The good Greek shortly afterwards arrived safely in Smyrna with the children, and had them taught singing, riding, and how to walk about in nice clothes, and some years after he sold them to the Seraglio of the Grand Vizier for two thousand sequins.
And all that he had said at random to the children during the journey, to cheer their spirits, actually came to pass, as we shall presently see.
When Sultan Mahmoud lost his favorite damsel so strangely, Milieva was brought into the Seraglio instead. The girl was then about fourteen years old. The Circassian girls at that age are fully mature, and the bloom of their beauty is at its prime. Milieva, from the very first day when she entered the harem, became the Sultan's favorite damsel.
Thomar joined the ranks of the ichoglanler, a band of youths who are brought up in the outer court and form the Sultan's body-guard.
It was in this year that Mahmoud instituted the Akinji corps, selecting its members from amongst the Janissaries, and formed them into a small regular army. Thomar very soon won for himself the command of a company, and continued to rise higher and higher till at length he reached the eminence which the merchant had foretold to him; and when the course of time brought with it the day on which he was to see Kasi Mollah again, he had become Derbend Aga, one of the Sultan's very highest officials, and his name was mentioned respectfully by all true believers. And in the village of Himri his name was also mentioned. Kasi Mollah often heard it attached to the title of "bey," and Thomar also heard a good deal of the village of Himri and of Kasi Mollah, for they now called his father "murshid," and the name "murshid" is full of mournful recollections for both Moscow and Petersburg.
But of all these things we shall know more at another time.
CHAPTER X
THE AVENGER
And what now is old Ali Tepelenti about in his nest at Janina? Is he content with a state of things which results in this—that he must either perish or pass the brief remainder of his days in constant fighting? Is he satisfied with this sea of blood over which the tempest rages, and whose shores he cannot see?
Not yet has he surrendered to fate. His country has declared war against him, the Sultan has pronounced his death-sentence, his family have abandoned and turned against him; but Ali has not suffered his sword to be broken in twain. For eight and seventy years he has been the scourge of his enemies, the defence of his country, the Sultan's right hand, the patriarch of his family, and in his nine and seventieth year the Sultan and his relations say to him, "Die! thou hast lived long enough!" And he, by way of reply, set his country in flames, shook the throne of the Sultan, and extirpated his own kinsfolk.