Page:The Fall of Constantinople.djvu/24

6 THE PALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE. and the lonir duration of that branch of it with which we are concerned, is due to the fact that the municipal spirit had histed during many centuries after the towns and cities had been brought into subjection to the empire. In the capital itself the population always preserved the forms of its ancient municipality, and usually had a voice in the change of em- perors. Indeed, until the empire fell, it was always neces- sary to satisfy the population of the capital. Although it had no official representation, or nothing better than that provided by the trade-guilds or esnafs, the populace of the city could usually obtain its object by the dread of a riot. Absolutism had gradually undermined the municipal spirit, and was always tempered by fear of the masses of the capital. The soldier had been separated from the citizen. Byzantium preserved the bad tradition of the Elder Eome, which regard- ed with jealousy the attempt of the soldier to become a citizen. It was the duty of the latter to pay taxes and furnish con- scripts, and the emperors had gradually found it more con- venient to receive payment in substitution for military ser- vice, and to find soldiers elsewhere than among the agricul- tural or mercantile population of the empire. The Eoman citizen had at length been forbidden to carry arms. He was placed in subjection to Slavonians, to Italians, to Warings, and to other foreigners, some of whom were mereh^ merce- naries, while others had been invited to settle in Romania in order that they might furnish troops to keep the Roman citi- zen in subjection. But, notwithstanding these changes, the opposition of the masses was a popular power which had to be taken into consideration. It is difficult to form a satisfactory idea of what was the Position of popular conception of the position of the Roman the emperor, empcror in the East during the tenth and two fol- lowing centuries. But I would suggest that the Russia of to- day, with certain important reservations, offers a tolerably close analogy to the position under a Basilian emperor or a Comnenos. The traditional sentiment which had regarded the emperor as divinity lingered on long after the teaching of Christianity