were several devoted partisans of reform. The most influential of these was Mustapha Bairaktar, Pacha of Rustchuk, who set out in July 1808, at the head of 18,000 men, to restore Selim to the throne. He succeeded in taking possession of the capital, and keeping the Sultan so long in ignorance of his designs, until he sent him orders to resign the throne in favour of Selim. As the Sultan had only one hour allowed him for consideration, he was so helpless that he followed the advice of the Mufti and had Selim cruelly murdered. As the gates of the Seraglio were not opened at the appointed time, and Bairaktar hurried up to enforce his authority, Selim's lifeless body was thrown over the wall. Upon this the Pacha ordered the Seraglio to be stormed, seized the Sultan, destroyed all those who had advised the abolition of the plans of reform, and placed Mustapha's younger brother on the throne. Mahmud II, the second son of Abd-ul-Hamid, was born on the 2nd July, 1785, and was consequently twenty-three years of age when he ascended the throne. … Mahmud appointed Mustapha Bairaktar his Grand Vizier, and, regardless of the fate of his predecessor, restored all the measures of reform which Selim had undertaken. Within three months the Janissaries were again in open rebellion, and on the night of the 14th November, 1808, attacked the Seymens, destroyed a great number of them, and, after storming the new barracks, forced their way into the Grand Vizier's palace. He fled and appealed to the people for help, but the greater portion abused him as a renegade and joined the rebels. Bairaktar recognised his impending fate, but still ordered the execution of Mustapha, for fear he might reascend the throne. After this he retired with a body of Seymens into a stone tower, where he had before collected a quantity of gunpowder. He defended himself here for some time, but, at last, when the Janissaries rushed up in larger masses to the attack, he blew up the tower. The Janissaries then attacked the Seraglio, and, but for the fact that Mahmud was the last legitimate descendant of the race of Osman, they would have taken his life. But even this, probably, would not have saved him, had he not sent a deputation to the insurgents and given an unconditional assent to their demands. … As an additional guarantee for his own safety on the throne, ensanguined with the blood of his uncle and his brother, Mahmud ordered his brother's son, a child of three months old, to be strangled, and four of the Sultanas to be thrown into the Bosphorus. The reign of Mahmud is one of the longest and most important in the whole of Turkish history. It commenced with war. The Emperor Alexander menaced him on the Danube: the Hospodar of Servia, Czerny George, had rebelled against him. The campaign of the Turks in 1809, was, consequently, not a prosperous one.