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Thus I have long since recalled to my service a great number of Suliotes, and those who have responded to my invitation are occupying important posts near my person. To complete the reconciliation, I have written to those who are still in exile, desiring them to return fearlessly to their country, and I have certain information that this proposal has been everywhere accepted with enthusiasm.
The Suliotes were, however, still exorbitant, calling for fresh contributions for themselves and their families. His troubles were increasing, and every new rush of the angry tide rose nearer and nearer his heart; still his fortitude enabled him to preserve an outward show of equanimity.
You know that their town was the haunt of my enemies, and each time that I appealed to them to change their ways they answered only with insults and threats. They constantly aided the Suliotes with whom I was at war; and if at this moment they still were occupying Parga, you would see them throw open the gates of Epirus to the forces of the sultan.
On the winding up of this war, we find part of them at least an object of indulgent solicitude to the British government, and under their protection transferred to Cephalonia. Gordon assures us that "almost all the Suliotes were exterminated."
The Suliotes will soon return to their ancestral houses, and, reunited under my standard, will join me in combating the Osmanlis, our common enemies. "As to the avarice of which I am accused, it seems easily justified by the constant necessity I was under of satisfying the inordinate cupidity of the Ottoman ministry, which incessantly made me pay dearly for tranquillity.
Colonel Stanhope on receiving this despatch, which was carried to him by two of Lord Byron's servants, sent two armed boats, and a company of Suliotes, to escort his Lordship to Missolonghi, where he arrived on the 5th of January, and was received with military honours, and the most enthusiastic demonstrations of popular joy. No mark of respect which the Greeks could think of was omitted.
Ali contrived first of all to trepan the matchless leader of the Suliotes, Captain Foto Giavella, who was a hero after the most exquisite model of ancient Greece, Epaminondas, or Timoleon, and whose counsels were uniformly wise and honest.
To-day I have taken a warm bath, and live as temperately as can well be, without any liquid but water, and without any animal food"; then adverting to the turbulences of the Suliotes, he adds, "but I still hope better things, and will stand by the cause as long as my health and circumstances will permit me to be supposed useful."
But the gradual spread of liberal ideas which followed the French Revolution; the bravery which distinguished the resistance of certain sections of the Hellenic peoples, such as the Suliotes, and Spakiots of Crete; the aspirations of Ali Pacha, who conceived the idea of severing his connection with the Sultan and assuming the independent government of Albania; the impunity with which the Klephts or pirates pursued their calling in the Levant, all combined to demonstrate the real weakness of the Turkish rule, and at last brought about a national rising.
After paying the fleet, which indeed had only come out in the expectation of receiving the arrears from the loan he had promised to Mavrocordato, he resolved to form a brigade of Suliotes. Five hundred of the remains of Marco Botzaris's gallant followers were accordingly taken into his pay.
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