The Janissaries were first instituted for the protection of the throne and person of the sultan; the army being then composed of the victorious Turkomans, who had become turbulent, and were ready to take the reins of government into their own hands. A new militia was consequently instituted by Mourad, composed of young prisoners of war, who were brought up in the Moslem faith: and, in contradistinction to the existing army, were denominated Yeni-tcheri, or new soldiers.

With the design of giving more solemnity to the new order, the founder resorted to the aid of religion, and they were blessed by a famous sheikh, Hadji-Bektash,1 who extending his arms over the troops, invoked the blessing of Allah, and predicted their future victories, pronouncing these words:

“Let them be called Yeni-tcheries. May their countenance ever be bright! their hand victorious! their sword keen! May their spear always hang over the head of their enemies, and wheresoever they go, may they return with a white face!”

Their uniform consisted of loose trousers, and long, flowing robes, tucked up. Their head-gear, when in full dress, was very peculiar. A round cap of grey felt, with a long piece of the same hanging behind, in commemoration of the loose sleeve of the saint, which was suspended over their heads when he extended his arms to bless their institution.

They were armed with sabres, scimitars, pistols, yataghans, muskets, constituting, as it were, a peripatetic model arsenal.

Their mode of warfare was quite primitive; each fighting on his own responsibility.

From their earliest years, these Christian slaves snatched from the bosom of their families, were inured to all sorts of hardships, and to perfect resignation to the will of their superiors. They were diligently trained in the art of war, and every trace of their parents and native country being obliterated from their minds, their only aim was to promote the interest and glory of their lord and sultan, and they were, for many centuries, justly distinguished for the excellence of their discipline, and for their indomitable courage.

But, owing to their constant successes, they at last began to consider themselves invincible, and by degrees becoming insolent, respected neither the laws nor even the sultan himself. They thus turned that power, which was originally the defence and glory of the country, to its ruin and destruction; and many were the sultans who fell victims to their audacity and rebellion.

Sultan Selim III., in his attempt to reform them, was sacrificed to their fury.

They were, in reality, the ruling power in the country: dethroning sultans, and taking off the heads of ministers at their will. They were upheld in all their excesses by the people, from a dread of their vengeance, many of whom, from motives of personal safety, even enlisted as honorary members of their corps. For, even the assassin could find a secure asylum in their barracks, from which no power or authority could claim him.

Nothing was sacred in their estimation; families dared not to venture abroad without a janissary escort; and, on this account, the different foreign embassies were always accommodated with two or three of their number, which custom is still in vogue; though Kavasses, or Turkish police officers, have been substituted for the janissaries of former times.

Even the royal harem was not safe from them, and neither life nor property were secure from their depredations.

Besides their regular rations, their pay was at the rate of from one asper to twenty, according to their rank, per day. An asper was, at that time, equal to one cent of Federal money. But they had various ways of increasing their personal revenues.

They assumed a peculiar style of taxing the peaceable citizens, by carelessly tossing their handkerchiefs at them, with an intimation that their pockets needed replenishing, and none dared to return the handkerchief without a tribute tied in one of its corners.

Those who were stationed in the city as metropolitan guards, generally contrived to amass a quantity of mud before the guardhouse, which they would ask all the rayahs who passed by, either to sweep away, or contribute something for its removal.

The day of their revolt was most memorable, and our own janissary boatman coolly put the number and mark of his regiment upon the street-door of our residence, as an intimation to his comrades that the house was already appropriated by one of the brotherhood.

Assassination was a matter of frequent occurrence in those days. The father of the writer once narrowly escaped with his life.

He happened to be passing by a shop, where a janissary was examining a yataghan with a view of purchasing it.

“Stop,” cried the janissary, to him, “come here, I want to test this blade on you.”

He knew the character of those villains too well to suppose that the rascal was joking—as a forlorn hope, he indifferently remarked, “that it would be hardly worth the while to try such an exquisite blade on my old tottering body,” at the same time suggesting, that it would be better for his excellency to accept the sword as a gift, with the view of trying it on some worthier subject, and throwing the money to the merchant, the old gentleman very suddenly disappeared.

Imbued with the wildest fanaticism, and with all the prejudices of ancient times, and habituated to command rather than to obey, these janissaries constituted the most effectual barrier to all progress or national reform.

Indeed, their outrageous conduct was often the principal cause of war with foreign nations—and a stigma upon their country.

Any monarch, then, who appreciated the real interest of his subjects, and could anticipate the future downfall of his country, would be impelled to annihilate this scourge.

Eternal gratitude is due to the illustrious Mahmoud, who at last, accomplished this task. A man of remarkable energy and discernment, more inspired with the spirit of civilization and modern reform than any of his predecessors; with a determination and perseverance unparalleled in the history of his country, Mahmoud effected this coup d’État, and has justly been designated of “Glorious memory.”

He first gained over to himself the renowned HÜssein Pasha, who was then the Agha or chief of the janissaries; then Kara-Jehennem or Black-Hell, the chief of the artillery, and Bostangy-Bashi, the head of the life-guards; with the co-operation of these personages a system of military reform was ordered, requiring all the soldiery to be regularly drilled, and to adopt a certain uniform better suited to military life, than the flowing robes and cumbersome head gears they had hitherto worn.

The artillery corps and the life-guards cheerfully submitted to this order, but the janissaries considered this change of costume as an innovation upon long established customs, and averse to any military discipline, there arose great dissatisfaction among them; and, as usual, they commissioned the Kool-Keahiassi, their representative, to remonstrate with his majesty, upon whose refusal to listen to their murmurs, they determined on rebellion.

Having no suspicions of their chief, HÜssein-Pasha, according to his counsel and public proclamation, the janissaries all assembled in their own barracks, at the great square of Et-Meydan, nearly in the centre of the city, to be in readiness to resist any attempt on the part of the sultan, to enforce his edict.

The sultan being informed of this circumstance, he, on his part, issued a proclamation that all good Mussulmans should repair to the holy standard of the Prophet in the court of the seraglio.

This standard is never brought out except in cases of great emergency, and no Mussulman would refuse to repair to it when summoned. Accordingly all the Mussulman citizens, the artillery and the life-guards, who hated the janissaries, assembled at the seraglio and proceeded in a body to the great rallying point of the rebels, where they met with a warm reception from the barrack windows of the janissaries, who, confident in their own sheltered position, were sure of a glorious victory.

But they were soon undeceived; for, by the order of Kara-Jehennem, two field pieces had been slily transported to the very doors of the barracks, whose first discharge shattered the gates and prostrated hundreds of the rebels.

The janissaries now desperate, rushed to seize the cannon, which were just reloading: and had it not been for the heroic action of Kara-Jehennem at this critical emergency, all would have been lost. The brave general perceiving the nature of the affair, and although wounded as he was in the thigh, promptly jumped from his horse, and seizing the torch, instantly applied it to the cannon, and thus baffling the attempts of the assailants, soon turned the scale of fortune.

All resistance was now rendered futile by the barracks being set on fire, when amidst shrieks of agony the miserable wretches were, on the 15th of June, 1826, destroyed. Many among them were allowed to effect their escape, with the design of sparing the innocent. The most dangerous of their number were afterwards arrested and sent to the European castles on the Bosphorus, where their doom was sealed by the bow-string, and thus perished this formidable scourge of the Ottoman Empire.

Many censures and much opprobrium have been cast upon the memory of Mahmoud for this act of consummate destruction. He has been stigmatized as cruel and blood-thirsty, whereas his whole country was groaning under a scourge of tremendous power, in the shape of an unlicensed soldiery.

Day by day, the monster grew in strength, and threatened the utter annihilation of both sovereign and people. What greater act of humanity then, than to crush the Hydra with one fell blow.

By this act Mahmoud not only established his own sovereign authority, but bursting, for the first time, the bonds of barbarism, made a bold stride towards the platform of civilization, and the fraternity of the world. But for Mahmoud, Turkey would, perhaps, have, ere this, been only a record of the past.

The army was immediately re-organized, and the soldiers were trained in European tactics, by distinguished foreign officers.

They attained great distinction as infantry and artillery-men, and still greater progress would have been made in military science, had it not been for the intrigues of Russia, who, just at that period, availing herself of the forlorn condition of the country, found a favorable opportunity for declaring war.

The Allies of the present day, not discerning the Muscovite cunning, were quiet spectators of the affray, and became as it were silent partners in the shameful treaty of Adrianople, for which they have since paid so dearly.

But the janissaries were not the sole barriers to the civilization of the country. The Ulema, or the expounders of the faith, have exercised even greater influence over the minds of the superstitious people, through their unlimited spiritual authority.