What might have happened if he had been able to attend the Congress at Salona we shall never know. But we feel confident, from a long and close study of Byron's character, that, even if the Government and the chieftains had offered him the throne of Greece, he would have refused it. Not only would such a throne have been, figuratively, poised in air, swayed by every breath which the rival chieftains would have blown upon it, but Byron himself would have been accused, throughout the length and breadth of Europe, of exploiting the sufferings of Greece for his own personal aggrandizement. While we are discussing this question, it is well to understand the position of affairs at the time when the proposal to hold a Congress at Salona was made. The ostensible object of the Congress was to shake hands all round, to let bygones be bygones, and to unite all available forces in a spirit of amity. It was high time. The Morea was troubled by the hostilities between Colocotroni's men and Government factions. Colocotroni[22] himself was shut up in Tripolitza, and his son Pano in Napoli di Romagna. Eastern Greece was more or less tranquil. Odysseus[23] was at Negropont, from whence seven hundred Albanians had lately absconded. The passes of Thermopylæ were insecure. Although Western Greece was for the moment tranquil, life in Missolonghi was not worth an hour's purchase; and there was a serious split between the so-called Odysseans and the party of Mavrocordato, skilfully fostered by both Colonel Stanhope and Odysseus. Though Candia was subdued, the peasantry threatened a rising in the mountains; the Albanians were discontented; and, finally, the Government itself was not sleeping on a bed of roses, for it had most of the great military chiefs dead against it.