The origin of this standard is remarkable. When the Prophet lay on his death-bed at Medina, while his mind was full of his projected conquest of Syria, he summoned the chiefs of his host around him to hear his last orders and wishes. While listening to his dying utterances in silence and awe, Ayesha, the most beautiful and best beloved of his wives, rushed into the room, and, tearing down a green curtain which screened one end thereof, threw it before the chiefs, and desired them to display it as the holy banner of Islam, and this was actually done in many subsequent wars against the Christians and others. By some it was said to have been the curtain that hung before the apartments of Ayesha; and it has been permanently lodged in the Seraglio at Constantinople, and is generally brought forth on the occasion of a new sultan being girt with the sword of Osman, or Othman; but it may shrewdly be doubted whether this banner--the present _Tanjak-Sherif_--is the same that was unfurled at Bedr, and which was upheld by nine hundred and fifty of Mahomet's disciples against the whole power of Mecca, at Ohod, a mountain northward of Medina, when Hamza, the uncle of the Prophet, fell. Though unvarying faith and tradition carry it back to the days of Mahomet, there can be little doubt that it is the identical banner which, in 1683, Kara Mustapha, nephew of the great Cuprogli, hoisted on the walls of Vienna, though that city was not completely conquered. Its display is always attended with much pomp and ceremony. When unfurled it is always handed to the Scheik-ul-Islam, or Grand Mufti, who combines in his own person the supreme power of the law with the highest office of religion, who mounted on a caparisoned steed, and, attended by the Sultan, bearing a drawn scimitar, rides in procession through the streets of Constantinople, escorted by the _Ulemas_, whose duty it is to proclaim that war has been declared against the unbelievers. The scheik then assigns it to the Commander-in-chief, whose duty it is to see that it is always borne in front in battle. It is a veritable banner of blood, denying mercy to man, woman, and child, on the display of which, as the Koran has it, "the earth will shake, the mountains sink into dust, the seas blaze with fire, and the hair of children grow white with anguish;" but for more than three generations it has never been brought forth in hostility--at least, not since the Empress Catharine sought to reinstate the Christian Empire at Constantinople. Upon it is the dubious motto, "All who draw the sword in the cause of Faith shall be rewarded with temporal advantages." The Turks and Tartars were wont to make use of horses' tails for their ensigns, and the number of these denoted the rank of their commanders--the Sultan having seven, and the grand vizier only three, &c.