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THE 
 
 OTTOMAN POWER 
 IN EUROPE, 
 
 ITS NATURE, ITS GROWTH, AND ITS DECLINE. 
 
 BY 
 
 EDWARD A. FREEMAN, D.C.L., LL.D, 
 
 \ 1 
 KNIGHT COMMANDER OF THE GREEK ORDER OF THE SAVIOUR, 
 AND OK THE SERVIAN ORDER OF TAKOVA, 
 corresponding member of the IMPERIAL ACADEMY OF SC11 
 
 OF saint pstbxsbubg. 
 
 'Ev TOVT(f} VlKa. 
 
 Deus id vult. 
 
 WITH THREE COLOURED MAPS. 
 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
 1877. 
 
 [The Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved. ] 
 
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 REESE 
 
INVICTAE • GENTIS ■ INVICTO ■ PRINCIPI ' 
 FIDEI • AC • LIBERTATIS ■ VNICO ■ PROPVGNATORI ■ 
 IN • CIVES AMABILI ■ IN ■ BARBAROS TERRIBILI ■ 
 
 NICOLAO * 
 
 s 
 DEI • GRATIA ■ 
 
 MONTIS • NIGRI ■ ET ■ BERDAE ■ PRINCIPI ■ 
 
 VICINARVM • GENTIVM ■ DEO ' IVVANTE ■ LIBERATORI ■ rVTVRO 
 
 VITA ET VICTORIA. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 I SHOULD wish this little book to be taken as 
 in some sort a companion to my lately reprinted 
 History and Conquests of the Saracens. I there, 
 while speaking of most of the other chief Mahometan 
 nations, had no opportunity of speaking at all at 
 length of the Ottoman Turks. That lack is here sup- 
 plied, supplied that is in the same general way in 
 which the whole subject of Mahometan history was 
 treated in the earlier volume. Neither pretends to 
 be at all a full account of any branch of the subject ; 
 in both I deal with Eastern and Mahometan affairs 
 mainly in their reference to Western and Christian 
 affairs. The Ottoman Turks have had, at least for 
 some centuries past, a greater influence on Western 
 and Christian affairs than any other Eastern and 
 Mahometan people. Their history, from the point of 
 view in which I look at it, is therefore the natural 
 completion of my former subject. 
 
 But there is one wide difference between the two 
 books, a difference wide at least in appearance, though 
 I believe that the difference is in appearance only. 
 
 b 2 
 
Viil TREFACE. 
 
 In ordinary language, my former book would be 
 said to be primarily historical ; it would be called 
 political, only secondarily and to a very small extent. 
 My present book may be thought to be — in the 
 eyes of those who draw a distinction between history 
 and politics it will rightly be thought to be — 
 political rather than historical. But between history 
 and politics I can draw no distinction. History is 
 the politics of the past ; politics are the history of 
 the present. The same rules of criticism apply to 
 judging alike of distant and of recent facts. The 
 same eternal laws of right and wrong are to be 
 applied in forming our estimate of the actors in either 
 case. The championship of right and the champion- 
 ship of wrong bear exactly the same character in any 
 age. A Montfort and a Gladstone, a Flambard and a 
 Beaconsfield, must stand or fall together. It shews 
 the low view that some men take of politics that they 
 can conceive the word only as meaning a struggle to 
 support some and upset others among the momentary 
 candidates for office. Men who have no higher notion 
 of politics than this seem unable to understand that 
 there are those who support or oppose this or that 
 minister, because he follows or does not follow a 
 certain line of policy, who do not follow or oppose a 
 certain line of policy because it is or is not the policy 
 of this or that minister. Politics, the science of Aris- 
 totle, the science of the right ruling of men and 
 nations, means something higher than this. It teaches 
 us how to judge of causes and their effects ; it teaches 
 
 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 us how to judge of the character of acts, whether done 
 yesterday or thousands of years ago. The past is 
 studied in vain, unless it gives us lessons for the pre- 
 sent ; the present will be very imperfectly understood, 
 unless the light of the past is brought to bear upon it. 
 In this way, history and politics are one. In my 
 former little book, consisting of lectures read before 
 a certain society at its own request, it would have 
 been obviously out of place to do more than point 
 the political moral of the story in a general way. 
 The subject naturally led me to shew that the pre- 
 tended reforms of the Turk were in their own nature 
 good-for-nothing. Two and twenty years ago, I drew 
 that inference from the general current of Mahometan 
 history ; and I think that the two and twenty years of 
 Mahometan history which have passed since then, 
 have more than borne out what I then said. My 
 present business is to work out the same position 
 more fully, from a survey of that particular part of 
 Mahometan history which bears most directly on 
 that position, and on the immediate practical appli- 
 cation of that position. I use the past history of 
 the Ottoman Turks to shew what is the one way 
 which, according to the light of reason and experience, 
 can be of any use in dealing with the Ottoman Turks 
 of the present day. 
 
 In this way then my book is at once political and 
 historical. That is, it deals with the politics or the 
 history— I use those words as words of the same 
 meaning — both of past and of present times. In 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 opposition to all theoretical and sentimental ways 
 of looking at things, I argue from what has happened 
 to what is likely to happen. I argue that what has 
 been done already can be done again. As every land 
 •that has been set free from the Turk has gained by 
 its freedom — as every land which remains under the 
 Turk has but one wish, namely to get rid of the Turk 
 — as the lands which are set free do not envy the 
 bondage of their enslaved neighbours, while the lands 
 which remain enslaved do envy the freedom of their 
 liberated neighbours — I therefore argue from all this 
 that the one work to be done is to put the enslaved 
 lands on the same level as the liberated lands. So to 
 do is the dictate of right ; so to do is the dictate of 
 interest. As long as any Christian land remains 
 under the Turk, there will be discontents and dis- 
 turbances and revolts and massacres ; there will be 
 diplomatic difficulties and complications ; in a word, 
 the " eternal Eastern Question w will remain eternal. 
 From the experience of the past I infer that the only 
 way to settle that question is. to get rid of the stand- 
 ing difficulty, the standing complication, the standing 
 cause of discontent and revolt and massacre, namely 
 the rule of the Turk. And I further infer from the 
 experience of the past that the rule of the Turk can 
 be got rid of, because, wherever men have thoroughly 
 had the will to get rid of him, he has been got rid 
 of. He has been got rid of in Hungary, in Servia, 
 in the liberated part of Greece. With the same 
 hearty will and zealous effort, he may be got rid of in 
 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 all the other lands where he still does his work of 
 evil. By the policy of Canning backed by the sword 
 of Sobieski, perhaps by the policy of Canning without 
 the sword of Sobieski, the Eastern Question may be 
 solved. But, as long as there is neither sword nor 
 policy, but only the helpless babble of a man who 
 can never make up his mind, the Eastern Question 
 will go on for ever. 
 
 Since my last chapter was written, the long talked- 
 of Protocol has been signed. I do not pretend to 
 know what can be the object of Russia or of any 
 other power in proposing or signing it. The one 
 practical thing about it is that it does not bind 
 Russia to disarm. That is, it does not take away 
 from the South-eastern nations the last hope of 
 deliverance that is left to them. It is with a blush 
 that an Englishman writes such words as these. It 
 is with shame and sorrow that an Englishman has to 
 confess that, when another nation undertakes the work 
 which should above all things have been the work of 
 England, the utmost that he can dare to hope for is 
 that England may not be a hinderer in that work. 
 We have no wish for Russian aggrandizement, for 
 Russian ascendency, for Russian influence in any 
 form. We believe that the exclusive ascendency of 
 Russia in the South-eastern lands would be an evil ; 
 only we do not hold it to be the greatest of evils. We 
 would fain see England, Russia, any other civilized 
 power, have its fair share of influence in those lands. 
 But, if we are reduced to a choice between Russia 
 
Xll PREFACE. 
 
 and the Turk, then we must choose Russia. Our 
 consciences are clear ; the choice is not of our seek- 
 ing ; it is forced upon us, it is forced upon the South- 
 eastern nations, by the professed enemies of Russia. 
 It is those professed enemies of Russia who are doing 
 the work of Russia. It is they who are allowing 
 Russia to take on herself alone the office in which 
 England and all civilized nations ought to join with 
 her, that of the protector of the oppressed nations. 
 The policy of reason is to hinder any evil designs 
 which Russia may be thought to have — though I 
 know of no reason for always attributing evil designs 
 to Russia more than to any other power — by frank 
 and cordial alliance with her in designs which, at least 
 in profession, are good. The deliverance of the subject 
 nations ought to be, if possible, the work of all Europe. 
 Failing that, it should be the work of Russia and 
 England together. But if England holds back and 
 leaves Russia to do the work alone, the fault lies with 
 England and not with Russia. If the designs of 
 Russia are good, we lose the glory of sharing in 
 them ; if her designs are evil, we fail to employ the 
 best means of thwarting them. The policy with 
 which England entered into the Conference, the 
 resolve that, in no case whatever, was any thing to 
 be done, that in no case should the Turk be either 
 helped or coerced, was the very policy which Russia, 
 if she has any hidden designs, would wish England 
 to follow. 
 
 The disarmament of Russia at this moment would 
 
PREFACE. Xlil 
 
 be to take away from the subject nations their last 
 hope, that which the policy of Lord Derby has made 
 their last hope. It would be to leave those nations 
 helpless in the clutches of their tyrants. Intervention 
 must come sooner or later. As long as the Turk 
 rules, the present state of things will go on. As long 
 as the Turk rules, there will always be revolts, there 
 will always be massacres. Europe cannot endure this 
 state of things for ever. One European nation at least 
 stands ready to step in and put an end to it. We wish 
 that that nation did not stand alone ; but if, by the 
 fault of other nations, she does stand alone, we cannot 
 blame her, we cannot thwart her. Lord Beaconsfield 
 and Lord Derby have brought things to such a pass 
 that there is no hope but in Russia. It is something 
 that, even in their hands, the Protocol is not so drawn 
 up as not to cut off that only hope. 
 
 Otherwise the Protocol, as a document, and the 
 other documents which follow it, are simply talk of 
 the usual kind. The Protocol talks about this and 
 that circular and declaration of the Turk as if it 
 meant something. It talks "of good intentions on 
 the part of the Porte " — the " Porte " being the usual 
 euphemism for the Ring that ordered the massacres. 
 It talks of their " honour " — the honour of the men 
 whose falsehoods Lord Salisbury and General IgnatiefT 
 rebuked to their faces. It talks of their " loyalty " — 
 the loyalty of the men whose promises are, in the 
 schoolboy proverb, like pie-crust. It talks about " re- 
 forms," as if the Turk would ever make reforms. It 
 
XIV PREFACE. 
 
 " invites the Porte," in the queer, cumbrous, language 
 of diplomacy, " to consolidate the pacification by re- 
 placing its armies on a peace-footing, excepting the 
 number of troops indispensable for the maintenance 
 of order." What is "order"? By order the Turk- 
 means one thing ; the Bulgarian or the Thessalian 
 means another thing. By order the Turk means a 
 state of things in which the Bulgarian and the Thes- 
 salian lie still, while the Turk deals with them as he 
 chooses. The number of troops indispensable for the 
 maintenance of order in this sense may be got at, if 
 we know how many unarmed Christians can be kept 
 in bondage by one armed Mussulman. In the eyes 
 of the Bulgarian and the Thessalian, order means a 
 state of things for which it is in the first place indis- 
 pensable that there should be no armed Turks in 
 his country at all. Where the armed Turk is, there 
 can be no order ; for the presence of the armed Turk 
 means the commission of every form of outrage with- 
 out fear of punishment. Turkish troops can never be 
 put on a peace-footing ; because, where Turkish troops 
 are there can be no peace, except in that old sense 
 in which men call it peace when they have made a 
 wilderness. 
 
 And, to do all these wonderful measures of reform, 
 the Turk is to " take advantage of the present lull." 
 Where is the " lull " ? Certainly nowhere in the lands 
 east of the Hadriatic. There is no lull in Bulgaria, 
 where the Turk goes on with his usual work of blood 
 and outrage day by day. There is no lull in Free 
 
 
PREFACE. XV 
 
 Bosnia, where the victorious patriots have driven out 
 the Turk, and where they stand with their arms in 
 their hands lest he should come in again. There is 
 no lull on the Black Mountain, where the triumphant 
 champions of freedom, the men to whom the back of 
 a Turk is the most familiar of all sights, stand ready 
 to march, ready to extend their own freedom to 
 their suffering brethren. While all this is going on, 
 diplomatists see a lull. They meet and talk, and 
 say that, "if" the things happen which are happen- 
 ing every day, then they will meet again and have 
 another talk. 
 
 The sayings and doings of Lord Derby have long 
 since passed out of the range of practical politics. 
 He seems to have lost even that amount of practical 
 vigour which is involved in forbidding an act of 
 humanity or in exhorting the Turk to suppress an 
 insurrection. Of all things absolutely helpless the 
 most helpless surely is the conditional signature of 
 the Protocol. Yet, if anything, the long letter which 
 accompanies the Protocol is more helpless still. This 
 part of the document is really worth preserving. 
 
 " Under these circumstances it appears to the Russian Government 
 that the most practical solution, and the one best fitted to secure the 
 maintenance of general peace, would be the signature by the Powers of 
 a Protocol which should, so to speak, terminate the incident. 
 
 "This Protocol might be signed in London by the representatives of 
 the Great Powers, and under the direct inspiration of the Cabinet of 
 St. James. 
 
 "The Protocol would contain no more than the principles upon 
 which the several Governments would have based their reply to the 
 Russian Circular. It would be desirable that it should affirm that the 
 present state of affairs was one which concerned the whole of Europe, 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 and should place on record that the improvement of the condition of the 
 Christian population of Turkey will continue to be an object of interest 
 to all the Powers. 
 
 "The Porte having repeatedly declared that it engaged to introduce 
 reforms, it would be desirable to enumerate them on the basis of Safvet 
 Pacha's Circular. In this way there could be no subsequent misunder- 
 standing as to the promises made by Turkey. 
 
 "Asa period of some months would not be sufficient to accomplish 
 these reforms, it would be preferable not to fix any precise limit of time. 
 It would rest with all the powers to determine by general agreement 
 whether Turkey was progressing in a satisfactory manner in her work 
 of regeneration. 
 
 " The Protocol should mention that Europe will continue to watch 
 the progressive execution of the reforms by means of their diplomatic 
 representatives. 
 
 " If the hopes of the Powers should once more be disappointed, and 
 the condition of the Christian subjects of the Sultan should not be 
 improved, the Powers would reserve to themselves to consider in com- 
 mon the action which they would deem indispensable to secure the 
 well-being of the Christian population of Turkey and the interests of 
 the general peace. 
 
 " Count Schouvaloff hoped that I should appreciate the moderate 
 and conciliatory spirit which actuated his Government in this expression 
 or their views. They seemed to him to contain nothing incompatible 
 with the principles on which the policy of England was based, and 
 their application would secure the maintenance of general peace." 
 
 It appears then that, 6n March 31, 1877, Lord 
 Derby still believed that the Turk was going to 
 reform ; he still believed that, in watching his doings, 
 there would be something else to watch than the 
 kind of doings which the Turk has always done 
 for the last five hundred years. Such an example 
 of the charity which believeth all things can be 
 surpassed only by the charity of Origen and Tillot- 
 son, both of whom, according to Lord Macaulay, 
 did not despair of the reformation of a yet older 
 offender. But, in the practical, everyday, world in 
 
 
PREFACE. XVU 
 
 which we live, these illusions of a charitable senti- 
 mentalism cannot be taken into account. The 
 months during which Lord Derby is willing to look 
 on, hoping for the regeneration of Turkey, may be 
 profitably spent in accomplishing the regeneration 
 of Turkey by the only means by which it can be 
 regenerated, by putting an end to the rule of the Turk. 
 If Lord Derby expects the regeneration of Turkey 
 to be brought about by any other means, he will 
 no more see that done in 1877 than he or anybody 
 else has seen it done in any other year since 1356. 
 
 On the whole then, " the inspiration of the Cabinet 
 of St. James" does not seem likely to do much to- 
 wards " terminating the incident," if, by " terminating 
 the incident " is meant putting an end to the " eternal 
 Eastern Question " and its causes. The phrase is not 
 a bad one. The presence of the Turk, and the 
 " eternal Eastern Question" which his presence causes, 
 is really only an " incident," though it is an incident 
 which has gone on for five hundred years. The Turk's 
 presence in Europe is incidental. It is something 
 strange, abnormal, contrary to the general system of 
 Europe, something which keeps that system always 
 out of gear, something which supplies a never-failing 
 stock of difficulties and complications. The Turk in 
 Europe, in short, answers to Lord Palmerston's defini- 
 tion of dirt. He is M matter in the wrong place." 
 The sooner the " incident " of his presence is 
 " terminated," by the help of whatever " inspiration," 
 the better. An inspiration likely to terminate that 
 
XV111 PREFACE. 
 
 incident might have come from the Cabinet of St. 
 James in the days of Canning. It is not likely to 
 come from one who proposes to fold his hands for 
 some months to see what the Turk will do. Those 
 who have their eyes open, and who do not talk about 
 , " terminating incidents," know perfectly well that the 
 Turk will, during those months, go on doing as he 
 has done in so many earlier months. He will go on 
 making things look smooth at Constantinople, while 
 he does his usual work in Bulgaria and Crete. 
 
 But there is yet another danger. If everything 
 rested with Lord Derby, with a man who is steadfastly 
 purposed to employ himself with a vigorous doing of 
 nothing, we should at least have one kind of safety. 
 In the hands of Lord Derby, if we do no good, we 
 shall do no harm, except so far as the doing of 
 nothing is really the worst form of the doing of 
 harm. From him, if we hope for no active good, we 
 need fear no active mischief. But there is another 
 power against which England and Europe ought to 
 be yet more carefully on their guard. It is no use 
 mincing matters. The time has come to speak out 
 plainly. No well disposed person would reproach 
 another either with his nationality or his religion, 
 unless that nationality or that religion leads to some 
 direct mischief. No one wishes to place the Jew, 
 whether Jew by birth or by religion, under any dis- 
 ability as compared with the European Christian. 
 But it will not do to have the policy of England, the 
 welfare of Europe, sacrificed to Hebrew sentiment. 
 
PREFACE. XIX 
 
 The danger is no imaginary one. Every one must have 
 marked that the one subject on which Lord Beacons- 
 field, through his whole career, has been in earnest 
 has been whatever has touched his own people. A 
 mocker about everything else, he has been thoroughly 
 serious about this. His national sympathies led him 
 to the most honourable action of his life, when he 
 forsook his party for the sake of his nation, and drew 
 forth the next day from the Standard newspaper the 
 remark that " no Jew could be a gentleman." On that 
 day the Jew was a gentleman in the highest sense. 
 He acted as one who could brave much and risk 
 much for a real conviction. His zeal for his own 
 people is really the best feature in Lord Beaconsfield's 
 career. But we cannot sacrifice our people, the people 
 of Aryan and Christian Europe, to the most genuine 
 belief in an Asian mystery. We cannot have England 
 or Europe governed by a Hebrew policy. While 
 Lord Derby simply wishes to do nothing one way 
 or another, Lord Beaconsfield is the active friend of 
 the Turk. The alliance runs through all Europe. 
 Throughout the East, the Turk and the Jew are 
 leagued against the Christian. In theory the Jew 
 under Mahometan rule is condemned to equal de- 
 gradation with the Christian. In practice the yoke 
 presses much more lightly upon the Jew. As he is 
 never a cultivator of the soil, as he commonly lives 
 in the large towns, the worst forms of Turkish 
 oppression do not touch him. He has also endless 
 ways of making himself useful to the Turk, and 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 oppressive to the Christian. The Jew is the tool of 
 the Turk, and is therefore yet more hated than the 
 Turk. This is the key to the supposed intolerance 
 of Servia with regard to the Jews. I can speak for 
 Servia ; I have no information as to Roumania. The 
 Servian legislation is not aimed at Jews as Jews, for 
 Jews are eligible to the highest offices in Servia ; it is 
 aimed at certain corrupting callings which in point of 
 fact are practised only by Jews. Strike out the word 
 "Jew," and instead name certain callings which none 
 but Jews practise, and the law of Servia might 
 perhaps still be open to criticism on the ground of 
 political economy ; it could be open to none on the 
 ground of religious toleration. The union of the Jew 
 and the Turk against the Christian came out in its 
 strongest form when Sultan Mahmoud gave the body 
 of the martyred Patriarch to be dragged by the Jews 
 through the streets of Constantinople. We cannot 
 have the policy of Europe dealt with in the like sort. 
 There is all the difference in the world between the 
 degraded Jews of the East and the cultivated and 
 honourable Jews of the West. But blood is stronger 
 than water, and Hebrew rule, is sure to lead to a 
 Hebrew policy. Throughout Europe, the most fiercely 
 Turkish part of the press is largely in Jewish hands. 
 It may be assumed everywhere, with the smallest 
 class of exceptions, that the Jew is the friend of the 
 Turk and the enemy of the Christian. The outspoken 
 voice of the English people saved us last autumn 
 from a war with Russia on behalf of the Turk. The 
 
PREFACE. XXI 
 
 brags of the Mansion-House were answered by the 
 protest of Saint James's Hall. But we must be on 
 our guard. If Russia once goes to war with the 
 Turk, a thousand opportunities may be found for 
 picking a quarrel. Every step must be watched. 
 As we cannot have the action of Canning, we must 
 at least make sure that the inaction of Lord Derby 
 shall be the worst thing that we have. 
 
 As I have for many years read, thought and 
 written, much about the present subject and other 
 subjects closely connected with it — as they have, I 
 may say, been through life my chief secondary object 
 of study, I have thought it worth while to give a 
 list of the chief articles which I have written on 
 such matters during the last three and twenty years. 
 I forbear to mention mere letters in newspapers, 
 which are endless. I think the dates will shew that 
 my attention to these matters is at least not anything 
 new. 
 
 The Byzantine Empire. North British Review. 
 February, 1855. 
 
 Mahometanism in the East and West. North 
 British Review. August, 1855. 
 
 The Greek People and the Greek Kingdom. Edin- 
 burgh Review. April, 1856. 
 
 The Eastern Church. Edinburgh Review. April, 
 1858. 
 
 Mediaeval and Modern Greece. National Review. 
 January, 1864. 
 
 c 
 
XX11 PREFACE. 
 
 Mahomet. British Quarterly Review. January, 
 1872. 
 
 Public and Private Morality. Fortnightly Review. 
 April, 1873. 
 
 The True Eastern Question. Fortnightly Review. 
 December, 1875. 
 
 Montenegro. Macmillan's Magazine. January, 
 1876. 
 
 The Illyrian Emperors and their Land. British 
 Quarterly Review. July, 1876. 
 
 The Turks in Europe. British Quarterly Review. 
 October, 1876. 
 
 Present Aspects of the Eastern Question. Fort- 
 nightly Review. October, 1876. 
 
 The Geographical Aspect of the Eastern Question. 
 Fortnightly Review. January, 1877. 
 
 The English People in relation to the Eastern 
 Question. Contemporary Review. February, 1877. 
 
 Race and Language. Contemporary Review. 
 March, 1877. 
 
 I may add that the present volume is in some sort 
 an expansion of the argument of a small tract called 
 the " Turks in Europe," which I lately wrote as the 
 first number of the series called " Politics for the 
 People." 
 
 SOMERLEAZE, WELLS, SOMERSET, 
 
 April gl/i, 1877. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE I 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE 2J 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION 52 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE RISE AND GROWTH OF THE OTTOMAN POWER . . 87 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER 1 36 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER . . . . 166 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION 250 
 
THE 
 
 OTTOMAN POWER IN EUROPE; 
 
 ITS NATURE, ITS GROWTH, AND ITS DECLINE. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 THE rule of the Ottoman Turks in Europe is in 
 itself a phenomenon without a parallel in history. 
 For a length of time ranging in different parts from 
 two to five hundred years, a large part of the fairest 
 and most historic regions of the earth, a large part of 
 the most renowned cities, the ancient seats of empire 
 and civilization, have groaned under the yoke of 
 foreign rulers, rulers whose rule is in no way changed 
 by lapse of time, but who remain at (the end of five 
 hundred years as much strangers as they were at 
 the beginning. >> In the lands where European civiliza- 
 tion first had its birth, the European has been ruled by 
 the Asiatic, the civilized man by the barbarian. There 
 have been other phsenomena in European history 
 which have approached to this ; but there is none that 
 supplies an exact parallel. A race which stands apart 
 
 B 
 
KAsTi.RN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 from all the other races of Europe in all which makes 
 those races European, in all which distinguishes Euro- 
 pean man from Asiatic or African man, has held an 
 abiding dominion over those parts of Europe which 
 are in their history preeminently European, over 
 those parts of Europe from which the rest have learned 
 wellnigh all that has made Europe what it is. Alike 
 in Europe and in Asia, the ancient seats of European 
 dominion,lthe cities whence European man once ruled 
 over Asia, are now in the hands of the Asiatic who rules 
 in Europe.) The earliest homes of European culture 
 and European history have fallen under the rule of a 
 race to whom European culture and European history 
 are strange. The spots whence Christian teaching 
 first went forth to win the nations of Europe within 
 the Christian fold have passed into the hands of 
 votaries of the faith which is the most direct enemy 
 and rival of Christianity. Looked at as historical 
 events, these changes might pass as being merely 
 among the strangest among the strange revolutions 
 of history. But the phenomena of Turkish rule go 
 deeper than this. Changes of this kind have happened 
 in all parts of the world. They have happened with 
 special frequency in the Eastern world. It is not 
 merely that one dynasty or one race has overthrow: 
 another. It is not merely that a people of con- 
 querors have held a people of subjects in bondage 
 If this were all, there would be parallels enougl 
 The great and strange phenomenon is that, whil< 
 Europe believes itself to be the quarter of the work 
 which takes the lead of all others, there is still a large 
 part of Europe, and that the part of Europe which has, 
 so to speak, made the rest of Europe European, which 
 abides under the dominion of rulers who have nothing 
 
NATURE OF TURKISH RULE. 3 
 
 to do with Europe beyond the fact that they live and 
 bear rule within its borders. 
 
 The phenomena of Turkish rule in Europe are so 
 strange that their very strangeness sometimes in a 
 manner hides itself. Our usual modes of speaking are 
 at fault. It is hard to describe the actual state of 
 things, except by the use of words which belong to 
 another state of things, and which, when applied to 
 the state of things which exists in South-eastern 
 Europe, have no meaning. If we use such words as 
 nation, people, government, law, sovereign, subject, we 
 must give them all special and new definitions. If 
 we fancy that South-eastern Europe contains any- 
 thing which answers to the meaning of those words 
 in Western Europe, we are altogether deceived. We 
 have a political and social nomenclature which suits 
 the nations of Western Europe, as forming one poli- 
 tical and social world. We have no special nomen- 
 clature to describe an opposite state of things at 
 the other end of Europe ; and, if we transport our 
 Western nomenclature there, we find ourselves using 
 words which have nothing to answer to them. In 
 fact the gap which divides the Turk from the nations 
 of Europe is so wide and impassable that ordinary 
 language fails to express it It is so wide and impas- 
 sable that we are sometimes tempted to forget how 
 wide and impassable it is. The nations of civilized 
 Europe have so much in common with one another 
 that their differences strike us all the more because 
 they have so much in common. We are therefore apt 
 to forget how much they really have in common, how 
 they stand together as members of one body, bound 
 together by many ties, how they are kinsfolk whose 
 points of unlikeness are after all trifling compared 
 
 B 2 
 
4 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 with their points of likeness. As opposed to the Turk, 
 they are one body. They have a crowd of things in 
 common in which the Turk has no share. To under- 
 stand bhen what the Turk really is, how strange an 
 anomaly his presence in Europe is, it will be well to 
 run through the chief points of likeness between the 
 nations of civilized Europe, to point out the chief 
 things which they all share as common possessions. 
 When we clearly understand how much all European 
 nations, in spite of political and religious differences, 
 really have in common, we shall better understand 
 how utterly the Turk is a stranger to all of them 
 alike. 
 
 Fully to understand the nature of this common 
 store which belongs to the nations of civilized Europe, 
 but in which the Turks have no share, we must go 
 back to the very beginning of things. All the chief 
 nations of Europe belong to one branch of the. human 
 family ; they all speak tongues which can be shown 
 to have been at first the same tongue. There was a 
 time when the forefathers of all the nations of Europe, 
 Greek, Latin, Teutonic, Slavonic, and Lithuanian, were 
 all one people, when they marched in one common 
 company from the common home far away. Setting ' 
 aside a few remnants of earlier races which our 
 forefathers found in Europe, setting aside a few 
 settlements which have in historic times been mad 
 in Europe by men of other races, all the nations of 
 Europe belong to the one common Aryan stock. And 
 those which do not, the earlier remnants, the later 
 settlers, have all, with one exception, been brought 
 more or less thoroughly within the range of Aryan 
 influences. If not European by birth, they have 
 become European by adoption. [Here then is one 
 
 v 
 
KINDRED OF THE EUROPEAN NATIONS. 
 
 great common possession, namely, real original unity of 
 race and speech. ( x ) And it surely cannot be doubted 
 that this original unity of race and speech had a most 
 powerful, though an unconscious, influence, in bringing 
 the European nations together as members of one 
 great commonwealth, in distinction from those who 
 have no share in this ancestral possession.) The original 
 unity worked for ages before men knew anything of 
 its being ; it bound men together who had no thought 
 whatever of the tie which bound them. The Gaul, the 
 Roman, the Goth, had no knowledge of their original 
 kindred. But that original kindred did its work all the 
 same. It enabled Gaul, Roman and Goth, to be all 
 fusCd together into one society, a society in which the 
 Hun and the Saracen had no share. First and fore- 
 most then among the common possessions of civilized 
 Europe, we must place the common possession of 
 Aryan blood and speech. Throughout Europe that 
 which is Aryan is the rule ; that which is not Aryan 
 is the exception. And for the most part that which 
 is not Aryan has more or less thoroughly put on an 
 Aryan guise. Here then is the first common posses- 
 sion which marks off Aryan Europe from those who 
 have no share in the common heritage. 
 
 But original community of descent and language 
 are not all. By themselves they might not have been 
 enough to form the nations of Europe into one great 
 society. We have far-off kinsfolk, sprung from the 
 same ancestral stock, speaking dialects of the same 
 ancestral language, who have been parted off so long 
 and so utterly that the original kindred has now 
 become mere matter of curious interest, with little or 
 no working upon practical affairs. If Latin, Teuton 
 and Slave are all kinsmen to one another, the Persian 
 
EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 md the Hindoo are kinsmen no less. And yet tl 
 Persian and the Hindoo are not, like the Latin, the 
 Teuton, and the Slave, members of one great com- 
 monwealth of nations. The geographical separation 
 between the Eastern and the Western Aryans has 
 caused the Western Aryans to form a distinct 
 commonwealth of nations, quite apart from their 
 Eastern kinsfolk. The Western Aryans have settled 
 in lands which are geographically continuous, and 
 that geographical continuity has enabled them to add 
 to original tie of race and speech, the further tie of 
 partnership in a common history. They all form 
 part of one historic worl d, the world of Rome. They 
 all share, more or less fully, in the memories which are 
 common to all who have been brought within the 
 magic influence of either of the two seats of Roman 
 dominion. The modern nations of Europe were 
 either once subjects of the Roman Empire, or else 
 they are settlers within that Empire, in the character 
 half of conquerors, half of disciples. Or even if they lie 
 beyond the bounds of the older Empire, even if they 
 never submitted to its political authority, they have 
 still bowed beneath its moral influence. All Europe, 
 Eastern and Western, has a common right in Rome 
 and in all that springs from Rome, in the laws, the 
 arts, the languages, the general culture, which Rome 
 taught them. Of that Roman influence there have 
 been two centres ; Western Europe sat at the feet of 
 the Old Rome by the Tiber ; Eastern Europe sat at 
 the feet of the New Rome by the Bosporos. From 
 Rome, Old and New r , from the city of Romulus and 
 from the city of Constantine, has come the civilization 
 which distinguishes Europe from Africa and Asia. 
 In that heritage all Europe has a share. From that 
 
INFLUENCE OF ROME. 7 
 
 source all Europe has learned a crowd of ideas and 
 memories and sympathies, in which those nations 
 which stood outside the Roman world never had a 
 share. All Europe alike has its right in those two 
 languages of the Roman world which have ever been, 
 in one shape or another, the groundwork of European 
 culture. The Greek and the Latin tongues, the 
 tongue of poetry and science, the tongue of law 
 and rule, the undying literature of those two tongues, 
 the endless train of thoughts and feelings which have 
 their root in that literature, all these are a common 
 and an exclusive possession of civilized Europe. 
 They are a common heritage which parts off Roman 
 Europe from those nations which never came under 
 the abiding spell of Roman influence. 
 
 But besides their common origin and common history/ 
 there is another common possession of the nations of 
 Europe, a possession which is the greatest result of 
 their common history, the greatest gift which Rome 
 gave alike to her children, her subjects, her conquerors, 
 and her far-off disciples. Besides a common origin 
 and a common history, the nations of Europe have a 
 common religion. Besides being Aryan and Roman, 
 Europe is also Christian. In its historic aspect, 
 Christianity is the religion of the Roman Empire, the 
 religion of all those lands which either formed part of 
 the Roman Empire or which received their culture 
 from Rome, Old or New. It is the religion of Europe ; 
 if it is no longer the religion of the lands out of 
 Europe which once were Roman, it is because in those 
 lands it has undergone more or less of physical up- 
 rooting. In its origin Semitic and Asiatic, Christianity 
 became in its history preeminently European and 
 Aryan. Born in a remote province of the Empire, it 
 
8 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 became the religion of the Empire" ; it became the 
 religion of all the nations to which the Empire gave 
 its creed as well as its law and its culture. But beyond 
 those limits it hardly spread. It is the creed of 
 civilized Europe and America, because civilized 
 Europe and America share in the common heritage 
 of Rome. It is not the creed of Asia and Africa ; 
 because over the greater part of Asia and Africa the 
 influence of Rome never spread, and where it did 
 spread it has been rooted out by the events of later 
 history. Nor does it really affect this common 
 possession that the nations of Europe have accepted 
 Christianity in various forms, that each great division 
 of nations has moulded the common possession into 
 a shape of its own, according to its own national 
 character and national feelings. To go no deeper into 
 the divisions of Christendom, there is on the face of 
 things a Greek, a Latin, and a Teutonic Christianity, 
 each of which has features which are special to itself, 
 in ceremony, in discipline, and even in doctrine. And 
 these differences have led to divisions, hatreds, persecu-^ 
 tions, wars. And yet, among all this division, there is 
 real unity. Christianity is, after all, a common posses- 
 sion, a common tie, even among nations who are almost 
 ready to refuse to one another the name of Christians. 
 They may carry on their disputes even in the face of 
 men of another faith, and yet, as compared with men 
 of another faith, their union is stronger than their 
 diversity. Between the professors of any two forms 
 of Christianity the points of likeness are, after all, 
 more and stronger than the points of unlikeness. In 
 most cases this is true even of mere dogma. In all 
 cases it is true of those indirect results of Christian 
 teaching which are the truest common possession of 
 
INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY. 9 
 
 Christian nations. What those results are we will go 
 on to examine further ; but we have already found a 
 third note, a third possession, which the nations of 
 civilized Europe — reckoning also of course their 
 colonies in other lands — have in common and have 
 almost exclusively. Civilized Europe, besides being 
 Aryan and Roman, is also Christian. 
 
 We now go a step further. The common origin of 
 the European nations, combined with their geogra- 
 phical position, allowed them to have a common 
 history. That common history gave them a common 
 creed. And that common history and common creed 
 working together have given them a common civiliza- 
 tion, a common morality, a common possession of 
 political, social, and intellectual life. Community of 
 origin and community of history gave the European 
 nations a common possession of political and intel- 
 lectual instincts, and their common faith, to say the 
 least, did not stand in the way of the developement 
 of those common political and intellectual instincts. 
 This last assertion needs, if not some qualification, at 
 least some explanation. Men who have given them- 
 selves out as representatives of the Christian religion, 
 men who have borne the names of Christian teachers 
 and Christian rulers, have often stood in the way of 
 those instincts. Political freedom and intellectual 
 life have often been suppressed and proscribed in the 
 name of the Christian religion. Persecutions and 
 wars against men professing other creeds, against 
 men professing other forms of Christianity, have 
 often been decreed in the name of Christianity. But 
 Christianity itself has done none of those things. 
 Those who have done them have not obeyed but 
 disobeyed the genuine teaching of Christianity. That 
 
I. A STERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 this is so will appear more plainly when we come to 
 speak of the practical working of another religion. 
 The historical work of Christianity has been this. 
 The common creed of Europe, working together with 
 the common origin and common history of Europe, 
 has produced the common civilization of Europe. 
 The common creed has strengthened whatever was 
 good, it has weakened whatever was evil, in the state 
 of European society when that common creed was 
 first adopted. It has been enabled to do so mainly 
 through the negative side of its teaching. Christianity 
 lays down no political or civil precepts. It prescribes 
 no form of government ; it forbids no form of govern- 
 ment. Its precepts are purely moral. It lays down 
 no code of laws. It simply lays down moral precepts, 
 according to which its individual professors are bound 
 to shape their private actions, and therefore according 
 to which communities made up of those professors 
 are bound to shape their public actions. It prescribes 
 justice and mercy. It prescribes good will and good 
 deeds to brethren in the faith in the first instance, but 
 to men of other creeds as well. To do good unto all 
 men, specially unto such as are of the household of 
 faith, is the sum of its teaching. 
 
 In short, Christianity is so far from laying down 
 any political or civil code that it does not even lay 
 down a moral code. The practical application of its 
 moral precepts to political and social questions is left 
 to its disciples to work out for themselves. Take for 
 ( instance the (two great features which distinguish 
 Eastern from Western society, features which are 
 closely connected with one another, and of which it 
 may be safely said that one at least implies the 
 other. Eastern society not only allows slavery and 
 
EASTERN AND WESTERN SOCIETY. II 
 
 polygamy,)but it is grounded upon them. An Eastern 
 nation from which slavery and polygamy were wholly 
 swept away would cease to be an Eastern nation. It 
 would, whatever its geographical position, have, in 
 the most important social respects, become Western. 
 To say that Eastern society is grounded on slavery 
 and polygamy of course does not imply that each par- 
 ticular man in an Eastern nation is necessarily either 
 a slave-owner or a master of many wives. Slavery 
 and polygamy on any great scale must always be 
 in their own nature the privileges of the few. But 
 Eastern society is founded on those institutions 
 in the same sense in which it might be said that 
 some forms of Western society have been founded 
 on those ideas which, for want of better words, 
 may be called by the inaccurate, but not wholly 
 meaningless, names of feudal and chivalrous. The 
 possibility of slavery and polygamy in all cases, their 
 presence in many cases, give Eastern society its 
 distinctive character. The characteristics of Western 
 society, on the other hand, are that polygamy has 
 never existed, and that slavery has everywhere died 
 out. We may say that polygamy has never existed ; 
 for the few cases to the contrary are so purely excep- 
 tional as to have no practical bearing on the matter. ( 2 ) 
 And we may say that slavery has everywhere died 
 out, when it has vanished from every part of Christian 
 Europe and even from the great mass of European 
 colonies. This character of Western society is the 
 fruit of Christianity working on the earlier institutions 
 of the European nations. With regard to polygamy 
 there was hardly any need to legislate. Christianity 
 was first preached to societies where monogamy was 
 the law ; amid great licentiousness of manners and a 
 
12 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 lax law of divorce, no subject of the Roman Empire 
 could have more than one lawful wife at a time. And 
 what was the law of the Roman Empire was in this 
 respect the general law of the Teutonic nations also. 
 Here then the business of Christianity was, not to 
 lay down any new principle, but to work a general 
 purification of morals and to abridge the licence of 
 divorce. It is on this last head that rules are laid 
 down in the Gospel which come nearer to the nature 
 of civil precepts than any other. But it would be 
 hard to find any direct prohibition of polygamy in 
 the Christian Scriptures. The institution was allowed 
 by the Old Law, and it is not in so many words 
 taken away by the New. But every moral precept 
 of Christianity tells against it. And this tendency, 
 working together with the teaching both of Roman 
 and of Teutonic law, has caused all Christian 
 nations to take monogamy for granted as something 
 absolutely essential to a Christian society. With 
 slavery on the other hand Christianity has had to 
 fight a much harder battle. In the case of polygamy, 
 Christian teaching could go hand in hand with Roman 
 and Teutonic law. In the case of slavery, Christian 
 teaching found both Roman and Teutonic law 
 arranged against it. The New Testament contains 
 no precept which directly forbids slavery ; indeed 
 it assumes it as one of the ordinary conditions of 
 that Roman society to which Christianity was first 
 preached. But the moral precepts of Christianity are 
 distinctly inconsistent with slavery, and they have in 
 the end, slowly but surely, done their work. Men first 
 learned that it was a sin against Christian fellowship 
 to hold a fellow Christian in bondage. Thus, first 
 actual slavery, and then the milder forms of serfdom 
 
 
POLYGAMY AND SLAVERY. 1 3 
 
 and villainage, have gradually died out or have been 
 abolished in all European nations. The rule which 
 men thus learned to apply to men of their own creed 
 and their own colour they learned more slowly to 
 apply to men of other creeds and other colours. The 
 abolition of the slavery of the black man in European 
 colonies has followed the abolition of the slavery of 
 the white man in Europe itself. Personal slavery has 
 so long died out in Western Europe, even villainage 
 has so long died out in England, that we are apt to 
 forget that slavery remained a common institution in 
 all Western Europe, and not least in our own island, 
 for ages after the establishment of Christianity. Good 
 men in the eleventh and twelfth centuries preached 
 against the bondage and sale of fellow Christians, as 
 good men in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries 
 have preached against the bondage and sale of fellow 
 men. But in the end the implied teaching of the 
 Gospel has triumphed. As Christianity, working 
 along with Roman law, effectually shut out poly- 
 gamy, so in the end Christianity, even in the teeth of 
 Roman law, has effectually driven out slavery. 
 
 We may fairly say that, if there were no other 
 differences, these two points alone would be enougrjLto 
 distinguish Eastern and Western society. (The differ- 
 ence between a polygamous community and one in 
 which polygamy is forbidden or unknown is an essential 
 difference, a difference which runs through everything, 
 a difference of another kind from ordinary differences 
 in religion, manners, or forms of government. It is a 
 difference which directly affects the condition of half 
 the human species, and which indirectly affects the 
 condition of the other half. 3The whole social state 
 of a polygamous and a monogamous people is wholly 
 

 
 14 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 different. It is a difference which does not admit of 
 degrees, a difference in which the first step is every- 
 thing. [And it should further be noticed that polygamy 
 practically implies slavery, and that it is the greatest 
 encouragement of slavery .3 The difference of slavery 
 or no slavery by itself does not make so wide a gap, 
 and it does admit of degrees. We might say that the 
 prohibition of polygamy is implied in the earliest 
 conception of Western society; the prohibition of 
 slavery belongs only to its fullest developement. But 
 both prohibitions alike are characteristic of Western 
 society as we now conceive it ; they form an irre- 
 concileable difference between that society and any 
 society which allows either of the two great evils, 
 one of which we never knew, while from the other 
 we have set ourselves free. 
 
 Now as the European nations have all these 
 common possessions, historical, religious, and social, 
 it has naturally followed that they have all tended 
 more or less strongly to a common type of govern- 
 ment and polity. It has often been shown that the 
 various governments of Europe, notwithstanding all 
 their points of unlikeness, and notwithstanding the 
 widely different courses which they have run, have 
 all sprung out of certain common elements, and that 
 they have all along kept certain great ideas in com- 
 mon. And, for a good while past, all of them seem to 
 be, as it were, converging towards one model. The 
 worst European governments in the worst times have 
 kept up a certain show of right, a certain profession 
 of regard for law, even where the laws were worst in 
 themselves and were worst administered. And in 
 later times most European governments, even those 
 which have been in some things unjust and oppres- 
 
 
WESTERN GOVERNMENTS. 15 
 
 sive, have tended more and more towards a system 
 which does tolerably fair justice between man and 
 man, at all events in matters where the interest of the 
 government is not concerned. Where European 
 governments have become most nearly despotic, it 
 has always been by the overthrow or dying out of 
 earlier and freer institutions. And in every European 
 country but one, despotism has in its turn died out or 
 been overthrown. Russia is now the only European 
 country which has not some kind of political constitu- 
 tion, some measure of political freedom, greater or 
 less. In making this exception, we must remember, 
 on the one hand, that Russia is, both through its geo- 
 graphical position and through its former bondage 
 to Asiatic rulers, the least European of European 
 countries. And we must remember also that, though 
 Russia has as yet no political constitution, yet even 
 in Russia there are many tendencies at work in 
 the direction of freedom, and that public opinion is 
 beginning to have a power there which would have 
 seemed impossible only a short time back. But of 
 the countries of Western Europe, all at this moment 
 have constitutions of some kind. We may say, at all 
 events by comparison with other times and places, 
 that all the governments of Western Europe, though 
 doubtless some are better than others, all fairly dis- 
 charge the first duties of government. It is only in 
 a very few parts of Western Europe, that any great 
 crime of one man against another is likely to go 
 unpunished. And, even where it is so, the fault can 
 hardly be said to rest either with the law or with the 
 government, but rather with some local cause which 
 makes it hard to put the law in force. One Western 
 government is doubtless better than another, whether 
 
r 
 
 1 6 EASTERN AND* WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 in the law itself or in the administration of the la^ 
 But all of them fairly discharge the great duty 
 defending their subjects from wrong to their persoi 
 or properties. In all of them the voice of the nation 
 has some way, more or less perfect, of making itself 
 known. In all of them the ruler has a right to allegi- 
 ance from the subject, because the subject receives pro- 
 tection from the ruler. Lin short, in Western Europe, 
 and above all in England, we are so used to the rule 
 of law that we can hardly understand the absence of 
 law. We can understand the temporary suspension 
 of law through a state of war or revolution ; we 
 cannot understand its abiding absence.^ In one 
 sense indeed the utter absence of law is impossible. 
 In every society, even the rudest, there is some check, 
 either of religion or of traditional custom, upon the 
 personal will of the ruler. But the regular legal order 
 of things to which Western Europe is used, and to 
 which England has very long been used, is by no 
 means a thing which has existed in all times and 
 places. The notion of an appeal to the law in the 
 case of any wrong is so familiar to our minds that we 
 find it hard to conceive a state of things where no 
 such appeal is to be had. But it is specially im- 
 portant to remember that the good administration of 
 justice, an administration which has been getting 
 better and better for nearly two hundred years, and 
 to which we are so thoroughly accustomed that we 
 are apt to take it for granted, is a thing which has 
 been rare in the history of the world, and which in 
 its perfect form is not very old among ourselves. 
 
 Speaking roughly then, and by comparison with 
 other times and places, we may say that in all the 
 countries of Western Europe the main ends of govern- 
 
 <, 
 
 
NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS. 1 7 
 
 ment are well carried out. This or that government 
 may be bad in some particular points ; but on the 
 whole it is an instrument of good. To say the very 
 least, it does more good than it does harm. And 
 more than this, as a rule, the governments of Western 
 Europe are national governments. There are particu- 
 lar parts in several of the countries of Western Europe 
 in which men complain, with greater or less reason, 
 that they are not under national governments, that 
 they are under governments which are not of their 
 own choosing and which they would willingly throw 
 off. But the parts where complaints of this kind are 
 made make up but a very small part of Western 
 Europe. They are mere exceptions to a general rule. 
 And, even where people complain of a foreign 
 dominion, that foreign dominion does not, as com- 
 pared with other times and places, carry with it any 
 monstrous oppression. In no part of Western Europe 
 is there such a sight to be seen as that of a large 
 country where the people of the land are in bondage 
 to foreign rulers, where they are shut out from any 
 real share in the government of their own land, and 
 where they cannot get any redress from their foreign 
 rulers, even for their greatest wrongs. Even the 
 exceptional cases which have just been spoken of are 
 something very different from this. And, setting 
 those exceptional cases aside, the whole of Western 
 Europe may be fairly said to be under governments 
 which are really national governments, governments 
 which the people of the land may wish to improve in 
 this or that point, but which they do not wish to 
 throw off altogether. The nation and the Govern- 
 ment have common interests, common feelings. The 
 Government may fail rightly to understand the 
 
 C 
 
EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 interests, feelings, and wishes of the nation ; but it has 
 not, openly and avowedly, interests, feelings, and wishes 
 opposed to those of the nation. The King or other 
 chief of the Government is the acknowledged head of 
 the nation. Even if in any case he chances to be of 
 foreign birth, he throws off as far as he can the character 
 of a stranger, and puts on as far as he can the cha- 
 racter of a native ruler. If not a countryman by birth, 
 he becomes a countryman by adoption. His govern- 
 ment may be better or worse ; his personal character 
 may make him more or less popular ; but in any 
 case the nation accepts him as its leader at home and 
 its representative abroad. The land, the nation, and 
 the chief of the nation are all bound together. The 
 interests of England and the interests of the English, 
 the interests of France and the interests of the 
 French, are phrases of exactly the same meaning. 
 Nor does it come into any man's head that the Queen 
 of Great Britain or the President of the French 
 Republic has, in any public matter at home or 
 abroad, any personal interests opposite to or separate 
 from the interests of the lands and nations over 
 which they severally rule. 
 
 Now it should here be noticed that, though nearly 
 the whole of Western Europe is now under nationa 
 governments, it is far from being true that all thos 
 governments were national governments from the 
 beginning. Most of them had their beginning in 
 conquest ; most of them began in the forcible settle- 
 ment of one people in a land occupied by another 
 people. But in most cases it has gradually come 
 to be forgotten that the government had its begin 
 ning in conquest. The conquerors and conquerec 
 have, sooner or later, learned to feel as one people, 
 
ORIGIN OF WESTERN GOVERNMENTS. 1 9 
 
 and to acknowledge a common head in the ruler of 
 their common land. Sometimes the conquerors have 
 learned the language and manners of the conquered ; 
 sometimes the conquered have learned the language 
 and manners of the conquerors. Sometimes the 
 conquerors have taken the name of the conquered ; 
 sometimes the conquered have taken the name of 
 the conquerors. In either case, conquered and con- 
 querors have, sooner or later, become one people ; 
 and, in some cases, even where they have not so 
 thoroughly become one people as this, even where 
 the languages of the conquerors and the conquered 
 have gone on side by side, it has been found that 
 old wrongs can be thoroughly forgotten, and that the 
 two nations have practically become one in face of all 
 other nations. Thus, in the old days of the Roman 
 dominion, when the Roman Empire was spread over 
 all the lands around the Mediterranean sea, the con- 
 quered nations were, step by step, admitted to the 
 rights of Romans. They adopted the language and 
 manners of Rome ; they forgot their old national names 
 and feelings, and spoke of themselves only as Romans. 
 So in later times, when the German people of the 
 Franks settled in a large part of Gaul and gradually 
 spread their power over the rest, the conquerors and 
 the conquered gradually became one people. The 
 conquerors learned the language of the conquered, 
 and the conquered came, step by step, to call 
 themselves by the name of the conquerors. It 
 matters to no man in France now, whether his 
 forefathers long ago were of Iberian, Celtic, Roman, 
 Gothic, Burgundian, or Prankish blood. All are now 
 thoroughly mingled together in the one French 
 nation. So in our own island, where English, Scots, 
 
 C 2 
 
20 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 
 and Welsh have been brought together, partly by 
 conquest, partly by treaties, though old national 
 feelings are not forgotten, though even distinct 
 languages are still to some extent in use, yet all 
 form politically one nation. No man in Great 
 Britain wishes to throw off the common government 
 of Great Britain, or to cut off his own part of Great 
 Britain from the rest. So again, when England 
 was conquered by the Normans, and a foreign 
 king and a foreign nobility bore rule over the land, 
 still the conquerors and the conquered drew near 
 together in a wonderfully short time. The conquerors 
 gradually learned to speak the tongues of the con- 
 quered, to share their feelings, and to call themselves 
 by their name. It matters nothing to any Eng- 
 lishman now whether his forefathers ages back were 
 of Old-English or of Norman birth. It mattered but 
 little even so soon after the Conquest as the reign of 
 Henry the Second. In all these cases, governments 
 which began in conquest have, sooner or later, some- 
 times very soon indeed, become national governments. 
 And we may remark that the tendency of conquerors 
 and conquered to be in this way fused together is 
 especially characteristic of Western Europe, and 
 above all, of those parts of Western Europe whicl 
 formed parts of the Roman Empire. For the in- 
 fluence of Rome on men's minds was such that, 
 within the provinces which had become thoroughly 
 Roman, all conquerors, at least all Aryan conquerors, 
 came so far under its power as at least to learn t< 
 speak some form of the Roman language. In Italy 
 above all, though the land has been conquered over 
 and over again, though till lately it was dividec 
 among many separate governments, yet all the 
 
 iu 
 
FUSION OF CONQUERORS AND CONQUERED. 21 
 
 successive conquerors had learned the speech of 
 the land, and had become one with the people of 
 the land where they settled. One can have no doubt 
 that, in all these cases, the common origin of the 
 European nations, even though they knew nothing 
 about it, had a real effect in making it easier for 
 different nations to join into one. And in the lands 
 which had become thoroughly Roman the process 
 of union was easier still. 
 
 We have thus seen how many things all the nations 
 of Europe, among all their differences, really have 
 in common. They have a common origin, a common 
 history, a common religion, a common civilization, 
 common social, moral, and political ideas. And 
 the result of all this is that they, for the most part, 
 live under national governments, under fairly good 
 governments — that, even where the government began 
 in conquest the conquerors and the conquered have 
 commonly been able to come together as one people — 
 that there is no large part of Western Europe where 
 the people of the land can even pretend that they 
 are under foreign rulers — that in the few parts where 
 there is foreign rule, that foreign rule does not carry 
 with it any very gross oppression. We have seen 
 that in the countries of Western Europe there is 
 no separation of interest or feeling between the 
 land, the people, and the government. The 'nation 
 is a body of which the King or other ruler is the head. 
 When we have well taken in all these things, we shall 
 be really able to understand the peculiar position of 
 the Turks in South-eastern Europe, and how utterly * 
 it differs from anything to which we are used in 
 Western Europe. 
 
 Thus the Turks have given their name to the land 
 
22 
 
 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 which they conquered, exactly as the Franks have 
 given their name to the land which they conquered. 
 The one land is called Turkey, as the other is called 
 France. But the history of the Turks in Greece, 
 Bulgaria, Servia, and the other lands which they 
 conquered has been quite different from the history 
 of the Franks in Gaul. The Franks in Gaul have 
 been altogether lost in the general mass of' the 
 people of the land. But the Turks in Turkey are 
 just as distinct now from the mass of the people of 
 the land as they were when they first came into 
 it. It is not a question .whether a man's remote 
 forefathers were Turks or not; the question is a 
 much more immediate and practical one, whether a 
 man is himself a Turk or not. The Turks, though 
 they have been in some parts of Turkey for five 
 hundred years, have still never become the people 
 of the land, nor have they in any way become one 
 with the people of the land. They still remain as 
 they were when they first came in, a people of strangers 
 bearing rule over the people of the land, but in every 
 way distinct from them. They have not adopted the 
 language and manners of the people of the land, nor 
 have the people of the land adopted their language 
 and manners. £ After dwelling in the same land for so 
 many ages, they have never become the country- 
 men of the people of the land ; they still remain 
 foreigners and oppressors. The process of conquest, 
 which in all western conquests came to an end sooner 
 or later, still goes on in the lands conquered by the 
 Turk. So far as there is any law and government at 
 all, it is carried on for the interests of the conquering 
 strangers, and not for the interest of the people of the 
 land. The so-called sovereign is in no sense the head 
 
POSITION OF THE TURKS. 23 
 
 of the people of the land, but is simply the head of 
 the conquering strangers.^) 
 
 Now when we have thoroughly taken in the real 
 nature of such a state of things as this, we at once 
 ask how it came about. We ask why it is that there 
 is in South-eastern Europe a state of things so 
 different from anything to which we are used in 
 Western Europe ? Why is it that, while in the West 
 the differences between conquerors and conquered 
 have been everywhere gradually forgotten, in the 
 East the difference remains as strong at the end of 
 five hundred years as it was at the beginning ? Why 
 has the Turk failed to assimilate the people of the 
 land, and why have the people of the land failed no 
 less to assimilate the Turk ? Why has the Turk not 
 been able to do as the Roman did of old, to win the 
 people of the land to his own speech and manners, to 
 make them in short Turks, as the people of Gaul and 
 Spain became Romans ? Or why, on the other hand, 
 could not the Turk lose himself among the people of 
 the land whom he conquered, as the Frank lost himself 
 in Gaul, as the Lombard did in Italy, as the Norman 
 did in England ? Why is it that the people of the 
 land and their conquerors have never in all these 
 years been fused into one people, in the same way 
 which happened in all the other cases which we have 
 mentioned ? Why is it that, while, in all these other 
 cases, a government which began in conquest has gra- 
 dually become a national government, discharging the 
 duties of government, while it has often become a 
 thoroughly free government, the Turk has in all these 
 ages never given so much as common protection for 
 life, property, and personal rights to the nations under 
 his rule ? The causes are many ; some of them are to 
 
24 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 
 be found in the earlier history of the lands which the 
 Turk invaded ; some are to be found in the peculiar 
 position of the Turk himself. We may say that the 
 first set of causes made it harder for any conquering 
 people in those lands to become naturalized as they 
 did in the West, and that the peculiar position and 
 character of the Turk made what in any case would 
 have been hard altogether impossible. 
 
 We have thus traced out the chief points in which 
 the nations of Western Europe agree with one another, 
 and we have shewn in a general way how their state 
 differs from the state of the South-eastern lands which 
 are under the rule of the Turks. We must now go on 
 to trace out more in detail what the rule of the Turks 
 is, and the causes which made it what it is. But before 
 we go into these points, it will be well to set forth 
 rather more at length some of the points which, even 
 were the Turks away, would still distinguish Western 
 and Eastern Europe. These differences ought to be 
 well understood, because they certainly helped the 
 advance of the Turks when they invaded these lands, 
 and because they have a direct bearing on the relation 
 of the Turks to the subject nations and of the subject 
 nations to one another. These points of difference 
 between Eastern and Western Europe, which were 
 points of difference before the Turks came, and which 
 will remain points of difference even if the Turks are 
 taken away, will fittingly form the subject of a separate 
 chapter. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 (i, p. 5.) In speaking thus I am fully aware that, in a strictly scientific 
 sense, speech is no sure index of race. What Mr. Sayce says at the 
 beginning of the fifth chapter of his Principles of Comparative Philology 
 is perfectly true from a purely scientific view. That is to say, no nation is 
 of absolutely pure descent. No nation can make out such a pedigree as 
 would satisfy a lawyer in the case of a man claiming an estate or a peer- 
 age. But for practical and historical purposes, speech is, not indeed a 
 sure index, but a presumption of race. We assume speech as the index 
 of race, except when we know historically that a nation has changed its 
 speech ; and for historical and practical purposes we do not need that 
 absolute purity of race which is demanded by the scientific inquirer. 
 We may compare a nation to a Roman gens, which started as a family, 
 but which in course of time admitted many members who were not 
 naturally descended from the original forefather. We apply in short 
 the Roman law of adoption to nations as well as to families. For 
 historical purposes, we assume Teutons, Slaves, or any other people 
 marked out by distinction of speech, to be for historical purposes a race, 
 even though there will always be some admixture of blood, and in 
 some cases a great deal. It is possible for instance that the Gaulish or 
 the Greek nations, at the first time when we hear of them, were largely 
 made up of people who were not Greeks or Gauls by blood, but had 
 simply adopted the Gaulish or the Greek tongue. About this history can 
 say nothing. But history can say for certain that in after ages the Gauls 
 exchanged their own tongue for Latin, while the Greeks kept their own 
 tongue. I therefore do not scruple to speak of race and speech in a 
 manner which is perfectly true for my present purpose, though it may not 
 be quite scientifically accurate. For instance I should say that among 
 the Slavonic nations there is unity of race and speech. The Slaves may 
 in prae-historic times have assimilated other nations, as we know that they 
 assimilated the original Bulgarians. But for all practical purposes they 
 form one race, marked out by the use of a kindred speech. To speak of 
 the Slavonic race is historically true, though it may not be scientifically 
 accurate. But to speak of the " Latin race" is neither scientifically ac- 
 curate nor historically true. For the so-called Latin race is simply made 
 up of nations which at different times adopted the Latin language, but 
 which we know had no further connexion with the original Latin than 
 
26 EASTERN AND WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 coming of the same common Aryan stock, while some of them, namely, 
 whatever is of Iberian descent, are not Aryan at all. The reader will 
 thus understand in what sense I use the word race in these chapters. 
 The people of Hydra are Greek by speech, Albanian by race. The 
 people of Psara are Greek both by speech and race, even though they 
 may in prae-historic times have had Karian or Phoenician forefathers. I 
 have worked this matter out at greater length in the Contemporary 
 Review for March, 1877. 
 
 (2, p. 11.) Polygamy was utterly unknown both to Greek and to 
 Roman law. The story of Anaxandrides King of Sparta (Herodotus, 
 v. 40), who was specially allowed for a special reason to have two wives 
 at once, only brings the general rule into greater prominence. So 
 something like polygamy seems to have been practised by one or two of 
 the later Macedonian kings, besides the well-known case of Alexander 
 himself. But this only shows that they had partially adopted Eastern 
 manners, and the practice never became usual even among kings, much 
 less among other men. Among the Germans, Tacitus (Germania, 18), 
 speaks of polygamy as practised only by a few for special reasons — 
 " Prope soli barbarorum singulis uxoribus contenti sunt, exceptis admo- 
 dum paucis, qui non libldine, sed ob nobilitatem, plurimis nuptiis 
 ambiuntur. " So even in Christian times the Merwing Dagobert 
 (Fredegar, c. 50) had three acknowledged queens at once. " Tres 
 habebat ad instar Salomonis reginas, maxime et plurimas concubinas." 
 Put all such cases are exceptional. It was not legal polygamy, but 
 a lax law of divorce, with which Christianity had to struggle, alike 
 among Greeks, Romans, and Teutons. 
 
 I 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 The object of the present chapter is to point out 
 those features in the history and condition of South- 
 eastern Europe which would, even if the Turk were 
 away, make it different in many things from Western 
 Europe. These points of difference may be shortly 
 summed up in one, that distinctions of race and creed 
 are far more lasting in Eastern Europe than they 
 are in Western. The great case, the case where there 
 is the widest difference of all, is of course the differ- 
 ence between the Turk and his Christian subjects. 
 But the wide gap between race and race, between 
 creed and creed, though it takes its strongest and 
 most repulsive form in the case of the Turk, is not 
 altogether peculiar to his case. If we go back to the 
 times before the Turk came, we should still find in 
 South-eastern Europe a state of things quite different 
 to that to which we are used in Western Europe. 
 The difference will of course not be so great, nor 
 will it be at all of the same kind, as the difference 
 which has been made by the coming of the Turk. 
 Still there is a widely marked difference, and a 
 difference the causes of which it is well worth our 
 while to search out. 
 
28 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 A very small amount of thought will shew that 
 differences of race and speech are much more marked 
 and much more lasting in the East of Europe than 
 they are in the West. It will also shew that differ- 
 ences in religion have greater importance in the East 
 than they have in the West, and that they put on 
 more of the character of national differences. In the 
 West, as we have seen, the different races which have 
 settled in each of the great countries of Western 
 Europe have come together to form one distinct 
 nation in each. In each land, say England, France, 
 Germany, one type of man, marked by the use of one 
 language, is the rule. Everything which departs from 
 that rule, everything which uses any other language, 
 is exceptional. And anything that departs from the 
 general rule takes for the most part the form of mere 
 fragments or survivals, objects of curious historical 
 and linguistic interest, but having no bearing on 
 practical politics. The political unity of France is not 
 threatened because Flemish, Walloon, Breton, Basque, 
 and Provencal are all spoken within the French border. 
 The political unity of Great Britain is not threatened 
 because Welsh and Gaelic are spoken within its 
 coasts. The recent conquests of Germany stand on 
 a different ground, because they are recent conquests, 
 and because each of the disaffected districts lies in 
 close neighbourhood to a larger population of its 
 own speech. If the Breton-speaking districts of 
 France joined on to a large independent Breton- 
 speaking state, the Breton element in France would 
 not be so politically unimportant as it now is. Ireland 
 stands on a different ground, partly because two great 
 islands never can be so thoroughly united as a con- 
 tinuous territory, partly because for some centuries 
 
 
NATIONAL TYPES IN THE WEST. 20, 
 
 a variety of causes made the state of things in Ireland 
 rather Eastern than Western^ 1 ) With these excep- 
 tions, the rule holds good. In Western Europe each 
 land has a dominant type, Roman or Teutonic ; 
 whatever departs from both those types is every- 
 where exceptional and politically unimportant. And 
 the exceptional districts, where there are any, mark 
 their character as survivals by their geographical 
 position. The old tongues, those which are older 
 than both Roman and Teutonic, live on only in 
 corners by themselves. In no part of Western 
 Europe do we find districts inhabited by men 
 differing in speech and national feeling, lying in 
 distinct patches here and there over a large country. 
 A district like one of our larger counties in which 
 one parish, perhaps one hundred, spoke Welsh, another 
 Latin, another English, another Danish, another Old- 
 French, another the tongue of more modern settlers, 
 Flemings, Huguenots or Palatines, is something which 
 we find hard to conceive, and which, as applied to our 
 own land or to any other Western land, sounds absurd 
 on the face of it. 
 
 When we pass into South-eastern Europe, this 
 state of things, the very idea of which seems 
 absurd in the West, is found to be perfectly real. 
 All the races which we find dwelling there at the 
 beginning of recorded history, together with several 
 races which have come in since, all remain, not as 
 mere fragments or survivals, but as nations, each with 
 its national language and national feelings, and each 
 having its greater or less share of practical importance 
 in the politics of the present moment. Setting aside 
 races which have simply passed through the country 
 without occupying it, we may say that all the races 
 
THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 which have ever settled in the country are there still as 
 distinct races. And, though each race has its own par- 
 ticular region where it forms the whole people or the 
 great majority of the people, still there are large dis- 
 tricts where different races really live side by side in the 
 very way which seems so absurd when we try to con- 
 ceive it in any Western country. We cannot conceive 
 a Welsh, an English, and a Norman village side by 
 side ; but a Greek, a Bulgarian, and a Turkish village 
 side by side is a thing which may be seen in many 
 parts of Thrace. The oldest races in those lands, those 
 which answer, to Basques and Bretons in Western 
 Europe, hold quite another position from that of 
 Basques and Bretons in Western Europe. They form 
 three living and vigorous nations, Greek, Albanian, 
 and Rouman. They stand as nations alongside of 
 the Slaves who came in later, and who answer roughly 
 to the Teutons in the West, while all alike are under 
 the rule of the Turk, who has nothing answering to 
 him in the West. But it must be further remembered 
 that this abiding life of races and languages is 
 not confined to the lands which are under the Turk. 
 It comes out in its strongest form in these lands ; but 
 it comes out also in a form nearly as strong in the lands 
 which form the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. It is in 
 short a characteristic of Eastern Europe generally as 
 distinguished from Western. And the causes of this 
 difference will be easily seen, if we look carefully into 
 the history of Eastern Europe as distinguished from 
 Western. 
 
 The main causes of this difference between Eastern 
 and Western Europe are twofold. The first cause 
 is the different position which the Roman Empire 
 held in the West of Europe and in the East. The 
 
PERMANENCE OF RACES IN THE EAST. 3 1 
 
 second cause is the presence in the East of certain 
 elements which have nothing answering to them 
 in the West. East and West have three elements 
 in common, while the East has a fourth element 
 which it has all to itself. First, there are, both 
 in East and West, the nations which were there 
 before the Roman power began. Secondly, there is 
 the Roman power itself, still existing in its effects. 
 Thirdly, there are the Aryan nations which came in 
 since the establishment of the Roman power. All 
 these are common to West and East ; only their 
 proportions and relations to one another are not the 
 same in the East as they are in the West, a difference 
 which is caused by the different positions which the 
 Roman power held in the two cases. But, fourthly, the 
 East has a fourth element which is not to be found 
 in the West, namely the non- Aryan races which have 
 come in since the establishment of the Roman power. 
 Among these the Turks are the most important ; but 
 they are not the only non-Aryan settlers, and the 
 difference between the settlement of the Turks and 
 the settlements of the other non-Aryan races forms 
 one of the most instructive parts of our whole subject. 
 In examining these two causes of those differences 
 between Eastern and Western Europe which lie on 
 the surface, we shall find that the condition of the 
 earlier nations which were there before the Romans 
 came, and over whom they extended their power, 
 was altogether different in the East from what it was 
 in the West. In the West, in Gaul and Spain, the 
 Romans found nations much less civilized than them- 
 selves, nations which were ready to look up to their 
 conquerors as masters and to adopt the language, the 
 manners, and the name of Romans. In the West 
 
32 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 therefore the first element, the element older than 
 the Roman dominion, has lingered on only in the 
 shape of fragments and survivals. The great mass of 
 the people of those lands became practically Roman. 
 In the West the second element in our list, the 
 Roman element, swallowed up nearly the whole of 
 the first. But in Eastern Europe the Romans found 
 a nation more civilized than themselves, a nation 
 which they conquered politically, but to which in 
 everything else they were as ready to look up, as the 
 nations of the West were ready to look up to them. 
 This was the Greek nation. When the Romans 
 conquered the South-eastern lands, they found there 
 three great races, the Greek, the Illyrian, and 
 the Thracian. Those three races are all there 
 still. The Greeks speak for themselves. The 
 Illyrians are represented by the modern Albanians. 
 The Thracians are represented, there seems every 
 reason to believe, by the modern Roumans.( 2 ) 
 Now had the whole of the South-eastern lands 
 been inhabited by Illyrians and Thracians, those 
 lands would doubtless have become as thoroughly 
 Roman as the Western lands became. There would 
 be in the East Romance and Slavonic nations, as 
 there are in the West Romance and Teutonic na- 
 tions, with perhaps some fragments and survivals 
 of Illyrian and Thracian lingering on, as Basque an< 
 Breton have lingered on in the West. But the posi- 
 tion of the Greek nation, its long history and its high 
 civilization, hindered this. The Greeks could not 
 become Romans in any but the most purely politica 
 sense. Like other subjects of the Roman Empire 
 they gradually took the Roman name ; but they kept 
 their own language, literature, and civilization. In 
 
THE ROMANS AND THE OLD RACES. S3 
 
 short we may say that the Roman Empire in the 
 East became Greek, and that the Greek nation became 
 Roman. The Eastern Empire and the Greek-speaking 
 lands became nearly coextensive. Greek became 
 the one language of the Eastern Roman Empire, 
 while those that spoke it still called themselves 
 Romans. ( 3 ) Till quite lately, that is till the modern 
 ideas of nationality began to spread, the Greek- 
 speaking subjects of the Turk called themselves by 
 no name but that of Romans. This people, who 
 might be called either Greek or Roman, but who have 
 now again taken up the Greek name, has lived on as 
 a distinct nation to our own time. It is a nation 
 which has largely assimilated its neighbours, but 
 which has riot been assimilated by them. 
 
 While the Greeks thus took the Roman name 
 without adopting the Latin language, another people 
 in the Eastern peninsula adopted both name and 
 language, exactly as the nations of the West did. 
 If, as there is good reason to believe, the modern 
 Roumans represent the old Thracians, that nation 
 came under the general law, exactly like the 
 Western nations. The Thracians became thoroughly 
 Roman in speech, as they have ever since kept 
 the Roman name. They form in fact one of the 
 Romance nations, just as much as the people of Gaul 
 or Spain. They are a Romance nation on the Eastern 
 side of the Hadriatic instead of on the Western. 
 The third nation, that of the Illyrians, Skipetar, 
 or Albanians, have been largely assimilated by the 
 Greeks. Though they may be truly said to exist as 
 a nation, still their existence as a nation has been 
 mainly owing to their being a wild people living in 
 a wild country. They hold a position between that 
 
 D 
 
34 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 of a nation like the Greeks and that of a mere survival 
 of a nation like the Basques. The Roumans too, 
 though they learned the Roman language and have 
 kept the Roman name, can never have so fully adopted 
 the Roman civilization as the Gauls and Spaniards 
 did. In short, the existence of a highly civilized 
 people like the Greeks hindered in every way the in- 
 fluence of Rome from being so thorough in the East 
 as it was in the West. The Greek nation lived on, and 
 alongside of itself, it preserved the other two ancient 
 nations of the peninsula. Thus all three have lived 
 on to the present as distinct nations. Two of them, 
 the Greeks and the Illyrians, still keep their own 
 languages, while the third, the old Thracians, speak 
 a Romance language and call themselves Roumans. 
 
 Thus the existence of the Greek nation with its 
 higher civilization has influenced the relations of the 
 Roman power to the old nations of the peninsula, and 
 it has kept them alive as nations. It also affected the 
 relations of the Roman power to the Aryan nations 
 which came in afterwards. These are, to sum it 
 up in a word, the Slaves. The Slavonic nations 
 hold in the East a place answering to that which 
 is held by the Teutonic nations in the West. They 
 were the later Aryan settlers, the settlers who came 
 into the Empire after the establishment of the Roman 
 power. The Teutonic nations themselves founded no 
 lasting settlements within the Eastern Empire.( 4 ) The 
 Goths used the Eastern Empire as a highway to the 
 West ; they marched through it at pleasure, but it 
 was not till they had reached the West that they 
 founded lasting Gothic kingdoms. ( 5 ) On the northern 
 frontier of the Eastern Empire Teutonic kingdoms 
 were founded by the Gepidae and the Lombards. 
 
THE TEUTONS AND THE SLAVES. 35 
 
 But even these were not lasting. The Gepidae were 
 cut off altogether, and the Lombards passed into 
 Italy, to find their real place in history there. The 
 place in history which in the West belongs to the 
 Teutonic nations which founded kingdoms in Gaul, 
 Spain, and Italy, is filled in the East by the Slavonic 
 nations who made their way into the Empire, and 
 were the forefathers of the present inhabitants of 
 Croatia and Dalmatia, of enslaved Bosnia and Bul- 
 garia, of liberated Servia and of unconquered 
 Montenegro. Just like the Teutons in the West, the 
 Slaves in the East came into the Empire in all 
 manner of characters, as captives, as mercenaries, as 
 allies, at last as conquerors. In the sixth century 
 they carried havoc through all the provinces between 
 the Hadriatic and the Euxine ; in the seventh century 
 the Emperors found it wise to allow them to make 
 permanent settlements in those provinces which in 
 time grew into regular kingdoms. From this time 
 we must count the Slavonic people and the Slavonic 
 languages as one great element, in number perhaps 
 the greatest element, in the lands which form the 
 great eastern peninsula of Europe. 
 
 But though the Slaves in the East thus answer in many 
 ways to the Teutons in the West, their position with 
 regard to the Eastern Empire was not quite the same 
 as that of the Teutons towards the Western Empire. 
 The Western Empire was purely Roman. The 
 Eastern Empire was from one side Roman, and from 
 another side Greek. Its capital was the old Greek city 
 of Byzantium, refounded and enlarged to become the 
 New Rome or Constantinople. Its capital then was 
 at once Greek and Roman, and so was the dominion 
 of which it was the head. It was politically Roman, 
 
 D 2 
 
36 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 but intellectually Greek. Its political traditions, its 
 laws, the succession and titles of its Emperors, were 
 all Roman, and, down to its final conquest by the 
 Turks, it never knew any name but the Roman Empire. 
 Latin remained for some ages the language of 
 government and warfare. Byzantine Greek is full of 
 Latin technical terms, very much as English is, through 
 the effects of the Norman Conquest, full of French 
 technical terms. But Greek was the language of 
 literature and religion, and in the end it drove Latin 
 out for all purposes. Thus, while the nations which 
 pressed into the Western Empire came within the reach 
 of an undivided Roman influence, those which pressed 
 into the East came within the reach of a divided in- 
 fluence, partly Greek, partly Latin. Such a divided 
 influence was in itself less strong than the purely 
 Latin influence in the West. Add to this that the 
 Roman power in the East was centred in a single city 
 in a way in which it was not in the West. The moral 
 power of the Old Rome has been far greater than 
 that of the New. But the physical power of the New 
 Rome as a city has been far greater than that of the 
 Old. The Roman Empire grew out of the Old Rome 
 but, when the Roman power was at its height, the 
 local Rome itself had ceased to be the ruling city. 
 All Western Europe had, so to speak, become Rome, 
 and the local Rome itself was not more Roman than 
 other parts. Its geographical position, which had 
 made it the head of Italy, hindered it from remaining 
 the political head of Western Europe. The city of 
 Rome was taken over and over again by Teutonic con- 
 querors ; but by that very means its conquerors came 
 more and more under Roman influences. Thus in the 
 West the political succession of the Old Rome passec 
 
OLD AND NEW ROME. 37 
 
 away to Teutonic kings, while Rome herself, through 
 the absence of the Emperors, became the seat of a 
 new kind of dominion under her bishops. The New 
 Rome, on the other hand, was a great city, a great 
 fortress, which, as a city and fortress, commanded the 
 whole Eastern Empire, and which for nine hundred 
 years no foreign invader could ever take. Hence, 
 in the West, as the Roman power died out politically, 
 its moral influence was strengthened. In the East it 
 lived on as a political power, a power centred in one 
 great city, a city which the nations which pressed 
 into the Empire were always trying to take but never 
 could. /The Slaves who pressed into the Eastern 
 Empire admired and reverenced and looked up to the 
 New Rome. They learned its religion, and much of 
 its civilization. Still it remained a separate political 
 power, with which they were often at war. It followed 
 from all this that the Slaves in the Eastern Empire 
 remained distinct, in a way in which Goths, Franks, 
 and Burgundians in the Western Empire did not. 
 They learned much from the half Roman, half Greek, 
 power with which they had to do ; but they did not 
 themselves become either Greek or Roman, in the way 
 in which the Teutonic conquerors in the Western 
 Empire became Roman. Thus, as the existence ot 
 the Greek nation and Greek civilization preserved the 
 older nations as distinct nations, so the half Greek, 
 half Roman, character of the Eastern Empire, com- 
 bined with the centring of its whole power in a 
 single city, kept the new comers, that is chiefly the 
 Slaves, also apart as distinct nations. Thus, while in 
 the West everything except a few survivals of earlier 
 nations, is either Roman or Teutonic, in the East, 
 Greeks, Illyrians, Thracians or Roumans, and Slaves, 
 
38 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 tV.^ 
 
 all stood side by side as distinct nations when the 
 next set of invaders came, and they remain as distinct 
 nations still. 
 
 We thus see that, even with regard to the three 
 elements which Eastern and Western Europe may be 
 said to have in common, there are some marked dif- 
 ferences between the two. In both there were the 
 nations who were there before the Roman times, there 
 was the Roman power itself, and there were the 
 Aryan nations which had come in since the establish- 
 ment of the Roman power. But we have seen that 
 the relations between these three elements were not 
 quite the same in the East and in the West. In the 
 East the distinctions of race and language were broader 
 and more lasting than they were in the West. Still, 
 with all their differences and rivalries, these nations had 
 much in common ; they all had their share in those 
 things which are the common heritage of Christian 
 Europe. They were all Aryan ; they were all Christian ; 
 they had all come more or less fully under Greek and 
 Roman influences. Still various causes had made it 
 hard for them to unite, anfl they remained distinct 
 and often hostile nations. These points become of 
 importance when we come to the fourth element in 
 Eastern Europe, the settlement in it of nations wholly 
 foreign alike to Greeks, Albanians, Thracians, and 
 Slaves — nations, in a word, which were neither Aryan 
 nor Christian. The last and greatest of these were 
 the Ottoman Turks. But before we come to the 
 history of the Ottoman Turks, it will be well to com- 
 pare their settlement with the earlier settlements of 
 other nations more or less akin to them,( 6 ) as this 
 comparison will be found to be one of the most 
 instructive parts of our subject. 
 
 
NON-ARYANS IN EAST AND WEST. 39 
 
 The relations of Eastern and of Western Europe 
 to those nations which were neither Aryan nor Chris- 
 tian have been widely different. One might have 
 expected that the Semitic nations, the nations of 
 South-western Asia, the Phoenicians, Hebrews, and 
 Arabs, would have played a greater part in the 
 history of Eastern Europe than they played in the 
 history of Western Europe. Yet the contrary has 
 been the case both* in earlier and in later times. 
 Whatever influence the Phoenicians may have had on 
 the Greeks in the earliest times, the Phoenician settle- 
 ments in Europe in historical times were all in the 
 West, in Spain, in Sicily, in the other islands of the 
 Western Mediterranean. So it was ages after with 
 the Arabs or Saracens. They robbed the Eastern 
 Empi re of Sy ria, Egypt, and Africa ; they ravaged 
 Asi- a Minor ; they twice besieged Constantinople 
 itself ; but they formed no lasting settlement within 
 the bounds of Eastern Europe. But in the West they 
 conquered nearly the whole of Spain, and they kept 
 part of that conquest for nearly eight hundred years. 
 They held Sicily for a shorter, but a considerable 
 time ; and the only European province of the Eastern 
 Empire which they ever won, the island of Crete, 
 was won by a band of adventurers from Spain. Thus 
 the strictly Semitic power, the power of the Saracen 
 as distinguished from that of the Turk, has really 
 been stronger in Western than in Eastern Europe. 
 Yet we cannot reckon the Semitic power as one 
 of the elements in Western Europe. It was only in 
 Spain that the Saracen power was really abiding, 
 and even from Spain it has utterly passed away. It 
 could pass utterly away, because, though it lasted so 
 long, it was always an alien power in Europe, and 
 
! 
 
 40 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 never really took root. We need not count 
 Semitic power as an element either in Eastern or 
 Western Europe ; for in Eastern Europe the Semitic 
 nations never settled, and from Western Europe they 
 are quite gone. The case is quite different with 
 regard to that class of nations which form an im 
 portant element in Eastern Europe, but which hav 
 nothing answering to them in the West. This is th 
 group of nations to which the Turks belong, and o 
 which in Europe the Ottoman Turks are the most 
 prominent members. 
 
 Taking then the Turk as the greatest and the most 
 prominent specimen of those nations in Eastern 
 Europe which did not originally belong to the 
 European community of nations, and leaving out of 
 sight for a moment, the fact that he is only 
 one member of that class, let us ask how the 
 Turk looks as compared with the other nations of 
 the Eastern peninsula, Greek, Albanian, Rouman, 
 and Slave. We have seen that two chief causes had 
 combined to keep those nations distinct, and to make 
 any union among them very hard. At last there 
 came among them, in the form of the Ottoman Turk, 
 a people with whom union was not only hard but 
 impossible, a people who were kept distinct, not by 
 special circumstances, but by the inherent natureof 
 the case. Had the Turk been other than what he 
 really was, he might simply have become a new 
 nation alongside of the other South-eastern nations. 
 Being what he was, the Turk could not do this. He 
 could not sit down alongside of the other nations. 
 He could not assimilate the other nations or be assimi- 
 lated by them. He could not sit down -among jthe 
 other nations as a constant neighbour and occasional 
 
THE TURKS. 41 
 
 enemy. If he came among them at all, he could come 
 -only, as a„ ruler, and, if as a ruler, then as an oppressor. 
 We must now trace out what are the causes which, 
 even in Eastern Europe where the lasting distinction 
 of races is a characteristic of the history of the 
 country, have given the Turk a position wholly 
 unlike the position of any of the other races. 
 
 Why then has the conquest made by the Turks 
 been of a nature so different, not only from other 
 conquests made in Western Europe, but even from 
 other conquests made in Eastern Europe? Why is 
 the position of the Turks as a distinct people some- 
 thing quite unlike the position of any other people, 
 even in lands where nations have a tendency to 
 remain specially distinct ? The reason is because the 
 Turk has no share in any of those things which, 
 among all differences, are shared in common by the 
 European nations. The Turk belongs to another 
 branch— o£— the human family from the nations of 
 Europe, He has no share in the common history 
 of th-ese— nations, in their common memories, their 
 common feelings, their common civilization. Lastly, 
 what is more important than all the rest, he does 
 not profess any of the forms of the Christian religion, 
 but follows the religion of Mahomet. 
 (^ First then, the Turk has no share in that original 
 kindred of race and language which binds together 
 all the European nations/ The original Turks did 
 not belong to the Aryan branch of mankind, and 
 their original speech is not an Aryan speech. The 
 Turks and their speech belong to altogether another 
 class of nations and languages. They were wholly 
 distinct alike from the Aryan inhabitants of Europe 
 
42 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 and from the inhabitants of Western Asia, who, 
 wherever they were not Aryan, mainly belonged to 
 the Semitic family. The Semitic nations must, in all 
 those points which distinguish Eastern from Western 
 life, be set down as belonging to the Eastern divi- 
 sion. Yet in some points of language they come 
 nearer to the Aryans than the other non- Aryan 
 nations, and some of them have reached a higher stage 
 of civilization and civil polity than any of the nations 
 which lie beyond both the Aryan and the Semitic 
 range. It is not needful for our purpose to go deep 
 into any scientific enquiry, as to the exact relations of 
 those nations and languages of Asia and Northern 
 Europe which are neither Aryan nor Semitic. For our 
 purpose, it will be enough to class all those of them 
 with which our subject has anything to do under a 
 name which is sometimes given to them, that of 
 Turanian. The old Persians, who spoke an Aryan 
 tongue, called their own land Iran, and the barbarous 
 land to the north of it they called Turan. In their 
 eyes Iran was the land of light, and Turan was the 
 land of darkness. From this Turan, the land of 
 Central Asia, came the many Turkish settlements 
 which made their way, first into Western Asia and 
 then into Europe. The Turks are thus far more dis- 
 tant from any of the Aryan, or even from any of the 
 Semitic nations, of Europe and Asia than any one of 
 those nations can be from any other. From us Euro- 
 peans they are more distant than the Persians and 
 Hindoos, who are Aryan kinsfolk, though we and they 
 have been so long parted. They are more distant — 
 a fact which it is very important to notice — even than 
 their Semitic forerunners and teachers in the Ma- 
 hometan religion, the Arabs or Saracens. It is true 
 
 
 
IRAN AND TURAN. 43 
 
 that the original Turkish blood must have been 
 greatly modified, as their language has been greatly 
 modified, by their passage through Persia and Asia 
 Minor. It must also have been greatly modified by 
 their being joined by many European renegades, and 
 by their custom of forcing the youth of the nations 
 whom they conquered to serve in their armies and to 
 embrace their religion. In this way we might say 
 that the Turks in Europe are an artificial nation, and 
 it is certain that many of them must be, in actual 
 descent, of European blood. But the original stock 
 was something altogether foreign to Europe, and, in 
 a case like this, it is the original stock which gives the 
 character to the whole. The Turks in Europe have 
 neither assimilated the nations which they have con- 
 quered, nor have they been assimilated by them. 
 They have simply adopted a great many renegades, 
 one by one. And those renegades have of course 
 been assimilated by the body which they have joined. 
 They have practically become Turks. 
 
 Now we cannot reasonably doubt that this original 
 difference in blood and language has made it harder 
 than it would otherwise have been for the Turks 
 to become partakers of the common possessions of 
 the European nations, in short for them to become 
 an European nation. It would in any case have 
 made it harder for them, either, like conquerors in 
 Western Europe, to become one people with the con- 
 quered, or, like conquerors in Eastern Europe, to sit 
 down as a distinct nation alongside of other nations. 
 But there is no reason to believe that, had other 
 circumstances been favourable, the original difference 
 of race would of itself have made it impossible for 
 them to do so. Experience teaches us the contrary. 
 
44 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 
 For other Turanian nations beside the Ottoman 
 Turks have also made their way into Europe, and 
 the history of some of those nations has been quite 
 unlike the history of the Ottoman Turks. These 
 other Turanian nations came into Europe much earlier 
 than the Turks, and they came by a different road. 
 In chronological strictness then they should have 
 been mentioned before the Turks ; but, in order to 
 make the difference between their history and that 
 of the Ottoman Turks more clear, it seemed well first 
 of all to draw a general picture of the position of 
 the Ottoman Turks. The chief point to be shown is 
 that, while in any case it was harder for a Turanian 
 than for an .Aryan people to enter into the European 
 fellowship, yet, in the case of other Turanian nations, 
 though hard, it was not impossible. In the case of 
 the Ottoman Turks certain special circumstances 
 made it altogether impossible. 
 
 Setting aside any curious questions as to the re- 
 mains of Turanian nations in Europe earlier than 
 the coming of the Aryans, the historical incursions of 
 the Turanian nations, their attacks upon the Aryan 
 nations of Europe, began more than a thousand 
 years before the coming of the Ottoman Turks, in 
 the fourth century of our aera. Thus the Huns began 
 to make themselves terrible to Romans, Teutons and 
 Slaves. But in Western Europe neither the Hum 
 nor any other Turanian people ever made any lasting 
 settlements. ( 7 ) When Attila and his Huns invaded 
 Gaul in the fifth century, Romans, Goths, and Franks 
 all joined together. They smote the barbarians on 
 the Catalaunian fields, and saved Western Europe 
 from a Turanian occupation. In the East things 
 took a different course. There Turanian settlers, 
 
^m 
 
 OLDER TURANIAN INVASIONS. 45 
 
 ages before the coming of the Ottoman Turks, grew 
 up into great kingdoms. Passing by a crowd of 
 nations which play an important part in Byzantine 
 history but which have left no modern traces behind 
 them, we must mark that the Avars founded a great 
 kincrdom on the northern borders of the Eastern 
 
 o 
 
 Empire and often carried havoc through the lands 
 of the Empire itself. The Avars passed away be- 
 neath the sword of Charles the Great ; but two 
 other Turanian settlements must be specially noticed, 
 because they throw much light on the present ques- 
 tion. Long before the Turks came into Europe, 
 the Magyars or Hungarians had come ; and, before 
 the Magyars came, the Bulgarians had come. 
 Both the Magyars and the Bulgarians were in their 
 origin Turanian nations, nations as foreign to the 
 Aryan people of Europe as the Ottoman Turks 
 themselves. But their history shows that a Turanian 
 nation settling in Europe may either be assimilated 
 with an existing European nation or may sit down 
 as an European nation alongside of others. The 
 Bulgarians have done one of these things ; the 
 Magyars have done the other; the Ottoman Turks 
 have done neither. 
 
 So much has been heard lately of the Bulgarians 
 as being in our times the special victims of the 
 Turk that some people may find it strange to hear 
 who the original Bulgarians were. They were a people 
 more or less nearly akin to the Turks, and they came 
 into Europe as barbarian conquerors who were as 
 much dreaded by the nations of South-eastern Europe 
 as the Turks themselves were afterwards. The old 
 Bulgarians were a Turanian people, who settled in 
 a large part of the South-eastern peninsula, in lands 
 
46 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 
 I 
 
 which had been already occupied by Slaves. They 
 came in as barbarian conquerors ; but, exactly as 
 happened to so many conquerors in Western Europe, 
 they were presently assimilated by their Slavonic 
 subjects and neighbours. They learned the Slavonic 
 speech ; they gradually lost all traces of their foreign 
 origin. Those whom we now call Bulgarians are 
 Slavonic people speaking a Slavonic tongue, an 
 they have nothing Turanian about them excep 
 the name which they borrowed from their Turania 
 masters. Their case has been not unlike that o 
 the settlements of the Franks in Gaul or of the Nor- 
 mans in England. When we call their land Bulgaria 
 and its people Bulgarians, it is almost as if our own 
 land were called Normandy and ourselves Normans. 
 It is in some points as when the land and people 
 of Gaul came to be called France and French from 
 their Frankish conquerors. The Bulgarians entered 
 the Empire in the seventh century, and embraced 
 Christianity in the ninth. They rose to great power 
 in the South-eastern lands, and played a great part in 
 their history. But all their later history, from a com- 
 paratively short time after the first Bulgarian conquest, 
 has been that of a Slavonic and not that of a Turanian 
 people. The history of the Bulgarians therefore shows 
 that it is quite possible, if circumstances are favourable, 
 for a Turanian people to settle among the Aryans 
 of Europe and to be thoroughly assimilated by the 
 Aryan nation among whom they settled. 
 
 The other case of earlier Turanian settlement, 
 that of the Magyars or Hungarians, shows that 
 Turanian settlers can, even when they are not 
 assimilated, sit down in Europe and become an 
 European nation. The Magyars, who two hundred 
 
BULGARIANS AND MAGYARS. 47 
 
 years ago were among the subjects and victims 
 of the Turks, have lately taken to profess great 
 friendship for the Turks on the ground of common 
 origin. This is certainly carrying the doctrine of 
 race very far indeed. But there is just this much of 
 truth in it, that the Turanian Magyars came into 
 Europe, like the Bulgarians, as a race of Turanian 
 conquerors. They came in the last years of the 
 ninth century. For a while they were the terror 
 of East and West. But in the West they simply 
 ravaged ; in the East they sat down as a distinct 
 nation. And to this day they still keep marked 
 traces of their foreign origin, while the original 
 Bulgarians lost all traces of theirs in about two 
 hundred years. The Magyars still remain a distinct 
 nation, speaking their own Turanian tongue. In the 
 kingdom of Hungary to which they have given 
 their name, they still abide as in some sort a 
 ruling race among its Slavonic inhabitants, though 
 they certainly do not hold them in the same kind 
 of bondage in which the Turks hold their subject 
 nations. We therefore cannot say that the Magyars 
 have been assimilated, like the old Bulgarians ; 
 but we may fairly say that they have been incor- 
 porated among the nations of Europe. For, not very 
 long after their settlement, they adopted the religion 
 and the general civilization of Europe, and they have 
 ever since been reckoned as an European nation. 
 It has been a point of great importance in the 
 history of Eastern Europe that the Magyars, though 
 geographically they belong rather to Eastern than 
 to Western Europe, got their Christianity and civi- 
 lization from the West, and not from the East. 
 But our present point is that, though they kept 
 
48 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 
 their own tongue and remained a distinct nation, 
 they did adopt the religion and civilization of Europe 
 in some shape. Thus, though their history has not 
 been the same as the history of the Bulgarians, it has 
 been very different from the history of. the Turks. 
 And it should always be remembered that both 
 Bulgarians and Magyars have been among the 
 nations whom the Turks have overcome and borne 
 rule over. Their original kindred with the Turks 
 has not enabled them, any more than any of the 
 other nations whom the Turks overcame, either to 
 assimilate the Turks to themselves, or to be assimi- 
 lated by them. 
 
 It is therefore most important constantly to bear in 
 mind the history of the Bulgarians and Magyars, and 
 the difference between their case and that of the 
 Turks. Two of the Turanian nations which settled 
 in Europe have become more or less thoroughly 
 European. The third has not become European 
 at all. This shows that even difference of origin, 
 though very important, is not of itself enough to 
 account for the fact that the Turks, though they have 
 been so long settled in Europe, have never become 
 European. The cause of that fact must be sought 
 in difference of origin, combined with certain other 
 circumstances which have affected the settlement of 
 the Turks, but which did not affect the settlements of 
 the Bulgarians or the Magyars. 
 
 We have thus traced out the special characteristics 
 of the nations of South-eastern Europe, as compared 
 with the nations of the West. We have seen how the 
 earlier nations which were there before the Roman 
 conquest still abide as nations. We have seen how 
 one of them did in a manner make the Roman Empire 
 
 
SUMMARY. 49 
 
 its own, how in those lands the names Roman and 
 Greek came to have much the same meaning. We 
 have seen how, after the establishment of the 
 Roman power, the Slavonic nations settled in the 
 Eastern Empire, much in the same way in which 
 the Teutonic nations settled in the Western Empire, 
 but with some important differences, differences 
 which arose out of the earlier history of those lands 
 and which have affected their later history. We have 
 seen further how in the East there was a fourth 
 element which has nothing answering to it in the 
 West, namely the settlement of nations which were 
 not European or Aryan at all. We have seen that 
 some of these non- Aryan settlers could be assimilated 
 by their Aryan neighbours, while others could sit 
 down alongside of them as one nation among others. 
 That is, in different ways, they could both become 
 more or less thoroughly European. Lastly we have 
 seen that another race of non-Aryan settlers has 
 been able to do none of these things, but has always 
 remained distinct. It has conquered a large part 
 of Europe and held several European nations in 
 bondage, but it has never itself in any sort become 
 European. We must now go on to ask what were 
 the special reasons which hindered the Ottoman 
 Turks from doing as the Bulgarians did, or even as 
 the Magyars did, what in short has hindered them 
 from ever becoming an European nation. 
 
50 THE RACES OF EASTERN EUROPE. 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 (i, p. 29.) The truth is that during the last century the state of 
 
 things in Ireland was the nearest parallel in Western Europe to the 
 
 state of things in South-eastern Europe. The rule of the English in 
 
 Ireland was, we may hope, never quite so bad as the rule of the Turk in 
 
 South-eastern Europe, but it was a rule of essentially the same kind. 
 
 It was a rule of race over race, of creed over creed, exactly like the 
 
 rule of the Turk ; and, just as in the East, nationality and religion went 
 
 together. The subject class, the great Roman Catholic majority of the 
 
 island, consisted of the native Irish and of those of the earlier English 
 
 and Norman settlers who had practically become Irish, " Hibeinis 
 
 ipsis Hiberniores," as the phrase ran. The ruling Protestant body 
 
 consisted of those settlers, mainly later settlers, from Great Britain who 
 
 kept their own nationality, and were Protestant in religion. Practically 
 
 the state of things in Ireland was of the same kind as the state of things 
 
 in Turkey ; but the historical origin of the two cases was different. In 
 
 the case of the Turk and his subjects, the distinction was both national 
 
 and religious from the beginning. In the case of Ireland a distinction 
 
 which was originally national afterwards became religious. That is to 
 
 say, in the sixteenth century the native Irish, and those of the settlers 
 
 who had become Irish, clave to the Roman Catholic religion, while the 
 
 ruling English caste became Protestant. Thus the distinction became 
 
 more marked, as it is easier to tell what religion a man professes than 
 
 to tell from what blood he springs. Thus, while the earlier laws are 
 
 against the Irish as Irish, the later laws are against Roman Catholics 
 
 as Roman Catholics. The state of the Roman Catholic in Ireland 
 
 while the penal laws lasted was closely akin to the state of the 
 
 Christians in Turkey. It was a state of disability and degradation, 
 
 but not of religious persecution strictly so called. But the main 
 
 difference between the two cases is that in Ireland wrongs have been 
 
 redressed, while in Turkey they have not. On this head I shall have 
 
 something to say in a later chapter. 
 
 (2, p. 32.) I do not put forth this theory of the Thracian origin of 
 the Roumans with perfect confidence, but it seems to me more likely 
 than any other. It is commonly taken for granted that the Roumans 
 are the descendants of Roman colonists in Dacia, and of Dacians who 
 adopted the Latin language. The phenomena of Dacia would thus be 
 the same as the phenomena of Gaul and Spain. But then it should be 
 
NOTES. 5 1 
 
 remembered that Dacia was, of all the provinces of the older Roman 
 Empire, the last won, and the first lost. Conquered by Trajan, given 
 up by Aurelian, it was Roman only for about one hundred and seventy 
 years. The land was from that time onwards the highway of every 
 nation which pressed into Europe from the lands north of the Euxine ; 
 and it is most strange if Latin should have lived on there when it died out 
 in the neighbouring lands, or never made its way into them. But in truth 
 the Roumans or Vlachs are even now by no means confined to Dacia. 
 They are still found in many other parts of the peninsula, and their 
 settlement in the present Roumania was most likely owing to a later 
 migration. The Rouman power in those lands seems to have begun 
 only in the thirteenth century. (See Jirecek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, 
 p. 265.) It is much easier to suppose that these Latin-speaking people 
 in the Eastern peninsula represent, not specially Dacians or Roman 
 colonists in Dacia, but the great Thracian race generally, of which the 
 Dacians were only a part. The Thracian coast was early studded with 
 a fringe of Greek colonies, as it remains still ; but the mass of the 
 Thracian land was never Hellenized. It was thus ready at the time of 
 the Roman Conquest to be Romanized, just as Gaul and Spain were. 
 It adopted the Latin language, while Greece and the Hellenized 
 lands clave to Greek. The Roumans would thus represent those of 
 the Roman provincials of Thrace and Moesia who kept on their adopted 
 Roman nationality in the teeth of Slavonic conquests. The Vlachs 
 or Rumunje and the Greeks or* 'P&yieuoi both keep the Roman name, 
 though in different forms. (See more in Jirecek, pp. 66, 74.) 
 
 (3, p. 33.) "EA.A7JJ/, it must be remembered, from the New Testament 
 onwards, meant pagan. 
 
 (4, p. 34.) The Tetraxite Gothsin the land of Crim, if they are to be 
 called subjects of the Empire, did not become so by settling within its 
 bounds, but by entering into relations with it from outside. 
 
 (5, p. 34.) This is a point of special contrast between the Teutons 
 and the Slaves in the East. The Teutons only marched through ; the 
 Slaves settled. 
 
 (6, p. 38. ) I do not take on me to rule whether there is any real 
 kindred, strictly so-called, between the Bulgarians, the Magyars, and 
 the Ottoman Turks. They have for our purpose a kind of negative 
 kindred. The speech of all these belongs to a class quite distinct from 
 either the Aryan or Semitic. 
 
 (7, p. 44.) If there is any exception, it is the settlement of the Alans 
 in Spain. But the Alans, if they were Turanian to start with, would 
 seem to have been early brought under Teutonic influences, and they 
 have left no traces behind them in modern times. 
 
 F 2 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 We must now go back to the points which we drew 
 out in the first Chapter, the points in which Euro- 
 pean nations agree together, but in which the Turk 
 differs from all of them, the things which they all 
 have in common, but in which the Turk has no share. 
 First among these we placed general kindred of race 
 and speech, inasmuch as all the European nations, 
 with the smallest exceptions, belong to Aryan stock, 
 while the Turks belong to the Turanian stock. 
 But we have further seen in the last chapter, that this 
 original difference, had it stood by itself, would not 
 have been enough to hinder the Turks from becoming 
 Europeans by adoption. It doubtless would in any 
 case have made it harder for them to do so ; but it 
 would not of itself have made it impossible. For, as we 
 have seen, other Turanian nations, the Bulgarians and 
 Magyars, have become European by adoption. We 
 have now to see what it was by virtue of which the 
 change which was hard, but still possible, in the case 
 of the Bulgarians and Magyars has been altogether 
 impossible in the case of the Ottoman Turks. 
 
 To answer this, we must go through our other points 
 of likeness and unlikeness in order. The second 
 
THE TURKS ALIEN TO EUROPE. S3 
 
 point which we saw that the European nations had in 
 common, besides their original Aryan kindred, was 
 that they have a common history. They all have 
 certain historic memories in common, memories which 
 are chiefly derived from the dominion and influence of 
 Rome. From these memories comes a vast common 
 stock of what we may call literary and intellectual 
 possessions. In all this the Bulgarians and Magyars, 
 so far as they became European, came to have their 
 share, if not by inheritance at least by adoption. The 
 Bulgarians came under Greek, the Magyars under Latin, 
 influences. But in all those memories, and in all that 
 comes of fehose memories, as the Turks have no share 
 by inheritance, so neither have they ever won any 
 share by adoption. They have no share in that stock 
 of common ideas and feelings which belongs to the 
 European nations in general. They have no share in 
 the two languages which are the common possession 
 of Europe, the" Greek and the Latin. They have 
 their own languages and literature, of which we for the 
 most part know nothing, as they for the most part 
 know nothing of ours. They have their own Turkish 
 language, as we have our own tongues, Teutonic, 
 Romance, or Slavonic. What Greek and Latin have 
 been to us, Arabic and Persian have been to them, 
 They have occupied one of the two great seats of 
 Roman power, one of the great seats of Greek civili- 
 zation, but they have not thereby become Roman or 
 Greek, or European in any way. While the Teutons 
 in the West, while the Slaves in the East, came into 
 the Roman Empire, as half conquerors, half disciples, 
 the Turks have come in wholly as conquerors, not at 
 all as disciples. Settled in Europe, they have remained 
 untouched by all that distinguishes Europe and the 
 
54 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 colonies of Europe from Asia and Africa. The throne 
 of the New Rome is occupied by an Asiatic ruler 
 surrounded by an Asiatic people. Nor is this any the 
 less true, because, not the Turkish people in general, 
 but the ruling class among them, have very lately put 
 on a certain European varnish. The nature of the 
 Turkish power is not changed because certain classes 
 of Turks learn to speak an European language and 
 to wear an European dress. Such a mere varnish 
 has nothing in common with the deep moral influence 
 which the Western Rome had on the Teuton and the 
 Eastern Rome on the Slave. The Turk still remains 
 foreign to the feelings and habits and historic 
 memories of Europe. Of the other two Turanian 
 settlements in Europe this is not true. The modern 
 Bulgarian is whatever the other Slaves are ; the 
 Magyar, though he keeps his Turanian language, has 
 his share in the great heritage of Western Europe, in 
 the tongue and the civilization of Rome. 
 
 This brings us to the third point of difference 
 between the Turks and the European nations, the 
 point which is really the key to all the other points of 
 difference. We have seen that it is not impossible for 
 Turanians settled in Europe to become more or less 
 thoroughly European, to obtain a share in much of 
 those things which distinguishes European nations from 
 others. But while other Turanian nations have done 
 this, the Turks have never done it. Why is this? 
 Why could not the Turks do either as the Bulgarians 
 did or as the Magyars did ? The reason is because 
 the Bulgarians and the Magyars embraced the common 
 religion of Europe, while the Turks have never em- 
 braced it. Here is the great difference of all. As 
 soon as the Bulgarians and Magyars became Christians, 
 
 
 I 
 
PAGANS AND MAHOMETANS. 55 
 
 the great difference between them and the other 
 nations of Europe was at once taken away. The 
 Bulgarians indeed, . after some questioning and dis- 
 puting, embraced Christianity in its Eastern form, 
 while the Magyars embraced it in its Western form. 
 And many troubles and divisions in Europe have come 
 of this difference. Still both did become Christians, 
 and thus both became sharers in all those ideas and 
 feelings which are common to Christians of every sect, 
 but which are not shared by Pagans or Mahometans. 
 The Turks, on the other hand, entered Europe as 
 Mahometans, and Mahometans they still remain. 
 Here then is the great point of difference of all, that 
 point which makes it altogether impossible for the 
 Turks really to become an European nation. They 
 cannot become an European nation, as long as they 
 remain Mahometans ; and there is no known case of 
 any Mahometan nation accepting any other religion. 
 The question will now fairly be asked, why could 
 not the Turks lay aside their old religion, as the Bul- 
 garians and Magyars laid aside theirs, and embrace 
 the religion of Europe as the Bulgarians and Magyars 
 embraced it. The answer may be given in a very few 
 words. The Bulgarians and Magyars could embrace 
 Christianity, because they were heathens ; the Otto- 
 man Turks could not embrace Christianity, because 
 they were Mahometans. Because the Bulgarians and 
 Magyars were further off from the religion and civili- 
 zation of Europe than the Turks were, for that very 
 reason they were able to adopt the religion and 
 civilization of Europe, and the Turks were not. This 
 is a case in which we may reverse the familiar proverb, 
 and say that no bread is practically better than half a 
 loaf. That is to say, a half civilization stands as a 
 
56 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 hindrance in accepting a more perfect civilization, 
 half truth in religion stands in the way of accepting 
 more perfect truth. Experience proves this in all 
 ages of European history. The rude nations of 
 Western, Northern, and Eastern Europe easily 
 adopted the religion and civilization of Rome. No 
 Mahometan nation has ever been known to accept 
 Christianity ; no nation that has reached the half 
 civilization of the East has ever been known to accept 
 the full civilization of the West. This fact, the fact 
 of the wide distinction in these matters between the 
 Ottoman Turks and the earlier Turanian settlers in 
 Europe, is the very key of our whole subject. The 
 Turks are what they are, and they remain what they 
 are, because their religion is Mahometan. It by no 
 means follows that every Mahometan government 
 must be as bad as the Ottoman government is now. 
 For many Mahometan governments have been much 
 better. But no Mahometan government can ever give 
 to its subjects of other religions what we in Western 
 Europe are used to look on as really good govern- 
 ment. No Mahometan nation can really become part 
 of the same community of nations as the Christian 
 nations of Europe. These positions make it needful 
 to look a little further into the nature of the Maho- 
 metan religion, and into the relations which, under a 
 Mahometan government, must always exist, between 
 its Mahometan subjects and its subjects of other 
 religions. 
 
 This question is in itself a perfectly general one, not 
 a special question between Mahometanism and Chris- 
 tianity, but a question between Mahometanism and all 
 other religions. It is not needful here to enquire what 
 would be the position of a nation of some third religion, 
 
 
 
MUSSULMANS AND NON-MUSSULMANS. S7 
 
 neither Christian nor Mahometan. We need not ask 
 whether such a nation could be really admitted into the 
 European community, or whether it could give really 
 good government to any Christian or Mahometan 
 subjects that it might have. A great deal might be 
 said in answer to such a question, as a matter of 
 curious speculation. But the question is of no 
 practical importance for our present subject. The 
 only practical choice in Europe lies between Chris- 
 tianity and Mahometanism. The practical point is 
 that, whatever a nation of some third religion might 
 do, a Mahometan nation cannot live on terms of real 
 community with Christian nations ; a Mahometan 
 government cannot give real equality and good 
 government to its Christian subjects. The question) 
 in modern Europe lies between Christian and Ma- ' 
 hometan, because all the nations of Europe besides 
 the Turks are Christian. But it must be borne inj 
 mind that the question of the relation between 
 Mahometan and Christians is only part of a greater 
 question, that is, of the relation between Maho- 
 metans and men of other religions generally. What 
 is true of Mahometans and Christians in Europe, is, 
 or has been, true of Mahometans and Pagans in 
 Asia. It is true that the opposition between Maho- 
 metanism and Christianity in Europe has been 
 sharper than the opposition between Mahometanism 
 and other religions elsewhere. And this has come of 
 two causes ; first, because Christianity and Maho- 
 metanism are more distinctively rival religions than 
 any other two religions that can be named; secondly, 
 because Christians in Europe, have, for nearly four hun- 
 dred years past, had little to do with any Mahometans 
 except the Ottoman Turks, that is, with the fiercest 
 
58 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 and the most bigoted of all Mahometans. Q) Still, 
 the relation between Mahometans and Christians in 
 South-eastern Europe is only part of the general 
 relation between Mahometans and men of other 
 religions everywhere. What is true in the case of 
 South-eastern Europe will be found to be true in 
 the main, though it will often need some qualification, 
 in every land where Mahometans have borne rule 
 over men of any other creed. 
 
 f The fact simply is that no Mahometan govern- 
 ment ever has given or can give real equality to its 
 subjects of other religions. ] It would be most unjust 
 to put all Mahometan governments on a level in this 
 matter. There have been Mahometan rulers who 
 have avoided all wanton oppression of their non- 
 Muhometan subjects ; but, even under the best 
 Mahometan rulers, the infidel, as he is deemed in 
 Mahometan eyes, has never been really put on a level 
 with the true believers. Wherever Mahometans have 
 borne rule, the Mahometan part of the population 
 has always been a ruling race, and the Christian or 
 other non-Mahometan part has always been a subject 
 race. The truth is that this always must be so ; 
 it is an essential part of the Mahometan religion 
 that it should be so. The Koran, the sacred book 
 of the Mahometans, bids the true believers to 
 fight against the infidels, till the infidels either em- 
 brace Islam or submit to pay tribute. By paying 
 tribute, they purchase the right to their lives and 
 their property, which are otherwise held to be 
 forfeited, and to the exercise of their religion on 
 certain conditions. Their fate therefore is not the 
 worst of all possible fates ; they are not, like some 
 conquered nations, either swept away from the face 
 
 I 
 
MUSSULMAN TOLERATION. 59 
 
 of the earth or condemned to actual personal slavery. 
 Nor are they subject to anything which can in strict- 
 ness be called religious persecution. That is to say, 
 the Christian, or rather the non-Mussulman, subject 
 of a Mahometan government is not, simply as a non- 
 Mussulman, subject to death, bonds, or other legal 
 punishment. That he should be free from penalties 
 of this kind is implied in this very notion of the 
 tributary relation. His payment of tribute exempts 
 him from any penalities of the kind. So far the 
 position of the Christian under a Mahometan ruler is 
 better than that of the Christian heretic has been 
 under many Christian rulers. His religion is tolerated; 
 but it is simply tolerated, and the toleration is of a 
 purely contemptuous kind. There is no real religious 
 equality. The Christian may freely embrace Islam, 
 and no Christian may hinder him from so doing. But 
 for a Mahometan to embrace Christianity is a crime 
 to be punished with death. Thus the non-Mussulman 
 subjects of a Mussulman ruler sink to the condition of 
 a subject people. In the case of a people conquered 
 by Mussulman invaders, they sink into bondmen in 
 their own land. They remain a distinct and inferior 
 community, reminded in every act of their lives that 
 the Mussulmans are masters and that they are servants. 
 They so remain as long as they are faithful to their 
 religion : by forsaking it, they may at any moment 
 pass over to the ranks of their conquerors. Thus 
 every Christian under a Mussulman government is in 
 truth confessor for his religion, as he might gain 
 greatly by forsaking it. Still it is plain that such a 
 state of things as this, grievous and degrading as it 
 is, does not in theory involve any act of personal 
 oppression. That is to say, though the Christian is 
 
60 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 treated in every thing as inferior to the Mussulman, 
 yet his life, his property, and the honour of his family 
 might be safe. Under any Mahometan ruler who 
 did his duty according to his own law, they would be 
 safe, because the Christian by the payment of tribute 
 purchases his right to all these things. But the great 
 evil of a law which condemns any class of people to 
 degradation is that the practice under such a law is sure 
 to be worse than the law itself. The relation between 
 Christian and Mussulman under Mussulman rule is 
 fixed, not by a law like an Act of Parliament, which 
 may at any time be changed, but by a supposed 
 divine law which cannot be changed. The relations 
 between the Christian and the Mussulman, that is, 
 the abiding subjection and degradation of the Chris- 
 tian, are matters of religious principle. The law 
 enjoins neither persecution nor personal oppression : 
 it enjoins toleration, though merely a contemptuous 
 toleration. But when the toleration which the law 
 enjoins is purely contemptuous, when the subjection 
 of all religions but the dominant one is consecrated 
 by a supposed divine sanction, it is almost certain 
 that the practice will be worse than the law ; it is 
 almost certain that contemptuous toleration will pass 
 into an ordinary state of personal oppression, varied 
 by occasional outbursts of actual persecution. So 
 history shows that it has been. Instances may indeed 
 be found in which Christians or other non-Mussul- 
 mans have fared better under a Mussulman govern- 
 ment, than the law of the Koran prescribes ; as a rule, 
 they have fared worse. It could in truth hardly be 
 otherwise. When the members of one religious body 
 feel themselves to be, simply on account of their 
 religion, the superiors and masters of their neighbours 
 
 I 
 
IRREGULAR OPPRESSION. 6l 
 
 of another religion, the position is one which opens 
 every temptation to the worst passions of the human 
 heart. A man must have amazing command of him- 
 self, if, when it is his religious duty to treat a certain 
 class of men as subject and degraded, he does not 
 deal with them in a way which carries with it some- 
 thing yet more than subjection and degradation. A 
 bad man, even an average man, will be tempted every 
 moment to add direct insult and oppression beyond 
 what the letter of his law ordains. And so it has 
 been in the history of all Mahometan governments 
 which have borne rule over subjects of other religions, 
 especially over Christians. The best have been 
 what in Western Europe we should call bad ; and 
 their tendency has been, like most bad things, to 
 get worse. The Christian subjects of Mahometan 
 powers have often been much better off than Christian 
 subjects of the Turk are now. But in no case have 
 they been what in Western Europe we should call 
 really well off, and the tendency has always been for 
 their condition to get gradually worse and worse. 
 
 The truth is that the Mahometan religion is, above 
 all others, an aggressive religion. Every religion 
 which does not confine itself to one nation, but which 
 proclaims itself as the one truth for all nations, must 
 be aggressive in one sense. That is to say, it must be 
 anxious to bring men within its pale ; in other words 
 it must be a missionary religion. Now Mahometan- 
 ism is eminently a missionary religion ;( 2 ) but it is 
 something more. It is aggressive in another sense 
 than that of merely persuading men to embrace its 
 doctrines. It lays down the principle that the faith is 
 to be propagated by the sword. Other religions, 
 Christianity among them, have been propagated by 
 
62 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 the sword ; but it is Mahometanism only which lays 
 it down as a matter of religious duty that it should 
 be so propagated. No ruler who forced Christianity 
 by the sword on unwilling nations could say that 
 any precept of the Gospel bade him do so. And, 
 as the precepts of the Gospel have come to be better 
 understood, most Christians have agreed that such a 
 way of spreading the faith is altogether contrary to the 
 spirit of the Gospel. But the Mussulman who fights 
 against the infidel till he makes his choice between 
 the old alternatives of Koran or Tribute is simply 
 obeying the most essential precept of his religion; 
 This duty of spreading the faith by the sword, which 
 the Koran enforces on all Mussulmans, at once places 
 the Mahometan religion in a specially hostile position 
 towards all other religions. And furthermore the 
 whole character of that religion makes it the special 
 rival of Christianity. Without going into questions 
 of theological dogma, one main cause of this special 
 rivalry between Christianity and Islam is because 
 those two religions have so much in common. The 
 Christian would say of the Mahometan, and the Maho- 
 metan would say of the Christian, that in each case 
 the creed of the other had more of truth in it than 
 there was in any other creed which was not the whole 
 truth. As compared with heathen religions, the strife 
 between Christianity and Mahometanism has the pro- 
 verbial bitterness of the strifes of kinsfolk. A few 
 plain facts show the special rivalry of the two religions. 
 Many heathen nations have embraced Christianity, 
 and many have embraced Mahometanism. They 
 have done so in both cases, sometimes freely, some- 
 times by force. And in both cases they have, by 
 embracing either Christianity or Mahometanism, 
 
CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM. 63 
 
 raised themselves in every way, moral, social, and 
 religious. The advantage has been so clearly on the 
 side of the Christian or Mahometan teacher that the 
 heathens themselves have come to perceive it. But no 
 Christian nation has ever embraced Mahometanism ; 
 no Mahometan nation has ever embraced Christianity. 
 For they are distinctly rival religions, and not only 
 rival religions, but religions which represent rival 
 systems of social and political life. Each holds itself 
 to be theologically the one truth ; each believes itself 
 to represent a higher and better civil and social system. 
 And the Mahometan further believes that his civil 
 and social system is directly of divine authority. The 
 Christian does not hold that the Gospel is a legal code 
 for all times and places; the Mahometan does hold that 
 the Koran is such a code. Here, as Christians and 
 all who are not Mahometans hold, lies the great fault 
 of the Mahometan system. Precepts which were 
 admirable in the time and place where they were 
 first given, precepts which were a great reform when 
 Mahomet first preached them to the Arabs of the 
 seventh century, have been forced, wherever the 
 Mahometan power has spread itself, upon all nations 
 for all time. Hence, while a Christian government is 
 simply bound to shape its conduct according to the 
 moral precepts of the Gospel, a Mahometan govern- 
 ment is bound to enforce the Koran as the law of the 
 land. Hence too, while the Gospel is altogether 
 silent about the relations between the spiritual 
 and temporal powers, while Christian nations have 
 therefore settled that question in different ways at 
 different times, the Mahometan religion settles it in 
 one way for all time. Wherever the Mahometan 
 system is fully carried out, the spiritual power carries 
 
64 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 the temporal power with it. The successor of the 
 Prophet, the Caliph, is Pope and Emperor in one. 
 In the Mahometan system there is no distinction 
 between Church and State, no distinction between 
 religious and civil duty. Every action of a good 
 Mussulman is not only done from a religious motive, 
 but is done directly as a religious act. From this 
 spring both the best and the worst features of the 
 Mahometan system. This carrying of religion into 
 everything, the swallowing up, as one may say, of the 
 secular life in the religious life, leads to much that is 
 good in the relations of Mahometans towards one 
 another. A good and earnest Mahometan, who 
 carefully follows the precepts of his own law, must, at 
 least towards men of his own faith, practise many of 
 the moral virtues. The Mussulman too is never 
 ashamed of his religion or of any of the observances 
 which it enjoins. And this is certainly more than 
 we can say of all Christians. In short, if Islam had 
 never gone beyond Arabia, we might have reckoned 
 Mahomet among the greatest benefactors of mankind. 
 The only fault which could in such a case have been 
 laid to the charge of his system would be that, in re- 
 forming the old evils of the Eastern world, polygamy 
 and slavery, he had for ever consecrated them. The 
 worst that we could have said of Islam within its own 
 peninsula would have been that it was so great a reform 
 as to make a still greater reform altogether hopeless. 
 But this very feature which brings out so much good 
 in the relations of Mahometans to one another is the 
 very one which, before all others, makes Mahomet- 
 anism the worst of all religions in its relation to 
 men of any other religion. The feeling of exclusive 
 religious pride and religious zeal which it engenders 
 
GOOD SIDE OF ISLAM. 65 
 
 is very like that spirit of exclusive patriotic zeal and 
 pride which may be seen in the history of various 
 nations. The Mahometan has something in common 
 with the old Roman. The good and the bad features 
 of the old Roman character sprang from the same 
 source. The Roman commonwealth was to him what 
 the creed of Islam is to the sincere Mahometan. For 
 the Roman commonwealth he would freely give 
 himself, his life, and all that he had. Towards his 
 fellow citizens of that commonwealth he practised 
 many virtues. But as he was ready to sacrifice him- 
 self to the commonwealth, so he was equally ready 
 to sacrifice everything else. The rights of other 
 nations, the very faith and honour of Rome herself, 
 were as nothing in his eyes, if he deemed that the 
 greatness of the commonwealth could be advanced 
 by disregarding them. So it is with the Mahometan 
 religion. No religion has ever called forth more 
 intense faith, more self-sacrificing zeal, on the part 
 of its own professors. But the one precept which 
 corrupts all, the precept which bids the true believer 
 to fight against the infidel, turns that very faith and 
 zeal which have in them so much to be admired into 
 the cruellest instruments of oppression against men 
 of all other creeds. 
 
 At this stage it may very likely be asked, and that 
 not unfairly, whether it is meant to charge all Maho- 
 metan nations and all Mahometan governments with 
 the crimes which disgrace the rule of the Ottoman 
 Turks. The answer is easy. If it is meant to ask 
 whether all Mahometan nations and governments 
 have been guilty of those crimes in the same degree, 
 we may unhesitatingly answer, No. There is a vast 
 difference between one Mahometan nation or govern- 
 
 F 
 
66 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 ment and another, just as there is a vast difference 
 between one Christian or Pagan nation or governmenl 
 and another. But it is none the less true that the 
 crimes which mark the Ottoman rule spring directh 
 from the principles of the Mahometan religion. They 
 show the worst tendencies of that religion carried out 
 in their extremest shape. There have been other 
 Mahometan powers under which those tendencies 
 have not been allowed to reach the same growth. 
 That is to say, there have been Mahometan govern- 
 ments whiclr have been very far from being so bad 
 as that of the Ottoman Turks. But under every 
 Mahometan government those tendencies must exist 
 in some degree ; therefore, while some Mahometan 
 governments have been far better than others, no 
 Mahometan government can be really good according 
 to a Western standard. For no Mahometan govern- 
 ment which rules over subjects which are not 
 Mahometans can give really equal rights to all its 
 subjects. The utmost that the best Mahometan ruler 
 can do is to save his subjects of other religions from 
 actual persecution, from actual personal oppression ; 
 he cannot save them from degradation. He cannot, 
 without forsaking the principles of his own religion, 
 put them on the same level as Mussulmans. The 
 utmost that he can do is to put his non-Mussulman 
 subjects in a state which, in every Western country 
 would .be looked upon as fully justifying them in 
 revolting against his rule. And, as we have seen, the 
 tendencies to treat them worse than this are almost 
 irresistible. Among the Ottomans those tendencie 
 have reached their fullest development. A rude 
 people, a bigoted people, in its beginning a band of 
 adventurers rather than a nation, rose to power under 
 
 I 
 
SPECIAL POSITION OF THE OTTOMANS. 67 
 
 a line of princes who were endowed with unparalleled 
 gifts for winning and keeping dominion, but who had 
 but a small share in those qualities which make domi- 
 nion something other than a mere rule of force. The 
 Ottomans have been simply a power. They have been 
 a power whose one work has been the subjugation of 
 other nations, Mahometan as well as Christian, a power 
 whose sole errand has been that of conquest, and 
 which therefore, as soon as it ceased to conquer, sank 
 into a depth of wickedness and weakness beyond all 
 other powers. The Ottoman Turk, a conqueror and 
 nothing more, has had no share in the nobler qualities 
 which have distinguished many other Mahometan 
 nations which have been conquerors and something 
 else as well. He has no claim to be placed side by 
 side with the higher specimens of his own creed, with 
 the early Saracens or with the Indian Moguls. It 
 would be a blessed change indeed if the lands of 
 South-eastern Europe could be transferred from the 
 rule of the corrupt gang at Constantinople to a rule 
 just, if stern, like that of the first Caliphs. But, even 
 under the rule of the first Caliphs, they would still 
 be in a case which would cause any Western people 
 to spring to arms. No Mahometan ruler, I repeat, 
 can give more than contemptuous toleration ; he 
 cannot give real equality of rights. One Mahometan 
 ruler tried to do so, and not only tried but succeeded. 
 But he succeeded only by casting away the faith which 
 hindered his work. Akbar was the one prince born 
 in Islam who gave equal rights to his subjects who 
 did not profess the faith of Islam. But he was also 
 the one prince born in Islam who cast away the faith 
 of Islam. To do his work, the noblest work that 
 despot ever did, he had to cast aside the trammels 
 
 F 2 
 
I 
 
 X 
 
 68 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION 
 
 of a creed under which his work could never have 
 been done. No fact proves more clearly that under 
 Mahometan rule there can be no real reform than the 
 fact that the one Mahometan prince who wrought 
 real reform had to cease to be Mahometan in orde 
 to work it.( 3 ) 
 
 So again with regard to another point. It may be 
 asked, Is the Mahometan religion necessarily incon- 
 sistent with proficiency in literature, art, and science ? 
 Here too a different answer may be given according 
 to the different standard which we take. The East 
 has its own literature, art, and science, apart from 
 those of the West : the East has its own civilization 
 apart from that of the West. We may deem that the 
 East is inferior to the West in all these things, and 
 history proves that it is so. But the real point is, not 
 that one is inferior or superior to the other, but thai 
 they are essentially distinct. Our position is thai 
 the Turk has never won for himself any share in the 
 common intellectual possessions of the West. Ever 
 in the East, no one would place him in theserespect 
 on a level with either the Arab or the Persian. Bu 
 our point is wholly with regard to his share in th 
 intellectual possessions of the West. In those pos 
 sessions we may say that no Mahometan nation ha 
 ever had a full share, and that the Ottoman Tur 
 has had no share at all. The Saracen, both of th 
 East and of the West, has his distinct place in th 
 history of art and science ; the Ottoman Turk h; 
 none. What the real share of the Saracens in the. 1 
 matters is I have tried to show elsewhere. I nee 1 
 here only- repeat that those who speak of the Spani.' . 
 Saracens as ever having at any time had learning, a: , 
 and science all to themselves simply show that th< / 
 
MAHOMETAN ART AND SCIENCE. 69 
 
 are themselves in the blackness of darkness with 
 regard to the history of Christendom generally, and 
 specially with regard to the history of the Eastern 
 Rome.( 4 ) 
 
 We have gone off somewhat from the main track 
 of our argument to mark how far the special evils 
 of Ottoman rule are shared by Mahometan govern- 
 ments in general, and how far they are directly owing 
 to the Mahometan religion. The answer is that they 
 are directly owing to the Mahometan religion, that 
 they must in some measure affect every Mahometan 
 government, but that the special character and posi- 
 tion of the Ottoman Turks has aggravated the worst 
 tendencies of the Mahometan religion, and has made 
 their rule worse than that of any of the other great 
 Mahometan powers of the world. ( 5 ) We now come 
 back to the fifth point of difference between the 
 state of South-eastern Europe under the Turk and 
 the state of the nations of Western Europe under 
 their several national governments. It follows from 
 all that has gone before that the nations of Western 
 Europe, saving those small exceptions which have 
 been already spoken of, have national governments 
 of their own, but that the nations of South-eastern 
 Europe have not. Let us once more compare the 
 Bulgarian and the Ottoman Turk. The Bulgarians 
 came in as heathen invaders. They embraced Christi- 
 anity, and were lost among their Christian neighbours 
 and subjects. Their government then became a 
 national government. The Turks came in, not as 
 heathen but as Mahometan invaders. They have not 
 embraced Christianity. They have always remained 
 distinct from their Christian neighbours and subjects. 
 Their government has never become a national 
 
/O THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 
 government to any but the invading race themselves. 
 It is a string of causes and effects. The rule of 
 the Bulgarian could become a national government, 
 because he embraced Christianity, and he was able 
 to embrace Christianity because he came in as a 
 heathen. The rule of the Ottoman Turk has never 
 become a national government, because the Turk has 
 never embraced Christianity, he could not embrace 
 Christianity because he came in as a Mahometan. It 
 is a fact well worthy of remembrance that both the 
 Bulgarians, and somewhat later the Russians, when they 
 became dissatisfied with their own heathen religion, 
 had Mahometanism and Christianity both set before 
 them, and that they deliberately chose Christianity. 
 Had either of those nations chosen otherwise, the 
 history of Europe would have been very different 
 from what it has been. The rule of the Bulgarian 
 would have been what the rule of the Turk has been. 
 The state of things which began in the South-eastern 
 lands in the fourteenth century would have begun in 
 the ninth. We need not stop to show how different 
 the whole history of the world would have been, if the 
 heathen Russians, instead of adopting Christianity, 
 had adopted Mahometanism. As it was, both nations 
 made a better choice, and the history of the Bulgarian, 
 as compared with that of the Ottoman Turk, has 
 given us the most instructive of lessons. The heathen 
 conquerors could be turned into Christian brethren ; 
 the Mahometan conquerors could not. And, remain- 
 ing Mahometans, they could not give a national 
 government to fchose of the conquered who remained 
 Christians. Now among those who so remained were 
 the bulk of the conquered nations, the nations them- 
 selves as nations. Many individuals everywhere, in 
 
CONTRAST OF BULGARIANS AND TURKS. J I 
 
 some lands large classes, embraced, as was not very 
 wonderful, the religion of the conquerors, and so 
 rose to the level of the conquerors. But the vast 
 majority clung stedfastly to the faith whose con- 
 tinued profession condemned them to be bondmen 
 in their own land. Thus the distinction of religion 
 marked off the two classes of conquered and con- 
 querors, subjects and rulers, the people of the land 
 and the strangers who held them in subjection. Had 
 it been merely the distinction of conqueror and con- 
 quered, that might have died out as it has died out 
 in so many lands. The Turk might by this time 
 have been as thoroughly assimilated as the Bulgarian. 
 But the distinction of religion kept on for ever the 
 distinction between conquerors and conquered. The 
 process of conquest, the state of things directly follow- 
 ing on conquest, still goes on after five hundred 
 years. 
 
 Thus the rule of the Mahometan Turk is not, and 
 cannot be, a national government to any of his Chris- 
 tian subjects. This must be thoroughly understood, 
 because so many phrases which we are in the habit of 
 using are apt to lead to error on this point. We said 
 in an earlier chapter that many words which have one 
 meaning when we apply them to the state of things in 
 Western Europe, have another meaning or no meaning 
 at all when we apply them to the state of things in 
 South-eastern Europe. If in speaking of things in 
 South-eastern Europe we use such words as " sove- 
 reign," " subject," " government," " law," we must re- 
 member that we are using them with quite another 
 meaning than they bear when applied to the same 
 things in Western Europe. Thus in common lan- 
 guage we speak of the power which is now established 
 
72 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 at Constantinople as the Turkish ""government" or 
 the Ottoman "government." We speak of the 
 Sultan as the "sovereign" of Bulgaria, Bosnia, Thes 
 saly, or Crete. We speak of the Christian inhabitant 
 of those countries as the Sultan's " subjects." His 
 subjects they undoubtedly are in one sense ; but it is 
 in a sense quite different from that which the word 
 bears in any Western kingdom. The word "subject " 
 has two quite different meanings when we speak of a 
 Turkish subject and when we speak of a British sub- 
 ject. When we call an Englishman a British subject, 
 we mean that he is a member of the British state, and 
 we call him subject rather than citizen simply because 
 the head of the British state is a king or queen and 
 not a republican magistrate. Every British subject 
 is the member of a body of which the Queen of 
 Great Britain and Ireland is the head. But if we 
 call a Bulgarian an Ottoman subject, it does not 
 mean that he is the member of a body of which the 
 Ottoman Sultan is the head. It means that he is the 
 member of a body which is held in bondage by the 
 body of which the Ottoman Sultan is the head. It 
 does not simply mean that he is a subject of the 
 Grand Turk as a political ruler. It means that he 
 is also subject to all the lesser Turks as his daily op- 
 pressors. If we speak of " government," the " Turkish 
 government," and the like, the words are apt to sug- 
 gest, often unconsciously, that they have the same 
 meaning when they are applied to Eastern Europe 
 as they have when applied to Western Europe. 
 What we understand by " government " in Western 
 Europe is the administration of the law. The govern- 
 ment is the body which protects those who obey the 
 law, and which punishes those who break it. And in 
 
 e 
 
 I 
 
MISAPPLICATION OF WORDS. 73 
 
 all the countries of Western Europe, whether they are 
 called kingdoms or commonwealths, the nation itself 
 has some share, more or less perfect, more or less 
 direct, in appointing and controlling both those who 
 make the law and those who administer it. When 
 this is the case, it matters nothing for our purpose 
 whether the state is called a kingdom or a common- 
 wealth, whether the mass of the nation are spoken of 
 as " subjects " or as " citizens." For our purpose, for the 
 comparison between Eastern and Western Europe, 
 " subject " and "citizen " mean the same thing. We 
 speak of a British "subject" and we speak of a French 
 "citizen ;" but the use of the two different words simply 
 marks the difference of the form of the executive in the 
 two countries. " Subject " and " citizen " alike mean a 
 man who is a member of a political community, and 
 who has, or may by his own act acquire, a share in 
 the choice of those who make and who administer the 
 law. The duties of the sovereign and of the subject 
 are correlative. The subject owes allegiance to the 
 sovereign who gives him protection ; the sovereign 
 owes protection to the subject who lives under his 
 allegiance. All this applies in its fulness to all con- 
 stitutional states, whether they are called kingdoms 
 or commonwealths. It applies in a less degree even 
 to despotic states, so far as the despotic sovereign is 
 really the head of the nation and has interests and 
 feelings in common with the nation. But in South- 
 eastern Europe, under the rule of the Turk, there is 
 nothing which answers to the state of things which we 
 have just been describing. If therefore we use 
 words like "government," "sovereign," "subject,'' 
 to describe a state of things which does not exist 
 in those lands, we must remember in what sense we 
 
74 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 are using them. As far as the Turks themselves 
 are concerned, the Turkish government is a govern- 
 ment, though a despotic one. To the Turks the 
 Sultan is their sovereign, the head of their nation. 
 As members of that nation, they are his subjects. 
 A Turk is a subject of the Sultan, if not in the sense 
 in which an Englishman is the subject of his Queen, 
 yet at least in the sense in which a Russian is the 
 subject of his Emperor. But the Christian subjects 
 of the Sultan, that is the people of the lands in which 
 the Sultan and his Turks are encamped as strangers, 
 so far from being the Sultan's subjects in the English 
 sense, are not even his subjects in the Russian sense. 
 He is not the head of their nation, but the head of a 
 foreign nation, a nation whom they look on as their 
 bitterest enemies. They are not his subjects, because 
 he does not give them that protection which is involved 
 in the relation of sovereign and subject, that protection 
 which the Russian receives from his despotic sovereign 
 no less than the Englishman from his constitutional 
 sovereign. They are not his subjects in the English, 
 or even in the Russian sense, because, as he gives them 
 no protection, :they owe him no allegiance. He is 
 not their sovereign, but a stranger who holds them 
 down by force. They are not his subjects, except in 
 the sense of being held down by force. If we apply 
 the word "sovereign" and "subject" to the relation 
 between the Turkish Sultan and the Christian nations 
 which are under his power, we must remember that 
 we use those words in a sense in which we might 
 speak of a burglar who has broken into a house as the 
 " sovereign" of that house, and the owner of the house 
 and his family as the " subjects" of the burglar. 
 The rule of the Turk in short over the Christian 
 
 I 
 
" SOVEREIGN " AND u SUBJECT." 75 
 
 nations which are under his power is a rule of mere 
 force and not a rule of law. This must be so when- 
 ever a Mahometan government bears rule over 
 subjects of any other religion ; but it is so in a truer 
 and fuller sense when the Mahometan government is 
 the government of the Ottoman Turk. The rule of a 
 Mahometan power cannot be a rule of law to its subjects 
 of any other religion ; for them no law, strictly speak- 
 ing, exists. They have not, as the people have in a con- 
 stitutional state, any share, however indirect, in making 
 the law. So far from having a share in making the 
 law, the law is not even made in their interest or for 
 their benefit, as it may be even in a despotic state, 
 when the despot is really the head of the nation. In a 
 Mahometan state the only law is the Koran, the sacred 
 book of Mahomet ; or rather it is not the Koran 
 itself, but what the Koran has been made into by 
 successive expounders and commentators. But the 
 law thus made is a law made wholly in the interest 
 of the Mahometan rulers, not at all in that of their 
 Christian subjects. The Christian is in strictness out 
 of the pale of the law ; the utmost that he can do is 
 to purchase certain rights, the security of his life, his 
 property and the exercise of his religion, by the 
 payment of tribute. The law is not made for him, 
 and the law is not administered for him. So far as 
 he is in theory entitled to its protection, that protec- 
 tion is a mere name, because the witness of an infidel 
 cannot by the Mahometan law be taken against the 
 true believer. The Christian is thus absolutely without 
 protection. Even supposing the court to deal quite 
 justly according to its own rules, to punish all crimes 
 which are proved according to its own rules, still a 
 crime done by a Mahometan against a Christian can 
 
y6 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 hardly ever be punished, because it can hardly ever 
 be proved. If it be done in the presence of any 
 number of Christian witnesses, but of Christian wit- 
 nesses only, their witness cannot be taken and the 
 crime cannot be punished. Such is the theory of the 
 Mahometan law. Its practice has been better and 
 worse in different times and places. Under the 
 Turkish rule now it is for the most part very hard to 
 get justice done for a crime committed by a Maho- 
 metan against a -Christian, unless the Christian can 
 both bribe the judge and hire Mahometan witnesses. 
 Practically then a Mahometan may do what he 
 choses to a Christian with very little fear of being 
 punished for it. It is plain that to apply the words 
 " law " and " government " to a state of things like 
 this is a mere abuse of words. For the Christian 
 subject of the Turk law and government do not exist. 
 The thing which usurps their names is not law and 
 government, but simply a system of organized 
 brigandage. 
 
 The utter difference between the meaning of the 
 word government, as applied ■ to Western and to 
 South-eastern Europe, will be best understood if we 
 look at it in this way. We have seen that among 
 the nations of Western Europe, unless in a few ex- 
 ceptional corners, no one wishes to get rid of the 
 government of his country, though he may wish to 
 modify and improve it in many ways. The Swiss, 
 the Englishman, the Russian, live under very different 
 forms of government ; and it is possible that this or 
 that man among those three nations may think that 
 the form of government which he sees in one of the 
 other nations is better than his own. He may wish 
 to reform his own government according to the mode 
 
 lodel 
 
" GOVERNMENT." jy 
 
 of the other. But, at the utmost, all that he wishes 
 is to reform the government of his country, not to 
 get rid of it. All alike wish to remain members 
 of a political community which shall be Swiss, Eng- 
 lish, or Russian. But the Christian subject of the 
 Turkish government does not wish to reform the 
 Turkish government ; he does not wish to re-construct 
 it after the model of some other government ; he 
 simply wishes to get rid of it altogether. He is not 
 a member of a Turkish political community ; for, 
 while he is under the power of the Turk, he stands 
 outside all political communities. Nor does he wish 
 to become a member of a Turkish political com- 
 munity ; for he is not a Turk, and he does not look 
 on Turks as his countrymen. What he wishes is to 
 become a member of a political community of his own 
 nation, which shall have nothing to do with the Turk. 
 He knows nothing of the so-called Turkish "govern- 
 ment," or of his so-called "sovereign" the Sultan, 
 except so far as he is compelled by force to know 
 something of them. They are not the heads of his 
 own nation, but the heads of a foreign and hostile 
 nation. These are the plain facts as to the state of 
 South-eastern Europe ; and, if we do not wish to use 
 words which are altogether misleading, we must adapt 
 our language to the facts ; otherwise we shall fall into 
 strange mistakes. Thus it has sometimes been said 
 that, if the Christians of the East have grievances, they 
 ought to lay them before " their own government," and 
 not to listen to " foreign intriguers." In so saying, not 
 only are the facts of the case altogether misstated, but 
 the words themselves are used in a misleading sense. 
 As a matter of fact, the subject nations have, over 
 and over again, laid their grievances before the power 
 
78 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 
 which calls itself their government, and they have got 
 no redress by so doing. It is impossible that they 
 could have redress by so doing, for the power to 
 which they applied was not their own govern- 
 ment, nor any government at all. That power 
 could not redress their grievances, because to re- 
 dress their grievances would be to destroy itself. 
 For the existence of that power, that falsely called 
 "government," is itself the greatest of their griev- 
 ances, the root and cause of all lesser grievances 
 Those again who are spoken of as foreign intriguers 
 are, in the eyes of the subjects of the Turk, not 
 foreigners but countrymen. They are that part of 
 their countrymen who have kept or won their freedom, 
 while they themselves are left in bondage. The 
 English statesman who gave that piece of advice 
 spoke as if the Turk was the countryman of the 
 Bosnian Christian, as if the Turkish government was 
 his government, as if the Servian or the Montenegrin 
 was a foreigner to him. In truth, the Bosnian Christian 
 looks on the Servian or Montenegrin as his country- 
 man ; he looks on the Turk as a foreigner. He does 
 not look on the Turkish government as his government 
 at all ; for it does not discharge the common duties 
 of government. But he would gladly be under any 
 government, Servian, Montenegrin, or any other, 
 which would discharge those duties. So we often 
 hear of the " interests of Turkey," " the friends of 
 Turkey," " the enemies of Turkey." If by " Turkey " 
 is meant the land and people over which the Turks 
 rule, as we should mean if we spoke of the " interests," 
 the " friends," the " enemies," of England or France, 
 then those phrases are used in a sense which is utterly 
 misleading. People talk of the " interests of Turkey," 
 
" TURKEY" AND THE TURKS. 79 
 
 meaning the " interests of the Turks." But whatever 
 is for the real interest of Turkey is against the 
 interest of the Turks: for the interest of the Turk is 
 to keep Turkey in bondage ; the interest of Turkey 
 is to get free from the bondage of the Turk. So the 
 enemies of the Turks are the friends of Turkey ; the 
 friends of the Turk are the enemies of Turkey. At 
 the late Conference at Constantinople we sometimes 
 heard of the "representatives of Turkey," mean- 
 ing two Turks who were allowed to sit with the 
 European ambassadors. Now all those European 
 ambassadors might in a sense be called "represen- 
 tatives of Turkey ; " for it is to be hoped that they 
 were all trying to do something for the good of the 
 land and people of Turkey. But the two Turks were 
 in no way " representatives of Turkey ; " for they 
 were doing all that they could against the land and 
 people of Turkey by striving to prolong their own 
 wicked dominion over them. 
 
 So again at the same Conference there was talk 
 about a " foreign occupation " of this or that province 
 of the land which we call Turkey. By a " foreign 
 occupation " was meant the presence of civilized 
 troops who should protect the people of the land. 
 But those who used that phrase seemed to forget 
 that those lands are already under a foreign occu- 
 pation, a foreign occupation of the worst kind. The 
 Turks, as has been often said, are simply an army 
 of occupation in a conquered country. They have 
 been so for five hundred years, and they remain so 
 still. They are encamped on the lands of other 
 nations, where they hold down the rightful owners 
 by force. They are essentially an army ; for every 
 Turk is armed, while the Christian is unarmed. The 
 
80 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 only objection to calling them an army is that in 
 an army there is discipline, and a soldier who does 
 wrong may be punished, while in the Turkish army 
 of occupation there is no discipline. For every Turk 
 may do whatever wrong he chooses to the people of 
 the land, and he is never punished for so doing. 
 Wherever the armed Turk is, whether he is enlisted 
 as a regular soldier of the Sultan or not, there is 
 the foreign army of occupation. What was really 
 proposed was, not to bring in a foreign occupa- 
 tion as something new, but to change one foreign 
 occupation for another. It was proposed to put a 
 friendly foreign occupation instead of a hostile 
 one ; it was proposed to take away the Turkish 
 army of oppressors, and to put instead an European 
 army of protectors. It was proposed to take away 
 the army which killed and robbed the people of the 
 land at pleasure, and to put instead of them an army 
 which should save the people of the land from being 
 killed and robbed. That the army of foreign robbers 
 themselves disliked such a proposal was only natural : 
 but it was very strange to hear, as we often heard, 
 that such a measure was against the dignity, the 
 independence, or the interests of "Turkey." The 
 Turk of course did not want to be put aside, and 
 to put him aside might be said to be against his 
 interest ; but to put him aside was the very thing 
 which the interest of Turkey, its land and people, 
 demanded above all things. 
 
 This way of talking about "Turkey" and "the Turks" 
 as if they meant the same thing comes from our 
 Western way of looking at things. As England is the 
 land of England, as France is the land of the French, 
 we get almost unwittingly into a way of speaking 
 
THE TURKS AN ARMY OF OCCUPATION. 8 1 
 
 'as if Turkey were the land of the Turks. And if we 
 allow ourselves to speak in a misleading way, we can 
 hardly fail to get in some degree confused in our 
 thoughts as well as in our words. We cannot too 
 constantly remember, we cannot too often repeat, 
 that the Turks in the land which we call Turkey are 
 not the people of the land, but simply an army of 
 occupation encamped among them. They are an 
 army of foreign invaders, towards whom the people 
 of the land have only one interest and one duty, 
 namely to free themselves from the foreign yoke as 
 soon as they can. The words " army of occupation " 
 so exactly express the truth of the case that there 
 are no words which the friends of the Turks — that is, 
 the enemies of the land and people of Turkey — so 
 greatly dislike to hear. Those words exactly set 
 forth the truth of the case ; they bring out strongly 
 that the Turk, though he has been so long in the 
 land, is as much a stranger as he was when he first 
 came, that his rule which began in force has been 
 kept on by sheer force ever since. It was a foreign 
 army which entered the land five hundred years back, 
 and it is a foreign army which keeps the land in 
 bondage still. The Turk who occupies the Greek 
 and Slavonic lands is still as much a stranger in 
 those lands, as much a mere foreign invader, as the 
 Germans were in France, when a few years back they 
 held part of France as an army of occupation. In 
 one case the foreign occupation lasted only for a 
 year or two ; in the other case it has gone on for 
 ages ; but it has not changed its nature by length of 
 time. Only between the two cases there was this 
 great difference, that France was occupied by a 
 civilized and disciplined army, acting according to 
 
 G 
 
82 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 
 the rules of civilized warfare, while the Greek and 
 Slavonic lands are occupied by a barbarian army 
 which knows no rules of discipline at all. The 
 regular soldiers of the Sultan are doubtless the least 
 mischievous part of the army of occupation, for they 
 are under some kind of discipline. The worst part 
 of the army of occupation is made up of the armed 
 Turks scattered through the whole land, who are 
 under no discipline, and who do whatever evil they 
 may think good. -To call them an army of occu- 
 pation is not, as the friends of the Turks often say, a 
 figurative or rhetorical way of speaking. It is the 
 soberest and truest way of setting forth the past 
 history and the present state of the Turk, and of the 
 lands which he holds under his yoke. 
 
 We have seen now what the Turk is, and we have 
 seen that it is mainly his religion that has made him 
 what he is. From all this another point follows. A 
 system of this kind, a system under which the bond- 
 age of the mass of the people of a country is enforced 
 by their rulers as a matter of religious duty, is in- 
 capable of reform. It can be got rid of ; it cannot 
 be reformed. It may be got rid of in three ways 
 first, by the rulers embracing the religion of their 
 subjects ; secondly, by the subjects embracing the 
 religion of their rulers ; or thirdly, by trans- 
 ferring power to hands under which contending 
 races and religions may be put on a level of real 
 equality. The two former alternatives do not come 
 within the range of practical politics. The general 
 conversion of the Mahometans to Christianity is out 
 of the question. It is barely possible in some special 
 districts under special circumstances. ( 6 ) The general 
 conversion of the Christians to Mahometanism is 
 
REFORM IMPOSSIBLE. 8$ 
 
 equally out of the question ; and, even setting purely 
 theological feelings aside, it is a solution which no one 
 in Western Europe could wish for. The only means 
 of putting an end to the state of things which neces- 
 sarily follows on Mahometan rule is to put an end to 
 
 j^the Mahometan rule itself. Schemes of reform lie as 
 much out of the range of practical politics as any 
 
 ^ general conversion either way. A Mahometan govern- 
 
 \ ment cannot really reform ; it cannot get rid of the 
 inherent evils of Mahometan society ; nor can it get rid 
 
 'of the unjust relations in which in every Mahometan 
 country Mahometans must stand towards men of other 
 religions. Christianity has got rid of the two great 
 evils of polygamy and slavery. Mahometanism can- 
 not get rid of them, because they are allowed and 
 consecrated by the Mahometan law. So too a Ma- 
 hometan government cannot really reform the relations 
 between its Mahometan and non-Mahometan subjects. 
 It cannot give its non-Mahometan subjects the bene- 
 fits which they have a right to demand. It cannot 
 put them on a level with its Mahometan subjects : it 
 cannot put them on a level with the inhabitants of 
 countries where the government is not Mahometan. 
 For it is the first principle of the Mahometan religion 
 not to do any of these things. One Mahometan govern- 
 ment may be, as we have seen, very much better than 
 
 I another ; but none can be really good. The utmost 
 that any Mahometan government can do is to protect 
 its non-Mahometan subjects from actual persecution, 
 from actual personal oppression. It cannot do more 
 than this. Do what it will, it cannot, as long as it 
 remains Mahometan, make its non-Mahometan sub- 
 jects other than a subject class in their own land. It 
 therefore cannot reform, in the sense in which reform 
 
 G 2 
 
84 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 is understood in Western Europe. It cannot give the 
 people of Eastern Europe what they seek for and 
 what they have a right to demand, namely a con- 
 dition equal to that of the people of Western Europe. 
 Any scheme which expects that which is impossible 
 lies without the range of practical politics. The 
 expectation of reforms from the Turk, as expecting 
 what is beyond all things impossible, lies pre- 
 eminently without that range. The only solution 
 which comes within that range is the transfer of the 
 power of the Turk to other hands. 
 
 We have thus seen who the Turk is, and what h 
 is. We have seen in what he differs from the 
 nations of Europe, and why he can never really 
 enter into the fellowship of the nations of Europe. 
 We have seen that the Turks are a people alien 
 to the blood, language, civilization, and religion of 
 Western Europe. They have made conquests ; but 
 they have never legitimated their conquests in the 
 way that other conquerors have. They have 
 never either assimilated the conquered nor ye 
 been themselves assimilated by them. They hav 
 always remained a distinct race, holding the people o: 
 the land in bondage. The people under their rul 
 have no national government ; what calls itself a 
 government is simply a dominion of strangers ruling 
 by force. Their Sultan gives no protection to hi 
 Christian subjects; therefore his Christian subject 
 owe him no allegiance. And this state of things 
 one which cannot be mended, because it is a state o 
 things which the religion of the Turks enforces a 
 a religious duty. They are Mahometans, and 
 Mahometan government is bound to treat its subjec 
 of other religions as a conquered race, and not to pu 
 
 n 
 
 : 
 
 e 
 
 i 
 
SUMMARY. 85 
 
 them on a level with Mahometans. As long therefore 
 as that Mahometan government lasts, there can be no 
 real reform. If the people of South-eastern Europe ) 
 are to be made really free, if they are to be raised to 
 the level of the people of Western Europe, the great 
 hindrance which keeps them from so doing must be 
 taken out of the way. That hindrance is the power 
 of the Turk. The power of the Turk must therefore] 
 pass away. 
 
 We have thus, in these three chapters, traced in a 
 general way, the nature of the Ottoman power in 
 Europe. We will now go on in the following chapters 
 to trace out somewhat more fully what the Ottoman 
 Turks have done in the European lands in which they 
 are encamped. That is, we will go on to trace out 
 the leading features in the history of the Ottoman 
 power in Europe, how it began, how it rose to great- 
 ness, how it sank to the state of utter corruption and 
 degradation in which we see it now. 
 
86 THE OTTOMAN TURKS AND THEIR RELIGION. 
 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 (i, p. 58.) After the Castilian Conquest of Granada, the nations of 
 Western Europe had nothing to do with any Mahometan people in West 
 ern Europe itself. But, besides the Ottoman Turks, they had a good deal 
 to do with the Mahometan powers of Africa, that is they suffered a good 
 deal at their hands in the way of piracy, but most of these African 
 powers were at least nominally under the supremacy of the Ottoman 
 Sultan. Their history therefore of some centuries back is rather a part 
 of that Ottoman history than a part of the history of the European 
 power of the Saracens. 
 
 (2, p. 61.) All that can be said on Mahometanism as a missionary 
 religion will be found in the introductory lecture of Mr. R. B. Smith's 
 11 Mohammed and Mohammedanism." Mr. Smith seems to have got up 
 very carefully all that can be said on the Mahometan side ; unluckily he 
 does not seem to have bestowed the same care on any part of the history 
 of Christendom. Like most panegyrists of Mahometanism, especially 
 of Saracenic art and learning, he forgets that whatever the Saracens 
 knew they learned from the abiding home of civilization at New Rome. 
 
 (3, p. 68.) On Akbar see History and Conquests of the Saracens, 
 p. 114. 
 
 (4, p. 69.) History and Conquests of the Saracens, p. 155 — 159. 
 
 (5,. p. 69.) I am not called on to inquire whether South-eastern 
 Europe or Persia has at this moment the worst government. In 
 Persia the Mahometans are the nation ; Christians and Fire-worship- 
 pers — if any Fire-worshippers be left — are small minorities. The main 
 question there lies between Mahometan and Mahometan. As regards 
 Mahometans, the Persian government may possibly be worse than the 
 Turkish. So may the Egyptian government. But, as regards Maho- 
 metans, the Persian government is not inherently incapable of reform ; 
 it may conceivably be brought to the best Mahometan standard. The 
 great feature of Ottoman rule in Europe is that it is primarily and 
 essentially a rule of Mussulman over non-Mussulman. So to be is the 
 nature of its whole being. This the government of Persia is only to 
 a very small extent, and, as regards Christians, we might say quite 
 incidentally. 
 
 (6, p. 82.) On the possibility of reconversion in Bosnia and the 
 Mahometan parts of Albania I shall find something to say further on. 
 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE RISE AND GROWTH OF THE OTTOMAN 
 POWER. 
 
 We have thus traced out the distinguishing charac- 
 teristics of Eastern and of Western Europe. We have 
 seen what are the great races which have from the 
 beginning inhabited the South-eastern peninsula. We 
 have shown the special position of the Turks among 
 them, and the points in which they stand aloof from 
 the European nations. We have seen also what is the 
 nature of their rule over those European nations which 
 they have brought into bondage, and how impossible 
 it is that their rule can ever be mended. Thus far. we 
 have done this only in a general way ; we have seen 
 what, according to the laws of cause and effect, could 
 hardly have failed to happen. We have now to see 
 more fully how the working of those causes and 
 effects has been carried out in fact We have seen 
 what the Turks, being what they were, could not fail 
 to do. We must now see more minutely, by the help 
 of history, what the Turks have really done. 
 
 Our immediate subject is not the history of all 
 the Mahometan nations, not even the history of 
 all the Turkish dynasties, but more specially 
 the history of the Ottoman Turks, and mainly the 
 

 88 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 history of their doings in the lands which I 
 have conquered in Europe. -— Of t h e -first J&ah ome 
 tans, that is the Arabs or Saracens, and of the 
 earlier Turkish dynasties, I have said something 
 in another book, and I will repeat as little as I 
 can of what I have said there. At the same time, 
 in treating the special history of the Ottoman Turks, 
 it will be necessary to draw certain distinctions. 
 For some of the things which we may have to sa 
 about the Ottoman Turks will apply to Mahometan 
 powers in general, and some will not. It is quite 
 certain, as has already been shown, that no Mahome- 
 tan government can ever rule over men of another 
 religion in a way which any one in Western Europe 
 would call ruling well. It is quite certain that no 
 Mahometan nation can ever rise to the highest point 
 of civilization. Still there are great differences, which 
 ought not to be forgotten, between one Mahometan 
 nation and another, just as there are differences between 
 one Christian nation and another. Some Mahometan 
 nations have been much more civilized than others, 
 and the rule of some Mahometan governments over 
 men of other religions has been milder than that of 
 others. In speaking of the Ottoman Turks, we must 
 carefully distinguish what is common to them with all 
 other Mahometan nations and what is peculiar to 
 themselves. We must distinguish the Turks from the 
 Saracens, and we must further distinguish the Otto- 
 man Turks from other Turks. We may safely say 
 that no Mahometan nation — we are almost tempted 
 to say no other nation — ever produced so long a series 
 of great rulers as the Ottoman Turks. That is, if by 
 greatness we understand the power of carrying out 
 a man's purposes, good or bad. No people can show 
 
THE TURKISH RACE. 89 
 
 so long a succession of rulers who were at once wise 
 statesmen and skilful captains as the early Ottoman 
 Sultans. Their business was to conquer ; as long as 
 they went on conquering they were great ; when they 
 ceased to conquer they fell into utter decay and 
 degradation. Again, as regards what we call civiliza- 
 tion, as distinguished from political and military 
 success, the Ottoman Turks will be found to stand 
 above some and below others of the chief Mahometan 
 nations. But what specially distinguishes them is 
 that no other Mahometan people has ever had so 
 great a dominion over men of other religions. It 
 follows that the worst feature of the Mahometan 
 religion, its treatment of the unbeliever, comes out on 
 a greater scale and in a worse form in their history 
 than in any other. 
 
 The Ottoman Turks, it must be remembered, are 
 onl y one branch, out of many of the great Turkish 
 family, which is one of the most widely spread among 
 the families of mankind. There .were^ .several dynas- 
 — -ties^Qjf Mahometan Turks before the Ottomans arose, 
 and there are to this day vast nations of Turks, some 
 of them mere savages, who have never embraced Ma- 
 hometanism. It must always be borne in mind that 
 all Mahometans are not Turks, and that all Turks are 
 not Ottomans. The Turks with whom we have to do 
 are those Turks who learned the Mahometan religion 
 at the hands of the Saracens, and specially with that 
 _body of them which made their way into Europe and 
 founded the Ottoman dominion there. The Turks 
 and Saracens first came to have dealings with one 
 another at the moment when the Saracen dominion 
 which the Turks were to supplant was at the 
 height of its power. This was in the year 710, 
 
90 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 seventy-eight years after the death of Mahomet, 
 was in that year that the Saracens passed from Africa 
 into Spain, and made the beginning their greatest 
 conquest in Europe. In the same year they fi 
 crossed the Oxus, and began to make converts and 
 subjects among those Turks who lived between that 
 great river and the Jaxartes. In the next year 
 the conquest of Sind gave the Saracen dominion the 
 greatest extent that it ever had. This last possession 
 however was not long kept, and the great Maho- 
 metan conquests in India, conquests with which 
 we have now no concern, did not begin till long 
 afterwards. But it is worth noticing that it was 
 almost at the same mornent that the Mahometan 
 religion and the Mahometan power made their way 
 into India, into Western Europe, and into the land 
 which was then the land of the Turks. The Caliph-" 
 or successor of the Prophet, the temporal and spiritual 
 chief of all who profess the Mahometan creed, now 
 ruled over lands washed by the Atlantic and ove 
 lands washed by the Indian Ocean. The word whic 
 went forth from his palace at Damascus was obeyed 
 on the Indus, on the Jaxartes, and on the Tagus. 
 
 While the whole Mahometan world was thus unde 
 one ruler, the Christian nations were divided amon 
 many rulers. But there were two Christian powers 
 which stood out above all others. The Roman Era-^ 
 pire still had its seat at Constantinople, and stilfheld; 
 though often in detached pieces, the greater part of 
 the European coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The 
 Saracens had lopped away Syria, Egypt, and Africa ; 
 the Slaves had pressed into the South-eastern penin- 
 sula ; the Bulgarians had settled south of the Danube, 
 and the Lombards had conquered great part of Italy 
 
SARACENS AND TURKS. 9 1 
 
 Still both the Old and the New Rome obeyed the one 
 Roman Emperor, and the Roman Empire was still 
 the first of Christian powers, and still kept the chief 
 rule of the Mediterranean. The other great Christian 
 power was that of the Franks in Germany and Gaul, 
 the power which was, at the end of the century, to 
 grow into a new Western Empire with its seat at the 
 Old Rome. Thus the Roman power still went on, 
 only cut short and modified in various ways by the 
 coming in of the Teutons in the West and of the 
 Slaves in the East. And herein comes a very instruc- 
 tive parallel. For, as soon as the Saracens began to 
 conquer and convert the Turks, the Turks begin to 
 play a part in the history of the Saracen dominion in 
 Asia which is much like the part which was played 
 in Europe by the Teutons towards the Western 
 Roman Empire and by the Slaves towards the 
 Eastern. The Turks appear under the Caliphs as 
 slaves, as subjects, as mercenaries, as practical masters, 
 as avowed sovereigns, and lastly, in the case of the 
 Ottomans, as themselves claiming the powers of the 
 Caliphate. The dominions of the Caliphs gradually 
 broke up into various states, which were ruled for the 
 'most part by Turkish princes who left a merely 
 ^nominal superiority to the Caliph. It is not our 
 business here to go through all of them. But one 
 must be mentioned, that out of which the Ottoman 
 dynasty arose. This was the Turkish dynasty of the 
 house of Seljuk, which was the greatest power in Asia 
 in the eleventh century. Their early princes, Togrul 
 Beg, Alp-Arslan, and Malek Shah^ were not only 
 great conquerors, but great rulers after the Eastern 
 pattern. They had many of the virtues which 
 are commonly found in the founders of dynasties 
 
92 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 and their immediate successors. The Seljuk Turl 
 pressed their conquests to the West, and so had moi 
 to do with Christians than any of the Turkish dyne 
 ties before them had. And it should carefully 
 noticed that it is from this time that a more speck 
 and crying oppression of the Christians under M; 
 hometan rule begins. The Turks, even these earli< 
 and better Turks, were a ruder and fiercer people the 
 the Saracens, and they were besides full of the zeal 
 new converts. Doubtless, even under the Saracen 
 rule, the Christian subjects of the Caliphs had always 
 been oppressed and sometimes persecuted. But it is 
 plain that, from the time when the power of the 
 Turks began, oppression became harder and persecu- 
 tion more common. It was the increased wrongs 
 doings of the Turks, both towards the nathre-Crms- 
 tians and towards pilgrims from the \VesT,~~whicn 
 caused the great cry for help which led to the cru- 
 sades. There were no crusades as long as the Saracens 
 ruled ; as soon as the Turks came in, the crusades 
 began. 
 
 In the latter part of the eleventh century began 
 those long continued invasions~6rihe~Eastern Roman 
 Empire by the Turks which led in the end to tl 
 foundation of the Ottoman power in Europe. Then 
 is no greater mistake than to think that the whole 
 time* during which the Eastern Empire went on 
 Constantinople was a time of mere weakness anc 
 decline. Such a way of talking at once shows its own 
 folly. A power which was beset by enemies on all 
 sides, in a way in which hardly any other power ever 
 was, could not have lived on for so many ages, it could 
 not have been for a great part of that time one of 
 the chief powers of the world, if it had been all the 
 
 Lan 
 >le 
 
 i 
 
 " 
 
THE EMPIRE AND THE SELJUK TURKS. 93 
 
 time weak and declining. The Eastern Emperors are 
 often said by those who have not read their history 
 to have been all of them weak and cowardly men. 
 Instead of this, many of them were great conquerors 
 and rulers, who beat back their enemies on every 
 side, and made great conquests in their turn. The 
 great feature in the history of the Eastern Empire / 
 is not constant weakness and decline, but the alterna-/ 
 tion of periods of weakness and decline followed by.' 
 periods of recovered strength. In one century pro- 
 vinces are lost ; in another they are won back again, 
 and new provinces added. It was in one of these 
 periods of decline, following immediately after the 
 greatest of all periods of renewed power, that the 
 Turks and Romans first came across one another. 
 I say Romans, because the people of the Eastern 
 Empire called themselves by no other name, and the 
 nations of Asia knew them by no other name. The 
 Eastern Empire was indeed fast becoming Greek, 
 as the Western Empire may be said to have already 
 become German. But the Emperors and their subjects 
 never called themselves Greeks at any time, and the 
 time has not yet come when it becomes convenient 
 to give them the name. 
 
 The Turkish invasion of the Empire came just 
 after a time of brilliant conquest and prosperity / v 
 under the Macedonian dynasty- of Emperors. This; 
 dynasty began in the ninth century and went on 
 into the eleventh. Under it the Empire gained a 
 great deal, and lost comparatively little. At the 
 very beginning of the period, in 8j8, the Saracens^ 
 completed the conquest of Sicily, which had been 
 going on for about fifty years. A hundred years I 
 later, in 988, Cherson, an outlying possession in 
 
i 
 
 94 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 the Tauric peninsula or Crimea, was taken by th 
 Russian Vladimir. On the other hand, the power o 
 the Empire was vastly increased both in Europe an 
 in Asia. The dominions of the Emperors in Souther 
 Italy were increased ; Crete was won back ; the grea 
 Bulgarian kingdom was conquered, and the othe 
 Slavonic states in the Eastern peninsula becam 
 either subject or tributary to the Empire. In Asi 
 large conquests, including Antioch, were made fro 
 the Saracens ; Armenia was annexed, and the power o 
 the Empire was extended along the eastern shores of 
 the Euxine. The greatest conquests of all were made 
 in the reign of Basil the Second, called the Slayer 
 the Bulgarians, who reigned from 976 to 1025. 
 dominion of this kind, which depends on one man, 
 something like a watch, which, if wound up, will go 
 for a while by itself, but will presently go down, if it 
 is not wound up again. So, as after Basil no great 
 Emperor reigned for some while, the Empire began 
 again to fall back, not at once, but within a few years. 
 
 I About the middle of the eleventh century came one.y 
 of the periods of decline, and the Empire was cut 
 ( short by the Normans in Italy and by the Turks in 
 Asia. The Seljuk Sultan Alp-Arslan invaded Asia 
 Minor, a land which the Saracens had often ravaged, 
 but which they had never conquered. He overthrew 
 the Emperor Romanos in battle, and treated him per- 
 sonally with marked generosity. This was in 1071, 
 and from this time dates the establishment of the 
 Turks, as distinguished from the Saracens, in the lands 
 which had been part of the Roman Empire. All the 
 inland part of the peninsula was now occupied by the 
 Turks, and, when in 1092 the great Seljuk dominion 
 was broken up, the city of Nikaia or Nice, the place 
 
THE SELJUKS IN ASIA MINOR. 95 
 
 of the famous council, became the capital of a Turkish 
 dynasty. The map will show how near this brought 
 the Turks to Constantinople. And it might hardly 
 have been thought that three hundred and sixty years 1 
 would pass before the Turks entered the imperial 
 city. But, as ruling over a land conquered from the 
 Roman Empire, the Sultans who reigned at Nikaia 
 called themselves Sultans of Rotim, that is of Rome. 
 It was this great advance of the power of the Seljuk 
 Turks which caused the Christian nations of the West 
 to come to the help of their brethren in the East. 
 
 The history of the crusades concerns us here only 
 so far as, by affecting both the Eastern Roman Empire: 
 and the power of the Seljuk Turks, they did in the endj 
 pave the way for the advance of the Ottomans. The' 
 effect of the first crusade was to drive back the Turks 
 from their position at Nikaia which was so threaten- 
 ing to the Empire. The Emperors who now reigned, 
 those of the house of Komnenos, were for the most 
 part either wise statesmen or good soldiers. Under 
 their reigns therefore came another period of renewed 
 strength, though the Empire never again became what 
 it had been under the Macedonians. We are most 
 concerned with their advance in Asia. There, follow- 
 ing in the wake of the crusaders, they were able to 
 win back a great part of the land, and the capital of the 
 Seljuk Sultans fell back from Nikaia to Ikonion. The 
 dominion of these Sultans gradually broke up after 
 the usual manner of Asiatic powers, and so paved the 
 way for the coming of a mightier power of their own 
 race. But meanwhile events were happening in Europe 
 which equally paved the way for the growth of new 
 powers there. After the time of revival under the 
 Komnenian Emperors came another time of decline, 
 
g6 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 in the latter years of the twelfth century. The Bui 
 garians threw off the Roman yoke, and formed 
 restored Bulgarian kingdom which cut the Empir 
 short to the north-west. At the other end of the 
 Empire, a separate Emperor set himself up in the 
 isle of Cyprus. A time of utter weakness and dis- 
 union had come, when it seemed as if the Empir 
 must fall altogether before any vigorous enemy. 
 
 And so in some sort it happened. A blow presently 
 came which may be looked on as really the ending 
 of the old Roman Empire of the East. In 1204 
 Constantinople was taken by a band of crusaders 
 who had turned away from the warfare to which 
 they were bound against the Mahometans in Asia, 
 
 
 to overthrow the eastern bulwark of Christendom in 
 Europe. Now begins the dominion of the Franks 
 or Latins in Eastern Europ e. The Ch ristians of 
 1 the West were known as Latins, as- Jbelojiging to, 
 the Western or Latin Church which acknowledged 
 the authority of the Bishop of Rome. And they 
 were called Franks, as Western Europeans are called 
 in the East to this day, because most of them 
 came from countries where the French tongue was 
 spoken. But along with the French-speaking cru- 
 I saders came the Venetians, who had a great trade 
 \ in the East, and who had already begun to estab- 
 lish their power in Dalmatia. Constantinople was 
 taken, and Baldwin Count of Flanders was set up 
 as a Latin Emperor. So much of Romania, as the 
 Eastern Empire was called, as the Franks and Vene- 
 tians could get hold of was parcelled out among the 
 conquerors. But they never conquered the whole, 
 and Greek princes kept several parts of the Empire 
 Thus what really happened "was 
 
 
 
THE LATINS AT CONSTANTINOPLE. 97 
 
 split up into a number of small states, Greek and 
 Frank. We now cannot help using the word Greek ; 
 for, after the loss of Bulgaria, the Empire was wholly 
 confined to Greek-speaking people, and we need some 
 name to distinguish them from the Franks or Latins. 
 But they still called themselves Romans ; and it is 
 strange, in reading the Greek writers, to hear of wars 
 between the Romans and the Latins, as if we had 
 gone back to the early days of the Old Rome and 
 the Thirty Cities of Latium. Latin Emperors reigned 
 at Constantinople for nearly sixty years. For a few 
 years there was a Latin kingdom of Thessalonica, 
 and there were Latin princes at Athens and in Pelo- 
 ponnesos, while the commonwealth of Venice kept 
 the great islands of Corfu (*) and Crete, and allowed 
 Venetian families to establish themselves as rulers in 
 several of the islands of the ^Egaean. On the other 
 hand, Greek prince s reigned in Epeiros, and two 
 "Greek Empires were established in Asia. One had 
 its seat at Trapezous or Trebizond on the south-east 
 coast of the Euxine, while the other had its seat at 
 Nikaia, the first capital of the Turkish Sultans of 
 Roum. This last set of Emperors gradually won back 
 
 a considerable territory both in Europe and Asia, and 
 at last, in 1261, they won back Constantinople from 
 the Latins. Thus the Eastern Roman Empire in some 
 sort began afresh, though with much smaller territory 
 and power than it had before the Latin conquest. It 
 was threatened on all sides, by Bulgarians, Servians, 
 Latins, and Turks ; and no great Emperors reigned 
 in this last stage of the Empire. Yet, even in these 
 last days, there was once more something of a 
 revival, and the Emperors gradually won back nearly 
 the whole of all Peloponnesos. 
 
 II 
 
98 rise and growth of ottoman power. 
 
 I Thus a way was opened for a new race of conqu< 
 /both in Europe and Asia, by the breaking up of the 
 / power of the old Emperors who, even as late as the 
 eleventh century, had reigned at once in Italy and in 
 Armenia. Instead of the old Eastern Empire, there 
 was now only a crowd of states, two of which, at Con- 
 stantinople and Trebizond, kept on the titles of the 
 old Empire. None of them were very great, and 
 most of them at enmity with one another. The 
 thirteenth century too, which saw the break-up of the 
 Empire in Europe, saw also the break-up of the older 
 Mahometan powers in Asia and the beginning of the 
 last and the most abiding of all. This was in fact 
 the time when all the powers of Europe and Asia 
 seemed to be putting on new shapes. In the thir- 
 teenth century the Western Empire in some sort came 
 to an end as well as the Eastern. For after Frederick 
 the Second the Emperors kept no abiding power in 
 Italy. In Spain the Mahometan power, which had 
 once held nearly the whole peninsula, was shut up 
 within the narrow bounds of the kingdom of Granada. 
 Castile now took its place as the leading power 
 Spain, and France was in the like sort established 
 the ruling power of Gaul. And, while great Christiai 
 powers were thus established in the western lands 
 which had been held by the Mahometans, the Caliph- 
 ate of Bagdad itself was overthrown by conquerors 
 from the further lands of Asia. I have said in an 
 earlier book that at this time in the middle of the 
 thirteenth century, Islam seemed to be falling back 
 everywhere. But in truth the blow which seemed the 
 most crushing of all, the overthrow of the Caliphate 
 by the Moguls, was part of a chain of events which 
 brought on the stage a Mahometan power more 
 
 
BEGINNING OF THE OTTOMANS. 99 
 
 terrible than all that had gone before it. We have 
 now come to the time of the first appearance of the 
 Ottoman Turks. 
 
 I have spoken elsewhere of the conquests of the 
 Moguls both in Europe and in Asia. We have here 
 to deal with them only so far as, in the course of their 
 attacks on all other powers Christian and Mahometan, 
 they began also to cut short the power of the Seljuk 
 Sultans of Roum. But these last found unlooked-for 
 helpers. The tale runs that, in a battle between the 
 Turks and the Moguls, the Turks, as the weaker side, 
 were being worsted, when an unknown company of 
 men came to their help. These proved to be a wan- 
 dering band of Turks from the far East, who, in Hke 
 confusions of the times, were seeking a settlement 
 under their leader Ertoghrul. Through their help the 
 Seljuk Sultan overcame his enemies. The strangers' 
 were rewarded with a grant of lands, and those lands, 
 step by step, grew into the Ottoman Empire. f"Xt this 1 
 time the Latin Empire still lingered at Constantinople,' 
 but the Greek Emperors at Nikaia had won back 
 large territories both in Asia and in Europe. Partly 
 at the expense of the Greeks, partly at the expense 
 of other Turkish Emirs or princes, Ertoghrul and his 
 son Othman or Osman gradually grew in power. 
 Warriors flocked to the new standard, and Othman 
 became the most powerful prince in Western Asia. 
 From him his followers took the name which it has 
 ever since borne, that of Osmanli or Ottoman. 
 
 Our strictly Ottoman history now begins, and one 
 characteristic feature of Ottoman history may strike 
 us from the very beginning. The house of Othman 
 arose on the ruins of the house of Seljuk ; but 
 
 1 
 
ier 
 
 i 
 
 id 
 
 ? 
 
 I 
 
 100 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 whatever our own day may be destined to see, no other 
 power has yet arisen on the ruins of the house 
 Othman. No other Eastern power has had such ai 
 abiding life. The Bagdad Caliphate lasted as long b] 
 mere reckoning of years; but for many ages the Bagdad 
 Caliphate was a mere shadow. Other Eastern powers 
 have commonly broken in pieces after a few genera- 
 tions. The Ottoman power has lasted for six hundrec 
 years ; and, stranger than all, when it seemed for a 
 moment to be going the way of other Eastern dynas- 
 ties, when the power of the Ottoman Turk seemed to 
 be breaking in pieces as the power of the Ghaznevid 
 and the Seljuk Turk had broken in pieces before him, 
 the scattered fragments were again joined together, 
 and the work of conquest and rule again began. But 
 by means of this very abiding life, by prolonging the 
 rule of a barbarian power in the midst of modern 
 civilization, the rule of the Ottoman has shewn us, in 
 a way in which the earlier Turkish dynasties could 
 not shew us, what a power of this kind comes to in 
 the days of its long decay. An Eastern dynasty, 
 above all a Mahometan dynasty, is great and. glorious 
 according to an Eastern standard as long as it 
 remains a conquering dynasty. The Ottoman Turl 
 remained a conquering dynasty longer than am 
 other. Their power was thus so firmly establishe( 
 that it has been able to outlive the causes which 
 broke up earlier dynasties. But, by having its being 
 thus prolonged, it has lived on to give an example of 
 corruption and evil of every kind for which it would 
 be hard to find a parallel among the worst of earlier 
 dynasties. 
 
 The Ottoman Turks have never been, in any strict 
 sense, a nation. They were in their beginning a 
 
THE OTTOMANS NOT A'NATfc'lC IOT.. 
 
 wandering horde, and even in the time of theii 
 greatest dominion they kept up much of the charac- 
 ter of a wandering horde. They have nowhere really 
 become the people of the land. Where they have' 
 not borne rule over Christians, they have borne j 
 rule over other Mahometans, and they have often 
 oppressed them nearly as much, though not quite in 
 the same way, as they have oppressed their Christian 
 subjects. They have been, we may say, a ruling 
 order, a body ready to admit and to promote any 
 one of any nation who chose to join them, provided 
 of course that he accepted the Mahometan religion. 
 In this has lain their strength and their greatness ; 
 but it has been throughout, not the greatness of a 
 nation, but the greatness of a conquering army, bear- 
 ing rule over other nations. Stripping conquest and 
 forced dominion of the false glory which surrounds 
 them, we may say that the Ottomans began as a band 
 of robbers, and that they have gone on as a band of 
 robbers ever since. To a great part of their history, 
 especially to their position in our own times, that 
 description would apply in its fulness. But it would 
 not be wholly fair to speak in this way of the early 
 Ottomans. The settled and self-styled civilized Turk 
 is really more of a robber than the wandering bar- 
 barian under whom his power began. When conquest 
 simply means transfer from one despot to another, 
 the conquered often gain rather than lose. The rule 
 of the conquering despot is stronger than that of 
 the despot whom he conquers, and a strong despot 
 usually comes nearer to a good ruler than a weak 
 one. That is to say, he does a kind of justice in 
 his dominions. However great may be his own 
 personal crimes and oppressions, he puts some check 
 
TO.? M>I AM) (ikOAVTII OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 on the crimes and oppressions of others. As long 
 therefore as the Ottoman rulers were strong, as long 
 as they were conquerors, there was a good side to 
 their rule. Most of the Sultans were stained with 
 horrible crimes in their own persons ; but most of 
 the early Sultans had many of the virtues of rulers 
 and conquerors. It was when their power began to 
 decay that the blackest side of their rule came out. 
 The oppression of the Sultans themselves became 
 greater. To oppression was added the foulest corrup- 
 tion, and the weak Sultans were not able, as the strong 
 ones had been, to keep their own servants in some 
 kind of order. In short, the Ottoman rulers were 
 the longest, and the early Ottoman rulers were the 
 atest, of all lines of Eastern despots. Because of 
 their greatness, their power has been more long lived 
 than any other. Because it has been more long lived, 
 it has in the end become worse than any other. 
 
 We must be prepared then from the beginning to 
 find in the Ottoman rulers much that is utterly repul- 
 sive to our moral standard, much that is cruel, much 
 that is foul, joined with much that may fairly be 
 called great. They were in a ny case gre aj^soldjers. 
 If we may apply the name statesmanship to carrying 
 out any kind of purpose, good or bad, they were also 
 great statesmen. And it is not till they have passed 
 into Europe that their worst side distinctly prevails 
 And he who was at once the greatest of all and the 
 worst of all was he who fixed his throne in Con- 
 stantinople. As long as they remained in Asia, the 
 Ottomans might pass for one among many Asiatic 
 dynasties. It is their establishment in Europe which 
 gave them their special character. 
 
 It is hardly for me to settle how far the exploi 
 
 
 
REIGNS OF OTHMAN AND ORKHAN. IO3 
 
 of the patriarch of the new dynasty, of Ertoghrul 
 himself, belong to legend or to history. Both he and 
 his son Othman were merely Asiatic rulers. They 
 were not even avowed sovereigns ; they still respected 
 the nominal superiority of the Seljuk Sultan at 
 Ikonion. Othman bears a high character among 
 Eastern rulers ; yet he murdered his uncle simply 
 for dissuading him from a dangerous enterprise. 
 The- slaughter of brothers and other near kinsfolk 
 has always been a special feature of Ottoman rule. 
 
 Othman however at least slew his uncle in a 
 moment of wrath ; later Sultans sacrificed their 
 brothers by wholesale out of cold-blooded policy. 
 Othman enlarged his dominions at the expense of 
 the Emperors, and just before his death, in 1326, his 
 armies took Brusa, which became the Asiatic capital 
 of the Ottomans. It is with Othman's son Orkhan 
 that the Ottoman Empire really begins. He threw 
 off his nominal allegiance to the Sultan, though he 
 still bore only the title of Emir. And in his time the 
 Ottomans first made good their footing in Europe. 
 But while his dominion was still only Asiatic, Orkhan 
 began one institution which did more than anything 
 else firmly to establish the Ottoman power. This 
 was the institution of the tribute children. By the 
 law of Mahomet, as we have seen, the unbeliever is 
 allowed to purchase life, property, and the exercise 
 of his religion, by the payment of tribute. Earlier 
 Mahometan rulers had been satisfied with tribute in 
 the ordinary sense. Orkhan first demanded a tribute 
 of children. The deepest of wrongs, that which other 
 tyrants did as an occasional outrage, thus became 
 under the Ottomans a settled law. A fixed propor- 
 tion of the strongest and most promising boys among 
 
y 
 
 i 
 
 104 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 the conquered Christian nations were carried off fo 
 the service of the Ottoman princes. They wer 
 brought up in the Mahometan faith, and wer 
 employed in civil or military functions, accordin 
 to their capacity. Out of them was formed th 
 famous force of the Janissaries, the new soldiers, 
 who, for three centuries, as long as they were levie 
 in this way, formed the strength of the Ottoma 
 armies. These children, torn from their homes an 
 cut off from every domestic and national tie, knew 
 only the religion and the service into which they 
 were forced, and formed a body of troops such as 
 no other power, Christian or Mahometan, coul 
 command. In this way the strength of the conquere 
 nations was turned against themselves. They could 
 not throw off the yoke, because those among them 
 who were their natural leaders were pressed into th 
 service of their enemies. It was not till the practice 
 of levying the tribute on children was left off that th 
 conquered nations shewed any power to stir. Whil 
 the force founded by Orkhan lasted in its first shape, 
 the Ottoman armies were irresistible. But all this 
 shews how far the Ottomans were from being a 
 national power. Their victories were won by soldiers 
 who were really of the blood of the Greeks, Slaves, 
 and other conquered nations. In the same way 
 while the Ottoman power was strongest, the- chief 
 posts of the Empire, civil and military, were con- 
 stantly held, not by native Turks, but by Christian 
 renegades of all nations. The Ottoman power in 
 short was the power, not of a nation, but simply of 
 an army. The Ottomans began, and they have gone 
 on ever since, as an army of occupation in the lands 
 of other nations. 
 
 
THE JANISSARIES. 105 
 
 By the end of Orkhan's reign the Ottoman power 
 was fully established in Asia Minor. Its Emirs had 
 spread their power over all the other Turkish settle- 
 ments, and nothing was left to the Christians but a few 
 towns, chiefly on the coast. Above all, Philadelphia 
 and Phokaia long defended themselves gallantly after 
 everything else was lost. The chief Christian power 
 in Asia was now no longer the Roman or Greek 
 Emperor at Constantinople, but the more distant 
 Emperor at Trebizond. Besides their possessions on 
 the south coast of the Euxine, these Emperors also 
 held the old territories of the Empire in the Tauric 
 Chersonesos or Crimea. The Turks had now the 
 whole inland part of Asia Minor. And this inland 
 part of Asia Minor is the only part of the Ottoman 
 dominions where any Turks are really the people of 
 the land. The old Christian population has been 
 quite displaced, and Anadol or Anatolia, the land of 
 the East, is really a Turkish land. Yet it can hardly 
 be said to be an Ottoman land. There the ruling 
 body have borne sway over the descendants of the 
 old Seljuk Turks. The Ottomans in short are 
 strangers everywhere. They are strangers bearing 
 rule over other nations, over Mahometans in Asia, 
 over Christians in Europe. 
 
 The Ottoman rule over Christians in Europe began 
 in the last years of Orkhan. The state of South- 
 eastern Europe in the fourteenth century was very 
 favourable for the purposes of the Turks. We have 
 seen how utterly the old Empire was broken up, and 
 how the Greek-speaking lands were divided among 
 a crowd of states, Greek and Frank. A new power 
 had lately arisen in the vEgaean through the occupa- 
 tion of Rhodes and some of the neighbouring islands 
 
106 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 by the Knights of St. John. A military order is not 
 well fitted for governing its dominions ; but no power 
 can be better, fitted for defending them, and the 
 Knights of St. John at Rhodes did great things 
 against the Turks. The power of the Emperors at 
 Constantinople, cut short by the Turks in Asia, was 
 cut short by the Bulgarians in Europe. It was only 
 in Peloponnesos that they advanced at the cost of the 
 Latins. Just at the time before the Turks crossed 
 into Europe, a new power had arisen, or rather an 
 old power had grown to a much greater place 
 than it held before. Stephen Dushan, King of 
 Servia, who took the title of Emperor, had estab- 
 lished a great dominion which took in most part 
 of Macedonia, Albania, and Northern Greece. But 
 the Greek Emperors kept Constantinople and the 
 lands round about it, with detached parts of Mace- 
 donia and Greece, including specially the great city 
 of Thessalonica. Had the Servian Emperor been 
 able to win Constantinople, a power would have been 
 formed which might have been able to withstand the 
 Turks. Servia would have been the body, and Con- 
 stantinople the head. As it was, the Turks found in 
 Servia a body without a head, and in Constantinople 
 a head without a body. The Servian Empire broke 
 up on the death of its great king, and the Greeks were 
 divided by civil wars. Thus, instead of Servians and 
 Greeks together presenting a strong front to the 
 Turks, the Turks were able to swallow up Greeks, 
 Servians, and all the other nations, bit by bit. 
 
 The Ottomans did not make their first appearance 
 in Europe as avowed conquerors. They appeared, 
 sometimes as momentary ravagers, sometimes as 
 
 
THE OTTOMANS IN EUROPE. 107 
 
 mercenaries in the Imperial service or as allies of 
 some of the contending parties in the Empire. Thus 
 in 1346 the Emperor John Kantakouzenos called in 
 the Turks to help him in civil war. From this time 
 we may date their lasting presence in Europe, though 
 they did not hold any permanent possessions there 
 till in 1356 they seized Kallipolis in the Thracian 
 Chersonesos. This was the beginning of the Ottoman 
 dominion in Europe. From this time they advanced 
 bit by bit, taking towns and provinces from the 
 Empire and conquering the kingdoms beyond the 
 Empire, so that Constantinople was quite hemmed in. 
 But the Imperial city itself was not taken till nearly a 
 hundred years after the first "Turkish settlement in 
 Europe. It must always be remembered that the 
 Turks overcame Servia and Bulgaria long before they 
 won Thessalonica, Constantinople, and Peloponnesos. 
 Their first conquests gathered threateningly round 
 Constantinople ; but they did not as yet actually 
 attack it. Nor did they always at once incorporate 
 the lands which they subdued with their immediate 
 dominions. In most of the lands of which the Turks 
 got possession, the process of conquest shews three 
 stages. There is, first, mere ravage for the sake of 
 plunder, and to weaken the land which was ravaged. 
 Then the land is commonly brought under tribute or 
 some other form of subjection, without being made a 
 part of the Sultan's immediate dominions. Lastly, 
 the land which is already practically conquered be- 
 comes a mere Ottoman province. In this way it is 
 worth noticing that, as we shall see further on, a large 
 part of the European dominions of the Turk, though 
 they were subdued long before the taking of Con- 
 stantinople, were allowed to keep on some shadow 
 
108 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN TOWER. 
 
 of separate being under tributary princes till after 
 Constantinople was taken. 
 
 "" The first lasting settlement of the Turks on Euro- 
 pean ground was made, as we have seen, while Orkhan 
 still reigned. But it was in the reign of Murad or 
 Amu rath the First, the successor of Orkhan, that the 
 first settlement at Kallipolis grew into a compact 
 European power. In a very few years from their first 
 occupation of European territory, the Turks had 
 altogether hemmed in what was left of the Empire. 
 As early as 1361 Amurath took Hadrianople, which 
 became the European capital of the Ottomans till 
 they took Constantinople^ 2 ) Nothing was now left 
 to the Empire but the part of Thrace just round 
 Constantinople, with some of the cities on the 
 Euxine, together with the outlying possessions 
 which the Emperors still kept in Macedonia and 
 Greece. Among them were the greater part of 
 Peloponnesos and the Chalkidian peninsula with 
 Thessalonica. In Asia all that remained to the 
 Empire was a little strip of land just opposite 
 Constantinople, and the two cities of Philadelphia 
 and Phokaia, which might now almost be looked on 
 as allied commonwealths rather than as parts of the 
 Empire. But Amurath not only cut the Empire 
 short, he also carried his arms into the Slavonic 
 lands to the north. They lay as temptingly open to 
 conquest as the Greek lands. The power of Servia 
 went down at once after the death of Stephen Dushan, 
 and Bulgaria a few years later was split up into 
 three separate kingdoms. Amurath's first important 
 conquest in this direction was the taking of Philip- 
 popolis in 1363. That city had changed masters 
 several times, but it was then Bulgarian. Bulgaria 
 
 
BO 
 
 ""' 
 
A- 
 
 9**' a J'°* 
 
 TRIM 
 
 EXPLANATION 
 
 Greek 
 
 Turkish 
 
 Servian 
 
 mZm 
 Hungarian 
 I'f/ii-tuii) 
 Other Frank- Powera 
 
 JO 
 
 ill an &. Co. 
 
 Stanford* Geographical Estah 
 
CONQUESTS OF AMURATH THE FIRST. IO9 
 
 just now, besides her own divisions, had wars with 
 Hungary to the north and with the Empire to the 
 south. Yet amid all this confusion, several powers 
 did unite to withstand the Turks ; and it was only 
 gradually, and after several battles, that either Servia 
 or Bulgaria was conquered. It seems to have been 
 about 1 2,7 1 that the chief Bulgarian kingdom, that of 
 Trnovo, became tributary. But while Servia and 
 Bulgaria were breaking in pieces, Bosnia to the north- 
 west of them, which lay further away from the Turks, 
 was growing in power. A great Slave confederation 
 was formed under the Bosnian King Stephen, and 
 Bosnians, Croats, and Servians for a little while won 
 some successes over the Turks. But at last a great 
 confederate army, Bosnian, Servian, Bulgarian, and 
 Wallachian, was utterly defeated by the Turks at 
 Kossova in 1389. Amurath himself was killed, not in 
 the battle, but by a Servian who pretended to desert. 
 But he was at once succeeded by his son Bayezid or 
 Bajazet, who reaped the fruits of the victory. In the 
 course of two or three years after the battle, Servia 
 and Wallachia became tributary, and the greater part 
 of Bulgaria was altogether conquered. 
 
 It is from the battle of Kossova that the Servians, 
 and the Southern Slaves generally, date the fall of 
 their independence. Bosnia, in its corner, still re- 
 mained but little touched; it was ravaged, but not yet 
 conquered. But all the lands which had made up the 
 great Servian and Bulgarian kingdoms of former times 
 were now either altogether conquered by the Turk, or 
 made tributary to him, or else driven to maintain 
 their independence by ceaseless fighting. And as the 
 lands which the Turks subdued were made into 
 tributary states before they were fully annexed, the 
 

 I IO RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 j 
 
 Turks were able to use each people that they brought 
 under their power as helpers against the next people 
 whom they attacked. Thus at Kossova Amurath 
 had already Christian tributaries fighting on his side. 
 From this time till Servia was completely incorpo- 
 rated with the Turkish dominions, the Servians had 
 to fight in the Turkish armies against the other Chris- 
 tian nations which the Turks attacked. In this way 
 the strength of the Christian nations was used -against 
 one another, till the Turk thought the time was come 
 more directly to annex this or that tributary land. In 
 this the policy of the Ottomans was much the same 
 as the policy of the Romans in old times. For they 
 also commonly made the lands which they conquered 
 into dependent states, before they formally made 
 sthem into Roman provinces. In either case it may 
 be doubted whether the lands which were left in this 
 intermediate state gained much by not being fully 
 annexed at once. Still the way by which the Otto- 
 man Empire came together suggests the way by 
 which it ought to fall asunder. Some of the tributary 
 lands have always kept a certain amount of separate 
 being. Some have, after a long bondage, come back 
 again to the tributary state. In short, experience 
 shews that the natural way for restoring these lands 
 to their ancient independence is by letting them pass 
 once more through the intermediate state. Only this 
 time it must be with their faces turned in the, direc- 
 tion of a more thorough freedom, not of, as in ages 
 past, in the direction of a more thorough bondage. 
 
 The accession of Bajazet marks a distinct change 
 in the history of Ottoman conquest. Up to this time 
 the Ottoman princes had shewn themselves — except 
 in the exaction of the tribute children — at least not 
 
 
CORRUPTION UNDER BAJAZET. Ill 
 
 worse than other Eastern conquerors. With Amurath's 
 successor Bajazet the darker side of the Ottoman 
 dominion comes more strongly into view. He was 
 the first to begin his reign with the murder of a 
 brother out of cold policy. Under him too that 
 foul moral corruption which has ever since been the 
 distinguishing characteristic of the Ottoman Turk 
 came for the first time into its black prominence. 
 Other people have been foul and depraved ; what is 
 specially characteristic of the Ottoman Turk is that 
 the common road to power is by the path of the foulest 
 shame. Under Bajazet the best feature of the Ma- 
 hometan law, the almost ascetic temperance which it 
 teaches, passed away, and its worst features, the re- 
 cognition of slavery, the establishment of the arbitrary', 
 right of the conqueror over the conquered, grew intoi 
 a system of wrong and outrage of which the Prophet 
 himself had never dreamed. Under Bajazet'the Turl4 
 fully put on those parts of his character which dis- 
 tinguish him, even more than other Mahometans, 
 from Western and Christian nations. Yet amid all 
 this corruption, Bajazet could sometimes exercise 
 a stern Eastern justice, and the mission of his race, 
 the mission of warfare and conquest, still went on ; 
 Bajazet was surnamed the Thunderbolt, and he was 
 the first of the Ottoman princes to exchange the 
 humbler title of Emir for that of Sultan. Yet, after 
 Bajazet had consolidated the results of the victory of 
 Kossova by his Bulgarian and Servian conquests, the 
 actual dominion of the Ottomans did not make such 
 swift advances under him as it had made under his 
 father Amurath. It was rather distinguished by a 
 scourge worse than that of actual conquest, by con- 
 stant plundering expeditions, carried on chiefly for the 
 
I 12 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 sake of booty and slaves — the slaves being specially 
 picked out for the vilest purposes. These ravages 
 spread everywhere from Hungary to Peloponnesos. 
 But the most remarkable conquest of Bajazet was in 
 Asia. Philadelphia still held out, and its citizens 
 still deemed themselves subjects of the Emperors at 
 Constantinople. Yet, when Bajazet thought proper 
 to add the city to his dominions, the Emperor Manuel 
 and his son were forced, as tributaries of the Sultan, 
 to send their contingent to the Turkish army, and to 
 help in the conquest of their own city.( 3 ) But enemies 
 presently came against Bajazet both from the West 
 and from the East. His enemy from the West he 
 overthrew ; but he was himself overthrown by his 
 enemy from the East. A large body of crusaders 
 came to the help of Sigismund King of Hungary, 
 the same who was afterwards Emperor of the West. 
 But Bajazet, at the head of his own Turks and of his 
 Christian tributaries who were of course forced to 
 serve with them, overthrew Sigismund and his allies 
 in the battle of Nikopolis in 1396. A number of 
 Christian knights from the West were massacred after 
 the battle, and others were put to ransom ; among 
 these last was one whose name connects Eastern and 
 Western history, John Count of Nevers, afterwards 
 Duke of Burgundy, the second of those dukes of 
 Burgundy who play so great a part in the history of 
 France, England, and Germany. Bajazet also was 
 the first of the Sultans who directly attacked Con- 
 stantinople. Things looked as if the last traces of 
 the Eastern Empire were now about to be wiped out. 
 But the Ottoman conqueror was presently met by a still 
 more terrible conqueror from the further East. The 
 conquests of Timour, the famous Tamerlane, which 
 
VICTORY OF TIMOUR. 113 
 
 spread slaughter and havoc through Mahometan Asia, 
 gave a moment's respite to Christian Europe. Of his 
 career I have said somewhat elsewhere. ( 4 ) What con- 
 cerns us now is that Bajazet was overthrown and taken 
 captive by Timour at Angora in 1402. No such blow j 
 ever fell on any Ottoman prince before or after. 
 
 After the defeat and captivity of Bajazet, things 
 looked as if the Ottoman dominion had run the 
 common course of an Eastern dominion, as if it 
 was broken up for ever. And, as I before said, the 
 most wonderful thing in all Ottoman history is that, 
 though it was broken up for a moment, it was able 
 to come together again. The dominions of Bajazet 
 were for a while divided, and their possession was 
 disputed among his three sons. At last they were 
 joined together again under his son Mahomet the 
 First. Still the time of confusion was a time of relief 
 to the powers which were threatened by the Turks, 
 and, even after Mahomet had again joined the 
 Ottoman dominions together, he was not strong 
 enough to make any great conquests. Thus the 
 European power of the Ottomans made but small 
 advances during his reign. It was otherwise under 
 his son Amurath the Second, during whose reign of 
 thirty years, from 1421 to 1 451, the Turkish power, 
 notwithstanding some reverses, greatly advanced. 
 He failed in an attack on Constantinople ; but he 
 took Thessalonica, which had lately passed from the 
 Empire to the Venetians. So in his wars with 
 Hungary he underwent several defeats from the great 
 captain Huniades ; but his defeats were balanced by 
 victories. And in one battle it must be allowed that 
 the Turk was in the right and the Christian in the 
 wrong. In a triumphant campaign, the Hungarian 
 
 I 
 
1 14 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 army had reached the Balkan. By the peace which 
 followed, Servia again became independent, and 
 Wallachia was ceded to Hungary. Then Wladislaus, 
 King of Hungary and Poland, was persuaded to break 
 the treaty, but he was defeated at Varna and the Otto- 
 man power was again restored. Still the crowning of 
 all, by the taking of the Imperial city and the com- 
 plete subjugation of the lands on the Danube, was 
 not the work of Amurath, but was reserved for the 
 days of his son. 
 
 This son was Mahomet the Second, surnamed the 
 Conqueror. We may take him as the ideal of his 
 race, the embodiment in their fullest form of Ottoman 
 greatness and Ottoman wickedness. A general and 
 statesman of the highest order even from his youth, 
 a man who knew his own purposes and knew by what 
 ends to achieve his purposes, no man has a clearer 
 right to the title of great, so far as we can conceive 
 greatness apart from goodness. We hear of him also, 
 not merely as soldier and statesman, but as a man 
 of intellectual cultivation in other ways, as master of 
 many languages, as a patron of the art and literature 
 of his time. On the other hand, the three abiding 
 Ottoman vices of cruelty, lust, and faithlessness 
 stand out in him all the more conspicuously from 
 being set on a higher pedestal. He finished the work 
 of his predecessors ; he made the Ottoman power 
 in Europe what it has been ever since. He gave a 
 systematic form to the customs of his house and to 
 the dominion which he had won. His first act was 
 the murder of his infant brother, and he made the 
 murder of brothers a standing law of his Empire. 
 He overthrew the last remnants of independent 
 
TAKING OF CONSTANTINOPLE. 1 1 5 
 
 Roman rule, of independent Greek nationality, and 
 he fixed the relations which the Greek part of his 
 subjects were to bear both towards their Turkish 
 masters and towards their Christian fellow-subjects. 
 He made the northern and western frontiers of his 
 Empire nearly what they still remain. The Ottoman 
 Empire, in short, as our age has to deal with it, is, 
 before all things, the work of Mahomet the Conqueror. 
 The prince whose throne was fixed in the New Rome 
 held altogether another place from even the mightiest 
 of his predecessors. 
 
 Mahomet had reigned two years, he had lived 
 twenty- three, on the memorable day, May 29th 1453, 
 when the Turks entered the city of the Caesars and 
 when the last Emperor Constantine died in the breach. 
 The last ruling prince of his house, he was also the 
 worthiest. The degradation of the last hundred years 
 of the Empire is almost wiped out in the glory of its 
 fall. The Roman Empire of the East, which had 
 lasted so long, which had withstood and outlived so 
 many enemies, whose princes had beaten back the 
 Persian and the Saracen, the Avar, the Bulgarian, 
 and the Russian, now at last fell before the arms of 
 the Turk. The New Rome, so long the head of the 
 Christian and civilized world, became the seat of 
 Mahometan and barbarian rule. The Sultan took! 
 the place of a long line of Caesars. And the great 
 church of Saint Sophia, the most venerated temple of 
 the whole Eastern Church, the seat of Patriarchs and 
 the crowning-place of Emperors, has been, from 
 Mahomet's day to our own, a mosque for Maho- 
 metan worship. And now that the Imperial city was 
 at last taken, Mahomet seemed to make it his policy 
 both to gather in whatever remained unconquered, 
 
 I 2 
 
1 1 6 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 and to bring most of the states which had hitherto 
 been tributary under his direct rule. Greece itself, 
 though it had been often ravaged by the Turks, had 
 not been added to their dominions. The Emperors 
 had, in the very last days of the Empire before the 
 fall of Constantinople, recovered all Peloponnesos, 
 except some points which were held by Venice. 
 Frank Dukes also reigned at Athens, and another 
 small duchy lingered on in the islands of Leukas 
 and Kephallenia and on the coasts of Akarnania. 
 The Turkish conquest of the mainland, again saving 
 the Venetian points, was completed by the year 
 1460, but the two western islands were not taken 
 until 1479. Euboia was conquered in 147 1, when 
 the Venetian governor Erizzo, who had stipulated 
 for the safety of his head, had his body sawn 
 asunder. No deeds of this kind are recorded of the 
 earlier Ottoman princes ; but by Mahomet's time 
 the Turks had fully learned those lessons of cruelty 
 and faithlessness which they have gone on practising 
 ever since. The Empire of Trebizond was conquered 
 in 1461, and the island of Lesbos or Mytilene in 
 1462. There was now no independent Greek state 
 left. Crete, Corfu, and some smaller islands and 
 points of coast, were held by Venice, and some of 
 the islands of the ALgszan were still ruled by Frank 
 princes and by the Knights of Saint John. But, after 
 the fall of Trebizond, there was no longer any inde- 
 pendent Greek state anywhere, and the part of the 
 Greek nation which was under Christian rulers of any 
 kind was now far smaller than the part which was 
 under the Turk. 
 
 While the Greeks were thus wholly subdued, the 
 Slaves fared no better. In 1459 Servia was reduced 
 
 
CONQUESTS OF MAHOMET THE SECOND. 117 
 
 from a tributary principality to an Ottoman province, 
 and six years later Bosnia was annexed also. The 
 last Bosnian king, like the Venetian governor in 
 Euboia, was promised his life ; but he and his sons 
 were put to death none the less. One little fragment 
 of the great Slavonic power in those lands alone 
 remained. The little district of Zeta, a part of the 
 Servian kingdom, was never fully conquered by the 
 Turks. One part of it, the mountain district called 
 Tsernagora or Montenegro, has kept its independence 
 to our own times. Standing as an outpost of freedom 
 and Christendom amid surrounding bondage, the 
 Black Mountain has been often attacked, it has 
 been several times overrun, but it has never been con- 
 quered. In a ceaseless warfare of four hundred years, 
 neglected, sometimes betrayed, by the Christian 
 powers of Europe, this small people, whose whole 
 number does not equal the population of some of our 
 great towns, has still held its own against the whole 
 might of the Turkish power. First under hereditary 
 princes, then under warrior bishops, now under here- 
 ditary princes again, this little nation of heroes, whose 
 territory is simply so much of the ancient land of 
 their race as they are able to save from barbarian 
 invasion, have still held their own, while the greater 
 powers around them have fallen. To the south of 
 them, the Christian Albanians held out for a long 
 time under their famous chief George Castriot or 
 Scanderbeg. After his death in 1459, tnev also came 
 under the yoke. These conquests of Mahomet gave 
 the Ottoman dominion in Europe nearly the same 
 extent which it has now. His victories had been 
 great, but they were balanced by some defeats. The 
 conquest of Servia and Bosnia opened the way to 
 
Il8 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 endless inroads into Hungary, South-eastern Ger 
 many, and North-eastern Italy. But as yet these 
 lands were merely ravaged, and the Turkish power 
 met with some reverses. In 1456 Belgrade was saved 
 by the last victory of Huniades, and this time 
 Mahomet the Conqueror had to flee. In another part 
 of Europe, if in those days it is to be counted for 
 Europe, Mahomet won the Genoese possessions in 
 the peninsula of Crimea, and the Tartar Khans who 
 ruled in that peninsula and the neighbouring lands 
 became vassals of the Sultan. The Ottomans were 
 thus brought into the neighbourhood of Poland, Lithu- 
 ania, and Russia. The last years of Mahomet's reign 
 were marked by a great failure and a great success. 
 He failed to take Rhodes, which belonged to the 
 Knights of Saint John ; but his troops suddenly seized 
 on Otranto in Southern Italy. Had this post been 
 kept, Italy might have fallen as well as Greece ; but 
 the Conqueror died the next year, and Otranto was 
 won back. 
 
 Thus two Empires, and endless smaller states, came 
 out of the power of the Ottomans under the mightiest 
 of their Sultans. Greeks, Slaves, Albanians, all came 
 under the yoke. But it must not be forgotten that it 
 was by the arms of men of Greek, Slave, and Alba- 
 nian blood that they were brought under the yoke. 
 For the Janissaries formed the strength of the Otto- 
 man armies, and the Janissaries were formed of the 
 kidnapped children of the conquered nations. Thus 
 the Christian nations of South-eastern Europe had 
 their own strength turned against them, and were 
 overcome by the arms of their own children. And 
 presently the far-seeing eye of Mahomet found out 
 that their wits might be turned against them as well 
 
 
 
MAHOMET'S POLICY. 119 
 
 as their arms. He saw that the Greeks had a keener 
 wit, either than his own Turks or than the other 
 subject nations, and he saw that their keen wit might, 
 in the case of a part of the Greek nation, be made an 
 instrument of his purposes. By his policy the 
 Eastern Church itself was turned into an instrument 
 of Turkish dominion. Speaking roughly, the lower 
 clergy throughout the conquered lands have always 
 been patriotic leaders, while the Bishops and other 
 higher clergy have been slaves and instruments of 
 the Turk. Greek Bishops bore rule over Slavonic 
 churches, and so formed another fetter in the chain 
 by which the conquered nations were held down. In 
 course of time the Sultans extended the same policy 
 to temporal matters. The Greeks, not of Old Greece, 
 but of Constantinople, the Fanariots, as they came to 
 be called, became in some sort a ruling race among 
 their fellow-bondmen. Their ability made them use- 
 ful, and the Turks learned to make use of their 
 ability in many ways. In all conquests a certain 
 class of the conquered finds its interest in enter- 
 ing the service of the conqueror. As a rule, such 
 men are the worst class of the conquered. They 
 are commonly more corrupt and oppressive than 
 the conquerors themselves. It therefore in no way 
 lessened but rather heightened the bitterness of 
 Ottoman rule, that it was largely carried on by Chris- 
 tian instruments. The Slavonic provinces had in fact 
 to bear a two-fold yoke, Turkish and Greek. But 
 this it should be remembered only applies to the 
 Greeks of Constantinople. The Greeks of Greece 
 itself and the rest of the Empire were no better off 
 than the other subjects of the Turk. It must be 
 remembered too that, after all, the Fanariot Greeks 
 
I2o RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 themselves were a subject race, cut off from all share 
 in the higher rule of their country. That was reserved 
 for men of the ruling religion, whether native Turks 
 or renegades of any nation. And lastly it should be 
 remembered that, under the rule of Mahomet the 
 Conqueror, every man, Turk, Christian, or renegade, 
 held his life and all that he had at the pleasure of 
 Mahomet the Conqueror. 
 
 
 The Turkish rule was now fully established over a 
 considerable part of Europe, over nearly the whole of 
 the lands between the Hadriatic and the Euxine. 
 Save where the brave men of Zeta still held out on 
 the Black Mountain and where the city of Ragusa 
 still kept its freedom, no part of those lands was 
 under a national government. The few islands and 
 pieces of coast which had escaped the Turk were 
 under the rule either of Venice or of other Frank 
 powers. From that day, till in our own century Servia 
 and Greece became free, all those lands have been in 
 bondage. The greater part of them remain in bond- 
 age still. Their people have not only been subjects 
 of a foreign prince ; they have been subjects of a 
 foreign army in their own land. The rule of law has 
 for all those ages ceased in those lands. The people 
 of the land have had only one way of rising out of 
 their state of bondage, namely by embracing the 
 religion of their conquerors. This many of them 
 did, and so were transferred from the ranks of the 
 oppressed to the ranks of the oppressors. In some 
 parts whole classes did so. This happened specially 
 in Bosnia. There the mass of the land-owners em- 
 braced Islam in order to keep their lands, while the 
 body of the people remained faithful. These renegades 
 
 
ESTABLISHMENT OF TURKISH RULE. 121 
 
 and their descendants have ever since formed an 
 oligarchy whose rule has been worse than that of the 
 Turks themselves. The same thing happened in 
 Bulgaria to some degree, though to a much less extent 
 than in Bosnia. It was only in Albania that the Ma- 
 hometan faith was really adopted by the mass of the 
 people of large districts. In Albania a large part of 
 the country did become Mahometan, while other parts 
 remained Christian, some tribes being Catholic and 
 some Orthodox. But, as a rule, throughout the Euro- 
 pean lands which were conquered by the Turk, the 
 mass of the people clave to their faith, in defiance of 
 all temptations and all oppressions. Rather than 
 forsake their faith, they have endured to live on as 
 bondsmen in their own land, under the scorn and lash 
 of foreign conquerors, while apostasy would at any 
 moment have raised them to the level of their con- 
 querors. They have endured to live on, while their 
 goods, their lives, the honour of their families, were 
 at the mercy of barbarians, while their sons were kid- 
 napped from them to be brought up in the faith of 
 the oppressor and to swell the strength of his armies. 
 In this state of abiding martyrdom they have lived, 
 in different parts of the lands under Turkish rule, for 
 two, for four, for five hundred years. While the 
 nations of Western Europe have been able to advance, 
 they have been kept down under the iron heel of 
 their tyrants. And because they have not been able 
 to advance as the nations of Western Europe have 
 advanced, men in Western Europe are not ashamed 
 to turn round and call them degraded and what not, 
 as though we should be any better if we had lived 
 under a barbarian yoke for as many ages as they 
 have lived. 
 
122 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 It may however be asked with perfect fairness, how 
 came the Ottoman Turks, starting from such small 
 beginnings and having at first such small power, to 
 make such great conquests, and to win and to keep so 
 many lands, both Christian and Mussulman ? With 
 regard to the conquests of the Ottomans over other 
 Mussulmans, there is nothing wonderful in their 
 making them ; the wonderful thing is that they 
 were able to keep them. Their rise to power was 
 exactly like the rise to power of many other Eastern 
 dynasties. Only, while other Eastern dynasties have 
 commonly soon broken in pieces, this one kept 
 on unbroken. Or it would be truer to say, what is 
 really more wonderful, that, after the fall of Bajazet, 
 the Ottoman power did break in pieces for a moment, 
 but that it was able to come together again. The 
 continued succession of able princes in the House 
 of Othman, the firm administration which they 
 established, their excellent military discipline, and 
 above all the institution of the Janissaries, will 
 account for a great deal. And before long we shall 
 see that the Ottoman Sultans won a further claim 
 to the religious allegiance, not only of their own 
 subjects, but of all orthodox Mussulmans. With 
 regard to their conquests over Christians, the state of 
 the South-eastern lands at that moment gave them 
 many advantages. The Ottomans were a power — 
 natio?i is hardly the word — in the full freshness of 
 youth and enthusiasm, military and religious. Every 
 Janissary, it must be remembered, brought to his 
 work the zeal of a new convert. As yet the Ottomans 
 were in their full strength, under princes who knew 
 how to use their strength. They found in South- 
 eastern Europe a number of disunited powers, jealous 
 
 
 
CAUSES OF TURKISH SUCCESS. 1 23 
 
 of one another, and many of them having no real 
 basis of national life. The Eastern Empire was worn 
 out. The vulgar talk about its weakness and degra- 
 dation, which is mere vulgar talk when it is applied 
 to the whole time of the Byzantine history, ceases 
 to be vulgar talk if it is confined to the last hundred 
 and fifty years of Byzantine history. It would seem 
 as if the strength of the Greeks had been worn out 
 by winning back Constantinople. Certain it is that 
 the Emperors who reigned at Nikaia in the thirteenth 
 century were far better and more vigorous rulers than 
 the Emperors who reigned at Constantinople in the 
 fourteenth century. Certain it is that the greatness of 
 Constantinople, its strength and its great traditions, 
 helped to prolong the existence of a power whose 
 real day was past, and thereby to hinder the growth 
 of the more vigorous Slavonic nations which might 
 otherwise have stepped into its place. The Frank 
 powers, save Venice, were small and weak, and they 
 were nowhere national. We may believe that their 
 rule was nowhere quite so bad as that of the Turks ; 
 still it was everywhere a foreign rule. The Greeks 
 who were under Venice and under the Frank princes, 
 were under rulers who were alien to their subjects in 
 speech, race, and creed. There could be no loyalty 
 or national feeling felt towards them. It is not 
 very wonderful that the Turkish Sultans, with their 
 stern determination and their admirably disciplined 
 armies, could swallow up these powers, disunited 
 and some of them decaying, one by one. Again 
 the fashion of making their conquests for a while 
 merely tributary, instead of at once fully annexing 
 them, helped the purpose of the Turk by enabling 
 him to employ the forces of one nation to help 
 
124 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 in subduing the nation next beyond it. So did 
 the fashion of harrying and plundering lands be- 
 fore their actual conquest was attempted. Men 
 might be tempted to doubt whether regular bondage 
 to the Turk might not be a less evil than having 
 their lands ravaged and their children carried away 
 into slavery. 
 
 As most things in history have their parallel, it 
 may be well to notice that the cause which brought 
 the Ottoman power nearer to destruction than it ever 
 was brought at any other time was essentially the 
 same as one of the causes which most promoted its 
 success. Any two sects of Christians, any two sects 
 of Mahometans, are really separated from one 
 another by a difference which should seem very slight 
 compared with the difference which separates both of 
 them from men of the other religion. Yet in practice 
 it is not always so. The Eastern Empire was saved 
 from Bajazet, and its existence was prolonged for 
 fifty years, because Timour, who belonged to the 
 Shiah sect of Mussulmans, waged a religious war on 
 the Ottomans, who have always belonged to the 
 Sonnite sect. And in exactly the same way, nothing 
 helped the Ottomans so much as the dissensions 
 between the Eastern and Western Churches, the 
 members of which could be got heartily to act with 
 one another. Many of the Greeks said that they 
 would rather see the Turks in Saint Sophia than the 
 Latins, and they lived to see it. And the Latins, 
 with a few noble exceptions, could never be got to 
 give any real help to the Greeks. All this illustrates 
 the law that the quarrels of near kinsfolk are the 
 most bitter of any. And it is after all another 
 instance of this same law which, as has already been 
 
REICxN OF BAJAZET AND SELIM. 1 25 
 
 said, makes Christianity and Islam rival religions 
 above all others. 
 
 The Turkish dominion in Europe was now tho- 
 roughly formed. For some years after the death of 
 Mahomet the Conqueror, it was hardly at all enlarged. 
 The next Sultan, Bajazet the Second, who reigned 
 from 148 1 to 1512, was not a man of war nor in any 
 way a man of genius like his father. His character 
 was an odd mixture of sensuality and religious 
 mysticism, two things which, under the Mahometan 
 system, are not incompatible. His wars were con- 
 fined to winning a few points from Venice, and to 
 constant ravages of Hungary and the other Christian 
 lands to the north. Here we may mark how evil 
 deeds produce evil. The horrible cruelties of the 
 Turks in these incursions provoked equal cruelties 
 on the part of the Christians, and so a black strife 
 of retaliation went on. Such a reign as this was 
 naturally unsatisfactory to the ruling race. Bajazet 
 was deposed, and, after the manner of deposed princes, 
 he speedily died. Then came the eight years' reign 
 of his son Selim, called the Inflexible. His was a 
 reign of conquest, but of conquest waged mainly 
 against Mahometan enemies beyond the bounds of 
 Europe. Syria and Egypt were added to the Otto- 
 man dominion, and the Sultan added to that secular 
 title the spiritual authority of the Caliphate. The 
 real Caliphs of the Abbasside house had come to an 
 end when Bagdad was taken by the Moguls ; but a 
 line of nominal Caliphs, who had no temporal power 
 whatever, had gone on in Egypt. From the last of 
 these phantoms Selim obtained a cession of his 
 rights, and ever since the Ottoman Sultans have been 
 
126 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 acknowledged as chiefs of their religion by all orth 
 dox Mussulmans, that is all who belong to the Sonnit 
 sect and admit the lawfulness of the first three Caliph 
 The Persians and other Shiahs of course do not ac- 
 knowledge the religious supremacy of the Sultan, any 
 more than the Orthodox and the Reformed Churches 
 in Christendom acknowledge the supremacy of the 
 Pope. The Caliph, it should be remembered, is 
 Pope and Emperor in one. For one who was already 
 Sultan thus to become Caliph was much the same as 
 if, in the West, one who was already Emperor had 
 also become Pope. 
 
 The rule of the new Caliph was in some things 
 worse than that of any of the Emirs and Sultans who 
 had gone before him. In systematic blood-thirstiness, 
 whether towards Christians, towards heretical Maho- 
 metans, or towards his own ministers and servants, 
 Selim outdid all who had gone before him. But here 
 comes out one of the special features of Ottoman rule. 
 The one check on the despot's will is the law of the 
 Prophet. What the law of the Prophet bids on any 
 particular matter the Sultan must learn from the 
 official expounders of that law. And it must be 
 said, in justice to these Mahometan doctors, that, if 
 they have sometimes sanctioned special deeds of 
 wrong, they have also sometimes hindered them. So 
 it was in the reign of Selim. The Mufti Djemali, 
 whose name deserves to be remembered, several 
 times turned the Sultan from bloody purposes. At 
 last he withstood Selim when he wished to massacre 
 all the Christians in his dominions and to forbid the 
 exercise of the Christian religion. Now such a pur- 
 pose was utterly contrary to the text of the Koran, 
 and the act of Djemali in hindering it was the act of 
 
 * 
 
SELIM AND SULEIMAN. \2J 
 
 righteous man and an honest expounder of his own 
 law. But be it remembered that, if the question 
 had been, not whether Christians should be mas- 
 sacred, but whether they should be admitted to 
 equality with Mahometans, Djemali must equally 
 have withstood the Sultan's purpose. The contem- 
 ptuous toleration which the Koran enforces equally 
 forbids massacres on the one side and real emanci- 
 pation on the other. 
 
 The next reign was a long and famous one, that of 
 Suleiman — the name is the same as Solomon — called 
 the Magnificent and the Lawgiver, who reigned from 
 1520 to 1566. Mahomet had established the Empire; 
 Suleiman had to extend it. But Suleiman was a 
 nobler spirit than Mahomet. Under any other sys- 
 tem, he would have been a good as well as a great 
 ruler. And allowing for some of those occasional 
 crimes which seem inseparable from every Eastern 
 despotism — crimes which in his case chiefly touched 
 his own ministers and his own family — we may say 
 that he was a good prince according to his light. The 
 Ottoman Empire was now at the height of its power. 
 Its army was the strongest and best-disciplined of 
 armies. But the Christian nations were now growing 
 up to a level with their Mahometan enemies. Even 
 the long and cruel wars among the Christian powers 
 themselves, while they hindered those powers from 
 joining together to withstand the Turk, schooled them 
 in the end severally to cope with him. Suleiman took 
 Rhodes early in his reign, and the Knights withdrew 
 to Malta. He again besieged them at Malta in the last 
 years of his reign, but this time without success. But 
 the greatest of Suleiman's victories and the most 
 instructive for our purpose, are those which he won 
 
128 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 in Hungary. At the beginning of his reign, in 1521, 
 he took Belgrade. Five years later, the last of the 
 separate Kings of Hungary — those I mean who were 
 not also Archdukes of Austria — Lewis the Second, 
 died in battle against the Turks at Mohacs. After 
 that the crown of Hungary was for a long while 
 disputed between rival Kings. Thus at once on 
 Lewis' death, John Zapolya, Prince of Transsilvania, 
 and Ferdinand of Austria, who was afterwards 
 Emperor, were both chosen by different parties. 
 Suleiman found it to his interest to support Zapolya ; 
 he even besieged Vienna, though in vain. The end 
 was that the Emperors kept that part of Hungary 
 which bordered on Austria and their other dominions, 
 while princes who were vassals of the Turk reigned in 
 Transsilvania and the eastern part of the kingdom. 
 But the Turk himself took a larger share of Hungary 
 than either, and a pasha ruled at Buda as well as at 
 Belgrade. Here too the progress of the Turks was 
 helped by disunion among the Christians. Just as 
 further south the Turks profited by the dissensions 
 between the Catholics and the Orthodox, so in Hun- 
 gary they profited by the dissensions between the 
 Catholics and the Protestants. These last were of 
 various sects, but all alike were persecuted by the 
 bigotted Austrian Kings. It was no wonder then 
 that the Protestants preferred the alliance, and even 
 the sovereignty, of the Sultan to the rule of a Catholic 
 sovereign. This fact has often been made a strange 
 use of by the partisans of the Turks. No doubt the 
 contemptuous toleration which the Turk gives to his 
 Christian subjects was better than actual persecution, 
 and men who were actually persecuted might well 
 think that they gained by becoming his subjects. It 
 
 
 I 
 
PERSECUTION AND TOLERATION. 1 29 
 
 would be so even now. A man who was forbidden to 
 exercise his religion under pain of death or bonds 
 would even now gain by becoming a subject of the 
 Turk. He would have to put up with degradation ; 
 he would have to take his chance of irregular oppres- 
 sion, oppression which might sometimes amount to 
 robbery or murder ; but no sentence of law would con- 
 demn him to death or bonds or banishment, simply 
 for the practice of his religion. And if it is so even 
 now, much more was it so in the time of Suleiman, 
 when oppression was not so great as it is now, and 
 when it was the policy of the Sultan to attach one 
 party in the Hungarian nation to himself, that they 
 might act as his allies against the other party. But 
 this does not prove that the Turk is, or ever was, 
 really tolerant, as toleration is now understood in the 
 West. Their toleration was always contemptuous, 
 or at most politic. And, though it is certain that 
 in Suleiman's day any English Roman Catholic 
 or Hungarian Protestant would have gained by 
 becoming the subject of Suleiman, it is still more 
 certain that neither of them would gain by becoming 
 a subject of the Sultan now. 
 
 Besides the conquests of Suleiman in Hungary, 
 the relations between the Turk and the two Rouman 
 principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia were now 
 definitely settled. They were to be vassal states, 
 paying tribute ; but the Sultan was to have no part 
 in their internal government. No Turk was to live in 
 the country, and the princes were to be freely chosen 
 by the nobles and clergy of the principalities. This 
 system lasted from 1536 to 171 1. Then the Sultans 
 took to appointing and deposing the princes at 
 pleasure. They appointed Fanariot Greeks ; and so, 
 
 K 
 
I30 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 strangely enough, the Greeks, bondmen in their own 
 land, became rulers in another. 
 
 Splendid as was the character and the rule of 
 Suleiman, still it is from his day that both Turkish 
 and Christian writers date the decline of the Turkish 
 power. Suleiman ceased to manage all state affairs 
 so directly as earlier Sultans had done. The power of 
 the Viziers and the influence of the women increased. 
 The taxes were farmed out to Jews, Greeks, and others, 
 a system which always at once lessens the revenue of 
 the sovereign and increases the burthens of the subject. 
 Conquest, we are told, brought with it luxury, love 
 of ease, love of weath. The soldiers fought less for 
 victory than for plunder. Certain it is that, while up 
 to Suleiman's time the Ottoman power had steadily 
 advanced, after his time it began to go down. The 
 Turkish lords of New Rome, like their Roman and 
 Greek predecessors, had their times of revival, their 
 days of unexpected conquest. But, on the whole, the 
 Ottoman power now steadily declined. 
 
 After Suleiman came a second Selim, known as the 
 Drunkard, a name which marks the little heed which 
 he paid to the precepts of his own law. His short reign, 
 from 1566 to 1574, was marked by the first great re- 
 verse of the Ottoman arms. This was the overthrow 
 of the Turkish fleet by the fleets of Spain and of 
 ' Venice in the great fight of Lepanto in 157 1. It has 
 been often said, and said with perfect truth, that though 
 the Turk was defeated in the battle, yet he had really 
 the better in the war. For the Turk lost only his fleet, 
 which might be replaced, while the Venetians lost the 
 great island of Cyprus, which has ever since formed 
 part of the Turkish dominions. But the battle of 
 
 
BEGINNING OF DECAY. 131 
 
 Lepanto none the less marks the turning-point in 
 the history of the Ottoman power. It broke the 
 spell, and taught men that the Turks could be con- 
 quered. Hitherto, though they had failed in particular 
 enterprises, their career had been one of constant 
 advance. Now, for the first time, they were utterly 
 defeated in a great battle. And, with the military 
 power of the Ottomans, their moral power decayed 
 also. The line of the great Sultans had come to 
 an end. Several of the later Sultans were men of 
 vigour and ability ; but the succession of great rulers 
 which, unless we except Bajazet the Second, had 
 gone on without a break from Othman to Suleiman 
 the Lawgiver, now stopped. The power of the 
 Sultans over their distant dominions was lessened, 
 while the power of the Pashas grew. The discipline 
 of the Ottoman armies was relaxed, and the courts 
 of most Sultans became a scene of corruption of every 
 kind. Early in the seventeenth century men marked 
 the decay of the Turkish power, and expected that 
 it would presently fall to pieces. Why did it not fall ? 
 The growth of the Turkish power is easily explained. 
 A succession of such men as the early Sultans, 
 wielding such a force as the Janissaries, could not fail 
 to conquer. Why their power lasted so long after 
 it began to decay may seem, at first sight, less easy 
 to explain. But the causes are not very far to seek. 
 The preservation of the same ruling family, and that 
 a family whose head is not only Sultan of the Otto- 
 mans, but is deemed by orthodox Mussulmans to be 
 the Caliph of the Prophet, alone counts for a good 
 deal. More important still has been the possession 
 of the Imperial city. New Rome, under her elder 
 lords, held on under greater dangers than have ever 
 
 K 2 
 
132 RISE AND GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 threatened their Ottoman successors. In quite late 
 times the Turkish power has been propped up by 
 the wicked policy of the governments of Western 
 Europe. But, long before that policy began, men 
 had begun to ask why the Ottoman power did not 
 fall. The possession of Constantinople is of itself 
 perhaps reason enough. In the case of the later 
 Byzantine Emperors, the possession of Constantinople 
 prolonged the existence of a power which otherwise 
 must have fallen, and whose prolonged existence did 
 no good to the world. The case is exactly the same 
 with the dominion of the Ottomans. 
 
 
 We have thus traced the growth of the Ottoman 
 power, from its first small beginnings till it had 
 swelled into a vast dominion, first in Asia and then 
 in Europe. It had grown to that extent of power 
 by the great qualities of a long succession of princes, 
 whose skill in the craft of conquerors and rulers 
 sometimes goes far to make us forget their crimes. 
 And, in the case of the Ottoman Sultans, it is not 
 merely their personal crimes that we are tempted 
 to forget. Their personal crimes may be paralleled 
 in the history of other times and other nations. But 
 there has never been in European history, perhaps 
 not in the history of the whole world, any other 
 power which was in everything so thoroughly a fabric 
 of wrong as the power of the Ottomans. There has 
 been no other dominion of the same extent lasting 
 for so long a time, which has been in the same way 
 wholly grounded on the degradation and oppression 
 of the mass of those who were under its rule. Others 
 among the great empires of the world have done much 
 wrong and caused much suffering ; but they have for 
 
 
 
SUMMARY. 133 
 
 the most part done something else besides doing wrong 
 and causing suffering. Most of the other powers of the 
 world, at all events most of those which play a part 
 in the history of Europe, if they had a dark side, 
 had also a bright one. To take the great example 
 of all, the establishment of the Roman dominion 
 carried with it much of wrong, much of suffering, 
 much wiping out of older national life. But the 
 Empire of Rome had its good side also. If Rome 
 destroyed, she also created. If she conquered, she 
 also civilized ; if she oppressed, she also educated, 
 and in the end evangelized. She handed on to 
 the growing nations of Europe the precious inhe- 
 ritance of her tongue, her law, and her religion. The 
 rule of the Ottoman Turk has no such balance of 
 good to set against its evil. His mission has been 
 simply a mission of destruction and oppression. From 
 him the subject nations could gain nothing and learn 
 nothing, except how to endure wrong patiently. His 
 rule was not merely the rule of strangers over nations 
 in their own land. It was the rule of the barbarian 
 over the civilized man, the rule of the misbeliever over 
 the Christian. [The direct results of Turkish conquest 
 have been that, while the nations of Western Europe 
 have enjoyed five hundred years of progress, the 
 nations of South-eastern Europe have suffered five 
 hundred years of bondage and of all that follows 
 on bondage. The rule of the Turk, by whatever 
 diplomatic euphemisms it may be called, means the 
 bondage and degradation of all v/ho come beneath 
 his rule. Such bondage and degradation is not an 
 incidental evil which may be reformed ; it is the 
 essence of the whole system, the groundwork on 
 which the Ottoman power is built. The power which 
 
134 
 
 GROWTH OF OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 Othman began, which Mahomet the Conqueror firmly 
 established, which Suleiman the Lawgiver raised to 
 its highest pitch of power and splendour, is, beyond 
 all powers that the world ever saw, the embodiment 
 of wrong. In the most glorious regions of the world, 
 the rule of the Turk has been the abomination of 
 k desolation, and nothing else. Out of it no direct 
 good can come ; indirect good can come of it in 
 one shape only. The natives of South-eastern 
 Europe came under the yoke through disunion. 
 Greek, Slave, Frank, could not be brought to com- 
 bine against the Turk. Orthodox and Catholic could 
 not be brought to combine against the Mussulman. If 
 the long ages during which those nations have paid the 
 penalty of disunion and intolerance shall have taught 
 them lessons of union and tolerance, they may have 
 gained something indirectly, even from five hundred 
 years of Turkish bondage. We have thus far traced 
 the steps by which they came under the yoke. We 
 have now to trace the steps by which, on the one 
 hand, the yoke was made harder, while, on the other 
 hand, hopes began to dawn which promised that the 
 yoke might one day be thrown off. We have in this 
 chapter traced the gradual course of the growth of 
 the Ottoman power ; in the next chapter we must go 
 on to trace the gradual course of its decline. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 (i, p. 97.) Corfu is the island which called itself Korkyra y but which 
 in Attic and modern Greek is called Kerkyra. It is better to use the 
 real Greek names of Greek places than their Turkish or Italian names. 
 But Corfu is a case where one Greek name has been changed for 
 another. It comes from Kopv<pai, peaks, or perhaps from K6p(pos-K6\rros, 
 the gulf. 
 
 (2, p. 108.) The dates of the death of Orkhan and of the taking of 
 Hadrianople seem not to be quite certain. I have followed Von Hammer 
 and Finlay, who place the death of Orkhan in 1359, and the taking of 
 Hadrianople in 1361. But it seems that there are other authorities 
 according to which Orkhan did not die till 1362, and Hadrianople was 
 taken the next year. See Jirecek, Geschichie der Bulgaren, p. 319. 
 
 (3, p. 112.) The different dates given to the taking of Philadelphia 
 range from 1374 to 1391 ; but it seems to have been taken during the 
 reign of Bajazet. 
 
 (4, p. 113.) See History and Conquests of the Saracens, p. 181. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 The difference between the time which we have 
 just gone through and the time to which we have now 
 come is well marked in this way. Thus far it is easy 
 for any one who follows the history, even in the most 
 general way, to carry in his head the names and order 
 of the Ottoman Emirs and Sultans. Each of them 
 has a character of his own ; the reign of each is 
 marked by some special event, commonly by some 
 conquest, which is the prince's own doing. The reign 
 of Othman is marked by the establishment of the 
 Ottomans as an Asiatic power. Under Orkhan they 
 pass into Europe. Under the first Amurath Hadria- 
 nople is taken ; the Eastern Empire is hemmed in ; 
 Servia becomes tributary. Bajazet, the first Sultan, 
 defeats the great crusade from the West at Nikopolis. 
 Mahomet the First restores the Ottoman power after 
 its overthrow by Timour. Amurath takes Thessalo- 
 nica and overthrows Wladislaus at Varna. Mahomet 
 the Conqueror wins the city of the Caesars ; he gives 
 his dominions their lasting extent, and organizes as 
 well as conquers. The second Bajazet, the first 
 Sultan who was deposed, seems like a shadow from 
 the second period cast back into the first. But the 
 few years of Selim nearly double the extent of the 
 
THE LATER SULTANS. 137- 
 
 Ottoman dominion, and crown its master with the 
 sacred honours of the Caliphate. Under Suleiman 
 the Ottoman power reaches its highest point. 
 Even the second Selim, unworthy of remembrance 
 in himself, lives in the memory as the prince in 
 whose days Cyprus was won and Lepanto lost. 
 Thus far it is easy to go, even without book. But 
 to remember the Sultans after Selim needs an effort. 
 A few of them stand out through some special point 
 in their character. Amurath the Fourth (162 3- 1640) 
 stands forth as the most bloody, Ibrahim (1640- 1648) 
 as the most brutally sensual, of the line. Suleiman 
 the Second (1687-1691) and Mustafa the Second 
 (1695-1703) were men of some force of character, who 
 might have played a greater part than they did, if 
 they had lived in days when their empire was rising 
 instead of falling. Of course any one who studies the 
 Ottoman history minutely will be able to remember 
 the Sultans of this time, just as he may remember the 
 Kings of England or France, great and small. The 
 difference is that no one who reads the general history 
 of the world with any thoughtfulness will fail to re- 
 member the order of the Sultans for the first two 
 hundred years or more, while for the next two hundred 
 years he may follow the general course of events, and 
 the general relations of the Ottomans to other powers, 
 without always remembering who was Sultan at any 
 particular time. No one can help remembering that 
 Amurath died at Kossova and that Mahomet took 
 Constantinople. But it is easy to remember the 
 second siege of Vienna, and to remember what terri- 
 tories were lost and won by the peace of Carlo witz 
 and the peace of Passarowitz, without remembering 
 who was Sultan when each of those events happened. 
 
I38 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 At one part of the history, namely the second half 
 of the seventeenth century, the ministers stand out 
 rather than the sovereigns. In an Eastern despotism, 
 where all alike are the slaves of the prince, there can 
 hardly be such a thing as an hereditary aristocracy. 
 A man may rise from the lowest place, even from 
 slavery itself, to the highest offices in the empire. 
 It is rare then in the Ottoman empire, or in any 
 other Eastern despotism, to find anything like a suc- 
 cession of power in the same family. But in the 
 seventeenth century there was an exceptional case of 
 this kind in the family of Kiuprili. Several members 
 of that house were chief ministers of the Sultans ; they 
 were all men of ability, and some of them were really 
 better and more tolerant rulers than the common run 
 either of the Sultans or their ministers. But, as a 
 rule, through the whole of this period, such a sketch 
 as this may deal with events and with the general 
 course of things, without having so much to say as 
 before about particular men. In short, the time of 
 the great Sultans has passed away, and the time of 
 the small Sultans has begun. 
 
 Allowing, as has been already said, for occasional 
 fits of revived energy, the Ottoman power went 
 steadily down after the time of Suleiman the Lawgiver. 
 It went down in two ways. Though territory was 
 still sometimes won, yet on the whole the Ottoman 
 frontiers fell back. After Suleiman no lasting conquests 
 of any importance were made, except those of the 
 islands of Cyprus and Crete. The frontier on the 
 north towards Hungary, and in later times towards 
 Russia, though there have been considerable fluctua- 
 tions and winnings back of territory, has on the whole 
 steadily gone back. And, last of all, in our own age 
 
THE SULTANS AND THEIR MINISTERS. 1 39 
 
 large parts of the Ottoman territory have been 
 separated from it to form distinct states, either 
 tributary or wholly independent. In these ways the 
 extent of the Ottoman dominion on the map has 
 lessened wonderfully indeed since the days of Sulei- 
 man. And, during the greater part of the times with 
 which we are dealing, the power of the Sultans was 
 getting less and less in the dominions which were left 
 to them. The central administration got more and 
 more corrupt, more under the influence of ministers, 
 favourites, and women than under the authority of the 
 Sultans themselves. The Pashas or governors of pro- 
 vinces got more and more independent, and in some 
 cases they made their offices practically hereditary. In 
 some parts indeed, especially toward the end of the 
 last century, when the power of the Sultans was at its 
 lowest, there was utter anarchy without any control 
 of any kind. Through the seventeenth century especi- 
 ally, we may mark the short reigns of the Sultans, as 
 contrasted with the long reigns of most of the great 
 Sultans. Many of them were deposed and murdered, 
 as they have again begun to be in our own times. 
 Xor must we forget, as _one cause of decay, the 
 wretched education, if we may so call it, of the Sul- 
 tans themselves. Kept in a kind of imprisonment till 
 they came to the throne, with every means of enjoying 
 themselves, but with no means of learning the duties 
 of rulers, they came forth from prison to be clothed 
 with absolute power. One is really inclined to wonder 
 that they were not even worse than they were, and 
 that any of them shewed any sign of virtue or ability 
 of any kind. 
 
 This may pass as a general picture of the charac- 
 ter of Ottoman rule during the days of the decay of 
 
140 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 the Ottoman power. But it concerns us more 
 know what was the effect of this state of things on the 
 nations which the Turks held in bondage. It must 
 not be thought that the decay of the power of the 
 Sultans brought any direct or immediate relief to the 
 subject nations. Some indirect advantages they did 
 gain from it ; but in the main the weakening of the 
 power of the Sultans, the general decay of their 
 empire, meant not lessened but increased oppression ; 
 it meant, not lighter, but heavier bondage to be borne 
 by their Christian subjects. The great Sultans, as a 
 rule, were not men who delighted in oppression for 
 oppression's sake. Their personal crimes mainly 
 touched those who were personally near to them ; 
 they had wisdom enough to see that they would gain 
 nothing by making the bondage of the conquered 
 nations intolerable. In all despotisms there is more 
 chance of justice and mercy from the head despot 
 than from his subordinates, and many a tyrant has 
 deemed tyranny a privilege of the crpwn which no 
 subordinate might share. As the power of the Sul- 
 tans grew weaker, the subject nations lost their one 
 chance of redress. In such a state of things grinding 
 local oppression at the hands of a crowd of petty 
 tyrants takes the place of the equal, if stern, rule of 
 the common master of all. Under such grinding local 
 oppression, lands were untilled, houses were unin- 
 habited, the population of the country sensibly 
 lessened. But, as the demands both of central and 
 of local rulers did not lessen, the burthens of those 
 who survived were only made the heavier. Such, with 
 a few moments of relief, has been the general state of 
 things in South-eastern Europe since the decline of 
 the empire began. There have been exceptions. 
 
FEELING OF THE SUBJECT NATIONS. 14 1 
 
 One of the viziers of the house of Kiuprili, Zade 
 Mustafa, who became vizier in 1689, was an excep- 
 tional case of a Turkish ruler who did every justice 
 to the Christians which the Mahometan law allowed. 
 He thereby for the while did much for the truest 
 prosperity of his master's dominions. Other ministers 
 of the same family had the wisdom to follow the 
 same course ; but the beginning of better times, or 
 at least of brighter hopes, for the subject nations, 
 which may be dated from the latter years of the 
 seventeenth century, was mainly owing to quite 
 different causes. 
 
 Those causes were chiefly two, the remission of the 1 
 tribute of children and the advance of the Christian 
 powers at the expense of the Turk. As was before 
 said, as long as the tribute of children was levied, the 
 subject nations really could not stir. From the time 
 when it ceased, even when there was no actual 
 improvement in their condition, there was the be- 
 ginning of hope. There was a stirring of national 
 life, such as there could not be as long as their best 
 strength was taken from them. And every success 
 gained by any Christian power against their masters 
 raised the hopes and heightened the spirit of those 
 who were under the yoke. Herein comes out the 
 main difference between a national government and 
 the rule of strangers. When any Christian power was 
 at war with the Turk, the enslaved nations looked on 
 the enemies of the Turk, not as their enemies, but 
 as their friends. Every failure on the part of their 
 masters, every danger that threatened their masters, 
 gave them a hope of deliverance. In any Western 
 country we should deem it treason for any man to 
 help, or wish success to, the enemies of his country. 
 
I42 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 But to the Christians under the Turk, it was the Turk 
 
 fpio seemed the enemy of their country. Those who 
 ade war on the Turk seemed, not the enemies of 
 f their country, but its friends. And so it ever will be, 
 as long as, instead of being under a government of 
 their own, they are left under the yoke of strangers. 
 The subject nations have often been very badly 
 treated by Christian powers who professed to be 
 their friends. Hopes have often been kindled, pro- 
 mises have often been made, which were never 
 fulfilled. Still, all these causes joined together to 
 stir up men's minds, and to raise them from the state 
 of utter wretchedness and despair under which they 
 had been bowed down for so many generations. 
 
 From the middle of the seventeenth century the 
 Turks had constant wars with the neighbouring 
 Christian powers, wars in which, though the Turks 
 sometimes won victories and recovered provinces, 
 their dominion on the whole went back. The chief 
 powers with which they had to strive up to the latter 
 part of the seventeenth century were the common- 
 wealth of Venice and the kingdom of Hungary, then 
 held by the Emperors of the House of Austria. They 
 had also wars with Poland, when the Polish kingdom, 
 in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, stretched 
 much further to the south-east than it did before or 
 after. And lastly, they have had wars with Russia, 
 which, for a long time past, have been of greater 
 moment than any of the others. But, in the latter 
 part of the sixteenth and the greater part of the 
 seventeenth century, the chief wars were those with 
 Venice and with the Emperors in their character 
 of Kings of Hungary. Both the Venetian and the 
 
 
WARS WITH VENICE AND THE EMPERORS. 143 
 
 Hungarian wars greatly affected the interests of the 
 subject nations. The Hungarian wars chiefly affected 
 the Slaves, and to some extent the Roumans. The 
 Venetian wars mainly affected the Greeks, and to 
 some extent also the Slaves. The possessions of 
 Venice in the East consisted of islands and points or 
 lines of coast. These might easily be lost, and won, 
 as they often were, without the loss or gain of one 
 settlement greatly affecting any other. But the 
 kingdom of Hungary had, before the time of Sulei- 
 man, lain as a compact mass, with a continuous 
 frontier, to the north of the Ottoman dominions. And, 
 as the Ottoman frontier went back, Hungary gradually 
 took that character again. Along the Danube and its 
 great tributaries, sometimes the power of the Em- 
 perors, sometimes the power of the Sultans, advanced. 
 But on the whole the Ottoman frontier fell back. It 
 will be seen by the map how great a territory has 
 been won back from the Turks since the days of 
 Suleiman. On the other hand, though the Venetians 
 gained some successes, though they often won back 
 lands which they had lost and sometimes even won 
 new lands, still, on the whole, the Venetian power fell 
 back, and the Ottoman power advanced. In both 
 cases, the change of frontier between the Turk and 
 Venice or between the Turk and the Emperor was, for 
 the Greek and Slavonic inhabitants of the disputed 
 lands, a mere change of masters. Still there was the 
 difference between civilized and barbarian masters. 
 The rule of Venice in her distant possessions was bad, 
 and often oppressive. It could awaken no kind of 
 national or loyal feeling on the part of the subjects 
 of the commonwealth. Still it was not brutal 
 and bloody, like that of the Turks. And, on the 
 
144 TIIE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 Hungarian frontier, when the Austrian kings ceased 
 to persecute, instead of Hungarian Protestants wel- 
 coming the Turk as a deliverer, the Christian subjects 
 of the Turks welcomed every success of the Imperial 
 arms as bringing deliverance to themselves. 
 
 It may be as well to sketch, as far as may be, in 
 one continuous story the chief gains and losses of 
 territory, especially among the islands, which hap- 
 pened in the long wars between the Venetians and 
 the Turks. At the time when the Turks took Con-, 
 stantinople, Venice had a dominion in Dalmatia, the 
 boundaries of which had often fluctuated in the wars 
 between Venice and the Kings of Hungary, and which 
 afterwards no less fluctuated again in the wars between 
 Venice and the Turks. Many of the Dalmatian towns 
 in this way changed masters over and over again ; 
 but it would be impossible to tell their story except 
 at great length. But the commonwealth of Ragusa, by 
 contriving to keep on good terms with the Turks, kept 
 on its independence throughout. When Mahomet 
 took Constantinople, besides her Dalmatian dominion, 
 Venice held some territory to the south on the Alba- 
 nian coast, and also several points on the coasts both 
 of Northern Greece and of Peloponnesos, Argos and 
 Nauplia. She also held the great islands of Crete, 
 Euboia, Corfu, and Cyprus. The first three of these 
 she had kept continuously from the Latin taking of 
 Constantinople. Euboia and Crete she kept till they 
 were conquered by the Turks, while Corfu she kept till 
 the end. The other islands off the west coast of Greece, 
 commonly called the Ionian Islands, were tossed to and 
 fro over and over again between Venetians, Turks, and 
 Frank princes. But in the end Venice got them all, 
 and kept them till the time of her own fall. Several of 
 
CONQUEST OF CRETE. 145 
 
 the islands of the ^Egaean were also held either by the 
 commonwealth of Venice or by Venetian families. 
 In 1489 the Venetians got possession of the island of 
 Cyprus, which had hitherto been a Frank kingdom. 
 The Venetian possessions in Peloponnesos, Euboia, 
 and most of those in the smaller islands of the 
 ^gaean, were gradually conquered by the Turks from 
 the reign of Mahomet the Conqueror to that of Sulei- 
 man. Thus, at the time when the decay of the Otto- 
 man Empire began, Venice had lost a great part of 
 her Eastern territories, but she still kept a large in- 
 sular dominion. She had Cyprus, Crete, Corfu and the 
 other Ionian Islands, and a few points on the western 
 coast and in the ^Egaean. In all these she was a ruler 
 over Greeks, or, in some of the northern points, over 
 Albanians. In Dalmatia she ruled over Slaves, except 
 so far as the coast towns had largely become Italian. 
 
 We have already seen how Cyprus was lost in the 
 reign of Selim the Second. In the next century Crete 
 was lost also. The Turks attacked the island in 
 1645, an d the war went on till 1669, when Crete was 
 lost. This is called the war of Candia, from the long 
 siege of the town of Candia, which was most gallantly 
 defended by the Venetians, with the help of many 
 volunteers from Western Europe. It must be re- 
 membered that, though the island has sometimes 
 got to be called Candia, from the town of Candia 
 and its memorable siege, yet the island itself has 
 never changed its name, but has always been called 
 Crete both by Greeks and Turks. This great island 
 now passed under Turkish bondage. The mass of 
 the people remained faithful, and sank to the usual 
 lot of the subject nations, or rather to a worse 
 lot than most of them. For a good many of the 
 
I46 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 inhabitants became Mussulmans, so that there are 
 Greek-speaking Mussulmans in Crete, just as there 
 are Slavonic-speaking Mussulmans in Bosnia. And 
 the result was the same as it was in Bosnia, and 
 as it was everywhere. These renegades and their 
 descendants were more oppressive to their Christian 
 fellow-countrymen than the Turks themselves. In 
 Cyprus, on the other hand, the exactions of the 
 Sultan's government were even greater than in most 
 other parts ; but Turks and Christians in the island 
 were on better terms than usual. It is important to 
 remember these distinctions ; for it is easy, by draw- 
 ing inferences which apply to one time or place 
 only, and applying them to other times and places 
 to fall into great mistakes. The Christian subjects 
 of the Turk were everywhere in bondage ; they were 
 everywhere in a case which in Western Europe would 
 be held to justify them in revolting. But it is not 
 wonderful that bondage was lighter in some places 
 and heavier in others ; nor is it wonderful that, as a 
 rule, renegades and their descendants were worse 
 oppressors than the natural Turks. For the conqueror 
 can afford to shew some kind of mercy, if it be only 
 contemptuous mercy. The renegade is full of a mean 
 spite towards better men than himself. 
 
 These were the chief changes of territory with 
 •regard to those great islands which were at different 
 times held by Venice in the East of Europe. Corfu 
 alone was always held by the Republic for nearly 
 six hundred years, from the Latin taking of Con- 
 stantinople to her own fall. But besides the wars in 
 the islands and the wars in Dalmatia, Venice had 
 also important wars with the Turks on the mainland 
 of Greece. But these wars had a great deal to do 
 
END OF THE TRIBUTE OF CHILDREN. 147 
 
 with wars which were carried on at the same time by 
 other European powers. It will therefore be well to 
 go back a little in our story, in order to understand 
 the general position in which the Turkish power stood 
 in the latter part of the seventeenth century. Though, 
 as we have seen, several of the Sultans of this time 
 were men of some vigour, though they were often 
 served by able ministers, still decay and corruption 
 had greatly advanced, and the Ottoman power was 
 going down on every side. It was during this century 
 that the tribute of children was gradually left off. 
 The Janissaries were now no longer what they had 
 been, and the tables were now altogether turned in 
 military matters between the Turks and the nations 
 of Europe. Mahomet the Conqueror had commanded 
 armies such as" no European power could put in the 
 field against him. In the two centuries which had 
 passed since his time, the military system of every 
 European power had improved, while the system of 
 the Turks had gone back. They had lost their own 
 old discipline, and they had not learned the discipline 
 of European armies. Thus the latter part of the 
 seventeenth century was a general time of loss to 
 the Ottoman power. Besides Venice and Hungary, 
 the Turks had wars with Poland and Russia, of which 
 we shall say more presently. Notwithstanding some 
 occasional successes, the Turkish power gave way at 
 all these points. During this period wars with the Turks 
 were going on at various points from Peloponnesos 
 to the mouth of the Don. But the war in Hungary 
 formed the centre of all. This was now the region 
 where the great struggle between Turks and Christians 
 was waged, and in that region at this time the Turkish 
 frontier steadily went back. The wars of this time 
 
 L 2 
 
48 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 were like a vast battle, in which Venice at one end, 
 Poland and Russia at the other, were attacking 
 and defending this and that outpost, while the main 
 struggle went on in the lands upon the Danube. 
 
 We have seen that the conquests of Suleiman left 
 only a small part of Hungary to its nominal king 
 the Emperor. The greater part of the land was 
 ruled by a Turkish Pasha, while Transsilvania and 
 part of Hungary itself formed a vassal principality. 
 The state of things in these lands often changed, and 
 there were several wars in the sixteenth and seven- 
 teenth centuries. But, on the whole, the Turks kept 
 their predominance in Hungary. In the latter hall 
 of the seventeenth century things began to change. 
 In 1663, while the siege of Candia was still going on, 
 when Mahomet the Fourth was Sultan and Leopold 
 the First was Emperor and King of Hungary, a war 
 began in which for the first time the Imperial arms 
 decidedly had the better. The war was famous for 
 the great battle of Saint Gotthard, fought in 1664, in 
 which the Imperial general Montecuculi won a great 
 victory over the Turks under the Vizier Kiuprili. 
 This battle was by land much the same as Lepanto 
 was by sea. It was the first great overthrow of the 
 Turks ; it therefore marks a turning-point in their 
 history. Or rather it was really of much greater mo- 
 ment than Lepanto. For, though Lepanto broke the 
 spell of Turkish success, it really did no material harm 
 to the Turkish power. But Saint Gotthard was really 
 the beginning of a long series of victories over the Turks 
 on the part both of the Emperors and of other Christian 
 powers. Yet it was like Lepanto in this, that, as the 
 victory of Lepanto was accompanied by the loss of 
 
BATTLE OF SAINT GOTTHARD. 1 49 
 
 Cyprus, so the victory of Saint Gotthard was very 
 soon followed by the loss of Crete. The battle was 
 followed by a truce for twenty years between the 
 Emperor and the Turks. Meanwhile the affairs of 
 the Cossacks, the wild people of the border-lands 
 between Poland, Russia, and the Turkish vassal 
 states north of the Euxine, led to wars both with 
 Poland and Russia. The Polish war lasted from 
 1672 to 1676. In this, though the famous John 
 Sobieski won several brilliant victories both before 
 and after his election to the Polish crown, yet 
 Poland lost the strong town of Kaminiec, and the 
 whole province of Podolia. This should be noticed, 
 as it was the last time that the Turks won any large 
 territory from any Christian power, as distinguished 
 from merely winning back territory which they had 
 held before. In this war both Sultan Mahomet and 
 his minister Kiuprili had a share. Its issue is in- 
 structive. Sobieski won battles, but the Turks kept 
 Podolia. For the Turks were just now ruled, in the 
 person of Kiuprili, by a single wise and strong will, 
 while, though the Poles are one of the bravest nations 
 on earth, yet the weak and disorderly nature of their 
 government made them constantly lose in other ways 
 what they won in fighting. In the Russian war, the 
 first war of any moment between Russia and the 
 Turk, the Sultan, who had just won a superiority over 
 the Cossacks of Ukraine from the Poles, lost it again 
 to the Russians. But the real beginnings of the 
 struggle between Russia and the Turk come a few 
 years later, though still within the times with which 
 we are dealing. It will be better to go back to what 
 were at the time the more important wars in Hungary 
 and Greece. 
 
150 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 We have already seen that the religious intoler- 
 ance of the Austrian Kings in Hungary gave a great 
 advantage to the Turks, and that it often made the 
 Protestants of Hungary think, with good reason, 
 that the rule of the Turk was the less heavy bond- 
 age of the two. No king did himself and his sub- 
 jects more harm in this way than the Emperor 
 Leopold the First. His persecutions, and the revolts 
 to which they led, laid not only Hungary but the 
 Empire itself open to the Turks. Mahomet the 
 Fourth was still Sultan ; but he had lost his wise 
 minister Kiuprili, and the present vizier Kara 
 Mustafa was fond of planning enterprises too great 
 for his power to carry out. It was he who had con- 
 ducted the unsuccessful war with Russia ; now in 1682 
 he undertook, not only to complete the conquest of 
 Hungary, but once more, like Suleiman, to invade 
 Germany itself. In 1683 the Turks again besieged 
 Vienna, and the city was saved, not at all by the 
 Emperor, but by John Sobieski and his Poles. 
 Austria and Hungary were in truth delivered from 
 the Turk by the swords of a Slavonic people, the 
 people of a kingdom which, within a hundred years, 
 Austria helped to dismember. A war now went on, 
 which lasted till 1698. The Turks were gradually 
 driven out of Hungary. In this war Sobieski at the 
 beginning, and Prince Eugene of Savoy in its later 
 stages, won some of their most famous victories. It 
 might at the time be doubted whether Hungary 
 gained much by being delivered from the Turk, only 
 to be put under such a king as Leopold. No doubt 
 Hungary has had much to complain of at the hands 
 of her Austrian Kings ; but the same rule applies 
 here as everywhere else. The Christian government 
 
DELIVERANCE OF HUNGARY. 151 
 
 can amend and reform ; the Mahometan govern- 
 ment cannot. During the reign of the next Sultan, 
 vSuleiman the Second, came the administration of 
 another Kiuprili, the one who has been already 
 mentioned as one of the very few Turkish rulers who 
 ever really thought of the welfare of the Christians 
 under Turkish rule. At the time, it was doubtless 
 better to be a Christian under Kiuprili than to be a 
 Protestant under Leopold. But mark the difference 
 in the long run. Hungary was freed from the Turk; 
 Bosnia and Bulgaria remained under his yoke. No 
 subject of the Hungarian crown, not even in those 
 Slavonic lands which have good reason to be dis- 
 contented with Magyar supremacy, would now wish 
 to change places with a Christian subject of the Turk. 
 But it is hard that a people like the Magyars, who 
 owe their freedom to Slavonic help, should grudge 
 their Slavonic neighbours t # he same freedom which 
 they themselves enjoy. 
 ^^ While the centre, as we may call it, of the general 
 Christian army was thus victoriously bearing the 
 main brunt of the strife in Hungary, much was also 
 done by what we may call the two wings, the ancient 
 power of Venice, the seemingly new, but really only 
 revived, power of Russia. It was now that Venice, 
 whose island dominion had been cut so sadly short 
 by the loss of Crete, suddenly began to play a great 
 part on the mainland of Greece. We have seen that 
 Peloponnesos had wholly fallen into the hands of the 
 Turks, the greater part under Mahomet, and the 
 little that was left by him under Suleiman. But 
 in some of the wilder parts of the country, as in 
 the peninsula of Maina, the Christians long kept a 
 rude independence. It was not till 1614 that the 
 
152 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 people of Maina were compelled to pay the haratch, 
 the tribute by which the non-Mussulman buys the 
 right to toleration at the hands of the Mussulman. 
 The Greek coasts were often visited by Spanish and 
 other European ships in their wars with the Turk, so 
 that the Greek inhabitants really suffered instead of 
 their masters. At last, in the year after the siege of 
 Vienna, when the Turkish power was giving way in 
 Hungary, it seemed a good time for Venice to strike 
 a blow. So in 1684 the great Venetian commander 
 Francesco Morosini, who was chosen Doge in the 
 course of the war, began the conquest of the peninsula. 
 It was thought that Peloponnesos would be more 
 easily held than Crete. The Venetian forces, with 
 help from other parts of Europe, conquered all Pelo- 
 ponnesos. The war also went on in Attica and 
 Euboia : Athens was taken, and it was in this siege 
 that the Parthenon, the great temple of Athene, was 
 ruined. It had been a church under the Emperors 
 and under the Frank Dukes; but the Turks had 
 turned it into a powder magazine, and a falling shell 
 caused an explosion which broke it down. But the 
 Venetians were not able to keep anything beyond 
 the isthmus ; Peloponnesos itself they did keep for 
 a while. Thus a large part of Greece was placed 
 under a government which, if not national, was at 
 least civilized. The Greeks at this time had no hope 
 for anything better than a change of masters. But 
 the Venetian was at least a better master than the 
 Turk : Peloponnesos passed under political bondage 
 to the republic ; but its people were saved from 
 personal oppression and degradation. 
 
 But meanwhile events were happening in what we 
 may call the other wing of the great battle, events 
 
VENETIAN CONQUEST OF PELOPONNESOS. 1 53 
 
 which, though they seemed less at the time than either 
 the Hungarian or Venetian wars, were the beginning 
 of much that has gone on with increasing importance 
 down to our own time. This is the beginning of those 
 long wars between Russia and the Turk at which we 
 have already glanced. Russia, it should not be for- 
 gotten, though it is less than two hundred years since 
 she began again to play a part in European affairs, 
 is really a very old power. Russia is a nation which 
 made a start, so to speak, early in life, which then re- 
 ceived a great check, and which began a second career 
 some ages after. In the ninth century the Russians, 
 a Slavonic people, though under rulers of Scandi- 
 navian descent, threatened the Eastern Empire, 
 just as the Bulgarians and afterwards the Servians 
 did. Only, while the Bulgarians and Servians came 
 by land, the Russians for the most part came by sea. 
 They crossed the Euxine, and tried to take Con- 
 stantinople, and afterwards they had wars with the 
 Emperors on the Danube. Presently Russia became 
 Christian ; Vladimir, its first Christian prince, had 
 as I have already said, deliberately preferred Chris- 
 tianity to Islam. The Russians got their Christianity 
 from Constantinople, and thus, being both Slavonic 
 in race and Orthodox in creed, they had a closer tie 
 to the nations who were under the Turk than any of 
 the nations of Western Europe. The Church of 
 Russia was for several ages dependent on the Church 
 of Constantinople ; but for several ages too Russia 
 had no means of taking any share in the affairs of 
 South - eastern Europe, or indeed in the general 
 affairs of Europe at all. Two things joined to keep 
 Russia back. First, the great Russian power of the 
 ninth and tenth centuries broke up into several smaller 
 
154 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 states. Then, in the thirteenth century, the power 
 of Russia was altogether overthrown by those same 
 Mogul invasions which, by overthrowing the Seljuk 
 Turks and the Bagdad Caliphate, had made the 
 ground ready in Asia for the first growth of the 
 Ottomans. On these Moguls, better known by the 
 name of Tartars, Russia was dependent for more than 
 two hundred years. Thus the Russians, like the 
 people of South-eastern Europe, had in some sort 
 Mahometan masters. They had not indeed, as the 
 Greeks, Bulgarians, and Servians had, a body of 
 oppressors scattered through their whole land. They 
 were rather like Wallachia and the other lands which 
 were tributary to the Turk. Still they had felt 
 bondage at the hands of Mahometan masters. They 
 had therefore a traditional hatred of Mahometan 
 rule ; and, as members of the Orthodox Church, they 
 had a tie of special fellowship with the South-eastern 
 Christians. The history of Russia answers in some 
 points to the history of Spain. In both these lands 
 at the extreme east and west of Europe, Mahometan 
 masters had to be driven out, and there are some 
 points of likeness in the processes by which they were 
 driven out in the two cases. 
 
 At the time which we have now reached, two of the 
 great seats of the Tartar power, at Kasan and at 
 Astrakhan, had long been held by Russia. But the 
 Tartars of Crim, that is of the peninsula of Crimea 
 and the neighbouring lands, still remained. And, as 
 long as they remained, Russia, whose fleets had in old 
 times sailed over the Euxine to attack Constantinople, 
 was even more thoroughly cut off from that sea 
 than Castile had been cut off from the Mediterranean 
 by the Saracens of Granada. The Khans of Crim 
 
GROWTH OF RUSSIA. 1 ^ 
 
 had been vassals of the Sultans ever since the time of 
 Mahomet the Conqueror, and their affairs, and those 
 of the Cossacks to the north of them, led to disputes 
 between Russia, Poland, and the Turks. The wars 
 between Russia and the Turks began in the middle 
 of the seventeeth century, and we have already spoken 
 of a war somewhat later, in which Russia won the 
 land of Ukraine. But in the reign of Peter the Great, 
 under whom Russia first began to play any great 
 part in European affairs, the wars between Russia 
 and the Turks put on a new character. Hitherto the 
 Euxine had been wholly under the power of the 
 Turks, and was chiefly used for their trade in slaves. 
 No European nation had had any commerce there 
 since Mahomet the Conqueror had taken the Genoese 
 possessions in Crimea. The object of Russia was 
 now for a long time to get free access to the sea, 
 which the Turks of course tried to keep to themselves. 
 This strife was begun when Peter the Great took Azov 
 in 1696. For a long while after that time the posses- 
 sion of Azov, as the key of the Euxine, was the great 
 point of contention between Russia and the Turks. 
 It was disputed with fluctuating success during a 
 great part of the next century. 
 
 Thus, at the end of the seventeenth century, the 
 Turks had been at war with all their Christian neigh- 
 bours, and they had lost territory at all points except 
 one. They had gained Podolia ; but they had lost 
 Peloponnesos, Hungary, and Azov. Most of these 
 territories they formally gave up by treaties in 1699 
 and 1700. The peace of Carlowitz in 1699 marks a 
 point in the history, or more truly in the decline, of 
 the Ottoman power. Up to this time the Sultans had 
 deemed themselves the superiors of all European 
 
156 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 princes, and had treated them and their ambassadors 
 with great haughtiness. Sometimes they imprisoned 
 ambassadors, and dealt in other ways contrary to the 
 received law of nations. Strictly following the law of 
 their own Prophet, they would not make peace with 
 any Christian power ; they would only grant truces. 
 Now, in the reign of Mustafa the Second, they were 
 [/^driven to treat with European powers on equal terms, 
 and formally to give up territory. They formally 
 ceded Peloponnesos to Venice, and gave back Podolia 
 to Poland. But, oddly enough, it was not a peace for 
 ever, but only a truce for twenty-five years, which was 
 concluded between the Turk and the power which had 
 won most back from him. By this truce the Turks 
 gave up all Hungary, except the district called the 
 Banat of Temesvar, with Transsilvania and the greater 
 part of Slavonia. This treaty, it should be remarked, 
 was concluded under the mediation of England and 
 the United Provinces. This shows that we have now 
 got to the beginnings of modern diplomacy. Russia 
 was not a party to the Peace of Carlowitz ; but she 
 concluded an armistice for two years, which in the 
 next year was changed into a thirty years' truce. By 
 this truce Russia kept Azov. ^. 
 
 The Turkish power thus received one of the 
 heaviest blows that was ever dealt to it. From 
 that blow it has never really recovered. The power 
 of the Turk has never again been what it was before 
 the wars which were ended by the Peace of Carlowitz. 
 But we have already said that the Ottoman power, 
 just like the Byzantine power before it, had times of 
 revival, which alternated with times of decay. So, 
 through a great part of the eighteenth century, the 
 
 
TREATIES OF CARLOWITZ AND PASSAROWITZ. 1 57 
 
 Turks were still able to win victories, and, though 
 they won no new ground, they sometimes won back 
 a good deal of what they had lost. There soon were 
 wars again between the Turks and all their European 
 enemies, except Poland, whose day of greatness has 
 now come quite to an end. War with Russia broke 
 out again in 171 1, and this time the Turks had the 
 better. By the Treaty of the Pruth, Azov was re- 
 stored to the Turk. Here was one success, and this was 
 followed by the Turkish conquest of Peloponnesos, 
 Tenos, and whatever else Venice held on the Eastern 
 side of Greece in 1 7 1 5 . The Turks went on to threaten 
 Corfu and Dalmatia ; but in 17 16 the Emperor 
 Charles the Sixth, who of course was also King of 
 Hungary, made an alliance with Venice. Charles the 
 Sixth was more powerful than any Emperor had 
 been since Charles the Fifth. Men began to hope 
 that the Turks might be altogether conquered, and 
 that a Christian Emperor might again reign at Con- 
 stantinople. This indeed did not happen ; but the 
 Imperial armies, under Prince Eugene, made large 
 conquests from the Turks. The small part of 
 Hungary and Slavonia which the Turks kept was 
 won back, and Belgrade, with a large part of Servia, 
 a small strip of Bosnia, and the western part of 
 Wallachia, became part of the dominions of the 
 House of Austria. Things were now different from 
 what they had been under Leopold. Every inch of 
 territory won from the Turk was so much won for 
 civilization and comparative good government, and 
 the Imperial armies were welcomed as deliverers by 
 the people of the lands which they set free. By the 
 Peace of Passarowitz, in 1718, made for another term 
 of twenty-five years, all these conquests were con- 
 
158 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 firmed to the Emperor. But he shamefully neglected 
 the interests of Venice, and Peloponnesos was again 
 confirmed to the Turk, when there were hopes of 
 winning it back. Venice now, as a power, passes out 
 of our story, though we shall hear again of the fate 
 of what was left of her Eastern possessions. Through 
 the rest of the eighteenth century Austria and Russia 
 are the powers which keep up the struggle ; in the 
 nineteenth century it is Russia only. 
 
 There is no need to go through every detail of war 
 and diplomacy in these times, but only to mark those 
 events which form real landmarks in the decline of 
 the Turkish power. Thus it has no bearing on our 
 subject, though we may mark it for its very strange- 
 ness, that in the latter days of Peter the Great 
 the Czar and the Sultan joined together to make 
 conquests from Persia. And when the war again 
 began in Europe, the tide seemed at first to have 
 turned to the side of the Turks. Russia was eager to 
 get back Azov, and the Emperor Charles was ready 
 to go on with the conquests which had begun early 
 in his reign. War began again on the part of Russia 
 in 1735, and of Austria in 1737. The Russians made 
 conquests, but did not keep them ; and, now that the 
 Emperor Charles had no longer a great general like 
 Eugene, he lost much of what he had won in the 
 earlier war. By the peace of Belgrade, in 1739, 
 Belgrade, with all that had been won in Servia, Bosnia, 
 and Wallachia was given back by the Emperor to the 
 Turk. We read of this and other like things very 
 calmly, as this or that clause of a treaty, and we some- 
 times forget what they really mean. To give up those 
 lands to the Turk meant that the people of those lands 
 were taken from under a government which was not 
 
BELGRADE HANDED TO AND FRO. 1 59 
 
 a national government, which doubtless had many 
 faults according to the standard of our times, but 
 which still was a Christian and civilized government 
 having some notion of right and wrong, and were put 
 once more under the cruel bondage of Mahometan 
 tyrants. How the people of these lands felt as to the 
 change, we see by the way in which, whenever they 
 had a chance, they helped the Imperial armies against 
 the Turks. We see this specially in the next war 
 between Austria and the Turk, which was waged in 
 the last years of the Emperor Joseph the Second. 
 Belgrade was again taken, and other conquests were 
 made ; but nearly all was given back by the Emperor 
 Leopold the Second at the Peace of Sistova in 1791, 
 when the Turk again got Belgrade. In this last war 
 the Servians fought most gallantly on the Imperial side, 
 and learned much military discipline. But, as usual, 
 they were made the playthings of policy in other 
 directions, and were shamefully given up to their cruel 
 masters. But a great deal came out of the taste of 
 civilized government and civilized discipline which 
 Servia had in these wars. 
 
 The war which was ended by the Peace of Sistova 
 was the last of the wars between the Turks and the 
 Emperors of the House of Austria for the possession 
 of Hungary, Servia, and the other lands on the Danube, 
 wars which had gone on, with breaks from time to time, 
 ever, since the battle of Mohacz. The result of all these 
 wars was that Hungary was freed from the Turk, 
 but that Servia and Bosnia were left in his clutches. 
 But it must always be borne in mind that all these 
 lands alike, Hungary, Servia, and the rest, have 
 been lost and won again in exactly the same way. 
 The frontier which now divides the Hungarian 
 
l6o THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 kingdom from the Turk is simply the result of the 
 successive victories and defeats of the Austrian 
 arms, from the deliverance of Vienna in 1683 to the 
 betrayal of Belgrade in 1 79 1. There is no reason but 
 the accidents of those wars, the accident that Charles 
 the Sixth had a great general early in his reign and 
 had no great general in his later years, to account for 
 the fact, that part of the lands on the Danube are now 
 under a civilized government, while part are left under 
 the Turk. In the days of Sobieski and Eugene, men 
 had not learned to talk about the integrity and the 
 independence of the Ottoman Empire, or to think 
 it a good thing for Christian nations to be held in 
 Turkish bondage. Whatever may have been the 
 mixture of generous and merely politic motives in 
 the minds of the men of those times, they at least 
 did not openly profess the doctrine that certain 
 nations should be deprived of the rights of human 
 beings for the sake of the supposed interests of some 
 other nation. The great powers of those days, 
 Austria and Russia alike, cruelly deceived and for- 
 sook the nations that were under the Turks. But 
 
 they at least did not tell them that their bondage 
 was to be maintained as if it were something for the 
 general good of mankind. The ministers of the 
 despotic governments of those days were not ashamed 
 to use the subject nations for their own purposes, and 
 then to betray them. But they would have been 
 ashamed to stand up and either to deny that those 
 subject nations had wrongs, or to make those wrongs 
 a matter of mockery. 
 
 The wars between Austria and the Turk are th 
 ended. They ended in establishing the frontier whi 
 
WARS OF CATHARINE THE SECOND. l6l 
 
 remains still, except so far as one of the lands which 
 were given up to the Turk has won its freedom 
 for itself. But the wars between the Turk and 
 Russia still went on. As long as the Austrian wars 
 went on, there was commonly a Russian war at the 
 same time, while there were other wars with Russia 
 in which Austria had no share. Thus, at the Peace of 
 Belgrade in 1736, when Austria gave up so much, it 
 was agreed that the fortifications of Azov should be 
 destroyed, and that Russia should be shut out from 
 the Euxine. It was not till the reign of Catharine 
 the Second that the real advance of Russia began. 
 The first war of her reign began with the declaration 
 of war by the Turk in 1768, and it was ended by the 
 famous treaty of Kainardji in 1774. Two points are 
 specially to be noticed in the wars which now begin. 
 This first war had a special effect in stirring up the 
 Greeks to revolt. A Russian fleet appeared in the 
 ^Egaean, and the Greeks of Pelopbnnesos rose against 
 their oppressors. They were badly used by Russia, 
 just as the Servians were by Austria ; they were by 
 no means backed up as they ought to have been 
 against the Turks, or protected from their vengeance. 
 Still it was a great thing for the Greeks again to feel 
 that their masters had powerful enemies, and that 
 they themselves could do something against their 
 masters. And now too the people of Montenegro 
 begin to play a part in all the wars against the Turk. 
 They had always kept their own independence by 
 endless fighting. Their land had been often overrun, 
 but it was never really conquered. Montenegro was 
 now under the rule of its Bishops, who, somewhat 
 strangely according to our notions,. acted also as civil 
 and military chiefs. Russia had long given the 
 
 M 
 
1 62 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 Montenegrins a certain measure of help and encourage- 
 ment, and in all the wars from this time, Montenegro, 
 as an Orthodox land always at war with the Turk, 
 was found an useful ally. 
 
 The treaty of Kainardji, which finished this war, 
 marks an important stage in the history, just as the 
 eace of Carlowitz marked another. The Peace of 
 Carlowitz taught the Turk that he was no longer to 
 deal with the Christian nations of Europe as if he 
 were their superior. The Peace of Kainardji taught 
 him the further lesson that he was not really their 
 ( equal. The Ottoman power was now for the first time 
 ^ brought into some measure of dependence. By this 
 treaty Russia at last gained the long disputed posses- 
 sion of Azov, with some other points on the Euxine, 
 and the Tartars of Crim were recognized as a state 
 independent of the Turk. It is worth notice that, 
 by the treaty, the spiritual authority of the Sultan, 
 as Caliph of the Prophet, was fully recognized on 
 behalf of these Tartars, at the same time that they 
 were released from his temporal authority. The 
 principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia were re- 
 stored to the Turk, on condition of his observing their 
 ancient privileges and at the same time acknow- 
 ledging a right in Russia to remonstrate in case of 
 any breach of them. { Russia was acknowledged by 
 this treaty as the protector of the Christian sub- 
 jects of the Turk; in truth the principle was pro- 
 claimed, though not in so many words, that Turkish 
 rule was something different from anything that 
 we understand by government. It was practically 
 proclaimed that those whom he called his sub- 
 jects had need of the protection of another power 
 against the man who called himself their sovereign. 
 
PEACE OF KAINARDJI. 163 
 
 Both at the time and ever after, this treaty has been 
 looked on as the beginning of the fall of the dominion 
 of the Turk. For it did in truth make the Ottoman 
 power in some sort dependent on Russia, and ever 
 since the power of the Turk has steadily gone down 
 and the power of Russia has steadily advanced. 
 
 At the same time it must be remembered that 
 whatever good Russia did at this time to the enslaved 
 nations was wholly indirect. More than once Russia 
 stirred them up to revolt, and then left them in the 
 lurch. The truth is that, in those days, the more gene- 
 rous emotions which, in our days, have stirred whole 
 nations, especially the feeling of sympathy between 
 men of kindred race, hardly existed. It was not, as 
 now, the Russian people who were stirred to help 
 their oppressed brethren ; it was merely the rulers of 
 Russia who carried out their own schemes of policy. 
 Still, with every step that the power of the Turk 
 went back, the nations that were still under his yoke 
 took fresh heart. At no time have they really wished 
 for annexation by Russia, though doubtless at any 
 time, if they had been driven to choose between the 
 rule of the Turk and the rule of the Russian, they 
 would have chosen the rule of the Russian. But 
 every time that the power of their masters was weak- 
 ened, they saw fresh hopes of deliverance, whether 
 by the help of Russia, or, better still, by their own 
 right hands. We must therefore set down every 
 advance made by Russia at the cost of the Turk as, 
 indirectly at least, a step towards the deliverance of 
 the subject nations. 
 
 After the Treaty of Kainardji those steps pressed 
 fast upon one another. In 1783 the land of Crim 
 
 M 2 
 
164 THE DECLINE OF THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 was altogether incorporated with Russia, which thus 
 at last got a great sea-board on the Euxine. This was 
 one of those things which could not fail to happen. 
 The Tartars of Crim could not possibly keep on as 
 an independent state. It was something like Texas, 
 which, when it was cut off from Mexico, could not 
 fail to be joined to the United States. Russia, a 
 growing power, could not be kept back from the sea. 
 The next war, from 1787 to 1791, was the last in 
 which Austria shared, that which was ended by the 
 Peace of Sistova, when Belgrade was last given back 
 to the Turk. It almost seemed as if, between the two 
 Christian powers, the Turk would have been altogether 
 crushed. But, as we have seen, the Emperor Leopold 
 drew back, and the loss of the Austrian alliance, 
 together with the general state of affairs in Europe, 
 caused Russia to draw back also. Still this war gave 
 Russia the famous fortress of Oczakow, and advanced 
 the Russian frontier to the Dniester. Russia thus 
 gained, but Christendom lost. For this increase of 
 the territory of Russia did not mean the deliverance 
 of any Christian people, while the surrender of 
 Belgrade was the betrayal of a Christian city to 
 the barbarians. It did not perhaps much matter when 
 Russia ended a war in which Montenegro had helped 
 her without making stipulations on behalf of Monte- 
 negro. For the Montenegrins could help themselves, 
 and could keep their own borders. It was different 
 when Greeks and Servians, who had helped Russia ana 1 
 Austria, were again left under the rule of the Turk 
 Still the whole course of events helped to raise tl 
 hopes of the subject nations, and to make them fe 
 their strength. Before the next war between Russ 
 
DEALINGS WITH THE SUBJECT NATIONS. 1 65 
 
 and the Turk began, one of the subject nations had 
 done great things for its own deliverance. 
 
 We have now reached another marked stage in our 
 tale. We have gone through the history of the 
 decline of the Ottoman power, so far as that decline 
 was the work either of its own vices or of warfare 
 with enemies beyond its borders. The two causes 
 had worked together. Each cause of decline had 
 strengthened the other, and the two together had 
 called a third cause into being. Up to this time, our 
 tale of warfare has been mainly a tale of external 
 warfare. So far as we have had any revolts of the 
 subject nations to record, they have not gone beyond 
 help given by the subject nations to the external 
 enemies of the Turk. From this point the character 
 of the story changes. The main interest will now 
 gather round the efforts of the subject nations to free 
 themselves. The external wars of the Turk now 
 stand in a certain relation in the general history 
 of the world ; they stand in a special relation to 
 the struggles of the subject nations themselves. 
 The wrongs of those nations are the. cause or the 
 pretext or the occasion for every war. Something 
 for their good or for their harm is contained in every 
 treaty. We may therefore fittingly draw a line at 
 this point ; we may end our history of the mere 
 decline of the Ottoman power, and begin a new 
 chapter with the revolts of the subject nations. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 We have now reached our own century. We have 
 to tell the history of things of which the latest are 
 still going on, while the earliest happened so near to 
 our own times that a few old people can still re- 
 member them. The wars of the seventeenth and 
 eighteenth centuries had taught the subject nations 
 their own strength, and they now began to strive to 
 win freedom for themselves. Both the two great 
 races have had their share in the work. The Slaves 
 began ; the Greeks followed ; in later times the Slaves 
 have again been foremost. The history is a continu- 
 ous tale, so far as that there has hardly been a moment 
 during the present century when revolt against the 
 Turk has not been going on in some corner or other 
 of his dominions. But, for that very reason, because 
 different nations have revolted at different times and 
 in different places, the story is in another sense not 
 continuous. The greatest of the Slavonic revolts and 
 the greatest of the Hellenic revolts were going on at 
 the same time, without having much directly to d( 
 with one another. It will therefore be well, first t< 
 tell the story of the deliverance of Servia, then th( 
 
STATE OF SERVIA. 1 67 
 
 story of the deliverance of Greece, and then the story 
 of the revolts, partly Greek but mainly Slavonic, 
 which have happened since Europe betrayed the 
 subject nations to the Turk by the treaty of Paris in 
 1856. 
 
 The surrender of Belgrade to the Turk was the last 
 and the most shameful act of the wars between the 
 Turk and the Emperors. Yet this betrayal of the 
 Servians by their Christian allies did very directly 
 help towards the freedom of Servia. It taught the 
 Servians that they might, by their own right hands, 
 win something better than either of the two things 
 which as yet had been their only choice. They 
 learned that they might cease to be the subjects 
 of the Sultan without becoming the subjects of 
 the Emperor. As soon as the Servians were given 
 back to the Turk after a taste of civilized govern- 
 ment, they found themselves worse off than ever. The 
 Emperor, in giving up Belgrade, did indeed stipulate 
 for an amnesty for the Servians who had acted on his 
 side ; but just at that moment amnesties and stipula- 
 tions of any kind did not count for much. It would 
 have been a hard fate, if men who had been once set 
 free had been given back to one of the great Sultans, 
 or even to one of the Saracen Caliphs. But a harder 
 fate than either was in store for the Servians whom 
 the Peace of Sistova gave back to the Turk. The 
 greater part of the Ottoman dominion was now in a 
 state of utter anarchy. The authority of the Sultan 
 went for nothing. Servia was now in the hands of 
 local military chiefs, the leaders of the rebellious 
 Janissaries. In some parts bands of men which might 
 be called armies went about taking towns and ravag- 
 ing the country at pleasure^ 1 ) Brave men among 
 
1 68 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 the Christians took to a life of wild independence, 
 throwing off, for themselves at least, the Turkish 
 yoke altogether. In other parts the Sultans found 
 it necessary to allow the Christians to bear arms, 
 in defence alike of themselves and of the Sultan's 
 authority against Mussulman rebels. Thus, in all 
 these ways, the subject nations were gaining courage 
 and were learning the use of arms. And it must be 
 remembered that now the bravest and strongest of 
 their children were no longer taken from them, but 
 were left to grow up as leaders of their countrymen. 
 In such a state of things as this, the rule of the Sultan, 
 where it was to be had, was the least of many evils. 
 We therefore sometimes actually find an alliance 
 between the Sultan and the Christians against their 
 local oppressors. This was the case in Servia. The 
 Servians, under the yoke of their local oppressors, 
 cried to the Sultan for help, and the Sultan was for 
 a while disposed to favour their efforts against his 
 rebellious officers. But the war against local 
 oppressors gradually swelled into a war against the 
 chief oppressor himself. Herein is an instructive 
 lesson. A Sultan may for a while, for his own pur- 
 poses, favour his Christian subjects against local 
 Mahometan oppressors. But such an alliance can 
 never be lasting ; it can last only so long as the 
 interests of the Sultan and the interests of th 
 Christians remain the same ; and that can only be for 
 a very short time. The two may act together as 
 long as they have a common enemy ; as soon as 
 that common enemy is overthrown, their interests 
 part asunder. The yoke . of the Sultan will often 
 be lighter than that of the local tyrant ; but men 
 who have thrown off the heavier yoke will not be 
 
THE SERVIANS AND THE SULTAN. 1 69 
 
 willing to put their necks under the lighter yoke. 
 They will rather be stirred up by their success to 
 cast off every yoke, heavy or light. On the other 
 hand, though a Sultan may find it for his momentary 
 interest to favour Christians against Mahometans who 
 are in rebellion against himself, he will not find it 
 for his interest to do anything which may stir up a 
 general spirit of resistance in the Christians against 
 the Mahometans. The alliance between a despot 
 and a people is always dangerous and precarious; 
 because such an alliance can only be founded on 
 interest, and the interest of a despot and of a 
 people can never be the same for any long time 
 together. And this, which is true in any case, 
 becomes tenfold more true when the despot is Maho- 
 metan and the people are men of any other religion. 
 So it was with Servia. The war which began in 1804 
 with an appeal to the Sultan against local oppressors 
 grew in the next year into war with the Sultan himself, 
 which led in the end to the deliverance of Servia. 
 
 By this time the affairs of Servia, and of the subject 
 nations generally, were getting mixed up, in a way 
 in which they had not been before, with the general 
 affairs of Europe. It was not now merely the powers 
 whose dominions bordered on those of the Turk, but 
 Western powers like France and England, which came 
 to have a direct share in the affairs of the South- 
 eastern lands. We have seen something like the 
 beginning of this at the Peace of Carlowitz. where 
 England and the United Provinces acted as me- 
 diators. And, long before that, French Kings, both 
 Francis the First and Lewis the Fourteenth, were not 
 ashamed to give help and comfort to the Turks in 
 their wars with the Emperors. Lewis the Fourteenth, 
 
170 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 while he was persecuting Protestants in his own king- 
 dom, was not ashamed to pretend to be the protector 
 of the Protestants in Hungary and Transsilvania. But, 
 from the last years of the eighteenth century onwards, 
 the affairs of the South-eastern lands began to have a 
 much more direct connexion with the affairs of Europe 
 in general. The French Revolution had begun before 
 the Emperor Leopold had given up Belgrade to the 
 Turk. The wars which sprang out of that revolution 
 began soon after ; and they were at their full height 
 when the Servians were fighting for their freedom. 
 
 After the surrender of Belgrade, but before the 
 Servian revolt really began, Russia and the Turk 
 had become allies. The revolutionary French, under 
 Buonaparte, had in 1798 attacked Egypt, and this 
 led the Turk into an alliance with Russia and 
 England. Oddly enough, one result of this alliance 
 between a Mussulman, a Protestant, and an Orthodox 
 power was to set up again for a little while the tem- 
 poral dominion of the Pope which the French had 
 upset. At a later stage, in 1805, Russia again de- 
 manded a more distinct acknowledgement of the 
 Russian protectorate over the Christians. Sultan 
 Selim wept, and presently came under the influence 
 of France, which power, by annexing the Illyrian pro- 
 vinces of Austria, had become his neighbour. Selim 
 presently, Turk-like, broke his faith by deposing the 
 princes of Wallachia and Moldavia contrary to treaty, 
 and now England and Russia were both armed 
 against him. The barbarian bragged as usual, and 
 this time with more reason than usual. A Turkish 
 fleet was burned in the Propontis by the English ; 
 a little more energy, and Constantinople might have 
 been taken, and Europe might have been cleansed 
 
 ave 
 
 I of 
 
THE SERVIAN WAR. 171 
 
 Asiatic intruders. Later still, when Buonaparte and 
 Alexander of Russia were for a while friends, there 
 were further schemes for getting rid of the Turk 
 altogether, and for dividing his dominions between 
 Russia, Austria, and France. Such a division would 
 doubtless have been an immediate gain for the subject 
 nations. Any civilized masters, Russian, Austrian, 
 or French, would have been better than the Turks, 
 even under a reforming Selim. But for some at least 
 of the subject nations better things were in store. 
 They were, partly by their own valour, partly by 
 help from Christian nations, to be raised to a state 
 in which they had no need to acknowledge any 
 masters at all. 
 
 The war between Russia and the Turk went on till 
 it was ended in 181 2 by the Peace of Bucharest. By 
 that peace Russia kept Bessarabia and all Moldavia 
 east of the Pruth, which river became the boundary 
 instead of the Dniester. The war concerns us chiefly 
 so far as its course influenced the course of the war 
 between the Turk and the Servian patriots. When- 
 ever Selim was frightened by the advance of Russia, 
 he made promises to the Servians ; whenever he 
 thought that he had a chance against Russia, he 
 withdrew or broke his promises. Up to 1805 tne 
 Servian war was not strictly war against the Sultan, 
 it was a war against the Sultan's rebellious enemies. 
 Under their leader, Czerni, Kara, or Black George, the 
 Servians fought valiantly against their local tyrants, 
 but they tried to make favourable terms with the 
 Sultan through the mediation of Russia. Selim, 
 instead of granting any terms, attacked the men 
 who had been fighting against his enemies. But 
 Czerni George and the other Servian chiefs 
 
1 
 
 172 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 crushed his forces right and left, and the Russia 
 army was on the march. Selim was cowed ; he 
 offered to let Servia go free in every thing, except 
 payment of tribute and keeping a small Turkish 
 garrison in Belgrade. But, as soon as Selim heard 
 of the French successes against Russia, he backed 
 out of his promises and went on with the war. 
 Presently, in 1807, Selim was deposed and soon 
 after murdered, as was also Mustafa who was set 
 up in his stead. Then, in 1808, began the reign 
 of the fierce Mahmoud the Second, another Turkish 
 reformer, the nature of whose reforms are well re- 
 membered by the people of Chios. The war went 
 on till the peace with Russia in 18 12. That treaty 
 contained some provisions on behalf of Servia which 
 might have been more clearly expressed, but which 
 certainly were meant to make Servia a tributary 
 state, free from all Turkish interference in its internal 
 affairs. But now the Turk no longer feared Russia ; 
 he feared her still less when Buonaparte was 
 marching against her. Mahmoud therefore thought 
 himself strong enough to break the treaty. Servia 
 was attacked again ; Czerni George lost heart, and 
 took shelter in the Austrian dominions. Servia was 
 conquered, and Mahmoud the reformer had it all 
 his own way. The old tyranny was brought back 
 again. The Turk did after his wont ; every deed of 
 horror which is implied in the suppression of an 
 insurrection by Turkish hands was done in the sup-, 
 pression of the insurrection of Servia. When Belgrade 
 submitted, the Turks promised to put no man to 
 death. Turk-like, they beheaded and impaled the 
 men to whom they had promised their lives. Men 
 still live who remember seeing their fathers writhing 
 
DELIVERANCE OF SERVIA. 1 73 
 
 on the stake before the citadel of Belgrade. For 
 these good services Servia has been told by the man 
 who rules the counsels of England that she ought 
 to be grateful to the Turk. 
 
 Such was the first act of the Servian drama. Servia 
 was conquered ; her first deliverer had fled. But a 
 new deliverer arose in Milosh Obrenovich. He was 
 not a hero like Czerni George, and he was guilty of 
 some great crimes, specially in procuring the death of 
 George himself. Still he gradually won the freedom 
 of the land, and in 1817 he was chosen Prince. 
 Servian affairs dragged on for several years ; this and 
 that agreement was made with the Turk, but none 
 were fully carried out. By the treaty of Akerman, in 
 1826, Mahmoud consented to Servian independence. 
 The land was to be free, saving only the payment of 
 tribute and the keeping of Turkish garrisons in cer- 
 tain fortresses. But Mahmoud thought but little 
 of treaties. He massacred the Janissaries, he made 
 himself a new army, and thought that he could defy 
 all mankind. He was taught better, as we shall see 
 when we come to the affairs of Greece, at Navarino 
 and at Hadrianople. It was not till the treaty of 
 Hadrianople in 1829 that the provisions for the 
 independence of Servia were really carried out. 
 
 Since then Servia has been a separate state under 
 its own princes ; but more than one change of .dynasty 
 has taken place between Milosh and his descendants 
 and the descendants of Czerni George. The land has 
 flourished and advanced in every way, as it never 
 could have done under Turkish masters. The Prince 
 of Servia rules over a free people. But for a long 
 time freedom was imperfect, as long as the Turks kept 
 garrisons in Belgrade and other fortresses. In 1862 
 
174 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 Servia had a proof that, where the Turkish soldier is 
 allowed to tread, he will do as he has ever done. A 
 brutal outrage of the usual Turkish kind on a young 
 Servian was resisted ; the barbarian garrison presently 
 bombarded Belgrade. Diplomacy dragged on its 
 weary course; but at last, after five years, Servia 
 was wholly freed from the presence of the enemy. 
 The Turkish troops were withdrawn, and since then 
 Servia has been wholly free, saving the tribute which 
 goes, which sometimes does not go, from the purses 
 of her free children, for the tyrant whose yoke she 
 has thrown off to squander on his vices and follies. 
 
 Such has been the deliverance of Servia. We 
 must now go back some years to begin the tale of the 
 deliverance of Greece. And, though the deliverance 
 of Greece itself did not begin till Servian freedom was 
 nearly won, still the deliverance of Greece is closely 
 connected with a chain of events which influenced the 
 affairs of Servia. Down to the last years of the 
 eighteenth century, no part of the Greek nation was 
 even nominally free. That part of the nation that 
 was not subject to the Turk was subject to Venice. 
 The Venetian possessions now consisted of the Ionian 
 Islands, and a few points on the coast of Albania 
 and Epeiros. These last lay in detached pieces 
 to the south of the dominion of Venice in Dal- 
 matia. When Austria and France divided the 
 Venetian possessions in 1797, these outlying pos- 
 sessions of Venice were to pass to France. But, 
 when Russia and the Turk made an alliance in the 
 next year, it was settled that the Turk should have 
 the Venetian possessions on the coast, and that the 
 islands should be formed into a nominal republic, 
 
 
THE VENETIAN POSSESSIONS IN GREECE. 175 
 
 which should be at once tributary to the Turk and 
 under the protection of Russia. Of the points on the 
 coast some were presently subdued by the famous 
 Ali Pasha of Joannina, but Parga held over till after 
 the general peace, and was then surrendered. As 
 the acquisition of Podolia late in the seventeenth 
 century was the last case in which the Turk extended 
 his dominion over a considerable province which he 
 had never before held, so this was the last time in 
 which he extended his dominion by the acquisition of 
 outlying points on the coast of one of his provinces. 
 Both this and the supremacy over the islands might 
 pass for an increase of the power of the Turk ; but 
 all these transactions were in effect a blow dealt to 
 his power. The towns which were taken really passed, 
 not to the Sultan, but to his rebellious vassal Ali, and 
 the surrender of Parga against the will of its inhabi- 
 tants stirred up a strong feeling everywhere. And 
 the erection of the islands into a separate state 
 was really a great step in the direction of Greek 
 freedom. However nominal might be the freedom 
 of a commonwealth which was put under the 
 lordship of two despots, men saw in its foundation 
 the beginning of better things for the Greek people. 
 Part of the Greek nation had been declared free, and 
 however shadowy their freedom might be, such a 
 declaration could not fail to do much towards kindling 
 the hopes of that part of the nation which was still 
 under the yoke. Thus the Greeks at one end and 
 the Servians at the other were stirred up at about the 
 same time. The new commonwealth was presently 
 swallowed up by France ; but at the Peace in 1S15 it 
 was set up again, under a protectorate on the part 
 of England which did not differ much from actual 
 
176 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 t 
 
 sovereignty. Still the Greeks who were subjects o 
 the Turk saw by their side other Greeks who, if not 
 really free, were at least under civilized instead of 
 under barbarian masters.( 2 ) And this helped to 
 keep up hope and a spirit of enterprise in the whole 
 nation. 
 
 We are now coming near to the greatest event 
 in the later history of the Turkish power and of 
 the nations under the Turkish yoke. This is no 
 other than the general uprising of the Greek nation 
 against its barbarian lords, the liberation of part 
 of the Greek nation, and the formation of the 
 liberated part into a new and independent European 
 state. The revolt of Servia began first ; but the 
 Greek and the Servian war were going on at the 
 same time, and both were mixed up with the 
 general affairs of Europe, especially with the wars 
 between Russia and the Turk. It is only in this 
 last way that the Greek and the Servian revolutions 
 are at all brought together. Each was an indirect 
 help to the other, by diverting a part of the 
 Turkish force ; but the two struggles could hardly 
 be said to be carried on in concert. Many causes 
 joined together to stir up the spirit of the Greek 
 nation. When we speak of the Greek nation, we 
 must remember that the Greeks and those Albanians 
 who belong to the Orthodox Church have always had 
 a strong tendency to draw together. A large part of 
 Greece was at various times settled by Albanians, and 
 among these should be specially mentioned the people 
 of the small islands of Hydra and Spezza, because 
 they did great things for the cause. But there are 
 Albanians in other parts of Greece also, and it must 
 
 1 
 
ALI OF JOANNINA. 177 
 
 be remembered that the Albanians generally, both 
 Christian and Mahometan, have always kept up a 
 strong national feeling. Christians and Mahometans 
 alike have always been discontented, and often rebel- 
 lious, subjects of the Turk. Some of them were able 
 to maintain their independence for a long time in 
 wild parts among the mountains. Such were the 
 people of Souli, Christian Albanians who were never 
 fully subdued till 1803, when they were overcome by 
 AH of Joannina. This was a conquest of Christians 
 by Mahometans ; but it was not a conquest of 
 Christians by Turks. It was in truth a conquest 
 of Albanians by Albanians. Ali was a cruel and 
 faithless tyrant ; still he was not a Turk, but an 
 Albanian ; he was a rebel against the Sultan, and 
 he was so far an indirect friend of the Sultan's 
 enemies. And, like many other tyrants, among all his 
 own evil deeds, he did a certain amount of good by 
 keeping smaller oppressors in order. Thus the most 
 opposite things joined together to weaken the Turkish 
 power and to stir up the spirit of the Greeks. The 
 way in which the Souliots withstood Ali, and the way 
 in which Ali withstood the Sultan, both helped. Just 
 at the end of his life, Ali, who had destroyed the 
 freedom of Souli and Parga, was actually in alliance 
 with the Greeks who had risen up to win their own 
 freedom.( 3 ) 
 
 The Greek Revolution, or War of Independence, 
 began in 1821, and the first righting was where one 
 would certainly not have looked for it, namely, in the 
 Danubian Principalities. It could hardly be said 
 that the Greeks had suffered any wrongs in that part 
 of the world ; but the rule of Greek princes had 
 brought together a considerable Greek element in that 
 
 N 
 
178 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 quarter, and it was there the war actually began. 
 There was fought the first battle at Drageshan, where 
 the Greeks showed that they could fight bravely, but 
 where they were defeated by the Turks. The real 
 Greek War of Independence was of quite another kind, 
 and had quite another ending. It is most important 
 to remember that the rising was in no way confined to 
 the narrow bounds of that part of Greece which was 
 set free in the end. The whole Greek nation rose in 
 every part of the Turkish dominions where they had 
 numbers and strength to rise. They rose throughout 
 Greece itself, both within the present kingdom and 
 in Epeiros, Thessaly, and Macedonia, in Crete too and 
 Cyprus and others of the islands. In some parts they 
 were too weak to rise at all ; in some parts the rising 
 was easily put down ; and in some parts where there 
 was no rising at all the Turk did as he always had 
 done, as he always will do whenever he has the power. 
 Wherever the Turk was strong enough, he did then 
 exactly as he did last year. Fifty years and more ago 
 men were shocked by the story of the massacres of 
 Chios, Kassandra, and Cyprus, just as we have been 
 shocked by the story of the massacres of Bulgaria. 
 Sultan Mahmoud, whom it has been the fashion to 
 praise, was guilty of exactly the same crimes as his 
 predecessors and his successors. In Constantinople 
 innocent men were slaughtered day by day by the 
 Sultan's order. The Patriarch Gregory suffered 
 martyrdom ; and what should specially be noticed, 
 good men among the Turks themselves who tried to 
 stop the cruelties of Mahmoud and the Turkish 
 populace were, in some places murdered, in others 
 disgraced. ( 4 ) This also has happened again in our 
 own time. 
 
 
THE GREEK WAR OF INDEPENDENCE. 1 79 
 
 The effect of Mahmoud's cruelties was to put down 
 the revolt in many places, but in many others, 
 especially in the greater part of old Greece, the 
 Christians were able to hold their own. Truth forbids 
 us to pretend that the Greek war was a scene of 
 unmixed virtue and patriotism on the Greek side. 
 No insurrection ever was or will be. War is a fearful 
 scourge, even when carried on by civilized armies ; and 
 it is, in the nature of things, something yet more fear- 
 ful when it is carried on between barbarians and men 
 who have long been held down by barbarians, and have 
 therefore learned somewhat of barbarian ways. The 
 revolt of Greece against the Turk, like the revolt of the 
 Netherlands against Spain, was marked by some ugly 
 deeds on the part of the patriots as well as on the part 
 of the oppressors. And, as usual, jealousies and dis- 
 sensions often weakened the patriot arms. It could 
 not be otherwise ; men who had just escaped from 
 bondage will carry about them some of the vices of 
 the slave ; it is only in the air of freedom that they 
 can get rid of them. But many great and noble 
 deeds were done also. Among the foremost in the 
 struggle were the men of some of the islands, the 
 Albanians of Hydra and Spezza, and the Greeks of 
 Psara. These islands were among the parts of the 
 Turkish dominions which suffered least, or rather they 
 did not directly suffer at all. They contributed a 
 quota of men to the Sultan's fleet, and beyond that 
 were left to themselves. Shallow people sometimes 
 ask, Why should men who were so much better off 
 than their neighbours be the foremost to revolt ? The 
 reason is simply because they were better off than 
 their neighbours. Men who enjoy a partial freedom, 
 who therefore have some knowledge of what freedom 
 
 N 2 
 
l8o RE 1 
 
 TOMAN P( 
 
 is, will be more eager to win perfect freedom, and will 
 be better able to win it than those who are in utter 
 bondage and who have neither heart nor strength to 
 stir. Besides this, there are such things, though some 
 people seem to think otherwise, as noble and generous 
 feelings, which lead those who are free themselves to 
 help those who are in bondage. Therefore great 
 things were done in the War of Independence by 
 those who were themselves nearest to independence. 
 Such were the two foremost men of the War of Inde- 
 pendence by sea, the Albanian Andrew Miaoules of 
 Hydra and the Greek Constantine Kanares of Psara. 
 
 The Greek revolution was mainly the work of the 
 Greeks themselves, counting among them the Christian 
 Albanians. They had some help, but not very much, 
 from the other subject nations. The Servians had 
 their own war of independence going on ; but a few 
 Bulgarian and Rouman volunteers did good service 
 in Greece. But more was done by volunteers from 
 England, France, and other western countries. Lord 
 Byron's name is well known as one who in his latter 
 days gave himself for the Greek cause, and much 
 was done by other Englishmen, as Lord Cochrane, 
 Sir Richard Church, General Gordon, and Captain 
 Hastings, the worthy fellow of Miaoules and Kanares 
 by sea. These are men whose names should be 
 remembered in days like ours, when Englishmen sel 
 themselves to the service of the barbarian. And greai 
 things were done by the Greeks and Albanians them 
 selves, as by the Souliot hero Mark Botzares, ana 
 by Alexander Mavrokordatos, who was not a mili 
 tary man, but a Fanariot of Constantinople, almost 
 the only one of that class who did anything. He 
 
MAHMOUD GETS HELP FROM EGYPT. l8l 
 
 bravely defended Mesolongi against the Turks in one 
 of its two sieges. In short, among many ups and 
 downs, the Greeks, with such help as they had, were 
 able to hold the greater part of Greece itself against 
 the Turks. From European governments, Russian 
 or any other, they had no help. Most powers were 
 against them ; none were for them ; till at length 
 things took such a course that Christian rulers could 
 not for very shame keep themselves from stepping in. 
 After the war had gone on for some years, Sultan 
 Mahmoud found that neither his massacres in other 
 places nor the armies which he sent against Greece 
 itself could break the spirit of the Greek people. 
 Greece at one end, Servia at the other end, 
 were too strong for him. He had to send for what 
 was really foreign help. In the break-up of 
 the Turkish power, Mahomet Ali, the Pasha of 
 Egypt, had made himself practically independent 
 of the Sultan, just as earlier Turkish Emirs had made 
 themselves independent, at one time of the Saracen 
 Caliphs, at another time of the Seljuk Sultans. 
 Mahmoud, in order to bring back the Greeks under 
 his yoke, had to humble himself to ask for help of 
 his rebellious vassal. In a war against Christians, 
 where plunder and slaves might be had, Mahomet Ali 
 was ready to help ; so he sent his son Ibrahim 
 (Abraham) with an Egyptian force. The Greeks, 
 who had held their ground against the Turks alone, 
 found Turks and Egyptians together too strong for 
 them. Ibrahim, who afterwards, like most tyrants, 
 was honourably received in England, went on the 
 deliberate principle of making the land a desert, by 
 slaying or enslaving the whole Christian population. 
 Thus he went on, committing every kind of crime 
 
1 82 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 and fiendish outrage that even a Turk could think of 
 in Crete, Peloponnesos, and elsewhere, from 1824 to 
 1 827. At last the patience of Europe was worn out. 
 What followed is well worthy of our study 
 just now. The first movement on behalf of right 
 came from England, and England at once sought 
 for Russia as ally. The Minister of England, Mr. 
 Canning, did not write and tell the Turk to suppress 
 the insurrection ; he did not forbid any help to be 
 given to the victims of the Turk ; he did not think 
 that the liberation of Greece lay beyond the range 
 of practical politics. He saw well enough that there 
 were difficulties ; but he knew that human duty chiefly 
 takes the form of overcoming difficulties. In short, 
 he was a man and an Englishman, with the heart of 
 a man and an Englishman, and he acted as such. 
 In 1826 England and Russia agreed on a scheme for 
 the liberation of Greece which was distinctly drawn 
 up, not in the narrow interests of England or of 
 Russia, but in the interests of humanity. Both 
 powers disclaimed any advantage for themselves ; they 
 sought the advantage of others and of humanity in 
 general. Greece was to become a separate tributary 
 state, like Servia. Presently Mahmoud signed the 
 treaty of Akerman with Russia, which, as we have 
 seen, is an important stage in the history of all the 
 principalities on the Danube. But with regard to 
 Greece Mahmoud was obstinate ; the wild beast would 
 not let go his prey till it was dragged out of his 
 jaws. In those days men knew the art, which seems 
 since to have been forgotten, of dealing with wild 
 beasts in such cases. The u rights," the " dignity," the 
 " susceptibility " of the barbarian went for very little 
 then. The sentimental admiration of the Turk had 
 
BATTLE OF NAVARINO. 1 83 
 
 not yet set in, nor did base talk about English interests 
 then rule everything. Canning was guided by reason 
 and humanity. In July 1827 England, France, and 
 Russia signed the Treaty of London, by which they 
 bound themselves to compel the Turk, by force, if it 
 should be needful, to acknowledge the freedom of 
 Greece. In November was fought the great battle of 
 Navarino. Three great European powers, representing 
 three great divisions of the Christian name, Orthodox 
 Russia, Catholic France, Protestant England, joined 
 their forces to crush the power of the barbarian and 
 to set free his victims. The Turkish and Egyptian 
 fleet was destroyed, and Greece was saved. But by 
 that time the great English Minister was dead : the 
 Treaty of London was his last work. Men succeeded 
 him who could not understand his spirit or walk in 
 his steps. The great salvation of Navarino was 
 spoken of in the next King's speech as an " untoward 
 event." England therefore had no share in the great 
 works that followed. France had the glory of 
 clearing Peloponnesos from the Egyptian troops ; 
 Russia had the glory of bringing the Turk on his 
 knees at Hadrianople. Mahmoud himself had to 
 yield, and by accepting the Treaty of London, to 
 consent to the liberation of Greece. 
 
 Such was the wise and generous policy of England 
 under a great Minister; such was the way in which 
 she fell back under smaller men. Such was the way 
 in which, fifty years back, three great European 
 powers could join together to do righteousness. 
 The pride of the Turk was utterly humbled ; his 
 power was utterly broken. A large part of his 
 dominions was taken from him ; that is, a large 
 part of mankind was set free from his tyranny, 
 
1 84 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 and again admitted to the rights of human beings. 
 Servia and Greece were now free ; Greece became not 
 only free, but altogether independent. This last was 
 a special humbling of Mahmoud's pride. He had 
 insolently said that he would allow no interference 
 between him and those whom he called his subjects. 
 No one should interfere with his right to rob, massacre, 
 and do all other things that a Sultan does to his sub- 
 jects. He was presently driven to acknowledge the 
 independence of those subjects, to deal with them 
 as an independent power, to receive a minister from 
 them, and to send a minister to them. And all this 
 was done simply by union, determination and vigour, 
 by dealing with the Turk, not after any sentimental 
 fashion, but as reason and experience teach us is the 
 only way to deal with him. Mahmoud bragged as 
 loud as any Turk can brag now; but his bragging 
 was stopped at Navarino and Hadrianople. And we 
 learn another lesson from this history. As long as 
 Mahmoud thought that he could have bis own way, he 
 massacred whom he would, Christian and Mussulman. 
 After Navarino and Hadrianople he left off massacring. 
 To bring the Turk to reason only needs a will : the 
 way is perfectly plain. Canning not only knew the 
 way, but had the will. Any other Minister who has 
 Canning's will can easily find Canning's way. 
 
 Greece now became an independent state : but it 
 took some time for the powers exactly to settle its 
 boundaries and its form of government. Several 
 boundaries were traced out, one after another, and 
 at one time it was actually proposed to leave 
 all the western part of the present kingdom, Aitolia 
 and Akarnania, to the Turk. As it was, somewhat 
 
WISDOM OF CANNING. 1 85 
 
 more than this was set free; but still a large part 
 of the Greek nation was left in bondage, includ- 
 ing some of the parts which had done and suf- 
 fered most in the War of Independence. Epeiros, 
 Thessaly, and Chalkidike, Crete and Chios, and 
 Psara, the birthplace of Kanares, were all left to 
 the barbarians. It is hard to give any reason why, if 
 one part of the nation was to be freed, another part 
 was to be left in bondage. And now that the Turk 
 was utterly cowed and weakened, it would have been 
 as easy to wrest a large territory from him as a small 
 one. The truth is that the powers were beginning to 
 be afraid of their own work. Nowhere in Europe 
 was there any man in power with a wise and generous 
 heart like Canning. The crushing of a despot and 
 the setting up of a free people was something which 
 seemed new and strange. It was something which 
 the powers of those days, as they could not wholly 
 back out of what they had already done, seemed 
 anxious to do as feebly and imperfectly as they could. 
 Mere diplomacy seems never to understand either 
 the facts of the past or the needs of the present. For 
 mere diplomacy always thinks that it can settle 
 every thing by mere words and by signing papers ; it 
 leaves the thoughts and wishes and feelings of nations 
 out of sight. The diplomatists wished to cripple 
 Greece, and they did cripple it. In so doing, they 
 did a great wrong to that part of the Greek nation 
 which they left in bondage, and they hindered that 
 part of Greece which was set free from flourishing 
 as it otherwise might have done. All history shows 
 that, when a people has been set free, its impulse is 
 to extend itself and to enlarge its borders, either by 
 arms or by persuasion. Greece was shut up in a 
 
86 REVOL' 
 
 id 
 h 
 
 narrow boundary, and was strictly forbidden to 
 extend itself. The policy of the powers with regard 
 to Greece was as much as if, when the Swiss Con- 
 federation began, the powers of Europe had said that 
 Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden might remain united, 
 and might even admit Luzern, but that they might 
 on no account admit Bern or Zurich. Happily 
 the fourteenth century there was no diplomacy, an( 
 nations were allowed to grow ; in the nineteenth 
 century there was diplomacy, and nations were not 
 allowed to grow. 
 
 The folly of the narrow boundary given to the new 
 state was soon shown in a marked way. Greece had 
 as yet no settled form of government, and things 
 were in a most confused and disorderly state. Servia 
 had been more lucky ; for her struggle had given her 
 a prince of her own, who, though he did some evil 
 deeds, was a man of energy and knew how to rule. 
 But Count Capo d'Istria, who was now at the head 
 of affairs in Greece, though a better man than 
 Milosh, was less able to rule over a newly freed 
 people. The great powers now settled that Greece 
 should have a king, and a king of some foreign 
 reigning family. Prince Leopold, afterwards King of 
 the Belgians, accepted the crown ; but he presently 
 resigned it, because he saw that no Greek state could 
 flourish which was pent up in such a narrow frontier. 
 Above all, he saw no good in a Greek kingdom which 
 did not take in Crete. But no ; Crete was on no 
 account to be free, and Greece thus lost the services 
 of a prince who, as his reign in Belgium showed, 
 was the wisest prince of his time. Capo d'Istria was 
 murdered in 1831, and the confusions in Greece got 
 worse. At last in 1833 the powers sent a young 
 
THE GREEK KINGDOM. 1 87 
 
 Bavarian prince, Otho by name, as king, with a 
 Bavarian regency. The regents did not know how to 
 manage matters, and by their centralizing schemes 
 they rooted out such traces of the old institutions of 
 the country as had lived through years of Turkish 
 bondage. Otho reigned as an absolute sovereign till 
 1843, when the kingdom became constitutional. In 
 1862 Otho was deposed, and was presently succeeded 
 by another young foreign prince, George of Denmark. 
 In 1864 the Ionian Islands, hitherto a nominal 
 commonwealth under the protectorate of England, 
 became part of the Greek kingdom. 
 
 It is the fashion to say that the experiment of 
 Greek freedom has failed, and that its failure proves 
 something against setting free other lands which are 
 under the Turk. In a certain sense, it is true that 
 free Greece has failed. That is, it has failed to 
 answer the extravagant hopes which were formed by 
 some Greeks and some friends of Greece when the 
 War of Independence began. Some people thought 
 that Greece was to be again all that Greece had been 
 in days when Greece was in truth the whole of the 
 civilized world. The history of the world never goes 
 back in that kind of way. It is also perfectly true 
 that the kingdom of Greece has not flourished so much 
 as even more reasonable people hoped. Still Greece 
 has gained greatly, and has advanced greatly, since 
 she was set free. She is again a nation. She is free 
 from the brutal and bloody yoke of the Turk. She 
 is under civilized instead of barbarian rule. And her 
 difficulties have been great, difficulties which were 
 partly inherent in the case, partly the fault of the 
 European powers. Greece might have succeeded 
 better, if she had had no memories of days of past 
 
1 88 REVOLTS AGAIJ 
 
 greatness, and if she had been less in sight of modern 
 European civilization. She might then have grown 
 steadily and healthily from the point which she had 
 already reached. As it is, she has, in the very nature 
 of the case, had unsuitable models set before her. 
 Then again, in those parts of the world, those states 
 seem to succeed best which are most left to them- 
 selves. Servia has succeeded better than Greece, 
 because Servia has been less meddled with than 
 Greece ; Montenegro has succeeded better than 
 Servia, because Montenegro has not been meddled 
 with at all. But a great part of the failure of Greece, 
 so far as Greece has failed, has been the fault of the 
 European powers. She has been half cockered, half 
 snubbed, neither of which are healthy ways of treating 
 a young nation. The powers gave her an absurd 
 frontier, and sent a prince instead of a man to rule 
 her. If we look below the surface of modern affairs 
 in Greece, we shall see that whatever is good in the 
 state of Greece has been the work of the Greek 
 people themselves, that whatever is bad is the work 
 of foreigners, or of Greeks who have aped the ways 
 of foreigners. Greece has done much and has gained 
 much. At all events, no Greek could wish to exchange 
 the present place of his country for the place of any 
 province of the Turk. If the promising child has done 
 less as a grown man than might have been hoped, it 
 is largely because foolish nurses insisted on keeping 
 him in swaddling clothes throughout the days of his 
 youth. 
 
 After the final establishment of the Greek kingdom 
 came a time of more than twenty years, an epoch in 
 which men's minds changed in a wonderful way with 
 
 I 
 
TURKISH REFORMS. 1 89 
 
 regard to South-eastern Europe. Sultan Mahmoud, 
 who had shewn himself one of the bloodiest tyrants in 
 history, set up in his later days for a reformer. The 
 man who had the blood of Chios on his hands 
 put forth beautiful proclamations, as his successors 
 have done since, promising all kinds of good govern- 
 ment to his subjects of all religions. This kind of 
 talk has taken many people in ; but no Turkish 
 (7eform has been ever carried out ; no Turkish reform 
 k was ever meant to be carried out. The object is 
 ) always simply to throw dust in the eyes of Europe. 
 *fbr the Turk is cunning, and he knows that he can 
 i always deceive some people, especially diplomatists 
 and others who look to names instead of things. The 
 "'only real reform that Mahmoud or any of his 
 successors ever made is doubtless a reform from the 
 point of view of the Turk, but it is no reform 
 from the point of view of the nations which the Turk 
 holds in bondage. That is, Mahmoud and his 
 successors, while they have broken all their promises 
 of good government to the subject nations, have 
 improved and strengthened their army in order the 
 better to keep the subject nations in bondage. And 
 in this work officers of several European nations, to 
 their everlasting shame, have not blushed to help 
 them. 
 
 Then again, besides this foolish belief in Turkish 
 reforms, a foolish fear of Russia grew up in men's 
 minds during this time. No doubt it is wise for any 
 power to be on its guard against any other power ; but 
 it is not wise to treat any power with unworthy 
 suspicion, and to try to thwart the objects of that 
 power, simply because they are the objects of that 
 power. Gradually a strange notion has sprung up, 
 
190 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 that, because Russia was thought to be dangerous, 
 therefore Russia is to be thwarted in every way, and 
 , the Turk is to be patched and bolstered up in every 
 way. For fear lest Russia should get too much 
 power, Englishmen became ready to support the 
 Turk, and to give him greater power of oppression. 
 Nothing could be more foolish. If we are afraid of 
 Russia taking the South-eastern lands or gaining 
 an exclusive influence in those lands, the true way 
 to hinder it is for ourselves to gain influence in those 
 lands, by showing ourselves the friends of the subject 
 nations and helping them in every way to throw 
 off the yoke. In all their struggles, in the Greek 
 War of Independence and in every other, the hearts 
 of the subject nations turned first to England. They 
 turned to England, because they wished to be free, 
 and they held that England, as a free country, 
 would help them better than any other. For one 
 moment under Canning, England acted a wise, a 
 righteous, and a generous part. She made herself the 
 protector of the oppressed, and the oppressed gave 
 her their love and thankfulness. Since then we have 
 gone back. We have thrust away the nations which 
 asked our protection ; we have done all that we could 
 to prop up the wicked power of their oppressors. In 
 our foolish fear of Russia, we have done all that 
 Russia could most wish us to do. We have taught 
 the subject nations, whose impulse was to look to 
 England for help, to look to Russia for help 
 instead. And when we have done all this, w 
 turn round and blame, sometimes Russia, sometime 
 the subject nations, for a state of things which i 
 simply the result of our own foolish fears. 
 
 In the latter days of Mahmoud, while his pretende 
 
MAHOMET ALL 191 
 
 reforms did little good to the Christians, they set his 
 Mahometan subjects against him. There were Maho- 
 metan revolts in Bosnia, Albania, and other parts, and 
 Mahomet Ali of Egypt, the same who had helped 
 Mahmoud against the Greeks, began to found a 
 dominion of his own. He founded a dominion at the 
 expense of the Ottoman Turks, just as the first 
 Ottomans had founded a dominion at the expense of 
 the Seljuk Turks. He held Egypt and Crete, and 
 presently conquered Syria. As usual, the rule of the 
 new despot was not so bad as that of the old one. 
 Mahomet was a tyrant of that kind which will not 
 endure smaller tyrants; so, like Ali of Joannina, he 
 established, if not really good government, at least 
 something of stern order in his dominions. It was 
 clearly the natural course of things for the new power 
 to grow at the expense of the old ; and it was clearly 
 the policy of the European powers to let the two bar- 
 barians struggle against one another, and only to keep 
 them from doing any further wrong to any Christian 
 people. But by this time men had begun to think 
 that " English interests " called for the support of the 
 Turk. So the power of England was used to take 
 Syria from Mahomet, and to give it back to the 
 Turk. That meant to take both Mahometans and 
 Christians in Syria from a rule which was com- 
 paratively good, and to put them under the worst 
 rule of all. Since then the Turk has had his way in 
 Syria ; he has done his Damascus massacres and the 
 like. Happily for once England did interfere to get 
 a better government for Lebanon. Here again what 
 was gained was gained by energy, by acts and not 
 by words. It marks the difference between Lord 
 Dufferin's interference and later cases of interference, 
 
192 REVOLTS A( 
 
 POWER. 
 
 that, instead of idle talk and compliments, 
 Turkish Pasha was hanged, and a large measure 
 freedom was given to his Christian victims. 
 
 " 
 
 These Asiatic affairs concern our subject only 
 indirectly, nor have I told them at all at length. Nor 
 need we here to go at length through the provisions 
 of the several treaties which were made between the 
 liberation of Greece and Servia and the beginning of 
 the Crimean war.( 5 ) Nor yet is it needful to go 
 through the history of that war. But it must be remem- 
 bered that the disputes which led to that war arose, 
 not with Russia, but with Louis-Napoleon Buonaparte. 
 It was Buonaparte's evident policy to pick quarrels 
 in succession with the great military powers of the 
 continent, and each time to give his doings a 
 respectable look, by getting some free nation to help 
 him. He began with Russia, and altogether deceived 
 England into a war with Russia, though Russia had 
 done England no harm. He next attacked Austria, 
 under pretence of helping Italy. But Italy was not 
 deceived as England was ; she was able to make use 
 of Buonaparte against her enemy, and then to estab- 
 lish her own freedom in defiance of Buonaparte 
 himself. Lastly, he attacked Prussia, expecting that 
 he would deceive South Germany ; but South 
 Germany, as all the world knows, would not listen 
 to him, and this third time he and his power were 
 got rid of altogether. But the first time England 
 was the dupe of his schemes, and plunged into a war 
 with Russia on behalf of the Turk. Buonaparte be- 
 gan by getting up a quarrel about the Holy Places 
 at Jerusalem on behalf of the Latins against the 
 Orthodox. Then the Emperor Nicolas of Russia 
 
THE TURK THE ALLY OF ENGLAND. 1 93 
 
 demanded a fuller acknowledgement of his rights as 
 protector of the Orthodox, and he, on the Turk's 
 refusal, occupied the Principalities. The Turk then 
 declared war and was, after a while, helped by France 
 and England, and, later again, by Sardinia. Few 
 Englishmen perhaps now remember the noble appeals 
 of the Russian Emperor to his subjects when he was 
 thus attacked by two Christian powers who drew the 
 sword to hinder the nations of South-eastern Europe 
 from having the protection of a sovereign of their 
 own faith against their oppressor. ( 6 ) The English 
 declaration of war spoke of "coming forwards in 
 the defence of an ally whose territory is invaded, 
 and whose dignity and independence are assailed." 
 It went on to speak of an ally, " the integrity and 
 independence of whose empire had been recognized 
 as essential to the peace of Europe." It even spoke 
 of M the sympathies of the English people with right 
 against wrong." The Turk then, whose power England 
 had helped to crush in 1827, had in 1854 become 
 the ally of England. To be the ally of the Turk 
 could only mean to become the enemy of the Turk's 
 enemies, that is, the enemy, not only of Russia, but of 
 the nations which the Turk holds in bondage. It was 
 declared that the " independence and integrity of the 
 Ottoman Empire" — that is, the continuance of the 
 bondage of those nations — was essential to the peace 
 of Europe. It was declared that right was on the side 
 of the barbarian power which existed only by tramp- 
 ling every form of right under foot. We went to war tol 
 maintain the dignity and independence of the common 
 enemy of Christendom and humanity. It is hard to 
 understand what was meant by the " dignity " of the 
 chief of a barbarian horde encamped on the lands of 
 
 O 
 
194 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 other nations. This "independence," at any rate, 
 could mean nothing but the uncontrolled power of 
 L doing evil at his own will. 
 
 ( In all these dealings with the Turk, it is most 
 
 important to remember that the ordinary phrases 
 of law and politics do not apply. There is no 
 question of international right in any matter that 
 touches the Turk ; for the existence of the Turkish 
 power is itself a breach of all international right 
 He exists only by the denial of all national rights 
 to the nations which he keeps in bondage. The 
 Russian Emperor was not interfering between a 
 lawful government and its subjects; for the rule of 
 the Turk is not a government, but a mere system of 
 brigandage ; and those whom the Turk calls his 
 subjects are not his subjects but his victims. And 
 if there was danger to Europe from Russia gaining 
 an exclusive influence over the South-eastern nations, 
 England had no one but herself to blame for that. 
 It was the policy of England which had driven those 
 nations to seek for a protector in Russia, when they 
 would much rather have found a protector in 
 England. In such a cause as this, in the cause of the 
 independence of the Turk, that is, on behalf of his 
 right to hold Christian nations in bondage, three Chris- 
 tian powers made war upon Russia. The armies of 
 England, France, and Sardinia appeared as allies of 
 the armies of the Turk. Free Greece was held down 
 by force, lest she should give what help she could 
 against the common enemy. And, as if to throw 
 mockery upon titles and badges which once had a 
 meaning, the Sultan, the successor of Mahomet, was 
 admitted to the Order of the Garter, the Order of 
 Saint George, and the Grand Cross of the Bath was 
 
 
THE CRIMEAN WAR. 195 
 
 given to Omar Pasha, a renegade of Slavonic birth, 
 who had forsaken his nation and his religion for the 
 pay of the Turk. This man had done the Turk's 
 work against his countrymen in Montenegro and other 
 Christian lands, and he was now commander of the 
 barbarian army against Russia. 
 
 The war was ended by the treaty of Paris in 1856. 
 The terms of that treaty are well worth studying. 
 By its seventh article, the powers which signed it, 
 France, Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, Russia, and 
 Sardinia, declared that the Sublime Porte — that is, 
 the Turk — was admitted to partake in the advan- 
 tages of public law and the European concert. That 
 ! is to say, the barbarian was, by a kind of legal fiction, 
 ' to be treated as a civilized man. He was to be 
 outwardly admitted to an European concert in 
 which it was utterly impossible that he could have 
 any real share. To admit the Turk to the advan- 
 tages of public law is like giving the protection of 
 the law to the robber and refusing it to those whom 
 l he robs. As applied to the Turk, the word law has 
 no meaning ; for the very existence of his power 
 implies the wiping out of all law. To admit the 
 Turk to the European concert was to give an Euro- 
 pean recognition to a power which is not and never 
 can be European. It was to give the sanction of 
 Europe to the position of the Turk ; it was to give 
 I an European approval to the bondage of European 
 > nations held down under a barbarian yoke. Things 
 had indeed strangely gone back since earlier times. 
 It was a step in advance when the pride of the Turk 
 was humbled at Carlowitz. It was a further step 
 in advance when his pride was further humbled at 
 Kainardji. Now the work of a century and a half 
 
 o 2 
 
196 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 was undone, when the barbarian was solemnly ad- 
 mitted into the fellowship of European and Christian 
 powers. To admit the Turk to the advantages of 
 public law and of European concert was in effect to 
 declare that the South-eastern nations were shut out 
 from the advantages of that law and that concert. 
 The nations themselves, and the power which de- 
 barred those nations from the rights of nations, could 
 not both enjoy them at the same time. 
 
 In the same spirit the powers further engaged to 
 respect the " independence and territorial integrity of 
 the Ottoman Empire " and they guaranteed the strict 
 observation of this engagement. It is worth while to 
 stop and see what these words mean. To guarantee 
 the territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire could 
 only mean that the powers would hinder any part of 
 the lands which were under the yoke of the Turk 
 from being set free from his yoke, whether by be- 
 coming independent states or by annexation to any 
 other power. It meant, for instance, that Thessaly, 
 Epeiros, and Crete might not be joined to Greece. 
 It meant that Bosnia, Herzegovina, or Bulgaria might 
 not become independent states as Greece had become. 
 It meant that no part of these lands might be added to 
 Montenegro, or even put under the power of Austria. 
 It was declared to be a matter of European interest 
 that the Turk should keep what he had got. And 
 it was further declared to be matter of European 
 interest that the Turk should be allowed to treat all 
 that he had got as he thought good. For the powers 
 guaranteed the independence of the Ottoman Empire, 
 which could only mean the right of the Sultan to do 
 what he pleased ; that is of course, to commit any 
 oppression that he pleased. And this was made 
 
THE TREATY OF PARIS. 1 97 
 
 clearer still by the ninth clause. Sultan Abd-ul-Medjid 
 had at the time of the treaty just put forth one of the 
 usual papers of lying promises, talking about his con- 
 cern for all his subjects, and promising to do this and 
 that without distinction of race or religion. Reason 
 and experience should by this time have taught men 
 that all promises of the kind were good for nothing. 
 But this empty talk of the Turk was treated by the 
 powers as if it had been something serious. The treaty 
 speaks respectfully of the " firman which had spon- 
 taneously emanated from the sovereign will of the 
 Sultan." The powers go on to say — one might 
 almost think that it was in irony — that they " accept 
 the value of this communication ; " and they go on 
 to disclaim any right " collectively or separately " to 
 interfere with " the relations between the Sultan and 
 his subjects, or in the internal administration of his 
 empire." That is to say, if words have any meaning, 
 the powers pledged themselves to let the Turk do 
 what he would with the nations under his yoke, and 
 promised that they would do nothing to help them. 
 The "relations between the Sultan and his subjects" 
 could only mean the usual relations between the op- 
 pressor and the oppressed, between the murderer and 
 the murdered, between the robber and the robbed, 
 between the doer of every kind of outrage and the 
 sufferer of every kind of outrage. Those relations had 
 been for ages, as the powers must have known, the re- 
 lations between the Sultan and those whom he called 
 his subjects. There was no guaranty, only the word 
 of a Turk, to make any one think that things were 
 likely to change. As a matter of fact, they have not 
 changed ; things have gone on since Abd-ul-Medjid's 
 paper of false promises exactly as they went on before, 
 
198 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 or, if anything, they have been worse still. The rela- 
 tions between the Sultan and his subjects, that is the 
 relations between the tyrant and his victims, have gone 
 on just as they went on before ; or, if anything, they 
 have become worse still. And with those relations the 
 Christian powers pledged themselves not to interfere. 
 There is of course no need to believe that the 
 European powers deliberately meant to do all this. 
 They may have really put faith in the false promises 
 of the Turk. To be sure the Turk had even then 
 broken his word so often that no wise man ought to 
 have trusted him ; still he had not then broken his 
 word so often as he has now. Or they may have 
 been simply led away by the misuse of names and 
 phrases. They may really not have fully taken in 
 what the " independence and integrity of the Ottoman 
 Empire " meant. They may not have seen how dif- 
 ferent a meaning is conveyed by the words " relations 
 between the Sultan and his subjects " from the mean- 
 ing which those words bear when they are applied to 
 any European sovereign. They might not have taken 
 in the great distinction that, though the relations be- 
 tween any European sovereign and his subjects or part 
 of his subjects may happen to be bad and oppressive, 
 still the evil is incidental and may be reformed, but 
 that with regard to the Sultan and his subjects the 
 relation is essentially evil in itself and never can be 
 reformed. Diplomatists are so much governed by 
 words and names, they are so used to think so much of 
 sovereigns and courts, or at most of governments and 
 states, and so little of nations, that they may really 
 not have understood what it was to which they 
 were pledging themselves. But, whatever they meant 
 to pledge themselves to, what they did pledge 
 
 
THE TURK'S FALSE PROMISES. 1 99 
 
 themselves to was this, that the Turk might do what 
 he would with the nations of South-eastern Europe, 
 and that the Christian powers would do nothing to 
 hinder him. 
 
 The paper of false promises which was now put 
 forth by Abd-ul-Medjid was not the first paper of the 
 kind, neither was it the last. Sultan after Sultan has 
 put forth paper after paper of the same kind. These 
 papers have been full of promises which, if they had 
 been carried out, would have made as good a system 
 of government as a despotic government can be. 
 Only they never have been carried out ; they have 
 never been meant to be carried out ; they never can 
 \ be carried out. The object of the Turk in making 
 these promises is to go on working his wicked will 
 on the subject nations, and at the same time to deceive 
 the European powers who ought to step in and deliver 
 them. The Turk promises anything, but he does 
 nothing. His tyranny gets worse and worse, because 
 it has become the tyranny, not so much of the Sultans 
 themselves as of a gang of men about them. We have 
 seen that in the time of the great Sultans the oppres- 
 sion of the subject people was not so great as it 
 became afterwards. And when, in later times, the 
 Pashas of the several provinces became hereditary 
 and nearly independent, a Pasha would sometimes 
 take a certain care and feel a certain pride in the 
 well-being of his province, and would therefore not 
 push oppression to the uttermost. It has been in 
 the days of pretended reform that the last stage of 
 oppression has been reached. Every chance, every 
 hope, has passed away from the oppressed people since 
 all power has come in our own day into the hands 
 
200 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 1 
 
 of a corrupt Ring — as the Americans call it — at Con- 
 stantinople. These men have carried centralization 
 to its extreme point, and with centralization, corrup- 
 tion, oppression, evil of every kind, have reached their 
 height. A gang of men who in any other land woulc 
 find their way to the gaol or the gallows rule th< 
 Ottoman Empire. It is worth while to see who these 
 men are. A man who inherits power from his fore- 
 fathers, if he has the faults, will also commonly have 
 some of the virtues, of high birth ; he will understand 
 the feelings which are expressed in the phrase 
 " noblesse oblige" A man who has risen from a low 
 estate to a great one by his own merits is the noblest 
 sight on earth. But the men who form the Ring 
 at Constantinople belong to neither of these classes. 
 The man who has risen from a low estate to a great 
 one by vile means, the man who has bought his 
 place by bribes, the slave who has risen by craft 
 and cringing, the wretch who has risen by that viler 
 path which Christian tongues are forbidden to speak 
 of, but which is the Turk's surest path to power, 
 in such men as these the lowest and basest form of 
 human nature is reached. And such men as these 
 rule at pleasure over South-eastern Europe. Barba- 
 rians at heart, false, cruel, foul, as any of the old 
 f~ Turks, but without any of the higher qualities of the 
 old Turks, these men have picked up just enough of 
 the outward show of civilization to deceive those who 
 do not look below the surface. They meet the 
 Ministers of civilized powers on equal terms ; they 
 wear European clothes ; they talk an European 
 tongue, and are spoken of as " Excellency" and 
 " Highness." The wretched beings called Sultans an 
 thrust aside as may be thought good at the moment 
 
 ; 
 
THE RULE OF THE RING. 201 
 
 but the relations between the Sultan and his subjects, 
 the relations with which at the treaty of Paris the 
 Christian powers bound themselves not to interfere, 
 go on everywhere in full force. There is no barbarian 
 
 Lso dangerous as the barbarian who is cunning enough 
 to pass himself off for a civilized man. 
 
 Under such a rule as this it naturally follows 
 that sheer falsehood governs everything. Lying 
 promises have been made over and over again, 
 whenever it has been wished to make a fair show 
 in the eyes of Europeans. But of course no promise 
 is ever kept. The Turk professes to abolish slavery ; 
 but slavery and the slave-trade go on. In truth the 
 peculiar institutions of Turkish society could not go 
 on without them. The Turk promises that Christians 
 shall be allowed freely to own and buy land. But 
 when the Christian buys land, his Mussulman neigh- 
 bour comes and takes the fruits, or perhaps turns him 
 out of the land altogether. The Turk promises that 
 Christians shall have seats in local councils. That is 
 to say, in a district where the Christians are a great 
 majority, one or two Christians are admitted to the 
 local council, simply to make a show. They are 
 afraid to oppose their Mussulman colleagues, and 
 their Mussulman colleagues are able to say that the 
 Christian members have consented to the acts of 
 the council. The Turk promises that men of all 
 religions shall be equal before the law r . But it is 
 certain that in most parts of the Turkish dominions 
 no redress can be had for any wrong done by a 
 Mussulman to a Christian, except by bribing both 
 judge and witnesses. Christians are put to death 
 without trial simply for resisting Mussulmans in com- 
 mitting the foulest outrages. In short no Christian 
 
202 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 under the Turkish rule can feel that his life, his 
 property, the honour of his wife and children, are safe 
 for a moment. The land is ruined by heavy taxes, 
 wrung from the people by every kind of cruelty, in 
 order to keep up the luxuries and wickedness of their 
 tyrants. Such, under the rule of the Ring, are the 
 ordinary relations between the Sultan and his sub- 
 jects. To keep on those relations untouched is one 
 of those " sovereign rights " of the Sultan about which 
 diplomatists are very tender. To meddle with his 
 exercise of those rights — that is with the way in which 
 the Ring exercises them for him — would be to touch 
 his honour, his dignity, his susceptibility; it would 
 be to interfere with the independence of the Ottoman 
 Empire. To lessen the area within which those rights 
 are exercised would be to interfere with its integrity. 
 And the independence and integrity of the Ottoman 
 Empire are, we all know, sacred things. They, and 
 all that they imply, all that comes of them, are in 
 some mysterious way essential to the welfare of 
 Europe. They are cheaply purchased, we are bound 
 to believe, by the desolation of wide and fertile 
 kingdoms, and by the life-long wretchedness of their 
 people. 
 
 One thing is always specially to be borne in mind, 
 that oppression and wrong of every kind are not 
 merely the occasional, but the constant, state of 
 things under the rule of the Turk. We are apt to 
 think of some sudden and special outburst, like the 
 doings of the Turk in Bulgaria last year, as if it 
 stood by itself. In truth those doings in no way 
 stand by themselves. The kind of deeds which were 
 done then, and at which all mankind shuddered, were 
 nothing new, nothing rare, nothing strange. They 
 
"atrocities" nothing strange. 203 
 
 were the ordinary relations between the Sultan and 
 his subjects, the ordinary exercise of his sovereign 
 rights. They were the necessary and immediate 
 results of the independence and integrity of the 
 Ottoman Empire. Deeds of the same kind which 
 were done then are always doing wherever the Turk 
 has power. The only difference between the " Bulga- 
 rian atrocities" and the ordinary state of things under 
 the Turk is that certain deeds which are always being 
 done now and then were done, in much greater num- 
 bers than usual, in particular places at a particular 
 time. " Atrocities " were going on before ; they have 
 been going on since ; the only difference is that in 
 those particular places, at that particular time, they 
 were thicker on the ground than usual. It is the same 
 kind of difference as if a police magistrate, who is 
 used to deal every day with some half-dozen charges 
 of drunkenness, should some day find that he had to 
 deal with hundreds or thousands of charges. In both 
 cases, there is nothing new or strange in the thing 
 itself ; only there is more of it than usual. This is a 
 plain truth which must never pass out of mind. The 
 ordinary state of things under Turkish rule, those 
 relations between the Sultan and his subjects with 
 which the powers of Europe pledged themselves not 
 to meddle, are simply a lasting state of " Bulgarian 
 atrocities." Only it is not often that so many are 
 done at one time or in one place, as were done in 
 particular times and places last year. 
 
 There is something very strange in the way in 
 which the European powers, and England to our 
 shame more than any other, have lent themselves to 
 prop up this wicked dominion of the Turk. We have 
 done for the Turk things that we do not do for any 
 
204 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 other power. We have treated him as if we 
 some special call to prop up his dominion, as if ii 
 was some special business of ours to persuade our 
 selves and to persuade others that bitter was swee 
 and that evil was good. Every thing that one powe 
 could do for another has been done for the Turk 
 although everything that is done for the Turk is don 
 against the enslaved nations. It has been thought 
 great point to give the Turk every help in providin: 
 lrimself with a strong army and navy. The stron 
 army and navy are of course among the mean 
 by which he holds the subject nations in bondag< 
 Officers of Christian nations, Englishmen among then 
 have not been ashamed to take service under th 
 barbarian and to help in his work of oppressior 
 Christian governments have not been ashamed t 
 lend officers to discipline the armies by which th 
 oppressor holds down his victims. Christian men ha\ 
 not been ashamed to lend their money to the Tun 
 and Christian governments have not been ashamed 
 encourage them in lending it, well knowing that 
 money would be spent on the follies and cruelty oi 
 barbarian court, and knowing that the interest on 
 money could be paid only by practising every for 
 of oppression on the people of the subject natioi 
 The subject nations themselves look meanwhile 
 somewhat different eyes on the sovereign rights 
 the Sultan and on the independence and integrity f 
 the Ottoman Empire. To them those rights, 
 independence and integrity, simply mean subject 
 to strangers in their own land, subjection which 
 volves every kind of wrong that one human bei 
 can do to another. In their eyes the Sultan 
 calls himself their sovereign is not their sovereig 
 
 i 
 
THE TURK UPHELD BY CHRISTIANS. 205 
 
 nor do they hold that he has any rights over them. 
 By them the foreign tyrant at whose bidding they are 
 daily robbed, murdered, and dishonoured, is known, 
 not as their sovereign, but as "the Blood-sucker." 
 And to throw off the yoke of the Blood-sucker, they 
 deem it their duty to strive in every way, and to 
 strive with arms in their hands whenever they have 
 the chance. 
 
 We have seen that by the treaty of 1856 the Turk 
 promised to do this and that which he never did, and 
 that the European powers declared that they had no 
 right to interfere between him and those whom he 
 called his subjects. Since that day the enslaved 
 nations have had no hope but in their own swords. 
 Servia and Greece had more or less of help from the 
 European powers ; but in the later revolts against the 
 Turk the Christians have never had any help from 
 the European powers, and in most cases the influence 
 of the European powers has been used against them 
 and in favour of their masters. 
 
 Since 1856 there have been several revolts of the 
 subject nations, and several wars have been waged by 
 the Turks against the independent state of Monte- 
 negro. When the treaty of Paris was made, when 
 there was so much care to guarantee the independence 
 and integrity of the Turk, no one thought of guaran- 
 teeing the independence and integrity of Montenegro 
 against the Turk. By the terms of the treaty it was 
 lawful for the Turk to enslave any part of Monte- 
 negro ; it was not lawful for Montenegro to set free 
 any part of Turkey. But in all struggles the free 
 people of the Black Mountain have always helped 
 their enslaved brethren, and their enslaved brethren 
 
>06 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 have always helped them. And both have always 
 been helped by the brave men of the Bocche d> 
 Cattaro, who themselves not so long back revolted 
 against their Austrian rulers. But, though late events 
 have led us to think more of the Slavonic nation.' 
 than of the Greeks, we must remember that the Greek? 
 have suffered equally, and that they have more thai 
 once revolted as well as the Slaves. And, when the} 
 have revolted, they have of course been helped b) 
 their free countrymen in the kingdom of Greece, jus 
 as the Slaves have been helped by their brethren ii 
 Montenegro and Dalmatia. To people who go wholl} 
 by words and names, it seems something strange anc 
 wicked that these free Greeks and Slaves should helj 
 their oppressed kinsfolk. They talk about " foreigi 
 aggression," " foreign intrigues," " secret societies," anc 
 every other kind of nonsense, sometimes of falsehood 
 Yet these men who help the oppressed are simply doinj 
 what brave and generous men would do and hav 
 done in every time and place. They are simply doini 
 what every Englishman would do in the like case. I 
 we could fancy a state of things in which one Englis) 
 county was free and the next county in Turkisl 
 bondage, it is quite certain that the men of the fre 
 county would help their enslaved neighbours whe: 
 they revolted. It is quite certain that they woul< 
 plan schemes of revolt with them, and would poin 
 out to them fitting times and places for revolt. To d 
 this, which is simply what every good man would d 
 everywhere, is, when it is done by Greeks or Slave 
 called "foreign intrigue," "foreign agitation," and th 
 like. So, if we could conceive Yorkshire being free an 
 Lancashire being in bondage, and if the men of York 
 shire did anything to help the men of Lancashire, the; 
 
"FOREIGN INTRIGUERS." 207 
 
 ought to be called "foreign intriguers " too. For there 
 is no greater difference between the men of Monte- 
 negro and the men of Herzegovina, between the 
 •men of Aitolia and the men of Thessaly, than there 
 is between the men of Yorkshire and the men of 
 Lancashire. No reason can be given why one part of 
 either nation should be free and the other part in 
 bondage. At least, if there is any reason, it is a 
 reason that can be seen only by diplomatists or by 
 sentimental lovers of Turks. The reason is not seen 
 by those who are most concerned in the matter, and 
 it never will be seen by them. 
 
 Of the Greek revolts one was actually going on in 
 Epeiros at the time of the Crimean war. It was of 
 course thought very wrong both for the men of Epeiros 
 to try and set themselves free, and for the men of free 
 Greece to try and help them. They were said to be 
 stirred up by Russia and the like. If they were 
 stirred up by Russia, it is not easy to see what there 
 was to blame either on their part or on the part of 
 Russia. But another Greek revolt, ten years after the 
 treaty of Paris, is of more importance. The wisdom 
 of King Leopold, when he said that Crete ought to be 
 joined to the Greek kingdom, and the folly of those 
 who would not let it be joined, were now proved 
 indeed. In 1866 the people of Crete rose against 
 their tyrants, and they kept up a gallant struggle 
 till i868.( 7 ) In this war the way in which the en- 
 slaved people were treated by the western powers, 
 and especially by England, comes out very strongly. 
 In many parts of the Turkish dominions English 
 consuls seem to be sent there only to cook reports 
 in favour of the Turk ; but in Crete the English 
 
-AINST Til] 
 
 consul, Mr. Dickson, was a humane man, who did 
 all that he could to save women, children, and other 
 helpless people from the cruelty of the Turks. Some of 
 these poor people were carried off in safety to Greece 
 in ships of several European nations, amongst others 
 in the English ship Assurance under the command 
 of Captain Pym. But the English Foreign Secretary, 
 Lord Stanley, now Earl of Derby, forbad that any such 
 act of humanity should be done again. It does not 
 appear that the governments of any other European 
 nation acted in the same way. England alone, or 
 rather the minister of England — for few Englishmen 
 knew much about it — must bear the shame of having 
 in cold blood forbidden that old men and women and 
 children and helpless persons of all kinds should be 
 saved from the jaws of the barbarians. The thing 
 is beyond doubt ; it is written in a Blue Book ; nt 
 man can deny the fact; no good man can justify 
 it. No blacker page in the history of England, nc 
 blacker page in the history of human nature, can b< 
 found than the deed of the man who, for fear of bein^ 
 misconstrued in this way or that — for that seems t( 
 have been the real motive — could write letters for 
 bidding any further help to be given to those wh< 
 were simply seeking to save their lives from thei 
 destroyers. ( 8 ) No doubt what was going on in Cret 
 was the ordinary relation between the Sultan and hi 
 subjects ; no doubt the powers had pledged them 
 selves not to interfere between the Sultan and hi 
 subjects ; still it is hard to believe .that the treaty c 
 Paris itself meant that no help should be given i 
 such a case as this. But if it did, then the moralit 
 which can talk of the faith of treaties in such a cas 
 is the morality of Herod. If any one holds that Lor ! 
 
THE CRETAN WAR. 209 
 
 Derby did right in deliberately ordering that the 
 Cretan refugees should not be saved from their 
 murderers, because of the treaty of Paris, he need only 
 go one step further to hold that Herod did right in 
 ordering John the Baptist to be beheaded, because 
 his oath had bound him to do so. The faith of 
 treaties and the sanctity of an oath are much the 
 same in the two cases. No treaty, no oath, can bind 
 a man himself to do a crime : nor can it bind him, 
 when he has the power of hindering a crime, to 
 allow it to be done. 
 
 Crete was in the end conquered ; and, again to 
 the shame of England, it was largely conquered by 
 means of an Englishman. This was an English naval 
 officer, Hobart by name, who was not ashamed to 
 enter into the service of the barbarian, to take his 
 pay, and to help him to bring Christian nations 
 under his yoke. In the old days of the crusades, 
 there was one Englishman, Robert the son of 
 Godwine, who went to the holy war, who saved the 
 life of King Baldwin in battle, who was at last taken 
 prisoner by the Mussulmans, and who, rather than 
 deny his faith, was shot to death with arrows in the 
 market-place of Cairo. Somewhat later there was 
 another Englishman, Robert of Saint Alban's, a knight 
 of the Temple, who betrayed his order, his country, 
 and his faith, who took service under Saladin, and 
 mocked the last agonies of the Christians when 
 Jerusalem was taken. We have had such men as 
 both of these in our own day. The glory of Robert 
 son of Godwine has its like in the glory of Hast- 
 ings. The shame of Robert of Saint Alban's has 
 its like in the shame of Hobart. Of all the deeds 
 done in naval warfare surely the most glorious was 
 
 P 
 
210 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 when Hastings went forth in his Kartena to free 
 Greece from the barbarian. The basest was surely 
 when Hobart abused English naval skill to bring 
 back Greeks under the Turkish yoke. Crete was 
 conquered ; the Turk again, after his manner, made 
 false promises, and set up a sham constitution. Under 
 this constitution the island has of course been as 
 much oppressed as ever, and it is now as ready as 
 ever to seek deliverance from the yoke and union 
 with its free brethren. So it always has been ; so it 
 always will be ; men who feel the yoke on their 
 own necks will always strive to cast it off. Men who 
 see their brethren under the yoke will always come to 
 help them to shake off the yoke. And they will do 
 this, even though diplomatists tell them that, for some 
 reason which they at least cannot see, the yoke mu 
 still be pressed upon them. 
 
 Among the other nations which are subject 01 
 tributary to the Turk, the Rouman lands north of 
 the Danube have made great advances towards 
 freedom since the treaty of Paris. By that treaty 
 Wallachia and Moldavia were to remain distinct 
 principalities under the supremacy of the Turk. 
 The territory of Moldavia was somewhat increased 
 by the cession of a small part of Bessarabia which 
 Russia had by the treaty to give up, in order to keep 
 her frontier away from the Danube. In 1858 the 
 relations of these lands were more definitely settled 
 The two principalities were united for some purposes 
 but they were still to have separate native princt 
 The princes were to be chosen by the assemblies 
 each principality, and to be invested by the Sultan, 
 whom each principality was to pay a tribute. Bi 
 
UNION OF ROUMANIA. 211 
 
 the Rouman people were eager for a more perfect 
 union. In 1859 the two principalities elected the 
 same prince, Alexander Cusa. As the union of the 
 two principalities made the Rouman nation stronger, 
 the Turk and the friends of the Turk grumbled ; 
 but the Turk had to acknowledge the new state of 
 things under protest. In 1866 Prince Alexander 
 was deposed, and a prince of a reigning family, 
 Charles of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, was chosen. 
 The Turk again grumbled, and made show of fight- 
 ing ; but again he had to give way. And now 
 Roumania, under a prince who is a kinsman of the 
 German Emperor, may be looked on as practically 
 independent of the Turk. 
 
 But the main interest of these later times gathers 
 round the Slavonic subjects of the Turk and their 
 free brethren in Montenegro. It will be seen at once 
 by the map that the principalities of Servia and 
 Montenegro come at one point very near to each 
 other. They thus leave the lands of Herzegovina, 
 Bosnia, and Turkish Croatia almost cut off from 
 the mass of the Turkish dominion. These are the 
 lands where oppression has been even worse than 
 elsewhere. It has been so above all in Bosnia, where 
 the Mussulmans are not Turks but descendants of 
 renegade Slaves. And mark further that, while the 
 oppression in these lands is even greater than else- 
 where, their people have more to stir up hopes of 
 freedom than in most other parts of the Turkish 
 dominion. Enslaved Bosnia naturally envies free 
 Servia ; enslaved Herzegovina naturally envies free 
 Montenegro. Add to this that a great part of 
 : these lands consists of wild mountains, where a few 
 
 P 2 
 
212 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 brave men can easily hold out against a much 
 greater force. In these lands therefore revolts have 
 been common. In Bosnia one might say that 
 there is always some revolt of some kind going on, 
 for in that land there is a treble discontent. The 
 Christians are discontented, alike with their imme- 
 diate oppressors, the Mussulmans of the country and 
 with the Sultans who promise reforms and do not 
 carry them out. The Mussulmans, on the other 
 hand, who, though oppressors of Christians, are 
 themselves for the most part very lax Mussulmans, 
 are almost equally discontented with the Sultans 
 because, under the centralizing system at Constan- 
 tinople, they have lost a good deal of their power 
 It seems strange that the part of the whole Turkisr 
 dominion which is in the worst bondage of al 
 should be a land which is furthest away of any ir 
 Europe from the seat of the Turk's own power, 
 land which borders close on a Christian kingdom, 
 which part of it was actually joined by the peace 
 Passarowitz. But though there have always bee: 
 disturbances of one kind or another in Bosnia, 
 great centre of real national revolt has rather been 
 Herzegovina. There men see the free heights c 
 Montenegro rising above them, and they ask wh 
 they should not be as free as their brethren. It 
 no wonder then that the Turk has given his m 
 efforts to subdue the valiant principality. A sho t 
 sketch of its later history will therefore be needf 1 
 in order fully to understand the relations betwec 1 
 the Turks, the Montenegrins, and those neighbours f 
 Montenegro who are, some under Turkish and son e 
 under Austrian rule. 
 
 Not very long before the Crimean war, the co - 
 
 I 
 
HISTORY OF MONTENEGRO. 213 
 
 stitution of Montenegro was altogether changed. 
 The line of prince-bishops came to an end. The 
 bishopric, with the civil and military government 
 attached to it, had been as nearly hereditary as a 
 bishopric could be. That is, it commonly passed 
 from uncle to nephew. In 185 1 the last Vladika 
 or Prince-Bishop, Peter the Second, died.( 9 ) His 
 nephew Daniel, who, according to rule, would have 
 succeeded him, felt no call to become a Bishop ; so 
 it was agreed between him and the Senate that the 
 spiritual and temporal powers should be separated, 
 that Daniel should reign as an hereditary prince, and 
 that the new Metropolitan should be simply Bishop 
 without any temporal power. The Russian Emperor, 
 the one protector of Montenegro, approved ; but the 
 Turk sought a ground of quarrel out of this change in 
 the constitution of a perfectly independent state. The 
 Prince and people of Montenegro had a clear right 
 to make what changes in their own government they 
 thought fit; but it must be remembered that the 
 Sultans have always claimed a supremacy over 
 Montenegro, which they have never been able to 
 establish and which the Montenegrins have never 
 acknowledged. In 1852 Sultan Abd-ul-Medjid sent 
 the Slavonic renegade Omar to try to subdue the free 
 Slavonic and Christian state. The people of Herze- 
 govina, as usual, helped their free brethren, and the 
 renegade was beaten in several fights. In 1853, by 
 the intervention of Russia and Austria, the Turk sus- 
 pended hostilities with Montenegro ; the insurgents 
 of Herzegovina had been already cajoled by the 
 usual promises to lay down their arms. 
 
 During the Russian war Montenegro, as a state, 
 took no share in the struggle. But, on the one hand, 
 
4 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 Prince Daniel found it impossible wholly to keep his 
 people from action against the Turk, and, on the other 
 hand, his efforts to remain neutral only raised up 
 disaffection and revolt in his own dominions. At the 
 Congress of Paris, the Prince strove to get the assem- 
 bled powers to acknowledge his independence, and to 
 allow an extension of the Montenegrin frontier to the 
 sea. But the powers were just then too busy provid- 
 ing for the interests of barbarian intruders to give 
 any heed to the claims of the heroic people who had 
 for so many ages formed the outpost of Christendom 
 against them. He made the same appeal the next 
 year, when part of the people of Herzegovina asked 
 for annexation to Montenegro. But all that he got 
 was a recommendation to acknowledge the supremacy 
 of the Turk, on which condition some small increase 
 of territory might be allowed to him. All this time 
 war was going on, and in 1858 the Turks were utterly 
 routed by the Montenegrins in the battle of Grahovo. 
 Two years later Daniel was murdered. His rule had 
 been harsh and stern ; but he had done much to 
 establish the reign of law and order in his principality. 
 The same work has been carried on more peacefully 
 and gently under the present Prince Nicolas, under 
 whom the country has made perhaps greater advances 
 than any other part of Europe has in the same short 
 time. No land is now safer for the traveller, and the 
 chief objects of the Prince have been peaceful objects 
 enough, making roads and establishing schools. The 
 death of Daniel raised the spirit of the Turks, and 
 the spirit of the Turks shewed itself in the usual 
 fashion by increased cruelties in Herzegovina. The 
 land was given up to the rule of bashi-bazouks. 
 the people rose against their tyrants, an 
 
 Again 
 
 d 
 
REIGNS OF DANIEL AND NICOLAS. 21 5 
 
 though the Prince did what he could to remain 
 neutral, it was of course impossible to keep Monte- 
 negrin volunteers from going to help their brethren. 
 The Turk then again attacked the principality. The 
 renegade Omar was again sent to do a renegade's 
 work against the faith and the nation which he had 
 betrayed. Adorned by this time with the highest 
 knighthood of an English order, our Grand Cross of 
 the Bath went forth to do the errand of the barbarian 
 to whom he had sold himself. This time unluckily 
 he was more successful ; Montenegro had now in 
 1862 to consent to an humiliating treaty. The claim 
 of supremacy on the part of the Turk was not brought 
 forward. But the Turk claimed to keep a road across 
 the principality with Turkish garrisons and block- 
 houses along it. The Turk also, with a mean spite, 
 demanded the banishment of Mirko, the Prince's 
 father, who had been the Montenegrin commander in 
 the war. But neither of these conditions was carried 
 out ; the demand for thern was simply a piece of 
 Turkish brag, which did little real harm. In diplomatic 
 language a concession was made to the honour, the 
 dignity, the susceptibility, and all the other fine and 
 delicate feelings of the Sublime Porte. The treaty 
 was doubtless humiliating ; but it was little more. 
 The effects of Montenegrin victory in 1858 were far 
 more deep and lasting than the effects of Montenegrin 
 ill-success in 1862. Seven years later, the Prince had 
 a yet more difficult part to play, when in 1869 a revolt 
 arose, not against the Turk, but against the Austrian. 
 The brave men of the Bocche rose against certain 
 regulations which they deemed to be breaches of their 
 privileges, and they stood their ground so manfully 
 that at last they submitted only on very favourable 
 
2l6 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 terms. Fourteen years of peace did much for the 
 principality ; but, as was presently shewn, those 
 fourteen years of peace did nothing to weaken the 
 warlike strength of the unconquered race which had 
 kept its freedom for so many ages. 
 
 And now we have at last come to the great events 
 of the last two years, those events which all generous 
 hearts trust may be the beginning of the end, the 
 death-blow struck to the wicked dominion of the 
 Turk. The oppressed nations have risen over and 
 over again; they have been over and over again 
 cajoled or overcome. But this time they rose with 
 the full determination never to be again cajoled, but 
 either to win their freedom or to perish. And they 
 have kept their word. Wherever the Turk rules within 
 the lands which really rose against him, he rules only 
 over the wilderness that he has made. The people 
 of the land are either still holding their land in arms 
 against him, or else they have fled from his rage to 
 seek shelter in other lands where he cannot reach 
 them. The present movement has been the result of 
 a general stir through all the South-Slavonic lands. 
 The minds of the Slave people throughout the 
 peninsula were much moved on the occasion of a 
 visit made by Francis Joseph of Austria to his 
 Dalmatian kingdom. It was a visit of reconciliation, 
 and it suggested the thought that the King of 
 Dalmatia, Croatia, and Slavonia — such are among the 
 titles of the prince who is also King of Hungary and 
 Archduke of Austria — was likely to take up a policy 
 favourable to the Slavonic part of his subjects. A 
 vigorous hand at such a moment might perhaps have 
 gone far to carry out the dreams of Charles the Sixth 
 
 I 
 
REVOLT OF HERZEGOVINA. 2\J 
 
 A King of Slavonia who also ruled at Vienna might 
 have done more than the work of Bulgarian Samuel 
 or of Servian Stephen. 
 
 The revolt began in the summer of 1875. Like 
 most of the great events of history, its causes and its 
 immediate occasions must be distinguished. Its one 
 abiding cause was the abiding oppression of the Turk. 
 Men's minds were further stirred by the King's visit 
 to Dalmatia, and some special outrages of the Turks 
 caused the flame to burst forth. The immediate occa- 
 sion was a specially brutal outrage of the barbarians 
 towards two Christian women. Then the sword of 
 the Lord was drawn, as it was drawn of old by 
 Gideon against the tyrant of Midian, by the Mac- 
 cabees against the tyrant of Syria. And from that 
 day to this the sword of the Lord has not been 
 sheathed. With the praises of God in their mouth and 
 a two-edged sword in their hands, the champions of 
 their faith and freedom have stood forth to be avenged 
 of the heathen and to rebuke the people. On many 
 a bleak hill-side the men of those rugged lands have 
 waxed valiant in fight and turned to flight the armies 
 of the aliens. Twice in the pass of Muratovizza have 
 the hosts of the barbarian turned and fled, smitten 
 down before a handful of patriots, as the Persian 
 turned and fled at Marathon, as the Austrian turned 
 and fled at Morgarten. And the men who won those 
 fights are still unconquered. Neither the arms nor 
 the promises of the Turk have overcome them. The 
 Bloodsucker sent his armies against them, and they 
 cut his armies in pieces. He sent his emissaries with 
 lying words to beguile them, and they cast his lying 
 words back in his teeth. 
 
2l8 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 As the first immediate occasion of the war was the 
 visit of King Francis Joseph to Dalmatia, it seemec 
 for a while as if the Austrian policy was not wholly 
 unfavourable to the Christian cause. That the strong- 
 est sympathy for the revolt was felt through all the 
 Slavonic lands under Austrian rule might be taken 
 for granted. As many volunteers from Montenegro 
 joined the insurgents, so did many — in some cases 
 the full force of whole districts — of the fighting men 
 from the Bocche. Under her governor, General Rodich, 
 Dalmatia was a good neighbour to the kindred land of 
 Herzegovina. The insurgents practically got every 
 help that they could have without what is called, in 
 diplomatic language a breach of neutrality — that is 
 without Austria openly taking the part of the patriots 
 against the Turks. It was only much later, when 
 the Magyar feeling in Hungary had shewn itself 
 strongly against the Slaves, that the Austrian govern- 
 ment took any strong steps the other way. The 
 strongest step of all was the kidnapping and imprison- 
 ment of the insurgent leader Ljubibratich, who was 
 seized in May 1876 on Herzegovinian ground, and 
 kept in ward till March 1877. The jealousy felt by 
 the Magyars towards any thing like Slavonic inde- 
 pendence has been one of the most striking things 
 throughout the whole story. Their own land was 
 delivered from the Turk by Slavonic swords ; ye 
 now they grudge any hope of deliverance to th 
 Slavonic subjects of the Turk. 
 
 I need not here go in any detail through the his 
 tory, either military or diplomatic, of the year 1876. 
 The leading facts are in everybody's memory ; th 
 time for them to be written in detail as a matter o 
 past history has not yet come.( 10 ) I will only poin 
 
 is 
 
REVOLT OF BULGARIA. 2IO, 
 
 out some of those features of the story which have 
 been specially misunderstood, and which, by throwing 
 light on the real nature of Turkish rule, give us 
 practical lessons as to the course which Europe ought 
 to take at the present moment. The main facts of 
 the tale are easily told. The war had gone on for 
 nearly a year in Herzegovina and Bosnia, when an 
 attempt at a rising took place in Bulgaria also. The 
 Bulgarian people are a quiet, industrious, race, who 
 had been making advances in civilization which 
 seemed quite wonderful for people who had to bear 
 such a yoke as they had. There can be little doubt 
 that this advance of a subject nation aroused the envy 
 of the Turks, and that the Ring at Constantinople 
 worked with a deliberate policy to oppress and, if pos- 
 sible, to destroy the whole Bulgarian people. The 
 first means that they took to this end was to plant 
 colonies of savage Circassians in Bulgaria, who were 
 allowed to commit any kind of outrage against their 
 Christian neighbours. Thus Bulgaria had its own 
 special grievance. The ingenuity of the Highnesses 
 and Excellencies at Constantinople had lighted on a 
 new thing ; they had found out a third scourge, worse 
 than the Turk himself, worse than the renegade Slave 
 in Bosnia or the renegade Greek in Crete. Thus it 
 was no wonder that, when the Bulgarians saw the 
 success of their brethren to the North-west, they 
 tried to rise also. But Bulgaria is not a land fitted 
 for irregular fighting, nor are its people men of war 
 like the Slaves of the mountain lands. Thus the 
 Bulgarian revolt was a feeble revolt, compared with 
 revolts in the other two lands. While the Turks 
 could not put down the revolt in Bosnia and Herze- 
 govina, they easily put it down in Bulgaria. How 
 
220 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 they put it down all the world knows. They put i 
 down in the usual Turkish fashion; the wild beast 
 simply did according to his kind ; only a great part 
 of the world then learned for the first time what th 
 kind of the wild beast really was. There can be n 
 doubt that the massacre was deliberately ordered b; 
 the Ring at Constantinople, the Highnesses and 
 Excellencies of polite diplomacy. This is proved by 
 the facts that they honoured and decorated the chief 
 doers of the massacre, while that they neglected, and 
 sometimes punished, those Turkish officers who acted 
 at all in a humane way. To this day, in defiance of 
 all remonstrances from the European powers, the chief 
 doers of the massacre remain unpunished, while we 
 still hear of Bulgarians, sometimes being punished, 
 sometimes being amnestied, for their share in the 
 attempt to free their country. It is plain that the 
 Ring do not dare to punish men who acted by their 
 own orders, for fear lest their own share in what was 
 done should come to light.( n ) Two things should be 
 always borne in mind, first, that the doings of last 
 May are still unpunished ; secondly, that doings of 
 the same kind, though doubtless not so thick on 
 the ground, have been going on ever since. 
 
 By the time that the Bulgarian massacres happened, 
 the patience of the two principalities of Servia and 
 Montenegro was worn out. Volunteers had joined all 
 along, but now the strain was too great ; the govern- 
 ments could no longer keep in the national impulse, 
 and both states declared war against the Turk. On 
 the part of Montenegro, it must be borne in mind that 
 that war has been thoroughly successful. The bar 
 barians have been, as they have so often been before 
 
 [ L 
 
 
MONTENEGRIN AND SERVIAN WAR. 221 
 
 utterly routed by the valiant men of the Black Moun- 
 tain. In negotiating with the Turk, the Prince of 
 Montenegro has every right to negotiate as a conqueror 
 with a conquered enemy. With Servia the case has 
 been different. Its small force valiantly withstood the 
 barbarians for a long while, but, even with the help of 
 Russian volunteers, their strength was not equal to 
 that of their enemies. The Turk was thus able to 
 occupy part of Servia, and in the part which he occu- 
 pied he did after his wont ; he did as he had done 
 in Bulgaria. Then came an armistice ; then came 
 the European conference. At the moment when I 
 write Servia, has made peace, things being put much 
 as they were before the war. Victorious Montenegro 
 is still negotiating, and of course demands the fruits 
 of victory from the vanquished Turk. In the greater 
 part of Bosnia and Herzegovina the Turk rules over 
 a wilderness. In one corner of Bosnia the Christians 
 still hold their own. The barbarians have been 
 utterly driven out ; men are already beginning to 
 speak of that corner of land as Free Bosnia. May 
 it ever remain so.( 12 ) 
 
 Meanwhile, while both Christians and Turks alike 
 have been acting in their several ways, the powers 
 of Europe have been talking. A great deal of paper 
 and ink, a great deal of human breath, has been 
 wasted on matters where paper and ink and talk 
 of any kind were simply useless. The note which 
 was drawn up in December 1875 by the Austro- 
 Hungarian minister Count Andrassy, and to which 
 the other powers, England somewhat reluctantly, 
 agreed, was a document such as has not often been 
 presented to a power which calls itself independent. 
 
r ER. 
 
 : 
 
 It set forth in very strong words, flavoured in some 
 parts with very strong sarcasm, the wickedness of 
 Turkish rule and the constant breach of Turkish 
 promises. As a sermon preached to the Turk to 
 enlighten his conscience and to bring him to better 
 ways, nothing could have been better. Only Europe 
 ought by that time to have known that it is no us 
 preaching sermons to the Turk, that no amount o: 
 preaching will ever enlighten his conscience or bring 
 him to better ways. Five hundred years ago, when 
 the Turk and his doings were something new, such a 
 document would not have been out of place, and 
 either the first or the second Amurath would have 
 been more likely to listen to good advice than the 
 corrupt Ring who now bear rule at Constantinople. 
 To the Andrassy note, a good sermon and no more, 
 England, so far as England is represented by Lord 
 Derby, agreed. In May a stronger paper, called the 
 Berlin Memorandum, was drawn up, which was some- 
 what more practical. It contained, among other things, 
 proposals" that the Christians should be allowed to 
 be armed as well as the Mussulmans, and that the 
 Turkish troops should be concentrated in certain 
 particular places. Here was at least something de- 
 finite, some approach towards doing something. It 
 was indeed quite impossible that these proposals 
 could be carried out without doing a great deal 
 more ; still it was a proposal to do something, as 
 opposed to mere talk. But, as the Berlin Memo- 
 randum was a proposal to do something, England, as 
 far as England is represented by Lord Derby, refused 
 to join in it. Later in the year, when the heart of 
 the people of England was thoroughly stirred up, 
 Lord Derby himself wrote letters which also were 
 
 
DIPLOMACY. 223 
 
 very good sermons for the instruction of the Turk, 
 but which served no practical purpose. Lastly, in 
 December the Conference of the six great powers 
 met at Constantinople. Strange to say, two Turks 
 were allowed to sit along with the representatives of 
 Europe, and one of them was allowed to be the 
 President of the Conference. So to do was accord- 
 ing to diplomatic traditions. That is to say, if the 
 Conference had been held in London or Paris, an 
 English or French minister would have had the 
 presidency. But, putting diplomatic traditions aside, 
 in the eye of common sense, to allow Turks to sit with 
 European ministers was allowing the criminal to sit 
 with his judge, and to settle the verdict and sentence 
 upon himself. Of such a Conference nothing could 
 come. The powers made certain proposals to the Turk, 
 which, if they could have been carried out, would 
 have been a real reform. The one fatal thing was 
 that they never could have been carried out, as long 
 as the Turk was allowed to remain in power. The 
 Turks who were admitted to sit with the European 
 ministers of course objected to every proposal which 
 would have lessened their own power of doing evil. 
 The European ministers yielded point after point, till 
 the proposals were pared down to nothing, and then 
 the Turks refused to accept even the wretched rem- 
 nant that was left. Europe, in short, came together 
 to see what was to be done with the Turk. The 
 Turk snapped his fingers in the face of Europe, and 
 Europe has up to this time sat down quietly under 
 the insult. 
 
 While these greater matters have been going on, 
 it might be easy to forget that the Sultan has been 
 changed more than once. The truth is that now 
 
: 
 
 224 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER 
 
 that the rule of the Turkish dominions has changed 
 from a corrupt despotism to a more corrupt oligarchy, 
 it matters very little who bears the title of Sultan. 
 The Sultan, heir of Othman and Caliph of the Pro- 
 phet as he is, is now set aside as suits the convenience 
 of the governing Ring. The decay which has fallen 
 upon the whole Ottoman power has specially fallen 
 on Othman's own house. As no house once pro- 
 duced so many mighty men in succession, so now no 
 house has fallen so low. The race of Mahomet and 
 Suleiman, the race which produced men of energy 
 so lately as the last Selim and the last Mahmoud, 
 has sunk into a line of sots and idiots. This or that 
 sot or idiot is set aside by the governing Ring, 
 and another sot or idiot is drawn out of the harem 
 in his stead as may be convenient. Abd-ul-Aziz 
 was set aside, and presently died. Those who 
 believe that Edward the Second of England and 
 Peter the Third of Russia died of their own free will 
 may perhaps believe the same of Abd-ul-Aziz. Then 
 came Murad, and wonderful things were to be done 
 in his reign ; but presently the Ring set him aside 
 too. Then wonderful things were to come of Abd- 
 ul-Hamid. But as yet Abd-ul-Hamid has done no 
 more than Murad. These modern Sultans at least 
 gain one thing by their degradation. No one would 
 think of blaming Murad or Abd-ul-Hamid personally 
 for any of the crimes that have been done in their 
 names. 
 
 For any purpose of practical politics, it is hardly 
 worth mentioning that another way of relieving the 
 Sultans from any responsibility for the deeds that are 
 done in their names has been thought of within the 
 last few months. Just as the Conference was meeting 
 
CHANGE OF SULTANS. 22 -, 
 
 a Turk named Midhat, who was for the moment 
 in power, but who has since, after the manner of 
 Eastern ministers, fallen from power, put forth what 
 he called a. constitution for the Ottoman Empire. 
 The Sultan was no longer to be a despot, but was to 
 reign, like an European King, with a Ministry and a 
 Parliament. The object of the trick was plain ; it 
 was simply to throw more dust in the eyes of Europe, 
 just at the time of the meeting of the Conference. 
 The Turks who sat at the Conference were able to 
 say, " We are going to make greater reforms out of 
 our own heads than any that you bid us to make." 
 Again they could say, "The Sultan is now a 
 constitutional King, and cannot do this and that 
 without consulting his Parliament." Any plain man 
 could see through so transparent a trick ; yet some 
 people in Western Europe have been so blind as to 
 argue that time should be given to the Turk to work 
 his new constitution and give his new reforms a chance. 
 That is, the Turk is to be allowed so much time longer 
 to go on doing his wickedness unchecked. For, as no 
 Turkish promise has ever been kept, as none of the 
 pretended Turkish reforms have ever been made, 
 there is no reason to suppose that Midhat or any 
 other Turk really meant any reform this time any 
 more than any other time. And, supposing the con- 
 stitution were to be carried out, it would, if it be 
 possible, make things worse; it could not possibly 
 make them better. For, first of all, the constitution 
 is a mere sham. It is a copy of the sham constitu- 
 tion of France under the tyranny of Louis-Napoleon 
 Buonaparte. It would leave all real power in the 
 hands of the Sultan, or rather of the Ring, and the 
 Ring would be able to carry on their oppression and 
 
 Q 
 
. 
 
 226 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 corruption with some pretence of the approval of a 
 constitutional assembly. And again, if the pretended 
 Parliament had any real power, nothing would be 
 gained. It would be simply the sham of admitting 
 Christians to local councils done over again on a 
 greater scale. Midhat took care that in his sham Par- 
 liament the Mussulmans should greatly outnumber 
 the Christians. Again, the constitution would put the 
 final stroke to the system of centralization, and would 
 wipe out any traces that are still left of communities 
 keeping any kind of separate being. 
 
 But a greater political truth than all this lies be- 
 hind this pretence of a Turkish constitution. Setting 
 aside the absurdity of putting the representatives of 
 civilized European nations alongside of representa- 
 tives of this or that barbarous Asiatic tribe, expe- 
 rience shows that a common Parliament is not a 
 good form of government for several nations which 
 have little in common, or which, from any cause, are 
 strongly hostile to one another. A King who rules 
 despotically over several nations will often rule them 
 better than if he ruled with a common Parliament foi 
 all of them. For a well-disposed despot may dea 
 equal justice to all the nations under his rule, anc 
 may not rule in the interest of any one nation in par- 
 ticular. But in a common Parliament of two or mon 
 nations which have no interests in common, or whicl 
 have a mutual dislike, that nation which has th< 
 greatest numbers will outvote the others, and al 
 legislation will be done in the interest of the domi 
 nant nation only. This is shown by several case 
 in our own time, even among civilized and kindre< 
 nations. To take one instance only, the German 
 who were under the rule of the Danish Kings com 
 
 
THE SHAM CONSTITUTION. 227 
 
 plained much less while the Danish Kings ruled 
 despotically than they did after Denmark had a free 
 constitution. And now that things are turned about, 
 now that some Danes are under German rule, they 
 have still less chance of being heard than the 
 Germans had who were under Danish rule. Now, if 
 nations like Danes and Germans, Christian, civilized, 
 and kindred nations, cannot get on together with 
 a common Parliament, how much less should Greeks, 
 Slaves, Turks, and all manner of savages from Asia ? 
 The Parliament of the Turkish Empire, even if it 
 really and freely represented all races and creeds in 
 the Turkish dominions, would certainly vote every 
 thing wholly in the interest of the Turks. All 
 therefore that would come of it would be that the 
 same oppression and corruption which now goes on in 
 the name of the Sultan would go on with a fairer show 
 in the name of the Parliament. Alongside of this, 
 one might almost forget a piece of barbarian insolence 
 on the part of Midhat, who decreed in his constitution 
 that all subjects of the Sultan were to take the name 
 of " Ottomans." Greeks and Slaves, sharers in the 
 civilization of Europe, inheritors of the traditions of 
 European history, were to be branded with the name 
 of a gang of Asiatic robbers.( 13 ) 
 
 The sham constitution was of a piece with another 
 sham, that of trying to get the chiefs of the different 
 Christian communities to join the Turks in a so-called 
 "patriotic" declaration, that is, a declaration on 
 behalf of the Turk. But this trick failed ; for several 
 of those who were summoned refused to betray their 
 country in this way. And, so far as one can yet 
 see, no real elections have been held under the sham 
 constitution. In some places, naturally enough, no one 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 seems to know what it means ; in others the peop 
 of whatever creed, refuse to elect at all ; in others the 
 Pasha names the members himself, or perhaps names 
 the Mussulmans himself and orders the Bishop anc 
 the Rabbi to name the Christians and the Jews 
 We may be sure that those members of all thre< 
 creeds will be named who will be the most ready 
 do the work of the Ring. 
 
 
 And now for some comments on those events 
 the last two years which we have thus so brief!; 
 run through. To those who had been watching thes 
 matters for many years, it seemed strange, and yet i 
 did not seem strange, that, for a long time after th 
 revolt began, it was the hardest thing in the world t 
 get people in general to take any heed to it. Peopl 
 in the West really knew very little of the real state c 
 things in the East. If they thought about them i 
 all, they had a kind of notion that the Turk had bee 
 an ally both of England and of France, and that h 
 had joined with England and France to win victori 
 over Russia. Then too people had been brought i 
 so far as they thought about the Eastern Christia 
 at all, in a kind of prejudice against them. It was 
 very old prejudice, a prejudice which dated from t 
 times of the okl disputes between the Eastern ar 1 
 Western Empires and between the Eastern ar 1 
 Western Churches. And this traditional prejudi 
 has worked in the minds of many who have nev r 
 heard of the disputes between the Empires or tl 
 Churches. Again, among those who knew a litt ' 
 more, there was a theological prejudice against tl 
 Orthodox Church in the minds both of Catholics at J 
 of Protestants. The Catholics have a feeling again t 
 
POPULAR PREJUDICES IN ENGLAND. 229 
 
 the Orthodox, because they have never submitted to 
 the Pope. On the other hand, Protestants are often 
 taught to believe that the Orthodox are something 
 worse than if they did believe in the Pope. Then 
 there have been all kinds of foolish talk about the 
 Turk being a "gentleman" and the like, and about 
 his subjects being "degraded." Those who talked in 
 this way did not stop to think who it was who had 
 " degraded " them ; they did not stop to think that it 
 is very hard for men to improve so long as they are 
 in bondage, and that the only way to make them 
 improve is to set them free. Thus it came about that 
 most people knew and cared very little about the 
 matter, and that the prejudices of those who knew 
 a little about the matter went largely the wrong way. 
 Those who really knew what was going on, those who 
 had looked at these matters all their lives, knew that 
 a very great work had begun in South-eastern Europe. 
 They knew in short that one of the great crises of 
 the world's history had come. Of course those who 
 could see were mocked at by those who could not see. 
 It has always been so since the beginning of the 
 world. Altogether it was very hard to make people 
 really know or care anything about the great events 
 that were going on, till the doings of the Turk in 
 Bulgaria opened their eyes. Those who had been 
 carefully watching the course of events saw nothing 
 strange in those doings. But to the mass of people 
 in England those doings seemed as strange as they 
 were horrible. Till then they had never known what 
 the Turk was. Now at last the Turk himself taught 
 them what he was. He showed himself in his true 
 colours, and when the English people saw him in his 
 true colours, their natural feelings of right and wrong 
 

 ey 
 
 overcame all their traditional prejudices, and they 
 declared that the)' would no more have anything to 
 do with the doers of such deeds. 
 
 An opportunity was thus offered to the English 
 Government to play a great and noble part, if they 
 had known how to play it. Had the Governmei 
 listened to the voice of the people, England migl 
 have done as great a work for right as she did fift] 
 years before. But the English Government had no 
 feeling for right, no understanding of the great 
 events that were going on. And mere party men, 
 men who thought it of more importance that this 
 or that man should be for a year or two minister 
 in England than that the wrongs of ages should be 
 redressed, began to utter every kind of calumny 
 against those who spoke for right, to misquote their 
 words, to misrepresent their motives. It really seems 
 that there are those who cannot understand that 
 men do sometimes act from a feeling of right and 
 wrong, and that everybody is not always thinking 
 only about keeping this man in power or turning 
 that man out of power. As the English Government 
 refused to listen to the voice of the English people, 
 the partizans of that Government set themselves to 
 oppose the great and righteous national feeling. The 
 noblest emotion that ever stirred any nation was 
 checked by a paltry party-spirit. The truth is that 
 political party ought to have had nothing to do with 
 the matter. Conservatives and Liberals in England 
 had sinned equally, they had often joined together in 
 sinning, against the oppressed nations of the East 
 They might have joined together to repent, and tc 
 undo their misdeeds. The Liberal party repented 
 but it repented, not as a party, but as that part o 
 
CONDUCT OF THE ENGLISH GOVERNMENT. 23 1 
 
 the nation which thought right higher than party. 
 The Conservative party did not repent, because the 
 Conservative Government did not repent, and its 
 followers did not know how to repent without orders 
 from the heads of their party. Thus, what with mere 
 political partizans, what with sentimental lovers of 
 Turks, what with people whose whole notion of 
 foreign politics is a foolish fear of Russia, England 
 was hindered from doing as reason and the expe- 
 rience of the past would have led her to do. But 
 reason and experience did something. The general 
 feeling of the nation made it quite impossible for any 
 minister, even the most reckless, to go to war with 
 Russia on behalf of the Turk. 
 
 There is something which seems very strange in 
 the utter blindness of the English Government and 
 their partisans to the great events which were going 
 on. The very day that I am writing this, I took 
 up a newspaper dated in November 1875, and I 
 there found it said that the insurrection in Herze- 
 govina had been " unexpectedly prolonged " till 
 the winter. In that word " unexpectedly " we see 
 the key to the whole state of mind of Lord Derby 
 and of men like Lord Derby. The things which 
 are perfectly plain to men who use their eyes and 
 their reason were " unexpected " to them. Any 
 one who knew the nature of the country, the firm 
 determination of the patriots, the utter corrup- 
 tion and demoralization of the barbarians, knew 
 perfectly well that the revolt was not a thing that 
 could be put down. But Lord Derby and people 
 like Lord Derby were in the same state of mind in 
 which such people commonly are at the beginning of 
 
232 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 any of the great events of the world's history. Tc 
 men of this stamp the success of every great move- 
 ment in every age has been " unexpected." They an 
 in the same frame of mind as the Persian King 
 when he asked who the Athenians were, or as Leo the 
 Tenth when he thought that nothing could come of 
 a movement begun by so small a person as Martin 
 Luther. Just in the same way, Lord Derby thought 
 that the revolt was something which could be very 
 easily suppressed, something which could be easily 
 put out of the way and got rid of, so as to give no 
 more trouble. He pooh-poohed the insurrection, be- 
 cause, like most great things, it looked little in its 
 beginning. He pooh-poohed it too, because it arose 
 from those great and generous feelings of men's 
 hearts which some men feel so little themselves that 
 they do not understand that other men can feel them. 
 Lord Derby, Foreign Minister of England in the 
 nineteenth century, pooh-poohed the movement in 
 Herzegovina, just as, if he had been Foreign Minister 
 of Rome or Persia in the seventh century, he would 
 have pooh-poohed the movement of the camel- 
 driver of Mecca and his first handful of followers. 
 He pooh-poohed it, as, if he had lived in the thir- 
 teenth century, he would have pooh-poohed the little 
 band which came to help the Seljuk Sultan against 
 the Mogul, — as, a few years later, he would have 
 pooh-poohed the rash resolve of the three little 
 lands among the mountains to match themselves with 
 the power of the Austrian Duke. All these things 
 seemed in their beginnings as if they might be easily 
 suppressed and got rid of. The Derbies of those 
 several ages doubtless thought that they might easily 
 be suppressed and got rid of. But in each case the 
 
BLINDNESS OF LORD DERBY. 233 
 
 little cloud like a man's hand soon grew into a mighty 
 storm. The small beginnings that men mocked at 
 grew into powers which, for good or for evil, made 
 their mark upon the history of the world. 
 
 But Lord Derby did something more than merely 
 think that the revolt could be suppressed ; he did 
 something more than merely wish it to be suppressed. 
 He, a civilized man, a Christian, an Englishman, an 
 English minister, was not ashamed to write letters 
 urging the Turk to suppress the insurrection.( 14 ) He 
 was not ashamed to write letters by which he hoped 
 that the people of Dalmatia and Montenegro might 
 be hindered from taking any part in the struggle. ( 15 ) 
 It is worth while to stop and think, though seemingly 
 Lord Derby did not stop and think, what was the 
 meaning of his own words when he spoke of the 
 Turks suppressing the insurrection. It is to be 
 supposed that Lord Derby had learned something 
 of the history of the century in which he lived, a 
 century in whose history he was himself called on 
 to be an actor. It is to be supposed that he had 
 heard for instance of the massacre of Chios, of 
 the massacre of Damascus, of any other of the 
 doings of the Turks. He must surely have known 
 the fate to which he had condemned his own victims 
 in Crete. What the Turkish suppression of an in- 
 surrection meant the world in general did not know 
 till the doings in Bulgaria became known. But 
 it is to be supposed that a Foreign Minister, whose 
 business it is to know something of the history and 
 condition of foreign countries, must have known what 
 every one knew who had given the matter a 
 moment's serious thought. To advise the Turk to 
 suppress the insurrection was in other words to advise 
 
234 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 him to do as he had done in Chios and Damascus, 
 as he was to do in Bulgaria. It is not to be supposed 
 that any man calling himself an Englishman and a 
 Christian really wished such things to be done ; but 
 that was the plain meaning of the words of the de- 
 spatch. The Turk was counselled to suppress the 
 insurrection ; the Turk would understand, and doubt- 
 less did understand, that England would stand by him 
 while he suppressed the insurrection in his usual way 
 of suppressing insurrections. The Turk did what he 
 could in Bosnia and Herzegovina to carry out the 
 advice which he had received from England. He 
 carried it out more fully in Bulgaria. There he did 
 thoroughly according to the advice contained in the 
 English despatch. He did suppress the insurrection 
 by his own forces. It is not to be thought that Lord 
 Derby really wished the Turk to do what he in effect 
 told him to do. But he told him none the less. A 
 dull man brought face to face with great events, great 
 movements, great stirrings of men's hearts which he 
 cannot understand, will be simply puzzled and fright- 
 ened, and will hardly know what he says or writes. 
 But the fact that Lord Derby was puzzled and 
 frightened will not wipe the blood of Crete and 
 Bulgaria from his hands. The one notion of Lord 
 Derby, as of most of the professional diplomatists, 
 was to try to avoid trouble by getting rid of the thing 
 as soon as they could. Let it be suppressed out of 
 hand, never mind at what cost, so that it be sup- 
 pressed and got rid of. But the thing could not be 
 got rid of. Lord Derby and the Turk and all the 
 diplomatists together could no more suppress that 
 mighty movement of men who had made up their 
 minds to win their rights or to perish than the king 
 
 
LORD DERBY AND SIR HENRY ELLIOT. 235 
 
 in the legend could hinder the waves of the sea from 
 flowing up to the foot of his throne. 
 
 The whole correspondence published in the Blue 
 Book shews the same spirit. There is no feeling of 
 the greatness of the movement ; there is no sympathy 
 with the righteousness of the movement. One reads 
 for instance of the news being more or less " satis- 
 factory." " Satisfactory " news, in the language of 
 the Blue Book, means news by which it seems likely 
 that the Turk will succeed in again bringing his 
 victims into bondage. The triumph of evil, the 
 handing over of Christian nations to their oppressors, 
 the doing of all the deeds which the Turk does when 
 he gets back any piece of Christian soil into his power 
 — this was what was called " satisfactory " in English 
 consulates, in English embassies, in the English Foreign 
 Office. When Servia was about to strike her gallant 
 blow for right, Sir Henry Elliot was not ashamed to 
 tell the Servian agent that he hoped that Servia 
 would be beaten. The deeds of Bulgaria had then 
 been done ; yet an Englishman, a representative of 
 England, could tell the representative of a Christian 
 people arming themselves for the freedom of their 
 brethren, that he wished that they might be beaten 
 by the Turk. That is, he said that he wished that 
 Servia might be dealt with as the Turk always deals 
 with beaten nations, as the Turk had just before 
 dealt with Bulgaria, as he presently did deal with so 
 much of Servia as came within his clutches. When 
 Lord Derby called on the Turk to suppress the 
 insurrection, he said in effect, Go and do your will; 
 slay, rob, burn, torture, ravish, force the flesh of the 
 roasted child into his parent's mouth ; do all in short 
 that you do when you suppress insurrections. When 
 
236 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 Sir Henry Elliot wished Servia to be beaten, he wished 
 in effect that all these things should fall on Servia, or 
 rather that they should fall on the whole of Servia, 
 as they did fall on a part. No one believes that either 
 Lord Derby or Sir Henry Elliot really wished for 
 anything of the kind. But men who had either heads 
 or hearts, men who were capable of understanding 
 and facing the great events in which they found 
 themselves actors, would have spoken in another 
 way. There are no despatches of Canning exhorting 
 Ibrahim to suppress the insurrection in Peloponnesos. 
 
 One trick of the favourers of the Turk through the 
 whole business has been, first to try to represent the 
 insurrection as something quite insignificant, and when 
 they found that this would not do, then, to represent 
 it as wholly the work of foreign intriguers, foreign 
 agitators, and the like. What is really meant by 
 foreign intriguers and foreign agitators I have already 
 shewn. They are foreign intriguers and foreign 
 agitators in the same sense in which Sir Philip 
 Sidney was a foreign intriguer when he died at 
 Zutphen for the freedom of the Netherlands. As 
 Englishmen then fought and died for the freedom of 
 a kindred land, so now many men from Montenegro 
 and from Russia, and from Italy too, fought and died 
 the same glorious death for the freedom of the op- 
 pressed Slavonic lands. But the belief which was 
 carefully spread abroad by the Turkish party in Eng- 
 land, the belief that the revolt was no real revolt, that 
 it was but a thing got up by men from other lands, is 
 altogether false. It would seem as if those who 
 talked in this way really could not understand that 
 men could ever rise and fight for their own freedom. 
 
 
 
"FOREIGN INTRIGUERS. 237 
 
 That men should do so seemed so strange to them 
 that they cast about for some other cause, and in- 
 vented this talk about foreign intriguers. Monte- 
 negrins fought in Herzegovina ; Russians fought in 
 Servia ; and in both cases, as was not wonderful, the 
 people who knew less of the art of warfare were 
 glad to accept commanders from the people who 
 knew more. But it is a great mistake, if it is not 
 something worse than a mistake, to say that the great 
 mass, or even any considerable part, of the Herze- 
 govinian army consisted of Montenegrins, or that the 
 great mass, or any considerable part, of the Servian 
 army consisted of Russians. In both cases the war 
 was strictly national ; volunteers came, volunteers 
 were welcomed ; but they were welcomed by men 
 who had already risen to do the work for them- 
 selves. A moment's thought will shew how foolish 
 this talk is about foreign intriguers and agitators. 
 Men who are under the yoke of the Turk do not 
 need to be told what oppressions they are suffering 
 under ; they do not need to be told that there is no 
 way of getting rid of those oppressions but by drawing 
 the sword for freedom. They know all that very 
 well, without any foreign intriguers to tell them. If 
 there are foreign intriguers, and if they get listened to, 
 that of itself is proof enough that there is something 
 which greatly needs redress in the land where they 
 do get listened to. If foreign intriguers came into 
 any well governed country and tried to persuade the 
 people to revolt, no one would listen to them. If 
 foreign intriguers stir up a people to revolt, and if 
 that people listen to them, it is the surest of all 
 signs that there is something to revolt about. 
 
 Perhaps the most daring case of all of saying " the 
 
2 ^8 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 thing that, is not," was that which was made by Lord 
 Beaconsfield at Aylesbury. He there — to be sure it 
 was after dinner — ventured to say that, when Servia 
 began the war, it was the " secret societies of 
 Europe which made war on Turkey." Now in truth 
 Servia did not make war on Turkey ; Servia made 
 war on the Turk on behalf of Turkey. But of all the 
 untrue things that ever were said the most untrue was 
 that the Servian war was got up by secret societies. No 
 doubt much help has been given by societies in Russia 
 and in other Slavonic lands. But those societies are 
 no more secret than our Anti-Corn-Law League was, 
 or any other of our political or religious societies. 
 Lord Beaconsfield also ventured to talk about Servia 
 being " ungrateful " to the Turk. He called the Ser- 
 vian war an act of " treachery." All this was simply 
 using words without any meaning. Whatever an 
 open declaration of war may be, it is at least not 
 treacherous, and it would certainly be very hard to 
 find any reason that the Servians had to be grateful 
 to the Turk. Centuries of bondage, followed by 
 hideous breaches of faith, the impaling of their 
 grandfathers in 1 815, the bombarding of their capital 
 in 1862, the violation of their frontier in 1876, would 
 seem to be the things for which, according to Lord 
 Beaconsfield, Servia ought to be thankful. 
 
 Another trick was to enlarge on and blacken to the 
 uttermost everything that was done, or said to be 
 done, on the patriot side which was not exactly 
 according to the laws of civilized warfare. The most 
 was made of anything amiss that was done, or said to 
 be done, by any insurgent, while anything that was 
 done by a Turk was slurred over or hushed up 
 altogether. Most of these stories were mere lies. For 
 

 ALLEGED EXCESSES OF THE PATRIOTS. 239 
 
 instance, the Turks, Safvet and the rest of them, 
 tried to make the world believe that they were inno- 
 cent lambs cruelly set upon by Bulgarian lions.( 16 ) 
 There is no doubt that the mass of the stories which 
 were got up by the Turks and their friends against 
 the Christian insurgents were mere falsehoods. But 
 suppose, as is quite possible, that some of them were 
 true. Is it very wonderful if men who rise up to free 
 themselves from the most cruel yoke that man ever 
 was under, men who have been goaded to revolt by 
 every wrong that a human being could endure, should 
 not always behave like the soldiers of civilized armies, 
 whose nations or governments may have a dispute, but 
 who have no personal wrongs to embitter them against 
 one another ? In the most civilized and best disciplined 
 armies there will always be some men who do wrong 
 things. In an insurgent and irregular army the pro- 
 portion of men who do such things will always be 
 greater. In strict morality, we must condemn men 
 who commit any kind of excess, even in avenging the 
 bitterest of wrongs. But we cannot wonder at them ; 
 we ought not harshly to condemn them. They are 
 doing as we ourselves should doubtless do in the same 
 case. In no case can the excesses of the insurgent 
 who is avenging his wrongs be put on the same level 
 of moral guilt as the excesses of the oppressor who is 
 wantonly inflicting wrongs. Men do not get better by 
 dealings either with barbarian masters or with barbarian 
 enemies. The way to make them better is, I must say 
 once more, to set them free from their bondage. 
 
 This is the fair way of looking at any particular 
 excesses which may have been here and there done by 
 the insurgents, whether in Herzegovina, Bulgaria, or 
 anywhere else. But most of the tales are simply false ; 
 
240 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 and, in any case, what they may have done in revenge, 
 was nothing compared with what the Turks did in 
 wantonness. The same kind of falsehoods were told of 
 the Servians. So they were of the Montenegrins. At 
 a time when no Montenegrin prisoner was ever spared 
 by the Turks, but when Turkish prisoners, a Pasha 
 among them, were living quite comfortably in 
 Montenegro, we were told of the horrible atrocities 
 of the Montenegrins. The old custom, which the 
 Montenegrins had learned of the Turks, was to bring 
 home the heads of slain enemies as trophies. The 
 Princes of Montenegro have long tried to stop this 
 practice, and it is not now done by any troops who are 
 under regular Montenegrin discipline. But the custom 
 of cutting off the dead enemy's nose, as a kind of 
 substitute for his head, has still been sometimes kept 
 up both by the irregular insurgent bands and by 
 the Albanians who have joined the Montenegrins. 
 It seems that, in one or two cases, a man who was 
 thought to be dead was wakened up by the loss of 
 his nose. And this has been made the ground of 
 tales of wholesale mutilation, torture, and the like. 
 Nobody defends any such doings ; they simply come 
 of the fact that men whose whole life has for so many 
 ages been one long strife against a barbarous enemy 
 have, as is not very wonderful, sometimes picked up 
 a little of his barbarism. Take the Turk and hi; 
 bad example away, and they will mend. And after 
 all, though to cut off a dead man's nose is a brutal 
 thing, it is hardly so brutal as roasting, torturing, 
 and impaling living people ; it is not so brutal a: 
 the things which the Turks always do when the 
 suppress insurrections, and sometimes when ther 
 are no insurrections to suppress. 
 
 I 
 
 
SLANDERS AGAINST SERVIA. 24 1 
 
 So again, a great many falsehoods were told about 
 the Servians, how they mutilated themselves rather 
 than fight, how they shot Russian officers in the back, 
 how they refused to carry wounded men to the rear, 
 and the like. Now it is certain that the Servians and 
 their Russian helpers did not always agree. The 
 truth is this. No men in any war ever behaved 
 more nobly in the way of risking and sacrificing 
 themselves than the Russian officers did in Servia. 
 But their habits in their own army did not fit them 
 to command a free citizen militia like that of Servia. 
 Disputes and ill will therefore arose in many cases. 
 Those who know the Servian army, and who know 
 other armies as well, say that in every army there 
 will always be found some black sheep who will now 
 and then do some of the things with which the Servian 
 army is charged. But they add that to say that such 
 things were the rule, or that they were at all common, 
 in the Servian army is as great a slander as to say the 
 same of any other army. Nor is it at all true to say 
 that the Servians are mere cowards. It is true that their 
 militia, men who have come, one from his farm and 
 another from his merchandise, are not born fighters 
 like the men of the Black Mountain. Neither would 
 an army of Englishmen be, if it was brought together 
 in f the same way. But no mere cowards would have 
 held out so long as the Servians did, with smaller 
 numbers than their enemies, and with inferior arms.( 17 ) 
 
 Such are some of the mistakes and falsehoods which 
 have been going about ever since the beginning of 
 this great and righteous struggle. And it may also 
 be well to notice that, while the diplomatists were 
 wondering and pottering and asking to have the 
 
 R 
 
242 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 
 insurrection suppressed, the one rational way 
 dealing with the whole matter was many times set 
 before them. Only they were too blind to see it. 
 Experience shews that, wherever a land is set free 
 from the direct rule of the Turk, it gains greatly by 
 its deliverance. But experience also shews that the 
 separation need not be complete and sudden ; it shews 
 that the tributary relation through which most of the 
 nations passed on their road towards perfect bondage 
 forms an useful intermediate stage on their road 
 towards perfect freedom. So long as the Turk has no 
 share in the internal government of the country, there 
 is no great harm in the formal relation of tribute and 
 vassalage. Indeed, as long as the Turk exists at all, the 
 tributary relation to a common over-lord has one ad- 
 vantage. It helps to bind the several nations together ; 
 it helps to prepare the way for the time when the 
 Turk can be got rid of altogether, and when the 
 tributary relation may be exchanged for a federal 
 relation. On the other hand, experience shews that 
 the Turk's promises go for nothing, that his constitu- 
 tions go for nothing. Experience shews that, wherever 
 the Turk is allowed to keep troops or to have any 
 share in the nomination of rulers of any kind, 
 oppression goes on just the same as if no promises 
 had ever been made. Experience further shews that 
 Christians and Mahometans cannot live together — ex- 
 cept as oppressor and oppressed — under a Mahometan 
 government, but that they can live perfectly well 
 together under a Christian government. From all this 
 it follows that the only way to secure good government 
 for the revolted lands is to put an end to the direct 
 rule of the Turk over those lands. The only way 
 is to establish some state of things in which, whatever 
 
 
TEACHING OF EXPERIENCE. 243 
 
 may be the form of government, the Turk shall have 
 no voice or authority in any internal matter. Nor 
 must he be allowed to keep garrisons in any of the 
 lands which are to be set free. Any form of govern- 
 ment which compassed these two objects, will be so 
 far a real gain. One kind of government may be 
 better than another ; but by gaining these two points 
 the first essentials of good government will be secured. 
 Reason and experience taught this, and reason and 
 experience further taught that, if there was any 
 difficulty in creating absolutely independent states, any 
 difficulty in annexing the revolting lands to any of 
 the neighbouring states, there was the tributary rela- 
 tion to fall back upon. It had been tried, and it had 
 answered. The obvious immediate remedy therefore 
 was to enlarge the old tributary states or to make new 
 ones, in short to put the revolted lands in the same 
 position as Servia and Roumania. The lands would be 
 free, and the Sultan would still get all that he wants 
 out of them, some money, that is, to squander as 
 Sultans do squander money. But Lord Derby said 
 that the formation of tributary states lay, in a phrase 
 which has become a kind of proverb, out of the range 
 of practical politics. The truth is that it was the one 
 thing which did lie within the range of practical 
 politics, while everything that Lord Derby did lay 
 altogether without that range. Lord Derby's one idea 
 seemed to be a sentimental notion that the Turk 
 might be got to mend by preaching to him. And 
 just like the Andrassy note, so some of Lord Derby's 
 sermons, had they been preached to hearers who were 
 the least likely to listen to them, were very good 
 sermons indeed. They got better still as soon as 
 Lord Derby found out that the people of England 
 
 R 2 
 
244 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 were really in earnest about the matter. Still Lord 
 Derby's whole course was sentimental and not 
 practical. He refused the remedy which reason and 
 experience had shewn would answer, and which lay 
 within the range of practical politics. Instead of that, 
 he tried the remedy which reason and experience had 
 shewn would not answer, and which therefore lay 
 without the range of practical politics. So of course 
 nothing has been done. If, instead of Lord Derby's 
 sentimental way of managing affairs, we had had 
 Canning's practical way, things would have been 
 very different. 
 
 Here then is the end of our history and of our 
 comments upon it. In the last chapter we must see 
 what the practical guides, reason and experience, 
 tell us ought to be done to get us out of the difficulty 
 into which we have been brought by a long and 
 vigorous course of doing nothing. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 (i, p. 167.) See Chapter XXVIII. of Jirecek, Geschichte der Bui- 
 garen, headed Pasvanoglu und die Krdzalijen. 
 
 (2, p. 176.) Perhaps the rule of Sir Thomas Maitland, King Tom 
 as he was called, may not have been much better than that of some 
 Pashas. But he was hardly a specimen of English rulers in general. 
 One Lord High Commissioner at all events, Lord Guildford, thoroughly 
 deserved and won the thankfulness of the Greek people. 
 
 (3> P- l 77-) There are several valuable narratives of the Greek War 
 of Independence. The great work on the subject is the History of the 
 Greek Revolution ('la-ropia ttjs 'EWtjvikvs 'ETravaaraffecos), by Spyridon 
 Trikoupes, formerly Greek Minister in England. In German there is 
 the Geschichte des Aufstandes und der Wiedergeburt von Griechenland, 
 forming the fifth and sixth volumes of Gervinus' Geschichte des ncun- 
 zt'hnten Jahrhunderts seit den Wiener Vertrdgen. In English we have 
 the History by General Gordon, the plain narrative of an honest 
 soldier, who played a distinguished part in the war. And we have the 
 two volumes of the History of the Greek Revolution, which form the 
 conclusion of Mr. Finlay's great series of mediaeval and modern Greek 
 I listory. This brings the history down to a much later stage than either 
 of the others. It is the work of one of the keenest of observers, who 
 knew the history of the country from the beginning to the end ; but the 
 bitter and carping spirit in which it is written almost reminds one 
 of Cato the Censor, and his epithet vaudaxer-ns. Plutarch, Cato 
 Major, 1. 
 
 (4, p. 178.) See the account of the murder of the Mollah at Smyrna 
 in Trikoupes, I. 289, .Ed. I ; I. 251, Ed. 2. See also the story in 
 Vol. II. p. 103, Ed. i ; II. p. 95, Ed. 2. Mahmoud himself disgraced his 
 Grand Vizier, Beterli Ali, giving as his reason that he wished to spare 
 the blood of the Greeks (i\6€\rj(re va <pei<rdrj rrjs faijs ruv 'EXkrivuv, are 
 the words of the official papers in Trikoupes, I. pp. 112, 374, Ed. 1. ; 
 90, 338, Ed. 2. ) The Sheikh-ul-Islam was also deposed because he had 
 refused his fetva for a general slaughter of the Greeks, i. 192, Ed. i. ; 
 163, Ed. ii. 
 (5, p. 192.) There was the Treaty of Unkiar-Skelessi in 1833, 
 
246 RE 1 
 
 
 between Russia and the Porte, which concerns only the external rela- 
 tions between the two powers, and merely confirms the arrangements 
 already made with regard to Greece. There were two Conventions of 
 London in 1840, 1841 about the affairs of Syria ; and there was the 
 Convention of Balta-Liman, between Russia and the Porte, in 1849, 
 which settled the affairs of the Danubian Principalities, and which in 
 fact sacrified their liberties both to Russia and to the Turk. 
 
 (6, p. 193.) See Annals of our Time, pp. 393, 401. 
 
 (7, p. 207.) Accounts of the Cretan war were written by Mr. Skinner, 
 correspondent of the Daily News, in his book, " Roughing it in Crete," 
 and by the then American Consul, Mr. Stillman, " The Cretan Insur- 
 rection of 1 866- 1 868." The official papers are to be found in a Blue 
 Book, "Correspondence respecting the Disturbances in Crete, 1866, 
 1867." In official language a patriotic war is a "disturbance." No 
 doubt it is a "disturbance" to all the Foreign Offices. 
 
 (8, p. 208.) The despatch which contains Lord Stanley's order on 
 this matter is No. 158, p. 140, of the Cretan Blue Book. The reasons 
 given for refusing help stand thus : — 
 
 " Lord Stanley has received despatches from Greece which clearly 
 show that the proceedings of her Majesty's ship, Assurance, in taking 
 off from Crete a certain number of refugees, has been regarded in Greece, 
 not in the light of a simple act of humanity, irrespective of political 
 considerations ; but as an indication on the part of her Majesty's govern- 
 ment that they sympathise with the cause of the insurgents, and Lord 
 Stanley cannot doubt but that the same construction would be put on 
 any similar proceedings on the part of her Majesty's ships of war, 
 especially if taking place in consequence of express orders to that effect 
 sent out from this country. 
 
 " Lord Stanley fears that the effect of any such step would be to hold 
 out false hopes of assistance to the insurgents, and thereby in the end 
 to create far more suffering by the protracting of the suffering than that 
 which might be averted at the moment by the removal of these destitute 
 persons. 
 
 " Her Majesty's government deeply lament the further ruin and misery 
 in which a prolongation of the struggle cannot fail to involve the 
 Christians in Crete, but it is their duty not to expose themselves to mis- 
 construction, and not by an appearance of intervention, the moral effect 
 of which might be very great, to depart from the position of strict 
 neutrality which they have thought it their duty to assume." 
 
 In plain words Lord Stanley deliberately sacrificed these poor 
 creatures to a cowardly dread of'" misconstruction." It is to be noticed 
 that he does not dare to condemn, though he very faintly approves 
 conduct of Captain Pym and Mr. Dickson (see pp. 141, 150). 
 
 
 es, the 
 Only, 
 
NOTES. 247 
 
 instead of doing right at all hazards, as they did, he was afraid of this 
 and that ; he might be "misconstrued." 
 
 In noble contrast to Lord Stanley's despatch are the letters of Lord 
 John Hay and Mr. Dickson in pp. 140, 141, 147, 151. That in 147 is 
 a remonstrance from Mr. Dickson to a Turk called Ali Bey, who in 
 p. 146 growls over the escape of his victims. 
 
 The crime of Lord Stanley was well rebuked by the Duke of Argyll 
 in the House of Lords on March 8, 1867. Lords Kimberley and Grey, 
 to their shame, defended the criminal, the former with some of the 
 usual fallacious illustrations. There were other debates in the Commons 
 on February 15, and the Lords on August 15. In that in the Commons 
 the cause of evil found a characteristic supporter in Mr. Layard. 
 
 The moral aspect of the case, as of the whole of Lord Derby's deal- 
 ings with Eastern Christendom, is instructive. We see that mere 
 dulness, mere timidity and weakness of purpose, mere shrinking from 
 obvious duty, may do just as much mischief as active cruelty. Canning 
 wished, like Lord Derby, to put a stop to a wasting struggle. But he 
 set about doing so in a different way from Lord Derby. In a word, 
 Lord Derby was puzzled and frightened, and did not know what to do. 
 Canning was neither puzzled nor frightened ; he saw the right thing to 
 do, and he did it. 
 
 (9, p. 213.) This Peter is the Vladika of whom Sir Gardner Wilkin- 
 son has much to say in his book on Dalmatia and Montenegro. For 
 the history of Montenegro, see Le Montinegro Contemporain y par G. 
 Frilley et Jovan Wlahovitj, Paris, 1876. 
 
 (10, p. 218.) As yet there is not much to refer to besides Blue Books 
 and newspapers. But there are already some pieces of history, as Der 
 Krieg in der Tiirkei. Zustande und Ereignisse auf der Balkanhalbinsel 
 in den Jahren 1875 und l8 7 6 » b y Colonel Riistow, Zurich, 1876. The 
 story of the war in Herzegovina, down to the declaration of war by 
 Servia and Montenegro, is told in Mr. Stillman's " Herzegovina and 
 the late Uprising ; London, Longman, 1877. The writer here de- 
 scribes what he saw with his own eyes, eyes sharpened by his earlier 
 experience of patriotic warfare in Crete. 
 
 (11, p. 220.) This point is strongly brought out in Mr. Gladstone's 
 late pamphlet, Lessons in Massacre, and it is most forcibly argued 
 in Sir George Campbell's Handybook on the Eastern Question, p. 133 
 et seqq. See also the very important letter of Consul Calvert in the 
 Blue Book ; Correspondence respecting the Conference, pp. 170, 171. 
 
 (12, p. 221.) On the state of things in this corner, some most valu- 
 able letters have lately appeared in the Manchester Guardian. I hear 
 from a private source that the insurgents in this quarter are largely 
 Catholic. In another part the Catholic Mirdites are in arms, and in 
 
248 REVOLTS AGAINST THE OTTOMAN POWER. 
 
 f some parts the Mahometans themselves are rising. In short, there 
 seems a hope that men of all creeds may join to shake off the yoke that 
 presses on all. 
 
 (13, p. 227.) The same kind of talk was brought into the speech 
 which, at the opening of the sham Parliament, was not spoken, or even 
 read, by the Grand Turk himself, but read by somebody else at his side. 
 Fancy Mahomet the Conqueror or Suleiman the Lawgiver having 
 speeches read for them. 
 
 (14, p. 233.) In the despatch written by Lord Derby on August 12, 
 1875, in the Blue Book (Correspondence respecting Affairs in Bosnia 
 and the Herzegovina, Turkey, No. 2, 1876), he writes thus to Sir 
 Henry Elliot :— 
 
 " Her Majesty's Government are not aware whether your Excellency 
 may have any opportunity of advising the Prince of Montenegro to 
 restrain his subjects from aiding the Insurrection. Should such an 
 opportunity offer, they do not doubt that you would avail yourself of it, 
 and they wish you to direct her Majesty's agent at Belgrade to use his 
 best efforts to counteract any dispositions which may be apparent in 
 Servia to aid or foment the disturbances. 
 
 "At the same time her Majesty's government are of opinion that 
 the Turkish government should rely on their own resources to suppress 
 the insurrection, and should deal with it as a local outbreak of disorder, 
 rather than give international importance to it by appealing for sup- 
 port to other powers. 
 
 11 1 have informed Musurus Pasha [the Greek who takes the pay of 
 the Turk in London] of the substance of this despatch." 
 
 In the next letter we hear how " the Porte begged the Italian govern- 
 ment to join the other powers in counselling the Princes of Servia and 
 Montenegro to observe a prudent attitude." Perhaps by this time Lord 
 Derby himself has found out that the victorious sovereign of the Black 
 Mountain is more used to the "attitude" of Judas Maccabseus and of 
 Rudolf Reding, than to any "attitude" that Lord Derby and the 
 " Porte " might deem " prudent." 
 
 (15, p. 233.) See the letters of Lord Derby in the Blue Book 
 (Correspondence respecting Affairs in Bosnia and the Herzegovina. 
 Turkey No. 2, 1876, p. 6, p. 57)— where Lord Derby cherishes the 
 vain hope of extinguishing the insurrection before the spring. So in 
 Turkey No. 3, p. 18, where Lord Derby discusses the "great dis- 
 couragement of the Turkish government " after a defeat of the Turks 
 by the insurgents with Dalmatian help, and how " it is feared that the 
 effect of it in Montenegro will be very mischievous." The letter in 
 p. 115 to Mr. Adams is worth reading. It seems to have taken two 01 
 three Excellencies conferring together to find out that "by whateve 
 
 
NOTES. 249 
 
 measures Montenegro might be restrained, the result to Turkey of dis- 
 sociating her from the insurrectionary cause would be a vital one." And 
 so on, till on April 25, 1876, Sir Henry Elliot finds that the " last 
 accounts from the north of Bosnia are entirely satisfactory," and adds 
 how "Rashid Pasha says that, the Austrian frontier being now effi- 
 ciently guarded, the bands of insurgents had been easily dispersed 
 and tranquillity is restored in that district." What state of things is 
 " entirely satisfactory " to Sir Henry Elliot, what kind of "tranquillity" 
 is meant by Rashid Pasha, will be best studied in the letters of Miss Irby 
 from the frontier of which he speaks. 
 
 (16, p. 239.) A curious illustration of the lengths to which Turkish 
 power of lying may go will be seen in the speech of " his Excellency 
 the President," otherwise Safvet Pasha, in the Blue Book of Corre- 
 spondence respecting the Conference at Constantinople, pp. 217, 224. 
 Lord Salisbury and General Ignatieff seem both to have answered as 
 strongly as would be polite towards a fellow " Excellency." 
 
 (17, p. 241). These facts are known to every one who has really 
 studied the course of the war, and has not been led away by slander- 
 ous words. I am happy to add from private sources the testimony of a 
 highly distinguished Russian general, who distinctly asserts that the 
 Servians are not inferior in military qualities to his own countrymen, 
 and that in fact they shewed themselves capable of greater endurance. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION, 
 
 And now at last we come to the great practical 
 question, What is to be done ? What is the duty of 
 England and of Europe in this great crisis of the 
 world's history ? I assume that England and Europe 
 have a duty in the matter. I am old-fashioned enough 
 to believe that there are such things as right and 
 wrong, and to believe that right is to be followed, and 
 that wrong is to be avoided, in the affairs of nations 
 as well as in the affairs of private men. I assume that 
 nations as well as individuals owe a duty alike to God 
 above and to man below. It would seem that there 
 are some who think otherwise. It would seem that 
 there are some to whom any mention of right or 
 wrong as having anything to do with the matter is 
 ground enough for an outburst of wrath or of scorn. 
 There are some who shamelessly put forth in the 
 face of day the doctrine that interest alone is to be 
 thought of, that it matters not what wrongs are done, 
 what sufferings are borne, if some fancied interest of 
 England is supposed to be jeoparded by doing right. 
 I will quote, as an example of the spirit in which the 
 affairs of the nation ought not to be carried on, the 
 following passage from a letter in one of the published 
 
 I 
 
SIR HENRY ELLIOT ON "INTERESTS." 25 I 
 
 Blue Books addressed by Sir Henry Elliot to the 
 Earl of Derby, dated Therapia, September 4th, 
 1876 :— 0) 
 
 "An insurrection or civil war is everywhere accompanied by cruelties 
 and abominable excesses, and this being tenfold the case in oriental 
 countries, where people are divided into antagonistic creeds and races, 
 the responsibility and sin of those who incite a peaceful Province to rise 
 becomes doubly heavy, and they now endeavour to throw them upon 
 others. 
 
 "To the accusation of being a blind partisan of the Turks, I will 
 only answer that my conduct here has never been guided by any senti- 
 mental affection for them but by a firm determination to uphold the 
 interests of Great Britain to the utmost of my power, and that those 
 interests are deeply engaged in preventing the disruption of the Turkish 
 Empire is a conviction which I share in common with the most eminent 
 statesmen who have directed our foreign policy, but which appears now 
 to be abandoned by shallow politicians or persons who have allowed 
 their feelings of revolted humanity to make them forget the capital 
 interests involved in the question. 
 
 " We may, and must, feel indignant at the needless and monstrous 
 severity with which the Bulgarian insurrection was put down, but the 
 necessity which exists for England to prevent changes from occurring 
 here which would be most detrimental to ourselves, is not affected by the 
 question whether it was 10,000 or 20,000 persons who perished in the 
 suppression. 
 
 *' We have been upholding what we know to be a semi-civilized 
 nation, liable under certain circumstances to be carried into fearful 
 excesses ; but the fact of this having just now been strikingly brought 
 home to us all cannot be a sufficient reason for abandoning a policy 
 which is the only one that can be followed with due regard to our 
 interests." 
 
 One's breath is taken away on reading such words 
 as these. The only excuse or palliation for them can 
 be that the writer, quartered so long among Turks, 
 has caught some of the spirit of the Turk. 
 
 fiefiapfidpaxTcu, xP^vios &v <?*/ fiopfSdpois.C*) 
 
 Or perhaps so to speak is injustice to the Turk. 
 When the Turk is suppressing an insurrection — I 
 
252 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 speak not of the Ring at Constantinople, but o 
 actual doers of the deeds — he may, in his fierce 
 fanaticism, believe that he is doing good service to 
 Allah and his Prophet. The motives confessed by 
 Sir Henry Elliot are lower than this. Of right and 
 wrong, of duty, there is not a word. The one avowed 
 motive is interest, from one end to the other. It is 
 not merely that the blind partizanship, the affection, 
 whether sentimental or otherwise, which the writer 
 shews for the Turk, comes out in the difference of tone 
 between the first paragraph that I have quoted and 
 the third. It is not merely that the devilish doings 
 of the Turk are gently spoken of as " needless and 
 monstrous severity," while the high moral tone about 
 "responsibility" and "sin" is taken towards those 
 who strove, however vainly, in the noble cause of Bul- 
 garian freedom. This is not new. We can fancy Philip 
 of Spain feeling the same holy indignation at the sin 
 of William of Orange. We can fancy that there were 
 milder moments when Philip himself deemed that the 
 Fury at Antwerp was severity carried a little toe 
 far. But what is new, not perhaps altogether new 
 but characteristic of the dealings of the last generatior 
 or two with this particular subject, is the calm avowa 
 that interest is to be the one guide of public action 
 and that to interest humanity and every other noblei 
 feeling must give way.( 3 ) Whether the disruptior 
 of the Turkish Empire would be good or bad for the 
 nations that live under it is not even thought of. Al 
 that matters is that the interests of Great Britain an 
 deeply engaged in preventing that disruption. W( 
 are graciously allowed to be indignant at Turkis 
 severity ; but even revolted humanity must not c 
 us to forget the higher claims of " capital interest 
 
THE NEW MORALITY. 253 
 
 It matters not who may perish, 10,000 or 20,000, if 
 their perishing will hinder changes that will be " most 
 detrimental to ourselves." We must prevent those 
 changes. We uphold a semi-civilized nation, and the 
 nature of the power that we uphold has just now been 
 strikingly brought home to us. But if the upholding 
 of that power is the only policy which can be followed 
 with a due regard to our own interests, nothing that 
 that semi-civilized power may do can be a sufficient 
 reason for abandoning it. Such is the morality, such is 
 the doctrine, such, it seems, is the practice, of a repre- 
 sentative of England in the nineteenth century. One 
 feels, in reading Sir Henry Elliot's words, as Chatham 
 felt when he burst forth in that strain of righteous 
 eloquence which would hardly sound parliamentary in 
 the delicate ears of a modern House of Lords. He 
 called on Judges and Bishops to " interpose the 
 purity of their ermine and of their lawn " to " save 
 his country from pollution." He could not rest his 
 head on his pillow till he had poured forth "his 
 eternal abhorrence " of " principles preposterous and 
 enormous," "equally unconstitutional, inhuman, and 
 unchristian." In his day to profess humanity and 
 Christianity as motives for public conduct had not 
 yet become matter for scorn. In the moral code 
 of Sir Henry Elliot Christianity seems to have no 
 place. Humanity appears only as an offering of 
 small account, which may be wisely offered up at 
 the shrine of all-ruling interest. 
 
 I take this passage merely as a specimen. Coming 
 as it does from an official person, couched in all the 
 calmness of official language, it proves more than the 
 wild outpourings which are sent forth daily and 
 weekly by a certain section of the English press, a 
 
THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 section for which the name " Mahometan press " is 
 far too honourable. Their sneers, their revilings, are 
 in truth the most honourable tribute which can be paid 
 to the "shallow politicians" of Sir Henry Elliot's 
 attempted sarcasm. With men to whom every noble 
 sentiment, every generous feeling, seems simply mat 
 ter of mockery, with men who by their sneers at 
 "humanity" and " philanthropism " seem to proclaim 
 their hatred of their own species, it is in vain to argue. 
 One's labour would not be more utterly lost, if one 
 argued with a tiger or a Turk. It is indeed sad and 
 shameful that such men are ; but the only thought 
 that we need give to them is the thought that their 
 jeers and slander make the noblest wreath of honour 
 that an honest man can twine around his brow. 
 
 I assume then the opposite doctrine. I assume, in 
 opposition to Sir Henry Elliot, but in company with 
 the Chatham of one age and the Gladstone of another, 
 that there is such a thing as right and wrong in public 
 affairs, and that nations have their duty before God 
 and man as well as individuals. Sir Henry Elliot 
 himself would perhaps allow the existence of duty 
 in the case of private men. I cannot believe that 
 he conducts his private affairs on the principles on 
 which he would have us conduct the affairs of the 
 nation. I cannot believe that, in his everyday dealings 
 with his fellow-men, he would look on his own interest 
 as plea enough for any breach of the laws of justice 
 and humanity. Yet, if interest is not to be every thing, 
 if right and wrong are to count for something, in the 
 dealings of this and that man with his fellow, it is 
 hard to see why interest is to be every thing and right 
 and wrong to go for nothing, in the dealings of those 
 aggregates of men which we call powers and nations. 
 
 I 
 
PRIVATE AND PUBLIC MORALITY. 255 
 
 For it must not be forgotten that powers and nations 
 are simply aggregates of men, that every act of 
 national right or wrong doing is really an act of 
 personal right or wrong doing on the part of those 
 men, few or many, whose will determines the na- 
 tional action. And, if interest is to be the only rule 
 in national affairs, if it is to be a rule to which 
 humanity is to give way, it is hard to see what acts 
 of national perfidy and national cruelty may not be 
 justified. A morality which holds that Bulgarian 
 massacres are no ground for ceasing to uphold the 
 power which is guilty of Bulgarian massacres, has 
 little right to blame that power for " needless and 
 monstrous severity " in the Bulgarian massacres them- 
 selves. If the Turk deemed the Bulgarian massacres 
 to be for his interest, he did right, in Sir Henry 
 Elliot's morality, in not allowing feelings of humanity 
 to hinder him in following the course which interest 
 dictated. If he was mistaken in thinking that the 
 massacres were for his interest, that would be, in 
 Sir Henry Elliot's morality, at most an error of 
 judgement, and not a moral crime. 
 
 I make then one assumption. I make it as the 
 geometer makes those few assumptions with which 
 he starts, assumptions which he cannot prove, but 
 which he deems can abundantly prove themselves. 
 With those who deny that things which are equal to 
 the same are equal to one another the geometer does 
 not argue. With such an one he has no common 
 ground for argument. So neither can the moralist 
 argue with one who says either that there is no right 
 and wrong, or that right or wrong concern private 
 conduct only. With such an one he has no common 
 ground for argument. I must make my assumption 
 
THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 as the geometer makes his. But having made the 
 assumption at starting, I trust that I may, like the 
 geometer, go on for the future, not with assumption, 
 but with argument. I trust to shew, not indeed by 
 geometrical proof, but by such proof as the nature of 
 the subject allows, first that England has a duty 
 in this matter, and secondly, that, in this matter 
 interest and duty do not clash. 
 
 The duty of England and Europe towards the 
 nations which are under the Turk is simply the 
 duty of redressing a wrong which England and 
 Europe have themselves done. Neither a man nor 
 a nation is at all called upon to go all over the 
 world seeking for wrongs to redress. If either a 
 man or a nation undertook so to do, that man or 
 that nation would soon find that there was very 
 little time left to do anything else. Neither man 
 nor nation is called upon to practise such mere 
 knight-errantry as this. Nor does it necessarily follow 
 that either a man or a nation is bound to go forth 
 to redress wrongs, even when those who are suffering 
 the wrongs call upon him to do so. It would be very 
 hard to settle beforehand in what cases either a man 
 or a nation is bound to give help to those who call 
 upon him to give it. The duty of either man or 
 nation in such matters must greatly depend on the 
 circumstances of each particular case. But one thing 
 no one will deny to be the duty of each particular 
 man. If he has himself done a wrong, then it is his 
 duty to redress that wrong. This will be denied by no 
 one who professes any moral principle at all, by no one 
 who believes that there are such things as right and 
 wrong in the common dealings between man and man. 
 
DUTY OF REDRESSING WRONG DONE. 257 
 
 And — to make our one assumption once for all — if 
 there be such a thing as right and wrong in public 
 affairs, if nations are to be* guided in their dealings 
 with one another by the same moral rules by which 
 private men ought to be guided in their dealings with 
 one another, then it follows that, when a nation has 
 done a wrong, it is the duty of that nation to redress 
 that wrong. For a nation to say that it will not 
 discharge this duty, because it is not for its interest 
 to do so, is exactly as base as it would be for a private 
 man to refuse to redress any wrong that he had done, 
 because it would be against his interest to do so. 
 Every kind of law, the law of honour, the law of the 
 land, the law of morals, the law of religion, all say 
 that a man who has done a wrong must redress that 
 wrong. They all say he must redress it, even if it be 
 against his interest to redress it. And the higher 
 forms of teaching would go on to tell him that it 
 was in any case his real interest to redress it. They 
 would tell him that the approbation of his own con- 
 science, the esteem of other men — the law of religion 
 would add the approval of his Maker — are worth more 
 than any sacrifice that he might make by doing right. 
 So, if we believe that right and wrong are to be 
 thought of in public affairs, if we do not think that 
 a nation may do any cruelty, any perfidy, that it may 
 fancy to be for its immediate interest, it follows that 
 a nation is as much bound as a private man to redress 
 any wrong that it has done. It must do right, even 
 to the prejudice of its own interests. It may, if it 
 pleases, comfort itself by thinking that, according to 
 the true saying that honesty is the best policy, its 
 interests will not suffer in the long run by doing its 
 duty. 
 
258 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 Now that England, and Europe in general, but 
 England in a more marked way than any other 
 nation of Europe, have done wrong to the subject 
 nations of South-eastern Europe hardly needs proof. 
 We need go no further than the passage which I 
 quoted a few pages back from Sir Henry Elliot's 
 letter to Lord Derby. Sir Henry Elliot there says, 
 in so many words, " We have been upholding what 
 we know to be a semi-civilized nation, liable under 
 certain circumstances to be carried into fearful ex- 
 cesses." In other words, we have been upholding 
 the Turk in his wicked dominion over Bulgaria, 
 Thessaly, Crete, and the other subject lands. It is not 
 merely that we have left things in those lands to 
 take their own course ; it is not merely that we have 
 not helped the oppressed ; we have actively helped 
 the oppressor. This Sir Henry Elliot confesses. We 
 have upheld him, upheld him, knowing, as Sir Henry 
 Elliot goes on to say, what manner of thing it was 
 that we were upholding. Knowing that the rule oi 
 the Turk was a rule of the foulest oppression, we have 
 not merely done nothing to put an end to thai 
 oppression, we have actively upheld the oppressor ir 
 his oppression. All the powers that signed the treat) 
 of Paris have been more or less guilty on thi: 
 score. England has been more constantly and glar 
 ingly guilty than any other. We have throughout 
 for more than forty years, upheld the Turk, becaus 
 we thought that it was for our own interest. That i< 
 we have done as a nation towards other nations in 
 way which any man among us, Sir Henry Elliot 
 doubt not as well as any other man, would blush t 
 do in common every day dealings between one ma 
 and another. 
 
 
THE TREATY OF PARIS. 259 
 
 Our great crime of all, the general crime of 
 Europe, the great sin against the oppressed nations of 
 the East, was the signing of the treaty of Paris. By 
 that treaty, as I have before shewn, England and the 
 other powers bound themselves to let the Turk do 
 what he would with his Christian victims, and to do 
 nothing to hinder him. This was a very different 
 matter from merely not doing anything to help them, 
 or even from refusing to help them when they asked 
 us. It was not a mere negative omission ; it was a 
 positive wrong. Before the Crimean war the 
 Christians under the rule of the Turk had a protector, 
 at least a power that claimed to be their protector, in 
 Russia. It is no use here to dispute either how far the 
 protectorate of Russia was formally acknowledged, or 
 how far the protection of Russia was either sincere 
 or effectual. Russia was at least a nominal and pro- 
 fessed protector. Now it would have been perfectly 
 fair to argue that it was not well that the protection 
 of those nations should be left to Russia alone, but 
 that it would be better that all the other powers, or 
 some of them, should join with Russia in protecting 
 them. It might have been argued that such a joint 
 protectorate would be better for the general interests 
 of Europe, better even for the interests of the subject 
 nations themselves. To substitute such a protectorate 
 as this for the sole protectorate of Russia might have 
 been a wise and just measure. It might have been a 
 step towards getting rid of the Turk altogether. But 
 this was not what the treaty of Paris did. The treaty 
 of Paris took away from the subject nations what 
 little chance of protection they had, and it gave them 
 nothing instead. It took away the protectorate of 
 Russia, whatever that might be worth, and it put 
 
 S 2 
 
260 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 nothing in its place. The powers pledged themselves 
 not to interfere with the relations between the Sultan 
 and his subjects, knowing what those relations were, 
 what they always must be. They handed over the 
 subject nations to the power of the Turk, with no 
 better guaranty than the Turk's paper of lying 
 promises. That is, they left the lamb in the jaws of 
 the wolf, with no safeguard except the wolf's promise 
 not to bite the lamb. 
 
 The fault in the matter of the treaty of Paris was no 
 special fault of England. It was shared by England 
 with the other powers which signed the treaty. But 
 there is no other power which has so steadily shewn 
 itself the friend of the Turk and the enemy of the 
 subjects of the Turk as England has done. There is 
 no other power which has so steadily, in the happy 
 phrase of Sir Henry Elliot, upheld the Turk. The 
 best proof of this is to be found in the feelings of the 
 Turks themselves. Through the whole of the doings 
 of the last two years, the Turks have always taken for 
 granted that England was their friend. It has been 
 hard to persuade them that England was not ready tc 
 stand by them in any cause and against any enemy 
 One instance will do among many. At one point o J 
 the doings of last year, the English fleet was, as al 
 the world knows, sent to Besika Bay. Why it wa. ; 
 sent there was at the time not perfectly clear. A: 
 happened more than once in the events of last year 
 Lord Beaconsfield gave one reason and Lord Derb} 
 another. It matters little what the real reason was 
 The instructive point of the business is the way 
 which it was looked upon by every man, Turk 
 Christian, in the lands which were most concerne 
 Every man, in those lands, Turk or Christia 
 
"UPHOLDING" THE TURK. 26l 
 
 believed, rightly or wrongly, that the fleet was sent 
 to encourage the Turks and to discourage the 
 Christians. That such a belief could be general 
 speaks more than any long argument as to the 
 conduct of England in that part of the world, as to 
 the reputation which the conduct of England has 
 won for her in that part of the world. Turk and 
 Christian, oppressor and oppressed, agreed ill taking 
 for granted that an English fleet could have come for 
 no end except to carry on the usual work of England 
 in upholding the oppressor. Nor was anything done 
 to undeceive either Turk or Christian. Though it was 
 known what Turk and Christian alike believed to be 
 the reason of the fleet's coming, the fleet was still left 
 there. That is, England, so far as England is repre- 
 sented by those who then and now rule England, was 
 not unwilling that England should be looked upon 
 by Turk and Christian alike as the friend of the Turk 
 and the enemy of the Christian. 
 
 It is hardly needful to pile together instances to 
 shew how truly Sir Henry Elliot speaks when he says 
 that we have upheld the Turk. Our loans of money, 
 our loans of men, our honours bestowed on the 
 barbarian and the renegade, the Grand Cross of 
 Omar, the Garter of Abd-ul-Medjid and Abd-ul- 
 Aziz — the reception given to the last-named 
 tyrant at the very moment when his hands were 
 reeking with the blood of Crete — the hideous 
 crime of refusing the shelter of English vessels to 
 the Cretan refugees — that dark day of shame and 
 sorrow when other nations did the work of humanity 
 and Englishmen were forbidden to share in it — all the 
 black doings of last year — the letters hounding the 
 Turk on the patriots of Herzegovina — the other 
 
262 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 letters written to and fro to stir up Austria to depart 
 from her wise and righteous policy during the first 
 days of the war — the refusal of every note, of every 
 proposition, from every other power which seemed 
 likely to do any thing to lessen the sufferings of the 
 oppressed nations — all these things, done by our rulers, 
 uncensured by our Parliament, but branded in the 
 movement of last autumn by the righteous and re- 
 pentant voice of the English people — all these things 
 form a black catalogue of wrong, a catalogue of deeds 
 done to uphold the oppressor and to snatch away any 
 shadow of hope that might arise in the breasts of his 
 victims. The England of Canning and Codrington, 
 the England of Byron and Hastings, has come to 
 this, that the world knows us as the nation which 
 upholds oppression for the sake of its own interests. 
 We have indeed a national sin to redress and to atone 
 for. We are verily guilty concerning our brother, 
 in that we saw the anguish of his soul when he 
 besought us and we would not hear. Nay, our guilt 
 is deeper still. We have not only refused to listen 
 to our brother's cry for help ; we have not merely 
 looked on and passed by on the other side ; we have 
 given our active help to the oppressors of our brother 
 We have " upheld " the foulest fabric of wrong that 
 earth ever saw, because it was deemed that the in 
 terests of England were involved in " upholding " the 
 wrong and trampling down the right. 
 
 Such a list as this might be made much longer 
 Perhaps one fact alone is a more speaking commen 
 than all of the way in which England has " upheld 
 the Turk. The tale has often been told in full( 4 ) 
 all that I need do is to call it to remembrance. 
 When Sir Henry Bulwer was British Ambassador at 
 
 
AMBASSADORS AND CONSULS. 263 
 
 Constantinople, a circular was sent to the British 
 consuls in the Turkish dominions, bidding them send 
 in an account of the state of the country. Another 
 letter went with the circular, bidding them make their 
 report as favourable* as they could to the Turks. 
 One consul received the circular without the letter ; 
 he sat (jown and wrote a true account, a vivid pic- 
 ture of the horrors of Turkish rule. Then came the 
 Ambassador's letter, and the consul sat down and 
 wrote a humble apology for having spoken the truth. 
 No means then, not even deliberate falsehood, are 
 deemed too base, if they can anyhow help to "uphold " 
 the Turk. We may believe that Sir Henry Bulwer 
 would not have been guilty of falsehood, or of en- 
 couragement of falsehood, in any transaction between 
 man and man. But in his public character, the great 
 duty of upholding the Turk was held to override the 
 dull rules of every-day morality. In his character as 
 Ambassador, he was to carry out the old definition 
 of an Ambassador ; he was to act as " an honest man 
 sent to lie abroad for the good of his country." 
 
 Our national crime then is that we have upheld the 
 Turk for our own supposed interests. That is, for the 
 sake of our own supposed interests, we have doomed 
 the struggling nations to abide in their bondage. We 
 have doomed them to stay under a rule under which 
 the life and property of the Christian, the honour of 
 his wife, the honour of his children of both sexes alike, 
 are at every moment at the mercy of the savages 
 whom our august and cherished ally honours and 
 promotes in proportion to the blackness of their 
 deeds. W 7 e have, for our own interest, upheld the 
 power which has done its foul and bloody work in 
 Chios, at Damascus, and in Bulgaria, which is still 
 
264 
 
 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 doing the same foul and bloody work wherever a 
 victim is to be found. And, if we listen to Sir Henry 
 Elliot, though we know all this, though we know it 
 better than we ever did before, we are still to go on 
 upholding the doers. We uphold the power whose 
 daily work is massacre and worse than massacre. It 
 matters not whether ten thousand or twenty thousand 
 perish. We are still to uphold the slaughterer, for i 
 is to our interest that he should not be shorn of hi 
 power of slaughtering. 
 
 Now, if there be any such thing as right and wrong 
 in public affairs, if moral considerations are ever to 
 come in to determine the actions of nations, it is hard 
 to see how there can be deeper national guilt than 
 this. Unjust wars, aggressions, conquests, are bad 
 enough ; but they are hardly so bad as the calm, un- 
 blushing, upholding of wrong for our own interests. 
 Men may be led into wars and aggressions by passion 
 and excitement, by the fantasies of national honour 
 and glory, even by generous feelings led astray. But 
 here there is nothing to cloak the cold wickedness of 
 a base and selfish policy. We look on, we count the 
 cost, we see how the wrong-doer deals with his victim, 
 and we determine to uphold the wrong-doer, because 
 we think that to uphold him will suit some interest of 
 our own. There is no question of national glory, no 
 question of national honour, nothing which can stir 
 up even a false enthusiasm. It is a calm mercan- 
 tile calculation that the wrongs of millions of men 
 will pay. This is the case as stated by Sir Henry 
 Elliot ; this is the case as it is set forth by Lord 
 Derby, and by all who follow him in the ostentatious 
 setting forth of interest as the one motive of national 
 action. I do not believe that so base a code of 
 
THE DOCTRINE OF INTEREST. 265 
 
 national conduct will be approved by any large body 
 of thinking Englishmen. It may indeed be approved 
 by those who glory in their shame, who make their 
 boast of putting justice and humanity out of sight, 
 whose pride is that they never feel, or that, if they 
 feel, they succeed in speedily stifling, all the higher 
 and more generous feelings of man's nature. But 
 I would fain believe that, beyond such circles as 
 these, no deliberate approval would be given to the 
 base doctrine of making interest our only rule. Some 
 may be misled by mere party-blindness. Some may 
 be misled by the mere traditional repetition of mean- 
 ingless formulae. But I do not believe that the bulk 
 of the English people are ready to affirm that the 
 conduct of the nation is to be systematically guided 
 by principles on which any honest man would shrink 
 from acting in the common affairs of daily life. 
 
 I assume then that wrong has been done, that we 
 are, as a nation, guilty ol the sufferings of our Eastern 
 brethren. I assume that, by upholding the Turk, we 
 have made ourselves, as a nation, partakers in his 
 crimes. From this I infer that, where wrong has been 
 done, redress must be made. I infer that we must not 
 merely fold our hands and let events take their course, 
 but that we must, as a nation, stand forth to undo the 
 wrong which, as a nation, we have done. We must 
 do as we did fifty years ago, in those brighter days 
 when the policy of England was guided by an 
 Englishman with an English heart. We must do as 
 Canning did. We must stand forth, in common, if it 
 can be, with the other powers of Europe, or with so 
 many of them as will join us, or if all fail, alone in the 
 strength of a righteous cause, to undo the wrong that 
 
266 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 we have done, to wipe away the tears that we have 
 made to flow, to burst asunder the chains that we 
 ourselves have riveted. We must do it by peaceable 
 means, if peaceable means can be made to serve our 
 turn. But, if peaceable means will not serve our turn, 
 then, we must do it by force. If we have to fight, we 
 never can fight in a worthier cause. We have fought for 
 this and that dream of national glory — we have fought 
 for this and that doctrine of the balance of power — 
 we have fought to maintain the rights of this and that 
 claimant of foreign crowns — we have even fought to 
 maintain the Turk in his dominion ; let us now fight, 
 if we must fight, as we fought fifty years back, for 
 righteousness. No army could ever march forth with 
 so sure a certainty that every blow that it dealt would 
 count among the good works of him that dealt it, 
 as the army that should go forth to free the Greek 
 and Slavonic lands from Turkish bondage. Our 
 thoughts go back to the days when crusades were 
 still crusades, before the warriors of the cross had 
 turned aside from their work to storm Zara and 
 Constantinople, or to become the tools of papal ven- 
 geance either on Emperors or on so-called heretics. 
 We should go forth with the pure zeal of the great 
 assembly of Clermont ; we should put the cross upon 
 our shoulders with the cry of " God wills it " on our 
 lips and in our hearts. ' 
 
 For force then, for coercion in the euphemistic 
 language of our times, that is, in plain words, for war, 
 if war be needful — that is, not war on behalf of the 
 oppressor, but on behalf of the oppressed — not war for 
 the Turk as in 1854, but war against the Turk as in 
 1827 — we must stand ready. But the readier we are 
 for war, the more fully we have made up our mind for 
 
 
HOW TO DEAL WITH THE TURK. 267 
 
 war if war be needed, the less likely it will be that war 
 will be needed. A real union of the powers of Europe, 
 a real and frank union between England and Russia, 
 can do all that is needed without war. If England 
 can once make up her mind to act cordially with 
 other powers, if she will cease to reject every proposal, 
 to put stones in every path, to put spokes in every 
 wheel, the thing may be done. The one thing to be 
 fully understood must be that, though it may be done 
 without fighting, it cannot be done by mere talking. 
 Those who know the Turk know how to deal with the 
 Turk. They know how little his brag really goes 
 for, if it is met as it ought to be met. The bully is at 
 heart a coward. He will yield, if he once fully under- 
 stands that nothing will be yielded to him. With 
 the Turk it is as easy to gain a great point as a small 
 one ; it is as easy to take the ell as to take the inch. 
 To mere talk he will never yield the inch; to real 
 firmness he will at once yield the ell. All who have 
 had practical dealings with the barbarians know this. 
 When they have gained any point, they have gained 
 it, not by talk, not by empty courtesy, but by strong 
 words and strong deeds, by bringing to bear on the 
 barbarian mind the one argument which the barbarian 
 mind can understand, by cowing the wild beast by 
 sheer fear. By a resolute mien and resolute words, 
 unarmed Europeans have made parties of armed 
 Turks tremble before them, and turn about and do 
 their bidding like humble slaves. It is exactly so in 
 dealings on a greater scale. The Turk brags as long 
 as he thinks that there is anything to be gained by 
 bragging. As soon as he finds that nothing can be 
 gained by bragging, he knocks under to the power 
 which he knows to be stronger than his own. 
 
268 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 The whole mistake lies in dealing with the Turk 
 the civilized nations of Europe deal with one another. 
 He should be dealt with as we deal with any other 
 barbarian. We have already seen that certain Turks 
 have learned to talk European languages, and to dress 
 themselves up in European clothes. It must always 
 be remembered that this makes no difference. The 
 men who ordered the massacres in Bulgaria wear 
 tight coats and jabber French, and expect to be called 
 Highnesses and Excellencies. But they ordered the 
 massacres in Bulgaria all the same. They ought to 
 be dealt with, not as Highnesses and Excellencies, but 
 as the men who ordered the massacres in Bulgaria. 
 Their tight coats and French ought not to save them 
 from being treated as what they are, as wild beasts 
 who have put themselves out of the pale of human 
 fellowship. Above all, the Turk should be made to 
 understand that his word goes for nothing. He has 
 lied too often to be believed. Reason and experience 
 tell us that, when a man has lied nine hundred 
 and ninety-nine times, it is foolish to believe in the 
 thousandth time. It is only the foolish sentimentalists, 
 the people who talk about the Turk being a " gentle- 
 man," the people who think it proves something that he 
 does not shake hands ( 5 ), who would have us trust the 
 convicted liar once again. The Turk should be made 
 to feel that his most solemn assertions, his most 
 solemn promises, the pledges of this and that Excel- 
 lency, of this and that Highness, or of his Imperial 
 Majesty himself, are simply words without meaning. 
 He should be told that his Irades and his Tanzimats, 
 his Hatti-sheriffs and his Hatti-humayouns, are all so 
 many names which the copiousness of the Turkish 
 language has devised to express the single idea of 
 
 
THE " CIVILIZED " TURK. 269 
 
 waste paper. He must be told that his Midhat 
 constitution is simply a mockery, a delusion, and a 
 snare, a net spread in the sight of the birds who 
 ought to be too wise to be caught by it. When 
 the Turk feels that Europe knows what he is, and 
 has made up its mind to treat him as what he is, 
 there will be an end of his brag, an end of his lying. 
 He will most likely crouch humbly and accept his fate 
 at the hand of his masters. If he chooses to rush 
 upon his doom, Europe is surely strong enough to do 
 execution on the convicted criminal. 
 
 This is the way which reason and experience teach 
 
 us to deal with the Turk. Any other way of dealing 
 
 with him lies without the range of practical politics. 
 
 To put trust in him, to accept his promises as going 
 
 for anything, springs either from silly sentimentalism, 
 
 which still puts faith in the " gentleman," murderer 
 
 and liar as he has shewn himself, or else it springs 
 
 from a guilty shrinking from the discharge of duty, 
 
 or indeed from doing anything at all. Perhaps the 
 
 very height of blindness, the highest point that could 
 
 be reached in the art of doing nothing, the art of 
 
 cowardly shrinking from duty, is to be found in 
 
 a short letter from Lord Derby to Lord Salisbury 
 
 dated December 22, i8y6/ K 6 ) Lord Derby there says 
 
 " that Her Majesty's Government have decided that 
 
 England will not assent to or assist in coercive 
 
 measures, military or naval, against the Porte." He 
 
 adds, u the Porte must on the other hand be made 
 
 to understand, as it has from the first been informed, 
 
 that it can expect no assistance from England in the 
 
 event of war." That is to say, the Conference was to 
 
 do nothing. It was settled beforehand that nothing 
 
 was to come of it. It was absolutely certain, in any 
 
2-JO THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 but the blinded eyes of a Foreign Secretary, that th 
 Turk would do nothing except under coercion. Yet 
 it is laid down as a rule that England will not join in 
 coercion. Even if other powers do, England will not 
 The European concert is to be broken, the arm of 
 justice is to be stayed, because Lord Derby either 
 has a sentimental belief in the power of talk, or 
 else because he is afraid to do anything at all. To 
 do something for the Turk, to do something against 
 the Turk, are courses of which one is wrong and 
 the other right, but both of which come within 
 the range of practical politics. To expect that the 
 Turk will yield anything to talk, when he knows that 
 it will be all talk and that no coercion will be used, 
 is the very height of silly sentimentalism. The sim- 
 plicity of what follows is indeed charming. " In the 
 event of the Porte persisting in refusing and the 
 Conference failing, your Excellency will of course 
 come away." What would the Porte do except per- 
 sist in refusing when the Porte knew that it would 
 gain everything by refusing and nothing by yielding ? 
 How could the Conference do otherwise than fail, 
 when' it was agreed beforehand that nothing was to 
 come of it ? The Conference failed, because it was 
 doomed to failure before it met. It was doomed to 
 failure, because the representatives of Europe, instead 
 of calling up the convicted criminal to hear his 
 sentence, admitted two of the Ring, two of the 
 Highnesses and Excellencies who had ordered the 
 Bulgarian massacres, to sit with them as equals, 
 and one of them to take his place as president of 
 an assembly of civilized men. We have already seen 
 that the falsehoods with which Safvet opened the 
 Conference were contradicted by both the English 
 
NECESSARY FAILURE OF THE CONFERENCE. 27 1 
 
 and the Russian ministers. But something more 
 was needed than a contradiction. The liar should 
 have been taught his place ; he should have been 
 made to understand that his talk went for nothing. 
 He should have been told that Europe had come 
 together, not to hear him talk, but to pronounce 
 sentence upon him. Instead of this, point after point 
 was yielded. When the first point was yielded, all 
 was over. Indeed all was over before anything 
 began ; ail was over when the barbarian criminal 
 was allowed to take his place among his European 
 judges. 
 
 The Conference then failed. It could not but fail. 
 And, now that it has failed, one might appeal to a 
 feeling which once was strong in the hearts of Eng- 
 lishmen, a feeling not so high as the sense of duty, 
 but at least higher than the mere base reckoning of 
 interest. Is the honour of England dead ? Does 
 no man among the rulers or the people of England 
 feel his cheeks tingle at the insult that England 
 and all Europe has received at barbarian hands ? 
 There were times when English swords would have 
 leaped from their scabbards at far lighter ignominy 
 than that which England and Europe bore then. 
 Surely they never bore greater shame than when 
 their representatives were brought together simply 
 to hear that a barbarian power which lingers on 
 only by their sufferance would have none of their 
 counsels and none of their reproof. The Turk 
 snapped his fingers in the face of England and of 
 Europe ; he shewed England and Europe the way 
 to the door; and England and Europe have walked 
 out quietly. There is, at least there was, such a 
 feeling as national self-respect. In the Government, 
 
272 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION 
 
 
 I 
 
 in the people, which can tamely endure such treatment 
 as this from a power which needs our upholding, that 
 feeling of self-respect would seem to be wholly dead. 
 In the new code of conduct we are taught that right 
 and humanity are to be offered up to the Moloch of 
 interest. It would seem that the honest sense oi 
 shame, to say nothing of the feeling of knightly 
 honour, are to be cast into the fire along with them. 
 
 We see then that, in the name of morality, there is 
 something to be done, and that, in the name of com- 
 mon sense, it must set about being done in some other 
 quite different way than what was done at the late 
 Conference. The proposals made at that Conference 
 all lay out of the range of practical politics. They 
 were all sentimental proposals, proposals which could 
 never be carried out, because they all went on the 
 supposition that the Turk might possibly do some- 
 thing without being forced to do it. Such a supposi- 
 tion is belied by all experience ; it is therefore wholly 
 unpractical. I must here insist more fully on 
 doctrine which I have already laid down, that ii 
 settling the affairs of the South-eastern lands, two 
 points must be laid down as principles, without 
 which no lasting or satisfactory settlement can be 
 made. In any land on which it is proposed to 
 bestow freedom — I use the plain word freedom, not 
 the silly word "autonomy," invented by diplomatists 
 because it may mean anything or nothing — in any 
 such land no Turkish soldier must be allowed to 
 tread, and the Turk must have no voice in the ap- 
 pointment of its rulers, magistrates, or officers, high 
 or low. Every proposal which does not embody these 
 principles lies without the range of practical politic 
 Any proposal which does not embody them can nevei 
 
 : 
 
 : 
 
 ese 
 ics. 
 ver 
 
THE TWO NECESSARY POINTS. 273 
 
 lead to any lasting reform, because it leaves with the 
 Turk the power of undoing whatever is done the 
 moment the back of Europe is turned. There was 
 talk of confining Turkish troops to particular spots, 
 and of giving the Turk a voice along with the Euro- 
 pean powers in the choice of Governors. It is curious 
 to read how this very moderate form of restraint was 
 met by a Turk, as shown in a letter of Sir Henry 
 Elliot to Lord Derby, dated December 30, iSy6.( 7 ) 
 He there describes a conversation which he had had 
 with Midhat Pasha. Midhat, it should be remem- 
 bered, besides being one of the Ring who ordered 
 the great Bulgarian massacre, had already been 
 Governor of Bulgaria. He had there undoubtedly 
 made some improvements in the way of roads and 
 the like, improvements of that kind which might be 
 useful for the ruling powers. But his personal cruelties 
 and excesses of other kinds are already written in 
 the pages of Bulgarian history. ( 8 ) With this man 
 Sir Henry Elliot had " long been intimate." The 
 proposals of the European powers were thus com- 
 mented on by the Turk talking to his "intimate" 
 English friend. 
 
 "The project, as it now stood, would be a step towards the certain 
 realization of the Russian dream of creating small autonomic states in 
 European Turkey. 
 
 "We had only to look back to what had occurred fifty years ago in 
 Servia to become convinced that the compulsory confinement of the 
 Ottoman troops to the fortresses and principal towns would shortly lead 
 to the expulsion of the Turks from the Province, and the establishment 
 of quasi independence." 
 
 It would seem from this confession that the blessings 
 of Ottoman rule, as set forth by Safvet at the opening 
 of the Conference, even the special blessings of the 
 personal rule of Midhat, were not fully appreciated 
 
 T 
 
274 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 in Bulgaria. Bulgaria, like Servia, sought for indepen 
 dence. It had no love for the presence of Ottoman 
 troops. But Midhat must have given his English 
 " intimate " credit for a large amount of ignorance of 
 Servian history. " What occurred fifty years ago in 
 Servia," to which this Turk ventures to appeal, was the 
 brutal breach of faith on the part of the Turks, when 
 they impaled men to whom their lives had been pro- 
 mised. Midhat feared that even the mild proposals of 
 the Conference would hinder himself or any other Turk 
 in Bulgaria from doing the same again. He feared 
 that the presence of foreign commissioners, of foreign 
 troops, of foreign gendarmerie, would hinder him or 
 any other Turk from bombarding any Christian city 
 which they fancied to bombard, as they bombarded 
 Belgrade only fifteen years back. The barbarian is 
 wise in his generation. He will admit of no restraint 
 on his power of doing evil. He will not endure that 
 the barbarian troops should be confined to particular 
 places, least of all to places like large towns, where 
 numbers, and in some cases the presence of Europeans, 
 may be some slight check. He and his fellows must 
 have the whole land to range through unrestrained, 
 and to do their pleasure on all whom they find in the 
 land. Servia is free ; the Turk has left her soil ; 
 life, property, family honour, are safe within her 
 boundaries. Such an example is not lost upon Midhat. 
 He will allow no step which shall look at all in the 
 direction of extending these blessings to Bulgaria. 
 One land has escaped from his clutches ; he has learned 
 to be all the more careful lest another land should 
 escape from them also. 
 
 The example of Servia to which Midhat appeal.' 
 in this conversation is indeed an instructive one. Il 
 
 
 
TURKISH TROOPS TO BE SHUT OUT. 275 
 
 proves the whole point. Servia is free, Servia flou- 
 rishes, because the direct power of the Turk has 
 wholly ceased within its borders. It is tributary and 
 no more. Turkish soldiers are no longer quartered 
 on any spot of the emancipated land. The Turk has 
 no voice in the choice of prince or minister or magis- 
 trate for any spot on Servian soil. As long as Servia 
 was under Turkish rule, the land was as wretched as 
 Bosnia or Bulgaria. The extinction of Turkish rule 
 has made the change. Only ten years ago, while 
 there were still Turkish garrisons in certain places, 
 those places were still exposed to the crimes and 
 outrages which are implied in the presence of Turkish 
 garrisons. The Turkish garrisons are gone, and the 
 people of Belgrade and the other towns which are 
 delivered from their presence are as safe as any inha- 
 bitants of other Christian towns elsewhere. In the 
 eyes of Midhat this state of things naturally seems 
 like the loss of a victim. For that very reason, Europe 
 should the more strongly insist on the deliverance of 
 the other victims of Midhat and his fellows. Midhat's 
 objection to confining the garrisons to certain points 
 proves that the confining them to certain points would 
 be a gain. His fears that such confinement would 
 lead to total expulsion may be read as a hope that it 
 will lead to total expulsion. But the experience of 
 Servia proves that the confining the enemy to certain 
 spots is not enough. As long as there is a Turkish 
 garrison in any Bulgarian town, that town may at any 
 moment be dealt with as Belgrade was in 1862. There- 
 fore no Turkish soldier must be allowed to set foot 
 in any land which is supposed to be set free. The 
 usual law comes in. It is as easy to get much out of 
 the Turk as to get little. It will cost no more trouble 
 
 T 2 
 
276 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 to compel the Turk to take away his garrisons alto- 
 gether than it will cost to compel him to confine them 
 to certain places. The Turk will never submit to 
 restriction without coercion ; under coercion he will 
 submit as easily to the greater restriction as to the less. 
 One practical lesson then is learned by the example 
 of Servia; Turkish troops must be shut out of every 
 land which it is designed to set free. The other great 
 principle is that the Turk shall have no voice in the 
 appointment of any one who is to bear rule or office 
 in the liberated lands, be he a prince or be he a 
 beadle. It is vain to stipulate that the governors or 
 other officers to be appointed shall be natives, or that 
 they shall be Christians. The Turk can always find 
 Christians as ready to do his work as any Mussulman. 
 He finds Greeks ready to do his work of falsehood at 
 European courts ; he has found at least one English- 
 man ready to do his work of blood in Crete. The 
 native who sells himself and his country for the pay 
 of a foreign master will always be a worse ruler than 
 the foreign master himself. In truth, one would 
 rather be ruled by those worthy Mussulmans whc 
 refused to do the work of blood in Bulgaria thar 
 by any Christian who would take the pay of th< 
 Turk. Nor is it anything to say that these governor: 
 shall be appointed with the approval of Europeai 
 powers. Of all the proposals in the world this i 
 one which is most sure to lead to what diplomatist 
 so greatly fear by the names of " difficulties " am 
 "complications." Such a proposal is a very seed 
 plot of difficulties and complications. The Turk i 
 cunning, and he will be sure to find some way ( 
 setting the powers together by the ears, and of ge' 
 ting his own way by the help of some of them. One 
 
GOVERNORS NOT TO BE CHOSEN BY THE TURK. 2*]*J 
 
 more, the appeal is to experience. Look at Roumania 
 under the rule of princes who, though Christians, 
 were nominees of the Turk. Look at Roumania now 
 under the rule of an independent prince. Doubtless 
 there are things to amend in the state of Roumania, 
 as there are in the state of other lands. But it is 
 perfectly certain that, whatever Roumania has still 
 to mend, she has gained much since she attained a 
 practical freedom, and that whatever still needs mend- 
 ing in her will not be mended any the quicker by 
 giving the Turk a voice in her affairs. 
 
 Two principles then are to be laid down, two princi- 
 ples which are taught us by the witness of experience. 
 Wherever it is meant to give any degree of freedom, 
 to work any degree of reform, within those borders 
 the presence of Turkish troops must be forbidden, 
 and the Turk must be shut out from any voice in 
 the internal affairs of those lands. These are the 
 only guaranties which are really any guaranties at 
 all. They are the only securities against a con- 
 tinuance or a revival of all the horrors of Turkish 
 rule. Any proposals which do not start from those 
 two principles lie without the range of practical 
 politics. They may be dictated by a sentimental 
 regard for the honour, the dignity, or the suscepti- 
 bility of the Turk. They may be dictated by a 
 desire to escape for the moment from the hard neces- 
 sity of doing something. They are not dictated by a 
 rational regard for the welfare of the lands that are 
 to be benefited, or for the permanence of the reforms 
 which it is sought to make. Lord Derby once 
 sneeringly spoke of "the eternal Eastern Question.'' 
 He forgot perhaps that it was his own do-nothing 
 policy which has done more than anything else to 
 
* 
 
 278 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 make the Eastern Question eternal. For, as long 
 attempts at settlement are made which are not 
 founded on these two principles, the Eastern Question 
 will remain eternal. It will always be cropping up 
 again, because nothing practical will have been done 
 to settle it. But these two provisions will secure, at 
 least negatively, the freedom and good government of 
 any land to which they are applied. That is, they will 
 take away the great hindrance to freedom and good 
 government, namely the power of the Turk. They 
 may not settle the Eastern Question for ever, but they 
 will settle one stage of it ; they will make the way 
 ready for a full and final settlement. 
 
 These two points, the shutting out of Turkisl 
 garrisons and the denial to the Turk of any voice in 
 the appointment of governors, are matters of prin- 
 ciple, matters of absolute necessity. Everything else 
 is matter of detail, in settling which all manner of 
 particular circumstances may rightly be taken into 
 account. I felt no call here to bring forward any cut 
 and dried scheme. To draw up any minute scheme 
 would be impossible without going into minute in- 
 quiries as to the condition and prospects of every 
 province, almost of every district. It is necessary 
 alike for Bosnia and for Thessaly that both those 
 lands should be set free from Turkish soldiers and 
 from rulers appointed by the Turk. It does not 
 follow that the political state which would be best 
 for Bosnia would be best for Thessaly. Shall the 
 liberated lands become wholly independent states ? 
 Shall they be united by any federal tie ? Shall they, 
 or any of them, remain in an external vassalage to 
 the Turk ? Shall any of them be annexed to exist- 
 ing states, tributary or independent ? Shall their 
 
CIRCUMSTANCES OF DIFFERENT DISTRICTS. 279 
 
 constitutions be monarchic or republican ? Shall 
 their princes be hereditary or elective ? All these 
 are important, and some of them difficult, questions, 
 questions which are not to be answered off hand, 
 questions to which no single answer can be given, but 
 which must be answered one by one, according to 
 the particular circumstances of each district. The 
 point is that, under any of these systems or forms of 
 government, freedom and good government are at 
 least possible ; under the direct rule of the Turk they 
 are impossible. Let the liberated lands be as Greece, 
 let them be as Montenegro, let them be as Servia, let 
 them be as Dalmatia. In any of these cases, they 
 will be better off than they can be if they remain as 
 Bosnia and Bulgaria are now. In any of these cases, 
 it is possible — it is enough to say " possible," with- 
 out going on to " probable " or u certain " — that the 
 essentials of good government and civilized order 
 may be had. Where the Turk either sends troops 
 or appoints rulers, they never can be had. 
 
 The question will now naturally come, to what 
 lands are these advantages to be granted ? The 
 answer doubtless is to as many lands as possible. 
 The greater the number of human beings that are set 
 free from the yoke of the Turk, the greater the gain 
 for mankind. But the Turk grew by degrees, and 
 something may be said for letting him die out by 
 degrees. The Roman world was once, in Gibbon's 
 words, confined to a corner of Thrace ; and it may be 
 no unnatural stage in the course of events if for a 
 while the Turkish world, as far as Europe is concerned, 
 should be confined to the same corner of Thrace also. 
 As a matter of feeling, as a matter of historic 
 
28o THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 memory, the recovery of the Imperial City woul 
 be the foremost object of all. Before thoughts o 
 Bosnia and Bulgaria, before thoughts of Thessaly and 
 Crete, would come the cleansing of the New Rome, 
 the chasing of the barbarian from the throne of the 
 Caesars, the driving out of the misbeliever from the 
 mighty temple of Justinian. But, in a calmer 
 view, if the essential freedom of the Greek and 
 Slavonic lands can be purchased by letting the 
 barbarian still linger on a little while within the 
 bounds of Constantinople, let that sacrifice be made. 
 In Constantinople the Turk is less mischievous than he 
 is anywhere else. He cannot, in the great city, under 
 the eyes of Europeans, indulge the same frantic ex- 
 cesses of tyranny which form his daily sport in Bosnia 
 and Bulgaria. Again, till Greek and Bulgarian have 
 settled their differences and drawn their boundary line, 
 till it is settled whether the next Caesar of the East 
 shall be a successor of Basil or a successor of Samuel, 
 it may be as well to keep the glittering prize out 
 of the hands of either claimant. If then Bulgaria 
 and Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Epeiros, and 
 Thessaly, Crete and every island of the ^Egaean, are 
 set free from the direct rule of the Turk, let him, 
 such is to be the price, still tarry for a while in New 
 Rome. If it pleases Turkish susceptibility, or rather 
 if it would better win the good will of any European 
 power, let the Sultan still be over-lord ; let him still 
 take tribute from the lands which are freed from his 
 yoke ; let him exercise a Sultan's right of squander- 
 ing that tribute as he will. The Highnesses and the 
 Excellencies may lose ; but the Imperial Majesty will 
 not lose. The Highnesses and Excellencies will lose 
 their power of mischief ; the Imperial Majesty may still 
 
 ! 
 
TRIBUTARY STATES. 28 1 
 
 wallow in a marble sty and gorge itself out of a gilded 
 trough. The lands would be set free ; their people 
 might be flourishing and happy. The sum of human 
 happiness would be increased ; the nations would be 
 happier; the Sultan would not be less happy; the 
 nations might again live the life of nations ; the Sultan 
 might go on living the life of a Sultan ; it is only the 
 Ring and its tools, the Highnesses and the Excel- 
 lencies, who would lose by such an arrangement, 
 and all that they would lose would be the power of 
 doing evil. 
 
 The plan of tributary states thus seems to be the least 
 violent form of change, and yet to be change enough 
 to secure all immediate practical objects. That plan 
 is the one practical course, the course which experience 
 dictates ; there are none but sentimental objections to 
 it. But there is one of those sentimental objections 
 which takes a somewhat plausible shape. To those who 
 have studied these questions all their lives it is 
 amusing to see how certain writers in the weekly and 
 daily press, who have just found out for the first time 
 that there are such beings as Slavonic-speaking 
 Mussulmans, are suddenly kindled with a burning 
 zeal for the welfare of these same Slavonic-speaking 
 Mussulmans. The same men who think the slaughter 
 and outrage of any number of Christians a mere 
 joke, who sneer at humanity and philanthropy when 
 Christians are their objects, who put M atrocity " in 
 inverted commas when it is a Christian who suffers 
 the atrocity, who put " insurrection " in inverted 
 commas when it is a Christian who rises against his 
 oppressor — these men are very eager, sometimes in 
 sentences of wild screaming, sometimes in sentences 
 of lumbering solemnity, to set forth the possible 
 
282 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 wrongs of the Bosnian Mahometans, in case Bosnia 
 should ever be put under a Christian government. 
 Those who sneer at philanthropy on behalf of a 
 Christian victim can become wonderfully philanthropic 
 on behalf of a Mussulman oppressor. Those who will 
 not allow the "atrocity" of evil deeds when the Chris- 
 tian is the sufferer, shriek with horror at the " atro- 
 city " the moment the Christian is the possible doer. 
 Those who will hardly bring themselves to believe that 
 the Turk is other than a suffering lamb clutch at the 
 faintest shadow of rumour to paint the revolted patriot 
 as a wolf. Let this kind of folly pass. We might in- 
 deed answer that no great wrong would be done in the 
 long run, if the oppressing minority and the oppressed 
 majority were to change places for a season. But a 
 worthier answer may be given. The abolition of the 
 direct rule of the Turk is as much needed in the 
 interest of the peaceable and orderly Mussulman, who 
 conscientiously follows his own law and is ready to 
 leave his Christian neighbour to follow his, as it is in 
 the interest of the Christian himself. Such Mussul- 
 mans no one wishes to injure ; no one wishes to make 
 them the subjects or inferiors of the Christians, or to 
 put them under any disability as compared with the 
 Christians. To them the rule of the Sultan, that is 
 in truth the rule of the corrupt and bloody gang at 
 Constantinople, is almost as oppressive, though not 
 quite in the same way, as it is to the Christian him- 
 self. The disabilities of the Christian often wrong 
 the peaceful Mussulman as well as the Christian. A 
 wanton murder of Mussulman by Mussulman has 
 been known to go unpunished when Christian wit- 
 nesses only could prove the fact( 9 ) Peaceable 
 Mussulmans, who keep those virtues which are said 
 
THE MUSSULMAN POPULATION. 283 
 
 to distinguish the private Turk from the official Turk, 
 would have a far more favourable field for the prac- 
 tice of those virtues under a Christian government. 
 Such a government could give equal justice to all its 
 subjects, and to them among the rest. Such equal 
 justice they cannot find under a government which 
 corrupts part of its subjects by giving them a power 
 of oppressing the rest. 
 
 While the notion of good government for the 
 Christian under Mussulman rule is purely dreamy 
 and sentimental, to secure good government for the 
 peaceable Mussulman by putting him under Christian 
 rule is in every way practical. Those who know 
 the Mussulman character best believe that the 
 peaceable Mahometan population, where there is 
 any, would sit down in perfect contentment under a 
 government of any kind which would relieve them 
 from the oppression of their present masters at Con- 
 stantinople, and would respect their religion and 
 customs. The Bulgarian beys with whom Mr. Calvert 
 talked invited of their own accord the help of an 
 European in the administration of the province. 
 They complained of the ruling powers at Constanti- 
 nople almost as strongly as the Christians did. On 
 two points only would they support the powers at 
 Constantinople ; they would not be annexed by 
 Russia ; they would not " have the Bulgarians put 
 over their heads."( 10 ) Most certainly no one wishes 
 to annex them to Russia; no one wishes to put the 
 Bulgarians " over their heads," in the sense in which 
 they have hitherto been put over the heads of the 
 Bulgarians. Even in the land where oppression has 
 been worst of all, the Bosnian beys, the descendants 
 of renegades, still keeping up the old spite of the 
 
284 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 renegade, are described none the less as very lax 
 votaries of Islam, as remembering their Christian 
 descent, as treasuring up the patents of nobility which 
 their forefathers received from the ancient Christian 
 kings. Those who know them well think that, if 
 they were put under a Christian government, their 
 reconversion would not be hard ; the bey would 
 easily slide back into the baron. At this very mo- 
 ment some of them are crying out for an Austrian 
 occupation of their country ; in other parts the native 
 Mussulmans are rising against the corrupt rule of the 
 Ring* against a constitution which is as great a 
 mockery for them as it is for the Christians. In short, 
 we have again only to make our old appeal to experi- 
 ence. Both Greek and Slavonic experience teach that 
 under a Mussulman government Mussulmans and men 
 of other religions cannot live together on equal terms. 
 English and Russian experience teaches that under a 
 Christian government Mussulmans and men of other 
 religions can live together on equal terms. In truth 
 Greek and Slavonic experience proves the same also. 
 There is a mosque at Chalkis and there is a mosque 
 at Belgrade. In this war even Mussulman refugees 
 have found a hospitable shelter in Montenegro. The few 
 Mahometans at Chalkis suffer no wrong or disability. 
 At Belgrade the case is still more instructive. When 
 the Turkish garrison left Belgrade, the settled Mussul- 
 man population went also. But why did they go ? 
 Not by their own free will ; not by the will of the Ser- 
 vians, who wished them to stay. They went by orders 
 from Constantinople, where the ruling powers wished to 
 make a case again Servia, as if Servia had driven them 
 out. But the mosque is there still ; and its minister 
 is paid by the Servian state for his services towards 
 
TOLERANCE IN THE CHRISTIAN STATES. 285 
 
 any Mussulman remnant that may be left, or towards 
 any Mussulman travellers that may pass by. Here 
 surely there can be no charge of intolerance ; there 
 may be some ground for disestablishment. 
 
 In the particular case of Bosnia, if any special 
 safeguard is needed, the safeguard is plain. I believe 
 that either the Servian government in case of an- 
 nexation, or a native Bosnian government in case 
 of the foundation of a separate state, would be both 
 able and willing to do justice to its Mussulman 
 subjects. But, if it be thought otherwise, there is a 
 neighbouring power which is quite able to do all that 
 is needed. Let the King of Slavonia, Croatia, and 
 Dalmatia become King of Bosnia also.( u ) 
 
 Another question may be raised, Are our thoughts 
 in this matter to be directed only to Europe ? Is 
 Asia to go for nothing ? It is undoubtedly a fact that 
 Turkish rule has done its work yet more thoroughly 
 in Asia than in Europe. It has been even more 
 utterly desolating and blighting. It has more 
 thoroughly turned the garden into a wilderness. We 
 ask for the seats of Greek colonization, of Macedonian 
 and Roman rule, for the cities famous in the early 
 days of ecclesiastical lore and ecclesiastical contro- 
 versy. A far greater proportion of them than in 
 Europe have utterly perished ; a far greater propor- 
 tion, if they have not utterly perished, have ceased to 
 be the abodes of Christian and civilized men. The 
 territory of ancient commonwealths and kingdoms 
 has become the pasture of a few wandering herds- 
 men. To win those lands back again to civilized 
 rule would indeed be a noble work. It would be a 
 noble work too to free Syria, all its races, all its creeds, 
 united in nothing else, but united in hatred towards the 
 
286 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 Ottoman master, from the yoke which equally weighs 
 down all the representatives of all the older inhabitants 
 of the land. Yet it is in Asia, in the Anatolian penin- 
 sula and in the Anatolian peninsula only, that the Turk 
 is really at home. The Ottoman is hardly at home even 
 there ; but the Turk, the representative of the earlier 
 and better Turkish races, is at home. There alone 
 can we speak of a really Turkish nation or people, as 
 distinguished from a mere Turkish army of occupation. 
 Europe and Asia then stand on different grounds, and 
 at all events the settlement of Europe is the nearer 
 and the more pressing claim. In Europe the rule of 
 the Turk must be wholly got rid of; in Asia the Turk 
 may be left alone in those parts where he really forms 
 the people of the land, provided full room for freedom 
 and developement is given to that fringe of civilization 
 which still, as of old, cleaves to the Euxine and ^Egaean 
 coasts. The line of Othman is worn out ; but a 
 Seljuk Sultan at Ikonion need be the object of no 
 more dislike or jealousy than a Shah of Persia. 
 
 Our argument then seems perfect. Granting our 
 one assumption to start with, the stages follow on one 
 another almost like a demonstration in Euclid. If 
 there be such a thing as right and wrong in national 
 affairs, then a nation which has done wrong to another 
 nation is bound to make redress to that nation. Eng- 
 land has done deep wrong to those nations of Europe 
 which are under the rule of the Turk. Therefore 
 England is bound to make redress to those nations. 
 But no real redress can be made to them as long as 
 they are left under the direct rule of the Turk. There- 
 fore they must be set free from the direct rule of the 
 Turk, and put in a relation at least not worse than 
 the present relation of Roumania and Servia. And 
 
 I 
 
 
NEED OF IMMEDIATE ACTION. 287 
 
 this can be done, most likely without fighting, if only 
 the powers of Europe, or some of them, will agree to 
 deal with the Turk in the only way in which it is any 
 use trying to deal with him. And such an agreement 
 with other powers may be made, if only England will 
 leave off making objections to every scheme which 
 seems likely to do the least good to the oppressed 
 nations. In a word our duty is plain, our duty is 
 easy ; we have nothing to do but to do it. 
 
 And it must be done at once. The tales which 
 come day by day from every corner of the lands 
 which still groan under Turkish tyranny might move 
 the heart of a Turk ; they have moved the hearts of 
 some Turks, of those good Turks whom the Ring 
 punished for their goodness. One might almost think 
 that they were enough to move the heart of an Am- 
 bassador or a Foreign Secretary. Every day we hear 
 the same tales of murder and robbery and burning, 
 of insult and outrage of every kind, which show that 
 those relations between the Sultan and his subjects of 
 which the treaty of Paris was so tender have at least 
 not changed for the better since the treaty of Paris. 
 So it is, so it ever has been ; so it ever will be, as long 
 as an inch of Christian soil is left under the wasting 
 rule of the barbarian. There must be no delay, no 
 shilly-shallying, no cowardly or sentimental chatter 
 about a year of grace. It is enough to tell us what 
 the year of grace means, that it was proposed by the 
 Turk himself through the voice of Midhat.( 12 ) It 
 means that the Turk wants a little longer time to work 
 his wicked will on Eastern Christendom, and that for 
 that end, he wants a little more time to throw dust in 
 the eyes of Western Christendom. A year's grace is 
 asked to carry out reforms. What reason is there to 
 
288 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 think that these reforms would be any more carried 
 out than the reforms which have been promised a 
 hundred times before ? What reason is there to think 
 that, if they were carried out, they would do the 
 slightest good to the oppressed nations ? For they 
 would not take away the rule of the Turk, and where 
 the rule of the Turk is there can be no reform. The 
 year of grace will be spent in putting on a little 
 varnish and veneer in places where European eyes 
 are likely to see it, while the back parts of the 
 fabric of rottenness will remain untouched. It will 
 be spent in whitening the sepulchre which will 
 still be full within of dead men's bones and of all 
 uncleanness. It will be spent in setting things so as 
 to make a fair show at Constantinople and Thessalo- 
 nica and a few other places where deluded Europeans 
 will see the show, while the relations between the 
 Sultan and his subjects, the relations from which 
 Midhat complains that Servia is set free, will go on 
 as ever in the dark places of Bosnia and Bulgaria, of 
 Thessaly and Crete. Yet it would seem that there 
 are Englishmen, that there are English statesmen, 
 who cannot or will not see through such a flimsy 
 cheat as this. The net is set in vain in the sight of 
 any bird, but it may be set openly enough in the eyes 
 of an English Foreign Secretary. Or is it merely 
 the shrinking from doing anything, the cowardly hope 
 that, in the space of a year, something may happen 
 to save the sad necessity of action and decision ? 
 " The King may die, or the ass may die, or I may die 
 myself." And this hand-to-mouth way of doing 
 things, this helpless waiting on something — hardly on 
 Providence — is what nowadays is called statesmanshi 
 A statesman now is not the man who strives by th 
 
 '• 
 
A "YEAR OF GRACE." 289 
 
 lessons of the present and the past to shape his 
 
 course for the future ; it is the man who can devise 
 
 some petty momentary shift to save himself from the 
 
 trouble and responsibility of taking any course at all. 
 
 Rather than face the responsibility of making up 
 
 his mind to do anything, the modern statesman will 
 
 face the responsibility of condemning suffering 
 
 nations to go on bearing their sufferings unhelped 
 
 and unpitied. To such a statesman as this the 
 
 notion of a year of grace, a year in which he may 
 
 save himself from acting or thinking, is a Godsend 
 
 indeed. Those who do not wilfully shut their eyes, 
 
 those who walk by the light of reason and experience, 
 
 would be inclined, instead of talking of a year of 
 
 grace, to echo the cry, Now or never, now and for 
 
 ever. Of all the schemes which lie beyond the range 
 
 of practical politics, surely official weakness and 
 
 cowardice never lighted on a scheme which lay further 
 
 beyond that range than the scheme of giving the Turk 
 
 a year of grace to work his sham reforms. 
 
 The main argument then stands thus ; but there 
 are one or two by-points to which it may be well 
 to give a word or two. We are told over and over 
 again that, after all, the Turks are no worse than 
 other people, that Christian governments and Chris- 
 tian nations have done things just as bad, that the 
 Turks and the Christians in the South-eastern lands 
 are both very bad, that there is nothing to choose 
 between them, and that we shall do best to leave 
 them to themselves. Now most of these statements 
 are quite false, and the arguments which are founded 
 on them are the merest fallacies. Still there is just 
 enough truth mixed with the falsehood to make the 
 
 U 
 
29O THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 I 
 
 falsehood more dangerous. It may be therefore 
 worth while to point out where the falsehood and 
 fallacy lies. 
 
 One argument on behalf of the Turk, that which is 
 drawn from the fact that Christians are said to have 
 done things equally bad, has spread to the Turks them- 
 selves. At the Conference, when the Turks Safvet 
 and Edhem were trying to deceive the European 
 ministers by quibbles about the meaning of the word 
 " Bulgaria," they had the further impudence to speak 
 of certain doings in France in past times, as the 
 massacre of Saint Bartholomew and the dragonnades, 
 as parallels to the doings which they had themselves 
 ordered. The French ministers were naturally an- 
 gry. ( 13 ) The Turks doubtless thought that they were 
 saying something clever, and showing their knowledge 
 of European history. But what they said was very 
 little to the purpose. If Turks do evil now, it does 
 not make that evil any the less to say that Frenchmen 
 do evil even now, much less to say that Frenchmen did 
 evil a long time ago. Let it be proved that Charles the 
 Ninth or Lewis the Fourteenth was as bad as Safvet 
 himself, that does not make Safvet any the better. 
 Comparisons of this kind prove nothing. But, if 
 it can be proved that the government of Marshal 
 MacMahon, even that the government of Louis- 
 Napoleon Buonaparte, is much better than that oi 
 Charles the Ninth, but that the government of Midhat, 
 Edhem, and Safvet is much worse than that of Sulei- 
 man the Lawgiver, something is proved the othei 
 way. When we see that all the European govern- 
 ments, whatever faults they may still have, hav< 
 changed greatly for the better during the last thre< 
 hundred years, while the rule of the Turk has simpl) 
 
FALLACIOUS PARALLELS. 291 
 
 got worse and worse, we are brought back to the 
 distinctions which we drew in an earlier chapter. 
 The worst form of misgovernment in an European 
 state is after all only the corruption or perversion 
 of a thing which is in itself good and which therefore 
 may be reformed. The rule of the Turk is in itself 
 evil, and cannot be reformed. It is perfectly true 
 that European governments, therefore that Christian 
 governments, have in past times done particular acts 
 which were as bad, or nearly as bad, as the doings of 
 the Turk. But the worst doings of Christian govern- 
 ments have been in a manner incidental. They have 
 been the crimes of particular men or of particular 
 ages. They are not the necessary consequence of 
 any form of the Christian religion, or of any form of 
 government, from despotism to democracy, which has 
 ever existed in any European state. Therefore Euro- 
 pean governments have left off doing such things. 
 All European governments have mended ; some have 
 mended more than others, but all have mended more 
 or less. The very worst have mended so far as to 
 be a great deal better than the rule of the Tu,rk. 
 Take the country which we commonly think has 
 mended least of any in Western Europe. Take Spain. 
 A Spanish Protestant a hundred years back was liable 
 and likely to be burned alive. He would have been 
 better off as a Christian subject of the Turk. But now, 
 though the Spanish Protestant complains with good 
 reason of vexatious restrictions on the public practice 
 of his religion, yet his life and property are as safe as 
 those of the Catholic. He would not now be better 
 off by becoming a Christian subject of the Turk. 
 Christian governments have done particular acts as 
 bad as those of the Turk. But no Christian govern- 
 
 U 2 
 
292 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 ment has been evil in its very nature in the way 
 in which the rule of the Turk is evil. No Christian 
 government has gone on ruling so badly for so 
 long a time as the Turk has done. For any Euro- 
 pean government is, in its idea, a government of 
 men by rulers of their own nation, established for 
 the general good of the nation. It may carry out 
 that idea more or less perfectly ; but the idea is 
 in itself a good one, and, when it is departed from 
 in practice, reforms may bring things nearer to what 
 they ought to be. But the idea of the Turkish rule 
 in Europe is a thing which is bad in itself. It is 
 always and essentially, not now and then and in- 
 cidentally, the rule of men of one religion over men 
 of another religion, carried on in the interest of 
 the men of the ruling religion only. Its very nature 
 involves the subjugation and degradation of the 
 mass of the people of the land ; and subjugation and 
 degradation are sure to grow into direct oppression 
 and outrage of every kind. Therefore the worst 
 European government is only misgovernment, the 
 abuse of a good thing which may be reformed. The 
 rule of the Turk is not government at all. It is 
 a thing evil in itself, which cannot be reformed, 
 but which, like other evil things, is sure to get 
 worse and worse. 
 
 Let us take the things which, if they are true, are 
 worst of all. Let us take the worst stories which have 
 been told of the doings of Russia in Poland and in 
 Turkestan. I need not enter into the truth of either ; 
 for argument's sake, let us take them at the worst. ( 14 ) 
 If the worst stories are true, nay, even if we take off 
 a good deal from the worst stories, no right-minded 
 man will defend them. Still they are quite different 
 
FALLACY ABOUT RUSSIA. 293 
 
 from the doings of the Turk. The worst stories from 
 Turkestan are after all not so bad as the doings in 
 Bulgaria. The element of brutal outrage and mockery, 
 for the sake of outrage and mockery, is wanting. And 
 in any case all these things are incidental. They 
 are done towards enemies or revolters. The par- 
 ticular doings in Bulgaria might also be said to be 
 done to enemies and revolters. But then something 
 of the same kind, though not so much of it at 
 once, is always going on in the Turkish dominions, 
 whether there are any revolts or not. The worst 
 things that have been said, truly or falsely, of any 
 Russian in Poland or Turkestan are incidental evils 
 which might be reformed. They are not always 
 going on in all times and in all places under the 
 Russian dominion. But doings of the same kind are 
 always going on in all times and in all places under 
 the Turkish dominion. For they are the direct con- 
 sequence of the nature of the rule of the Turk, and 
 therefore they cannot be reformed. 
 
 Perhaps the most striking way of shewing the 
 difference between governments which can improve 
 and governments which can only get worse is to look 
 at the signatures to the treaty of 1856, and to compare 
 the history of the powers which signed it during the 
 twenty-one years that have passed. That treaty was 
 signed by England, France, Russia, Sardinia, and the 
 Turk. In 1856 England still kept up traces of the 
 days when the people of Ireland were bondmen on 
 their own soil, as the people of Thessaly and Bulgaria 
 are still. In 1877 the dominion of the alien Church 
 has passed away, and the soil of Ireland has been 
 set free. In 1856 France was under a blood-stained 
 tyranny, and her troops held Rome in bondage. In 
 
294 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 I 
 
 1877 France is a commonwealth ; Rome is the head 
 of free Italy, and he who figures in that treaty as 
 King of Sardinia is King of the whole ransomed land. 
 In 1856 Nicolas of Russia reigned over a people of 
 whom all but an exclusive class were bondmen. In 
 1877 Alexander the Liberator reigns over a people 
 who are not yet politically free, but among whom 
 every man's personal chains are broken. He reigns 
 over a land where the voice of a nation, strong in its 
 renewed life, is heard for the first time as it bids its 
 sovereign march forth to the relief of the oppressed. 
 In all these lands reforms may be wrought and have 
 been wrought. But all the change that one and 
 twenty years have wrought for the lands under 
 Turkish rule is that in 1877 the scorpions of Safvet 
 and Midhat and Edhem, of Selim and Chefvet and 
 Achmet, are felt to be yet harder to bear than the 
 whips of Abd-ul-Medjid were in 1856. 
 
 As for the feeble cry that the Christians in those 
 lands are as bad as the Turks, that I have dealt with 
 already in more places than one. All that need be 
 said here is one parting word of wonder and pity at 
 the moral state of those who can rake up and gloat 
 over every fault which long ages of wrong may have 
 caused to stain the glorious uprising of our suffering 
 brethren, while they catch with desperate zeal at every 
 straw which they deem may be twisted to make out a' 
 case for their oppressors. ( 15 ) 
 
 But now comes the last point which we have to 
 argue. Is there after all any clashing in this matter 
 between the duty of England and her interests ? 
 Those who truly love their country, those to whom 
 her honour is dear, those to whom her real well- 
 
QUESTION OF INTEREST. 295 
 
 being is dear, will say that, if duty and interest clash, 
 it is interest that must give way. But it is only the 
 feeblest and shallowest and most short-sighted view 
 of English interests which can persuade men that any 
 English interest will be jeoparded by England doing 
 right. If we can conceive a man from some distant 
 land, able to understand and judge, but knowing 
 nothing of the actual facts of European politics — if 
 we can conceive such an one being told that it was 
 for the interest of an island at one end of Europe 
 that the people at the other end of Europe should 
 go on bearing unutterable wrongs — if he were told 
 that the people of that island had strained every 
 nerve, that they had poured forth their treasure and 
 their blood, to prolong the bondage of those nations 
 — if he were told that it was handed down as the 
 traditional policy of that island that the oppressors 
 of those nations should at all hazards be upheld 
 in their power of oppression — one is tempted to 
 apply the words of the apostle ; Would he not say 
 that ye are mad ? To such an one it would seem the 
 paradox of paradoxes to be told that the wrongs of 
 Bosnia and Crete could in any way promote the 
 interest of England. And the paradox would seem 
 greater still when he heard the way in which the dark 
 saying was explained, when he was told in what way 
 it was that England was supposed to find her interest 
 in the plundered and outraged homes of South- 
 eastern Europe. He would be told that there was 
 another power, another nation, a nation which had 
 never wronged us, but to which we had done deadly 
 wrong, a nation whose advance we thought good to 
 dread and which we thought ourselves specially called 
 on for the sake of our own interest to keep back from 
 
296 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 winning influence over those lands. He would be told 
 that these lands were struggling for freedom — that in 
 every struggle for freedom they had first looked for 
 help to the home of freedom — that, when they needed 
 protection, it was English protection which they first 
 sought — that, when they had a crown to bestow, it 
 was to an English prince that they first offered it — but 
 that England steadily refused help, steadily refused 
 protection, for fear of increasing the strength of the 
 rival power, and so drove those nations, against their 
 will, to seek at the hands of that rival power for that 
 help and protection which England refused to them. 
 
 This is in truth what we have been doing for many 
 years. And to our supposed impartial observer it would 
 indeed seem a strange way of strengthening ourselves 
 and of checking the advance of that rival power. If 
 the man from the distant land spoke his thoughts out 
 openly, he would say, " O fools and blind, you are 
 working in the cause of the power which you wish to 
 weaken. You are doing all that you can to tarnish your 
 own fame, and to brighten the fame of the rival power. 
 You are throwing away the allies who offer themselves 
 to swell your strength, and driving them against their 
 will to swell the strength of your rival." He would 
 perhaps even be tempted to go on and say, " Is this 
 your own counsel ? Is it not rather some device of 
 the very power which you dread ? You tell me that 
 that power is a dark, subtle, intriguing power, a power 
 which has its spies and emissaries everywhere, prying 
 and thrusting themselves into every corner, and 
 everywhere doing the work of that power in secret. 
 Are you sure that you have no traitor in the camp ? 
 are you sure that the policy of which you boast your 
 selves is not in truth a suggestion of some spy or 
 
FEAR OF RUSSIA. 297 
 
 emissary of your rival ? Has no such emissary cun- 
 ningly found out the way to lure you into the path 
 where your interests will be sacrificed to the interests 
 of your rival, where your honour will be tarnished and 
 his honour made to shine brighter ? " 
 
 If we look the case fairly in the face, without 
 troubling ourselves with oft repeated formulae, it does 
 indeed seem like madness when we profess to dread 
 the advance of Russia in South-eastern Europe, and 
 then by way of checking that advance, do all that we 
 can to make the nations of South-eastern Europe the 
 friends of Russia, the enemies of England. We profess 
 to fear that Russia may add the European dominions 
 of the Turk to the empire which she has already. 
 Our way to keep her from adding those lands to her 
 empire is to drive those lands to seek for annexation 
 to her empire, as the lesser evil in a choice of evils. 
 Those lands have not the faintest wish for annexation 
 to Russia. They are glad of the friendship of Russia, 
 as they would be still more glad of the friendship of 
 England. But there is not a man from the border of 
 Croatia to the border of liberated Greece who wishes 
 of his own free will to become a Russian subject. 
 We drive them to wish for it ; we bring about a state 
 of things which leaves them no choice except the 
 Russian or the Turk; and then we turn about, and 
 wonder and cry out and deem ourselves wronged, and 
 look on those nations as monsters of wickedness, if, 
 in the sad choice which we ourselves have forced upon 
 them, they choose the lesser evil rather than the 
 greater. If a day ever comes when those lands are 
 formally annexed to Russia, if a day ever comes 
 when, without being formally annexed to Russia, they 
 are brought under such exclusive Russian influence 
 
298 THE PRAGTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 as to become practically subjects of Russia, the men 
 who have brought all this about will be the men who 
 have held up the Russian hobgoblin before the eyes 
 of England. Foremost among the truest friends of 
 Russia is the man who, when the people of England 
 and the people of Russia were stirred at the same 
 moment by the same high and generous feelings, when 
 the sovereign of Russia was offering us the right hand 
 of fellowship in the noblest of works, had no answer 
 to give in the name of England but brags of insolent 
 defiance, sent forth, not from the council-chamber, 
 but from the banquet. And a trusty, though unwit- 
 ting, yoke-fellow he has found in the colleague who 
 surpasses all men in stirring heaven and earth to find 
 the means of doing nothing. If a Russian Emperor 
 ever mounts the throne of the New Rome, the men 
 who will have done most to guide him thither will be 
 Benjamin Earl of Beaconsfield and Edward Henry 
 Earl of Derby. 
 
 It does indeed seem to be a matter of simple com- 
 mon sense that, if we are afraid of Russian encroach- 
 ment, of Russian influence in those lands, we ought at 
 once to seize every opportunity of making the people 
 of those lands our friends, every opportunity of teach- 
 ing them to look to us and not to Russia for help and 
 for counsel in their need. Except during the short 
 moment when the counsels of England were swayed 
 by wisdom and generosity under the rule of Canning, 
 we have done everything that we could to drive the 
 people of those lands to look to Russia as their helper. 
 This strange course is supposed in some mysterious 
 way to be likely to check the advance of Russia and to 
 lessen her influence. There is really some reason to 
 suspect that we have here a result of a confusion which 
 
HOW TO "SUPPORT TURKEY." 299 
 
 was spoken of in an earlier chapter. It really looks as 
 if this kind of traditional policy largely sprang out of 
 sheer inability to distinguish between Turkey and the 
 Turks. Lord Palmerston, in words worthy to rank 
 with the passage which I before quoted from Sir 
 Henry Elliot, says : " We support Turkey for our own 
 sake and for our own interests. ( 16 ) " The truth is 
 that we do not support Turkey at all ; we support 
 the enemy of Turkey, namely the Turk. To support 
 Turkey would be not only a generous policy ; for 
 those who deem it a matter of paramount importance 
 to check the advance of Russia, it would be also a wise 
 policy. To support Turkey ought to mean to support 
 the people of Turkey, to support the nations which 
 inhabit Turkey, to encourage every movement which 
 can give them more strength and more freedom, 
 and thereby to make them a stronger barrier 
 against Russian encroachment, if Russian encroach- 
 ment is dreaded. But to make Turkey free, strong, 
 national, able to hold her own, able to withstand en- 
 croachments from Russia or anywhere else, the only 
 way is to free Turkey from the Turk. In supporting 
 Turkey in this sense, we should be upholding a moral 
 power. In upholding the Turk at the expense of 
 Turkey, we are upholding a power of simple brute 
 force. The power of the Turk can never get beyond 
 brute force ; it has no moral basis, no moral strength, 
 and the lack of moral strength weakens its physical 
 strength also. The Turk can never bring against 
 Russia or against any other power the full resources 
 of the lands over which he rules. The ruler of any 
 other land can call into the field the full strength of 
 the nation which inhabits the land. But the Turk 
 can never call into the field the full strength of the 
 
300 • THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 nations which inhabit Turkey. At the outside, all 
 that he can bring is the strength of the army of occu- 
 pation which keeps the nations of Turkey down. 
 But he cannot even bring the full strength of the 
 army of occupation ; for part of that army of occu- 
 pation must be employed in keeping down, or rather 
 in fighting against, the subject nations. Its full force 
 therefore can never be brought to act against the 
 invader from without 
 
 We are thus brought again to one of the dis- 
 tinctions which we drew at the beginning. We 
 here see the difference between a land which has 
 a national government and a land which is held 
 down by strangers. The national government is 
 essentially strong ; the domination of strangers is 
 essentially weak. When France and Germany were 
 at war, each side had to dread the efforts of the 
 enemy abroad ; neither side had any reason to dread 
 the efforts of a'ny enemy at home. Every man in 
 France was ready to fight for France ; every man 
 in Germany was ready to fight for Germany. But if 
 Russia went to war with the Turk, the vast majority 
 of the people of European Turkey would at once 
 spring to arms, not to fight for the Turk but to fight 
 against him. The Turk would have to wage war in 
 every corner, not only against the invading army, but 
 against the people of the land which he calls his own. 
 In trying then to support the Turk, we are supporting 
 a thing which is not only wicked, but is in its own 
 nature weak. If we hold that our interest leads us to 
 support Turkey, as a check on Russia, or for any other 
 reason, we must get rid of that which makes Turkey 
 weak, namely the rule of the Turk. In short, duty 
 and interest, if there be any interest in the matter, 
 
 
INHERENT WEAKNESS OF- THE TURK. 3OI 
 
 do not clash, but both lead us the same way. Duty 
 bids us set free those suffering nations as an atone- 
 ment for the wrongs which we have done to them. 
 Interest, if there be any interest in the matter, leads 
 us to set them free, in order that South-eastern 
 Europe may become strong, and may be mistress of 
 the whole of her own resources, which she never can 
 be while she is under the foreign yoke of the Turk. 
 
 In saying this, I do not put out of sight the in- 
 herent difficulties of the case. We cannot call up at 
 a moment any single power which may at once take 
 the place of the Turk. We shall have to face the 
 difficulties which arise from the fact that so many 
 separate nations dwell in those lands, and that some 
 of them are unhappily divided by grudges against 
 one another. In such a case, it would be impossible 
 to call into being any power which should have the 
 full national unity and national strength as is pos- 
 sessed by such a power, for instance, as France. 
 Such a power has never been in those lands, and it 
 never can be. That is the natural result of that 
 permanent distinction of races in those lands which 
 were spoken of in an earlier chapter. The utmost 
 that can be thought of, at all events for a long time 
 to come, would be a number of states united by a 
 close federal tie. And no one can hope that such 
 a federation of states would have the strength of 
 a single national power. But it would be stronger 
 than the Turk. Jealousies between the several states 
 would be likely enough, and they would undoubtedly 
 be a source of weakness. But they would not be 
 the source of such utter weakness as the necessity 
 under which the Turk lies of fighting at once against 
 his enemy without and against the great mass of those 
 
302 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 whom he calls his subjects within. But more import- 
 ant still would be the moral power which such an 
 union of states would have, as compared with the 
 wicked rule of the Turk. If Russia, as those who 
 call themselves her enemies say, cloaks all manner of 
 evil designs under the pretext of helping the op- 
 pressed, that pretext would be at once taken from 
 her. She has always — I am again speaking the 
 language of her professed enemies — a plausible ex- 
 cuse for interfering in those lands as long as the Turk 
 rules over them. She will have no longer any such 
 pretext as soon as the rule of the Turk comes to 
 an end. Any Russian attack on the Turk can now 
 be coloured so as to have a fair show in the eyes of 
 men ; no such fair show could ever be given to an 
 attack on the freedom of any Greek or Rouman or 
 Slavonic land. One favourite fallacy is that, because 
 tributary Roumania and Servia and independent 
 Montenegro have now to look to Russia, and largely 
 to direct their policy by that of Russia, the whole of 
 European Turkey, if it were set free, would in the 
 same way look to Russia. But why are those states 
 now driven to look to Russia ? Simply because they 
 have a dangerous neighbour in the Turk, and no 
 helper but Russia offers himself. Take away the 
 Turk, and there would be no longer any necessity 
 for looking exclusively to Russia. Those lands might 
 well look to Russia with a traditional friendship ; but 
 they would be released from all necessity of practical 
 dependence upon her. 
 
 Again it does seem blindness indeed when those 
 who take up the cause of the Turk strive to serve his 
 cause by drawing the blackest picture of Russian rule 
 that can be drawn, by heaping together every tale, true 
 
RUSSIAN POLICY AND INTERESTS. 303 
 
 or false, that can be found to the disparagement of 
 Russia. Of the real fallacy of some of these pictures I 
 have spoken already. But take the doings of Russia 
 in Poland and Turkestan at the very worst, Russia 
 would not, for her own interest's sake, deal in the 
 same way with'the people of Bosnia or Bulgaria. She 
 would not deal with those whose affections it was her 
 interest to win in the same way in which she deals, 
 or at least is said to deal, with enemies and revolters. 
 But set this aside ; take the very blackest picture 
 of Russia that can be drawn. We then ask, whose 
 concern is it ? It is the concern of those who are 
 playing the game of Russia by letting Russia win 
 moral influence. It is the concern of those who, by 
 refusing all other help to the subject nations, are 
 driving them to seek help from Russia. We who 
 assert the rights of the subject nations have no wish 
 to see them annexed by Russia. We have no wish 
 to see them brought under exclusive Russian in- 
 fluence. They do not themselves wish for such 
 annexation or for such exclusive influence. Without 
 believing all that is said against Russia, fully taking 
 in the difference between Russia now and Russia 
 twenty years back, neither we nor the people of those 
 lands themselves believe that Russian annexation or 
 exclusive Russian influence would be any gain for 
 those lands. We therefore wish to strengthen those 
 lands, to strengthen them, if needs be, against Russia, 
 by freeing them from the Turk. But those who 
 believe in the extreme blackness of Russia, those who 
 make no distinction between the comparatively free 
 Russia of to-day and the enslaved Russia of past 
 times, are yet more called on to pause than we are 
 before they give Russia the moral advantage of repre- 
 
304 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 
 senting herself as the one refuge of the oppressed. 
 All that we on the other hand say, all that the nations 
 themselves say, is this. Let us have neither Turk 
 nor Russian ; but, if we must choose between Turk 
 and Russian, then let us have Russian. It will be 
 wholly the fault of those who cut off those nations 
 from the hope of anything better than either, those 
 whose blind policy first drives those nations into the 
 arms of Russia, those who thus do the very work that 
 Russia would have done, and who then turn round 
 and tell us how very black a power it is for whose 
 objects they are themselves steadily working. 
 
 If then Russian advance in the South-eastern lands 
 is a thing to be dreaded, it is the party that is always 
 crying out against Russia which is really playing the 
 game of Russia. Our traditional policy, the policy of 
 upholding the Turk against the people of Turkey, gives 
 Russia even physical, and still more moral, advantages 
 which otherwise she could not have. This strange 
 notion of adapting means to ends is of a piece with 
 the glaring inconsistency of many of those who now 
 raise the cry of " Poland." That cry is raised by 
 many who never thought of Poland, whose sympathies 
 were all with Russia against Poland, till they suddenly 
 found out that Poland might be turned into a conve- 
 nient cry on behalf of the Turk or the Turk's friends. 
 We have a right to talk of Poland, if we choose ; and 
 we have a right to talk also of something nearer than 
 Poland. If the Russian hobgoblin ever appears to me 
 as a hobgoblin, it is when I look on the map and see 
 how very closely Russian guns are pointed towards 
 the capital of a people of our own race, our own faith, 
 almost our own language. It is not on behalf of the 
 Turk, not even on behalf of the Pole, but on behalf 
 
 
CRY OF "POLAND." 305 
 
 of the noble kingdoms of Sweden and Norway, that 
 Russia is really to be feared, if she is to be feared at 
 all. We talk about Sebastopol and the Black Sea, about 
 the danger of Russian fortresses on her own shore, 
 about the danger of a Russian ship of war being seen 
 in the Mediterranean. It would have been a worthier 
 object of European policy to insist that Russia should 
 withdraw from the isles of Aland. But the two glorious 
 kingdoms of the North were never thought of till, in 
 the days of the Crimean war, it was found for a 
 moment that they too might be turned into a means 
 for upholding the Turk.( 17 ) We who speak up for the 
 victims of the Turk, as we have no special hatred for 
 Russia, so we have no special love for her. All that 
 we ask is that Russia may be dealt with on the same 
 terms as any other European power. We ask that 
 she may be treated as neither better nor worse than 
 any other of the powers which make up the European 
 concert. We do not ask that she should be treated 
 with greater confidence than any other power ; we do 
 ask that she may not be suspected, thwarted, insulted, 
 in a way in which we should not suspect, thwart, and 
 insult any other power. We believe that Russians, 
 like Englishmen, Germans, Frenchmen, or any other 
 nation, are neither angels nor devils, but men, capable 
 alike of good and of evil. We have no great faith in 
 governments, least of all in despotic governments. 
 But we have a faith in nations ; and we see in the 
 great uprising of the Russian nation on behalf of its 
 oppressed brethren one of the noblest movements of 
 generous sympathy that the world ever saw. And 
 though we have little faith in governments, we may 
 now and then have faith in personal rulers. We 
 cannot look wholly askance at the prince who has 
 given freedom to his people. We have no love for 
 
306 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 despots ; yet we can reverence a Marcus and an 
 Akbar. And along with the names of Marcus and of 
 Akbar the voice of truthful history will one day place 
 the name of the second Alexander. 
 
 After all, when we come to shake off mere vague 
 traditionary fears, it is not easy to see where the real 
 danger to England from Russia lies. No one believes 
 that Russia has any notion of annexing or invading the 
 British Islands. The fear is always for India. Now 
 in those vast lands of Asia the mission of Russia and 
 the mission of England is really very much the same- 
 Russia and England are the two European powers 
 on whom the duty has fallen of carrying European 
 rule into two different parts of the great Eastern 
 continent. England is far more favoured in the lot 
 which has fallen to her share ; but the duty which is 
 laid on both the powers is the same. I say the duty ; 
 for neither for England nor for Russia can Asiatic 
 empire be thought either a gain or a glory, while for 
 both it is a fearful responsibility. No right-minded 
 man will justify all the acts either of Russia or of 
 England in their Asiatic dominions; but both have 
 the same general mission, the mission of keeping 
 nations at peace which cannot be kept at peace 
 except under the rule of some power stronger than 
 themselves. And both alike seem to be carried on 
 by a kind of irresistible destiny, which makes each 
 annexation lead to some further annexation. The 
 dominions of the two powers may some day meet ; 
 and, when they do meet, it will be of the highest 
 moment for the world that they should meet as 
 friendly neighbours, and not as enemies. To be 
 always stirring up ill blood between the two powers 
 before that time comes is as foolish as it is wicked. 
 
QUESTION OF INDIA. 307 
 
 As for the notion that a Russian occupation of Con- 
 stantinople would interfere with our road to India, a 
 glance at the map is enough to lay that hobgoblin. 
 It is in Egypt, not at Constantinople, that our interest 
 in that matter lies. 
 
 A more plausible ground of alarm is sought in the 
 alleged danger from the Mahometans of India, or at 
 least the Sonnite part of them, if we deal otherwise 
 than very respectfully with their supposed spiritual 
 head at Constantinople. But those who know the 
 Indian Mussulmans best say that they really care 
 very little for their supposed Caliph, that they most 
 certainly will not revolt on his behalf. And one 
 would really think that a devout Mussulman would 
 have very little respect for the Ring which deals 
 with Caliphs so lightly, and by whom the Successor 
 of the Prophet may any morning be set aside. From 
 the point of view of Mussulman orthodoxy, one 
 would rather expect to see a non-juring schism arise 
 on behalf of Murad, or to hear of miracles wrought 
 at the tomb of the martyred Abd-ul-Aziz. One 
 thing is certain, namely that, if the Indian Mahome- 
 tans are likely to revolt on behalf of their Caliph, the 
 way to show them that revolt is useless will be to 
 show that their Caliph is no object of fear to us. 
 Firm dealing with the Turks will have a good moral 
 effect through the whole of Islam. Many Mussul- 
 mans believe that the Sultan is really the lord of all 
 European powers. It is time to undeceive them. 
 
 But, after all, it is only a very shallow way of looking 
 at things which really believes that Russia has any 
 thought of annexing Constantinople. To gain exclu- 
 sive influence in the South-eastern lands, even to place 
 a Russian prince on the throne of Constantinople, are 
 
 x 2 
 
308 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 possible and rational objects of Russian policy. Not so 
 the annexation of the Imperial city. Russian states- 
 men are wise enough to know, if English statesmen 
 are not, that the New Rome cannot change her nature. 
 The Queen of Nations, seated at the junction of two 
 worlds, can never give up her Imperial calling. Her 
 empire may be shut up within her own walls ; but 
 she can never be subject. In the last agony of her 
 Latin Emperor, in the last agony of her restored 
 Greek Emperors, she was still the seat of rule, ready 
 again to become the seat of wider rule under stronger 
 masters. Constantinople cannot be ruled from Saint 
 Petersburg, neither can Saint Petersburg be ruled 
 from Constantinople. The Romanoff may reign in 
 New Rome ; the Russian cannot. For the Romanoff 
 on the throne of New Rome would cease to be 
 Russian. A cautious student of politics not long 
 ago proposed to place on that throne a prince who 
 might be said to be English, German, and Russian 
 all at once. Once on that throne, he would not long 
 remain either English, German, or Russian. The 
 magic of the spot would assert its right. That magic 
 has touched the Turk himself. What Abd-ul-Hamid 
 may deem himself to be it is hardly worth while to 
 ask ; but Mahomet the Conqueror deemed himself 
 to be Caesar as well as Sultan. An European prince 
 on the throne of all the Constantines could not remain 
 merely English, merely Russian ; he would again be 
 the Caesar of the Eastern Rome, and nothing less. 
 
 One word more. It may be doubted whether there 
 is much to be said, from the point of view either of 
 morals or of politics, for these excessively long-sighted 
 views of things. The interests of England and the 
 
 
CONSTANTINOPLE. 309 
 
 interests of Russia may possibly clash at some far 
 distant day. Therefore, in order to make matters 
 worse when that day does come, we are to spend all 
 the time till it comes in making a sore and rubbing at 
 it, in doing everything to stir up jealousy and ill will 
 between the two countries. We are to suspect and 
 thwart Russia in every way that we can think, to force 
 her to become an enemy by treating her in all things 
 as an enemy. This is an over-wisdom which is nearly 
 allied to folly. It is really only because Russia is so far 
 off that we can venture on such a course. We should 
 soon feel the effect if we dealt with a nearer power, 
 say France or Germany, in the same way. Diplo- 
 matists themselves cannot tell the future for certain. 
 On the eve of a great war or revolution they generally 
 tell us that things are remarkably tranquil. When 
 they do come face to face with a great movement, all 
 that they can think of is to suppress it. In all this 
 there is an odd mixture of a longsightedness which 
 lays plans for generations to come, and a short- 
 sightedness which cannot see the clearest facts of 
 to-day and to-morrow. These very elaborate calcu- 
 lations leave out two important elements in the 
 reckoning ; they leave out the will of God and the 
 will of man. A single man, great whether for good 
 or for evil, a Mahomet, a Buonaparte, a Garibaldi, is 
 enough to upset all their reckonings. A really great 
 man, one who is righteous as well as great, has a 
 higher wisdom. Such an one knows that the truest 
 prudence is to do the immediate duty of the moment, 
 believing that so doing will clear the way for the duty 
 of the next moment, whatever that duty may prove 
 to be. We are sometimes twitted with proposing to 
 drive out the Turk without having drawn out any 
 
3IO THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 exact schemes as to what is to take the place of the 
 Turk. The answer is that, by taking the first steps, 
 the steps which are our manifest duty, we shall learn 
 what are to be the next steps. The greatest deeds 
 that have ever been done, never would have been 
 done, if their doers had waited till they had drawn out 
 their journals beforehand for seventy or for seven 
 years to come. If William the Silent had waited to 
 strike for the freedom of the Netherlands till he had 
 the Articles of Union of the Seven Provinces ready 
 in his pocket, he would have waited for ever. If 
 Washington had waited to strike for the freedom of 
 the American colonies till the Federal Constitution 
 had settled exactly what form of government was to 
 be put in the place of King George the Third, he too 
 would have waited for ever. But one thing we may 
 foretell beforehand. In one case we may write our 
 journals beforehand. If we make up our minds to 
 bring no real force to bear upon the Turk, if we give 
 him Midhat's year of grace, or any kind of grace at 
 all, then we may write our journals beforehand, and 
 we may fill them beforehand with difficulties and 
 complications, with atrocities and insurrections, with 
 commissions and conferences, with notes and proto- 
 cols, with all things which arise out of the Sultan's 
 relations with his subjects, and out of the feebleness 
 and blindness which refuses at once to strike the blow 
 which shall put those relations to an end. To do 
 nothing, to give a year of grace, may be a noble diplo- 
 matic triumph ; in the eye of. common sense it simply 
 means to leave every thing to be done over again. 
 
 We have thus seen what the Turk is, what he has 
 done, how he has grown, how he has decayed, how 
 
CONCLUSION. 311 
 
 his victims have risen up against him, and how we 
 have dealt between him and his victims. We have 
 seen what is our duty to the brethren whom we have 
 wronged ; we have seen that our interest and our 
 duty do not clash. The policy of 1827 should be the 
 policy of 1877. "Pax in terris hominibus bonae 
 voluntatis." Peace and friendship, frank and cordial 
 union, among all powers that will join to cleanse 
 Europe from its foulest wrong, its blackest shame. 
 But not peace where there is no peace — no partner- 
 ship, no paltering, with evil — no year of grace which 
 will only be another year of broken promises — but 
 united action in the noblest of causes, united action 
 to free the East from bondage, and to clear the West 
 from dishonour. Let us once more remember what the 
 enemy is. It is the common enemy of mankind. If 
 he no longer sacks Otranto or bombards Vienna, it 
 is not because he lacks the will, but merely because 
 he lacks the power. Where he still holds power, his 
 power is in no way better, it is rather in all things 
 worse, than it was when he sacked Otranto and bom- 
 barded Vienna. What the Turk, his Sultan and his 
 Sultan's following, then were, that they still abide, 
 in all except the dazzling greatness which half leads us 
 to forget that their greatness was wholly a greatness 
 of evil. The Turk came into Europe as a stranger 
 and an oppressor, and after five hundred years he 
 is a stranger and an oppressor still. He has hin- 
 dered the progress of every land where he has set his 
 foot. He has brought down independent nations to 
 bondage ; by bringing them down to bondage, he has 
 taught them the vices of bondmen. He has turned 
 fertile lands into a wilderness, he has turned 
 fenced cities into ruinous heaps because under his 
 
312 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 rule no man can dwell in safety. Wherever his rule 
 has spread, the inhabitants have dwindled away, 
 and the land has day by day gone out of cultivation. 
 While other conquerors, even other Mahometan 
 conquerors, have done something for the lands which 
 they conquered, the Ottoman Turk has done nothing 
 for the lands which he has conquered ; he has done 
 everything against them. His dominion is perhaps 
 the only case in history of a lasting and settled 
 dominion, as distinguished from mere passing in- 
 roads, which has been purely evil, without any one 
 redeeming feature. The Saracen in South-western 
 Europe has left behind him the memorials of a 
 cultivation different from that of Europe, but still 
 a real cultivation, which for a while surpassed the 
 cultivation of most European nations at the same 
 time. But the Turk in South-eastern Europe can 
 shew no memorials of cultivation ; he can show only 
 memorials of destruction. His history for the five 
 hundred years during which he has been encamped 
 on European soil is best summed up in the pro- 
 verbial saying, " Where the Sultan's horse-hoof 
 treads, grass never grows again." 
 
NOTES. 
 
 (i, p. 251.) Correspondence respecting the affairs of Turkey p. 197. 
 
 (2, p. 251.) Euripides, Orestes, 479. 
 
 (3, p. 252.) The most open profession of the doctrine that right goes 
 for nothing is to be found in a book of scraps, called " England's 
 Policy in the East" by a "Baron Henry de Worms." The Baron is 
 constantly speaking of we and us, as if he were speaking of some 
 nation, but he does not tell us on behalf of what nation he is entitled 
 to speak. In p. 15 a little knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures might 
 have stood the Baron in good stead. 
 
 (4, p. 262.) The story will be found in full in Mr. Denton's 
 Christians in Turkey, 17-22. 
 
 (5, p. 268.) This singular argument will be found in a pamphlet 
 called " The Turks, Their Character, Manners and Institutions, as bear- 
 ing on the Eastern Question, by H. A. Munro-Butler-Johnstone, M.P." 
 It comes in the very first page. 
 
 (6, p. 269.) Correspondence respecting the Conference at Constanti- 
 nople p. 56. 
 
 (7> P- 2 73-) Correspondence respecting the Conference at Constanti- 
 nople, p. 243. 
 
 (8, p. 273.) See Tireeek, Geschichte der Bulgaren, 556, 558. 
 Midhat seems to have had a special fancy for hanging children. 
 
 (9, p. 282.) See Denton, Christians in Turkey, p. 131. 
 
 (10, p. 283.) Correspondence respecting the Conference, p. 170. 
 
 (11, p. 285.) I argued in favour of the annexation of Bosnia by the 
 Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in the Fortnightly Review as long ago as 
 December 1875, on the very ground which the friends of the Turks did 
 not think of till some months later. 
 
314 THE PRACTICAL QUESTION. 
 
 (12, p. 287.) Correspondence respecting the Conference, p. 243. 
 "Let a fixed time, say a year, be granted to the Porte for carrying out 
 the reforms now being inaugurated, and at the end of that period let the 
 Ambassadors report whether they were being fairly executed or not." 
 
 (13, p. 290. ) See Lord Salisbury's letter in p. 271 of the Correspond- 
 ence respecting the Conference, where this scene is described as I have 
 said in the text. But nothing like it can be found in the protocol of 
 the Meeting, p. 341. How are these things edited ? 
 
 (14, p. 292.) Perhaps the worst will be found in the book of the 
 Baron Henry de Worms mentioned already. I know not on what 
 evidence the Polish stories rest ; but, even if we believe the worst, the 
 remarks in the text still apply. 
 
 (15, p. 294.) On the subject of mutual "atrocities," to use the 
 word which has become technical, Trikoupes remarks candidly and 
 reasonably, i. 305. Ed. i., p. 286. Ed. ii. " ToiovTorpoiroos Xpiaria- 
 vo\ Koi Tovpicoi ((puyrjffav iirl tt\s iiravaardaus wo\\6.kis fxaOrjTal evos ko\ 
 rov avrov ax u ^ eiov > «AAd <r;£oA.efou Tovptcatov diSdanoi/Tos vd. iraiZtvicvrai 
 5<d m-cuV/nora, &\\wv oi /w») irra/o-aj/Tes." 
 
 (16, p. 299.) Lord Palmerston says, in a letter to Lord Aberdeen, 
 Life of Lord Palmerston, in September 1853, ii. 44, "It would be 
 easy to shew that strong reasons political and commercial make it 
 especially the interest of England that the integrity and independence 
 of the Ottoman Empire should be maintained." At p. 46 he says, "We 
 support Turkey for our own sake and for our own interests ; and to 
 withdraw our support, or to cripple it, so as to render it ineffectual, 
 merely because the Turkish government did not show as much deference 
 to our advice as our advice deserved, would be to place our national 
 interests at the mercy of other persons." This is the doctrine of Sir 
 Henry Elliot put forth somewhat less unblushingly. Right and humanity 
 are put out of sight ; they are not, as with Sir Henry Elliot, brought in 
 to be insulted. It is curious, in reading Lord Palmerston's letters, to see 
 how little, with all his sharpness, he understood the real facts of South- 
 eastern Europe. There is a curious letter in Vol. ii. p. 212, in which he 
 seems to be just getting a little glimmering of the real state of things at 
 the time of the accession of Abd-ul-Aziz. Earlier in September 1853 
 (see Vol. ii. p. 37) he seems really to have believed in Turkish reforms. 
 The Russian troops were then in the Principalities. " Let him [the 
 Russian Emperor] be satisfied, as we all are, with the progressive liberal 
 system of Turkey, and let him keep his remonstrances till some case and 
 occasion arises and calls for them. At present he has not been able 
 even to allege any oppression of the Christians, except that which he 
 himself practises in the Principalities." In a letter, so late as 1853, 
 
 
NOTES. 3 1 5 
 
 addressed to Baron Brunow, Vol. ii. p. 230, we get the usual talk about 
 Russia stirring up insurrections and the like, especially in Bosnia. Did 
 Lord Palmerston really fancy that it needed Russians or anybody else to 
 stir up insurrection there, among either Christians or Mussulmans ? 
 
 (17, p. 305.) It is a speaking illustration of this real danger, if it be 
 true, as has just been stated in the papers, that the King of Sweden and 
 Norway is seeking an alliance with the Turk. 
 
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