Annals of the Turkish Empire, from 1591 to 1659Naima, Mustafa
History
Annals of the Turkish Empire, from 1591 to 1659
Naima, Mustafa
Turkey -- History -- 1453-1683
The enemy, after the burning of their bridge, tried to repair their
loss by building another, in which labour they spent another twenty
days; but it also met with the fate of the former. Finding themselves
thus a second time foiled in their attempts, they commenced building
boats of fir-wood at the head of the Berk, which they covered over
with boards, over which they again placed cow-hides, with the view of
preventing the small arms of the besieged injuring those on board of
them. After having launched this flotilla, each of which carried one
hundred men, the infidels, on the night on which this took place, began
to make great rejoicings. Hasan Páshá, in the meantime, and on the same
night, sent out a party to try and seize some prisoners, who returned
with two. On their being presented before the páshá, he asked one of
them, privately, the cause of the enemy’s rejoicing; and was answered
that it was owing to the great success which had attended their arms
at Alba Julia. “How comes it to pass,” asked the páshá, “that all the
prisoners which we have hitherto taken belong to your nation (Germany)?
Are there no Hungarians and Croatians among you?” “Why,” answered the
prisoner, “the Hungarians are favourable to the Turks, and therefore
none of them are allowed to straggle from the camp.” The páshá again
asked him what number of Hungarians there might be in the army? He was
told, that besides Croatians, there were about thirty thousand in it.
After having thus questioned the first prisoner, he called the other
and questioned him in the same way, and he returned similar answers to
those given a little before by his fellow prisoner. The páshá, with
a stern voice, ordered the prisoners to be led forth, and to have
their heads struck off; secretly intimating, however, to Karah Omar,
to whom this order was given, to take the prisoners and show them the
one hundred and fifty pandúrs and the five hundred Hungarian horsemen
who had accompanied the waggons of provisions which had entered Kaniza
about the time the siege was begun, and whom the páshá had retained.
“Tell them,” said the páshá to Karah Omar Aghá, “that they are all
Hungarians, and that we expect a thousand volunteers of the same race
to join us in two or three days more. Say to them,” continued the
sagacious páshá, “that you yourself are one of their nation (Germany),
but that you have been in the service of the páshá since your youth;
that you have a thousand men under your command; that you have got so
much property that you cannot think of relinquishing it: that you will
be extremely happy if the German army succeed in taking Kaniza, but
that there are many amongst them who wish for no such thing; that there
is provision in the garrison of Kaniza sufficient for a whole year
to supply the number of inhabitants within it, who amount to thirty
thousand Turks alone; that there is abundance of gunpowder in it also:
then invite them to wait till the ice is formed, when you will let them
away.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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