Manuel Palaeologos, who had learned from the Venetian Senate the news of Bayezid’s defeat at Angora, hurried home from Europe.[647] He banished John to Lemnos, expelled the Ottoman colonists from Constantinople, and closed their tribunal.[648] To Timur he sent an embassy offering to acknowledge his suzerainty, and expressing his willingness to pay to him the tribute that had been given to Bayezid. But when Timur responded with an order to prepare a fleet to help the Tartar hordes to pass into Europe, Manuel was seized with panic. Smyrna had just fallen, and he felt that a similar fate was now reserved for Constantinople. An ambassador was sent to Rome and Venice to implore the immediate aid of the Vatican and the Senate.[649] Timur, however, had become tired of Asia Minor and the western campaign. He had no constructive policy. He never attempted to organize his conquests into a world empire. Like the earlier conquerors of his race, Timur was a raider. Satiety came with destruction and victory, that is, satiety for the particular conquest in which he was engaged. So he turned his back on Constantinople and the glittering possibilities of a European invasion. He wanted to return to Samarkand to enjoy the fruits of his victories. Perhaps his character was only the reflection of that of his followers. The march had hardly started when Bayezid died at Ak Sheïr, in March, 1403. From this moment Timur forgot all about the Osmanlis. After a brief sojourn at Konia, he left Asia Minor. Within two years he died of fever while on his way to conquer China.[650] XIX After Angora the Ottoman army could have been annihilated; for Timur sent his victorious Tartars hot upon the heels of the refugees. Not only did they follow Soleiman to the Sea of Marmora, and the divisions which had retreated to the Bosphorus, but they pursued closely the main body of the army, which, to the number of possibly forty thousand, had fled along the customary line of march to the Dardanelles.[651] There Greeks and Latins vied in helping the refugees to cross.[652] A Venetian eye-witness of the crossing of the Bosphorus wrote that the Venetians in good faith offered to join with the Genoese in refusing to transport the Osmanlis who were crowded upon the Asiatic shore. But the Genoese started secretly to ferry them over to Europe, with the aid of the Greeks. Then the Venetians, fearing to lose favour with the Osmanlis, started in to help.[653] This testimony is corroborated by Clavijo, who visited Constantinople in the following year. He adds that Timur was disgusted with the way the Greeks and Latins failed to co-operate with him in destroying the Ottoman army.[654]