On receiving news of the Turkish advance, the pope once more preached a new Crusade and called upon all Christians to go to the aid of the Poles and Hungarians. But messengers travelled slowly, and preparations were long. Four years afterwards, in 1433, Murad again invaded Hungary, but was stoutly resisted by Elizabeth, mother of the infant Ladislaus, and had to retire. In withdrawing he attempted to annex Serbia, on the pretext that Bajazed having married the sister of Stephen, the former sovereign, the crown belonged to him as the heir of Ilderim. In 1435, he laid siege to Belgrade, and put out the eyes of two sons of the kral, under the pretext that they had attempted to escape to their father. The siege lasted six months, but the attempt failed. The Serbians defended the city bravely. The Turkish army suffered from malarial fever, and a relieving army under a Polish general compelled them to raise the siege.

It is worthy of note that during the absence of the emperor at Ferrara and Florence in order to treat of the Union of the Churches—an absence from his capital of two years and two months (November 1437 to February 1440)—Murad proposed to attack the city and was advised to do so by all his council with the exception of Halil pasha,134 who pointed out that as John had gone to confer with the representatives of the Christian powers on questions of religion, at the request of the pope, they would feel bound to come to his aid, if advantage were taken of his absence to attack the capital. Halil’s advice was taken.135

Immediately on John’s return, he and other European Christian rulers began to make more or less combined movements against Murad. The influence of the pope was energetically used to make an alliance successful. The question was no longer one merely of defending a schismatic though Christian emperor, but of preserving the existence of great Catholic states. Nor were the means for offering a strong resistance to Turkish advance wanting. The crown of Hungary was worn by Ladislaus, the young king of Poland, who was crowned in 1440. Almost immediately after his accession, his army succeeded in defeating a Turkish detachment in Hungary. In the same year Scanderbeg—that is, Alexander Bey—at the head of a large body of Albanians, declared war on Murad. Though John on his return from Florence sent an embassy to the sultan to protest that he was a loyal vassal, he was only waiting for the ships and aid promised by the pope and by Western princes in order to join in a combined attack. Although the ships promised were long in arriving, the West was known to be full of anxiety, and preparations were being hurried forward. On New Year’s Day 1442, the pope again preached a Crusade and called on all Christian princes, and especially on Ladislaus, king of Poland and Hungary, to help in the defence of the three bulwarks of Christendom—Constantinople, Cyprus, and Rhodes.136 Cardinal Julian was commissioned to advise Ladislaus, and the king was ordered to render every aid possible to him as the legate of Eugenius. George Brancovich of Serbia bound himself to aid the Hungarian king and for this purpose to send twenty-five thousand men and large sums of money, the produce of the Serbian mines. The combined army of Hungarians and Serbs, with the co-operation also of Scanderbeg, was placed in June under the command of John Corvinus Hunyadi, the waywode of Transylvania. Hunyadi leader of Christian armies. Hunyadi had already distinguished himself as a brave and skilful leader against the Turks. In a short campaign of less than half a year, he had captured five strongholds north of the Danube, won as many battles, and had returned laden with booty and trophies of victory. In 1442, at the head of twelve thousand chosen cavalry, he chased the Turks out of Serbia and defeated in succession several armies. Christians from France, Italy, and Germany hastened to enrol themselves under his leadership. Not even before the terrible disaster at Nicopolis in 1396 had so powerful an army been gathered together to attack the common enemy as was now collected under Hunyadi. It represented all the force that the pope and Western Europe could muster, and the presence of Cardinal Julian gave it the sanction of an international army representing Christendom. Seldom have soldiers had more confidence in their leader, and apparently that confidence was well bestowed.

Near Nisch the army of twelve thousand chosen cavalry under Hunyadi was joined by that of Ladislaus, consisting of twenty thousand men, with whom were the king and the cardinal. The first and most important battle of the campaign with the united army was fought between Sofia and Nisch, probably near Slivnitza on November 3, 1443. The Turks were completely defeated, and thirty thousand of them are said to have been left on the field. Four thousand were made prisoners and nine standards captured. Thereupon the Christian army advanced to Sofia, which it captured, and then pushed on towards Philippopolis. At Isladi near Ikhtiman, the beginning of the pass about midway between Sofia and Philippopolis, Hunyadi found that Murad had arranged for making a stand. The natural strength of the pass, the principal entrance to which is the Gate of Trajan, and the measures taken on the high tableland at the head of this pass to make the frozen ground impassable to cavalry, made Hunyadi hesitate. A second pass appeared more practicable. On Christmas Eve, the Christian army forced a passage, triumphing over the Turks and over the equally serious obstacles of rocks and ice. Murad’s strong entrenchments were carried by brilliant and persistent attacks, the Christians having to make their way through snowdrifts, while the enemy rolled rocks and masses of ice from the heights. The Turks were driven from their stronghold and the Christian army followed them down the slopes of the Balkans into the plain. Once more the Turks stood, and again they were beaten.137 Upon this, the triumphant Christian army halted and waited for reinforcements before further advance.

It was probably immediately after this campaign, or possibly during the halt in Roumelia, that Murad hastened into Asia, where the prince of Caramania had engaged in a conspiracy with others of the emirs of Anatolia to rise against the sultan and to attack his territory simultaneously with the attacks made by Christians in Europe. Konia and many other cities had been sacked and desolation carried far and wide even among the Turks wherever they had stood for Murad.138 The sultan suppressed the rising with his usual cruelty, treating the Turks as he had done the Christians.

The successes of Hunyadi compelled Murad, and this for several reasons, to sue for peace. He sent an embassy to the Hungarian, but as the latter was awaiting new troops to pursue his campaign, he at first declined to treat, and sent Murad’s delegates to Szegedin, then occupied by the king and the cardinal. Finding, however, that his reinforcements did not arrive, Hunyadi consented to retire and take part in the negotiations. The Turks on their side agreed to terms. Murad was to give up to George Brankovitch all the places in Serbia which he had captured, to allow Wallachia to be added to Hungary, to leave Scanderbeg in possession of Albania and Macedonia, and to give up the two lads whom he had blinded and the other hostages. Ladislaus and Hunyadi on the return of the latter to Hungary made a triumphal entry into Buda. Thirteen pashas, nine Turkish standards, and four thousand prisoners bore testimony to the success of the campaign. The mission from Murad had gone forward into Hungarian territory to complete the formalities of peace which had been agreed to at Szegedin. A formal Peace solemnly accepted. truce for ten years was concluded in June 1444 between Murad and the king of Poland and Hungary and his allies. The treaty was not, however, signed by Hunyadi, who declared that he was only a subject. Each party swore that the army of his nation would not cross the Danube to attack the other. Ladislaus took the oath to this effect solemnly on the Gospels and Murad on the Koran.139

The treaty of June 1444 thus solemnly ratified was almost immediately broken.140 To the eternal disgrace of Treaty violated by Christians. Ladislaus and of the cardinal legate, Julian Cesarini, who had accompanied Hunyadi on the campaign just described, and who figures as the evil genius of Ladislaus until his death, it was broken by the Christians. History furnishes few examples of equally bad faith.

All the evidence goes to prove that the Turks intended to respect the treaty. The sultan, indeed, had taken the opportunity of abdicating and of formally handing over the government to his son, Mahomet, a boy fourteen years old, and had already retired to Brousa with the intention of going on to Magnesia, to live in peace and quietness. Murad wanted rest. Even when he was seen by La Brocquière, probably in 1436, he was ‘already very fat.’ A short, thick-set man with a broad brown face, high cheekbones, a large and hooked nose, he looked, says the same writer, like a Tartar—that is, like a Mongol. Voluptuous in the worst Turkish sense of the word, he also loved wine and banished a believer who dared to reprove him for drinking it. ‘He is thought,’ adds La Brocquière, ‘not to love war, and this opinion seems to me well founded.’141 Just about this time also he lost his eldest son, Aladdin, to whom he was much attached, and was overcome with grief. Hence his determination to get rid of the cares of government.

The opportunity to the Christians seemed tempting. News had arrived that a powerful fleet of seventy ships had appeared in the Bosporus, ten triremes having been sent by the pope and ten others at his request by Latin princes. The duke of Burgundy and a French cardinal had arrived at Constantinople to urge John to join in a Christian league. The cities of Thrace were undefended by the Turks, and the fleets, it was believed, could prevent Murad with his army from crossing into Europe. The only obstacle to vigorous and successful action was the newly signed treaty.

Pretexts were found that Ladislaus had had no right to agree to a truce without the consent of the pope, and that Murad had not executed his part of the treaty. Ladislaus hesitated to break his oath, but Cardinal Julian urged that his league with the Christian princes of the West was better worth respecting than his oath to the miscreant. According to more than one author, he maintained the proposition that no faith need be kept with infidels.142 Finally, the cardinal called down upon his own head all punishment due to the sin, if sin there were, in violating the oath. But in the name of the pope, the vicar of God on earth, he formally released the king from the obligations to which he had sworn.143

The action of Ladislaus was in reality not merely wicked and immoral, but ill-advised and hasty. Even in the short interval between the conclusion of peace and the declaration of war, the French, Italian, and German volunteers had gone home. John was not ready to aid him. Phrantzes had been sent to Ladislaus, to the cardinal, and even to the sultan, to temporise and to prevent an outbreak of war before a coalition could be formed. Hunyadi very reluctantly gave his consent to the violation of the truce, and then only on condition that the declaration of war should be postponed until September 1. George of Serbia not only refused to violate the engagement into which he had solemnly entered with Murad but refused to permit Scanderbeg to join Ladislaus. The whole business was ill-considered and ill-managed, and the fault lies mainly with the cardinal.

When Murad’s dream of quiet days at Brousa was disturbed by the news that the treaty solemnly accepted a few weeks earlier had been violated by the faithless Christians, who in this case are justly characterised by the Turks as infidels, he at once resumed the duties of a ruler and prepared to go to the aid of his son, young Mahomet. With the aid of the Genoese he crossed the Bosporus, probably at the extreme north end below the Giant’s Mountain, where the entrance into the Black Sea was, and long continued to be, known, from the number of temples which had existed there from pre-Christian times, as the Sacred Mouth. The Italian and Greek fleets near the capital were unable successfully to resist the passage, the ascent of the Bosporus being almost impossible for sailing vessels during the continuance of the prevailing north winds. From thence Murad hastened to meet the army of Ladislaus.144

The place of rendezvous for the Christian armies was Varna. Ladislaus took the field in the autumn, with only ten thousand fighting men. He marched along the valley of the Danube, and was joined by Drakul, prince of Wallachia, with five thousand of his subjects. The total of the two armies probably never exceeded twenty thousand men.

The Wallachian prince advised prudence and delay. He pointed out that even a hunting party of the sultan contained as many men as were now collected to oppose him. Hunyadi, however reluctant he had been to enter on the campaign, seems to have thought that, once the armies had started, their only hope of safety lay in expedition and in being able to obtain a strong position for fighting. The discussion between the two brave leaders led to a quarrel, in which Drakul drew his sword, but was immediately overpowered and compelled to purchase safety by the promise of a further reinforcement of four thousand men.145 Drakul then retired, and his place was taken by his son. Many of the towns and villages passed through on their march were held by Turks, but the Christian armies, in most cases, easily overcame all opposition, and in their course plundered the schismatic Bulgarians and their churches as if they had been enemies.

At Varna the army proposed to rest. Further advance, if desirable, was difficult, on account of the illness of Ladislaus.146 Hunyadi took up a strong position.

Varna is at the head of a bay. On the south side was situated, at a distance of about four miles from the town, a village named Galata. Between the two stretched a long line of marsh, which is the termination of a lagoon, bounded on the south side by a steep range of hills.147 Between the end of the marsh and the bay the Christian army encamped with the hill on its rear. Hardly had it taken up its position when scouts brought the startling news that Murad’s army was encamped at a distance of four thousand paces. The night was bright and clear, and by ascending the hill they could see the fires, and make even an estimate of the number of their enemies. Their astonishment at the rapidity with which Murad had advanced added to their alarm. They found that he was at the head of an army of at least sixty thousand men—a hundred thousand men are said to have crossed into Europe—while their own consisted only of eighteen or twenty thousand. Guards were doubled, and a council at once held, to decide upon what was to be done. Cardinal Julian’s advice was that they should entrench themselves, make a barrier around them of their carts, and await attack. Their machines, or guns, the alarming effect of which had already been seen at Belgrade, would be of value for their defence. He also urged that probably a fleet would soon come to their aid. The bishops with the army, and a few others, agreed with him.

On the other hand, Hunyadi and the leader of the Wallachs declared the proposal to be absurd. The great Hungarian urged that the enemy was only to be conquered by daring and dash. Every sign of hesitation, especially at the beginning of a campaign, was fatal. Suppose the Turks also chose to play the waiting game, were the Christians ready to stand a siege? Their only salvation lay in audacity. He characterised what was said about the coming of a fleet as ridiculous. Ships would be of no more use in their present position than cavalry at sea. Even if the sailors landed, what could they do against horsemen?

The advice of the experienced soldier carried the day. The young king, though he was suffering great bodily pain, supported Hunyadi, and declared against delay.

Hardly was the council of war over before the scouts announced that the Turks had settled the question for them and were preparing to attack. Though the alarm was false, or at least premature, Hunyadi at once made all arrangements for defence, and strengthened his position. His army had its back to a hill; on one side was the marsh, and on the other he placed his baggage and other wagons, so as to make a rampart. He blocked up the passes through the marsh as well as he could with carts and chariots. He placed four companies of Wallachians on the left, where the marshes afforded protection, while the Hungarians formed the right wing, of which he himself took command. This was the position of greatest danger, as being least protected. Ladislaus was placed in the safest place in the centre, surrounded by Hungarians and Poles. The great black standard of Hungary floated over Hunyadi, while the flag of St. George marked the place near the king occupied by the cardinal and the Wallachian chief. A reserve of Wallachs was stationed to act wherever there was necessity. Murad, however, did not begin his attack as soon as the Christians expected. He took four days before he completed his preparations. He came down further into the plain, and carefully formed his plan of battle. The invincible Janissaries occupied the centre, with the sultan in their midst. They formed what may be called a zariba. Around them was a ditch or trench. Behind that stood the camels, while behind them was a breastwork formed of shields fixed to the ground immediately in front of the Janissaries surrounding the sultan. The Anatolian troops, some of whom were armed with arquebuses, were on the Sultan’s left, and the European or Rumelian troops on his right. In front of the sultan, hoisted on a long spear, was placed the violated treaty.

The Turks sent forward six thousand of their cavalry, who occupied the hill near the Christian army. Their purpose was to examine the ground, and to take note of the numbers of the enemy, and of their position. Nevertheless, they discharged showers of arrows against the Christians, their archers being, as usual, their best troops.148 When Franco, one of the standard-bearers of Ladislaus, prevented his men from attacking them, the Turks, believing that the Christians were overawed by their superior numbers and dared not leave their entrenchments, came down into the plain and began the battle. Then Franco let his troops go, and with such effect that the Turkish cavalry were soon in full retreat. Murad thereupon brought forward the main body of his army, and the fight became general. Hunyadi sustained successfully the shock of the Anatolian division, drove it back and put it to rout. The remainder of the Christian army in the plain were attacked at the same time, but the Turkish horsemen were hard pressed, and fled. One of the bishops who, says Callimachus, was more skilful in ecclesiastical than in military matters, seeing the Turks retreating, hastened after them with a band of soldiers, and, arriving at the densely packed host, was soon floundering in the marsh, and he and his men were of no further use in the fight. But the Turks were pursuing their usual method of fighting; ‘for,’ remarked La Brocquière only half a dozen years before this battle, ‘it is in their flight that they are most formidable, and it has been almost always then that they have defeated the Christians.’149

Meantime, Hunyadi, who knew their tactics well, on returning from his fight with the Asiatic division, strictly charged the young king not to allow the troops around him to move, to remain with them, and to wait for his return after attacking the European division, or at least until he knew the issue of the fight, because, if successful, he would then have to deal with the Janissaries.150 The Christians of the left wing and even around the standard of Ladislaus were hard pressed. The cardinal and Franco, with the son of Drakul, had to fall back to the barricade of wagons. A fierce struggle took place near and among the wagons, and the Turks for a while gained ground. Hunyadi hastened to the aid of the Christians, and his arrival changed for a while the tide of battle. The Turks retreated from the wagons and were driven back two thousand paces. Hunyadi and his men were fighting splendidly and manifestly succeeding. In their attack, Caradja, the leader of the European division of the Turks, was killed.

At this moment occurred an incident which in all probability influenced and perhaps altogether changed the fortunes of the day. According to Chalcondylas, some who were near the king and were jealous of the fame of Hunyadi persuaded Ladislaus not to leave the glory of the day to the Hungarian, as if he were the only leader. ‘His would be the sole renown; ours the ignominy of having remained idle.’ Influenced by these taunts, the king led his followers into the fight while Hunyadi was attacking Murad’s right, and made direct for the sultan himself in the midst of his entrenchments. Hunyadi, who during the day was always at the point of greatest danger, on galloping back after the retreat of the Turks before the troops forming the left wing, found that the brave but too impulsive young king had left his post. Hunyadi immediately went to his aid. He found that Ladislaus and his followers had broken through the entrenchments, the line of camels and the shields, and were among the Janissaries. Struggling desperately, he had laid low many of the enemy, but had become separated from his own men.

His absence caused many of the Christians to believe that he had been either captured or killed and, in consequence, many of them began to give way. The fortune of the day was at this time doubtful. Many among the Turks and Christians were in flight, neither party being able to judge how the battle was going. The unconquerable Janissaries, however, remained firm and resisted the young king’s attack vigorously. In the crisis of the battle, according to the Turkish annals, Murad prayed, ‘O Christ, if Thou art God, as Thy followers say, punish their perfidy.’151

Hunyadi was in despair. He saw his men deserting and that his army had already been greatly reduced in numbers, but he managed to reach the king. Ladislaus was still fighting when his general drew near, but his horse fell forward with him, in consequence of a great blow from an axe. As the king fell, says Callimachus, he was instantly, not merely pierced, but simply buried beneath the weapons of the Janissaries. His head was taken to Murad, who had it at once hoisted upon a lance.152

The issue of the battle had been at various stages doubtful. Two divisions of the Turks had been beaten and fled, but both had rallied and returned. At one moment the sultan himself contemplated flight, but was stopped by a Turk who cursed him as a coward and prevented him from leaving the field. Hunyadi attempted to recover the king’s body, but when he saw one after another of the small number of Wallachs who were with him struck down, he looked to his own safety and made good his escape. The battle was lost. He, Julian, Franco, and as many as could, when darkness came on, retreated across the hills into the great neighbouring forest.

The fortune of battle had so often changed that it was not until the following day that the Turks recognised how great was the success they had gained. The slaughter in the small army of the Christians had been heavy. Many, too, had perished in the marsh or had been drowned in the lagoon. Others, among whom was Julian, were afterwards caught in the forest. The remnant of Huns and Wallachs had the utmost difficulty in making their way across the Danube. On his way home, Hunyadi was taken prisoner by his old enemy, Drakul, prince of Wallachia, but was set free when the Hungarians threatened war, as they immediately did, unless he was at once released.

The great effort from which the emperor and the West had hoped so much had proved futile. The fleets had been powerless. The struggle was over before aid was received from the emperor or the Western princes. The remark of a careful traveller is justified, that the bad faith of the Christians did much to intensify among the Moslems dislike and distrust, and led to reprisals commonly justified by the Turkish teaching that ‘no faith is to be kept with infidels.’153

The part which the emperor John played, if he took any, in this campaign, is doubtful. Chalcondylas states that he had declared war against the sultan, but he is the only contemporary who makes this assertion. Probably he was ready, though unable, to aid the Western ships in preventing Murad from crossing the Bosporus.

Murad had inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Christians, was weary of fighting, and readily promised the emperor that, if he abandoned all concerted action with the Western powers, he should not be attacked. He once more abdicated the throne in favour of his son Mahomet, and withdrew to his beautiful gardens and palace at Magnesia, hoping once more for peace in retirement.154

The same year—always 1444—he was forced by the Janissaries, who were already beginning to claim a share in the government, and who had marked their discontent by burning a large part of Adrianople, to resume the guidance of the state.

After reducing them to complete submission, he turned his attention to Greece, which on the death of the previous emperor had been divided between three of his seven sons.

Constantine, brother of John, and afterwards the last emperor, had shown energy in the Morea. He was in possession of a large part of the Peloponnesus, and had chased the Turks out of Boeotia, Pindus, and part of Thessaly. This weakening of their hold compelled Murad to bestir himself. In November, 1446, he started for Greece at the head of an army of sixty thousand men. Constantine sent an ambassador, the historian Chalcondylas, to propose terms, which were, however, rejected. Murad then advanced and attacked Constantine, who held a strong position behind the famous rampart of the Hexamilion, extending across the Isthmus of Corinth. Murad carried it by assault, and killed all the garrison. His principal general then ravaged the Morea, and carried off sixty thousand Christians into slavery. Patras was captured and burnt, and Constantine, who had fought well but whose army was much smaller than the Turkish, had to pay tribute and surrender all territory that he had conquered from the Turks beyond the Isthmus of Corinth. He was still, however, able to retain possession of a large part of the Morea.

After the campaign in Greece, Murad marched northwards to attack the Albanians, and endeavoured to capture Kroya,155 the capital of the country. But it was held by the Albanian leader, George Castriotes, whom we have already met under the name of Iskender (or Alexander) Bey, a man who was a military genius, and who in some respects recalls the adventures and characteristics of Garibaldi. But he was unscrupulous as well as energetic. Devoting himself like a new Hannibal to the salvation of his country, he held and continued to hold absolute, but willingly rendered, sway during twenty-five years over the Albanian mountaineers. Christian by birth, but given over with his brothers to the Turks as hostages, and forcibly converted to Mahometanism, he had become a favourite of Murad for his handsome appearance, his strength of body, and his courage. He had gained power over his countrymen in the first instance by a ruse as bold as it was relentless. Scimitar in hand, he offered as an alternative to the reis-effendi, or commander-in-chief, either immediate death or the affixing of his signature and seal to a document ordering the governor of Kroya to hand over to him the fortress and the adjacent country. Having obtained the document in due form, he then killed the reis-effendi. At this time Iskender Bey was only nineteen years old. Gathering a small band of Albanians about him, he hastened across the peninsula and obtained possession of Kroya by a stratagem even more desperate and dangerous than that by which he had obtained the order for his appointment as Turkish governor. Leaving his followers outside the city and in hiding, he presented his credentials and obtained the keys of the fortress. During the night, he personally admitted his followers, and the Turkish garrison were murdered while they slept. Then he rapidly made his preparations for defence against the attack of Murad which he knew would follow. It is sufficient for our purpose to say that he was successful, and that at the approach of the winter of 1447–8, Murad’s attempt to recapture Kroya entirely failed, and the great sultan withdrew to Adrianople.

Meantime the Christians north of the Danube were preparing to make a greater effort than ever to strike at the power of the sultan. The new pope, Nicholas the Fifth, urged the duty of aiding the Hungarians and the Poles as vigorously as his predecessor. But his appeals to other states were of little avail. Hunyadi, notwithstanding the defeat at Varna, was named lieutenant-general of the kingdom almost immediately on his return, and at once set himself to reconstruct an army. In less than four years he possessed the best-disciplined host which Hungary had yet seen. But it was far too small for the purpose on hand. Among its twenty-four thousand men were two thousand German arquebusers and eight thousand Wallachians. With this force Hunyadi crossed the Danube near Turn-severin and invaded Serbia, because its ruler, whose sister was married to the sultan, refused to break the engagement with Murad.

When the sultan, who was preparing for another attempt to defeat Iskender Bey and the Albanians, heard that George of Serbia was on the point of being attacked, he at once made all haste to go to his assistance. Hunyadi encamped near Cossovo, on the same Plain of Blackbirds where, in 1389, Murad the First had been assassinated after his victory. The Turkish army, probably numbering a hundred and fifty thousand men,156 occupied three days in crossing the Sitnitza, a small river which runs through the plain into the Vardar. Hunyadi, for some reason which is not evident, left his entrenchment and crossed the stream, apparently with no other object than of forcing on the fight. Why he should have done so, since he was hourly expecting the arrival of a detachment of Albanians under Iskender Bey, it is impossible to understand.

The battle commenced on October 18, 1448. The Turks were drawn up in the same order as at Varna, the Janissaries in the centre surrounded by a trench, behind which were ranged the camels, and behind them again a belt of shields or bucklers fixed in the ground. To the right of the Janissaries was the European, and to the left the Asiatic, division of Murad’s army. On the other side, the centre of the Christian army was occupied by the German and Bohemian arquebusers and some of the best troops of Transylvania. The right wing was formed of Hungarians with a few Sicilian auxiliaries, while the Wallachs were on the left.

The first day’s fight was not general. But at noon on the second, the whole lines on both sides were engaged, and continued till sunset, when, in spite of the superiority in numbers on the Turkish side, no advantage had been gained. Hunyadi, indeed, believed that during the night his enemy intended to break up his camp and commence a retreat. For this reason, he determined upon a night attack—one of the measures, as General Skobeleff testified after fighting in Central Asia under somewhat similar circumstances, in which the best-disciplined army almost necessarily wins. All the valour of the Hungarian army was powerless to break through the line of the Janissaries, and the attack consequently failed. On the morning of the third day, the fight was again renewed, and victory appeared doubtful. But the Wallachs turned traitors, and in the midst of the fight, their leader having obtained terms from Murad, passed over to the Turkish side. The army of Hunyadi was now attacked in front and rear, but contrived to reach its entrenchments. Judging that its condition was hopeless, Hunyadi made his escape in the evening, leaving the Germans and Bohemians to hold the central position of his encampment. This they did with magnificent courage, but the battle was already lost. Out of the army of twenty-four thousand, seventeen thousand men, including the flower of the Hungarian nobility, are said to have been left dead on the field.157 But the victory had been dearly bought by Murad. During the three days’ fight, forty thousand Turks had fallen.158

The Christians had lost the battle through the rash courage and confidence of their leader. Hunyadi had refused to wait for Iskender Bey and his Albanians, had abandoned a strong position in order to attack an enemy largely superior in numbers, and his desertion of the best of his auxiliaries is inexplicable or unjustifiable. The defeat at Cossovo-pol, following that at Varna, made men forget for a time the series of brilliant victories which the great Hungarian had gained over the Turks in Transylvania and elsewhere. But in the glorious defence of Belgrade against Mahomet after the capture of Constantinople, Hunyadi recovered greater reputation than ever, and the West recognised in that city the first bulwark of Christendom, and in its defender the greatest soldier of the age.159

The effect in Hungary and Constantinople of these victories of Murad was appalling. The sultan and his successors for many years had nothing to fear from the enemy north of the Danube.

The great combined efforts of the West to break the Ottoman power and, incidentally, to save Constantinople had failed disastrously. Nor are the reasons for such failure difficult to understand. They are mainly two: underestimating the power of the enemy, and dividing their own forces. First and above all, neither the pope nor the statesmen of Europe had realised the enormous number of fighting men which the Turk could bring into the field. They knew that the empire of Constantinople had been dismembered by Turkish armies, but they attributed this loss to secondary causes, and do not appear to have realised that Turkish armies beaten again and again constantly reappeared. The empire’s loss, in their opinion, was due to the incapacity of some of its emperors, to civil war, to the pressure of Serbia and Bulgaria, and to the judgment of Heaven upon the Greeks for having refused to come within the one Christian fold, and to acknowledge the one shepherd. The Turks were the instruments of divine justice to punish schismatics, but, having done their work against the empire, they would, now that they ventured to attack Catholic states, no longer be permitted to make further encroachments.

The failure of the men of the West was largely due to the fact that they despised the common enemy. They were under the curious delusion that the Turk was not a fighting man; that, though he had been successful in beating Greeks, Serbs, and Bulgarians, he was no warrior, and that he had thus far succeeded because he had never encountered European soldiers. This delusion lasted for at least two centuries after the capture of the city. Almost every Western writer who visited Constantinople spoke of the defeat of the Turks as a task well within the power of a European state. That such a blunder influenced the men of the West before the capture of the city, may be illustrated by the statement of two contemporaries. In an oration by Aeneas Sylvius, who afterwards became Pope Pius the Second, delivered at Rome in 1452, before Pope Nicholas, King Ladislaus, and a number of cardinals, the orator appealed to the knowledge of his audience to recognise that the Turks were ‘unwarlike, weak, effeminate, neither martial in spirit nor in counsel; what they have taken may be recovered without difficulty.’160 A like testimony is given by La Brocquière in 1438, but with much more caution, since he had been through Asia Minor and had seen the Turks. Nevertheless, this Western traveller states that, though he would not depreciate them, he is ‘convinced that it would be no difficult matter for troops well mounted and well led to defeat them,’ and, in regard to himself, he adds, ‘I declare that with one half of their numbers I should never hesitate to attack them.’161 He fully realised, as he explains again and again, that their victories had been gained by their enormous superiority in numbers, but though he was very far from despising them as soldiers, he regards them individually as greatly inferior to the soldiers of Western states. His estimate of the inferiority of the Turk was shared by his countrymen and Western statesmen generally,162 but they did not recognise to the same extent as he did how great and ever increasing was the host which had to be fought. Nor did they recognise, as did he, the wonderful mobility of the Turkish army. It was the same error of forgetting their mobility which brought disaster upon Hunyadi at Varna and at Cossovo-pol.

While the first mistake was in underrating the might of the enemy in regard to numbers, warlike spirit, and mobility, the Western powers blundered also in dividing their forces. The sermon before the pope already referred to, on New Year’s Day 1452, called for international concerted action to defend Constantinople, Cyprus, and Rhodes. The mistake was in trying to do too much. On many occasions, as we have seen, the forces sent against the Turk were divided, and an army which might have been sufficiently strong to strike an effective blow against one of the Turkish divisions was defeated in detail when split into two or three, to be sent against Saracens, or to the aid of the military knights, as well as against the Turks.

The one chance of safety for Constantinople now lay in the inhabitants themselves, with such forces as, at the instigation of the pope, should be sent to the aid of the emperor. But to add to the chagrin and difficulties of the aged John at seeing the Christian armies defeated, he had once more formally to promise the sultan that he would not assist any of the enterprises set on foot from the West. Nor did the influence of the disasters upon the emperor and people of Constantinople stop here. A formidable party in the city, headed by the bishop of Ephesus, which was opposed to the Union, and which strongly resented the proceedings at the Council of Florence, was greatly strengthened. Its members pointed to the victories of Murad, and asked, with scorn, what had been gained by the abandonment of their faith. They knew that they had the support of Murad in their opposition to the Unionists, and the fact that they were not forcibly suppressed by the Court party during the reign of John’s successor can probably be best accounted for on the ground that any strong steps taken against their members would be represented to the sultan as a violation of the engagement to have no further intrigues with the West.

The disaster of Cossovo-pol hastened the death of John, which took place on the last day of October 1448, within a few days after he had heard the news.163

In February 1451, his great contemporary, Murad, died at Adrianople. He had been a successful warrior, and, with the exception of his failure to capture Belgrade, had succeeded in most of his enterprises. Gibbon is perhaps justified in speaking of him as a philosopher in matters of religion, but he was relentless in imposing his creed. Cantemir, his eulogist, relates that in Epirus he converted all the churches into mosques, and ordered every male Epirot, under penalty of death, to be forcibly made a Mahometan. He deserves the praises of Turkish writers. Chalcondylas and Ducas recognise in him certain good traits of character. The first says that he was a just and equitable man, and Ducas gives him credit not undeserved for having scrupulously respected the treaties which he made with Mahometans or Christians. His son Mahomet, who now becomes the second sultan of that name in the Ottoman dynasty, was at Magnesia when he heard the news of his father’s death.