392 THE DECLINE AND FALL the mariners only were left in the vessels ; the soldiers, horses, and arms were safely landed ; and, in the luxury of an Imperial palace, the barons tasted the first-fruits of their success. On the third day, the fleet and army moved towards Scutari, the Asiatic suburb of Constantinople ; a detachment of Greek horse was surprised and defeated by fourscore French knights ; and, in a halt of nine days, the camp was plentifully svipplied with forage and provisions. Fmitiess 111 relating the invasion of a great empire, it may seem strange the emperor that I liavc not described the obstacles which should have checked the progress of the strangers. The Greeks, in truth, were an unwarlike people ; but they were rich, industrious, and subject to the will of a single man, had that man been capable of fear when his enemies were at a distance, or of courage when they approached his person. The first rumour of his nephew's alliance with the French and Venetians was despised by the usurper Alexius ; his flatterers persuaded him that in his con- tempt he was bold and sincere ; and each evening, in the close of the banquet, he thrice discomfited the barbarians of the West. These barbarians had been justly terrified by the report of his naval power ; and the sixteen hundred fishing-boats of Constantinople "' could have manned a fleet to sink them in the Adriatic, or stop their entrance in the mouth of the Hellespont. But all force may be annihilated by the negligence of the prince and the venality of his ministers. The great duke, or admiral, made a scandalous, almost a public auction of the sails, the masts, and the rigging ; the royal forests were reserved for the more important purpose of the chase ; and the trees, says Nice- tas, were guarded by the eunuchs like the groves of religious worship. 2 From this dream of pride Alexius was awakened by the siege of Zara and the rapid advances of the Latins : as soon as he saw the danger was real, he thought it inevitable, and his vain presumption was lost in abject despondency and despair. He suffered these contemptible barbarians to pitch their camp in the sight of the palace ; and his apprehensions were thinly disguised by the pom)) and menace of a suppliant embassy. The sovereign of the Romans was astonished (his '2 Eandem urbem pins in soils navibiis piscatorem abundare, quam illos in toto navigio. Habebat enini mille et sexcentas piscatorias naves . . . Rellicas autcm sive mercatorias habebant infinitne multitudinis et portum tutissimuni. Gunther, Hist. C. P. c. 8, p. lo. '■* KaOdirep tepoji- aAffe'coi', CLTTetr 6e /cat ^fo^irturo)!' nnpa^ricrwr €'/>et5oi'T0 rouTwri. Nicelas in Ale.x. Con)neno, 1. iii. c. 9, p. 348,
