Hunyadi returned to Hungary, and hastened to forget the injury done to him by the Servian prince; but the Turks he did not forget. In his most desperate straits he steadily kept before his eyes—the main object of his life—the ruin of the Turks. In 1453, the child-king, Ladislaus V., began his reign; but, although Hunyadi then relinquished his position as governor of Hungary, he still remained the captain-general of the country, the commander-in-chief of the army, and as such he missed no opportunity to injure his arch-enemy. This same year, 1453, witnessed a most remarkable event in the history of Europe. Mohammed II., the new sultan, took Constantinople, the capital of the Greek empire and the gate of Europe, and made it the capital of his empire. “There is one God in heaven, and one Lord on earth, and I am that Lord!” exclaimed the sultan on entering Constantinople. All Europe trembled; Hunyadi alone remained calm and prepared for war. After a few minor engagements, Turks and Hungarians stood face to face again near Belgrade in 1456. This fortress was the gate of Hungary, and the great sultan wanted to get possession of it. For this purpose he determined to make a supreme effort, feeling that the seizure of this fortified place would decide the fate of generations to come. He led over 150,000 men under the walls of that famous fortress, and hastened to station his ships on the Danube, on which Belgrade lies, in order to cut off the communication between the Hungarian army and the garrison, and thus to isolate the latter. The Hungarian army itself did not number, even now, over 15,000 men, hardly more than those whom Hunyadi had been able to collect by his own exertions. Only this time, however, the great captain did not stand alone, but received great help from another quarter. A monk of magic eloquence, John Capistrano, who was sent by the pope to the country to preach a crusade, had, by the irresistible power of his appeals, collected 60,000 crusaders to assist Hunyadi. These men were armed with scythes and pole-axes only, and were led by the sound of bells instead of words of military command; but their fanaticism was quite equal to that of the Mohammedan Turk.