"The entrance to the Seraglio, the shore under the Sultan's windows, and the sea itself, are crowded with dead bodies--many of them torn and in part devoured by the dogs."[46] Théophile Gautier adds even more gruesome details. To the destruction of the Janissaries was added that of the Becktash derviches. Then the new army was formed, organized, drilled. For the rest of his reign, Mahmûd's chief thought was to perfect the reforms which he had inaugurated in blood. When in 1834 he struck coins bearing his own portrait, so grave a breach of the rules of the Koran caused another insurrection. It was suppressed with fearful severity, and added four thousand victims to the tale. But the coinage had to be called in. Fanatics, whom the people regarded as saints, coveted martyrdom by seizing the Sultan's bridle as he rode over the new bridge which he had made from Galata to Stambûl, calling him "Giaour Padishah" and paying Heaven's vengeance on his head. Nothing moved Mahmûd. Without, misfortunes befell his power on every side. He held steadfastly on, and when he died in 1839, he left behind him a strong government, and an appearance--it may have been little more--of approximation to the ways of Western Europe. The aim of Mahmûd, indeed, was not unlike that of Peter the Great: he wished to make his State an integral part of the European system. Hitherto, admitted though she was into European politics, coveted as ally and dreaded as a foe, Turkey had occupied no place among the permanent factors of European politics. Mahmûd thought to make Turkey, really and essentially, a European power. It was impossible. The external events of the reign, the revolt of Mohammed Ali, the treaty of Adrianople, the creation of Greece as an independent State, important as they were in the history of the Ottoman power, hardly affected Constantinople. In 1832, Stratford Canning returned on a special mission to Constantinople. He found the outer change extraordinary. Mahmûd received him as an European sovereign would receive. He began to think a real reform of Turkey possible. He secured the concession that he sought on behalf of Greece: "The new Hellas was lifted up to that great mountain ridge whence the eye of the traveller may range unchecked over the pastures of Thessaly." Canning, after renewed experience of the delays and intrigues of the Turkish ministers, bade farewell to the Sultan for the last time. His character of Mahmûd is too important to be omitted from our view. It may well conclude what we have to say of the most important reign in recent Turkish history.