259 The date of Bajazet’s death was September 25, 1561.

260 See note, page 108.

261 See Sketch of Hungarian History.

262 Compare page 159.

263 Theriac, the original form of the word treacle, is derived from θηρίον, i.e. a venomous serpent (see Acts xxviii. 4). It originally meant a confection of vipers’ flesh, which was popularly believed to be the most potent antidote to vipers’ poison. Hence the word came to mean any antidote against poison.

264 The value of this balsam is illustrated by the amusing account of the adventures in Ireland of Jean de Montluc, Bishop of Valence, given by Sir James Melville in his Memoirs (page 10, Bannatyne Club edition). Like his friend Busbecq (see vol. ii. p. 34, Letter to Maximilian, XI.) he had been ambassador at the Turkish Court, and was afterwards sent in the same capacity to Scotland. On his return he paid a visit to Ireland to intrigue with the chieftains who were hostile to England. Melville, then a boy of fourteen, was sent back with him by Mary of Guise, the Queen Regent, to be a page to her daughter Queen Mary. They landed on Shrove Tuesday, 1550, in Lough Foyle, and were taken to Odocarte’s house. A woman, who had been brought to entertain the bishop, and was kept quietly in his chamber, ‘found a little glass within a case standing in a window, for the coffers were all wet by the sea waves that fell in the ship during the storm. But she believed it had been ordained to eat, because it had an odoriphant smell; therefore she licked it clean out; which put the bishop in such a rage that he cried out for impatience.... But the Irishmen and his own servants laughed at the matter, for it was a phial of the only most precious balm that grew in Egypt, which Solyman the great Turk had given in a present to the said bishop, after he had been two years ambassador for the King of France in Turkey, and was esteemed worth two thousand crowns.’

265 See p. 86.

266 Here we part from the gallant Spaniard. For his future career see note p. 317. He was finally Governor of Oran, ‘où il a finy ses jours fort vieux et cassé.’—Brantôme, i. 219.

267 The then Duke, or rather Elector, of Saxony, was Augustus the Pious, who succeeded his brother, the famous Maurice, in 1553, and died in 1586. The Duke of Bavaria was Albert III., surnamed the Magnanimous, who reigned from 1550 to 1579. His wife was a daughter of Ferdinand. William the Rich was then Duke of Juliers, Cleves and Berg, &c. He reigned from 1539 to 1592, and he also had married a daughter of Ferdinand. He was younger brother of Anne of Cleves, Henry VIII.’s fourth wife.

268 Ferdinand might have defended himself by the example of his predecessor Sigismund. See the story in Carlyle’s Frederick the Great, i. 187, of his speech at the Council of Constance. “‘Right Reverend Fathers, date operam ut illa nefanda schisma eradicetur,’ exclaimed Sigismund, intent on having the Bohemian schism well dealt with,—which he reckons to be of the feminine gender. To which a Cardinal mildly remarking, ‘Domine, schisma est generis neutrius (Schisma is neuter, your Majesty),’ Sigismund loftily replies, ‘Ego sum Rex Romanus et super grammaticam (I am King of the Romans, and above Grammar)!’”

269 An allusion to Horace, Odes, iii. 3, 1-10.

270 In the battle of Nicopolis, A.D. 1396, Bajazet defeated Sigismund, King of Hungary (afterwards Emperor), and a confederate army of 100,000 Christians, who had proudly boasted that if the sky should fall, they would uphold it on their lances. Among them was John, Count of Nevers, son of Philippe-le-Hardi, Duke of Burgundy, afterwards the Duke known as Jean Sans-Peur, who led a contingent of French knights. In the battle of Varna, A.D. 1444, Ladislaus, King of Hungary and Poland, was defeated, and killed by Sultan Amurath II. For Mohacz, see Sketch of Hungarian History.

271 Compare Camoens: ‘Eu nunca louvarei o general que diz “Eu não cuidei.”—I will never praise the general who excuses himself by saying, “I thought not.”’

272 See Sketch of Hungarian History.

273 The Suleimanyeh, or mosque of Solyman, is the most glorious masterpiece of Ottoman architecture. It is built after the pattern of St. Sophia, and was intended to surpass it. As regards the regularity of the plan, the perfection of the individual parts, and the harmony of the whole, that intention appears to have been fully attained. It was begun in 1550 and finished in 1555.

274 Johann Trautson von Matray, Freiherr von Sprechenstein, &c., descended from an ancient Tyrolese family, was Governor of the Tyrol, and Privy Councillor and Lord High Chamberlain to Ferdinand, who created him a Baron. Leonard von Harrach, a member of an ancient Bohemian family, Privy Councillor and Court Chancellor of Ferdinand, is probably the person meant.

275 Mattioli or Matthioli, an Italian physician, was one of the founders of modern botany. He was born at Siena in 1500, and died at Trent in 1577. He was educated at Venice and Padua, and afterwards lived at Siena and Rome, but was compelled by the sack of the latter city to retire to Trent, from which he removed to Goritz. In 1562 he was summoned by Ferdinand to his Court, where for ten years he was first physician to Maximilian. His most celebrated work is his Dioscorides and his Commentary on that author. In this he made especial use of two MSS. discovered at Constantinople by his intimate friend Busbecq, one of which is presently mentioned in the text.

Mattioli in his Commentaries, continually refers to the specimens and information he had received from Quacquelben, Busbecq’s physician. He gives a figure and description of the Acorus, the plant mentioned in the text, which Busbecq had had collected for him from the Lake of Nicomedia, and also mentions the Napellus under the head of Aconite. Apparently there were two species known by that name, one of which was extremely poisonous. Mattioli gives instances of experiments tried with it upon condemned criminals, some of which proved fatal. Mattioli also describes and gives figures of the horse-chestnut and lilac, taken from branches and seed sent him by Busbecq.

Quacquelben took advantage of the return of Busbecq’s colleagues in August 1557, to send Mattioli a box of specimens accompanied by a long letter, which, with Mattioli’s reply, is printed among the letters of the latter.

276 The sweet or aromatic flag was used as a medicine in cases of bites from mad dogs, &c. See Salmon’s Herbal. It was also used for scenting rooms, and for ornamental purposes. See Evelyn’s description of Lady Clarendon’s seat at Swallowfield: ‘The waters are flagg’d about with Calamus aromaticus, with which my lady has hung a closet that retains the smell very perfectly,’ Diary, p. 490. See also Syme’s English Botany, vol. ix. p. 11.

277 See page 389.

278 Matarieh, a village near Cairo, occupies the site of the ancient On or Heliopolis, where Cleopatra’s Needles originally stood.

279 See page 256 and note.

280 This MS. was purchased by the Emperor, and is still preserved at Vienna. It is one of the most ancient and remarkable MSS. in existence. It was written at Constantinople, towards the end of the fifth century, for Juliana Anicia, daughter of the Emperor Olybrius, who died A.D. 472. On the second and third pages are two miniatures, each representing seven famous botanists and physicians assembled in consultation. Among those represented in the second are Dioscorides himself and Cratevas. On the fifth page is a picture of Dioscorides engaged in the composition of his work. Visconti considers that the resemblance of the two portraits of Dioscorides proves that they were taken from a real original, and are not imaginary. On the sixth page is a picture of Juliana Anicia seated on a throne between two allegorical figures of Wisdom and Magnanimity. A winged Cupid, above whom is written ‘The Love of the Creator of Wisdom,’ is presenting her with an open book, while a kneeling figure entitled Gratitude is kissing the feet of the princess. Engravings of these pictures, which, apart from their antiquity, are remarkable as works of art, are given by Visconti, Iconographie Grecque, vol. i. ch. 7, and by Montfaucon, Palæographia Græca, bk. iii. ch. 2. Throughout the MS. the description of each plant is illustrated by a figure.

Dioscorides was a famous botanist and physician, who wrote a celebrated treatise on Materia Medica. Cratevas was a Greek herbalist, who is supposed to have lived about the beginning of the first century B.C. The great work of Busbecq’s friend, Mattioli (see note 1 page 415), was his edition of Dioscorides.

END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.

LONDON: PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE
AND PARLIAMENT STREET

INDEX TO THE LETTERS.