Stahremberg has been by some blamed for postponing so long the destruction of the suburbs. Others would have been found to blame him if, while a hope or a possibility remained of an abandonment of their undertaking by the Turks, he had given so many costly public edifices, so many abodes of luxury and comfort, so much wealth, to the flames. To the last moment that hope was probably entertained—that possibility might reasonably be held to exist. The disputes in the Turkish council were no secret, and perhaps were exaggerated in the imperfect reports which reached Vienna. The movement on Vienna might be an empty menace; even if serious, it might be frustrated by a counter-advance of the forces of the Empire. If these or other possible contingencies had occurred, what complaints of ruined proprietors would have assailed him—what a stigma of useless barbarity would chroniclers have attached to the name since become so famous! The circumstances were very different in 1529. The suburban buildings of that day were of far less extent and value, but approached much nearer to the city; and the necessity of their demolition was much more palpable, inasmuch as after the fall of Pesth the advance of such a leader as Soliman was a matter of far greater certainty than that of the Vizier in this instance; the more so because in the former case there was no regular force whatever to oppose the invasion—in the present, an army of some strength, well disciplined, and ably commanded, was in the path of the invader. The ultimate event certainly justified the wary advice of the old Pacha of Pesth, but it was rather in the execution of his plan than in its conception that the Vizier can now be held to have failed. If Vienna had fallen, we should have heard little of the rashness of the rapid and daring march by which so great a blow had been struck, and the operation would have been possibly considered as an anticipation of the system of Napoleon by a semi-barbarian but kindred genius. As such indeed it is now considered by some military critics. CHAPTER VIII. From the 13th to the 19th July.