of both authority and wealth, and on the other to
consolidate his own by establishing a firm administration, he neglected
no means of acquiring popularity. A fervent disciple of Mahomet when
among fanatic Mussulmans, a materialist with the Bektagis who professed a
rude pantheism, a Christian among the Greeks, with whom he drank to the
health of the Holy Virgin, he made everywhere partisans by flattering the
idea most in vogue. But if he constantly changed both opinions and
language when dealing with subordinates whom it was desirable to win
over, Ali towards his superiors had one only line of conduct which he
never transgressed. Obsequious towards the Sublime Porte, so long as i