The news that Constantinople had fallen and that the Emperor had been slain came like a thunderbolt upon his wretched brothers, who naturally expected that they would be the next victims. But Mohammed was not in a hurry; he knew that he could annihilate them when he chose; meanwhile he was content to accept an annual tribute of 12,000 ducats. The folly of the greedy Byzantine officials, who held the chief posts at the petty courts of Patras and Mistra, had prepared, however, a new danger for the Despots. The Albanian colonists had multiplied while the Greek population had diminished; and the recent Turkish devastations had increased the extent of waste land where they could pasture their sheep. Fired by the great exploits of their countryman, Skanderbeg, in Albania, they were seized by one of those rare yearnings for independence which meet us only occasionally in Albanian history. The official mind seized this untoward moment to demand a higher tax from the Albanian lands. The reply of the shepherds was a general insurrection in which 30,000 Albanians followed the lead of their chieftain, Peter Boua, “the lame.” Their object was to expel the Greeks from the peninsula; but this, of course, did not prevent other Greeks, dissatisfied, for reasons of their own, with the rule of the Despots, from throwing in their lot with the Albanians. A Cantacuzene gained the support of the insurgents for his claims on Mistra by taking an Albanian name; the bastard son of Centurione emerged from prison and was proclaimed as Prince of Achaia. Both Mistra and Patras were besieged; and it soon became clear that nothing but Turkish intervention could save the Morea from becoming an Albanian principality. Accordingly, the aid of the invincible Turakhan was again solicited; and, as Mohammed believed in the policy—long followed in Macedonia by his successors—of keeping the Christian races as evenly balanced as possible, the Turkish general was sent to suppress the revolt without utterly destroying the revolted. Turakhan carried out his instructions with consummate skill. He soon put down the insurgents, but allowed them to retain their stolen cattle and the waste lands which they had occupied, on payment of a fixed rent. He then turned to the two Despots and gave them the excellent advice to live as brothers, to be lenient to their subjects, and to be vigilant in the prevention of disturbances. Needless to say, his advice was not taken.