“May Halil Patrona live long enough to see it come to pass.  This also will I report to the Sultan.”

“Look sharp about it then!  I will wait in your room here till you come back.”

“You will wait here?”

“Yes, never mind about me!  I have given orders that my dinner is to be sent after me here.  I look to you for coffee and tobacco, and if you happen to be delayed till early to-morrow morning, you will find me sleeping here on the carpet.”

Kabakulak could now see that he had to do with a man of character who would not stir from the spot till everything had been settled completely to his satisfaction.  The most expeditious mode of ending matters would, no doubt, have been to summon a couple of ciauses and make them lay the rascal’s head at his own feet, but the political horizon was not yet sufficiently serene for such acts of daring.  The bands of the insurgents were still encamping in the public square outside.  First of all they must be hoodwinked and pacified, only after that would it be possible to proceed to extreme measures against them.

All that the Grand Vizier could do, therefore, was frankly to present all Halil Patrona’s demands to the Sultan.

Mahmud granted everything on the spot.

In an hour’s time the firmans and hatti-scherifs, deposing and elevating the various functionaries, were in Musli’s hands as desired.

Only as to the method of destroying the kiosks did the Sultan venture to make a suggestion.  They had better not be burnt to the ground, he opined, for thereby the Mussulmans would make themselves the laughing-stock of the whole Christian world; but he undertook to dilapidate the walls and devastate the pleasure-gardens.

And within three days one hundred and twenty splendid kiosks, standing beside the Sweet Waters, had become so many rubbish heaps; and the rare and costly plants of the beautiful flower-gardens were chucked into the water, and the groves of amorous dallying were cut down to the very roots.  Only ruins were now to be seen in the place of the fairy palaces wherein all manner of earthly joys had hitherto built their nests, and all this ruin was wrought in three days by Halil Patrona, just because there is but one God, and therefore but one Paradise, and because this Paradise is not on earth but in Heaven, and those who would attain thereto must strive and struggle valiantly for it in this life.

FOOTNOTES: 

[3] 1481 A.D.

[4] Ablutions before prayers.

[5] The first section of the Koran.

[6] The Imperial Treasury.

[7] The part of Stambul inhabited by the Greeks.

[8] Companies of horse.

[9] Tablets indicating the direction in which Mecca lies.

[10] “God be for ever gracious to him.”

[11] Believer.

[12] Unbeliever.

[13] Anti-Christ.