Speaking as a man sure of his facts and well acquainted with the ground, he pledged his head that with twenty thousand men he would, in spite of Ali's troops and strongholds, arrive before Janina without firing a musket.
However good these plans appeared, they were by no means to the taste of the sultan's ministers, who were each and all in receipt of large pensions from the man at whom they struck.

Besides, as in Turkey it is customary for the great fortunes of Government officials to be absorbed on their death by the Imperial Treasury, it of course appeared easier to await the natural inheritance of Ali's treasures than to attempt to seize them by a war which would certainly absorb part of them.
Therefore, while Pacho Bey's zeal was commended, he obtained only dilatory answers, followed at length by a formal refusal.
Meanwhile, the old AEtolian, Paleopoulo, died, having prophesied the approaching Greek insurrection among his friends, and pledged Pacho Bey to persevere in his plans of vengeance, assuring him that before long Ali would certainly fall a victim to them.

Thus left alone, Pacho, before taking any active steps in his work of vengeance, affected to give himself up to the strictest observances of the Mohammedan religion.
Ali, who had established a most minute surveillance over his actions, finding that his time was spent with ulemas and dervishes, imagined that he had ceased to be dangerous, and took no further trouble about him..