him should have promised. His younger brother, D'jem, better known under
the name of Zizimeh, had argued that whereas he was born in the
purple--that is, born during the reign of Mahomet--Bajazet was born
prior to his epoch, and was therefore the son of a private individual.
This was rather a poor trick; but where force is all and right is naught,
it was good enough to stir up a war. The two brothers, each at the head
of an army, met accordingly in Asia in 1482. D'jem was defeated after a
seven hours' fight, and pursued by his brother, who gave him no time to
rally his army: he was obliged to embark from Cilicia, and took refuge in
Rhodes, where he implored the protection of the Knights of St. John.
They, not daring to give him an asylum in their island so near to Asia,
sent him to France, where they had him carefully guarded in one of their
commanderies, in spite of the urgency of Cait Bey, Sultan of Egypt, who,
having revolted against Bajazet, desired to have the young prince in his
army to give his rebellion the appearance of legitimate warfare. The
same demand, moreover, with the same political object, had been made
successively by Mathias Corvinus, King of Hungary, by Ferdinand, King of
Aragon and Sicily, and by Ferdinand, King of Naples.

On his side Bajazet, who knew all the importance of such a rival, if he
once allied himself with any one of the princes with whom he was at war,
had sent ambassadors to Charles VIII, offering, if he would consent to
keep D'jem with him, to give him a considerable pension, and to give to
France the sovereignty of the Holy Land, so soon as Jerusalem should be
conquered by the Sultan of Egypt. The King of France had accepted these
terms.

But then Innocent VIII had intervened, and in his turn had claimed D'jem,
ostensibly to give support by the claims of the refugee to a crusade
which he was preaching against the Turks, but in reality to appropriate