This man the yeare before, had so inlarged and extended his greatnesse, that comparing with his power, his ambition to be greater, pushed on with manie helpes of nature, it was worthilie to be doub|ted, that if he were not preuented by the inuasions of the christians, he would in his pride lift vp his vic|torious hands against them. For Selim discerning that Baiseth his father, reduced to extreme old age, sought to establish the succession of the empire in the person of Acomath his elder brother, drew into rebel|lion against him, and by force of armes, concurring the corruption of the souldiors of his gard, constrei|ned him to resigne vp to him the authoritie of the go|uernment: and not suffering his ambition to staie there,The ambition and tyrannie of Selim a|gainst his fa|ther & affines. it was beleeued of all men, that for his more absolute assurance he tooke awaie his life by poison: and afterwards giuing an ouerthrow to his brother in an inconter of a battell, he confirmed fullie the seat of his empire, by depriuing him of his life in publike shew, exercising the like rage of crueltie vp|on Corcu the yongest brother of all. And being not satisfied according to the tyrannie of the house of Ot|tomanni, with the bloud and slaughter of all his ne|phues, or anie others that remained of that line and stocke, he was in thought oftentimes (by the rage and furie of his disposition) to take awaie the life of Soliman his onelie sonne.

Of these beginnings bréeding one warre vpon another, after he had subdued the Aduliti, a people of the mountaines, he passed ouer into Persia against the Sophi, to whome he gaue battell and ouerthrew him, and in that felicitie of warre he tooke the citie of Tauris the souereigne seat of that estate,Selim ouer|throweth the Sophi of Persia. togither with the greatest part of Persia which he was con|streined to abandon, not through the valour of his enimies, who for their disabilitie to support their army were retired into the mounteins and places desert, but for the vniuersall dearth and barrennesse of that yeare, he fell into an extreme want of vittels: he re|turned soone after this expedition to Constantinople, where after he had doone execution vpon certeine souldiers seditious, and for certeine moneths had re|freshed his armie, he gaue out that he would eftsoons returne to make warre vpon Persia. But indeed he turned his forces against the Soldan king of So|ria and Aegypt, a prince not onelie of most ancient reuerence and dignitie for that religion; but most mightie for the amplitude of dominion, most rich in tributes,The state of the Soldan king of Soria and Aegypt. and verie glorious by the discipline of the Mammelukes, of whose armes and forces that state was possessed with great reputation thrée hundred yeares.

For that empire, being ruled of the Soldans, they not by succession but by election ascended to it, and to the supreme seat of gouernement were not preferred but men of manifest vertue, and confir|med by all the degrees of warre, in the administra|tion of prouinces and armies, and also the sinewes and strengthes of their forces stood not vpon souldi|ors mercenarie and forreine, but of men elected, who taken of children in the prouinces adioining, and trained vp by succession of yeares in hardnesse of fare, in suffering of labour and toile, and in the exer|cise of armes and all customes apperteining to the discipline and law of warre, they ascribed and inrol|led them in the order of the Mammelukes. There suc|céeded from hand to hand in this order, not the sons of the Mammelukes that were dead, but others, who being taken of children for slaues, had their rising by the same discipline, and by the same industrie and artes, by the which their predecessours had passed from hand to hand.