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BULGARIA 
 
 and Her Neighbors 
 
 An Historic Presentation of the Back- 
 ground of the Balkan Problem, 
 One of the Basic Issues 
 of the World- War 
 
 By HISTORICUS 
 
The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 924028571 655 
 
BULGARIA 
 
 and Her Neighbors 
 
 An Historic Presentation of the Background 
 
 of tlie Balkan Problem, One of the 
 
 Basic Issues of the World- War 
 
 
 
 By HISTORICUS 
 
 The Mail and Express Job Print^ Inc. 
 
 New York, N. Y. 
 
 1917 
 
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 "-J J, 
 
 f\374-^bf/* 
 
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CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I — Who and What Are the Bulgarians of To-Day? 5 
 
 II — Serbo-Bulgarian Relations Before and After 1878 8 
 
 III — Serbian and Bulgarian Claims to Macedonia^ 15 
 
 IV — The National Consciousness of the Macedonian 
 
 Bulgarians _ ., 39 
 
 V — The Serbian Propaganda in Macedonia : Its Causes 
 
 and Aims _ 46 
 
 VI — Greco-Bulgarian Relations 51 
 
 VII — Greek Claims to Macedonia 55 
 
 VIII — Rumano-Bulgarian Relations 70 
 
 IX — The Balkan League and the Balkan Wars of 
 
 1912-1913 - 79 
 
 X — Russo-Bulgarian Relations 99 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 EVER since the Balkan War of 1912 the Balkan States— Bul- 
 garia, Greece and Serbia — have been in the limelight of 
 public interest and the object of public discussion. The 
 newspaper and magazine articles and the books which have been 
 published treating of the Balkan situation, are so numerous that 
 one could easily form a voluminous library of them. In these 
 publications the Balkan problem has been approached and discussed 
 from various points of view, both by those who are directly con- 
 cerned in its solution and by those who treat of it as outsiders 
 and impartial judges. 
 
 One would have supposed that with so much and so varied a 
 material on hand, anyone desirous of becoming acquainted with the 
 facts of the Balkan question could do so easily. Unfortunately, 
 this is not the case, especially with the people on this side of the 
 ocean. 
 
 It may be that the very volume and variety of the literature 
 extant on the subject serve to befog and confuse the student of 
 Balkan politics instead of enlightening him. Much of what has been 
 or is being written is the product of imperfect knowledge or igno- 
 rance, while not a little is tinged with prejudice or partisan passioa 
 
 Statements that have no basis in either history or fact, are daily 
 met with in the public press, and go to prove how dangerous a thing 
 a little knowledge is, and what misconceptions there are in people's 
 minds as to the real points at issue in the Balkans. And yet, a clear 
 ■understanding of the various factors and phases of the Balkan 
 situation is of great importance not only for the right comprehension 
 of the origin of the present European war, but also for the future 
 peace of the Balkan Peninsula and of Europe. 
 
 No one can deny that the war that is now devastating Europe 
 was brought about principally, if not solely, by the clash of the 
 political and economic interests of the Great Powers, especially 
 Austria and Russia, in the Balkan Peninsula. The Balkan wars of 
 1912 and 1913, and the Bucharest Treaty of August 10, 1913, which 
 upset the previously existing state of things on the Peninsula, intensi- 
 
 3 
 
fied the political tension between Austria and Russia on the one 
 hand, and among the Balkan States on the other. An Austro-Rus- 
 sian struggle for supremacy in the Balkan Peninsula sooner or later 
 was inevitable, and it was due solely to an untoward event — the as- 
 sassination of the Austrian heir to the throne and his wife in June, 
 1914 — that the conflict was precipitated. 
 
 The Balkan question has at all times been a serious menace 
 to the peace of Europe, and such a menace it will remain so long as 
 it is not settled in a permanent and satisfactory manner. In what 
 way it will be settled, we do not presume to foretell, but we feel 
 sure that if it is not settled to the saisfaction of the legitimate na- 
 tional demands of the Balkan peoples the Peninsula will again be- 
 come the arena of political intrigues and ambitions. There will still 
 be a Balkan question, to weigh like an incubus upon European 
 diplomats and disturb their pleasant dreams of a lasting peace in 
 Europe. 
 
 Every one who has studied the subject agrees that the Berlin 
 Congress of 1878, which undertook to settle the Balkan question, 
 proved a failure because the European Powers which took part in 
 the Congress faced the question not from an equitable and states- 
 manlike point of view, for the good of the Balkan peoples, but for 
 the satisfaction of their mutual jealousies and prejudices and the 
 furtherance of their own selfish interests. The Treaty of Berlin 
 of 1878, instead of bringing peace to the Balkan Peninsula, created 
 discontent and disillusionment and left the door open to unrest and 
 intrigue. It is to be hoped that the Peace Conference that will 
 rearrange the status of Europe after this war will prove more far- 
 sighted and intelligent than was the Berlin Congress in the settle- 
 ment of the Balkan question. 
 
 Our object, however, is not to discuss the politics of the war 
 but to dispel certain erroneous conceptions about the Balkan situa- 
 tion and to establish facts which seem to be ignored by many who 
 treat that situation. 
 
BULGARIA AND HER NEIGHBORS 
 
 I 
 
 Who and What Are the Bulgarians of To-Day? 
 
 By the middle of the seventh century A. D., according to the 
 testimony of Byzantine historians, the Balkan Peninsula was set- 
 tled by Slavs. Their settlements extended almost over the whole 
 peninsula as far south as Epirus, Thessaly, and even Greece. Geo- 
 graphical names of villages, rivers, mountains, etc., retained to this 
 day in these countries plainly show the extent of the Slavic coloni- 
 zation. In the second half of the seventh century (679) a band 
 of warlike &ulgars crossed over the Danube into the present Do- 
 bruja, quickly subdued the Slavic tribes living there and extended 
 their domination to the east over other Slavic communities. What 
 the numerical strength of these Bulgar conquerors was is not known, 
 but the historians Shaffarik and Iretchek, whose works are con- 
 sidered authoritative on the subject, say that it could not have been 
 very large. 
 
 The ease with which the Bulgar invaders conquered the 
 various Slavic tribes, and welded them into a state or kingdom is 
 explained by the fact that these tribes or communities lived a 
 separate existence, independent of one another, each under a petty 
 chief of its own. To what race these Bulgar warriors belonged is 
 still a matter of dispute. Some historians think they were Tartars, 
 others class them as Finns or Turks. One thing is certain: they 
 were not Slavs. The numerical inferiority of these Bulgars to the 
 overwhelming mass of their Slav subjects is plainly proved by the 
 fact that in less than 200 years after their establishment in the 
 Balkan Peninsula, they were completely assimilated and absorbed by 
 the Slavs, leaving nothing behind them but their name to desig- 
 nate the people they had conquered and the state they had founded. 
 The Slavs, who before their subjugation by the Bulgar invaders 
 were designated by various tribal names, became thenceforth known 
 
 S 
 
as Bulgars or Bulgarians — a name, which they have retained to this 
 day. 
 
 What the mutual and social relations between the Bulgar 
 conquerors and their Slav subjects were, cannot be positively deter- 
 mined in the absence of sufficient historical data, but we have enough 
 indirect evidence to show that the Bulgars for a long time after their 
 conquest formed a ruling caste, which could not have had much in 
 common with their Slav subjects. The non-Slavic Bulgar blood was 
 limited mostly to this ruling caste, which in course of time was swal- 
 lowed up in the Slav majority. How complete this amalgamation was 
 is best proved by the fact that when in 864 A. D. the Bulgarian 
 prince Boris introduced Christianity into Bulgaria, the language of 
 the church was a pure Slav language, without any trace of Finnish 
 or Tartar elements. This church language, which is still desig^nated 
 by many historians and philologists as Old Bulgarian, became also 
 the language of the Bulgarian literature which flourished in the days 
 of Tsar Symeon (873-927) and became the prototype and model 
 for the later Russian and Serbian literatures. Its productions were 
 freely transcribed by Russians and Serbians as composed in a lan- 
 guage perfectly intelligible to them. With some slight orthographic- 
 al modifications that were introduced into it in the course of time 
 in Russia, so as to bring it more in harmony with the Russian lan- 
 guage, this Old Bulgarian tongue under the name of Church-Slavic, 
 is still used as the church language by the Slavs (Russians, Ser- 
 bians and Bulgarians) who belong to the Eastern or Orthodox 
 Church. 
 
 "The forefathers of the Bulgarians of to-day," says Dr. Iret- 
 chek in his History of the Bulgarians, "were not the handful of Bul- 
 gars, who conquered in 679 a part of Moesia along the Danube, but 
 the Slavs who m'uch earlier had settled in Moesia, as well as in 
 Thrace, Macedonia, Epirus and almost in the whole peninsula." 
 The modern Bulgarian language is not Finnish or Tartar, but a 
 Slavic dialect, akin to Russian, Serbian and other Slavic languages. 
 In its lexicology it is much nearer to the Old Bulgarian or Old 
 Slavic than any other Slavic dialect. The modern Bulgarian literary 
 language, both in phraseology and orthography, is much nearer 
 to the Russian than the Serbian is, and an educated Russian can 
 read and understand Bulgarian newspapers or books much more 
 easily than a Serbian. In their popular beliefs and customs also the 
 modern B'ulgarians are close kin to the other Slavs, and are free 
 
 6 
 
from any trace of Finnish or Tartar influences. The name Bulgar 
 or Blugar (the u as in plug) has no connection whatever with the 
 name of the river Volga, or with the Latin words vulgus, vulgaris. 
 The spelling of it with a V (Volgars, Vulgars or Vulgarians) is 
 sheer nonsense, due to prejudice or ignorance. In all languages in 
 which the sound of B exists both in the present day and in ancient 
 times, the word is written Bulgar, Boolgar or Bolgar. By the Byzan- 
 tine historians, who wrote in Greek, it is written with the Greek 
 B, which is, however sounded as V by the Greeks of to-day. To this 
 lack of a B-sound in the Greek language is due the spelling of the 
 word Servia, instead of Serbia, which has no connection whatever 
 with the Latin word senHis, a slave. 
 
 This ethnographical phenomenon of the absorption of a con- 
 quering people numerically small by the conquered, and its disappear- 
 ance, leaving behind only its name, is to be observed in the history 
 of other nations also. Gaul and the Gauls were subdued by the 
 German Franks, who finally disappeared as such, but left their 
 name to France (German Frankreich) and of the French. The 
 Longobards or Lombards, a Germanic tribe, bequeathed the name 
 of Lombardy in Italy, and of Lombard, to the present Italian inhab- 
 itants with whom they became amalgamated. A Varingian band 
 of warlike Russ, likewise Teuton in its origin, in the second half 
 of the ninth century, conquered several small Slavic tribes in Rus- 
 sia, welded them into a state, gradually extended their rule over 
 other tribes, and laid the foundation of the present Russian em- 
 pire. They were soon absorbed by the Slavs, j'ust as the original 
 Bulgars were in the Balkans, but their name still survives in the 
 words Russia and Russian. A still stranger phenomenon is the fact 
 that the Greeks in Turkey have called and still call themselves 
 Romei, by the name of their former rulers, and their language, 
 Romeica, although they are no Romans, nor do they speak Latin. 
 It is just as absurd to maintain that the modern Frenchmen, Rus- 
 sians or Italians (in Lombardy) are Germans, or the Greeks are Ro- 
 mans, as it is to assert that the modern Bulgarians are Finns or 
 Tartars, and not Slavs. 
 
II 
 
 Serbo-Bulgarian Relations Before and After 1878 
 
 From 1459, when Serbia was definitely subjugated by the 
 Turks, to 1829, when by the terms of the Russo-Turkish treaty of 
 Adrianople she was constituted into an autonomous province under 
 the suzerainty of the Sultan, the Serbians remained subjects of Tur- 
 key. The first attempt made by Serbia to free itself from the 
 Turkish rule took place in 1804 under the leadership of George 
 Petrpvitch, commonly known as Kara George (Black George), 
 grandfather of the present Serbian King. But the attempt failed. 
 In 1815 it was renewed under the leadership of Milosh Obreno- 
 vitch and probably would have proved unsuccessful in the long run 
 if Russia had not forced Turkey, by the treaty of Adrianople, to 
 recognize the autonomy of Serbia. As an autonomous province Ser- 
 bia obtained the right of managing its own internal affairs, under its 
 own prince, by the payment of a definite tribute to Turkey. As a 
 visible sign of the survival of the Sultan's suzerainty, Turkish gar- 
 risons were left in possession of the fortresses in the country. This 
 arrangement, so fraught with danger to public peace on account of 
 the contingent friction between the people and the Turkish troops, 
 lasted till 1867, when all the Turkish troops were withdrawn from 
 Serbia, without, however, altering the status of the country as a 
 vassal of Turkey. This vassalage continued till 1878, when the 
 Berlin treaty declared Serbia an independent kingdom, and the 
 Serbian ruler assumed the title of "Krai" or King. 
 
 Of all the Serbian princes of the Obrenovitch dynasty, which 
 ruled the country till 1903, when its last representative was mur- 
 dered by a band of officers, the most noted was Prince Michael, son 
 of Milosh. Both as an individual and as a ruler, Michael was a 
 high-minded man of noble impulses and intentions, who had at 
 heart the good of his people. Under his wise rule of eight years 
 (1860-1868), the internal administration of the country was im- 
 proved, the organization of a national army was undertaken, and 
 Serbia began to dream of becoming, as the Serbian press compla- 
 cently boasted, the Piedmont of the Balkan Peninsula, i. e., the 
 country which was to free the Balkan people from Turkish rule and 
 
 8 
 
unite them, as Piedmont had done in Italy, in one state. All these 
 dreams, however, came to naught owing to the assassination of 
 Prince Michael in 1868, by a band of conspirators, to whose mis- 
 deed the family of Karageorge, the rivals of the Obrenovitch dy- 
 nasty, is said not to have been alien. If this charge of complicity is 
 correct, the present King of Serbia, Peter Karageorgievitch, can 
 claim for his party the credit of having deprived Serbia, in 1868, 
 of its best ruler, and of having put an end, in 1903, to the Obreno- 
 vitch dynasty, both done by assassination. 
 
 Bulgaria remained a Turkish province without any political 
 privileges up to the year 1878, when by the Berlin Treaty it was con- 
 stituted a vassal principality, under the suzerainty of the Sultan. 
 This principality was limited to the region between the Danube and 
 the Balkan Mountains, which was known as the Danubian Vilayet or 
 Province, while under Turkish administration. The territory south 
 of the Balkan Mountains, bounded by the Adrianople Vilayet on the 
 south, was formed into an autonomous province, called Eastern 
 Roumelia, under the sovereignty of the Sultan. In 1885 this prov- 
 ince was united to the Bulgarian Principality by a bloodless revolu- 
 tion. 
 
 So long as Bulgaria, as a Turkish province, remained under 
 the immediate rule of Turkey, there could be no direct political re- 
 lations between it and Serbia. The Bulgarians naturally looked 
 with sympathy upon autonomous Serbia and envied her her privi- 
 leged position. They even cherished the hope that the Serbians, 
 as Slavs, and closely related to them by race and religion, might 
 eventually be of assistance to Bulgaria in her own political emanci- 
 pation from Turkish rule. This hope grew stronger when, in the 
 second half of the sixties of last century, a movement for liberation 
 was started by the Bulgarians living in Rumania. A Bulgarian Revo- 
 lutionary Committee was established in Bucharest, the capital of 
 Rumania, which by secret propaganda in Bulgaria and by its revolu- 
 tionary press in Rumania was working to rouse the Bulgarians to 
 rebellion against Turkish oppression. 
 
 The confidence which the Bulgarians placed in Serbia as the 
 country that might help them eventually to regain their political 
 independence, is illustrated by the following fact: On April 17, 
 1867, a "National Council," composed of prominent Bulgarians liv- 
 ing in Rumania, and representing their fellow-countrymen in Bul- 
 garia, Thrace and Macedonia, held a meeting in Bucharest and 
 
 9 
 
adopted the following resolution: "Between the Serbians and the 
 Bulgarians a brotherly union under the name of South-Slavic King- 
 dom should be established. This South-Slavic Kingdom shall be 
 composed of Serbia and Bulgaria, the latter to include Thrace and 
 Macedonia. The head of the newly-formed kingdom shall be the 
 reigning Serbian Prince Michael Obrenovitch, with the right of suc- 
 cession." 
 
 Two delegates were sent to Belgrade to lay the resolution before 
 the Serbian Prince and his government. The Prince received the 
 delegates in private audience and told them that "the resolution of 
 the Bulgarians was a patriotic act ; that he accepted their proposition 
 and would instruct the Minister of Foreign Relations to inform the 
 Bulgarians through the Serbian representatives in Bucharest of the 
 Prince's acceptance." In a letter dated May 22, 1867, and addressed 
 to "the Board of the Bulgarian Benevolent Society," in B'ucharest, 
 Mr. Garashanin, Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs, wrote as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 "I have received your protocol (minutes of the meeting) of 
 April 5-17, 1867, sent to me through the Serbian representative in 
 Bucharest, in regard to some benovelent objects. Having examined 
 the contents of these minutes, I find that nothing stands in the way 
 of these benevolent objects being furthered by Serbia, too. There- 
 fore, in full agreement with the basis of the proposed points we will 
 take steps for action, leaving the details to negotiations for a 
 complete understanding." The use of the expression, "benovelent 
 objects," was obviously only a diplomatic expedient to conceal the 
 true contents of the resolution. 
 
 Nothing came of this attempt at a personal union between 
 Serbia and Bulgaria, which, be it said to the credit of the Bulgarians 
 who first proposed it, might have led to a Balkan Confederation. 
 The reasons for the failure of the attempt are to be sought either 
 in the inability of Serbia to carry it through or, which is much more 
 likely, in her deceitful purpose to make use of the Bulgarians as 
 tools for the attainment of her own selfish ends. Mr. Che- 
 domil Mijatovitch, a Serbian statesman, in the article on Serbia in 
 the Encyclopaedia Britannica (Uth edition) says that Prince Michael 
 of Serbia "entered into understandings with Greece, Montenegro, 
 Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria and Albania, for an eventual gen- 
 eral rising against the Turks," and that in the beginning of 1867 he 
 formally demanded from Turkey the withdrawal of the Turkish 
 
 10 
 
garrisons from Serbia. Through the intervention of the European 
 Powers his demand was granted. Having secured her object, Serbia 
 turned a cold shoulder to the Bulgarians, forcibly disbanded the corps 
 of Bulgarian volunteers, who had assembled at Belgrade in the ex- 
 pectation of common action, and expelled from the country with 
 them even the few Bulgarian yo'ung men who were studying in the 
 University of Belgrade. When in 1868 Bulgarian revolutionary 
 bands crossed the Danube into Bulgaria and tried to raise an insur- 
 rection, the Serbians remained passive spectators and offered no 
 help. 
 
 Eight years later Serbia showed the same duplicity in her rela- 
 tions with the Bulgarians. In 1875 an insurrection against Turkish 
 rule broke out in Herzegovina and to a certain extent affected the 
 neighboring province of Bosnia. Everyone expected that both Ser- 
 bia and Montenegro would be drawn into a war with Turkey in de- 
 fense of their co-nationalists. Under the stimulus of Serbian prom- 
 ises and preparations, an insurrection was started in Bulgaria in the 
 spring of 1876, but Serbia did not move, and the insurrection was 
 quickly quelled in blood. When two months later Serbia did declare 
 war on Turkey, a contingent of Bulgarians, from Rumania and Rus- 
 sia, to the number of about 2,000, flocked to Servia with thousands 
 of Russian volunteers and fought for her. 
 
 The continuation of the Herzegovinan insurrection, and es- 
 pecially the Bulgarian massacres of 1876, finally forced Russia to 
 declare war on Turkey in April, 1877. Serbia took no part in the 
 war, even at the time when the position of the Russian troops who 
 crossed the Danube into Bulgaria, was so precarious that Russia had 
 to ask the military help of Rumania. When on December 10, 1877, 
 the strongly fortified town of Pleven fell into Russian hands, the 
 Turks' power of resistance was practically broken, and within seven 
 weeks the victorious Russians were at the gates of Constantinople. 
 It was not until about ten days after the fall of Pleven that the Ser- 
 bian army crossed the frontiers into Bulgaria and occupied towns 
 and districts as far as Sofia without any opposition, because the 
 Turks had no troops in them. It is utterly false to assert that little 
 Serbia helped in the emancipation of Bulgaria. Her intervention 
 had not the slightest influence upon the issue of the war, and it was 
 undertaken solely for the purpose of claiming by right of possession 
 territory that was racially Bulgarian. By the Treaty of Berlin of 
 July 13, 1878, Serbia obtained the districts of Nish, Pirot and 
 
 11 
 
Vranya, which were inhabited by a Bulgarian population, and had 
 formed an integral part of Bulgaria or the Danubian Vilayet. 
 
 Mr. Mijatovitch in his article cited above, tells us that "the 
 treaty of Berlin disappointed Serbian patriots." He is quite right, 
 for by its terms Bosnia and Herzegovina, which on the basis of na- 
 tionality should have been annexed to Serbia, were given to Austria, 
 while Serbia was not permitted to retain all that she had hoped to 
 steal from Bulgaria. This, then, was what Bulgaria gained by her 
 desire for a "brotherly union" with Serbia, and by the latter's 
 "benevolence" towards the Bulgarians, she lost districts and a popu- 
 lation which were Bulgarian and ought to have been included within 
 the boundaries of Bulgaria. 
 
 After 1878, when a semi-independent Bulgarian Principality 
 was constituted, Serbo-Bulgarian relations remained apparently nor- 
 mal and friendly ; but evidently Serbia had not forgotten the disap- 
 pointment that the treaty of Berlin had caused her. Bulgaria had to 
 put up with the loss of the districts of Nish, Pirot and Vranya, and 
 no accusation has ever been brought by Serbians or others against 
 her of any attempt at agitation among her lost co-nationalists in order 
 to create any difficulties for Serbian rule there. And yet, Serbian 
 rule was carried on by oppressive measures having for their object 
 the denationalization of the people. The B'ulgarian language was 
 proscribed in the schools, Bulgarian teachers and priests who re- 
 fused to become agents of the Serbian propaganda were expelled 
 from the country, and people were even forced to change their names 
 to Serbian. A special order was issued to the Serbian troops sta- 
 tioned in these districts forbidding them to speak of the inhabitants 
 as Bulgarians. 
 
 In September, 1885, the autonomous province of Eastern Ru- 
 melia proclaimed its union with the Bulgarian Principality. By this 
 act an end was put to the unjust and unjustifiable action of the Ber- 
 lin Congress, which had separated a people of the same race, lan- 
 guage and religion, who should have been united. Every right- 
 minded man had condemned this division as unwise and unwar- 
 ranted. No interests of any of the neighboring Balkan States were 
 violated or infringed 'upon by this union, for Eastern Rumelia was 
 practically a Bulgarian province, with no Serbians in it, and with 
 only a small proportion of Greeks and Turks. The interests of 
 Turkey, under whose sovereignty the province was, were the ones 
 that were directly affected by the change. The general expectation 
 
 12 
 
was that the Sultan would refuse to sanction the union and would 
 order his troops into the province to occupy it. Against this contin- 
 gency the troops of the Principality and the militia of Eastern Ru- 
 melia had been concentrated on the Turkish frontier towards Ad- 
 rianople. While the European Powers were deliberating and nego- 
 tiating among themselves, and the Bulgarians were daily expecting 
 a Turkish attack, Serbia, without the slightest provocation and with- 
 out even a formal declaration of war, invaded Bulgaria. The reason 
 given for this treacherous attack was the flimsy pretext that by the 
 union of Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia the "balance of power" in 
 the Balkan Peninsula had been disturbed. The Bulgarian troops, 
 left without any officers — for Russia, which disapproved of the 
 union, had withdrawn her officers who served as instructors in the 
 Bulgarian army — met the Serbian attack, drove the enemy out of 
 Bulgaria and crossing the frontier captured the town of Pirot. The 
 Serbian army was thoroughly beaten and demoralized, and had not 
 Austria threatened Bulgaria with armed interference, the victorious 
 Bulgarians would certainly have pushed their advance into the inte- 
 rior of Serbia. A treaty consisting of only one article, which de- 
 clared that peace was reestablished between Serbia and Bulgaria, 
 was signed by the two warring nations. Serbia escaped scot-free 
 after precipitating the war and Bulgaria did not obtain even a pecu- 
 niary indemnity. 
 
 The failure of this attempt to seize additional Bulgarian terri- 
 tory; the mortification of having been defeated on the battlefield 
 by an army that had been in existence only six years, and was com- 
 manded by youthful lieutenants and sub-lieutenants, the prestige 
 that the war had brought to Bulgaria and the praise which the Bul- 
 garians had earned by the progress they were making in every di- 
 rection as a self-governing people — all this tended to rouse jealous 
 animosity toward Bulgaria among the Serbians. While outwardly 
 maintaining normal relations with Bulgaria, Serbia inwardly cher- 
 ished a determination to thwart every Bulgarian attempt at the uni- 
 fication of the Bulgarian nation in the Balkan Peninsula and the cre- 
 ation of a united Bulgarian state. On her part Bulgaria tried to 
 disregard the past and to live on friendly terms with Serbia. Dur- 
 ing the arbitrary rule of the late Serbian King Milan, when life in 
 Serbia was quite insecure for those who opposed his policy, Serbian 
 political refugees, of whom Mr. Pashitch, later Prime Minister of 
 Serbia, was one, found refuge in Bulgaria. When in 1905 Austria 
 
 13 
 
declared a customs war upon Serbia and closed her frontiers against 
 the importation of Serbian swine and cattle, Bulgaria offered to 
 Serbia a customs union and treaty, which accorded reduced rates on 
 the Bulgarian railways for the exportation of Serbian goods by way 
 of Varna and Salonica. Serbia declined to ratify the treaty, but 
 the offer undoubtedly helped the Serbian government indirectly to 
 make a more advantageous arrangement with Austria than she 
 would have otherwise made. 
 
 A Bulgarian writer who stood in close touch with political 
 circles in Bulgaria wrote in 1910: "We have tried more than once 
 to be of service to the Serbians in their economic struggle with 
 Austria, and we know positively how amicably inclined our govern- 
 ment has been towards Serbia and with what readiness it has always 
 come to the assistance of the Serbian government, whenever its help 
 has been asked." Compare with this statement that of Prof. Tsviitch 
 of Belgrade University, who in his pamphlet, "The Annexation of 
 Bosnia and the Serbian Question," of 1909, censures Europe for hav- 
 ing allowed the 'union of Eastern Rumelia with Bulgaria and for 
 thus making Bulgaria bigger and stronger than Serbia. He also 
 deprecates the declaration of Bulgaria as an independent kingdom, 
 because thereby "the equilibrium in the Balkan Peninsula has been 
 destroyed" ( !). 
 
 "It is a mistake," says he "to allow the existence in the Balkan 
 Peninsula of a state twice as big as its neighbor. There will be 
 no peace, unless the territorial equilibrium between these states is 
 strictly observed." These sentiments are unfortunately not peculiar 
 to this writer. They are those of all Serbians, and confirm 
 our statement that the feelings of the Serbian people towards the 
 Bulgarians have been those of jealous animosity. 
 
 14 
 
Ill 
 
 Serbian and Bulgarian Claims to Macedonia 
 
 The author of the article on Macedonia in the Encyclopaedia 
 Britannica (11th edition) thus defines the region comprised under 
 that name : Macedonia, the name generally given to that portion of 
 European Turkey which is bounded on the north by the Karadagh 
 Mountain range and the frontier of Bulgaria, on the east by the 
 river Mesta, on the south by the Aegean Sea and the frontier of 
 Greece, and on the vsrest by an ill-defined line coinciding with the 
 mountain chains of Shar (ancient Scardus), Grammus and Pindus." 
 
 This delimitation of Macedonia is, generally speaking, in ac- 
 cordance with the boundaries assigned to it by the best and most 
 reliable travelers and geographers. Speaking more specifically, we 
 may say that the natural geographic, historic and ethnographic boun- 
 dary between Macedonia, Albania and "Old Serbia" are the Shar and 
 Karadagh Mountains, the river Black Drin, and the southwestern 
 part of the Lake of Ochrida. The river Bistritsa (ancient Haliak- 
 mon) separates Macedonia from Thessaly, while the river Mesta 
 separates it from Thrace. The administrative division, under the 
 Turkish rule, into the vilayets of Salonica, Monastir and Uskub or 
 Kossovo, did not coincide with the geographic boundaries. The ad- 
 ministrative partition was based upon political considerations. The 
 aim was to give the preponderance to the Mohammedan population 
 in each vilayet or to mingle peoples of various nationalities so that 
 no one of them should form a compact whole in any vilayet. If 
 these nationalities happened to be hostile to each other, so much the 
 better for the interests of the Turkish authorities. 
 
 In this way, for example, the vilayet of Salonica was made up 
 of parts of Macedonia proper and of parts that properly belong to 
 Thessaly. The same is true of the vilayet of Monastir and Uskub, 
 which comprises parts of Albania and "Old Serbia," north of the 
 Shar Mountain. 
 
 The Serbian contention that the districts of Uskub or Skopia 
 and of Tetovo or Kalkandelen belong not to Macedonia, but to "Old 
 Serbia," is refuted by all travelers in Macedonia and by all geog- 
 raphers. The Byzantine administration as well as the Turkish geog- 
 
 15 
 
raphers and administration counted these districts as part of Mace- 
 donia. Moreover, the name of "Old Serbia" does not connote either 
 a historical or a geographical region. It is a recent creation of 
 Serbian chauvinists for the purpose of political propaganda, and was 
 unknown even to Serbian geographers before the middle of the last 
 century; and even then the designation was applied only to the 
 country north of the Shar Mountain. In 1871 a certain Miloevitch, 
 a Serbian ultra-patriot, in his "Journeys in Old and True Serbia," 
 extended the name "Old Serbia" to Macedonia and to more than 
 half of the Balkan Peninsula. 
 
 We may dismiss as beyond the scope of practical politics the 
 Serbian claim to Macedonia, based upon the historical fact that in 
 the reign of the Serbian King Stefan Dushan (1331-1355) Macedo- 
 nia was wrested by conquest from the Byzantine Empire, and Skopia 
 was the royal residence. If one were to settle present questions on 
 the basis of what took place five hundred or a thousand years ago, 
 then the Bulgarians have a right to claim not only Macedonia, which 
 for more than 130 years was in their possession, but also present 
 Serbia, including Belgrade and the territory beyond the River Save, 
 where Bulgarian political rule in the ninth and tenth centuries ex- 
 tended. 
 
 Assuming to consider the Macedonian question from the stand- 
 point of actualities, the Serbians found their claim that the Slav 
 population of Macedonia is Serbian and not Bulgarian upon the 
 following arguments, if quibbles can be dignified by that name : 
 
 1. The name Bulgarians, by which the Macedonian Slavs call 
 themselves, is not an ethnic denomination and does not mean that 
 they are Bulgarians by nationality. It comes from the word Vulgaris 
 and means a hoor or peasant. 
 
 2. The Serbians, being a nation of warlike and rebellious nature, 
 and the Turks on that account disliking the name Serbian, the Mace- 
 donian Slavs, though Serbians by nationality, have from fear of the 
 Turks called themselves Bulgarians, because the latter designation 
 bore the suggestion of humble, submissive subjects. 
 
 This juggling of sophistry implies that the Slavs of Macedonia 
 have called and do call themselves, and have been called by others, 
 Bulgarians and not Serbians. We have already pointed out that the 
 name Bulgarian has absolutely no connection whatever either in 
 meaning or by derivation, with the River Volga or with the Latin 
 words vulgus and vulgaris. That the name Bulgarian by which the 
 
 16 
 
Slav population of Macedonia has always been known is an ethnic 
 and not a spurious name is proven by the testimony of all travelers 
 who have visited the country, as well as by that of history. When 
 in the second half of the tenth century the eastern portion of the 
 Bulgarian Kingdom was brought under subjection by Byzantium, 
 the western portion, having its seat in Macedonia under Tsar Samuel, 
 resisted Byzantine attacks for more than forty years, until finally, in 
 1018, it was subdued by Emperor Basil II. Prof. Iretchek, the best 
 living authority on the history of the Balkan Peninsula and its peo- 
 ples, in his "History of Serbicd' (German edition, 1911, p. 204) says : 
 "These antagonists of Basil II are always designated in Greek, Arab 
 and Armenian sources, as well as in Diocleas (a Croatian chronicler) 
 as Bulgarians." In this western Bulgarian kingdom an archbishopric 
 was established in the town of Ochrida with jurisdiction over the 
 dioceses in Macedonia, which existed until 1767 under the name of 
 "Bulgarian Archbishopric of Ochrida." It is so styled even in char- 
 ters granted to it by the Emperor Basil II in the eleventh century. 
 By the subjugation of the western Bulgarian kingdom this emperor 
 gained also the surname of Bulgarokthon (slayer of the Bulgarians), 
 by which Byzantine historians speak of him. The official titles by 
 which the Greek archbishops in Macedonia were designated up to 
 within the second half of the last century, and which titles conform 
 to usage dating far back in history, likewise prove that Macedonia 
 was considered a Bulgarian country. According to the "Collection 
 of Divine and Sacred Canons," published by Ralli and Potli in 
 Athens, 1885, the title of the archbishop of Strumnitza was this: 
 "Right Honorable Archbishop of Strumnitza and Tiberiopolis and 
 Exarch of Bulgarian Macedonia." The archbishop of Castoria was 
 styled "Right Honorable Archbishop of Castoria and Exarch of all 
 Old Bulgaria." This is confirmed by F. C. H. L. Pouqueville, a 
 French traveler in Macedonia, who relates in his "Voyage dans la 
 Grece," Paris, 1820, Vol. II, p. 355, that he was told by the metro- 
 politan of Castoria that his archepiscopal throne ceased, since 1768, 
 to be subordinated to the autonomous archbishop of Ochrida, and 
 that in consequence thereof the title of "Exarch of Bulgaria" was 
 conferred upon him. 
 
 Major W. M. Leake in his "Travels in Northern Greece," 
 London, 1835, Vol. I, p. 341, tells us that the Greek bishop of Korytsa 
 or Kortcha, told him that his diocese was a part of Old Bulgaria. 
 The Russian philologist, Prof. Grigorovitch, who traveled in Mace- 
 
 17 
 
donia in 1844, and knew personally the then Greek archbishop of 
 Bitolya or Monastir, says that his title was "Archbishop of Pelago- 
 nia and Exarch of all Upper Macedonia," but that formerly he had 
 been styled "Exarch of All Upper Bulgaria." Michael Constantino- 
 vitch, a Serbian by birth and a janissary by profession, who in the 
 second half of the fifteenth century took part in several expeditions 
 with the Turks, in his memoirs writes of Macedonia as a "Bulgarian 
 country." The same is true of various Byzantine historians, such as 
 George Acropolita, Anna Comnena, George Cedrynus and others, 
 who speak of Macedonia as a Bulgarian country and of its inhab- 
 itants as Bulgarians. 
 
 The writings of various modem travelers, who have visited 
 Macedonia, offer undeniable evidence of the nationality of the 
 Macedonian Slavs. Their testimony is the more valuable because 
 they saw the country and reported what they had seen long before 
 there was any Serbo-Bulgarian or Greco-Bulgarian dispute about 
 Macedonia; hence, there is no reason to suspect them of any precon- 
 ceived notions or partiality. 
 
 F. C. H. L. Pouqueville, former French consul general of France 
 at Janina, whose phU-hellenic sympathies were strong, and who in 
 the early part of the last century traveled through Greece, Thessaly, 
 Epirus, Albania and Macedonia, for the purpse of studying the 
 geography, antiquities and ethnography of these countries, has left 
 us in his "Voyage dans la Grece" (Paris, 1820, 5 Vols.) a most valu- 
 able description of the topography, geography and ethnography of 
 these countries. He entered Macedonia from the south, coming from 
 Thessaly over the Pindus Mountains, and his first stop was at the 
 village of Piacos or Doupiari, not far from the lake of Castoria. 
 
 "Thus far," he says, "I had traveled as if in a known country, 
 since I could talk to the people, and have intercourse with them, 
 but here the scene changed. I was entering the country of the 
 Bulgarians, and I was obliged to have recourse to some Slavic words, 
 which I had learned during my stay in Ragusa, in order to make 
 myself understood in speaking to the people." In all his description 
 of Macedonia he nowhere mentions Serbians, but speaks of Bul- 
 garians and of the difficulty he found in conversing with them in 
 Greek or with the small vocabulary of Serbian or Croat words he 
 had picked up in Ragusa. He mentions towns and villages he vis- 
 ited, gives the numbers of houses in them and of their families or 
 inhabitants, and explicitly calls the population Bulgarians. He says 
 
 18 
 
that the district of Serbia (Selfidjeh in Turkish) is the natural 
 boundary between Macedonia and Thessaly and not the river Bis- 
 tritsa, as the ancients had supposed, and that in the east the river 
 (Black) Drin forms the line of demarcation between the language of 
 the Bulgarians and that of the Albanians. 
 
 Ami Boue, a well-known French geologist, visited European 
 Turkey at four different times in 1836, 1837, 1838, 1839, and in 1840 
 published his work, "La Turquie d'Europe," which gives a most 
 complete ethnography of Turkey. In Vol. II, p. 6, he says : "The 
 Serbians comprise the inhabitants of Serbia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, 
 Montenegro and a part of those of the pashaliks (districts) of Prish- 
 tina, Ipek and Prisren." Speaking of the Bulgarians (ibid, p. 5), he 
 says: "The Bulgarians occupy Bulgaria, Lower Moesia and the 
 greater part of Upper Moesia, while they form the principal nucleus 
 of the population of Macedonia, excepting the southwesternmost 
 part from Castoria and on the Yenije-Karasoo (Bistritsa). The 
 mountains between the basins of Fiorina and Castoria, between 
 Kailari and Shatista, between Ostrovo and Verria and between 
 Voden and Niausta, limit the territory where nothing but Bulgarian is 
 spoken from that on the south, where Greek is the language of the 
 peasant. In his "Recueil d'ltineraires dans la Turquie d'Europe," 
 1854, Ami Boue afifirms the predominance of the Bulgarian element 
 in the various towns and districts which he visited, such as Skopia, 
 Prilep, Tetovo, Monastir, etc. North of the Shar Mountains he 
 mentions no Bulgarians, but speaks only of Serbians. 
 
 Cyprien Robert, professor of Slavic literature in College de France 
 in Paris, who also traveled in European Turkey, in his "Les Slaves 
 de Turquie," (Paris, 1844), says of the Bulgarians : "Their race far 
 exceeds the official limits of Bulgaria, to which geographers persist 
 in assigning for boundaries Thrace, Macedonia and Albania, three 
 provinces which now abound with Bulgarians. In Macedonia they 
 form the bulk of the population." 
 
 G. Lejean, a French engineer who traveled in the Balkan Penin- 
 sula in 1857-8, in his "Ethnographie de la Turquie d'Europe," pub- 
 lished in 1861, accompanied by an ethnological map which has been 
 accepted as generally correct, says : "In Macedonia the Bulgarians 
 have occupied almost the entire territory, and have gradually pushed 
 the Greeks towards the sea, where they have maintained themselves 
 in a narrow and marshy strip between Platomona and Kolakia." 
 Lejean divides the Serbians into "Serbians proper in the Principality, 
 
 19 
 
Bosnians in Bosnia and Turkish Crotia, Russians around Novipazar, 
 Herzegovinians and Montenegrins," but excludes them entirely from 
 Macedonia. 
 
 M. A. Ubicini in his "Lettres sur la Turquie" (Paris, 1854, Vol. 
 Ill, p. 174) says: "Among the peoples of Slavic race who are im- 
 mediate subjects of the Porte, the Bulgarians hold the first rank. Cut 
 in two parts by the Balkans, they reach to the Black Sea and the 
 Thracian [Aegean] Sea at Bourgas and Salonica, extend to the west 
 as far as Albania and Serbia, and skirt the Danube on the north from 
 Feti-Islam [Ada Kaleh] as far as Silistra." He limits the Serbians, 
 who are direct subjects of the Sultan, to Bosnia and Herzegovina, 
 the districts of Prizren, Prishtina and Novipazar, i. e., to the territory 
 north of the Shar Mountains. 
 
 Commandant Leon Lamo'uche, a French military officer, who 
 for several years was Chief of the Staff of the Inspector General of 
 Police in Macedonia, and who therefore had good opportunities 
 to familiarize himself with the country and its population, in his book, 
 "La Peninsule Balkanique" (Paris, 1899, p. 2), writes: "Up to 
 1878, we may say, no one who had studied the subject had any doubt 
 of the Bulgarian character of the Macedonians. Travelers of vari- 
 ous origins, French, German, Austrian, English, such as Lejean, 
 Hahn, Ami Boue, Kanitz, the Bohemian historian Iretchek, etc., are 
 in accord on this point. The Macedonians themselves, a long time 
 since, have been conscious of their community of race with the in- 
 habitants of Bulgaria. At the time of the religious strife between 
 Greeks and Bulgarians, the inhabitants of Uskup, Prilep, Monastir, 
 were most ardent in defending the Bulgarian interests. The Bul- 
 garian nationality of Macedonia was then considered a matter of 
 public notoriety. In the project for the reorganization of European 
 Turkey, elaborated in 1876 by the Conference of the Ambassadors 
 at Constantinople, Macedonia was joined to a vilayet having its prin- 
 cipal seat as Sofia. By the treaty of San Stefano it was included 
 almost in its entirety within the boundaries of the Principality of 
 Bulgaria, of the Great Bulgaria, which was divided later into three 
 parts by the Congress of Berlin. . . . Even the Turkish authori- 
 ties acknowledge that the majority of the inhabitants of the vilayets 
 of Salonica and Monastir and of the sandjak (district) of Uskup are 
 Bulgarians. I have made inquiries on this subject of the officials of 
 many towns in Macedonia and their answers have been identical." 
 
 Lamouche estimates the Bulgarian population of Macedonia at 
 
 20 
 
a little over 1,000,000, which together with the Bulgarians in the 
 Adrianople vilayet would make a total of 1,500,000. The Serbian 
 claims to Macedonia he rightly attributes to the desire of Serbia 
 to have an outlet on the Aegean Sea, which he considers reasonable ; 
 "but," he adds, "this does not prevent any impartial observer from 
 recognizing the Slavs of Macedonia as "Bulgarians and not Ser- 
 bians." 
 
 Rene Pinon, a well-known Frenchman who has devoted much 
 study to the Balkan question, in his "L'Eiirope et I' Empire Ottoman" 
 (Paris, 1909) after adducing the various arguments by which Bul- 
 garians^ Serbians and Greeks support their claims to Macedonia, and 
 referring to Lamouche's book, says : "We would be inclined to at- 
 tach more importance to the opinion of European officers. French- 
 men in particular, who have been all over their districts and have 
 interrogated the villagers in the absence of Turkish policemen or 
 officials, or to the opinion of a Lazarist Friar, like M. Cazot, whose 
 functions as President of the Bulgarian Catholic Seminary in Sa- 
 lonica have called him to traverse alone a large number of villages 
 in the Salonica region. Almost all these witnesses agree in regard- 
 ing the Macedonian Slavs as Bulgarians. After all, it is certainly 
 true that, up to 1878, and especially at the Congress of Berlin, the 
 Christians of Macedonia were generally regarded as Bulgarians. 
 They called and still call themselves Bulgarians." 
 
 The Englishman, Major William M. Leake, who in his works 
 made valuable contributions to the knowledge of the geography, 
 topography and ethnography of Greece and the adjacent countries, 
 in his "Researches in Greece" (London, 1814, p. 237) says, in speak- 
 ing of the Albanians and their lauguage : "Many Slavonian words 
 then found their way into the Albanian language, and have been 
 increased in number by the intercourse between Albania and the ex- 
 tensive regions of Servia and Bulgaria, which surround it on the 
 north and the east, and throughout which the Bulgarian dialect of 
 Slavonic is spoken." In his "Travels in Northern Greece" (London, 
 1835, 4 vols.), Leake in mentioning (Vol. I, p. 341) his conversation 
 with the Greek bishop of Korytsa or Kortcha, who told him that his 
 diocese was a part of Old B'ulgaria, and in proof thereof adduced 
 some Bulgarian names of villages, etc., adds : "A stronger proof is 
 the use of the Bulgarian language, which is still spoken in some of 
 the villages of this district." In speaking of the village of Khaivat in 
 the district of Salonica, Leake writes (Vol. II, p. 234) : "It is in- 
 
 21 
 
habited by Bulgarian Christians, a people which occupies, with the 
 exception of two or three large Greek villages, all the great mari- 
 time plain of Lower Macedonia." On p. 272 (ibid.) he tells us that 
 in the diocese of Voden are comprised of about 100 villages of Bul- 
 garian Christians, who in general are ignorant of the Greek language. 
 Leake nowhere in his description of Macedonia mentions any Ser- 
 bians. 
 
 Edmund Spencer, who is pro-Serbian in his feelings and thinks 
 that the Serbians are a coming nation in the Balkan Peninsula, in his 
 "Travels in European Turkey in 1850" (London, 1851, p. 402), 
 writes : "Throughout the whole of that vast district, extending from 
 the frontier of Serbia, the Danube and the Black Sea to Salonica on 
 the Aegean Sea, and through Thrace to the Gulf of Saros, the Bul- 
 garian lang-uage is spoken, and that people constitutes the dominant 
 race, comprising altogether a population, according to the statements 
 of well-informed natives and resident Franks [Europeans], of about 
 four millions and a half." In the vicinity of Serres, "a large district 
 of Macedonia," he says that the Bulgarians are the dominant race. 
 He speaks of no Serbians in Macedonia. 
 
 Rev. Henry F. Tozer made a journey in European Turkey in 
 1861, visiting Thessaly and Macedonia. In his "Researches in the 
 Highlands of Turkey" (London, 1869, 2 Vols.), he nowhere mentions 
 Serbians in Macedonia, although he speaks frequently of the various 
 nationalities he met with there, and gives an account of their his- 
 tory, customs, beliefs, etc. Chapters VII, VIII and IX, of Vol. I 
 are devoted to Macedonia and to his journey from Salonica via 
 Voden, Monastir, Ochrida, etc., to Albania. In describing his visit 
 to Ostrovo, in the district of Voden, he says (p. 163) : "The sub- 
 ject population in the country districts of all this part of Turkey 
 is composed of Bulgarian Christians." On p. 176 we read : "The 
 Bulgarians, who form the largest element in the Christian population 
 from Salonica to the confines of Albania, are a very interesting 
 people, and are highly spoken of for industry and honesty. They are 
 the most numerous of all the nationalities inhabiting European Tur- 
 key, and are estimated at between five and six millions." On p. 186, 
 in speaking of the Christians in Ochrida, he says : "The Christians 
 are Bulgarians, and these, too, cease with the mountains which bound 
 the lake on the west. The lake, which was the Lacus Lychnitis of 
 classical times, may be said to form the division between Western 
 Macedonia and Central Albania. In a geographical point of view, 
 
 22 
 
indeed, the Scardus [Shar Mountains] might more accurately be 
 regarded as the boundary, but the Slavonic population in this part 
 overruns its natural limit." 
 
 In Struga, a town on the Lake of Ochrida, Tozer visited a Bul- 
 garian school of 200 children, and v^ras told "that other schools like 
 this have lately sprung up among the Bulgarians of these parts (we 
 saw one ourselves adjoining the metropolitan church at Ochrida)." 
 In his journey from Prisren to Uskup or Skopia, he came down the 
 Shar Mountains to the valley of Tetovo or Kalkandelen, and says 
 (p. 353) : "The scattered villages which appeared here and there 
 are inhabited by Albanians, and so in part is the plain below ; there, 
 however, they are mixed with Bulgarians, and beyond that no regu- 
 lar Albanian population is found, but only a few scattered villages. 
 Thus in this more northerly district also, as we have already seen 
 in the neighbohhood of Ochrida, the Scardus is, roughly speaking, 
 the line of demarcation between the two races, though there the 
 Bulgarians extend over it for a little distance to the west, as here 
 the Albanians to the east." In Chapter XVII, where he describes 
 "the Vardar Valley," he likewise speaks of Bulgarians. 
 
 Miss G. Muir Mackenzie and Miss A. P. Irby, two English 
 ladies, traveled in 1863 in Macedonia, Albania, Bosnia and Monte- 
 negro, and in 1867 published their most interesting book, "Travels 
 in the Provinces of Turkey-in-Europe." In what high estimation 
 this work was held is shown by a preface contributed to the second 
 revised edition of 1877 by the late William E. Gladstone, in which 
 he says: "I do not mean to disparage the labors and services of 
 others when I say that, in my opinion, no diplomatist, no consul, 
 no traveler, among our countrymen, has made such a valuable con- 
 tribution to our means of knowledge in this important matter, as 
 was made by Miss Mackenzie and Miss Irby, when they published, 
 in 1867, their travels in some of the Slavonian Provinces of Euro- 
 pean Turkey." 
 
 Miss Mackenzie and Miss Irby tell us that "Bulgaria" they 
 understand to be "not that insignificant portion of the same termed 
 'the Turkish province of Bulgaria,' but the whole tract of country 
 inhabited by Bulgarians." They recognize three sections of Bul- 
 garia as it is divided by the Balkan and the Rhodope Mountains, 
 namely, northern Bulgaria, between the Balkan Mountains and the 
 Danube, Central Bulgaria, between the Balkan and the Rhodope 
 Mountains, and Southern Bulgaria, between the Rhodopes and the 
 
 23 
 
frontiers of ancient Greece; in other words, Macedonia. They 
 consider Salonica to be geographically Bulgarian, and they include 
 in Macedonia the town of Istip or Shtip "and other towns lying on 
 the more northerly route between Salonica and Skopia." Voden, 
 Monastir, Ochrida, Prilep, Veless and other towns with their dis- 
 tricts, that they visited are explicitly reckoned as Bulgarian. 
 Neither in the text of the book, nor in the map which accompanies 
 it, are any Serbians mentioned in Macedonia. As the two ladies 
 were pretty well acquainted with the Serbian language and the 
 Serbians, this omission is significant. But still more significant 
 is the fact that in 1868 a Serbian translation of the work, made 
 by Ch. Mijatovitch, a Serbian savant and ex-minister of Serbia in 
 London, was published at Belgrade at the expense of Prince Mi- 
 chael of Serbia. In his preface to this translation Mijatovitch 
 praises Miss Mackenzie and Miss Irby as distinguished explorers 
 of the Bulgarian and Serbian countries, and expresses no dissatis- 
 faction with or protest against their classification of the population 
 from Salonica to Ochrida, Skopia and Nish as Bulgarian, and the 
 designation of one province of Macedonia as "Southern Bulgaria." 
 The map attaches to this Serbian translation was slightly corrected 
 by the Bohemian Zach, a colonel in the Serbian army, who marked 
 the Dibra District as Serbian, while the map of the original marks 
 it as Albanian. 
 
 Mrs. Elodie Lawton Mijatovitch, wife of Mr. Mijatovitch, in 
 her "History of Modern Serbia" (London, 1872, p. 168-9) in speak- 
 ing of the revolt which broke out in 1842 against Turkish oppres- 
 sion in the Province of Nish, says explicitly that it was a rebellion 
 of Bulgarians and Bulgarian peasants. On p. 260-1 she writes: 
 "Between Serbia and Montenegro lie Bosnia and Herzegovina, and 
 these two provinces expect their liberation from Mussulman rule 
 to be accomplished by the Serbian and Montenegrine princes. A 
 treaty existed between Prince Michael of Serbia and Prince Nich- 
 olas of Montenegro, by which the latter prince acknowledged the 
 former to be the chief leader of the 'Serbian movement' and 
 bound himself to execute any plan he (Prince Michael) might 
 form for the delivery of Bosnia and Herzegovina." She never 
 once mentions Macedonia as entering into this "Serbian movement," 
 or "Serbian idea"; that is, the preparation of the Serbian nation 
 under Turkish rule for the day of liberation." 
 
 Mr. (now Sir) Arthur J. Evans, who by his frequent travels 
 
 24 
 
and researches in Bosnia, Herzegovina, Dalmatia, Albania and 
 Macedonia is entitled to speak with authority on the subject, recog- 
 nizes no Serbians in "Macedonia proper, that is, in the country 
 to the south of the Shar Mountains," but speaks of them as inhab- 
 iting "the lands on the other side of the Shar Mountains, that is, in 
 the region called Old Serbia, which lies between Macedonia proper 
 and the boundaries of Bosnia." 
 
 In speaking of Greco-Bulgarian relations later on we shall have 
 occasion to cite the testimony of other English writers who ignore 
 any Serbian pretensions in Macedonia and do not speak of Ser- 
 bians being part of its population. But as a recent English view 
 on the subject we will quote the following statement from "The 
 Annual Register, 1915" (Longmans, Green & Co., London, p. 252) : 
 "It may be of interest to record here, in connection with the acrimo- 
 nious Serbo-Bulgarian dispute about Macedonia (one of the worst 
 questions of the Alsace-Lorraine type) that the problems of na- 
 tionality in that region were dealt with at the meeting of the Brit- 
 ish Association for the advancement of Science, in September. No 
 more impartial tribunal for deciding such a question can be imag- 
 ined, and the erudite speakers gave their verdict in favor of Bul- 
 garia. One authority, Sir Arthur Evans, said that the Macedonian 
 population was 'homogeneously Bulgar,' except along the coast; 
 and Professor Elliot-Smith, the great anthropologist, whilst not 
 going quite so far as Sir A. Evans, also said that Bulgaria had a 
 much better claim than Serbia to the disputed territory." 
 
 We reserve for quotation elsewhere the testimony of the 
 American missionaries, who in their reports from 1874 to 1914 as 
 they appear in "The Missionary Herald," make no mention of any 
 Serbians in Macedonia, although they speak of Bulgarians, Greeks, 
 Albanians, Vlachs and Turks. As the American missionaries are 
 not men with any political bias or working for any political propa- 
 ganda, their testimony is of great value, for they are not passing 
 travelers, but permanent residents in the country, whose language 
 they are acquainted with, and with whose people both in towns and 
 in villages they are in constant contact. It is worthy of notice that 
 in 1880 the A. B. C. F. M. announced that as by the Berlin Treaty 
 Bulgaria was divided into three parts — Bulgaria, Eastern Rumelia 
 and Macedonia — for the future instead of European Turkey Mis- 
 sion, the board would employ the term "Mission to the Bulgarians." 
 Up to 1891 missionary work in Macedonia was carried on entirely 
 
 25 
 
in the Bulgarian language, and only in 1892 was new work started 
 in Albania. 
 
 Not very many Russians or other Slavs have traveled through 
 Macedonia, but those who have done so are decidedly of the opin- 
 ion that the population is Bulgarian. Victor Grigorovitch, profes- 
 sor of Slavic philology in the University of Kazan (Russia), made 
 in 1844 a journey in Macedonia for the purpose of studying the 
 language and ethnography of its population. In his "Sketch of a 
 Journey Through European Turkey," 1848, he says : "The villages 
 between Salonica and Yenidje Vardar are principally inhabited by 
 Bulgarians. The villages in the region of Yenidje- Vardar, Voden, 
 Fiorina, Monastir, as well as those between Monastir and Ochrida, 
 are inhabited exclusively by Bulgarians, mixed here and there with 
 Koutzo-Vlakhs and Turks." 
 
 The Russian historian Hilferding, author of a History of the 
 Serbians and Bulgarians, who was Russian Consul in Bosnia for 
 more than a year, in 1857 visited "Old Serbia," i. e., the region 
 north of the Shar Mountains, and a part of Northern Macedonia. 
 Referring to the town of Prizren in "Old Serbia," he writes: "It 
 still lies in Serbian territory, but on its very edge is the foot of the 
 huge mountain which arrests the movement of the Serbian element 
 towards the south and serves as a boundary between the Serbian 
 and the Bulgarian races. The latter has gone over this mountain 
 to the southeast and has populated Macedonia and the eastern 
 part of Albania." 
 
 V. Makushev, another Russian historian, who had made per- 
 sonal researches in some of the south Slavic countries inhabited by 
 Serbians, in his "Slavs Beyond the Danube and on the Adriatic," 
 1867, gives the area occupied by the Bulgarians corresponding to 
 that given by Lejean. Of the Serbian race he says: "The limits 
 of the Serbian race, which inhabits in a compact mass Serbia, 
 Bosnia, Turkish Croatia, Herzegovina and Montenegro, extend on 
 the south to the river Boyana in Albania, whence they traverse the 
 valley of the Zeta to Gussinyeh, Djakova and Prizren, where the 
 line that separates the Serbians from the Bulgarians begins." 
 
 Professor E. Golubinsky of the Moscow University in his 
 standard work, "A Short Sketch of the History of the Orthodox 
 Bulgarian, Serbian and Rumanian Churches" (1871), enumerates 
 the various dioceses under the spiritual jurisdiction of the Greek 
 Patriarch of Constantinople, "which by their population either 
 
 26 
 
wholly or partly are Bulgarian." The following dioceses in Mace- 
 donia he regards as "wholly Bulgarian": Melnik, Strumnitsa, 
 Doiran, Voden, Moglen, Monastir, Prespa, Ochrida, Veless and 
 Skopia. He admits the existence of no Serbians in any of the 
 "partially Bulgarian" dioceses in Macedonia, but says that 
 Vlakhs or Greeks are mixed with the Bulgarians in these districts. 
 
 Professors Pypin and Spassovitch of the St. Petersburg Uni- 
 versity in their "History of the Slavic Literatures" (1879) assign 
 to the Serbians the following territory : the principalities of Serbia 
 and Montenegro, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Turkish Croatia, Dalmatia, 
 part of Istria, Slavonia, the Military Frontier, Syrmia, Batchka, 
 Banat and into Hungary." They also recognize Serbians in "Old 
 Serbia," mixed with Albanians. The Bulgarian race they place 
 within "the large region from the river Timok, on the Serbian 
 frontier, and the mouths of the Danube on the one hand, to Salonica 
 and the boundaries of Albania on the other — i.e., ancient Moesia, 
 Thrace and Macedonia." 
 
 Professor T. D. Florinsky of Kiev University, a distinguished 
 Slavic philologist and historian, in his work, "The Slavic Race, 
 Statistico-Ethiwgraphical Survey of Contemporary Slavdom" 
 (1907), writing of the Bulgarians, says: "The Bulgarians inhabit 
 chiefly the eastern half of the Balkan Peninsula, namely, the old 
 countries of Moesia [Bulgaria], Thrace and Macedonia. ... In 
 these regions is concentrated the principal compact mass of the 
 Bulgarian nation. Here is the true old-time Bulgarian territory." 
 Then he draws the boundaries of this Bulgarian territory, including 
 almost the whole of Macedonia. Professor Florinsky is inclined 
 to regard as Serbian the districts of Skopia, Kratovo and Tetovo, 
 where the language of the people, he thinks, exhibits "peculiarities 
 of the Serbian language with the retention of some characteristic 
 Bulgarian features." But even this concession to the Serbian claims 
 in Macedonia he makes on linguistic grounds only, with the proviso : 
 "until the ethnographical relations in Macedonia have been investi- 
 gated by a special commission of competent learned men." 
 
 Professor L. Niederle of Prague University, in his "Survey 
 of Contemporary Slavdom," published as Part H of the "Encyclo- 
 paedia of Slavic Philogogy," edited by the Imperial Academy of 
 Sciences of St. Petersburg (1909) under the editorship of Prof. 
 V. Jagitch, the best living Slavic philologist, places the nucleus of 
 the Serbian nation in the Balkan Peninsula in the independent 
 
 27 
 
Serbian kingdom, the larger part of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the 
 independent principalities of Montenegro, the northern portions 
 of the Turkish vilayets of Scutari and Skopia, and finally in Syrmia 
 and southern Hungary (Batchka and Banat). In delimiting the 
 territory inhabited by Bulgarians, Prof. Niederle draws its geo- 
 graphical boundaries, which are too detailed for reproduction. 
 Suffice it to say that in Macedonia he recognizes only in Skopia, 
 Tetovo and Kumanovo a mixed Bulgaro- Serbian population, while 
 all the rest he considers as essentially Bulgarian. 
 
 P. J. Schaffarik, the famous Bohemian and Slavic historian, 
 whose "Slavic Antiquities" are to this day the standard work on 
 the ancient history of the Slavs, speaks of the Slavs in Macedonia 
 as Bulgarians. In his "Slavonic Ethnography," published in 1842, 
 and the ethnological map which accompanies it, he considers the 
 population of Macedonia as Bulgarian. 
 
 Prof. K. Iretchek, the Bohemian historian already mentioned, 
 in his "History of the Bulgarians," 1878, says : "The B'ulgarians 
 inhabit the ancient countries of Moesia [Bulgaria], Thrace and 
 Macedonia," and then proceeds to give in detail the boundaries, 
 which stretch from the Danube on the north along the river Timok, 
 past Vranya, along the Shar mountains, down through Castoria, 
 Salonica, Serres, the southern slope of the Rhodope mountains and 
 reach the Black Sea at Little Samokov. 
 
 But the most convincing evidence against the Serbian preten- 
 sions in Macedonia is to be found in what Serbians themselves have 
 thought or written about the country before chauvinistic ideas had 
 taken hold of Serbian writers. We have already quoted the corre- 
 spondence between the Bulgarians in Bucharest and the Serbian 
 government concerning a Serbo-Bulgarian political union in 1867. 
 We shall now proceed to adduce other Serbian testimony which 
 proves that the Serbian propaganda is of recent origin and artificial 
 in its nature. 
 
 Vuk S. Karadjitch is highly honored among the Serbians as the 
 founder of the modern Serbian literature in the popular language, 
 the author of the modern Serbian orthography, the collector of the 
 best Serbian popular ballads, and as a man thoroughly familiar 
 with the Serbian language in its various dialects. By his extensive 
 travels in Serbia, Syrmia, Slavonia, Croatia, Dalmatia, Montenegro 
 and other regions where the Serbian language is spoken, he gained 
 a wide knowledge of its dialects. In 1814 he published his "Grom- 
 
 28 
 
mar of the Serbian Language as Spoken by the Common People," 
 the first work of its kind in Serbian. In 1824 a German translation 
 of it was published entitled "Wuk Stephanowitsch's Small Serbian 
 Grammar," made by the well-known German philologist, Jacob 
 Grimm, who was personally acquainted with Karadjitch and from 
 whom he derived a great deal of his knowledge about the Serbians. 
 
 In his introduction to the translation Grimm designates the river 
 Kulpa, the town of Cattaro and the river Timok as the lines which 
 divide the Serbian language respectively from the Slovene, the 
 Albanian and the Bulgarian. "Its range," he says, "extends over 
 the following regions : Southeast Crotia, Dalmatia, Slavonia, Bosnia 
 with Herzegovina and Montenegro and Serbia proper." No men- 
 tion of Macedonia is made. But when he speaks of the Bulgarian 
 language he says that it is spoken "in Bulgaria and in Macedonia." 
 Quoting Karadjitch's division of the Serbian language into dialects, 
 Grimm says that Karadjitch recognizes three dialects : Herzegovinian, 
 Ressavian and Syrmian, and in the enumeration of the regions 
 where these dialects are spoken, Macedonia does not appear. A still 
 stronger confirmation of the fact that Karadjitch did not consider 
 the Macedonian dialect as Serbian is given by his publication in 
 1822 of 27 Macedonian ballads, written down by himself, and on 
 the basis of which he presented the characteristics of the Bulgarian 
 language and formulated his views on a reformed Bulgarian orthog- 
 raphy. 
 
 Stephan Verkovitch, a Serbian by birth, spent more than nine 
 years living and traveling in Macedonia collecting popular ballads 
 from various places and carrying on antiquarian research. In 1860 
 he published at the expense of the Serbian Literary Society, Bel- 
 grade, a volume of 335 songs under the title "Popular Songs of the 
 Macedonian Bulgarians." The book was printed in the state printing 
 office at Belgrade, and is dedicated to Princess Julia, wife of the 
 then reigning Prince Michael of Serbia. His introduction, written 
 in Serbian, is so interesting for the light it throws upon the national- 
 ity and language of the population in southeastern Macedonia, 
 where his researches were chiefly carried on, that we will quote 
 parts of it. After stating that this region, comprising the district 
 of Salonica, Serres and Drama, is erroneously believed to be peopled 
 by Greeks or Vlachs, he says: "As I have, however, for more 
 than nine years lived and traveled in these regions, I have had a 
 good opportunity of becoming well acquainted with them and their 
 
 29 
 
inhabitants, and being sure that it would be especially pleasing to 
 my Slav readers to know somewhat more circumstantially and inti- 
 mately about these distant brethren of theirs and about the regions 
 they inhabit, will state the boundaries of this part of Macedonia 
 in which these Bulgarian Slavs are settled." His lengthy descrip- 
 tion of the boundaries may be summed up as follows : To the north 
 of Salonica "the Bulgarians extend over Kukush, Doiran, and 
 Petrich up to Melnik; from the latter town over Demir-Hissar, 
 Serres and Drama they reach the river Mesta, which separates 
 Thrace from Macedonia." To the west of Salonica he places the 
 river Bistritsa as the natural boundary between Macedonia and 
 Thessaly, "or, in other words, between the Slavic and Greek world, 
 and up to this river in the villages the Bulgarian Slavs have the 
 preponderance everywhere." 
 
 In this region so defined by him, Verkovitch places four dif- 
 ferent nationalities: Bulgarian, Macedo-Wallachian or Tsintsar, 
 Greek and Turkish, "but of all these the Bulgarians are numerically 
 the most important, and after them come the Tsintsars. "That the 
 Slav population is the most important may be inferred from the 
 fact that almost every Tsinstar, besides his mother-tongue, speaks 
 also Bulgarian; on the contrary, it is rare to find a Bulgarian who 
 speaks Tsintsar." In regard to his calling the ballads Bulgarian, 
 he says: "I have called these ballads Bulgarian and not Slavic, 
 because to-day if you should ask any Macedonian Slav, 'What are 
 you?' he would at once reply, T am a Bulgarian,' and their language 
 they call Bulgarian." Verkovitch nowhere in his introduction speaks 
 or even mentions any Serbians in Macedonia, and this omission 
 occurs in a book issued at the expense of a Serbian Literary Society, 
 printed at Belgrade, in the State printing office, dedicated to the 
 wife of the then reigning prince of Serbia, and published by a 
 Serbian in A. D. 1860, when there was no Serbo-Bulgarian dispute 
 about Macedonia, and fully ten or twelve years before the existence 
 of any Bulgarian Exarchate ! 
 
 The two Brothers Miladinov, natives of Struga, a small town 
 in the district of Ochrida, published in 1861 more than 650 popular 
 ballads under the title : "Bulgarian Popular Songs." The book was 
 published at Zagreb or Agram, capital of Croatia, and is dedicated 
 to the late Bishop Strossmayer, the famous benefactor and patron 
 of Croatian literature, who defrayed the expenses of the publica- 
 tion. The songs were collected from various parts of Macedonia, 
 
 30 
 
namely, Kukush, Strumnitsa, Voden, Castoria, Veless, Dibra, 
 Prilep, Ochrida, Struga and Monastir. Considering that the Croats 
 and the Serbians are kith and kin by race and language, is it not 
 strange that in a Croat city, at the expense of a Croat Bishop, songs 
 from Macedonia should be published as Bulgarian without protest 
 against such a flagrant violation of the rights of the Serbians 
 in Macedonia? 
 
 A Bulgarian monk, named N.eophyt, printed, in 1835, "in Kra- 
 gujevats, at the Princely Serbian Printing- Press," a small Bulgarian 
 geography, the full title of which ran thus: "A short political 
 geography for the instruction of the Bulgarian youth, printed with 
 the approbation and at the expense of His Serenity, the Prince of 
 Serbia, Milosh Theodorovitch Obrenovitch, as a gift to the student 
 youth of Bulgaria, and with the blessing of the most Reverend 
 Metropolitan of Serbia, Peter." 
 
 In this geography, so highly patronized by the two highest Ser- 
 bian dignitaries, secular and clerical, Macedonia is described as a 
 province "inhabited by Greeks, Bulgarians, Kutso-Vlachs, some Mo- 
 hammedans and Jews," and then the author goes on to enumerate 
 several towns in Macedonia which he calls "Bulgarian." No Ser- 
 bians in Macedonia are mentioned, and this in a geography printed 
 at the expense of a Serbian Prince and accompanied with the bless- 
 ing of a Serbian Archbishop ! 
 
 Dimitri Stephanovitch, a Serbian, and a warm advocate of a 
 Panslavic Federation, in his French pamphlet, "Slavs and Greeks in 
 Turkey" (Paris, 1861), demands as the portion due to Serbia in this 
 Federation, only Bosnia and Novipazar. Vladimir lovanovitch, 
 also a Serbian, in his book, "The Serbians and the Mission of Serbia 
 in Eastern Europe," thus defines "Old Serbia" : "It is the Serbians 
 of Herzegovina, Bosnia and Metokhia, called Old Serbia." The 
 Serbian author who concealed his name under the initials, "C. C," 
 in his pamphlet, "The Eastern Question and Serbia" (Belgrade, 
 1870) , writes : "It is a mistake to believe that in Thrace, Rumelia 
 and Macedonia there are any Greeks. The latter form the majority 
 only in the towns along the coast of the Aegean Sea ; but the rural 
 population is purely Bulgarian." Vesselinovitch, a Serbian writer, 
 in his pamphlet, "The Serbians in Macedonia," does not deny that 
 as early as the tenth century "the Slavs of Macedonia called 
 themselves by the political name of Bulgarians, and that their 
 country has borne the name of Bulgarian territory." 
 
 31 
 
Aside from the above quoted evidence, there are three official 
 documents of primary importance that affirm most emphatically 
 the nationality of the Macedonian Slavs and classify Macedonia 
 as Bulgarian. 
 
 In order to put an end to the Church strife between the Greek 
 Patriarchate and the Bulgarians, who demanded a separate church 
 administration, the Turkish government, in 1870, issued a charter 
 establishing such an organization under the name of "Exarchate." 
 This charter was principally based upon a project previously pre- 
 sented by the Greek Patriarch for the solution of the question. In 
 this project the Patriarch was willing to assent to the constitution 
 of a Bulgarian Exarchate, provided its jurisdiction was limited to 
 the dioceses or districts comprised in Bulgaria proper, the territory 
 between the Danube and the Balkan Mountains. The Bulgarians 
 refused to accept the project and demanded that the dioceses in 
 Thrace and Macedonia should also be included. To reconcile the 
 two sides, the Turkish government in the tenth article of the charter 
 enumerated the seventeen dioceses of which the Exarchate was to 
 be formed, sixteen of which (including Nish and Pirot) were in 
 Bulgaria proper, and only one diocese, that of Veless, was in Mace- 
 donia. But fully aware that these seventeen dioceses did not in- 
 clude all the territory inhabited by Bulgarians, the Turkish govern- 
 ment added the following clause to the above article : 
 
 "If all or at least two-thirds of the inhabitants of the Orthodox 
 rite of places other than those enumerated and named above wish 
 to submit themselves to the Bulgarian Exarchate in their spiritual 
 affairs, and if this is proven and established, they will be authorized 
 to do so ; but this cannot be done except on the demand and by the 
 consent of the whole or at least two-thirds of the inhabitants." 
 
 The Greek Patriarchate refused to recognize this charter solely 
 because of this clause, for in every other of its provisions, the charter 
 is based upon the previous patriarchal project, and makes the Exar- 
 chate in every respect subordinate to the Greek Patriarchate. 
 Although the charter included in the Exarchate the dioceses of Nish, 
 Pirot and Veless, which the Serbians pretend are by nationality 
 Serbian; although Bulgarian bishops on the strength of the Im- 
 perial charter were in the course of time sent to seven dioceses in 
 Macedonia, no Serbian protest was ever raised in defence of any 
 Serbian rights in Macedonia. If Macedonia were a Serbian country, 
 why was no protest made? 
 
 32 
 
In December, 1876, after the massacres of Bulgarians in the 
 spring of that year, a European Conference, composed of the Am- 
 bassadors to Turkey and of special delegates of the Great Powers, 
 met at Constantinople to elaborate an autonomous administration for 
 Bulgaria. One of the prominent members of this conference was the 
 late Marquis of Salisbury, then Secretary for India, and later Prime 
 Minister of Great Britain. The territory and the people that this 
 Conference recognized as Bulgaria and as Bulgarians is best shown 
 by the project it presented for autonomy, in the elaboration of which 
 the late Eugene Schuyler, U. S. Consul-General in Constantinople, 
 had no small share. The first article of the project reads thus : 
 
 "Of the territories below designated, and conformably to the 
 map hereto attached, two vilayets (provinces) will be formed, which 
 shall be administered in the manner specified below : 
 
 "The Eastern vilayet, which will have its chief seat at Tirnovo, 
 will be composed of the districts of Rustchuk, Tirnovo, Tultcha, 
 Varna, Slivno, Philippopolis (excepting Sultan- Yeri and Akhir- 
 Tchelebi), and the counties of Kirk-Kilisseh, Mustapha Pasha and 
 Kizil-Agatch. 
 
 "The Western vilayet, the chief seat of which will be Sofia, will 
 be composed of the districts of Sofia, Vidin, Nish, Uskub, Bitolya 
 (excepting two counties on the south), a part of the district of 
 Serres (three counties on the north), and the counties of Strum- 
 nitsa, Tikvesh, Veless and Castoria." 
 
 In the minutes of the deliberations and discussions of the Con- 
 ference a great deal is said about guaranteeing the rights of the 
 Greek and Turkish minorities in these two vilayets, but not a word 
 is said by any one about any Serbians in Macedonia. No one of 
 the delegates in the Conference ever questioned the essentially Bul- 
 garian character of the two vilayets. Greek and Turkish protests, 
 mostly made by order of the Turkish authorities, were presented to 
 the Conference against its project as favoring the Bulgarians and 
 contesting the Bulgarian character of the enumerated districts. Not 
 one protest or declaration ever came from any Serbians complaining 
 of the violation of Serbian rights. 
 
 On January 31, 1878, at the end of the Russo-Turkish war, 
 "bases of peace with Russia" were signed at Adrianople by Russian 
 and Turkish plenipotentiaries. The first article of the agreement 
 was as follows : 
 
 "Bulgaria within the limits determined by the majority of the 
 
 33 
 
Bulgarian population and which, in no case, will be less than those 
 indicated by the Conference of Constantinople, will be erected into 
 an autonomous principality, tributary, with a national Christian 
 government and a native militia." 
 
 Article 6 of the Treaty of San Stefano, which brought the 
 Russo-Turkish war to a definite close, designates in detail the 
 boundaries of the newly-created Bulgarian Principality, which in- 
 cluded nearly the whole of Macedonia and of Thrace almost up 
 to Adrianople. The Greeks especially raised an outcry against 
 this article; the Serbians were significantly dumb. 
 
 Some of the European Powers, chiefly England, took excep- 
 tion to this treaty, fearing that a "great" Bulgaria would prove a 
 cat's paw of Russia. A European Congress was convened in June, 
 1878, in Berlin, and the Treaty of San Stefano was revised. By 
 the treaty of Berlin, which replaced that of San Stefano, Bulgaria 
 was arbitrarily divided into three parts: 1, the Principality of 
 Bulgaria, between the Danube and the Balkan Mountains; 2, the 
 autonomous Province of Eastern Rumelia, south of the Balkans; 
 3, Macedonia, for which a reformed administration was to be pro- 
 vided. The districts of Nish, Pirot and Vranya, which the Sultan's 
 charter of the Exarchate, the Conference of Constantinople and the 
 Treaty of San Stefano had recognized as Bulgarian, were arbi- 
 trarily annexed to Serbia, while more than half of Dobrudja was 
 likewise arbitrarily detached from Bulgaria and given to Rumania 
 to compensate her for the retrocession of Bessarabia to Russia. No 
 questions were asked of the population of these territories as to the 
 changes made ; they were treated as chattels fit for barter. 
 
 In the most interesting work by the late William T. Stead, "The 
 M. P. for Russia" (London, 1909), we find what competent people 
 thought and said about the work of the Berlin Congress. Mr. 
 Gladstone and other prominent Liberals in England strongly dis- 
 approved of it. Madame Novikov, a prominent Russian lady, who 
 on account of her connections with official circles in Russia and her 
 influence in England, was called "The M. P. for Russia," in a letter 
 to Mr. Stead, in 1878, writes: "I cannot understand how it is that 
 Englishmen — even liberal Englishmen — should so strangely ignore 
 the fact that Eastern Rumelia, so far from being coextensive with 
 Southern Bulgaria, does not include one-half of the Bulgarian lands 
 south of the Balkan." The late Prince Gortchakov, Chancellor of 
 the Russian Empire, in a conversation with Madame Novikov, told 
 
 34 
 
her: "Surely you know that I was strongly opposed to the parti- 
 tion of Bulgaria; but to start a new war on their behalf was more 
 than I dared to do." 
 
 The late Ivan Aksakov, the influential President of the Slavic 
 Association, and a prominent public man in Russia, in a public 
 speech in Moscow soon after the Berlin Treaty was signed, made 
 the following statement: "Never did any war cause such sacri- 
 fices, prompted by sublime charity, as this which had been under- 
 taken for the sole purpose of delivering all the Bulgarians from the 
 Turkish yoke. By the Treaty of San Stefano the whole of Bulgaria 
 was freed. But now it would appear, with the sanction of the self- 
 same generous liberator of Bulgaria, Bulgaria is torn asunder 
 alive, and the best, the richest portion of her territory finds itself 
 anew under the Turkish yoke." 
 
 The late General Ignatiev, for many years Russian Ambas- 
 sador to Turkey, and author of the San Stefano Treaty, who was 
 thoroughly acquainted with the Balkan Peninsula, in speaking with 
 Mr. Stead in the spring of 1888, said: "The Bulgaria of San 
 Stefano is only the Bulgaria of the Constantinople Conference with 
 rectifications necessitated by closer knowledge of the ethnographical 
 and geographical details. In the treaty of San Stefano I proposed 
 to construct a Bulgaria that would be homogeneous as regards na- 
 tionality and religion." 
 
 The late Prince Bismarck, in his famous speech of February 
 19, 1878, in the Reichstag, made this statement : "The ethnograph- 
 ical situation of Bulgaria, as I know it from authentic sources and 
 as it is evident from the best map we know of, that of Kiepert, 
 is the following: the limits of the nationality come down on the 
 west almost without any admixture to beyond Salonica, and stretch 
 on the east with a little admixture of Turkish elements to the 
 Black Sea." 
 
 It is hardly necessary to waste time in replying to the Serbian 
 assertion that the Macedonians, though Serbians by nationality, call 
 themselves Bulgarians for fear of the Turks, who dislike the Ser- 
 bians on account of their warlike and rebellious qualities. The 
 assertion is historically untrue. Before the Serbian rebellion of 
 1804, the Serbians were so abject in their submission to the Turks 
 that a traveler of the sixteenth century describes the people as "poor 
 captives, none of whom dared to lift up his head." It is strangely 
 significant that the Greeks make use of the same argument, mutatis 
 
 35 
 
mutandis, to prove that the Macedonians are Greeks. If it were 
 true that the Macedonian Serbians concealed their nationality under 
 the name of Bulgarians, why is it that the Serbians in Bosnia and 
 in the Province of Novipazar north of the Shar Mountains never 
 adopted the same subterfuge, but have persisted in calling them- 
 selves Serbians? 
 
 We have said enough, we think, to show incontrovertibly that 
 the Macedonian Slavs by nationality are and always have been Bul- 
 garians; that this name by which they have called themselves and 
 have been called by their neighbors — Turks, Albanians, Greeks, 
 Vlachs, and even Serbians — as well as by foreign and Slavic trav- 
 elers, historians, philologists, ethnographers and statesmen, is an 
 ethnic name and not a nickname or a subterfuge. To the twaddle 
 of the Serbians we have opposed the authority of distinguished 
 men who have written and spoken without partiality or prejudice, 
 and who enjoy a world-wide reputation. It was reserved, forsooth, 
 for a few Serbian professors of a third-rate Belgrade university, 
 whose reputation does not extend beyond its precincts, or the out- 
 skirts of the city, to discover that all these men, from Pouqueville 
 down to Bismarck, were mistaken or deluded in believing that the 
 Macedonians are Bulgarians, and to pronounce all the ethnographic 
 maps and statistics of trustworthy travelers and cartographers like 
 Misses Mackenzie and Irby, Lejean, Boue, Shaflfarik, Kiepert, 
 Reclus and others, erroneous and unreliable. For these Serbian 
 professors the greatest authority on the Macedonian question is a 
 certain Serbian Goptchevitch, whose work on "Macedonia and 
 Old Serbia" has been condemned by all prominent Slavists as biased, 
 untruthful and untrustworthy, and to which the only criticism 
 vouchsafed by the great Slavist Jagitch was: "What a pity for 
 the fine paper and the good print^ — the two sterling qualities of the 
 work." 
 
 We refrain from entering into any discussion about the lan- 
 guage of the Macedonian Bulgarians, for it can be of no profit 
 or interest to people who are ignorant of both Serbian and Bul- 
 garian. We could easily show that this language is a Bulgarian 
 and not a Serbian dialect. It has been recognized as such by all 
 Slavic philologists. Dr. V. Oblak testifies that "beginning with 
 Grigorovitch down to Kalina [a Polish philologist] and Lavroy [a 
 Russian philologist] the Macedonian dialects on the whole — even 
 to isolated exceptions — are reckoned as belonging to the Bulgarian 
 
 36 
 
language-stock, and by our knowledge of them to-day there is 
 hardly a single serious great scholar who would dispute this con- 
 nection." American missionaries carried on their work in Macedo- 
 nia entirely in Bulgarian prior to the occupation of the country by 
 the Serbians in 1914, when, as Mr. W. P. Clarke writes, the authori- 
 ties forbade preaching in Bulgarian (Missionary Herald, 1915, p. 
 519). Only Bulgarian Scriptures and tracts were circulated in 
 Macedonia, as is shown by the following letter written by an Amer- 
 ican missionary who spent many years at Monastir and Salonica, 
 which he left nineteen and fifteen years ago, respectively: "Pre- 
 vious to 1897, as I remember, there were almost no sales of Serbian 
 Scriptures. Whatever was sold was sold in the vicinity of Uskub, 
 where there were refugees from Old Serbia or travelers. My col- 
 porteur never took more than one or two Serb Testaments and that 
 as 'samples,' on his tour. North of the Shar Mountains the lan- 
 guage is Serbian, and there the greater part of sales of Serbian 
 Scriptures were made. While I was in Macedonia I met quite a 
 number, here and there, who had been to seek employment in 
 Serbia, who could speak Serbian learned there. I do not remem- 
 ber one who spoke Serbian as his home language. My experience 
 is that with the exception of a small minority in the border towns 
 from Tetovo (Kalkandelen) and Skopia to Komanovo there are 
 none in Macedonia who speak Serbian as their mother tongue." 
 
 Prof. L. Niederle, a well-known Bohemian ethnographer and 
 historian, gives the following conclusions as those of an objective 
 investigator : 
 
 1. The Slavs in Macedonia and Old Serbia represent a people 
 whose national sentiment up to this time is not fully and in equal 
 measure developed, in comparison with the two Slavic neighbors, 
 that is, Serbia and Bulgaria. 
 
 2. There is no doubt that the larger part of these Slavs feel 
 and declare themselves to be Bulgarians; moreover, this is an 
 old, historical denomination, that has not resulted only from the 
 Bulgarian church propaganda of the last decades. The name "Ser- 
 bian," although these territories in some past time were attached 
 to the Serbian state, has not taken root. 
 
 3. From the philological point of view the language of the 
 Macedonian Slavs, although it represents particularly a group of 
 local dialects, is, in its chief features, nearer to the Bulgarian than 
 
 37 
 
to the Serbian language. In consequence of this, he counts the 
 Macedonian Slavs as Bulgarians, and recognizes that only in "Old 
 Serbia" are a considerable number of families found that regard 
 themselves as Serbians. 
 
 To this dispassionate declaration of the learned professor we 
 may add that some years ago the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 
 proposed to the various Slavic academies to send to Macedonia a 
 commission of competent Slavists to investigate the language of 
 the people. The Serbian Academy of Sciences protested against 
 the proposition and rejected it. 
 
 38 
 
IV 
 
 The National Consciousness of the Macedonian Bulgarians. 
 
 Another basis which Serbian chauvinists adopt in their claim 
 to Macedonia is that its Slav population possesses "no national con- 
 sciousness, no sentiment, either Serbian or Bulgarian"; that "they 
 are predisposed to appropriate without opposition the one or the 
 other of these sentiments, and thus become Bulgarians or Serbians." 
 Dr. Milovanovitch in his pamphlet "Serbs and Bulgarians," writes: 
 "After a Bulgarian rule of 135 years the Macedonians felt them- 
 selves to be Bulgarians; but the later Serbian rule over them 
 almost eradicated this feeling. At the tim^ of King Dushan the 
 Macedonian population as far as the seacoast was called Serbian. 
 Under the Turkish yoke this Serbian sentiment vanished and the 
 population relapsed in its primitive condition," i. e., they became 
 again Bulgarians. He carefully avoids giving any explanation of 
 this strange national metamorphosis. Like every other Serbian as- 
 sertion, this statement is based on words only; no proofs are ad- 
 duced in its support, for there are none. It is historically untrue 
 that the populaion of Macedonia was ever called Serbian. King 
 Dushan ruled only twenty-fjur years (1331-1355), and during 
 his reign the Serbian state attained its greatest territorial expan- 
 sion in the Balkan Peninsula. He conquered from Byzantium the 
 whole of Macedonia, minus Salonica, as far as the River Mesta, the 
 boundary between Macedonia and Thrace. Dushan's kingdom did 
 not include either Thrace or Bulgaria proper. In official documents 
 he was styled "King of Serbians, Greeks, Bulgarians and Albanians." 
 On what ground did he include "Bulgarians" in his title, if it were 
 not that he ruled over Macedonia, for outside of Macedonia he pos- 
 sessed no other Bulgarian territory ? The allegation that the Mace- 
 donians were called "Serbians" under Dushan is disproved by Du- 
 shan himself. 
 
 The first sign that the Bulgarian nation gave of national life 
 and consciousness was about the second half of last century. Up 
 to that time the Bulgarians, besides being subject in secular matters 
 to the Turks, were in church matters under the jurisdiction of the 
 Greek Patriarch and his bishops. The name Bulgarian was ignored 
 
 39 
 
even in the official language of the Turkish government, and the 
 Bulgarians were classed as "Roum Millet" (Greek nation). In the 
 churches and schools the Bulgarian language was proscribed and 
 replaced by Greek. It was in 1835 that the first Bulgarian school 
 was started. This movement toward national self-assertion and 
 the vindication of national rights gained its greatest momentum 
 when in 1858-9 the Bulgarians made a formal demand upon the 
 Greek Patriarchate to have bishops of their own nationality, and 
 to be recognized as a national unit. The movement rapidly spread 
 to Macedonia. Petitions to the Turkish Government and the Greek 
 Patriarchate poured in from all over Macedonia, making common 
 issue with their Bulgarian brethren in their demands. Some of the 
 principal Macedonian dioceses even sent delegates to Constanti- 
 nople to press their cause, in conjunction with delegates from Bul- 
 garia and Thrace. Obedience to the Greek bishops and the payment 
 of the customary "bishop's dues" to them as their spiritual rulers 
 were refused by the people, in spite of the pressure brought to bear 
 upon them by the civil authorities. In some places, such as Doiran 
 and Kukush, the people in their desperate efforts to get rid of the 
 Greek ecclesiastical rule and safeguard their national interests, 
 united with the Roman Catholic Church and recognized the Pope as 
 their spiritual head. When in 1870 the Sultan's charter instituting 
 the Bulgarian Exarchate was promulgated, Te Deums and joyous 
 celebrations were held all over Macedonia. Formal declarations of 
 secession from the Greek Patriarchate and petitions for incorpora- 
 tion with the Exarchate were presented to the Turkish government 
 by the Macedonian dioceses. 
 
 In the autumn of 1878, when it became known that the Berlin 
 Congress had divided Bulgaria into three parts, risings in the valleys 
 of the Struma and the Vardar took place as a protest against sep- 
 arating Macedonia from Bulgaria. It was necessary to send a 
 European International Commission to induce the revolted districts 
 to lay down their arms under the assurance that the reforms pro- 
 vided in the Berlin Treaty for Macedonia would be carried out. 
 
 After the constitution of the Bulgarian Principality in 1878, 
 Bulgaria became the place of refuge for all Macedonian Bulga- 
 rians, who found life in their country unbearable under Turkish 
 rule. In 1902 in Sofia alone there were about 18,000 such refugees, 
 while the whole number in Bulgaria now must be over 150,000. In 
 the army and in the government service, in the schools and in vari- 
 
 40 
 
ous other occupations, as lawyers, merchants, physicians, etc., there 
 are thousands of them employed. During the Balkan wars of 1912- 
 1913, 15,000 Macedonians fought as volunteers in the ranks of the 
 Bulgarian army, first against the Turks and then against the Greeks 
 and Serbians. To Bulgaria the Macedonians have turned as to 
 their mother country, where they were sure of receiving a brotherly 
 welcome. No Macedonians have- ever served in the army or the 
 government of Serbia ; none have ever been employed in her schools 
 as teachers. Serbia to them has always been a foreign country. 
 
 In their schools and educational life also the Macedonian Bul- 
 garians have given abundant proof of their national consciousness. 
 Of all the Bulgarians those in Macedonia were the most heavily 
 oppressed by the attempts of the Greek bishops to denationalize and 
 hellenize them. If any Bulgarian dared to talk of Bulgarian na- 
 tionality or Bulgarian schools, he was denounced to the Turkish 
 authorities as a seditious man, a rebel against the Government, and 
 was liable to imprisonment or exile. Not a few of these victims of 
 the Greek bishops met an untimely death in prison or exile. Yet 
 the spirit of the people was not broken, and by dint of perseverance 
 and determination they carried on the fight for national self-asser- 
 tion. As early as 1839 a Bulgarian school was opened at Veless, 
 and eleven years later a school for girls was started. In 1857 at 
 Kukush Bulgarian was introduced into the school along with Greek, 
 and three years later a girls' school was started. In 1870 there 
 were in the diocese of Kukush thirty-seven schools in all, in thirteen 
 of which the language of instruction was Greek, in six mixed, i. e., 
 Greek and Bulgarian, and in the eighteen Bulgarian. In 1848 a 
 Bulgarian school was started in Skopia ; a little later in Shtip, Prilep, 
 Ochrida and other towns. Some of the schools were personally 
 visited and are mentionel by Misses Mackenzie and Irby, Tozer and 
 other travelers in Macedonia. Prof. Grigorovitch in 1844 enumerates 
 nine schools in Macedonia where the instruction was conducted in 
 Bulgarian. By 1860 in almost all the towns and larger villages in 
 Macedonia there were Bulgarian schools. 
 
 Almong those who initiated the Bulgarian movement for na- 
 tional self assertion and paved the way for it there were several 
 who were natives of Macedonia. The monk Paissi, who in 1762 
 wrote the first history of the Bulgarian nation — a work breathing 
 the most ardent patriotic zeal, and which gave the first impetus to the 
 Bulgarian national awakening — was from Macedonia. The first 
 
 41 
 
Bulgarian teacher, the monk Neophyt, who is rightly considered the 
 patriarch of Bulgarian teachers, was a Macedonian. The man who 
 established the first Bulgarian printing-press at Salonica, in 1839, 
 was a Macedonian, and the author of one of the first Bulgarian 
 books ever printed [in 1816 in Buda-Pest] was again a Macedonian. 
 
 These facts and others which we might easily cite demonstrate 
 in a most convincing manner the national feelings and consciousness 
 of the Macedonian Bulgarians. They also disprove the false asser- 
 tion of both Serbians and Greeks that it was due to the creation of 
 the Bulgarian Exarchate and its propaganda that the Macedonian 
 population was converted to Bulgarianism. The following short 
 sketch of the Exarchate and its work in Macedonia will make the 
 matter clearer. 
 
 The Bulgarian Exarchate, as we have already said, was insti- 
 tuted in 1870; but it was not really constituted till 1872, when the 
 first Bulgarian Exarch was chosen. The first Bulgarian bishop in 
 Macedonia was sent the following year to the diocese of Veless. In 
 1874 a census was taken in the dioceses of Ochrida and Skopia, and 
 as the population proved to be more than two-thirds Bulgarian, two 
 Bulgarian bishops were sent to these dioceses. Three years later 
 (1877) the Russo- Turkish war broke out as a result of the massacre 
 of Bulgarians in the previous year, and for -the avowed object of 
 freeing Bulgaria from Turkish rule. The three Bulgarian bishops 
 in Macedonia were removed from their dioceses by the Turkish au- 
 thorities. When the war ended, in 1878, and the Berlin Treaty 
 erected Northern Bulgaria into a Principality and Southern Bul- 
 garia into an autonomous province, the Turkish Government felt 
 bitterly inimical to everything Bulgarian. The Exarch, who re- 
 sided in Constantinople, was practically ignored by the Sultan and 
 his government, and a deaf ear was turned to all his demands for 
 the reinstatement of the three bishops in Macedonia or the appoint- 
 ment of new ones. The union of Eastern Rumelia with Bulgaria in 
 1885 increased the resentment of the Turkish Government against 
 the Bulgarians. This resentment grew stronger and more pro- 
 nounced as public meetings were repeatedly held all over Bulgaria 
 demanding the application in Macedonia of the reforms promised 
 by the Berlin Congress. Delegates also were sent to the Powers 
 signatory to the Berlin Treaty, to lay before them the grievous condi- 
 tion of the people in Macedonia. It was only in 1890 that the Turk- 
 ish Govei'nment consented to the return of the bishop of Skopia and 
 
 42 
 
Ochrida to their dioceses. Three years later two more bishops were 
 allowed to go to Veless and Nevrokop ; but the Turkish authorities 
 in Macedonia were so ill-disposed towards the bishops and so ob- 
 structive to the opening of Bulgarian schools and churches, that 
 the Exarch in a memorial presented to the Sultan in 1893 vigorously 
 protested against their conduct. He demanded that the tenth article 
 of the Charter of the Exarchate be carried out, that censuses be taken 
 in the other Macedonian dioceses without further delay and that no 
 impediments be put to the establishment of Bulgarian schools and 
 churches, but that they should enjoy the same privileges that were 
 granted to those that were under the jurisdiction and supervision of 
 the Greek Patriarch. As a consequence of this step of the Exarch, 
 which was backed up by the government and people of the Bulgarian 
 Principality and by some of the European Powers, three more 
 bishops were sent in 1895 to the dioceses of Monastir, Dibra and 
 Strumnitsa, respectively. These seven bishops were all that the 
 Exarchate was able to send to Macedonia up to the year 1912, when 
 the Balkan war broke out. From the sketch we have given it be- 
 comes apparent that no Bulgarian bishops were able to remain in 
 Macedonia permanently. For twelve years (1878-1890) Macedonia 
 was practically without any Bulgarian bishops, and its Bulgarian 
 population was left to the tender mercies of the Greek bishops and 
 the Serbian propaganda. The Turkish authorities cooperated openly 
 with them in repressing the national spirit of the people, in forcing 
 the people to declare allegiance to the Greek Patriarch, in closing 
 Bulgarian schools and churches, etc. These repressive measures did 
 not cease even after 1895, when the bishops were in their dioceses. 
 All kinds of obstacles were raised against them in the performance 
 of their ecclesiastical duties. They were not allowed to undertake 
 any tours of inspection among their flock, while the Greek bishops 
 were free to do so; their protests and representations to the gov- 
 ernment against the open favoritism shown to the Greek and Ser- 
 bian propaganda were unheeded. 
 
 The severities of the Turkish Government against the Bul- 
 garians in Macedonia reached such a pitch that the Exarch found 
 himself obliged, in 1904, to present a memorial to the Ambassadors 
 of the European Powers at Constantinople and another to the Grand 
 Vizier exposing the state of things in Macedonia. In the memorial 
 addressed to the Ambassadors he says: "The measures taken, at 
 the demand of the Greek Patriarch, against the Bulgarians who 
 
 43 
 
have rejected and do reject his jurisdiction, are of extreme harsh- 
 ness. The petitions by which the Bulgarians demand the right to 
 recognize their own ecclesiastical authorities, are either returned 
 to them or destroyed; the Bulgarian churches are closed and their 
 doors sealed ; the priests are driven away under guard and forbidden 
 to officiate in the Slavic language; the Bulgarians are told in the 
 plainest manner that they will not be allowed to worship and to 
 instruct themselves in their own language, and they are formally 
 asked to enter the fold of the Patriarchate. . . . It is not by 
 disregarding law and justice, nor by violating liberty of con- 
 science that the pacification of the country will be attained. Respect 
 for law and conscience alone can insure tranquility. Instead of 
 taking sides for this or that church, let true impartiality be shown 
 to each of them ; let all the people have the right to remain attached 
 to their respective institutions. There will be then no more misunder- 
 standings, no more quarrels among the Orthodox Christians who, by 
 themselves, will reach a peaceful solution of the difficult ethnical 
 and ecclesiastical question, that is, to know to what nationality and 
 to what church they belong. The Patriarch, who proclaims loudly 
 the unalterable affection which all the Orthodox Christians cherish 
 for his throne, will be the gainer thereby." 
 
 From the strongly worded memorial presented to the Grand 
 Vizier we cite the following: 
 
 "In several memorials, especially in that dated June 12, 1904, 
 we have brought to your notice the revolting acts of violence to 
 which the Bulgarian population has been subjected by the Patri- 
 archate, with the cooperation of the local authorities. With desig- 
 nation of dates and of places, and with documents in hand, we 
 have denounced to you bishops and Greek consular officials who, 
 going from village to village, have threatened the Bulgarian popu- 
 lation with the use of force in order to make it submit to the 
 Patriarchate. On the other hand, the Bulgarian bishops are express- 
 ly forbidden to make pastoral rounds in the villages of the Exar- 
 chate or to send priests and teachers to these Bulgarian villages. We 
 have proved to you that it is with the aid of armed force that the 
 Bulgarian Exarchist villages are forced to declare themselves patri- 
 archists, and the petitions of the Bulgarian population demanding 
 their separation from the Patriarchate have been destroyed by order 
 of Hilmi Pasha [Inspector General in Macedonia]. 
 
 "All these acts of violence have been committed not secretly or 
 
 44 
 
upon some isolated persons, but upon villages, upon whole districts, 
 upon the whole population and in broad daylight, with the con- 
 nivance of the authorities. If the villages complain to the governor, 
 he tells them that every village which declines to accept Greek 
 priests and teachers, but obstinately persists in making use of the 
 Bulgarian language in the churches and schools, will see both of 
 them closed. Sometimes it is the police that take it upon themselves 
 to bring some prominent men of a village to the Greek bishop, who 
 at first lectures them, then, if they refuse to speak, abuses them. In 
 some villages, the authorities, accomplices with the Patriarchate, 
 forbid the Bulgarian teachers to enter the schools. Some governors, 
 by official orders, impose Greek teachers upon the Bulgarian vil- 
 lages. Others simply send back to the villages the list of the teach- 
 ers with their diplomas, saying that the superior authorities cannot 
 permit the opening of a new school, or that they do not authorize 
 this person or that person to teach, and not infrequently that they 
 do not authorize any one to teach in the existing schools." 
 
 Such were the conditions under which the Exarchate, its clergy 
 and teachers had to work in Macedonia. Both the Greek bishops 
 and the government authorities were actively hostile to it, and no 
 pains were spared by either side to paralyze its activities. 
 
 Is it not absurd, then, to affirm that it was the Exarchate's 
 propaganda that created a Bulgarian nationality in Macedonia by 
 converting, through its priests and teachers, Serbians or Greeks into 
 Bulgarians ? 
 
 45 
 
V 
 
 The Serbian Propaganda in Macedonia: Its Causes and Aims 
 
 Writing in 1898 the late Dr. Milovanovitch says : "The Serbians 
 did not begin to think about Macedonia until 1885; but as late as 
 1889 the Serbian action was conducted without any plan, without 
 any understanding and without any result. Only for the past nine 
 years has the Serbian campaign in Macedonia been organized to 
 counteract the plans of the Exarchate and defend the Serbian 
 nationality there." 
 
 This statement proves that the Serbian campaign in Macedonia 
 is of recent origin, that before 1885 the Serbians did not pay any 
 attention to Macedonia, although the Bulgarian Exarchate had 
 already been in existence for fifteen years. Dr. Milovanovitch 
 fixes upon 1889 as the date of the organization of the Serbian 
 propaganda in Macedonia, because it was from that year that the 
 Serbian government took it in hand and began to subsidize it. The 
 Serbian company had its base of operation not in Macedonia, but in 
 Belgrade, whence it was organized, directed and financed.- 
 
 The failure of Serbia's attempt in 1885 to prevent the union 
 of Eastern Rumelia with Bulgaria or to seize Bulgarian territory 
 as a compensation, made the position of the late King Milan, the 
 originator of the Serbo-Bulgarian war, very precarious. Milan was 
 already unpopular with a large part of the intelligent class of 
 Serbians. The fatal issue of a war made his unpopularity still 
 greater, and he feared an outbreak of discontent. To avert this 
 misfortune, Milan found it necessary to divert public attention in 
 Serbia from home affairs, and he hit upon a Serbian propaganda 
 in Macedonia as the best plan. He could not agitate the question 
 of Bosnia and Herzegovina, because three years earlier he had 
 signed an agreement with Austria conceding to her the absolute 
 possession of the two provinces. 
 
 The initiation of this Serbian propaganda in Macedonia was 
 welcomed by the Turkish government, which had been incensed 
 against the Bulgarians by the proclamation of the Union and by the 
 persistent efforts of the government and people of Bulgaria before 
 the European Powers to obtain the execution of the twenty-third 
 
 46 
 
article of the Berlin Treaty, which granted autonomy to Macedonia. 
 The Turkish statesmen knew perfectly well that there were no 
 Serbians in Macedonia, and that a Serbian propaganda there would 
 be fruitless and could be of no menace to Turkish interests ; but it 
 would be a wedge driven between Bulgaria and Serbia and wo'uld 
 tend to weaken or paralyze Bulgarian influence in Macedonia and 
 the demands of the Bulgarians for autonomy. The more pre- 
 tenders to Macedonia there were, the easier it would be for Turkey 
 to play the game of divide et impera. 
 
 With this end in view the Turkish government readily accepted 
 in 1890 the appointment of Serbian consuls in Skopia, Monastir and 
 Salonica, although Serbia's commercial and industrial interests in 
 these three provinces were nil. That the installment of these con- 
 suls had political agitation for its object is evident from the fact 
 that Turkey, while permitting their establishment in Macedonia, 
 would not allow any Serbian consul in "Old Serbia," that is, north 
 of the Shar Mountains, where there is a Serbian population. The 
 Serbian propaganda was the chief business of these consuls in 
 Macedonia and they assumed its direction. 
 
 But Serbia was aware that, in order to carry on a propaganda 
 in Macedonia, it was necessary to gain the favor of another power 
 besides that of the Sultan. This power was the Greek Patriarch of 
 Constantinople, without whose aid the propaganda could not hope 
 for success. By the privileges the Patriarch enjoys he exercises 
 absolute control over the churches and schools of the populations 
 that recognize his jurisdiction. No permission for the erection of 
 a church is granted except at the demand of the Patriarch, and he 
 has the right to establish schools wherever and whenever he pleases. 
 In order that a church should be erected in a place it was provided 
 that there must be a recognized religious community or congrega- 
 tion. By a later law enacted by the Turkish government, no new 
 school could be opened in a quarter of a town where there were not 
 at least thirty houses or families that wanted it. Nowhere in 
 Macedonia were there enough Serbians to constitute a religious 
 community, or enough families in a town or village to justify the 
 opening of Serbian schools. It was necessary to create such com- 
 munities artificially, and this could be done only through the Greek 
 Patriarchate. Here and there in Macedonia there were still Bul- 
 garian communties that had not been allowed by the government to 
 join the Exarchate, and which were under the jurisdiction of the 
 
 47 
 
Greek bishops. These Bulgarian so-called Patriarchists could be 
 made centers upon which "Serbian" communities could be grafted 
 and a Serbian nationality created, for which churches and schools 
 were to be established. The Greek Patriarchate would lose nothing 
 by the arrangement, because its chief concern was to keep these 
 communities under its spiritual authority and, by declaring them 
 Serbian, to prevent their entering under the jurisdiction of the 
 Exarchate's charter. 
 
 This winning over of the Greek Patriarch to the Serbian cause 
 in Macedonia was consummated in 1896, during a visit of the late 
 King Alexander of Serbia to Constantinople. How it was done 
 is best told in the words of the late V. Georgievitch, the then Serbian 
 Minister to Turkey and a year later Prime Minister of Serbia. 
 In a report addressed to the King, as recorded in his book, "The 
 End of a Dynasty," he says : 
 
 "As to the Patriarchate, we must simply win it ... by 
 the Russian method. If the considerable influence that England 
 formerly enjoyed in Turkey has passed wholly over to Russia, it 
 is solely because the latter without sparing its resources has gained 
 by this tried means the dignitaries of the Sultan's court, the promi- 
 nent persons in the army and in the ministries, and especially the 
 ulemas [high religious dignitaries]. In our struggle against the 
 Bulgarians we should make use of the same methods." 
 
 By an alliance, then, with the Greek Patriarchate and by 
 bribery, the Serbians tried to create in Macedonia a Serbian nation- 
 ality and Serbian interests. With the help of corruption funds they 
 succeeded in opening in 1892 the first Serbian school in Skopia and 
 in having a Serbian ecclesiastic appointed in 1899 as bishop of the 
 Skopia diocese. Against this appointment even the Patriarchist 
 party in Skopia protested and refused to accept him as their spiritual 
 head. A census was ordered by the government in order to ascer- 
 tain how many of the inhabitants wanted the Serbian bishop. Only 
 twenty-eight families appeared on his side, and yet in spite of this, 
 bribery prevailed, and the Serbian was appointed. In the schools 
 which the Serbian propaganda succeeded in opening by the approved 
 method, pupils were received free of charge, being supplied with 
 clothing, shoes and even pocket money, while not unfrequently their 
 parents, being of the poorer class, were also paid for sending their 
 children to these schools. 
 
 All the teachers in the schools were Serbian emissaries sent by 
 
 48 
 
the Serbian government from Belgrade, and their object was to 
 work among the people for the Serbian cause. In the market- 
 places, coffee-houses and villages these Serbian emissaries went 
 about distributing pamphlets and leaflets extolling the grandeur, 
 nobility and might of the Serbian nation by distorting both ancient 
 and modern history. In Skopia four hotels of doubtful character, 
 run by Serbian men and women, with drinking saloons and cafes- 
 chantants attached, were opened. In 1896 some Bulgarian teachers 
 were denounced to the Turkish authorities as revolutionists, and 
 at their trial Serbian agitators, with one of the Serbian teachers at 
 their head, appeared as the chief witnesses. In short, no means 
 were considered too base to be employed in fighting the Bulgarian 
 element in Macedonia and furthering the aims of the propaganda. 
 
 And yet, with all the help that Serbia received from the Turkish 
 authorities, the Greek Patriarchate and corruption funds, what 
 were the results attained? If we can credit statistics published ten 
 years ago, and which have not been refuted, the total number of 
 so-called Serbians in Macedonia amounted to 52,672, with 13 high 
 and 122 primary schools with 3,612 pupils, as against 897,160 
 "Exarchist" Bulgarians, with 71 high and 788 primary schools with 
 45,033 pupils. 
 
 That the Serbians have no ground to stand upon in Macedonia 
 is recognized even by the Greek, Dr. Cleanthes Nicolaides, who in 
 his German work, "Macedonien," urges both Serbians and Vlakhs 
 to work together with the Greek Patriarchate against the Bulgarians. 
 He thinks that instead of opening Serbian high schools in Salonica 
 and Monastir, it would be have been better, in unison with the 
 Patriarch, to open primary schools, for "it is meaningless," says he, 
 "to f(/und a few high schools in the principal towns, while any 
 support in the broader masses of the population is still wanting." 
 
 The chief object of the Serbian propaganda in Macedonia has 
 been dictated not by the existence of any Serbians there, but by 
 the desire of Serbia to get to the Aegean Sea. Barred by Austria 
 from the Adriatic Sea and unable by any scheme or any corruption 
 or any Patriarch to secure an outlet upon it, the Serbians turned 
 their longing eyes upon the Aegean Sea and upon Macedonia, where 
 the help of both civil and patriarchal authorities could be easily 
 attained with the aid of money. But to lay claims to an exit on 
 the Aegean Sea through Macedonia, it was necessary first to create 
 
 49 
 
tfle semblance of a right to the country. Hence the Serbian pre- 
 tensions to Macedonia. 
 
 The Serbians themselves realize that their claims are baseless, 
 for every Serbian who has written on the subject of Macedonia, 
 after most extravagant and fantastic arguments that all Macedonia 
 is and has always been Serbian, that the Macedonians are genuine 
 Serbians and Bulgarians only in disguise, etc., winds up his quibbles 
 with a pathetic appeal to the brotherly love which should subsist 
 between Bulgarians and Serbians, and asks for a division of Mace- 
 donia. To divide Macedonia and get a large share of it is the 
 ultimate motive which has prompted Serbia to enter into alliance 
 with any one, Greek, Turk or Patriarch, who could help her attain 
 that object. The chauvinism displayed in this kind of Serbian 
 literature is appalling, and the violence done to history and facts 
 of common knowledge is simply amazing. We have already given 
 samples of the arguments by which the Serbian would-be savants 
 support their claims. We could multiply them by numero'us other 
 quotations which disclose their psychology. According to writers 
 like Prof. Andonovitch and others, not only Macedonia, but half 
 of Bulgaria is Serbian ; the Slavs who peopled the Balkan Peninsula 
 in the Vllth century as far as Greece were Serbians; the modern 
 Greeks are not pure Hellenes, but descendants of these "Slavo- 
 Serbians"; Emperor Justinian was a Serbian; Salonica has 70,000 
 Serbian inhabitants and no Jews ; the Bulgarians of today are Tar- 
 tars, therefore the Macedonian Slavs cannot be Bulgarians, but must 
 be Serbians; all travelers and writers who have written about 
 Macedonia as being Bulgarian were ignoramuses; that there is not 
 a single truthful testimony according to which the Macedonian Slavs 
 have called themselves Bulgarians or have spoken the Bulgarian 
 language; that the intelligent class of Bulgarians are without faith 
 or dignity, veritable parasites, who for money abjure their religion 
 and become Catholics or Protestants, and as an example he points 
 to the "Anglo-American" Robert College in Constantinople, which 
 has turned out "more than 1,000 Bulgarian graduates, most of whom 
 have come out of this college as Protestants," etc. 
 
 How can one argue with a man whose moral sense is so 
 perverted as to pen unabashed such a tissue of falsehoods? One 
 can only pity the Belgrade University for having such a professor 
 to educate and instruct its students. Ab 'uno disce otnnes. 
 
 50 
 
VI 
 
 Greco-Bulgarian Relations 
 
 No Greek, not even Venizelos, can speak of the Bulgarians 
 without abusing them. "Treacherous Bulgars," "the traditional 
 foe," "the hereditary enemy," "barbarians," are some of the choice 
 epithets that they heap upon the Bulgarians. People read these 
 abuses and repeat them, without attempting to understand why the 
 Greeks cherish such hatred for the Bulgarians, or in what the latters' 
 iniquity consists. As no Greek has so far, to our knowledge, given 
 an explanation of the enigma, it behooves us to do so. 
 
 It is true that Bulgarian history from the second half of 
 the Vllth century to the end of the XlVth, when Bulgaria lost her 
 political independence to the Turks, is mostly taken up with 
 wars between the Bulgarians and Byzantium, often attended on 
 both sides with an exhibition of ruthlessness peculiar to those times. 
 We leave to the reader to decide who was the greater barbarian: 
 the Bulgarian King, who in the IXth century had the head of a 
 Greek Emporor, slain in battle, cut off and the skull encased in 
 silver used as a drinking bowl at his banquets, or the Greek Em- 
 peror Basil II, who in the Xlth century ordered the eyes of 15,000 
 Bulgarian war prisoners to be gouged out, leaving to every hundred 
 men one man with one eye to lead them back to their King. For 
 this cruelty the Byzantine historians honored the Emperor with the 
 title of "Bulgarokhton" (slayer of the Bulgarians), with which 
 modern Greeks also have adorned their present ruler for the cheap 
 glory he gained in the Balkan wars, and the ravages and cruelties 
 his army perpetrated upon the Bulgarians by his orders (see "Report 
 of The International Commission to Inquire Into the Causes and 
 Conduct of the Balkan Wars," published by the Carnegie Endow- 
 ment for International Peace, pp. 95-108; also Will S. Munroe's 
 "Bulgaria and Her People," Chapter XXVII). 
 
 One would have supposed that the conquest of Bulgaria by the 
 Turks and the fall of the Byzantine Empire, which made both 
 Greeks and Bulgarians subjects of the Turkish Sultan, would have 
 done away with their mutual disagreements and hatreds, and their 
 common misery under Turkish rule would have created a bond of 
 
 51 
 
sympathy between them. This perhaps might have happened, had 
 not Greek ambition and intolerance stood in the way. With the 
 loss of her political independence Bulgaria lost also her ecclesiastical 
 organization as a self-governed religious community, and was sub- 
 jected by the Sultan to the Greek Patriarch of Constantinople. All 
 Bulgarian dioceses in Bulgaria, Thrace and Macedonia were placed 
 under the spiritual jurisdiction of Greek bishops. The Greek lan- 
 guage replaced the Bulgarian both in the churches and the schools, 
 and even the name Bulgarian ran the risk of being relegated to 
 oblivion. All Orthodox Christians, no matter of what nationality, 
 were classed as Greeks even by the Turkish authorities, simply 
 because their spiritual head was the Greek Patriarch. We do not 
 propose to go into any exposition of this rule and the character 
 of the persons who exercised it. There is abundant literature on 
 the subject by various writers, some of them Greeks, which lays 
 bare the corruption, venality and simony of the Greek hierarchy, 
 so much so that the name Fanariot, by which this hierarchy was 
 known, came to imply baseness, duplicity, hyprocrisy, extortion, etc. 
 After the Crimean war in 1856 the Sultan published an Imperial 
 Decree guaranteeing to his Christian subjects equal rights with the 
 Mohammedans, and proclaiming liberty of conscience for all. This 
 decree created a great sensation among the Christian subjects of 
 Turkey, for it granted to the Christian nationalities in the Empire 
 privileges which were to secure them against the oppression or 
 domination of one nationality over another. Two years after the 
 issuance of the decree, a mixed council of clericals and laymen 
 was called by the Greek Patriarchate to deliberate upon the question 
 of fixing regular salaries for the clergy instead of the tolls and 
 indefinite dues levied on the Christians, by which the Church had 
 derived its revenues — a practice full of abuses and which the Im- 
 perial Decree specifically condemned. In this council, consisting 
 of about forty members, there were only four Bulgarians and one 
 Serbian from Bosnia, representing a population of Syi or 7 millions 
 in the Bulgarian and Serbian dioceses, all the rest being Greeks and 
 representing a Greek population of not more than 3>4 or 4 mil- 
 lions. A petition from the Bulgarian and Bosnian delegates was 
 presented to the Council demanding the regular and fixed salaries 
 should be appointed for the Patriarch, the bishops and the lower 
 clergy; that to the Bulgarian and Bosnian dioceses bishops should 
 be appointed of the respective nationalities, or such as knew the 
 
 52 
 
language of the people and could conduct church services and preach 
 in that language ; that the dioceses should have the right to recom- 
 mend those whom they wished consecrated as bishops, and that 
 the Greek language should not be imposed upon the people in their 
 churches and schools. All these demands were scornfully rejected 
 by the Council on the ground that they were incompatible with the 
 tenets of the Church, which recognizes no racial distinctions ! 
 
 The defiant attitude of the Greek Patriarchate, instead of sup- 
 porting the national movement among the Bulgarians, made them 
 insist still more firmly upon their demands, and finally, after waiting 
 two years for the Patriarch to do j'ustice to their demands, they 
 formally declared in 1860 that they ceased to acknowledge him as, 
 their spiritual head. Petitions and protests addressed to the Turkish 
 government and the Patriarch made this renunciation of allegiance 
 to the Greek hierarchy publicly known. The government was asked 
 to do justice to the Bulgarians by recognizing them as a national 
 unit, distinct from the Greeks, and by restoring to them the former 
 ecclesiastical privileges of having their own separate church organ- 
 ization or administration of which former Sultans had deprived 
 them at the instigation of the Greek Patriarchate. 
 
 Thus arose the "Greco-Bulgarian Church Question," which was 
 settled ten years later by the issuance of a Sultan's decree instituting 
 a Bulgarian church organization under the name of "Exarchate." 
 In this struggle, which was momentous for the national self-asser- 
 tion of the Bulgarians, the whole Bulgarian nation, in Bulgaria, 
 Thrace and Macedonia, took part. The Sultan's decree, as we have 
 already observed, was practically based upon a former project 
 elaborated and presented by the Greek Patriarch in 1869 for the 
 solution of the question. The tenth article of the decree places 
 under its provisions all those dioceses that the Patriarch's project 
 granted to the Exarchate and which included the territory between 
 the Danube and the Black Sea, i. e., what was usually denominated 
 on the maps as Bulgaria proper. It was provided in addition, how- 
 ever, that after an enumeration in those dioceses not specified as 
 entering into the jurisdiction of the Exarchate, wherever the whole 
 or at least two-thirds of the population should prove to be Bulgarian 
 and should express a wish to be under the authority of the Exarch, 
 they should be allowed to do so. In all other respects the Bulgarian 
 Exarch was made subordinate to the Greek Patriarch, whom he 
 was to recognize and honor as his superior. The Greek Patriarchate^ 
 
 S3 
 
however, refused to accept the Sultan's decree, and the reason of 
 the refusal was the "two-thirds" clause of the tenth article. The 
 Patriarchate claimed that there were no Bulgarians in Macedonia 
 and Thrace, but that the population was Greek, although the people 
 of Ochrida, Prilep, Veless, Kukush, Skopia, etc., had years before 
 1870 formally declared by petitions to the Turkish government and 
 Patriarchate their solidarity with the demands and aspirations of 
 the other Bulgarian dioceses, and had ceased to obey their Greek 
 bishops. 
 
 The only way to settle the advanced claims by Greeks and Bul- 
 garians to these dioceses was the taking of a census of the population 
 so that the people might be enabled to show their preference. But 
 this project did not suit the Patriarchate, for it knew that the 
 results would not be favorable to its pretensions. Unable to annul 
 the Sultan's decree, which the Bulgarians gladly accepted, or to 
 prevent the taking of a census in Thrace and Macedonia, the 
 Patriarchate had recourse to a subterfuge. In 1872 the Patriarch 
 convened a Church Council, composed exclusively of Greek clerics, 
 which proclaimed the Bulgarian Exarch, his bishops and clergy, as 
 well as all those who should recognize their jurisdiction, schis- 
 matics. This was done, as stated in the resolution passed, on the 
 ground that the Bulgarians wished to introduce racial distinctions 
 in the Eastern Orthodox Church, as if God Almighty, Jesus Christ 
 and his holy apostles had ordained that Greeks only could be con- 
 secrated patriarchs and bishops to lord it over other nations. 
 
 The Russian, Serbian and Rumanian churches in their re- 
 sponses to the Patriarch's communication of what the Council had 
 done, not only disapproved the decision, but plainly hinted that they 
 considered it unjustifiable. The Serbian Metropolitan, for example, 
 found the Bulgarian demands just, and suggested that similar 
 rights and privileges should be granted to the Serbian dioceses that 
 were still 'under the jurisdiction of the Greek Patriarchate. 
 
 The object of the schism was evident. It was intended to 
 frighten the Bulgarians in general, and those in Macedonia and 
 Thrace in particular, who were devoted to their religion, from join- 
 ing the Exarchate as an institution that had seceded from the 
 Eastern Orthodox Church and had become heterodox. The plan 
 was, however, defeated by the stern resolution of all the Bulgarians 
 to hold on to their national church, which, they knew, had not 
 deviated one jot or tittle from the dogmas and doctrines of the 
 
 54 
 
Eastern Church, but, on the contrary, had demanded what was fully 
 consistent with the teachings of the apostles, the decisions of the 
 Church Councils and the spirit of Christianity. This national deter- 
 mination was made most manifest in Macedonia, where the people, 
 in the census-taking, boldly and overwhelmingly by majorities de- 
 clared their wish to join the Exarchate. Seven dioceses in Mace- 
 donia were added to those constituting the Exarchate, and if the 
 Turkish government, for political reasons of its own and under out- 
 side pressure, had not temporized and procrastinated with the faith- 
 ful and loyal execution of the Exarchate's charter, the whole of 
 Macedonia and of Thrace would long ago have been attached to 
 the Bulgarian national church. 
 
 The national movement of the Bulgarians for self-assertion 
 proved a death-blow to the aspirations of Hellenism in the Balkan 
 Peninsula. Especially since the creation of the Kingdom of Greece 
 in 1829 these aspirations had begun to grow, and found a ready 
 and willing tool in the Greek Patriarch of Constantinople and his 
 bishops. A so-called Megali Eedea (Great Idea) had obsessed the 
 Greeks, who dreamed of resuscitating the Byzantine Empire, with 
 the King of Greece enthroned in Constantinople and Greek hege- 
 mony assured in the Peninsula. That this wild dream is still cher- 
 ished by the Greeks is best illustrated by the title of Constantine 
 XII, which they have bestowed upon their present ruler, as the 
 presumed successor of the last Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI, 
 although he is the first Greek King to bear this name. 
 
 The Hellenization of the various Christian nationalities of the 
 Balkan Peninsula over which the Greek Patriarch held supreme 
 spiritual sway was the necessary preparation for the realization of 
 the Great Idea. It was hoped to supplement thereby the numerical 
 inferiority of the Greeks in the Ottoman Empire who, according 
 to Lamouche and others, could not be estimated at more than 
 two or three millions both in Europe and Asia Minor. 
 
 To what flight of imagination about their numerical status in 
 the Turkish Empire the Greeks had risen before the appearance 
 of the Greco-Bulgarian Church Question is seen in the statement 
 piublished in 1853 in the Greek newspaper Helios (Sun), which 
 enumerated 10,000,000 Greeks and about 4,000,000 "Hellenized Bul- 
 garians," and predicted after 30 years there would be 30,000,000 
 "pure Greeks." The article bears the significant caption: "The 
 Seen and the Unseen Hellas," meaning evidently by the latter term 
 
 55 
 
the Greece which was to be evolved by the process of Helleniza- 
 tion. The prophecy has not been realized, and the Bulgarian na- 
 tional movement has been the principal cause. It not only put a 
 stop to the process of Hellenization among the Bulgarians, but also 
 stirred up the national consciousness of the other Christian national- 
 ities which were under the rule of the Patriarch, especially the 
 Wallachians and Albanians. The first national school among the 
 former was opened in 1862 in the town of Vlakho-Klissura. The 
 Greek Patriarch tried to close the school and drive away the teach- 
 ers, but failed owing to the determined opposition of the people. 
 That the situation was getting serious and menacing for Greek 
 aspirations with the accession to this national movement of the 
 Macedonian Wallachians, whom the Greeks had always considered 
 a docile and easy prey to Hellenization, was fully realized by the 
 government at Athens. In a circular addressed in 1863 to various 
 learned men and professors of Greece, the Minister of Public 
 Instruction urged the organization of a committee at his ministry, 
 which should elaborate a plan for the maintenance and spread of 
 the Greek language wherever Greeks and other Christians lived 
 and where there was a distinct movement against it. 
 
 In the Greek Parliament a deputy sounded this cry of distress 
 when he said: "What has been taking place for some time in 
 Thrace and Macedonia, endangers the future of the fatherland and 
 places an insurmountable barrier to the progress and grandeur of 
 enlightening Hellenism. Some races, altogether unworthy to be 
 named, which a little while ago counted it an honor to be asso- 
 ciated with Hellenism, are becoming now blind and senseless tools 
 of two anti-Hellenic propagandas, and are doing all they can to 
 efface every trace of its existence. The Greek language has been 
 rejected and has been replaced by a barbarian tongue. Two hours, 
 gentlemen, outside of Salonica (Voices: 'In Salonica itself, in 
 Salonica itself), and in Constantinople itself, the Greek Church, 
 Greek language and Greek nationality have become objects of de- 
 rision and contempt." 
 
 The status of Hellenism and Hellenistic propaganda in Thrace 
 and Macedonia has become worse, as we shall see, since the day 
 when these lamentations were uttered. The Bulgarians have estab- 
 lished their national existence on a firm basis, impervious to any 
 Hellenizing influences. The national movement of the Macedonian 
 Wallachians, whom a Greek geographer about seventy years ago 
 
 56 
 
declared to be "Greeks speaking usually Wallachian," has gained 
 in strength and extent, and even the Orthodox Christian Albanians 
 have begun to clamor for the recognition of their language and 
 nationality. All this revulsion of feeling towards Hellenism and 
 opposition to its encroachments among people whom the Greeks had 
 considered as already gained to the cause of the Great Idea, was 
 the outcome of the national awakening of the Bulgarians, who 
 were the first to raise the cry for national rights, liberty of con- 
 science, and freedom of worship and instruction in the vernacular. 
 A nation of "thick-heads, numb-skulls, barbarians, boors," as 
 the Greeks were pleased to call them, dared to brave the power 
 and authority of the Greek hierarchy and to shatter Hellenic political 
 designs. With Bulgaria as a political power in the Balkan Penin- 
 sula, Hellenic dreams and aspirations for predominance are seen 
 to be still more unrealizable. Is it strange, then, that Venizelos and 
 his compatriots do not love but vituperate the Bulgarians. 
 
 57 
 
VII 
 
 Greek Claims to Macedonia 
 
 The claims of the Greeks to Macedonia are on a par with 
 those of the Serbians, if not even less tenable. They date back 
 to Alexander the Great and Greek culture and civilization, what- 
 ever those terms may mean, that are said to have obtained in 
 Macedonia before the birth of Christ. No account is taken of 
 Roman conquests or Slavic settlements after Christ, and of the 
 transformations that have taken place since then. Emile de Laveley, 
 the well-known Belgian writer, in his French work, "The Balkan 
 Peninsula," 1888, cites the two arguments advanced by the Greeks 
 in support of their claims to Macedonia. The first is based on 
 their "ethnocratic pre-eminence," namely, the pretension that the 
 Greeks are of a nobler race; hence, the Bulgarians ought to be 
 subject to them. The second argument is stated in, the words of 
 a Greek Minister in London as follows: "When a country has 
 formerly belonged to the Hellenes, it is not enough that it is occu- 
 pied today by Bulgarians that it should be adjudged to them. The 
 right of the Greeks is imprescriptible." The learned Belgian pro- 
 fessor dismisses both these arguments with the words : "It is diffi- 
 cult to discuss such theories; it is painful to have to point them 
 out," and adds that on such theories one would have to restore 
 the Netherlands to Spain or Austria, America to England or Spain, 
 and rearrange the map not only of Europe, but of the whole world. 
 
 Another Greek argument is that the Bulgarians inhabiting 
 Macedonia are not actual Bulgarians, but "B'ulgarophone Greeks," 
 that is, Greeks whose vernacular — mirabile dictu — is Bulgarian! 
 How this linguistic miracle came to pass was thus learnedly ex- 
 pounded to H. N. Brailsford ("Macedonia," p. 200) by a Greek 
 bishop: "Originally the population of Macedonia was Hellenic; 
 but it won so many victories over the Slavs, and took so many 
 prisoners of war, that linguistic difficulties arose. The Slavs being 
 then, as now, notoriously stupid, would not learn Greek, so the 
 Greeks were forced to learn Slav in order to have a means of 
 giving orders to their servants." The good bishop does not say 
 
 58 
 
when all these things happened, nor need we inquire about it. We 
 give the argument for what it is worth. 
 
 A third argument in favor of the Greek claims to Macedonia 
 is to be found in the German work, "Macedonien," by the Greek, 
 Dr. Cleanthes Nicola'ides. He says that owing to the Greek war 
 for independence the name "Greek"' had become hateful to the 
 Turkish government as that of a rebel and an enemy of Turkey. 
 On the other hand the Bulgarians were considered loyal and sub- 
 missive subjects. So the Greeks in many towns in order to con- 
 ceal their nationality preferred to use the Bulgarian language. The 
 author does not tell us why the Greeks in Constantinople, on the 
 islands of Crete, Khios, Mytelene, etc., in Smyrna and the Aegean 
 sea-coast and the Patriarchate itself did not adopt the same sub- 
 terfuge, but persisted in calling themselves Greeks. Moreover, we 
 have seen that the Serbians base their claims to Macedonia on ex- 
 actly the same argument, except that, according to their story, this 
 national transfiguration was undergone by Serbians and not Greeks. 
 
 Leaving the Greeks and the Serbians to reconcile their logic 
 in the matter, we shall proceed to state some facts and adduce 
 evidence which will throw light on the subject. 
 
 All writers and travelers who have written on the Balkan 
 Peninsula agree in placing a Greek population on the sea-coast and 
 the southernmost parts of Macedonia. We have seen that Ami 
 Boue places "the mountains between the basins of Fiorina and 
 Kastoria, between Kailari and Shatista, between Ostrovo and Verria 
 and between Voden and Niausta" as the limit of "the territory 
 where nothing but Bulgarian is spoken, from that on the south, 
 where Greek is the language of the peasant." Lejean and Cyprien 
 Robert are of the same opinion. The Chalcidic peninsula espe- 
 cially they regard as containing a compact Greek population. This 
 is confirmed by Major Leake, who in his "Travels in Northern 
 Greece" (Vol. II, p. 270) says that the Greeks are now chiefly 
 confined to that peninsula, "and there the name of places are of 
 Greek form and derivation." Miss Mackenzie and Miss Irby re- 
 gard Salonica, which "is geographically Bulgarian," as "a point 
 on the ethnographical boundary which, in this part of Turkey in 
 Europe, divides the Slavonic population from the Greek." The line 
 of division, according to them, coincides with the old Roman Via 
 Egnatia between Salonica and the lake of Ochrida. "The other 
 boundary cities are Monastir, Vodena and Yenidje, in all of which 
 
 59 
 
dwell few or no Greeks." In the latter town, as well as in the 
 country around, the only Greeks were the bishops and the school- 
 master in the town. "The principal men speak Greek, for com- 
 mercial purposes, but none of the women know it." In Monastir, 
 its environs and all the country around," the Greeks, who people 
 neither town nor country, contrive to have their interests and lan- 
 guage represented by the wealthy and crafty Tsintsars" or Wal- 
 lachians. Half-way between Monastir and Prilep, after crossing the 
 Tcherna (Black) River, "at every step on the other side the 
 Greco-Tsintsar element becomes weaker, and the Bulgarians have 
 got more and more the upper hand, both in church and school." 
 
 In Prilep they visited three schools, "one for the Tsintsar mer- 
 chants, who elect to have their children learn Greek, the other two 
 for the Bulgarians, who bring together 400 scholars." In Veless, "a 
 thorofughly Bulgarian town," they found a Tsintsar school with 
 thirty to forty pupils, and two Bulgarian schools with 500 pupils 
 between them. Bulgarians who had traffic with the South knew 
 Greek, like the host in whose house they lodged, "but his wife and 
 family did not know a word." At Skopia they found no Greek 
 or Tsintsar school, but they saw three "Slavonic schools." 
 
 Rev. F. H. Tozer says that "Greek communities are com- 
 paratively rare northward of Mount Olympus and its parallel, and 
 unmixed Slavonic blood is uncommon south of that line." He 
 thinks it was a mistake that, in forming the kingdom of Greece, 
 Thessaly and all the part of Albania within the same latitude were 
 not included within its boundaries, "since by that means nearly all 
 the Greeks and Hellenized Albanians would have been excluded 
 from the dominions of the Sultan." In referring to a Greek pam- 
 phlet published in 1861 by the Secretary of the Constantinopolitan 
 Synod, he says : "The writer urges that the Bulgarians form but a 
 small part of the population of Western Macedonia; he says that 
 many of the people are only Greeks who speak Bulgarian ; and even 
 goes so far as to assert that the physical appearance and customs 
 of the Bulgarians in these parts show them to be originally Greek, 
 and not Bulgarian — all of which statements can be contradicted 
 by one who has traveled in the country." 
 
 Mr. (now Sir) Valentine Chirol, a distinguished English 
 journalist and former political editor of the London Times, in his 
 book, "Twixt Greek and Turk" (London, 1881), in which he de- 
 scribes his tour in Macedonia, considers Kosana (Kozhani) as the 
 
 60 
 
last purely Vlakho-Greek town in Macedonia. Northwards, he 
 asserts, the Wallachs are only found interspersed with the Alban- 
 ians, Turks and Bulgarians, and generally in a minority. In 
 Monastir he found, at the time he wrote, Bulgarians who were 
 under the jurisdiction of the Exarchate; those "who share 
 in the patriotic aspirations of the above," but "who have not 
 thrown oflf their allegiance to the Greek Patriarchate," and Bul- 
 garians who have been Hellenized and speak Greek in preference to 
 their own tongue and whose "number is small and daily diminishing." 
 
 "Then," says he, "there are the Greeks, who are, it is true, 
 Greek only in name ; for with the exception of the archbishop and 
 the Hellenic Consul, there is scarcely a family in Monastir that 
 can lay claim to pure Greek blood. They are Wallachs ; and among 
 them, again, there is a large and growing section which still speaks 
 its own tongue in preference to Greek, and has distinct national 
 aspirations outside of Hellenism." Chirol divides the population of 
 the town of Monastir into three equal sections: Turks, Hellenized 
 Bulgarians and Wallachs, and Bulgarians, and then adds: "But 
 take the whole vilayet of Monastir, or go further and take the 
 whole province of Macedonia — namely, the four sandjaks of 
 Monastir, Salonica, Drama and Serres — and the proportion obtained 
 is very different. After leaving Kosana we lost sight completely of 
 the Greco- Wallach element, all the villages along our road being 
 either Turkish or Bulgarian; and the father north or east one goes 
 from here, the stronger the Bulgarian element becomes. To the 
 west the confines of Macedonia are close at hand, and yet even in 
 the mountains which, bounding it in that direction, are the bulwarks 
 of Albania, Bulgarians are to be met with in large numbers as far 
 as the Lake of Ochrida." 
 
 Leon Lamouche, the French officer of whom we have already 
 spoken, says that in Macedonia the Greeks are found "on the sea- 
 coast and in all the southern region bordering upon the Greek 
 Kingdom." 
 
 H. N. Brailsford ("Macedonia") informs us that the Wallachs, 
 although they affect to be Greeks, speak Wallachian at home and 
 are a nationality apart. "They are not a very numerous stock, 
 though without their aid the Greeks would cut a poor figure among 
 the statistics of the Macedonian races. The so-called Greeks of 
 Monastir are Vlakhs to a man." 
 
 About thirty years ago Mr. (now Sir) Arthur Evans published 
 
 61 
 
a long article on "Macedonia." From a French translation of it we 
 render the following extracts: "It is time for the Greeks to look 
 unpleasant facts in the face. In all Macedonia in its length and 
 breadth, the Bulgarian element widely predominates. Only in some 
 of the towns in the extreme southern districts it is true that one 
 meets here and there the Greek element, but even here, it is neutral- 
 ized and in point of numbers entirely smothered by the Bulgarian 
 population in the village districts. Salonica, the only truly large 
 city in the province, is chiefly inhabited neither by Greeks nor by 
 Bulgarians, but by Spanish Jews and Mohammedans, and therefore 
 can not be claimed by either side. Even in Monastir the town popu- 
 lation is predominantly Bulgarian, and the Bulgarian language is 
 the language of the market. Prilep, Skopia, Shtip, Kratovo, Palan- 
 ka, Strumnitsa, Melnik and other towns in the interior are purely 
 Bulgarian. I do not make the assertion from hearsay, but from 
 personal acquaintance with the country, when I say that it is pos- 
 sible for a traveler to journey through the whole of Macedonia, from 
 the Pind'us Mountains to the frontiers of Bulgaria without meet- 
 ing a single Greek." The testimony of Mr. Evans gains additional 
 force from the fact that he is well acquainted with the Greek and 
 Serbian languages and was in a position to judge of the nationality 
 of the people. He nowhere mentipns having found any Serbians in 
 Macedonia. 
 
 The late Sir George Campbell, M. P. for Kircaldy, in his book, 
 "A Very Recent View of Turkey," published in 1878, writes: "So 
 much of the present Eastern Question depends on a due apprecia- 
 tion of the geographical area of the Bulgarian country, that it should 
 be rightly understood how much they occupy the whole center, and 
 it may be said, body of European Turkey. . . . On the south 
 of the Balkans, almost as far as Salonica, the Bulgarian race pre- 
 vails. There is a small but very clear German ethnological map 
 by Kiepert, lately published, which gives the races very well as far 
 as they can be roughly delineated on a small scale. I am bound to 
 say that all my inquiries and personal observations, so far as they 
 enable me to test Kiepert's map, go to confirm its general correct- 
 ness. From collating consular and other reports, and other inquiries, 
 I had made out the Bulgarian area to be much as Kiepert puts it 
 before I had seen his maps, and in the parts of the country which 
 I visited, my inquiries led to the same result. . . . Kiepert gives 
 the Greeks the country up to and including Adrianople that seems 
 
 62 
 
about as much as they can fairly claim. From the Dan'ube then to 
 near Adrianople and Salonica, and from the Black Sea (less a small 
 Greek fringe) to the Albanian Hills, is the Bulgarian country, ex- 
 cept so far as Turkish settlements are interspersed in greater or less 
 degree." Sir George speaks of no Serbians in Macedonia. 
 
 The American missionaries, who by long residence, frequent 
 travels in the country and daily contact with the people are compe- 
 tent judges, tell the same story. Writing as early as 1874 that 
 Monastir had been selected for a new station in Macedonia, Mr. 
 Clarke says: "Of the Christians, about 2,000 are known as Bul- 
 garians, the rest being called Greeks, though, as a matter of fact, 
 there are scarcely any real Greeks in the city. This place is the 
 centre of a considerable population of decided and earnest Bulga- 
 rians, but a larger part of the Christian population are Hellenized 
 Bulgarians of pure origin. These latter, like the Bulgarians in and 
 about Philippopolis during the past few years, are increasingly pro- 
 claiming their true nationality, and glorying in it." 
 
 Mr. Jenney, after living eight years in Macedonia, writes in 
 1882: "Not one in twenty of the Christian population of Macedonia 
 is a Greek, or uses the Greek language. The large majority are 
 Bulgarians. Next in numbers come the Wallachians and Albanians, 
 and last of all the Greeks. Some of the Wallachians use the Greek. 
 Few of the women can more than pass the compliments of the day 
 in that language. These are all counted as Greeks by the Greek 
 party. Two-thirds of the so-called Greek party would leave the 
 Greek church and join the Bulgarian if they dared to. The declared 
 aim of this Greek party is, by fair means or foul, to require the 
 Greek language to be used in all the churches and schools, so as to 
 make a stronger claim before the Powers that Macedonia should 
 be ceded to Greece. This nine-tenths of the population do not desire. 
 It is understood in many places that if one expresses a strong desire 
 for Bulgarian schools, he will be accused of being an insurrectionist, 
 and sent, if possible, into exile. The poor victim thus falsely charged 
 must either leave, or pay a large bribe for his release, often amount- 
 ing to $500 or $1,000. To escape this tyranny of the Greek bishops 
 many in several of the cities and villages near Salonica have joined 
 the Catholic party, so as to secure the aid of the Austrian and 
 French consuls." 
 
 In 1889 Mr. Bonol of Monastir reports a conversation he had 
 with the Greek bishops of Strumitsa : "I besought him," he writes, 
 
 63 
 
"to train his priests to preach salvation to the people in their own 
 Bulgarian tongue, which alone they can understand. There are not 
 ten Greek families in all the Strumitsa region, and yet the Greek 
 language is forced upon the schools and churches." 
 
 In 1892 Mr. Baird, long a resident in the country, writes: 
 "Greek-speaking villages are not found in northern or in central 
 Macedonia." 
 
 In 1895 Dr. House, also a long resident missionary, reports that 
 the villages to the north and west of Salonica are Bulgarian. 
 
 In 1907 Mr. Haskell, on a visit to Xanthi or Sketcha, writes 
 that no Bulgarian school or church is tolerated in the town, although 
 "there are doubtless over one hundred (possibly over two hundred) 
 Bulgarian families in the place, but they have no rights which a 
 Greek is bound to respect." 
 
 In 1880 Mr. Baird writes from Monastir that there is no book- 
 store in all Macedonia where one can buy ordinary Bulgarian school- 
 books, or even almanacs, because "Bulgarians are afraid to keep 
 Bulgarian books for sale." Even his colporteur was arrested for 
 selling Bulgarian books. 
 
 Some of these reports of the missionaries plainly show "under 
 what disadvantages the Bulgarians in Macedonia were laboring 
 many years after the Constitution of the Exarchate, and how base- 
 less is the assertion that the Exarchate could under such circum- 
 stances carry on any action or propaganda for the Bulgarization of 
 Macedonia. 
 
 The pretensions of the Greeks that Thrace and Macedonia are 
 inhabited by Greeks were shown to be groundless by what happened 
 about forty years ago. In April, 1876, an attempt at an insurrection 
 against Turkish rule took place in Southern Bulgaria, or Thrace, 
 in the district of Philippopolis. The insurrection proved a failure, 
 but in putting it down the Turkish troops and irregulars committed 
 frightful massacres. Two official commissions, one British and the 
 other American, were sent to investigate and report upon the mas- 
 sacres. The American Commission, in which the late Eugene 
 Schuyler, United States Consul-General to Turkey, and J. Mac- 
 Gahan, of Columbus, Ohio, a newspaper correspondent, took part, 
 by its report of the horrors committed, roused public opinion in 
 Europe and especially England in favor of the Bulgarians. This 
 report helped indirectly the political liberation of Bulgaria, and 
 the names of the two noble Americans are to this day cherished 
 in Bulgaria as those of national benefactors. 
 
 64 
 
In the reports of the two Commissioners, as well as in the 
 European and Greek press, the insurrectionists, the massacred peo- 
 ple, the scores of men who were hanged by the Turkish Government, 
 and the hundreds of others who were imprisoned in the Turkish 
 dungeons, were invariably spoken of as Bulgarians. No protest 
 on the part of the Greeks was ever raised against their being called 
 so. On the contrary, the Greek press found particular pleasure in 
 keeping prominently before the public the Bulgarian nationality of 
 the revolutionists, hoping thereby to curry favor with the Turks, by 
 representing the Bulgarians as disloyal and hostile to the govern- 
 ment. 
 
 In December, 1876, a European Conference met at Constanti- 
 nople to elaborate a plan for the better administration of Bulgaria, 
 including Thrace and Macedonia. The Conference, as we have 
 already mentioned, proposed the creation of two vilayets or prov- 
 inces with an atitonomous administration from which all inhabitants, 
 without distinction of race, language or religion, were to benefit. 
 No sooner had this decision of the Conference become known than 
 the Greeks raised the alarm, and two Greeks appeared in Constanti- 
 nople as delegates with a protest from "the inhabitants of Philip- 
 popolis," without any signatures, protesting against the granting of 
 autonomy to the country south of the Balkans. The Greek Patri- 
 archate also protested against the extension of the limits of Bul- 
 garia to Thrace and Macedonia, and the granting of autonomy as 
 "contrary to justice and scientific truth, a violation of the geo- 
 graphical limits consecrated from time immemorial by history and 
 every ethnographical theory." On December 29, 1876, as the Eng- 
 lish Blue Book shows, the Greek Charge d' Affaires in London de- 
 clared to Lord Derby, the British Foreign Secretary, that the Greek 
 nation would consider an extension of autonomy to the south of the 
 Balkans as a severe blow to the interests of the Greek race. He 
 also added that the Greeks "would, as a body, feel better disposed 
 towards the continuance of Turkish rule than to any preponderance 
 or domination of the Slav races." 
 
 Here, then, we have a strange phenomenon. When an insurrec- 
 tion breaks out in Thrace, the insurgents, the thousands of people 
 killed, massacred, hanged and imprisoned, are declared even by the 
 Greeks to be Bulgarians; but as soon as self-government is offered 
 to the sorely tried province, lo and behold, it appears that its in- 
 
 65 
 
habitants are not Bulgarians, but Greeks, who reject the offer! 
 Every sane and thinking man would naturally ask: If Thrace was 
 really Greek, why should the Greeks object to autonomy or fear 
 any preponderance or domination of the Slavs, that is, the Bul- 
 garians ? Is it reasonable to believe that the Greeks are so enamored 
 of Turkish ride as to prefer it to self-government ? 
 
 The reason of this fear of the Greeks and the utter falsity 
 of their claims and protests was soon made manifest. The Berlin 
 Treaty of 1878 created out of the larger part of Thrace an au- 
 tonomous province, called Eastern Rumelia, eliminating thus the 
 name of Southern Bulgaria, evidently out of consideration for Greek 
 susceptibilities. The first Governor-General of the province, though 
 a Bulgarian on his father's side, was Greek on his mother's side, 
 and a Greek by education, habits of thought, family connections 
 and language. 
 
 What more could the Greeks have desired for their prospects? 
 And yet, in spite of all this, from the very beginning of the work- 
 ing of the autonomous administration in the province. Eastern Ru- 
 melia proved to be so overwhelmingly Bulgarian, as it had always 
 been, that the Greeks could elect only two out of the fifty-seven 
 deputies in the Provincial Assembly. In 1885 Eastern Rumelia pro- 
 claimd its union with Bulgaria, and no Greek voice was raised against 
 it. 
 
 The same is true of Macedonia. By spurious statistics that 
 vary with their authors, and by ethnographical maps that have been 
 differently colored every time they have appeared, the Greeks have 
 tried to throw dust into the eyes of the world as to the position 
 of their national element in Macedonia. To what ridiculous results 
 they have arrived is very well shown by Valentine Chirol in his 
 " 'Twixt Greek and Turk." He says that the Greek bishop of Mon- 
 astir confessed to him in 1881 that in the whole district of Prilep 
 there were only six villages and in the town eighty Wallach houses 
 that acknowledged his spiritual jurisdiction. At the time of the 
 Treaty of San Stefano in 1878, in the elaborate returns which the 
 Greek Syllogos or Association of Constantinople, presented to Sir 
 Henry Layard, the British Ambassador to Turkey, the Greek popu- 
 lation of the distrirct of Prilep was set down at 40,000 souls, either 
 resident in the town or scattered over ninety Greek and forty-seven 
 mixed villages. In the short space of three years these 40,000 
 Greeks had dwindled down to eighty Wallach families in the town 
 
 66 
 
and six villages, most probably also Wallach, in the district ! What 
 became of the rest ? Why, they vanished into thin air, for they had 
 never existed, except in the imagination of the Syllogos and in its 
 fictitious statistics. 
 
 As an example of the reliability of Greek statistics on Macedo- 
 nia we give the following data. A certain Greek professor. Sari- 
 polos of Athens, sets down the Greeks in Macedonia at 500,000, the 
 Slavs at 120,000, Turks at 100,000, and Jews at 40,000, whereas, 
 everybody knows that in the town of Salonica alone there are from 
 sixty to seventy thousand Jews. Some notables of Salonica in a 
 memoir to the Greek Patriarch and the Turkish government, in 1878 
 put the number of the Greeks in Macedonia at 800,000, while the 
 Greek Syllogos of Constantinople in the same year puts the Greeks 
 at 438,000, but raises their number to 705,000 by counting as Greeks 
 70,000 "Greco- Vlakhs," and 197,000 "Bulgarophones." The Greek 
 Minister in Paris in 1904 stated that in Macedonia in 1877 there 
 were 256 Greek schools with 10,968 pupils. The Greek Syllogos for 
 the same year lays claim to 638 schools with 32,885 pupils, while 
 Mr. Chassiotis, a Greek author, in his book on "Public Instruction 
 Among the Greeks," states that in 1878 the number of Greek schools 
 in Macedonia was 421 with 20,682 pupils. 
 
 Which of these three Greek school statistics is correct? The 
 puzzle is hard to solve ; but the discrepancy between them is so great 
 that one is led to doubt the veracity of any of them. Emile de Lav- 
 eley, from whom we have quoted the above Greek statistics about 
 the population of Macedonia, says : "According to the most serious 
 statistics favorable to the Greeks, the latter form only one-tenth of 
 the population." 
 
 The numerical inferiority of the Greeks in Macedonia in com- 
 parison with the Bulgarians and the other Christian nationalities 
 there has led Greek politicians to resort to a subterfuge in repre- 
 senting the people as "Exarchists" and "Patriarchists," the former 
 recognizing the Bulgarian Exarch and the latter the Greek Patri- 
 arch as their spiritual head. All "Patriarchists" they reckon as 
 Greeks, and all who are "Exarchists" are classed as Bulgarians. 
 
 This division is ethnographically wrong and misleading. An 
 "Exarchist" is really a Bulgarian, for no Greek would own allegiance 
 to the Bulgarian Exarch, whom the Greek Patriarch has pronounced 
 a schismatic ; hence, there are no Greeks who are "Exarchists." A 
 "Patriarchist" is not necessarily or really a Greek, for all the Vlakhs, 
 
 67 
 
and Orthodox Albanians who are under the Patriarch's jurisdiction, 
 as well as several Bulgarian communities, which, not having been 
 allowed by the Turkish government to join the Exarchate, are kept 
 under the same jurisdiction, pass by the name of "Patriarchists." 
 All "Patriarchists," therefore, are not Greeks, either by nationality 
 or language, and ought not to be classed as such. The Greek statis- 
 tics, as Valentine Chirol and others have rightly observed, take the 
 religious denomination as their basis, which is as accurate for de- 
 termining the nationality of a man as it would be to class all Cath- 
 olic Bulgarians as Italians or French, or all Protestant Bulgarians 
 as Englishmen or Americans. The Bulgarian and other statistics, 
 which reckon the Bulgarian population of Macedonia at about one 
 and one-quarter millions, are based upon nationality and the language 
 habitually spoken, and "these," Chirol says, "are the least deceptive." 
 
 The intolerance of the Greeks towards the other nationalities in 
 the Balkan Peninsula, that seek to assert themselves as distinct na- 
 tional units, proceeds from the same cause. The Greeks had hoped 
 to swell their numbers by Hellenizing foreign elements and under 
 the guise of religious identity passing them as genuine Greeks. Any 
 movement against this process of Hellenization is hateful to a Greek, 
 and no means are spared in checking it. 
 
 Mr. Brailsford ("Macedonia," pp. 215-16) tells us that Greek 
 bands of brigands murdered the Albanian priest of the village of 
 Negovan, because he had translated the Greek liturgy into Albanian, 
 and a fair number of Vlakh priests and teachers were likewise exe- 
 cuted, because they attempted to say mass or teach the children in 
 Rumanian. 
 
 The reports of the American missionaries, engaged in evangel- 
 istic work among the Albanians, testify to the "unscrupulous oppo- 
 sition" offered to the work. In 1890 Mr. Kyrias, an Albanian 
 preacher and teacher in Kortcha, writes that the Greeks were op- 
 posed to any preaching or teaching in Albanian, simply because they 
 considered the work most dangerous to Hellenism. 
 
 In 1898 Mr. Baird reports : "The Greek church fiercely opposes 
 all schools, books, newspapers and preaching in Albanian, even when 
 conducted by Orthodox Greek Christians." 
 
 In the Missionary Herald of 1913 (p. 102) we read: "In a 
 discussion with an American keenly interested in the moral and in- 
 tellectual uplift of Albanians, a certain Greek commander recently 
 made the expressive remark : 'You are not friends to Greece. You 
 
 68 
 
and your American work will not be needed now, for you are a 
 propaganda for autonomy and the Albanian language.' " 
 
 What is true of the treatment of the Albanians by the Greeks 
 is equally true of their treatment of the Vlakhs. Hellenism is intol- 
 erant of all who desire to live a national life of their own. 
 
 Contrast with this spirit of national bigotry and tyranny the 
 following words of Mr. Thomson, a missionary of long residence in 
 Bulgaria: "Our freedom to work is astonishing, when we think 
 what it might have been had Bulgaria been like Greece, Rumania, 
 Serbia, Austria or Russia." Contrast with it the letter written in 
 1914 by the Minister of National Education in Bulgaria to the 
 Principal of the American Board of Missions School for Girls at 
 Samokov, in which he expresses the gratitude of the nation and the 
 government for "the education and the moral and spiritual training 
 of the youth," effected by the American schools in Bulgaria; the 
 recognition that the Bulgarian Government has granted to these 
 schools on a par with the national schools, or the letter that the same 
 minister addressed to Mrs. Haskell in 1914, expressing "deep and 
 heartfelt sorrow" at the death of her husband, "who fifty years ago, 
 with unexampled self-sacrifice, came to Bulgaria, then enveloped in 
 darkness, with the high and noble mission to bring to her light and 
 love," — and you will be able to judge between the "barbarity" of the 
 Bulgarian and the civilizing culture of the Greek. 
 
VIII 
 
 Rumano-Bulgarian Relations 
 
 When Bulgaria was still a Turkish province, Rumania was an 
 autonomous principality, enjoying the privileges of practically self- 
 government. The relations between Rumanians and Bulgarians were 
 very friendly, and Rumania was the place of refuge for thousands 
 of Bulgarians, who either for political reasons or out of a desire 
 to lead a life of freedom, betook themselves there. As in Rumania 
 there were already thousands of Bulgarians, who by former emi- 
 grations had settled in many towns and villages in Rumania and in 
 Bessarabia, then forming part of Rumania, these Bulgarian refugees 
 felt as if they were not altogether in a strange land. The Rumanian 
 Government and people treated them kindly and hospitably, and a 
 great many prominent Bulgarian commercial houses were estab- 
 lished in the principal towns. In Bucharest itself in the sixties of 
 the last century a Bulgarian Revolutionary Committee was formed, 
 having for its object the liberation of Bulgaria from Turkish rule. 
 This idea was freely propagated in the Committee's press, by its 
 secret emissaries in Bulgaria, and even bands of insurgents that in 
 1867 and later crossed the Danube into Bulgaria, hoping to raise a 
 general insurrection, were organized and fitted out on Rumanian soil. 
 The Rumanian Government winked at all these proceedings and 
 naturally gained the sympathy of the Bulgarian people. 
 
 This sympathy was so great that when in 1878 Bulgaria was 
 called upon to choose her first ruler, voices were not wanting to 
 urge the election of Prince Charles of Rumania as such, and bring 
 about a personal union between the two countries. The plan did 
 not succeed, as the Russian Tsar, Alexander II, had another candi- 
 date in view for the newly-created Principality of Bulgaria, which 
 Russian blood and treasure had emancipated. 
 
 The relations between free Bulgaria and Rumania continued to 
 be very good, however, and when in 1886 Bulgaria, owing to the 
 abdication of Prince Alexander of Battenberg, was in quest of a new 
 ruler, the project of electing King Charles of Rumania was again 
 seriously revived; but as the relations between the Russian Tsar 
 Alexander III and the Regency in Bulgaria were strained, and the 
 
 70 
 
Tsar would not recognize anybody who might be chosen without his 
 previous consent, King Charles declined the proposal. 
 
 There was no reason why the relations betwen Rumania and 
 Bulgaria should not have continued always friendly. Although 
 there were probably as many as 150,000 Bulgarians inhabiting Ru- 
 mania and Bessarabia, it had never entered the head of any Bul- 
 garian, either before or after the constitution of the Bulgarian Prin- 
 cipality, to lay claims on any part of Rumania. The large river 
 Danube formed a natural and well-defined boundary between the two 
 countries, which could give rise to no frontier disputes. But the 
 Berlin Treaty upset what nature had ordained, and by allotting to 
 Rumania a large part of Dobrudja sowed the seeds of future dis- 
 cord between the two countries. This act of diplomatic short-sight- 
 edness was done in order to compensate Rumania for the loss of 
 Bessarabia, which she was made to retrocede to Russia. Rumania 
 protested in vain against the exchange ; the people of Dobrudja, where 
 there were hardly any Rumanians, and who were mostly Bulgarians 
 and Turks, were not consulted about it. How badly the new Ru- 
 mano-Bulgarian boundary in the Dobrudja was drawn is shown by 
 the fact that one of the principal forts of Silistra, which commands 
 the town, was left in the hands of the Rumanians, while the town 
 itself was turned over to the Bulgarians. Many of the people of 
 Silistra had their fields and vineyards on Rumanian territory. 
 
 Having been allowed to extend its possessions on the right bank 
 of the Danube over territory which neither by nationality, language 
 nor historic rights belonged to her, Rumania naturally thought that 
 she might, under the pretext of a better rectification of frontiers or 
 eventual territorial compensation, aspire to more territory from Bul- 
 garia. Her object has been to extend her dominion so as to include 
 the towns of Varna, the principal Bulgarian seaport on the Black 
 Sea ; Shumen and Rustchuk, forming thus with Silistra a quadrilat- 
 eral of strongly fortified places. But as, according to the French 
 proverb, "appetite comes in eating," Rumanian greed for territory 
 was not satisfied with this, but reached out for other Bulgarian ter- 
 ritory as far as Tirnovo and along the Danube as far north as the 
 town of Vidin, especially as in the latter district there is a Rumanian 
 population of 38,500, which might serve as a plausible excuse for 
 Rumanian pretensions. 
 
 The Rumanian press and some Rumanian writers have made 
 no attempt to dissemble this plan of theirs, and it would have been 
 
 71 
 
very easy for Rtimanian politicians, at the opportune moment, to 
 grossly exaggerate the actual number of Rumanians inhabiting Bul- 
 garia, to claim them as rightfully belonging to Rumania. 
 
 J. D. Bourchier, who has been for more than twenty-five years 
 the special correspondent of the London Times in the Balkan Penin- 
 sula, and is well-versed in the political conditions of Rumania and 
 the Balkan States, in his work, "The Balkan States," 1905, wrote: 
 "Rumania will claim compensation in case any population which 
 she claims to be Rumanian is adjudged to some other power.'' In 
 the Balkan Peninsula there was no place where Rumanians existed, 
 except those who inhabited Bulgaria, about 123,000 inhabiting Serbia, 
 and those in Macedonia, Thessaly and Epirus, whose, number is 
 estimated by Prof. G. Weigand* to be about 160,000, and about half 
 of whom he assigns to Macedonia. This Rumanian or Vlakh popu- 
 lation in Macedonia nowhere forms a majority or a compact mass, 
 but is scattered over various districts interspersed among villages 
 of other nationalities, so that it has no importance as a social-polit- 
 ical factor in the country. In church matters the Vlakhs are under 
 the jurisdiction of the Greek Patriarch and a large part'of them 
 pride themselves on being Greeks, although their home language is 
 Vlakh or Rumanian. 
 
 It was not possible for Rumania to raise a Rumanian question in 
 Bulgaria or Serbia, for she would have exposed herself to the raising 
 of the question of the Bulgarians in Rumania. Moreover, the Ru- 
 manians in Bulgaria and Serbia, who had settled there for good 
 almost eighty years earlier, were treated on a footing of equality with 
 the native population and therefore had no reason to complain. 
 
 But in Macedonia it was dififerent. There the Vlakhs were in 
 a country the future of which was uncertain, and their national 
 existence was precarious, owing to the successful attempts at Hellen- 
 ization that the Greek clergy had made and was making among them. 
 Eighty thousand Vlakhs in the midst of a population of two and 
 one-quarter millions could not count m'uch in any future redistribu- 
 tion of territory in the Balkan Peninsula, nor could they justify Ru- 
 mania in claiming any part of Macedonia as hers by right of nation- 
 ality. The numerical insignificance of the Vlakh population, the 
 
 ♦ Dr. Weigand, professor of Roumanian language and literature in the 
 University of Leipzig, has compiled his statistics by personally visiting almost 
 all the villages and towns in Macedonia inhabited by Vlakhs, during his two 
 journeys undertaken for the study of their language, customs, manners and 
 mode of life. 
 
 72 
 
absence of any district which could be called purely or really Vlakh, 
 the geographical position of Macedonia and Rumania, precluded the 
 advance of any such claim. 
 
 But if Rumania could not substantiate her claims to Macedonian 
 territory, she could make 'use of the Macedonian Vlakhs as barter 
 for territory nearer home. She was aware of the fact that, owing 
 to the Christian population of Macedonia being overwhelmingly Bul- 
 garian, Bulgaria was the most serious claimant to Macedonia. If 
 in case of a rearrangement of the map of the Balkan Peninsula,. 
 Macedonia should go to Bulgaria, Rumania could then come forward 
 with a demand, based upon the trite pretext of "the balance of 
 power," for compensation with Bulgarian territory. 
 
 With this purpose in view a Rumanian propaganda, supported 
 and directed from Bucharest, was started among the Vlakhs in 
 Macedonia with the ostensible object of safeguarding them against 
 Hellenization and preserving their nationality. It was ostensibly 
 a "cultural" propaganda, carried on by the establishment of Ru- 
 manian schools and churches, subsidized by the Rumanian Govern- 
 ment, to replace the Greek schools and churches which were in exist- 
 ence among the Macedonian Vlakhs. At first no great importance 
 was attached by the Greeks and their Patriarchate to this move- 
 ment. The process of Hellenization that had gone on for years 
 among the Vlakhs had stifled any national consciousness among 
 them, and although the people still clung to their language, they 
 had no literature, no priesthood and no teachers of their own. Those 
 of them who had an education, and their number was relatively 
 small, had received it in the Greek schools at home or in Greece, and 
 were ardent admirers of Greek history, language, literature and 
 culture. As a rule, they became firm champions of Hellenism, and 
 considered it an ignominy to be counted as Vlakhs. The similarity 
 of religion and church rites, the docility and submissiveness of the 
 Vlakh population to the Greek bishops, priests and teachers, facili- 
 tated the work of Hellenization. 
 
 Eventually the Patriarch and his clergy tried to prevent the 
 spread of the Rumanian propaganda, obstructing the opening of 
 Vlakh schools. The question assumed a more threatening aspect 
 when in 1892 six Vlakh delegates from Monastir presented to the 
 Sultan a petition bearing 5,000 signatures asking for the appointment 
 of a Vlakh Archbishop to reside in the town of Monastir. The 
 
 7^ 
 
Greek Patriarch was naturally opposed to the proposition, and the 
 Turkish Government pigeonholed the petition. 
 
 But in 1905 a Sultan's decree was issued granting to the Vlakhs, 
 "in order to safeguard their national interests," the permission "to 
 use their own language in their schools, to perform their religious 
 services in their own churches, with their own priests and in their 
 own language." They were also granted the privilege of choosing 
 their own village mayors and of taking part in the elections of the 
 members of the provincial administrative councils. 
 
 The concession of these privileges to the Vlakhs was tantamount 
 to their being officially recognized as a separate national unit, which 
 carried with it their right to be registered in the official rolls as 
 Vlakhs, and not as Greeks, as the custom heretofore had been. But 
 the decree expressly stated that the Vlakhs were to remain under 
 the spiritual jurisdiction of the Patriarch. 
 
 This decree infuriated the Greeks. Armed bands, chiefly organ- 
 ized on Greek territory, and sent over into Macedonia, began to ter- 
 rorize the Vlakh population and prevent it from joining the Ru- 
 manian propaganda. The Greek Patriarch forbade the consecration 
 of priests of Vlakh origin, threatened with excommunication those 
 of them who should dare to use the Rumanian language in the church 
 services or sympathize with the aims of the propaganda. An at- 
 tempt to have the Vlakhs join the Bulgarian Exarchate and have 
 their priests ordained by the Bulgarian bishops failed, because the 
 Exarch refused to. interfere in the Vlakho-Greek strife and become 
 a tool of the propaganda. 
 
 The persecution of the Vlakhs by the armed Greek bands and 
 the Greek Patriarch produced a strain in the relations between Ru- 
 mania and Greece, and on September 12, 1905, four months after 
 the promulgation of the Sultan's decree in regard to the Vlakhs, 
 Greco-Rumanian diplomatic relations were broken off. 
 
 On the resumption of these relations in 1911 the Rumanian 
 Government again took up negotiations with the Greek Patriarchate, 
 hoping to induce it to sanction the privileges granted to the Mace- 
 donian Vlakhs by the Sultan, and the establishment of a Vlakh 
 church organization with its own spiritual chief. The answer of 
 the Patriarch was a categorical non possumus, on the ground that 
 these things were asked for by an insignificant minority, while the 
 majority of the Vlakhs did not desire to separate themselves .from 
 the Greek church. 
 
 74 
 
In its demand for a separate Vlakh church organization, Ru- 
 mania was really not sincere, for it did not suit the political plans 
 for the furtherance of which she intended to use the Macedonian 
 Vlakhs. If the Greek Patriarch were to grant such an organization, 
 he ipso facto would destroy the ground on which he had based his 
 opposition to the establishment of a Bulgarian church organization, 
 namely, that the church did not recognize racial distinctions. A 
 Vlakh church organization would have worked in favor of the Bul- 
 garian cause in Macedonia, for the Patriarch could not have refused 
 to a million of Bulgarians what he granted to 80,000 Vlakhs. 
 
 But a church separation was not in accordance either with 
 the Greek or the Rumanian aims. As early as 1905 the Rumanian 
 Government had declared its opinion, as the Rumanian official Green 
 Book of that year testifies, that "it would not be in the interest of 
 the Sublime Porte or in that of Rumania's problems to push afifairs 
 too far, and make the Vlakh religious community the outcome of a 
 religious schism." In the next place, the smallness of the Vlakh 
 population, which nowhere formed a compact or predominating 
 mass, made it incapable of becoming a national or political factor 
 in Macedonia. The Vlakhs could count for something only in union 
 with the Greeks. As to their being annexed to Rumania, it was out 
 of the question, beca'use Bulgaria stood geographically between Ru- 
 mania and Macedonia. Hence a division of tendencies arose between 
 the Vlakhs who wished to remain united with the Greek Patriarch, 
 and those who were in favor of a separatistic national movement. 
 
 Both these factions found fault with Rumania, which preached 
 to them loyalty to the Turkish Government. The Bulgarian move- 
 ment for an autonomous Macedonia found no more favor with Ru- 
 manian politicians than it did with those of Greece and Serbia. The 
 Vlakhs, however, thought differently. During the insurrection in 
 Macedonia in 1903 many Vlakhs joined the ranks of the Bulgarian 
 insurgents and fought bravely both against the Turkish troops and 
 against the Greek bands which cooperated with the latter. 
 
 This displeased the Rumanian politicians, who were not slow in 
 condemning the common action of the Vlakhs with the Btilgarians. 
 Romanul de la Find, the organ of the nationalist Vlakhs, in opposition 
 to this condemnation declared that the Vlakhs, in view of the reluc- 
 tance of the Rumanian Government to demand the separation of the 
 Vlakh church from the Patriarchate, "find it necessary to unite their 
 destiny with that of the Bulgarian nation, which seems to them less 
 
 75 
 
dangerous for their national existence and whose enemies (the 
 Greeks) are also their own enemies." And again: "If we do not 
 wish to exist as a separate nation in Macedonia, nothing remains 
 for us to do but to follow the advice of the Rumanian Government ; 
 if, on the other hand, we wish to exist as a separate nation, we 
 ought to get rid of these counsels — to follow the impulses of our 
 hearts and act as the needs of our people dictate." 
 
 Rumanian statesmen, such as Bratiano, Lahovary, Sturdza, Take 
 lonescu and others, were not wanting in protestations that Rumania 
 "had no plans of any conquests in Macedonia, as this province is too 
 far away from Rumania," or of "annexing it or creating it in a 
 a Rumanian state." All they wanted was "to help the cultural devel- 
 opment of a population with which we are bound by origin and com- 
 mon sentiments," and thus preserve its nationality and language. 
 
 While such were the outward professions of the Rumanian 
 statesmen, Bratiano, who was Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1902, in 
 a circular addressed to the Rumanian diplomatic representatives 
 abroad, wrote: "The affairs of Macedonia have constantly occu- 
 pied our attention, because they interest us: (1) on account of a 
 numerous (Sic!) population in Turkey of Rumanian origin, and (2) 
 on account of the political equilibrium in the Balkan Peninsula." 
 
 The Rumanian periodical, La Renaissance Latine, in its issue 
 of July, 1904, gave more precision to Bratiano's idea by declaring 
 that "the Rumanian Government is striving less at the creation of 
 a colony of Aromani, than at securing a pledge, which it could cede 
 to Bulgaria in return for extensive concessions, as, for example, 
 the rectification of the Dohrudja frontiers." 
 
 Writing not long ago before the first Balkan war. Prof. Barbu- 
 lescu of the University of Yassy, untrammelled by political consid- 
 erations or diplomatic circumlocution, was more outspoken when he 
 wrote : "The role and activities of the Aromani in Macedonia ought 
 to consist not only in purely cultural action, but also in political 
 action, parallel with it, for in that province we have to do with the 
 Bulgarians, who are aiming at the eventual annexation of our Do- 
 brudja, and, therefore, wish to violate our territorial integrity. 
 . . . The Rumanians, therefore, ought to pursue in Macedonia a 
 cultural as well as a political aim: to prevent the Bulgarians from 
 gaining possession of Macedonia. In order to retain Dobrudja we 
 ought to pursue in Macedonia such a policy as would, as far as 
 possible, unite us more closely with Serbia, the Greek Patriarchate 
 
 76 
 
and the Greeks, and thus enable us to paralyze the Bulgarian aspira- 
 tions to territorial expansion in Macedonia." 
 
 These quotations, and many others which might be adduced, 
 from the 'utterances of prominent Rumanians show the ulterior 
 object of the Rumanian propaganda in Macedonia and confirm the 
 statement of the correspondent of the London Times that the Vlakhs 
 of Macedonia were to be used as barter for compensation. The 
 confession of Prof. Barbulescu that Rumania can work against the 
 Bulgarians in Macedonia only in conjunction with Serbia, the Greek 
 Patriarchate and the Greeks, proves that the "numerous" Vlakh 
 population in Turkey, of which Bratiano speaks in his circular, is 
 powerless to act by itself. It is characteristic of the pretensions of 
 the Rumanians, Serbians and Greeks in Macedonia that while claim- 
 ing that they have large populations there and that the Bulgarians 
 form an insignificant minority, none of them feel strong enough to 
 cope with the latter separately, but all clamor for joint action. Bul- 
 garia is the only country that has refused to barter away its rights 
 to enter into bargaining or combinations with one nationality against 
 another. Strong in the righteousness of the Bulgarian cause, both 
 the Government and the Exarchate have declined to entertain propo- 
 sitions for political blackmail or unjust acquisition. 
 
 The charge that Bulgaria aims at an eventual annexation of 
 Rumanian Dobrudja and desires to destroy Rumania's territorial in- 
 tegrity, is gratuitous and baseless. We have already spoken of the 
 way Rumania obtained possession of Dobrudja in 1878. Rumanian 
 rule there has been attended with harshness and deliberate oppression 
 of the Bulgarian population. The Bulgarian schools were closed, 
 the Bulgarian language was proscribed, Bulgarian clubs or reading 
 rooms were forbidden, and church services were allowed only in 
 Rumanian. These proceedings of the Rumanian Government were 
 certainly provocative, but Bulgaria kept aloof from any political 
 agitation or propaganda in Dobrudja. It even went beyond that: 
 it allowed the opening of a Rumanian school in the very capital of 
 Bulgaria for a population (in 1905) of only 230 Rumanians, most 
 of them unmarried! That Bulgarians may have cherished senti- 
 mentally the desire to see Dobrudja eventually restored to Bulgaria, 
 to which it belongs both by right of nationality and by geography, is 
 very probable ; but it can hardly be called an attempt at the destruc- 
 tion of Rumania's territorial integrity. 
 
 If Rumania is justified in entertaining a longing desire for the 
 
 77 
 
annexation of Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia, on the ground 
 of historical and national rights, why should it be wrong for Bul- 
 garia to entertain a similar desire in regard to Dobrudja? Geo- 
 graphically and historically that province was a part of Bulgaria 
 up to 1878, when it was arbitrarily detached from it and annexed to 
 Rumania. The latter country has no more right to Dobrudja than 
 Bulgaria has to Transylvania. Rumanian territorial integrity begins 
 on the left bank of the Danube. Her natural expansion lies in an- 
 other direction, not across the Danube. By her geographical posi- 
 tion, Rumania is not a Balkan State and does not belong to the 
 Balkan Peninsula. On the right bank of the Danube she is an in- 
 truder, with potentialities for future mischief-making, and a stand- 
 ing menace to the security of Bulgaria and the peace of the Balkan 
 Peninsula. 
 
 78 
 
IX 
 
 The Balkan League and the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 
 
 The formation of the Balkan League and the joint cooperation 
 of Serbia, Greece and Bulgaria in a war against Turkey for the free- 
 ing of their respective co-nationalists, from Turkish rule was almost 
 a miracle. The current opinion in Europe had been that with the 
 apparently irreconcilable divergences of opinion among these states 
 abo'ut the settlement of the Balkan Question, and the mutual hatreds 
 among their peoples, no political combination for common action 
 was possible. But the unexpected happened. How this was brought 
 about and the struggle with Turkey crowned with success is so well 
 told in the "Report of the International Commission of Inquiry into 
 the Balkan Wars," published in 1914 by the Carnegie Endowment 
 for International Peace, that those who wish to get into touch with 
 the events preceding the war and with its subsequent phases may 
 with profit consult that Report. In fact, no one who wishes to 
 understand the Balkan situation or to talk intelligently about it can 
 afford to ignore its contents. Additional and valuable information 
 can be gained also by the perusal of "The Balkan League" (published 
 by John Murray, London, 1915), the author of which, I. E. Gueshoff, 
 was Prime Minister of Bulgaria from March, 1911, to May 30, 1913, 
 exactly four weeks before the second Balkan War began. Mr. Gues- 
 hoff's book is interesting both for the light it throws on the forma- 
 tion of the Balkan League and its vicissitudes during the First Balkan 
 War, and for the diplomatic documents it contains, which supplement 
 the contents of the Report of the Carnegie Commission. 
 
 It is a mistake to attribute to the initiative of Venizelos the 
 formation of the Balkan League. It is true that on October 16, 
 1911, the Greek Minister at Sofia informed the Bulgarian Govern- 
 ment that, if it could assure Greece of Bulgaria's willingness to inter- 
 vene in the event of a Turkish aggression upon Greece, he was au- 
 thorized by his Government to declare that Grece in her turn would 
 fight should Bulgaria be attacked by Turkey. The proposal was 
 accepted, but no treaty or project of a treaty was drawn. On April 
 27, 1912, Greece presented a draft for a defensive alliance with 
 Bulgaria, but as nothing was said in the project about the autonomy 
 
 79 
 
of Macedonia and Thrace, Bulgaria refused to entertain this project, 
 and submitted to Greece the following formula : 
 
 "Greece undertakes not to offer any opposition to an eventual 
 demand by Bulgaria of administrative autonomy for Macedonia 
 and the vilayet of Adrianople, guaranteeing equal rights to the 
 nationalities there." 
 
 This formula, with some slight modifications in the wording, 
 was finally adopted by Greece, and a Greco-Bulgarian defensive 
 alliance was signed on May 29, 1912, at Sofia. This was followed 
 by the signature, on October 5, 1912, of a Military Convention 
 between Greece and Bulgaria, but no agreement with respect to the 
 future frontiers in Macedonia of the two countries was concluded. 
 
 On March 13, 1912, that is, two months and a half before the 
 signing of the defensive alliance between Greece and Bulgaria, a 
 treaty of friendship and alliance between Serbia and Bulgaria was 
 signed. This treaty, due to the initiative of Bulgaria, was the real 
 foundation of the Balkan League. Article 2 of a Secret Annex to 
 this treaty states that, "Serbia recognizes the right of Bulgaria to 
 the territory east of the Rhodope Mountains and the River Struma ; 
 while Bulgaria recognizes a similar right of Serbia to the territory 
 north and west of Shar Mountain." As to the territory lying between 
 the Shar Mountain and the Rhodope Mountains, the Aegean Sea and 
 the Lake of Ochrida, a detailed delimitation line was fixed, beyond 
 which Serbia undertook to ask for nothing. This delimitation line 
 left to Bulgaria the larger part of Macedonia, reserving the districts 
 of Skopia, Kumanovo, Tetovo, and Dibra, for the arbitration of the 
 Russian Emperor. This was done in order to satisfy the pretensions 
 of Serbia to these districts, and at the same time to appease public 
 opinion in Bulgaria, which has always considered the above districts 
 as being part of Macedonia and by right of nationality belonging to 
 Bulgaria, 
 
 The Bulgarian Government in making this concession to Serbia 
 by leaving these districts to be arbitrated upon and adjudged by the 
 Russian Emperor, wished to guard itself against the imputation of 
 sacrificing Bulgaria's interests to those of Serbia, with the latent 
 hope perhaps that the arbitrator might still adjudge to Bulgaria the 
 "disputed zone" in whole or in part. The article is most explicit on 
 this point, for it reads thus: "Bulgaria undertakes to accept this 
 line, if His Majesty, the Russian Emperor, who will be requested to 
 act as supreme arbitrator, pronounces in its favor. It is understood 
 
that the two parties bind themselves to accept as a definite frontier 
 the Hne between the indicated frontiers which His Majesty, the 
 Russian Emperor, will esteem to correspond best to the rights and the 
 interests of the two parties." 
 
 Subject to arbitration, then, was not the whole treaty or the 
 delimitation line "beyond which Serbia undertakes to ask for noth- 
 ing," but the line "between the indicated frontiers" and the Shar 
 Mountain, which comprised the disputed or contested region. 
 
 On September 30, 1912, Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Monte- 
 negro, ordered a mobilization of their forces as a reply to a similar 
 measure on the part of Turkey, and on October 18, 1912, the Allies 
 formally declared war against Turkey. Shortly after the outbreak 
 of the war, the Bulgarian Government, as Gueshoflf tells us, came into 
 the possession of a copy of a circular letter, No. 5669, by Pashitch, 
 the Serbian Prime Minister, dated September 28, 1912, i. e., two 
 days before Bulgaria mobilized, and addressed to Serbia's diplomatic 
 representatives abroad. In this letter, discussing the proposal made 
 on August 14, 1912, by Count Berchtoldt, the Austrian Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs, to assist Turkey in extending "decentralization" to 
 the Christian nationalities, Pashitch instructed the Serbian diplomats 
 and consuls to support the cause of reforms in Old Serbia and to 
 demand the following frontiers for that province: 
 
 "The geographical frontier of this territory must start from 
 Poteritsa, on the Turko-Bulgarian boundary, and turn to the south 
 in the direction of the watershed of Vardar, thence continuing to- 
 wards Babuna, in such a way as to include v/ithin the scope of Old 
 Serbia the towns of Prilep, Kitchevo and Ochrida, together with 
 their surroundings." 
 
 By the terms of the Serbo-Bulgarian treaty of March 13, 1912, 
 Prilep and Ochrida had been adjudged to Bulgaria, and here was 
 Pashitch, six months after the signing of that treaty, in a secret 
 dispatch, behind the back of the Bulgarian Government, and in 
 violation of the treaty, claiming them as Serbian ! 
 
 The Bulgarian Government strongly protested against this exhi- 
 bition of bad faith on the part of Serbia, but as the war had already 
 begun, there was nothing else to do but to go on with it. While the 
 Bulgarian troops were fighting in Thrace against the Turks, the 
 Serbian and Greek troops were occupying Macedonia, driving the 
 Turkish forces before them. 
 
 After having established themselves in Macedonia the Serbians 
 
 81 
 
in November, 1912, occupied the seaport of Durazzo, on the Adri- 
 atic. In view of the opposition of Austria to this occupation, Serbia 
 had finally to abandon her pretensions to an outlet on the Adriatic 
 Sea. Mr. Gueshoff quotes a telegram of November 9, 1912, from 
 Sazonoff, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, to the Bulgarian 
 Government, in which he said that the Bulgarians, "who had stood 
 at the head of the Balkan Alliance, must explain to the Serbians that 
 necessity obliges them not to seek any territorial acquisitions on the 
 Adriatic coast. The Triple Alliance had definitely decided the ques- 
 tion, and after our great gains we must not start a fresh war for a 
 harbor. Obstinacy on the part of Serbia might give rise to very 
 serious complications." 
 
 The Serbo-Bulgarian treaty makes no mention whatever of 
 securing a seaport for Serbia on the Adriatic, or of extending Serbian 
 territorial possessions over Albania. What it provides for is, that 
 in case Austria should declare war on Serbia, Bulgaria would send 
 to Serbia an army of at least 200,000 men, to act offensively or 
 defensively against Austria. Serbia did not inform Bulgaria when 
 it advanced towards the Adriatic or when it definitely renounced 
 its claim to an Adriatic seaport, and yet the Serbians afterwards 
 complained that the Bulgarians did not support them in securing 
 a footing on the Adriatic Coast. 
 
 "The truth is," says Gueshoff, "that when we conveyed to 
 them the urgent counsels of Russia, we invariably declared that 
 we should do everything humanly possible to perform our duty 
 under the treaty of alliance." 
 
 Had Serbia maintained her occupation of Durazzo and been 
 attacked by Austria, Bulgaria would have been obliged to give her 
 the promised help. In case Bulgaria had refused to stand by her 
 engagement, Serbia's complaint wo'uld have been justified. If 
 Serbia withdrew from the Adriatic, she did it either because she 
 did not wish to pick a quarrel with Austria or because she saw 
 that even Russia did not approve her action and refused to uphold 
 her in it. 
 
 But what is significant in this question of a Serbian outlet on 
 the Adriatic and discloses the nefarious designs of the Serbian 
 Government in regard to its treaty with Bulgaria, is the fact that 
 before Serbia had renounced the Adriatic port, in the early part 
 of December, 1912, the Serbian Minister at Paris told the Russian 
 Ambassador "that in the event of non-compliance with the Serbian 
 
 82 
 
demand for sovereign ownership of an Adriatic port, Serbia would 
 be forced to look for compensation beyond the frontiers fixed by 
 the Serbo-Bulgarian treaty." These words plainly show that Serbia 
 was already planning to violate her territorial understanding with 
 Bulgaria, and that the latter was to be asked to compensate her 
 for a loss which she suffered through no fault or action of Bul- 
 garia. 
 
 The subject of the delimitation of frontiers, already settled 
 by the treaty, was raised by Serbia while the war against the Turks 
 was still going on and its final issue was uncertain. Sazonoff, in 
 apprising the Russian Minister of Belgrade of the above conversa- 
 tion between the Russian Ambassador and the Serbian Minister 
 at Paris, says: "A violation of the territorial understanding 
 between the two countries, which has been attained at the cost of 
 so much labor, can find in us neither sympathy nor support." 
 
 On January 23, 1913, Pashitch, the Prime Minister of Serbia, 
 for the first time spoke to the Bulgarian Minister at Belgrade 
 about a rectification of the frontier fixed by the Serbo-Bulgarian 
 treaty, and at the very beginning of March the Serbian Minister 
 at Sofia handed to the Bulgarian Government a note, officially 
 asking for compensations not mentioned in the treaty. The Bul- 
 garian Government naturally refused to entertain this proposal, 
 which was contrary to the letter and spirit of the treaty and was 
 not justified by anything that had happened. To have accepted 
 the Serbian demands would have meant to submit to revision the 
 entire treaty, for which there was no reasonable excuse. 
 
 Such was the opinion of Sazonoff, who in a telegram of March 
 10, 1913, to the Russian Minister at Belgrade, says: "We cannot 
 help regretting that, without waiting for the conclusion of peace, 
 the Serbian Government should raise a question with which we 
 can have no sympathy, because it is in contradiction to the obliga- 
 tions assumed by the Serbian Government." As the conference 
 which had sat in London from December 16, 1912, to January 27, 
 1913, failed to bring about peace between the Balkan Allies and 
 Turkey, owing to the refusal of the latter to accept the proposed 
 terms, hostilities against Turkey were resumed, and were carried on 
 principally by Bulgaria in Thrace. 
 
 Neither Serbia nor Greece took part in them, except that two 
 Serbian divisions cooperated with the Bulgarians in the siege of 
 Adrianople. 
 
 All this time Serbia was maturing her plans to break her treaty 
 
 83 
 
with B'ulgaria and plotting with Greece against Bulgaria. On March 
 8, 1913, the Rumanian Minister at Belgrade informed his govern- 
 ment that he had "learned from several sources that Serbia is ne- 
 gotiating with the Greeks for the purpose of concluding a defensive 
 alliance against Bulgaria. Both the Serbian Government and the 
 Greek Minister here are impenetrable. The latter spends several 
 hours daily at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs." A little later the 
 same Minister wrote : "All those with whom I have spoken tell me 
 that, from the general to the last soldier, the Serbians under arms 
 refuse to abandon Monastir and the other towns claimed by the 
 Bulgarians in virtue of the treaty of alliance, and would rather 
 be killed by Savoif than give up what they have conquered." 
 
 In Russia, too, they were aware of these Serbian machinations 
 and designs, for on April 17, 1913, Sazonoff telegraphed to the 
 Russian Minister at Belgrade as follows : "The Bulgarian Minister, 
 acting on instructions from the Sofia Cabinet, has called our atten- 
 tion to the dangerous 'under-currents which threaten the existence 
 of the Balkan Alliance. For instance, not long ago the Serbian 
 Finance Minister asked for supplementary military credits for a 
 period from the conclusion of peace until the final repartition of 
 the conquered territories among the allies. The Serbian and Greek 
 armies are being reinforced against the Bulgarian troops. Besides, 
 it appears that special negotiations have been opened between Serbia 
 and Greece, and it is seriously rumored that an alliance between 
 those two countries has been concluded." 
 
 On April 26, 1913, the Bulgarian Prime Minister in a long dis- 
 patch to the Bulgarian Minister at Petrograd instructed him to 
 assure Sazonoff that Bulgaria had no intention of breaking the Serbo- 
 Bulgarian treaty or of engaging in any fratricidal war. He pointed 
 out that it was Serbia that had raised the question of a revision 
 of the treaty, and was seeking alliances against Bulgaria and that 
 both Serbia and Greece were massing troops on the Bulgarian fron- 
 tiers. 
 
 "If Mr. Sazonoff," the dispatch said, "should ask for further 
 proof that we are not responsible for the present acute tension, but 
 are, on the contrary, sincerely desirous of a peaceful settlement of 
 the dispute, we are in a position to furnish it to him. For this 
 purpose, and in order to seek an issue out of the present difficulty, 
 I authorize you to propose to him that, in conformity with Article 4 
 of the Secret Annex, Russia should settle our dispute with Serbia. 
 The Serbian case will be found stated in the above-mentioned letter 
 
 84 
 
of Mr. Pashitch. We entirely reject the Serbian thesis, and as Mr. 
 Pashitch wishes to meet me and discuss it, all interviews are useless, 
 because the Ministerial Council in no wise can continue further dis- 
 cussion on this basis. We insist upon the carrying out of the treaty. 
 . . . There being an open dispute between us and 
 Serbia, and this dispute falling within the scope of the 
 said Article 4, we most urgently request that the Russian Govern- 
 ment undertake its settlement and invite the two sides to state their 
 respective cases in order to enlighten the arbitrator. Let me add 
 that when Mr. Spalaikovitch handed me the letter of Mr. Pashitch, 
 he himself admitted, in reply to my declaration that we could not 
 consent to a revision of the treaty, that there was no other way of 
 settling the matter except by recourse to the stipulated arbitration." 
 
 On the strength of this declaration on the part of the Bulgarian 
 Government Sazonofif wired on April 30, 1913, to the Russian Min- 
 isters in Belgrade and Sofia to remind the respective governments 
 to which they were accredited that "every dispute concerning the 
 interpretation or the application of the treaty and the military con- 
 vention must be submitted to the arbitration of Russia, as soon as 
 either side declares that it is impossible to reach an agreement 
 by direct negotiations." Sazonoff left it to the two allied govern- 
 ments to inform Russia "in due time that all disagreements will be 
 settled in the way indicated by the treaty and not by armed force." 
 
 On May 2, 1913, the Prime Minister of Bulgaria informed the 
 Russian Minister at Sofia, who had communicated to him the con- 
 tents of Sazonoff's telegram, that Bulgaria was in sympathy with 
 Sazonoff's proposal "that all disputes between Bulgaria and Serbia 
 be settled in the way indicated by the Serbo-Bulgarian treaty." 
 
 On May 4, the Russian Minister at Belgrade telegraphed that 
 Pashitch said that Serbia did not intend to disrupt her alliance with 
 Bulgaria, but "that in view of what has happened the treaty of 
 alliance must undergo an amicable revision," that "he still hopes 
 that the two countries will arrive at a friendly understanding." In 
 case this should prove impossible the Serbian Government announced 
 it would always be ready to submit its claims to the arbitration of 
 the Russian Government. Four days later the same Minister sent 
 another dispatch to Sazonoff in which he reiterated the willingness 
 of Pashitch "to conform to the advice of Russia in the matter of 
 the Serbo-Bulgarian dispute; but," he added, "in order to make 
 clear the character of the dispute which has arisen ; to give a moral 
 satisfaction to the Serbian army; to calm the political excitement 
 
 8S 
 
in the country; to preserve ties with Greece, which has identical 
 interests with Serbia, and in that way to facilitate the task of the 
 arbitrator — Mr. Pashitch considers it absolutely necessary that there 
 should be a preliminary friendly exchange of views between the 
 allied Premiers." 
 
 In reading the telegrams of Hartwig, the Russian Minister at 
 Belgrade, it should be borne in mind that he was an avowed Bul- 
 garophobe and Serbophile, and that his influence over the Serbian 
 Cabinet was paramount. The answer of Pashitch in the above tele- 
 gram is evidently evasive and was given in order to protract the 
 discussion and gain time. That it was so considered in Petrograd is 
 apparent from the following telegram from Sazonoff to the Russian 
 Ministers in Belgrade and Athens, dated May 27, 1913 : "It looks 
 as if the Serbian and Greek Governments are playing a dilatory and 
 dangerous game, professing to us their peaceful intentions but at 
 the same time avoiding clear and definite replies to our proposals 
 and getting ready for a common war against Bulgaria." 
 
 On June 18, 1913, Sazonoff again telegraphed to the Russian 
 Minister at Belgrade : "Please use your influence to obtain a reply 
 from Mr. Pashitch about his consent to arbitration as soon as pos- 
 sible. All further resistance or delay may have the most disastrous 
 consequences." The following day he again telegraphed: "Infor- 
 mation received from various sources confirms the growing agitation 
 in the Bulgarian Army for immediate war or demobilization. If 
 Serbia does not accept the arbitration of Russia withoiiit reservation, 
 as Bulgaria has done, the Bulgarian Government refuses to wait any 
 longer, and the proposed meeting of the Premiers will not take place. 
 An 'unconditional acceptance by Serbia of Russian arbitration can 
 in no way be regarded as a concession to Bulgaria." 
 
 To these urgent appeals from Sazonoff the Russian Minister 
 at Belgrade replied on June 21, 1913, by the following characteristic 
 telegram: "I have received your telegrams of June 18 and 19. 
 Following your instructions, I am using all my efforts to persuade 
 the Serbian Government to accept our arbitration without reserva- 
 tions, but for the time being am meeting with general difficulties. The 
 general impression here is that we want to force Serbia to accept 
 all the demands of Bulgaria, and against this impression I am strug- 
 gling with all my energy. Nevertheless, I have not lost hope of a 
 satisfactory settlement." 
 
 Hartwig's "efforts" at persuasion, whatever they may have been, 
 did not materialize, for we find Sazonoff telegraphing to the Russian 
 
 86 
 
Minister at Sofia on June 25, four days before the outbreak of the 
 second Balkan war: "We blame Serbia also for not having given 
 us a definite answer whether she will submit to the arbitration of the 
 Imperial Government." 
 
 The dilatory tactics of the Serbian Government are explained 
 by the fact that it really had no desire to submit its dispute with 
 Bulgaria to arbitration ; on the contrary, it was all the time working 
 to consolidate its alliance with Greece against Bulgaria and if pos- 
 sible to align Rumania and Turkey with herself, for an eventual 
 attack upon Bulgaria. The King of Greece, according to the testi- 
 mony of Majoresco, the Rumanian Minister of Foreign Affairs, in 
 the course of an audience given to the Rumanian Minister at Athens 
 towards the end of March, had spoken to him of an alliance between 
 Greece and Rumania against Bulgaria. On April 19, 1913, the 
 Serbian Minister at Bucharest formally proposed to Rumania a 
 similar alliance, and a month later the Greek Minister at Bucharest 
 made a like proposal, adding that Turkey also might participate in 
 such an alliance. Serbian and Greek delegates had been sent to 
 Constantinople in May to try and induce the Turkish Government to 
 join the alliance. In the beginning of May a conference was called 
 in London to conclude peace between Turkey and the Balkan Allies. 
 The terms of the treaty had been drafted by Sir Edward Grey. On 
 May 2, 1913, this draft was communicated to the Balkan delegates 
 and ten days later the Bulgarian delegate announced his readiness to 
 sign the treaty. But the Serbian and Greek delegates demurred and 
 tried to retard the conclusion of peace. More than that, they visited 
 the Turkish Ambassador in London and asked him to wire to Con- 
 stantinople urging that instructions be sent to the Turkish delegate 
 to delay the signature of the treaty, promising Turkey as compen- 
 sation a Thracian frontier to the west of Adrianople when the war 
 between Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece should break out. The Am- 
 bassador refused, but Sir Edward Grey, who had been made aware 
 of the fact, peremptorily ordered the delegates either to sign the 
 treaty or leave London, and it was signed on May 30, 1913. 
 
 And all this time Serbia was professing, according to Hartwig's 
 dispatches to Sazonofif, that she "harbors no aggressive intentions 
 against Bulgaria," "values as before a sincere friendship with her," 
 and did not intend to destroy her alliance with Bulgaria ! 
 
 If further proof of Serbian perfidy were wanted, it is to be 
 found in the sham resignation of Pashitch on June 22, when he 
 had pretended the day before to accept Russian arbitration. We 
 
 87 
 
give the circumstances as stated in an official dispatch sent out at the 
 time by the Belgrade Press Bureau. The Serbian Cabinet had been 
 convoked to give its sanction to the acceptance of arbitration. Pas- 
 hitch w^as in favor of it, because otherwise a w^ar with Bulgaria would 
 become inevitable. But several ministers opposed it because "the 
 acceptance of the Russian demand would be tantamount to the 
 abandonment of the Serbian point of view." General Bojanovitch, 
 the Minister of War, "laid stress upon the temper in the ranks of 
 the army, vvhich in no circumstance will abandon the territory con- 
 quered at the price of its blood." As two or three other ministers 
 sided with the General, Pashitch tendered the resignation of the 
 Cabinet. 
 
 Both Greece and Serbia were aware of "the growing agitation 
 in the Bulgarian army in favor of immediate war or demobilization," 
 to which Sazonoff had referred in his dispatch of June 19, quoted 
 above. They also knew that public opinion in Bulgaria was greatly 
 excited by the tergiversations of the Serbian and Greek Govern- 
 ments in the negotiations for arbitration. When on June 1, 1913, 
 the Bulgarian Prime Minister proposed to Pashitch to have the 
 treaty with its Secret Annex and the military conventions made pub- 
 lic in order to enlighten public opinion in both countries, Pashitch 
 refused. The reason for his refusal was evident. He wished to 
 exploit the ignorance of public opinion in Serbia by representing 
 the Bulgarian demands as exorbitant or unjust. Had he made public 
 the obligations contracted by Serbia towards Bulgaria he would have 
 let it be seen that Serbia had no real standing ground in her pre- 
 tensions to a revision of the treaty. He was also afraid that the 
 Military League in Serbia, which was all-powerful, would be up in 
 arms against the government for having made the concessions to 
 Bulgaria contained in the treaty. 
 
 In the night of June 29, 1913, an attack was made by the Bul- 
 garian troops without a formal declaration of war on the Greek 
 and Serbian lines. It has been proved beyond any do'ubt that the 
 order for this attack was given by General Savoff, without the 
 knowledge of the Bulgarian Ministry. On the following day, as 
 soon as the ministry was informed of what had happened, orders 
 were given to stop military operations and the Russian Minister 
 at Sofia was requested to telegraph to Petrograd and urge the inter- 
 vention of Russia with Greece and Serbia to prevent hostilities. The 
 Minister's telegram ran as follows: "According to news received 
 today a Serious conflict has occurred between the Bulgarian troops 
 and the Serbian and Greek troops. In view of his immediate de- 
 
parture for Petrograd, Mr. Daneff [the Bulgarian Prime Minister] 
 begs you to take steps at Belgrade and Athens to prevent further 
 fighting." 
 
 Sazonoff at once telegraphed this request to Belgrade and 
 Athens and sent a reassuring telegram to Sofia. The Serbian Gov- 
 ernment replied vv'ith a flat refusal, as is seen from Hartwig's dis- 
 patch of July 1, in which he says that "no peaceable measures would 
 have any effect on the Government, because of the general excite- 
 ment, which has become extreme." A printed war proclamation, 
 bearing the same date and issued before Hartwig's dispatch could 
 have reached Petrograd, was published in Belgrade, declaring war 
 on Bulgaria. The reasons given in the proclamation, signed by the 
 Serbian King, for the declaration of war were that the Bulgarians 
 would not allow the Serbians to take the Macedonian districts they 
 had conquered from the Turks, and would not let Serbia be joined 
 with the sea. 
 
 Both statements are false, for Bulgaria claimed no districts 
 except those that Serbia had recognized in the treaty as by right 
 belonging to her, neither did Bulgaria oppose Serbia's desire to have 
 an outlet on the sea. Even by the terms of the Bucharest Treaty 
 of August 10, 1913, which gave to Serbia the Macedonian districts 
 she unjustly coveted, Serbia did not gain direct and immediate 
 access to the sea. She had to obtain it by a separate agreement 
 with Greece through Greek territory at Salonica. What reason 
 is there to suppose that Bulgaria would have been less ready than 
 Greece to grant a similar privilege to Serbia, if Serbia had carried 
 out loyally and faithfully her treaty obligations? 
 
 It is worthy of note that the Serbian declaration of war made 
 no mention whatever of the Bulgarian attack of June 29, which, 
 according to Hartwig, had produced such excitement in Belgrade. 
 One would have naturally expected the Serbian Government to make 
 the most of this attack, unprovoked by the Serbians, and give it 
 prominence as a justification for declaring war. Again, the date, 
 "July 1," and the words "given at Belgrade," in the proclamation are 
 not in print, but are inserted in handwriting, and the date on which it 
 was communicated to the Serbian commander at Orakh, at least four 
 days' journey from Belgrade, again bears the date of July 1, the 
 day of its alleged issue at Belgrade! 
 
 All this proves that Serbia had been preparing all along for 
 a war with Bulgaria, and that even the proclamation of it was ready 
 before the Bulgarian attack of June 29. Her negotiations for arbi- 
 tration and a peaceful solution of the dispute were a mere sham, 
 
 89 
 
designed to gain time and exhaust the patience of Bulgaria. In 
 the meantime Serbia had strongly fortified strategical points in 
 Macedonia and had massed her troops along the Bulgarian frontier. 
 
 We have previously pointed out that there was no treaty be- 
 tween Greece and Bulgaria fixing a delimitation of frontiers or a 
 repartition of territory. Availing himself of this uncertainty the 
 Greek Minister of Foreign Affairs, probably with the knowledge of 
 Serbia, one week after the war with Turkey had begun, proposed 
 to the Bulgarian Government a scheme for the repartition of the 
 concfuered territories by which Greece reserved to itself a population 
 of 2,000,000, magnanimously leaving to Bulgaria territories inhabited 
 by only 1,300,000! In view of the fact that the Greek forces which 
 took part in the war were only one-third of the Bulgarian and that 
 Bulgaria's losses were seven times those of the Greeks, the claims 
 of Greece were certainly grossly exaggerated and inadmissible. While 
 in London as a delegate to the Conference of December, 1912, Veni- 
 zelos had proposed orally to the Bulgarian delegate a new project 
 for fixing the boundaries. On February 6, 1913, he passed through 
 Sofia on his way to Athens, and Gueshoff, the Prime Minister of 
 Bulgaria, asked him to submit in writing what he had proposed orally 
 in London. Venizelos promised to do so on his return to Athens, 
 but he delayed fulfilling his promise, and when at last his proposal 
 came it was fund to be totally different from the one he had made 
 in London. Proposals on the part of Bulgaria to send a special 
 delegate to settle the question of frontiers, the fixing of the posi- 
 tions of the B'ulgarian and Greek armies and the question of demobi- 
 lization were likewise evaded by the Greek Government. Plotting 
 already with Serbia the discomfiture of Bulgaria, procrastination 
 was the policy of Venizelos as well as of Pashitch. 
 
 Besides Serbia and Greece there was a third pretender, Ru- 
 mania, who claimed compensations at the expense of Bulgaria. In 
 the summer of 1912, almost four months before the outbreak of 
 the first Balkan war, Bulgaria had proposed to come to an under- 
 standing with Rumania in view of an eventual Turkish catastrophe. 
 Rumania declined the offer, "with the vague assurance that, if mat- 
 ters reached a climax, Bulgaria and Rumania would easily come 
 to an agreement." Rumania thus declined to join the Balkan League 
 and help in the emancipation of her co-nationalists in Macedonia, 
 whose number Rumanian statistics put somewhere between 500,000 
 and 1,000,000, and for whose welfare the Rumanian Government 
 pretended to be so much concerned. On November 3, 1912, soon 
 after the war against Turkey had begun, Rumania semi-officially 
 
 90 
 
asked Bulgaria for a cession of territory in Dobrudja from Silistra 
 and Tutrakan down to Baltchik on the Black Sea. Bulgaria refused 
 to entertain the proposition, for the simple reason that this part 
 of northern Bulgaria is the most fertile and most advanced in agri- 
 culture, that the population of about 300,000 is mostly Bulgarian 
 and Turkish, with only about 4,500 Rumanians in the Tutrakan and 
 Silistra districts, and that Rumania had no justification in claiming 
 such a territorial compensation. Even the Rumanians who lived in 
 this region were perfectly satisfied with Bulgarian rule ; had it been 
 otherwise, they would have emigrated long ago to Rumania, which 
 is in plain sight on the other side of the Danube. But they did not 
 do so, for in Bulgaria they were free citizens with their own land 
 and stock, while in Rumania they would have been simple serfs, as 
 almost all the peasants of Rumania are. 
 
 On January 8, 1913, Rumania threatened Bulgaria with mobili- 
 zation and invasion, but Russian interference prevented her from 
 carrying out her threat. Three weeks later a protocol was signed 
 in London between the Bulgarian delegate and Take lonescu, the 
 Rumanian Minister of the Interior, embodying the concession which 
 Bulgaria was willing to make to Rumania. These concessions were 
 the following: (1) Bulgaria will grant school and church autonomy 
 to the Vlakhs in the future Bulgarian possessions in Macedonia, and 
 will permit the establishment of an episcopate for these Vlakhs 
 and the subvention of their churches and schools by the Rumanian 
 Government; (2) Bulgaria will raze to the ground the fortifications 
 around Silistra and recognize the right of Rumania to fortify the 
 southern frontier of Rumanian Dobrudja and thus get the desired 
 absol'ute security; (3) Bulgaria consents to the rectification of the 
 Rumano-Bulgarian boundary so as to give Rumania better facility 
 for the improvement of the harbor of Mankalia on the Black Sea, 
 and for its greater security." 
 
 The Rumanian Government refused to ratify this protocol, 
 and finally the matter was referred to the mediation of the Great 
 Powers. On May 9, 1913, the ambassadors' conference in Petro- 
 grad drew up a protocol by which Bulgaria agreed to cede the town 
 of Silistra to Rumania. A mixed Rumano-Bulgarian Commission 
 was sent to fix the limits of the ceded territory, but a divergence of 
 opinion arose between the delegates as to the manner of delimita- 
 tion and the matter was left in abeyance. In the meantime the 
 second Balkan war broke out. 
 
 That this failure of the cession of Silistra was not unwelcome 
 to Rumania is evidenced by the fact that she joined in the 
 
 91 
 
war almost immediately. The Rumanian Government has cleverly 
 represented its entrance into the war against Bulgaria as an act of 
 pacification of the Balkans. It was, on the contrary, a dastardly 
 act more becoming that of a robber than of a pacifier. The London 
 "Punch" characterized this act truly when, in a cartoon show- 
 mg a Bulgarian and a Serbian struggling together it represented 
 Rumania with a revolver in hand standing between the two and 
 rifling the pockets of the Bulgarian. That Rumania, instead of 
 working for the pacification of the Balkans, was anxious for com- 
 plications so that the Balkan League might be broken up and she 
 might fish in troubled waters, is shown by the following fact: In 
 a "Report to H. M. the Rumanian King by the Rumanian Minister 
 of Foreign Aflfairs," dated April 19, 1913, the Minister informed the 
 King that on that day he had received a proposal from the Serbian 
 Minister for an alliance against Bulgaria, to which proposal he had 
 given an evasive reply. He expressed confidence that Greece also 
 would soon make a similar proposal, but that to her also an evasive 
 answer should be returned. Then he added : "There is always dan- 
 ger that before matters come to a head between the allies and Bul- 
 garia and war breaks out, all negotiations for an alliance with us 
 might only serve to render the B'ulgarians more conciliatory towards 
 the claims of Greeks and Serbians and help to consolidate their 
 alliance to the detriment of Rumania. We cannot intervene except 
 when war breaks out between Greeks, Serbians and Bulgarians. At 
 that moment our hands must be free so that we shall be able to 
 impose peace." 
 
 What better proof does one need of the role played by the 
 would-be pacifier of the Balkan Peninsula ? 
 
 In order to make clearer the dispute raised by Serbia in violation 
 of her treaty obligations, which was the real cause of the second 
 Balkan war and the breaking up of the Balkan League, it is well to 
 give the complaints of the Serbians with their refutations by the 
 Bulgarians, as set forth in a memorandum prepared by the Bul- 
 garian Government for submission to the Russian Emperor as the 
 arbitrator. 
 
 1 . The Serbians maintain that the events which led to the down- 
 fall of the Ottoman Empire were not fully foreseen at the time of 
 the conclusion of the Serbo-Bulgarian treaty, and that this fact 
 gave them the right to call for an entire revision of the treaty. 
 Considering that the treaty clearly and definitely states what ter- 
 ritory is to belong to Serbia, what to Bulgaria and what is to be 
 submitted to the arbitration of Russia, the contracting parties had 
 
 92 
 
in view the possibility of what actually occurred — the dismember- 
 ment of all Turkey in Europe. 
 
 2. The Serbians claim a revision of the treaty because, after 
 its conclusion, Greece and Montenegro took part in the war against 
 Turkey. This fact cannot modify the relations established by the 
 treaty between Serbia and Bulgaria. The entrance of Greece into 
 the war was of especial assistance to Serbia in her campaign against 
 the Turks in Macedonia. 
 
 3. The Serbian claim that they mobilized more troops that 
 were called for by the treaty gives them no right to demand the 
 revision of the treaty. By the terms of the military convention 
 between the two states, Bulgaria was required to have an army of 
 not less than 200,000, and Serbia not less than 150,000. Bulgaria 
 mobilized 620,000 men all told, of whom 480,000 were effectives, 
 while Serbia mobilized, according to General Savoff, only 201,115 
 men. The losses of Bulgaria in the war were 93,000 (killed, dead of 
 disease, and wounded), while the Serbian total does not exceed 
 25,000 casualties. 
 
 4. Serbians try to justify their demand for the revision of the 
 treaty by the allegation that, contrary to the text of the treaty, 
 Bulgaria sent less than 100,000 men to the Macedonian theater of 
 war, while the Serbians helped the B'ulgarians with two divisions 
 in the siege of Adrianople. The stipulation in the military conven- 
 tion that Bulgaria should send 100,000 men to the Vardar theater 
 of war was only conditional, "if no other special arrangement be 
 made." By a supplementary agreement, concluded on the basis of 
 the Military Convention, Bulgaria was required to send one di- 
 vision to the Vardar theater of war. This she did by sending 32,- 
 000 men who took part in the battle of Kumanovo and assisted the 
 Serbians in defeating the Turks. The Serbians had the same num- 
 ber of troops at Adrianople, and they had come to replace the 
 Bulgarian troops which had been sent to Tchataldja to fight the 
 Turks. This was done in accordance with the agreement which 
 provides for the transference, according to circumstances, of the 
 necessary troops from the Macedonian to the Thracian theater of 
 war, and vice versa. 
 
 5. The Serbian assertion that Serbia deserved compensation be- 
 cause the Bulgarians took Adrianople is not valid, because, accord- 
 ing to the treaty, Serbia conceded to Bulgaria all the territory east of 
 the Rhodope Mountains, which certainly includes Adrianople. 
 
 6. In regard to Serbia being deprived of a seaport on the Ad- 
 riatic Sea, the treaty mentions no such seaport. What it does state 
 
 93 
 
is, that should Austria declare war on Serbia, or march any troops 
 into the Sandjak of Novipazar, Bulgaria will come to the assistance 
 of Serbia with at least 200,000 men. The Serbians abandoned the 
 port they had occupied of their own will, without even informing 
 Bulgaria. If Serbia, on account of Austria's opposition, was forced 
 to abandon the Adriatic seacoast, so was Bulgaria forced, 
 on account of Russian opposition, to abandon her 
 conquests on the Sea of Marmora, including the sea- 
 ports of Gallipoli, Rodosto and Silivria. Bulgaria had also to 
 cede to Rumania territory of her own. Although Serbia lost her 
 Adriatic seaport, she had received a guarantee by the decision of 
 the Great Powers of a free railway to one of the Adriatic ports, 
 and besides, by the annexation of the Province of Novipazar, 
 Serbia would be able to use the Montenegrin ports on the Adriatic. 
 It has been said that the Balkan war, which began as a war of 
 liberation, degenerated into a war of conquest. The foregoing 
 exposition of the circumstances attending the beginning and the 
 continuation of the struggle will show upon whom falls the blame 
 for the change. Bulgaria went into the war with the avowed pur- 
 pose of liberating from Turkish rule the Bulgarians in Macedonia, 
 whose cause she had always had at heart. It was this motive that 
 prompted her to conclude a treaty of alliance with Serbia, whereby 
 she hoped to secure the liberation of Macedonia, as well as of Old 
 Serbia, north of the Shar Mountains, the Serbian right and claim 
 to which she fully recognized. Although the Bulgarians had the 
 right to insist on their claims to the province of Skopia, which had 
 always been recognized as Bulgarian, they agreed, in order to spare 
 Serbian susceptibilities and pave the way for a mutual understand- 
 ing, to allow that part of Macedonian territory to be considered as 
 doubtful or contested and to leave it to Russian arbitration to 
 decide to whom it should belong. That concession on the part of 
 Bulgaria seems to have been satisfactory to Serbia, for otherwise 
 she would not have signed the treaty. But the Serbian Government 
 on the very eve of the Balkan war, as is proved by the secret cir- 
 cular of Pashitch, which we have quoted, was bent on playing false 
 to its engagements with Bulgaria. The conduct of the Serbian army 
 and authorities towards the people of Macedonia, as soon as the 
 Serbian troops had occupied the country, also proves that they 
 regarded the war as one of conquest, not of liberation. The report 
 of the Carnegie Commission supplies abundant evidence of this (pp. 
 49-57, and Chapter IV). Schools and churches were closed, priests 
 and teachers were arrested, maltreated, or driven out of the country, 
 
 94 
 
and men who had fought for the liberty of Macedonia "were 
 arrested and punished Hke mere vagabonds and brigands." Mer- 
 chants were forbidden to have any intercourse with Bulgaria, and 
 Bulgarian books and newspapers were confiscated and proscribed. 
 The Bulgarian bishops of Veles and Dibra were expelled from their 
 dioceses, while the bishop's vicar at Uskub "was first driven out 
 of his house, taken by force, shut up in a room and belabored by 
 four soldiers until he lost consciousness." People who called them- 
 selves Bulgarians exposed themselves to the risk of being beaten 
 and even killed. Gendarmes and various other Serbian agents went 
 about the villages forcing the people, under threats of punishment, 
 to sign prepared addresses and declarations renouncing their Bul- 
 garian nationality and declaring that they and their fathers had 
 been and were "pure Serbians." 
 
 The Greeks did not lag behind the Serbians in these oppressive 
 measures, which show that both Serbians and Greeks came as con- 
 querors and enslavers of the people and not as their liberators. It 
 was a systematic attempt at the denationalization of the people 
 under a regime of terror and tyranny, which began with the entry 
 of the Greek and Serbian armies into Macedonia (November, 1912), 
 and continued to the beginning of the second Balkan war (June, 
 1913). Who were, then, responsible for the conversion of the 
 Balkan war of liberation into a war of conquest? Was not Bul- 
 garia justified in looking upon allies guilty of such proceedings 
 towards her brethren in Macedonia as perfidious enemies ? 
 
 Another illustration of the regime which the Serbians estab- 
 lished in Macedonia after the Bucharest treaty is found in the decree 
 of "public security," issued on October 4, 1913, by the Serbian King, 
 for the administration of the province. It was the establishment 
 of a military dictatorship, pure and simple, which called forth cries 
 of horror even in the foreign press. This Draconian edict is pub- 
 lished in full on pp. 160-162 of the report of the Carnegie Commis- 
 sion ; but as a sample of its ordinances we shall cite a few of its 
 articles: ' [ 
 
 Article 2. "Any attempt at rebellion against the public powers 
 is punishable by five years' penal servitude. The decision of the 
 police authorities, published in the respective communes, is sufficient 
 proof of the commission of crime. If the rebel refuses to give 
 himself up as prisoner within ten days from such publication, he 
 may be put to death by any public or military officer." 
 
 Article 3. "Any person accused of rebellion in terms of the 
 
 95 
 
police decision, and who commits any crime, shall be punished with 
 death." 
 
 Article 4. "Where several cases of rebellion occur in a com- 
 mune and the rebels do not return to their homes within ten days 
 from the police notice, the authorities have the right of deporting 
 their families whithersoever they may find convenient. Likewise, 
 the inhabitants of the houses in which armed persons or criminals 
 in general are found concealed, shall be deported." 
 
 Article 16. "Any one who knows a malefactor and does not 
 denounce him to the authorities shall be punished by five years' 
 penal servitude." 
 
 Article 18 provides that any act of aggression and any resist- 
 ance by word or force offered to a public officer is to be punished 
 "by ten years' penal servitude, or at least six months' imprisonment, 
 however insignificant be the magnitude of the crime." 
 
 Article 20 provides twenty years' penal servitude for those who 
 recruit bands against the State or for resistance to the public au- 
 thorities, while by article 21 accomplices of rebels or of bands shall 
 be punished by death or by at least ten years' penal servitude. 
 
 Article 26 empowers the Prefects or Governors to enact such 
 police measures as they deem best and fix the penalties for their 
 contravention. 
 
 In commenting upon these harsh and oppressive regulations 
 for the administration of Macedonia, the Carnegie Commission 
 says: "As a matter of fact, if one did not know what Macedonia 
 is, one might guess it from the publication of these ordinances." 
 
 If the population of Macedonia is truly Serbian, as Serbians 
 claim, what need was there of such Draconic laws, and why should 
 it have been deprived of the rights of citizenship which the Serbian 
 Constitution confers upon all Serbians? These tyrannical ordi- 
 nances show plainly that Serbia ruled in Macedonia against the will 
 of the people, as a conqueror and intruder, and that the only way 
 it co'uld maintain its rule was by terror and violence. The object 
 of these ordinances was to crush the national spirit of the people and 
 cow them into forcible submission to a rule which they detested. 
 
 The Greeks applied equally harsh and oppressive measures to 
 that part of Macedonia which the treaty of Bucharest allotted to 
 Greece as its share of the plunder. Even some of the Greek papers, 
 which dared to be outspoken, condemned these measures. Arrests, 
 beatings, tortures, banishments, closing of schools and churches, 
 burning of Bulgarian books and holy images bearing Bulgarian in- 
 scriptions, — in a word, every sort of persecution to force the people 
 
 96 
 
to renounce their nationality and language has been freely 'used. 
 
 Those who are acquainted with the conduct of both Serbians 
 and Greeks in Macedonia before the Balkan war will not wonder 
 at these proceedings. Neither Serbia nor Greece has ever wanted 
 to see a good government, as prescribed by the Berlin Treaty, estab- 
 lished in Macedonia. The sufferings of the people have never evoked 
 any sympathy or commiseration at Athens or Belgrade. These 
 sufferings have found an echo only in Bulgaria and among its 
 people. Two years after the Berlin Treaty was signed, an appeal 
 bearing the signatures of 102 representatives of Bulgarian commu- 
 nities was addressed to the European Ambassadors in Constanti- 
 nople. In it the petitioners, exposing the hardships and sufferings 
 of Macedonia, begged the Powers to hasten the execution of article 
 23 of the Berlin Treaty and introduce the promised reforms. Such 
 appeals were from time to time repeated, public meetings held, and 
 delegations sent to the various Powers to plead the cause of Mace- 
 donia, invariably from Bulgaria. No appeal was ever issued, no 
 public meeting ever held, no delegation ever sent by either Serbia 
 or Greece in favor of Macedonian autonomy. And yet the reforms 
 demanded by the Bulgarians were for the good of all the nationali- 
 ties in Macedonia without distinction of race, religion or language! 
 
 When all these peaceful means to secure the execution of what 
 the European Powers had solemnly promised failed, recourse was 
 had to risings in Macedonia in order to force the Powers to act. In 
 all these risings only Bulgarians from Bulgaria and Macedonia took 
 part. Playing upon the ignorance and credulity of the outside 
 world, Greeks and Serbians have represented, under the name of 
 Comitadjis, these champions of Macedonian liberty as brigands and 
 cut-throats. It is a base calumny that should not be allowed to pass 
 •unchallenged, for it is an insult to the memory of men who freely 
 died for a righteous cause. A Comitadji or committee-man is the 
 Turkish name for a revolutionary and means simply a man who is 
 affiliated with a revolutionary committee and who fights for the 
 cause which that committee represents. Although it is true that 
 among the Comitadjis there were some who might be classed as 
 "black sheep," the large majority of them were serious-minded men, 
 whose chief object was to free Macedonia from Turkish rule. 
 Teachers and professors abandoned their class-rooms, students of 
 colleges forsook their desks and books, army officers and government 
 officials threw up their careers, and tradesmen left their counters to 
 join the ranks of the insurgents. If men like these who sacrificed 
 
 97 
 
their lives for freedom are to be counted as brigands and cut-throats, 
 then there is in history no blow that has been struck for liberty 
 against tyranny that ought not to be called a crime, or men who, 
 from George Washington down, have fo'ught in the cause of liberty, 
 should not be branded as criminals fit for the gallows. 
 
 In 1903, when the most serious insurrectionary movement in 
 Macedonia took place, the Serbians and especially the Greeks organ- 
 ized bands to fight, not with the Bulgarian insurgents for the 
 freedom and autonomy of Macedonia, but against them in con- 
 junction with the Turkish troops. These bands were recruited in 
 Greece, especially in the island of Crete and in Thessaly, and sent 
 over to Macedonia to help the Turks in putting down the insurrec- 
 tion. They were real mercenaries and even local Turks were hired 
 to cooperate with them. 
 
 Deputations of Greek officers actuall)' visited the Turkish Min- 
 ister at Athens and offered him their swords to fight the Bulgarians 
 in Macedonia. The Greek bishop of Castoria sent his bravoes to 
 guide the Turkish troops to massacre the Bulgarian villages. There 
 is a photograph in existence showing the bishop, surrounded by 
 Turkish officers, in the act of blessing the Turkish cannon that were 
 to batter Bulgarian villages to dust. Bulgarian refugees captured 
 in Thessaly were handed over to the Turkish police to be tortured 
 in Turkish dungeons. The Greek Patriarch issued an encyclical 
 ordering the bishops and priests to denounce the insurgents and 
 their sympathizers to the Turkish officials. 
 
 The Greek Committee or the "Macedonian Syllogos" of Athens 
 issued a circular ordering the faithful to burn, shoot, assassinate 
 and purify the soil of Macedonia from all that is Exarchist, and 
 thus prove to the world that Macedonia is "purely Greek." 
 
 In view of these facts one can easily determine who were 
 acting as brigands and cut-throats ; those who were fighting for the 
 liberty of Macedonia or those who were helping the Turks to keep 
 it under subjection. 
 
 The American missionary. Rev. Dr. W. P. Clarke, who knew 
 Macedonia both under Turkish and Serbian rule, writing from 
 Monastir on the last day of 1914, after one and a half year's ex- 
 perience of Serbian administration, says : "People long for the past — 
 and yet that was bad enough. There is great suffering, some of it 
 due to the war, but much entirely unnecessary. The condition in 
 tfie villages is worse than even here in Monastir. As I have written 
 before, my prayer is for 'peace and freedom.' May God have 
 mercy on poor Macedonia !" 
 
 98 
 
X 
 
 Russo-Bulgatian Relations. 
 
 B'ulgaria owes to Russia her political emancipation from 
 Turkish rule. But even before that came the feelings of the Bul- 
 garians towards Russia were those of affection, gratitude and deep- 
 seated sympathy. The people of Bulgaria looked upon Russia as 
 their defender and benefactor. All the church books, ecclesiastical 
 robes for the clergy and sacred utensils were as a rule supplied 
 gratis from Russia. Hundreds of young Bulgarians received their 
 education free of charge in Russian colleges and universities, and 
 on their return home acted as teachers, journalists, physicians, etc. 
 Russian literature, both before and after the political emancipation, 
 was assiduously studied and cultivated in Bulgaria, and numerous 
 are the translations made of its productions. Pushkin, Lermontov, 
 Gogol and many other Russian writers are household names among 
 educated Bulgarians. This intellectual and literary connection be- 
 tween Russia and Bulgaria was still more strengthened by the 
 liberation of Bulgaria in 1878. The Russian language was intro- 
 duced into the curriculum of the Bulgarian schools as a special 
 subject, and in the higher classes of the colleges, Russian textbooks 
 for the students and Russian helps for the teachers were in common 
 use. One can safely say that in no Slavic country outside of Russia 
 were the sympathies for Russia, her language and literature so 
 strong as in Bulgaria. There is hardly a town in Bulgaria where 
 one does not meet with Bulgarians who are conversant with the 
 Russian langtiage. Streets, public parks, monuments and institu- 
 tions are found almost everywhere bearing the names of prominent 
 military or civil Russians. In Sofia, in front of the National As- 
 sembly building, stands a magnificent bronze equestrian statue of 
 the late Alexander II, who both for Russians and Bulgarians is 
 deservedly the Tsar-Liberator. Nearby rises the sumptuo'us pile of 
 the finest Cathedral in the whole Balkan Peninsula reared by pub- 
 lic subscription to commemorate his memory. In Pleven, so re- 
 nowned by the famous siege, all the places connected with the 
 glorious military feats of the Russian army have been piously pre- 
 served and kept up, and are known by the name of "The Holy 
 
 99 
 
Places," where people go as on a pilgrimage to revere the memory 
 of those who died for the liberty of Bulgaria. 
 
 So long as Tsar Alexander II lived the relations between Rus- 
 sia and Bulgaria ran smooth and friendly. Prince Alexander Bat- 
 tenberg was a great favorite with the Tsar and had been elected 
 as the first ruler of Bulgaria on the Tsar's recommendation. A 
 noble-minded and great-hearted man, Alexander II had at heart the 
 welfare of Bulgaria, which his magnanimity had called into being 
 as a free, self-governing country. His death in 1881 was, there- 
 fore, a great loss to Bulgaria, and was destined to exert a baneful 
 infl'uence upon Russo-Bulgarian relations. His son and successor, 
 Alexander III, a man of strong will, opinionated and autocratic 
 in character, is said to have had a personal dislike for the Prince 
 of Bulgaria. There was also a party or clique in Russia which 
 looked unfavorably upon a prince, German-Polish and not Russian 
 by birth, ruling over Bulgaria. The political inexperience of the 
 Prince, the party dissensions and bickerings of the political leaders 
 in Bulgaria and the annoying interference of Russian officials in the 
 internal affairs of the country tended to produce misunderstandings 
 and friction between the two countries. 
 
 The acute stage of this undesirable tension in Russo-Bul- 
 garian relations was reached in 1885, when Southern Bulgaria, or 
 Eastern Rumelia, proclaimed its union with the Principality. The 
 Russian Emperor took umbrage at this proclamation, because it was 
 issued without his consent, although it only re-established what the 
 San Stefano treaty between Russia and Turkey had sanctioned 
 seven years earlier. In a fit of ill humor, the Emperor ordered 
 all the Russian officers who were serving in the Bulgarian army, 
 to leave Bulgaria, although he must have known that Turkey or 
 Serbia or both together might attack Bulgaria. The measure pro- 
 duced an extremely painful impression among the Bulgarian people, 
 who interpreted the Emperor's action as an abandonment of Bulgaria 
 to her enemies. 
 
 But the Serbo-Bulgarian war was successfully fought by the 
 Bulgarian troops, and the union was consummated, thanks also to 
 the diplomatic support of England and the other European Powers. 
 Russia, however, lost a good deal of the sympathies of the Bul- 
 garians and the influence which she had through her officers in the 
 Bulgarian army was gone forever. The animosity against Prince 
 Alexander of Battenberg grew more pronounced as his popularity 
 
 100 
 
among the people and the army were augmented by the favorable 
 issue of the Serbian campaign. 
 
 In 1886 a number of Bulgarian officers, evidently suborned, at 
 the head of a regiment and the military cadets at Sofia, kidnapped 
 the Prince at night and took him off to the Russian town of Reni 
 on the Danube. When the news of this treacherous act spread 
 through Bulgaria, a cry of indignation was raised by the whole army 
 and people, a provisional government was organized, the perpe- 
 trators of the outrage were arrested and strenuous efforts were made 
 to bring back the deposed Prince. He returned to Sofia amidst the 
 enthusiastic acclamations of the people, but the determined opposi- 
 tion of the Russian Emperor to his stay in Bulgaria induced him, 
 for the good of the country, as he declared, to abdicate and leave 
 the country, after having appointed a Regency of three men to 
 govern it. For almost a year the princely throne of Bulgaria re- 
 mained vacant. Internal troubles, fomented from outside, threat- 
 ened the safety of the country and hung like an incubus upon the 
 people. Russia refused to recognize the Regency, insisted on hav- 
 ing a Russian commissioner to govern the country during the in- 
 terregnum, sent emissaries to stir up trouble and sedition in the 
 army and among the people, and would accept no prince who was 
 not her nominee. 
 
 In spite of all the pressure brought to bear upon them, the 
 Regency stood firm in defense of the rights of the country to manage 
 its own internal affairs, rejected all proposals that would infringe 
 upon those rights and maintained the principle of "Bulgaria for the 
 Bulgarians." In their desire to placate the Russian Emperor, they 
 proposed to have Prince Waldemar of Denmark, brother of the 
 Russian Empress, elected Prince of Bulgaria; but the offer was 
 declined by the Ptince. Finally, in 1887, the present ruler of Bul- 
 garia was elected to the vacant throne and thus an end was put to 
 the dangerous political uncertainty that had existed for nearly a 
 year. The European Powers in their desire not to displease the 
 Russian Emperor delayed recognizing the new Prince of Bulgaria 
 till after Russia had recognized him. This recognition was given in 
 1896 by Nicholas II on condition that Prince Boris, the Bulgarian 
 heir to the throne, should be rebaptized in the Eastern Orthodox 
 Church. 
 
 The relations between Russia and Bulgaria would have con- 
 tinued to be friendly and normal were it not for the policy which 
 
 101 
 
the Russian government adopted in regard to the Macedonian ques- 
 tion. It has been related already that in 1889 Serbia began an 
 active propaganda in Macedonia in support of its claims that Mace- 
 donia is Serbian. Whether by order of their government or on their 
 own initiative, the Russian Consuls in Macedonia made no secret of 
 their support of the Serbian claims. Attempts were also made by 
 the Russian government to have the seat of the Bulgarian Exarchate 
 removed from Constantinople to Sofia, which would have meant 
 the abandonment of Macedonia to the jurisdiction of the Greek 
 Patriarch and the Serbian propaganda, for the Turkish government 
 would have never consented to the Exarch exercising any jurisdic- 
 tion in Macedonia from Sofia. 
 
 The Russian support of Serbia's intrusion in Macedonia grew 
 more open in 1903, when the present King of Serbia came to the 
 throne and Serbia adopted a policy more favorable to Russia than 
 to Austria. In that year, with the help of Russian diplomacy, Serbia 
 succeeded in gaining the sanction of the Greek Patriarch for the 
 appointment of a Serbian as bishop of Skopia and later on of 
 another Serbian as bishop of Dibra, although in neither of these 
 places were there any Serbian communities to justify these appoint- 
 ments. 
 
 The effect of these Russian proceedings upon public opinion 
 in Bulgaria was disastrous to Russian influence and prestige. The 
 Bulgarians saw that Russia was repudiating her own treaty of San 
 Stefano, by which she had sought to create a united Bulgaria, and 
 was now backing Serbia in opposition to Bulgaria. Still Bulgarian 
 sympathies for Russia did not entirely disappear, for it was still 
 hoped that Russia in time would see the falseness of the position she 
 had taken. 
 
 Two of the political parties in Bulgaria, the Nationalists and 
 the Progressists, were strong in their attachment to Russia, and 
 the democratic party also showed similar leanings. The proclama- 
 tion of the independence of Bulgaria in 1908 was made while the 
 Democratic party was in power, and although it took place almost 
 simultaneously with the formal annexation of Bosnia and Her- 
 zegovina by Austria, it had no political connection with it. It was a 
 measure dictated by the best interests of Bulgaria. To sever all 
 vassal or tributary relations with Turkey was to avoid serious com- 
 plications, which were sure to arise in regard to various questions : 
 as for example, the Union of Eastern Rumelia with Bulgaria, which 
 
 102 
 
Turkey had never formally recognized; the stationing of Turkish 
 garrisons in the Balkans, as prescribed by the Berlin Treaty; the 
 payment of tribute, the regulation of the mosque and pious foun- 
 dations properties, etc. In proclaiming its independence of Turkish 
 suzerainty, Bulgaria did nothing more than Serbia and Rumania 
 had done a few years before. 
 
 The conclusion of the Serbo-Bulgarian treaty of 1912 was done 
 under the aegis and with the knowledge of Russia, as is evident 
 from the fact that the Russian Emperor was to be the arbitrator in 
 the dispute over the "Contested Zone." The treaty was the work of 
 a Nationalist or Russophile Cabinet of Bulgaria. That Russia 
 desired and worked for the maintenance of the treaty against the 
 Serbian violation of it may well be believed, for the preservation of 
 a Balkan League was for the benefit of Russian policy and to the 
 detriment of that of Austria. The disruption of the League might 
 have been prevented had Russia exerted stronger diplomatic pres- 
 sure at Belgrade. It was a misfortune that she was represented in 
 Serbia at the time by a man whose sympathies were decidedly pro- 
 Serbian and anti-Bulgarian, and who evidently was working for the 
 violation of the treaty. From the documents which we have already 
 cited it is apparent that Bulgaria was not the cat's-paw of Austria 
 in the course she took against Serbia, but acted in the firm belief 
 that the conduct of Serbia left her no alterative but to fight for the 
 assertion of the rights conferred upon her by the treaty. 
 
 The military party in Serbia, with the Crown Prince at its head, 
 the public press and all the leading politicians were firm against the 
 yielding of any Macedonian territory to Bulgaria. Even if the 
 arbitrator had pronounced in favor of the Bulgarian claims, which 
 were based upon the explicit stipulations of the treaty, the Serbian 
 army would have refused to evacuate Macedonia. No secret was 
 made of this ; Serbian military men openly declared it. General 
 Bojanovitch, the Serbian Minister of War, in declaring that the 
 Serbian army would in no circumstance abandon the territory it had 
 conquered at the price of its blood, added significantly that he de- 
 clined all responsibility for the consequences which might result 
 from the disregard of this temper of the army. These were 
 ominous words, coming as they did from one who had had no part 
 in the assassination of King Alexander and his wife a few years 
 before, the memory of which events served as a deterrent to opposi- 
 tion to the Military League. 
 
 103 
 
The intervention of Rumania in the Balkan war was due, ac- 
 cording to Russian testimony, to Russian instigation, in order to 
 save Serbia and humiliate Bulgaria. What the consequences of this 
 intervention would be must have been well known to Russia, 
 namely, that Macedonia would go to the Greeks and Serbians, and an 
 area of about 3,000 square miles of Bulgarian territory with a 
 population of about 300,000, freed thirty-five years before by 
 Russian blood and treasure from the Turkish rule, would be handed 
 • over to the tender mercies of the Rumanians. And yet in 1902 
 Russia had concluded a military convention with Bulgaria by the 
 terms of which she had undertaken to defend with all her forces 
 the integrity and inviolability of the Bulgarian territory ! 
 
 As if all the humiliation that had been inflicted upon Bulgaria 
 were not enough, and while the country was still smarting from the 
 wounds of mortification, the Russian Emperor in May, 1914, paid 
 an official visit to the Rumanian King at Constanza. Toasts and 
 speeches were exchanged, the Emperor lauding the King as the 
 pacifier of the Balkans and accepting the honorary colonelcy of the 
 Rumanian regiment that was the first to invade Bulgaria the year 
 before. What the effect of these Russo-Rumanian amenities upon 
 the Bulgarian people was may be easily imagined. They certainly 
 did not tend to rehabilitate Russian good will in the eyes of the 
 people, or to dissipate the prevalent opinion that Russia had 
 abandoned her protege in the Balkan Peninsula. Even the staunch- 
 est Russophiles in Bulgaria were shaken in their confidence in Rus- 
 sian diplomacy, and the Constanza meeting added the finishing touch 
 to the estrangement between the two countries. 
 
 If the siding of Bulgaria in the present war against Russia is 
 denounced by Bulgaria's enemies as base ingratitude, it is well to 
 remember that Bulgaria is not wholly to be blamed for it. The 
 medal has its reverse side. 
 
 104 
 
XI 
 
 In Conclusion 
 
 In the foregoing pages we have tried to give a short but faithful 
 sketch of the Balkan situation and of the causes which have con- 
 tributed to it. In the various documents which we have cited our 
 aim has been to quote competent and impartial witnesses, unbiased 
 by national or party prejudices. To the inane and sophisticated 
 reasonings of Serbians and Greeks about Macedonia and its pop- 
 ulation, we have opposed the authoritative opinions of learned men, 
 foreign travelers, prominent statesmen and official documents bear- 
 ing the sanction of international acts. 
 
 The testimony of all these is overwhelmingly in favor of the 
 Bulgarian contention that the Macedonian Slav population is Bul- 
 garian in feeling, consciousness and national aspirations and de- 
 sires. The Greek and Serbian claims are artificial, resting upon no 
 solid basis except that of forcible propaganda, originated and 
 directed from outside. We have shown that it was not the Bul- 
 garian Exarchate that created Bulgarian nationality in Macedonia, 
 for that nationality existed there long before the institution of the 
 Exarchate, but that it was the Bulgarian nationality that caused 
 the establishment of the Exarchate. The relations between Mace- 
 donia and Bulgaria have always been those of two cognate and 
 kindred peoples, animated by the same national motives and impulses. 
 The oppressive rule imposed by both Serbia and Greece upon Mace- 
 donia, whereby they have sought to terrorize the people and crush 
 their national spirit, is a convincing proof that the rulers were aliens 
 in an alien country. They obtained possession of the country by 
 treachery and the violation of solemn engagements, and they founded 
 their rule upon force and not upon the consent of the people. 
 
 Macedonia's cries of distress were bound to find an echo in Bul- 
 garia, and Bulgaria would have proved false to all her traditions and 
 to her legitimate national obligations had she turned a deaf ear to 
 those cries. Only those who are utterly ignorant of public senti- 
 ment in Bulgaria and of the close ties that have ever existed between 
 Bulgaria and Macedonia could suppose that the Bulgarian nation 
 would swallow tamely the insult and humiliation inflicted upon it 
 
 105 
 
by the Bucharest treaty. Bulgaria entered the European war, not 
 for the conquest of foreign territory or the imposition of its rule 
 upon unwilling people, but for the vindication of its rights and the 
 liberation of its kin from an oppression that was worse than that of 
 the Turks. 
 
 The claims of Italy to the Trentino, of France to Alsace-Lor- 
 raine, of Rumania to Transylvania, and of Serbia to Bosnia are 
 not a whit more valid than the claims of Bulgaria to Macedonia. 
 They are based upon the principle of nationality, the desires of the 
 people, and their right to determine under what government they 
 choose to live. 
 
 While the Entente Allies unceasingly proclaim that they are 
 fighting for the liberty of small nations and the upholding of right 
 and justice, in Macedonia they are fighting for the subjugation of a 
 people to the rule of Serbia, which was established and maintained 
 by brute force and oppressive laws. If France claims the restora- 
 tion of Alsace and Lorraine because forty-five years ago they were 
 annexed to Germany against the will of their inhabitants, why should 
 Bulgaria be denied her claim in Macedonia, which is and has been 
 much more Bulgarian than Alsace-Lorraine ever has been French? 
 
 It has been said that Bulgaria in joining the Central Powers 
 against Russia has proved a traitor to the Slavic cause. 
 
 But what is the Slavic cause ? If by the Slavic cause is meant 
 attachment to Russia and the satisfaction of the just claims of every 
 Slavic nation to what by right belongs to it, no Slavic people has 
 been more loyal to such a cause than the Bulgarians. Up to 1903 
 Serbia had been false to that cause. Its policy was avowedly anti- 
 Russian, and its aim was and has been, not the safeguarding of what 
 were its proper and legitimate interests, but the intrusion upon and 
 the violation of the rights of its Slavic neighbor — Bulgaria. 
 
 Russia's treatment of the Poles, her surrender of Bosnia and 
 Herzegovina to Austria, were certainly not in accordance with the 
 advancement of the Slavic cause. That Austria should rejoice at 
 the opening of a breach between Bulgaria and Serbia in Macedonia 
 one can easily understand; but that Russia should try to widen the 
 breach by going contrary to its San Stefano treaty and encouraging 
 Serbian pretensions, which only a few years before she had effect- 
 ively rejected, is incomprehensible on the basis of any consideration 
 for the Slavic cause. 
 
 Was it for the good of the Slavic cause that a large part of 
 
 106 
 
Macedonia, inhabited by Bulgarians, was handed over to the Greeks, 
 to be oppressed and denationalized by them ? 
 
 Was it in consonance with the Slavic cause that Serbia entered 
 into an iniquitous league with Greece for the spoliation of Mace- 
 donia, to the sentiments and desires of whose population she was 
 utterly indifferent, provided she secured for herself a large portion 
 of the booty? 
 
 Was it for the advancement of the Slavic cause that the grand- 
 son of the Tsar-Liberator permitted, nay, instigated, the occupa- 
 tion by Rumania of the most fertile and prosperous part of North 
 Bulgaria, emancipated in 1878 by his grandfather at the cost of 
 Russian blood and treasure? 
 
 Was the Serbian regime in Macedonia, with its Draconian laws 
 and relentless persecution of everything Bulgarian, a part of the 
 Slavic cause? 
 
 If these are the essential and distinguishing characteristics of 
 the Slavic cause as understood at Petrograd and Belgrade, then 
 Bulgaria cannot be blamed if she refuses to subscribe to them. 
 
 A prominent Serbian has been credited with the following re- 
 mark: 
 
 "Bulgaria stabbed us in the back. We did not supp>ose Bul- 
 garia, whose people are our own kinsmen, would treacherously turn 
 against us." 
 
 It does not behoove a Serbian to talk of Serbo-Bulgarian kin- 
 ship or of treacherous conduct after all that has happened, for facts 
 within the memory of living men, and which we have exposed in 
 our sketch of Serbo-Bulgarian relations, speak louder than words. 
 According to the "Annual Register" (published by Longmans, 
 Green & Co., of London), in which a historical survey of events 
 is given for the year 1915, Bulgaria in May, 1915, submitted to the 
 British government its demands and conditions for joining the 
 Entente Allies. They were the following : ( 1 ) Restitution by Serbia 
 of both the contested and uncontested portions of Macedonia ; (2) 
 cession of Ka valla. Drama and Serres; (3) restoration by Rumania 
 of New Dobrudja; with the exception of Silistra; (4) restoration 
 of the Enos-Midia frontier according to the London Treaty of 
 May 30, 1913. 
 
 On August 16, 1915, the Serbian Parliament held a secret session 
 to consider the Allies' proposal that Serbia cede to Bulgaria "that 
 
 107 
 
part of Macedonia which she had admitted to be Bulgarian, accord- 
 ing to the principle of nationality, before the second Balkan war." 
 But "the Serbian military party, led by the Crown Prince, had ob- 
 structed a settlement too long, and in September the storm began 
 to gather. A serious hitch thus arose, and the obduracy of Serbia 
 ultimately proved fatal to success." 
 
 To this English statement of what actually occurred during the 
 negotiations of the Allies with Bulgaria and Serbia, before Bul- 
 garia's entrance into the war, we may add that of Professor Paul 
 Milyukov, the well-known leader of the Constitutional Democratic 
 party in Russia. In a speech before the Russian Duma about a year 
 ago. Professor Milyukov took Russian diplomacy severely to task 
 for having brought about the second Balkan war and the destruc- 
 tion of the Balkan League by countenancing Serbia's pretensions 
 "contrary to the stipulations of the Serbo-Bulgarian treaty, con- 
 cluded under the aegis of Russia." 
 
 Then he continued: "Having found no support in Russia, the 
 Bulgarians, as we all know, suffered a great disaster. Russia allowed 
 Rumania to go as far as the Bulgarian capital, which lived through 
 a moment of deadly fear when the enemy's aeroplanes hovered over 
 it, and it seemed as if the fate of Bulgaria was sealed. Bulgaria 
 could not forget this, and could not help passing into the Austrian 
 channel. It was evident from that moment that if we wished to 
 turn Bulgaria again into our channel we could do it only in one 
 way — namely, by removing the consequences of the treaty of Buch- 
 arest and by restoring to Bulgaria what had been unjustly taken 
 away from her. It was also evident that if we did not do this, Bul- 
 garia would be free to choose her own way of realizing her national 
 aspirations, and would go, not with us, but with our adversaries." 
 
 In regard to Serbia's conduct during the Entente Allies' nego- 
 tiations with Bulgaria, Milyukov's declaration entirely agrees with 
 the English statement quoted above. 
 
 "The obstinacy of Serbia," said he, "was likewise due to our 
 insufficient insistence. During a whole year the plan of an Austro- 
 German invasion of Serbia and the possibility of her disastrous 
 defeat were well known. During all this time it was no secret that 
 Bulgaria was getting ready to occupy, in such a contingency, Mace- 
 donia. Serbia showed herself yielding only when danger imminently 
 hung over her; but no sooner had the danger temporarily passed 
 away than she at once withdrew her concessions." 
 
 108 
 
These declarations refute the assertion that Bulgaria stabbed 
 Serbia in the back as wholly gratuitous and baseless. She acted in 
 all her transactions openly and above board with Serbia and the 
 Allies, and her future conduct was plainly imposed upon her states- 
 men by the obstinacy and obduracy of Serbia. More than a month 
 before Bulgaria joined the Central Powers her Prime Minister 
 frankly stated to an American correspondent what her demands 
 were, and declared that at the opportune moment she would not fail 
 to secure them. Serbia certainly had plenty of warning as to what 
 she might expect, and the Serbian statesmen must have been very 
 simple-minded indeed if they thought that Bulgaria would allow 
 them to enjoy peacefully what they had wrested from her by trickery 
 and perfidy. 
 
 That Serbia, on the other hand, was playing a treacherous 
 game in her negotiations with Bulgaria and the Allies is proven by 
 the following extract from a letter, written by "a prominent Serb- 
 ian" (supposed to be the Serbian minister at Athens), and published 
 in the Greek Paper, Patris, of November 7, 1915, three weeks after 
 Bulgaria declared war against Serbia : 
 
 "Fifteen days before the Bulgarians attacked the Serbians, we 
 had concentrated on our frontier 120,000 men against 30,000 Bul- 
 garians. Under the circumstances, if we had attacked first we 
 would have been in Sofia in ten days, and would have forestalled 
 thereby the Bulgarian invasion." 
 
 On the authority, then, of this "prominent Serbian," while 
 Serbia was professing to negotiate through the Allies an under- 
 standing with Bulgaria, she had already massed a strong force on 
 the frontiers of Bulgaria ready to stab her in the back. Where does 
 the treachery lie? 
 
 In his address before the League to Enforce Peace on May 27, 
 1916, President Wilson said : 
 
 "We believe these fundamental things : First, that every people 
 has a right to choose the sovereignty under which they shall live. 
 . . . Second, that the small states of the world have a right to 
 enjoy the same respect for their sovereignty and for their territorial 
 integrity that great and powerful nations expect and insist upon. 
 And third, that the world has a right to be free from every disturb- 
 ance of its peace that has its origin in aggression and disregard of 
 the rights of peoples and nations." 
 
 In his peace message to the Senate on January 22, 1917, he 
 
 t09 
 
again declared that "no peace can last, or ought to last, which does 
 not recognize and accept the principle that governments derive all 
 their just powers from the consent of the governed, and that no 
 right anywhere exists to hand people about from sovereignty to sov- 
 ereignty as if they were property." 
 
 These noble sentiments and memorable words of the President, 
 unbiassed by prejudice and unblinded by party spirit, must find an 
 echo in the heart and mind of every one who deplores the present 
 sad plight of Europe, chiefly due to the disregard of these principles 
 in the conduct of its political life. 
 
 In no European country have President Wilson's opinions met 
 with a warmer and heartier reception than in Bulgaria. Although 
 the youngest State in the Balkan Peninsula, Bulgaria has been the 
 foremost in recognizing and establishing the rights of liberty and 
 equality for all its citizens. In its struggle for a national chutch 
 organization, the Bulgarian people fought for the principle of na- 
 tionality, for the right of peoples to independence, for liberty of 
 conscience and worship, and for "government by the consent of the 
 governed." 
 
 In the treatment of foreign elements in Bulgaria the Bulgarian 
 Constitution guarantees equal rights to all, and of all the Balkan 
 States Bulgaria is the only one where all nationalities enjoy not only 
 the privilege of freedom of conscience and worship, but also of free 
 national development. 
 
 Measures of forcible denationalization, of crushing the national 
 vitality or spirit of a people are unknown as well as repugnant to the 
 popular sentiment and character. Having themselves suffered for 
 centuries the oppression of alien masters, they have come to realize 
 and appreciate the boon of liberty and national self-preservation for 
 others as well as for themselves. They have no lust for conquest or 
 the acquisition of other people's property, no desire to dominate 
 other peoples. What they demand and are fighting for is that their 
 national rights shall be respected and their national unification 
 permanently established. 
 
 no 
 
Cornell University Library 
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 Bulgaria and her neighbors: 
 
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