of religion, and that spirit was productive only of animosity and discord.’ The observation or charge would hardly have been made if he had remembered the _ex parte_ character of all the evidence before him. While there is truth in the statement that the spirit of religion produced animosity and discord, it is far from true either that it was the only spirit which actuated the Greeks or that it was productive only of animosity and discord. The Greeks were actuated by their own worldly interest, by their desire to preserve their own lives and property, their own city and their own government. Nor in admitting that they were even deeply animated with the religious spirit, can it successfully be maintained that this spirit only produced animosity. It was the religious spirit which animated Greeks as well as Italians to fight for the honour of God and the benefit of Christianity and thus tended to suppress discord and animosity. Even theological differences did not make the Greeks less eager to prevent a Moslem from taking the place of a Christian emperor. The Greeks differed from and even quarrelled with the Italians and their Romanised fellow citizens, but they regarded Genoese and Italians not merely as fighting for the interests of Venice and Genoa, but as helping them to keep their own, and the evidence is certainly insufficient to show that such animosity and discord as existed prevented Greeks and Italians alike from doing their utmost to keep the common enemy of Christendom out of the city. My reading of the contemporary narratives leads me to conclude that, in spite of the isolated examples of dissensions mentioned by Leonard, of deep differences of opinion on the great religious question, and of constant jealousies between Greeks and Italians and between Venetians and Genoese, the unity of sentiment among the besieged for the defence of the city was well maintained. They might quarrel on minor questions, but on the duty and the desirability of keeping Mahomet out they were united. I doubt the statement as to many defections and, remembering how many and grave the reasons for dissensions were, consider that if they could be shown to have taken place in any considerable numbers it would not be a matter for wonder. [Sidenote: Preparations for a general assault.]