be carried on, and where a large army could not subsist.

In repairing to the posts assigned to them, these troops committed
such terrible depredations that the provinces sent to Constantinople
demanding their suppression. The Divan answered the petitioners that it
was their own business to suppress these disorders, and to induce the
Klephotes to turn their arms against Ali, who had nothing to hope from
the clemency of the Grand Seigneur. At the same time circular letters
were addressed to the Epirotes, warning them to abandon the cause of
a rebel, and to consider the best means of freeing themselves from a
traitor, who, having long oppressed them, now sought to draw down on
their country all the terrors of war. Ali, who everywhere maintained
numerous and active spies, now redoubled his watchfulness, and not
a single letter entered Epirus without being opened and read by his
agents. As an extra precaution, the guardians of the passes were
enjoined to slay without mercy any despatch-bearer not provided with
an order signed by Ali himself; and to send to Janina under escort any
travellers wishing to enter Epirus. These measures were specially aimed
against Suleyman Pacha, who had succeeded Veli in the government of
Thessaly, and replaced Ali himself in the office of Grand Provost of the
Highways. Suleyman's secretary was a Greek called Anagnorto, a native
of Macedonia, whose estates Ali had seized, and who had fled with his
family to escape further persecution. He had become attached to the
court party, less for the sake of vengeance on Ali than to aid the cause
of the Greeks, for whose freedom he worked by underhand methods. He
persuaded Suleyman Pacha that the Greeks would help him to dethrone Ali,
for whom they cherished the deepest hatred, and he was determined
that they should learn the sentence of deprivation and excommunication
fulminated against the rebel pacha. He introduced into the Greek
translation which he was commissioned to make, ambiguous phrases which