ed vast areas in Europe, Asia, and Africa. For a time, indeed, it
threatened to absorb all Christendom. Adrianople was conquered in 1361
and made the capital of the Turkish Empire. Then, in 1453, after a
memorable siege, Constantinople was captured by the Muhammadans, and
made the capital of the empire.

Orkhan was the first to exact as tribute the strongest and healthiest
male children of all Christian peoples whom he conquered. These youths,
reared as Muhammadans and trained under strict military discipline,
became that efficient body of troops called the Janizaries. For a long
time they were the bulwark of the empire, but at length they became so
dictatorial and powerful that the sultan began to fear them more than he
feared his foreign enemies. In 1825, when the army was reorganized on
the European plan, the Janizaries broke out in open revolt. Then the
reigning sultan unfurled the flag of the Prophet and called upon the
faithful to suppress the rebellious corps. In the contest that ensued it
is estimated that twenty-five thousand of the rebels were put to death,
twenty thousand were banished, and the others disbanded. This was the
end of an epoch of blood-shedding and the beginning of an era of
commerce.

The Russians have always been noted for their love of furs; as a result
a small, fur-bearing animal, the sable, led to the conquest of that vast
realm now known as Siberia.

About the middle of the sixteenth century a rich Russian merchant named
Strogonoff, residing at Kazan, established salt works on the banks of
the Kama, a tributary of the Volga River, and began trading with the
natives. One day, having noticed some strangely dressed travellers and
learning that they came from a country beyond the Ural Mountains, called
Sibir, he despatched some of his agents into that land. On returning,
the employees brought with them the finest sable skins that the
merchant had ever seen. They had been secured for a trifling sum.

Strogonoff began at once to extend the area of his trafficking, and
informed the government of the lucrative commerce that he had opened up.
Valuable concessions were then granted him. A few years afterward a
Cossack officer named Yermak, who had been declared an outlaw by Ivan
the Terrible, gathered together a force of less than one thousand men.
The band was composed of adventurers, freebooters, and criminals, and
the expedition was armed and provisioned by Strogonoff, who expected to
profit