[21] The appointment of the _Greek_ Panayoti marks an important
change in the system of Ottoman diplomacy; as previously the
Porte had disdained to employ the _rayahs_ in places of trust,
depending wholly, in their intercourse with foreign ambassadors,
on the interpreters attached to the suite of the latter.

Thus ended this famous siege, the longest, and one of the most
memorable, recorded in history. During its continuance, the Venetians
and their allies lost 30,000 men, and the Turks more than 100,000;
fifty-six assaults were made on the town above ground, and the same
number through the mines; and nearly an equal number of sorties was made
by the garrison. 460 mines were sprung by the Turks, and no less than
1172 by the Venetians; and the quantity of missiles hurled into the town
exceeded all calculation. The fortifications were, however, speedily
repaired by the care of Kiuprili, who remained in the island nine months
after the surrender, employed in the final organization of this new
province, which was divided into the three pashaliks of Canea, Retimo,
and Candia--the last being the residence of the beglerbeg, or supreme
pasha. The arrangements being at length completed, he quitted Candia for
Constantinople, whither the capitan-pasha had preceded him with the
fleet; and, on the 3d of July 1670, he replaced in the hands of the
Sultan, in his hunting-camp near Rodosto, the _sandjak-sheeref_, which
had been committed to his charge for the war against the infidels. "In
this manner," says Rycaut, writing not in a spirit of prophecy, three
years only before the battle of Vienna, "expired the action of the year,
fortunate in its success to the Turks; for though they gained but thirty
acres of land, with expense inestimable of blood and treasure, yet the
glory and fame which attended it, being the consummation of twenty-five
years' war, and the theatre where the whole world were spectators, was