“Thus are we restored to free commerce with these unrightuous people once again, how long it may continue is past my guess for never was there a people more false and ficle in theyr words then I have found thos here I have had to doe with ... but I consider’d it the duty of a faithfull servant to his master to avoid all is possible the necessity of pushing disputes to such extremities as to bring a war or great dishonor on his master and for this reason in the first place and secondly in regard to trade which would infallibly have receiv’d a deadly blow had their violence byn a little more provok’d for ’tis most certain that we have stuck many days at the pit’s brink.... I had my ar’s ready to have gone in person to the Visier and G: Signor but was overcome and prevented by the merchants reasons and intreaties and I hope all is for the best for there is not one instance of any one’s having ever got any good by wrangling with this Visier.”[301]
In adjusting this avania Lord Chandos had hoped, as he tells us, to find “some faire quarter” in other matters; but he soon found that “there is no peace with the wicked.” When he applied for his Audience of the Grand Signor, Kara Mustafa demanded an extraordinary present—not, he explained, as a price for the Audience, but as a recognition of the great favour he had done us by letting us off the silk claim on such easy terms. Chandos replied that all he had parted with was to purchase the Vizir’s goodwill, and he was willing to strain yet further to give him satisfaction; only he entreated his patience till the Audience was over, lest it should be said that he had paid money for it: which, being an alteration of the ancient practice between the Crowns, imported much more than his head was worth. This reply, in spite of its urbanity, set the Vizir in a mighty passion: he doubled his demand, and, as the Ambassador took no notice, he refused to let him deliver his Credentials. Moreover, every time an Englishman was sued before the Divan, Kara Mustafa condemned him out of hand; and, in short, missed no chance of showing his malice against us. Not that we enjoyed the exclusive monopoly of his rancour. The Dutch underwent a fresh fleecing on the same pretext as the English—silk export duties—and were glad enough to compound for 25,000 dollars; the Venetians were forced to pay ten times that sum by way of reparation for an affray between their own and some Turkish subjects in Dalmatia—it was, in truth, reparation for wrongs suffered rather than inflicted, but that made no difference: the Bailo, finding reason useless, had to employ “the rhetorick of chequins”—’twas the only means “to make faire weather with a Visier who is of a temper to doe anything for mony and nothing without it.” When describing to the Secretary of State how he and his colleagues fared at the hands “of this greivous oppressor of all Christians,” Chandos ventured to drop a hint that His Majesty might, “if the intolerable tyranny of this vile Minister receiv’s not a speedy check,” find “some other way to make him sensible of His iust indignation”—some way more “becoming His great wisedome and high honor.” But what could poor, lazy Charles do, where the haughty and energetic Louis was content to eat humble pie by the plateful? It was, indeed, the “submission,” as the Turks very correctly called it, of the French Padishah that had raised Kara Mustafa’s rapacious insolence to its present pitch. This brings us to the conclusion of the Chios exploit in which the Franco-Turkish quarrel had culminated.
Nothing more humiliating for Christendom, nothing better calculated to inflate Ottoman arrogance, could be imagined. The French Admiral, after hovering aimlessly about the Dardanelles with his squadron for nine months, sailed away leaving the French Ambassador to pay for his feat. It was no longer a question of exacting satisfaction for past insults, but of averting imminent calamities: M. de Guilleragues had to fight not for a stool, but for safety. A three days’ struggle ensued—the French gazettes of the time styled it an “audience.” The first day, when the Ambassador was brought before the Vizir, he spoke and acted with spirit; but Kara Mustafa, unimpressed by what he knew to be empty bluster, ordered him to be locked up. Three days’ confinement brought M. de Guilleragues to reason: he signed a bond to pay within six months an indemnity thinly veiled under the euphemism of a “galantaria” emanating from his private pocket—“a present of such value as became a Chivaliere.” When the six months expired, the “present” was duly tendered, but was rejected as falling short of what became a Chevalier in distress to give or a victorious Pasha to receive. After some kicking against the pricks, the Ambassador submitted to a valuation of his “galantaria” by experts appointed by Kara Mustafa, with the result that he was “screw’d up to 100 purses, that is, 50,000 Dollars.” This was for the Grand Signor. “What he paid the Visier himself and his inferior officers, by his own confession, came to between 15,000 and 20,000 Dollars and most of this mony was taken up at 18 or 20, and some at 22 per cent.”
Thus the long-drawn-out duel between the wig and the turban ended in a decisive victory for the turban. It was not pleasant to witness “the barbarous triumphing of the Turks over all Christians upon this their success against the French, for the Turks judge all things by the event and impute all that hitts right to the great wisedome and conduct of their Visier, for in this business they say (according to their proverb) the Visier caught a hare with a cart, and the French who are the loosers have nothing to say, which is hard according to our English proverb.” Nothing to say—they who a few months before “made many high brags of great wonders they resolv’d to doe.”[302]
But in ascribing their triumph to Kara Mustafa’s genius the Turks paid him a tribute to which he was not entitled. The causes of the French defeat lay in Paris rather than in Stambul. Louis was a calculating politician as well as an arrogant prince. His arrogance prompted him to beard the Turks, his policy forbade him to break with them. It was essential for the success of his ambition in the West that the German Empire should be engaged in the East; and he did not hesitate to purchase the co-operation of Kara Mustafa at any price. Kara Mustafa, on his part, had long nourished the wish to attack Austria, and he had a good opportunity of doing so in the first two years of his Vizirate, when the French harassed the Emperor on one side and the Magyars on the other; but, with characteristic acumen, he had chosen to go to a profitless war with Russia and to postpone the realisation of his favourite dream to a less convenient moment. However, Louis thought, better late than never.
In the meantime, while these machinations were maturing, Kara Mustafa sharpened his sword. Chandos heard of “nothing soe much as the drawing togeather of great forces from all parts of this vast Empire,”[303] and, though he prayed “God defend all Christians from the violence of Turks,” he could not help feeling that in a long-protracted war lay his only hope of escaping further molestation. It was therefore with profound relief that he saw the Vizir make his stately exit from Constantinople: “nor doe we dispair of God’s mercy either to convert him from or confound him in his malice against us before his returne.”
Of the two contingencies it was the more probable that came to pass; and, if the English had good reason to attribute the aggravation of their woes to the Machiavellian policy of Louis, it was to that same policy that they owed their final deliverance.
Kara Mustafa, in the spring of 1683, marched north at the head of as numerous an army as ever Grand Vizir led—the whole strength of the Ottoman Empire was bent against Austria. With this host, augmented, too, by Hungarian rebels, he crossed the frontier, traversed Hungary performing miracles of ferocity and perfidy, and, not finding in his way either fortified towns or armies capable to arrest his progress, penetrated to the very gates of Vienna (July 14, N.S.). At the approach of the enemy the Emperor Leopold fled with precipitation, leaving the Duke of Lorraine with a small force to defend his capital.
The unhappy citizens, isolated and abandoned by their natural protector, presented to the world a memorable example of courage and initiative. But hunger and disease soon began to decimate them. Of succour there was no sign. The beleaguered city seemed doomed, and with it the whole of Central Europe. Only a combination of chances could save Vienna.