Accordingly though I was under no delusion as to the extent of the danger I was incurring, and should have much preferred to hand over the duty to another, still, since I could not find a substitute, I was obliged to obey the wish of my most kind and considerate Sovereign—a wish which to me was law. As soon as he had returned from the session of the Imperial Diet,[151] and had given me an interview, in the course of which I informed him of the state of our negotiations with Solyman, he ordered me to hold myself in readiness to carry back his answer to the Sultan.
It was winter, and the weather was bad, being wet, cold, and windy, when I was ordered back to Constantinople with despatches which could hardly be acceptable to those to whom I went. Here you will exclaim at my infatuation in venturing a second time on such a risk. I cannot look on it in this light. It seems to me that what was the right course before must be the right course now. And surely the proper measure of the credit to be attached to an honourable act, is the amount of toil and danger involved in its accomplishment.
In the month of November I left Vienna to retrace my steps to the shores of the Euxine. I have no intention of abusing your patience by wearying you with a repetition of the trifling occurrences which befell me on my way, for I think you must have been so bored with the account of my former journey, as hardly yet to have recovered from its effects. Repetition is all the more needless, because we took almost identically the same route as before.
Early in January I reached Constantinople, after losing one of my companions from an attack of acute fever, brought on by the hardships of the road. I found my colleagues safe and sound, but a great change had taken place in the Turkish Government. Bajazet, the younger son of Solyman, had been delivered from a position of serious danger, and forgiven by his father. Achmet Pasha,[152] the Chief Vizier, had been strangled; and Roostem restored to his former honours.
Of these things more anon. I will now tell you of the unfavourable reception I had from the Sultan, the Pashas, and the rest of the Turks.
In accordance with their usual practice before admitting an ambassador to the presence of their Sovereign, the Pashas desired me to tell them the purport of the answer with which I was entrusted; on learning that his Majesty declined to make any concession, and insisted on his right to the fulfilment of the treaty which he had fairly and honestly negotiated with the widow and son of John the Voivode[153] (i.e. Governor) of Transylvania, the wrath and indignation of the Pashas knew no bounds. A long career of success has made the Turks so arrogant, that they consider their pleasure to be the sole rule of what is right and what is wrong.