CHAPTER II
THE PRINCESS IRENE [Footnote: This name is of three syllables, and ispronounced as if spelled E-ren-ay; the last syllable to rhyme with day,say, may.]
During the reign of the last Manuel, in 1412, as a writer has placedthe incident--that is to say, about thirty-nine years prior to theepoch occupying us--a naval battle occurred between the Turks andChristians off Plati, one of the Isles of the Princes. The issue was ofinterest to all the peoples who were in the habit of commercial resortin the region, to the Venetians and Genoese as well as the Byzantines.To the latter it was of most vital moment, since defeat would havebrought them a serious interruption of communication with the islandswhich still remained to the Emperor and the powers in the West uponwhich their dependency grew as year after year their capacity forself-defence diminished.
The Turkish ships had been visible in the offing several days. At lastthe Emperor concluded to allow his mariners to go out and engage them.His indecision had been from a difficulty in naming a commander. Theadmiral proper was old and inexperienced, and his fighting impulses,admitting they had ever really existed, had been lost in the habitudesof courtierly life. He had become little more than a ceremonial marker.The need of the hour was a genuine sailor who could manoeuvre asquadron. On that score there was but one voice among the seamen andwith the public--
"Manuel--give us Manuel!"
The cry, passing from the ships to the multitude in the city, assailedthe palace.
The reader should understand the Manuel wanted was not the Emperor, butone of his brothers who could lay no claim to birth in the purple. Hismother had not been a lawful spouse; yet the Manuel thus on the tonguesof the many had made a hero of himself. He proved his temper andabilities in many successful affairs on the sea, and at length became apopular idol; insomuch that the imperial jealousy descended upon himlike a cloud, and hid him away. Nor could his admirers say he lived; hehad a palace and a family, and it was not known that any of themonasteries in the city or on the Isles of the Princes had opened toreceive him.
On these shreds of evidence, affirmative and negative, slender as theymay appear, it was believed he was yet alive. Hence the clamor; andsooth to say it sufficed to produce the favorite; so at least thecommonalty were pleased to think, though a sharper speculation wouldhave scored the advent quite as much to the emergency then holding theEmpire in its tightening grip.
Restored to active life, Manuel the sailor was given a reception in theHippodrome; then after a moment of gladness with his family, andanother in which he was informed of the situation and trial before him,he hurried to assume the command.
Next morning, with the rising of the sun, the squadron under oar andsail issued gallantly from its retreat in the Golden Horn, and in orderof battle sought the boastful enemy of Plati. The struggle was long anddesperate. Its circumstances were dimly under view from the seawardwall in the vicinity of the Seven Towers. A cry of rejoicing from theanxious people at last rose strong enough to shake the turrets massiveas they were--"Kyrie Eleison! Kyrie Eleison!" Christ had made his causevictorious. His Cross was in the ascendant. The Turks drew out of thedefeat as best they could, and made haste to beach the galleysremaining to them on the Asiatic shore behind the low-lying islands.
Manuel the sailor became more than a hero; to the vulgar he was asavior. All Byzantium and all Galata assembled on the walls and wateralong the famous harbor to welcome him when, with many prizes and ahorde of prisoners, he sailed back under the sun newly risen over theredeemed Propontis. Trumpets answered trumpets in brazen cheer as helanded. A procession which was a reminder of the triumphs of theancient and better times of the Empire escorted him to the Hippodrome.The overhanging gallery reserved for the Emperor there was crowded withthe dignitaries of the court; the factions were out with their symbolsof blue and green; the scene was gorgeous; yet the public looked invain for Manuel the Emperor; he alone was absent; and when thedispersion took place, the Byzantine spectators sought their homesshaking their heads and muttering of things in store for their idolworse than had yet befallen him. Wherefore there was little or nosurprise when the unfortunate again disappeared, this time with hiswhole family. The victory, the ensuing triumph, and the too evidentpopularity were more than the jealous Emperor could overlook.
There was then a long lapse of years. John Palaeologus succeeded Manuelon the throne, and was in turn succeeded by Constantine, the last ofthe Byzantine monarchs.
Constantine signalized his advent, the great Greek event of 1448, bynumerous acts of clemency, for he was a just man. He opened many prisondoors long hopelessly shut. He conferred honors and rewards that hadbeen remorselessly erased from account. He condoned offences againsthis predecessors, mercifully holding them wanting in evil againsthimself. So it came to pass that Manuel, the hero of the sea fight offPlati, attained a second release, or, in better speech, a secondresurrection. He had been all the years practically buried in certaincells of the convent of St. Irene on the island of Prinkipo, and now hecame forth an old man, blind and too enfeebled to walk. Borne intoprivate audience, he was regarded by Constantine with tender sympathy.
"And thou art that Manuel who made the good fight at Plati?"
"Say rather I am he who was that Manuel," the ancient replied. "Deathdespises me now because he could not call my decease a victory."
The inquisitor, visibly affected, next spoke in an uncertain voice.
"Is what I have heard true, that at thy going into the Monastery thouhadst a family?"
The eyes of the unfortunate were not too far gone for tears; somerolled down his cheeks; others apparently dropped into his throat.
"I had a wife and three children. It is creditable to the feelingcalled love that they chose to share my fate. One only survives,and"--he paused as if feebly aware of the incoherency--"and she wasborn a prisoner."
"Born a prisoner!" exclaimed Constantine. "Where is she now?"
"She ought to be here."
The old man turned as he spoke, and called out anxiously:
"Irene--Irene, where art thou, child?"
An attendant, moved like his master, explained.
"Your Majesty, his daughter is in the ante-room."
"Bring her here."
There was a painful hush in the chamber during the waiting. When thedaughter appeared, all eyes were directed to her--all but the father's,and even he was instantly aware of her presence; for which, doubtless,the sensibility known only to the long-time blind was sufficientlyalive.
"Where hast thou been?" he asked, with a show of petulance.
"Calm thee, father, I am here."
She took his hand to assure him, and then returned the look of theEmperor; only his was of open astonishment, while hers wasself-possessed.
Two points were afterwards remembered against her by the courtierspresent; first, contrary to the custom of Byzantine women, she wore noveil or other covering for the face; in the next place, she tendered nosalutation to the Emperor. Far from prostrating herself, as immemorialetiquette required, she did not so much as kneel or bow her head. They,however, excused her, saying truly her days had been passed in theMonastery without opportunity to acquire courtly manners. In fact theydid not at the time notice the omissions. She was so beautiful, and herbeauty reposed so naturally in an air of grace, modesty, intelligence,and purity that they saw nothing else. Constantine recovered himself,and rising from his seat, advanced to the edge of the dais, which insuch audiences, almost wholly without state, raised him slightly abovehis guests and attendants, and spoke to the father:
"I know thy history, most noble Greek--noble in blood, noble inloyalty, noble by virtue of what thou hast done for the Empire--and Ihonor thee. I grieve for the suffering thou hast endured, and wishmyself surrounded with many more spirits like thine, for then, from myexalted place, I could view the future and its portents with greatercalmness of expectation, if not with more of hope. Perhaps thou hastheard how sadly my inheritance has been weakened by enemies without andwithin;
how, like limbs lopped from a stately tree, the themes[Footnote: Provinces.] richest in their yield of revenue have beenwrested from the body of our State, until scarce more than the capitalremains. I make the allusion in apology and excuse for the meagrenessof what I have to bestow for thy many heroic services. Wert thou in theprime of manhood, I would bring thee into the palace. That beingimpossible, I must confine myself to amends within my power. First,take thou liberty."
The sailor sunk to his knees; then he fell upon his hands, and touchedthe floor with his forehead. In that posture, he waited the furtherspeech. Such was the prostration practised by the Greeks in formallysaluting their Basileus.
Constantine proceeded.
"Take next the house here in the city which was thine when the judgmentfell upon thee. It has been tenantless since, and may be in need ofrepairs; if so, report the cost they put thee to, and I will charge theamount to my civil list." Looking then at the daughter, he added: "Onour Roumelian shore, up by Therapia, there is a summer house which oncebelonged to a learned Greek who was the happy possessor of a Homerwritten masterfully on stainless parchment. He had a saying that thebook should be opened only in a palace specially built for it; and,being rich, he indulged the fancy. He brought the marble from thePentelic quarries; nothing grosser was permitted in the construction.In the shade of a portico of many columns of Corinthian model he passedhis days reading to chosen friends, and living as the Athenians werewont to live in the days of Pericles. In my youth I dwelt much withhim, and he so loved me that at dying he gave me the house, and thegardens and groves around it. They will help me now to make partialamends for injustice done; and when will a claimant appear with betterright than the daughter of this brave man? In speaking but now, did henot call thee Irene?"
A flush overspread her neck and face, but she answered without othersign of feeling:
"Irene."
"The house--it may be called a palace--and all that pertains to it, arethine," he continued. "Go thither at will, and begin thy life anew."
She took one step forward, but stopped as suddenly, her color comingand going. Never had Constantine seen wife or maid more beautiful. Healmost dreaded lest the spell she cast over him would be broken by thespeech trembling upon her lips. She moved quickly to the dais then, andtaking his hand, kissed it fervently, saying:
"Almost I believe we have a Christian Emperor."
She paused, retaining the hand, and looking up into his face.
The spectators, mostly dignitaries of high degree, with theirattendants, were surprised. Some of them were shocked; for it should beremembered the court was the most rigidly ceremonial in the world. Therules governing it were the excerpt of an idea that the Basileus orEmperor was the incarnation of power and majesty. When spoken to byhim, the proudest of his officials dropped their eyes to hisembroidered slippers; when required to speak to him, they fell to theirknees, and kept the posture till he was pleased to bid them rise. Notone of them had ever touched his fingers, except when he deigned tohold them out to be most humbly saluted. Their manner at such times wasmore than servility; in appearance, at least, it was worship. Thisexplanation will enable the reader to understand the feeling with whichthey beheld the young woman keep the royal hand a prisoner in hers.Some of them shuddered and turned their faces not to witness afamiliarity so closely resembling profanation.
Constantine, on his part, looked down into the eyes of his fairkinswoman, knowing her speech was not finished. The slight inclinationof his person toward her was intended for encouragement. Indeed, hemade no attempt to conceal the interest possessing him.
"The Empire may be shorn, even as thou hast said," she resumedpresently, in a voice slightly raised. "But is not this city of ourfathers by site and many advantages as much the capital of the world asever? A Christian Emperor founded it, and his name was Constantine; mayit not be its perfect restoration is reserved for another Constantine,also a Christian Emperor? Search thy heart, O my Lord! I have heard hownoble impulses are often prophets without voices."
Constantine was impressed. From a young person, bred in what werereally prison walls, the speech was amazing. He was pleased with theopinion she was evidently forming of himself; he was pleased with thehope she admitted touching the Empire; he was pleased with theChristian faith, the strength of mind, the character manifested. Herloyalty to the old Greek regime was unquestionable. The courtiersthought she might at least have made some acknowledgment of hisprincely kindness; but if he thought of the want of form, he passed it;enough for him that she was a lovely enthusiast. In the uncertainty ofthe moment, he hesitated; then, descending from the dais, he kissed herhand gracefully, courteously, reverently, and said simply:
"May thy hope be God's will."
Turning from her, he helped the blind man to his feet, and declared theaudience dismissed.
Alone with his secretary, the Grand _Logothete_, he sat awhile musing.
"Give ear," he at length said. "Write it, a decree. Fifty thousand goldpieces annually for the maintenance of Manuel and Irene, his daughter."
The secretary at the first word became absorbed in studying hismaster's purple slippers; then, having a reply, he knelt.
"Speak," said Constantine.
"Your Majesty," the secretary responded, "there are not one thousandpieces in the treasury unappropriated."
"Are we indeed so poor?"
The Emperor sighed, but plucking spirit, went on bravely:
"It may be God has reserved for me the restoration, not only of thiscity, but of the Empire. I shall try to deserve the glory. And it maybe that noble impulses _are_ speechless prophets. Let the decree stand.Heaven willing, we will find a way to make it good."