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the privy seal, the archives, and the red or purple ink which was reserved for the sacred signature of the emperor alone. ^43 The introductor and interpreter of foreign ambassadors were the great Chiauss ^44 and the Dragoman, ^45 two names of Turkish origin, and which are still familiar to the Sublime Porte. 3. From the humble style and service of guards, the Domestics insensibly rose to the station of generals; the military themes of the East and West, the legions of Europe and Asia, were often divided, till the great Domestic was finally invested with the universal and absolute command of the land forces. The Protostrator, in his original functions, was the assistant of the emperor when he mounted on horseback: he gradually became the lieutenant of the great Domestic in the field; and his jurisdiction extended over the stables, the cavalry, and the royal train of hunting and hawking. The Stratopedarch was the great judge of the camp: the Protospathaire commanded the guards; the Constable, ^46 the great Aeteriarch, and the Acolyth, were the separate chiefs of the Franks, the Barbarians, and the Varangi, or English, the mercenary strangers, who, a the decay of the national spirit, formed the nerve of the Byzantine armies. 4. The naval powers were under the command of the great Duke; in his absence they obeyed the great Drungaire of the fleet; and, in his place, the Emir, or Admiral, a name of Saracen extraction, ^47 but which has been naturalized in all the modern languages of Europe. Of these officers, and of many more whom it would be useless to enumerate, the civil and military hierarchy was framed. Their honors and emoluments, their dress and titles, their mutual salutations and respective preeminence, were balanced with more exquisite labor than would have fixed the constitution of a free people; and the code was almost perfect when this baseless fabric, the monument of pride and servitude, was forever buried in the ruins of the empire. ^48

[Footnote 41: Par exstans curis, solo diademate dispar, Ordine pro rerum vocitatus Cura-Palati,

says the African Corippus, (de Laudibus Justini, l. i. 136,) and in the same century (the vith) Cassiodorus represents him, who, virga aurea decoratus, inter numerosa obsequia primus ante pedes regis incederet (Variar. vii. 5.) But this great officer, (unknown,) exercising no function, was cast down by the modern Greeks to the xvth rank, (Codin. c. 5, p. 65.)]

[Footnote 42: Nicetas (in Manuel, l. vii. c. 1) defines him. Yet the epithet was added by the elder Andronicus, (Ducange, tom. i. p. 822, 823.)]

[Footnote 43: From Leo I. (A.D. 470) the Imperial ink, which is still visible on some original acts, was a mixture of vermilion and cinnabar, or purple. The emperor's guardians, who shared in this prerogative, always marked in green ink the indiction and the month. See the Dictionnaire Diplomatique, (tom. i. p. 511 - 513) a valuable abridgment.]

[Footnote 44: The sultan sent to Alexius, (Anna Comnena, l. vi. p. 170. Ducange ad loc.;) and Pachymer often speaks, (l. vii. c. 1, l. xii. c. 30, l. xiii. c. 22.) The Chiaoush basha is now at the head of 700 officers, (Rycaut's Ottoman Empire, p. 349, octavo edition.)]

[Footnote 45: Tagerman is the Arabic name of an interpreter, (D'Herbelot, p. 854, 855;), says Codinus, (c. v. No. 70, p. 67.) See Villehardouin, (No. 96,) Bus, (Epist. iv. p. 338,) and Ducange, (Observations sur Villehardouin, and Gloss. Graec. et Latin)]

[Footnote 46: A corruption from the Latin Comes stabuli, or the French Connetable. In a military sense, it was used by the Greeks in the eleventh century, at least as early as in France.]

[Footnote 47: It was directly borrowed from the Normans. In the xiith century, Giannone reckons the admiral of Sicily among the great officers.]

[Footnote 48: This sketch of honors and offices is drawn from George Cordinus Curopalata, who survived the taking of Constantinople by the Turks: his elaborate, though trifling, work (de Officiis Ecclesiae et Aulae C. P.) has been illustrated by the notes of Goar,