Two years afterwards the ambassador has to tell Lord ARUNDEL a mingled story of failure and success: ‘The command you required for the Greeke to be sent into Morea I have sollicitted [of] two viziers, one after the other, butt they both rejected mee and gave answere, that it was no tyme to graunt such priviledges. Neare to the port they have not so great doubt and therefore I have prevailed with another, and [have] sent Mr. MARKHAM, assisted with a letter from the Caplen Bassa, whose jurisdiction extends to all the islands and sea-ports.... On Asia side, about Troy, Zizicum, and all the way to Aleppo, are innumerable pillars, statues, and tombstones of marble, with inscriptions in Greeke. [Sidenote: _Ibid._, 10 May, 1623, _Negotiations_, p. 154.] These may be fetcht at charge, and secrettly; butt yf wee ask leave it cannot be obteyned; therefore Mr. MARKHAM will use discretion rather then power, and so the Turks will bring them for their proffitt.’ ROE’S report encouraged Lord ARUNDEL to send an agent, named PETTY, on a special exploring mission into various parts of the Ottoman Empire. The agent thus selected was eminently fitted for his task, and showed himself to be a man of untiring industry. Very soon after PETTY’S arrival at Constantinople, Sir Thomas ROE wrote to the Duke of BUCKINGHAM an account of his successful researches, and he prefaced it with an acknowledgement that ‘by conference with Mr. PETTY, sent hither by my Lord of ARUNDELL, I have somewhat bettered my sckill in such figures. We have searched all this cyttye,’ he proceeds to say, ‘and found nothing but upon one gate, called anciently _Porta Aurea_, built by CONSTANTINE, bewtifyed with two mighty pillars, and upon the sides and over it, twelve tables of fine marble cutt into historyes,—some of a very great relevo, sett into the wall with small pillars as supporters. Most of the figures are equall; some above the life some less. [Sidenote: Roe to the Duke of Buckingham, 11 May, 1625, _Negotiations_, pp. 386–7.] They are—in my eye—extremely decayed, but Mr. PETTY doth so prayse them, as that he hath not seene much better in the great and costly collections of Italye.... The fower to which I have most affection ... are both brave and sweete.... The relevo so high that they are almost statues, and doe but seeme to sticke to the ground.’