m 
 
 "ilfflil
 

 
 ' 
 
 W q/ , i&i.
 
 KISMET; 
 
 THE DOOM OF TURKEY 
 
 CHARLES MAC FARLANE, 
 
 ACTBOJL OF 'CONSTANTINOPLE IV 182*,' ' TUBKEY AND ITS DESTINY, 
 ETC. ETC. 
 
 CUftton. 
 
 LONDON: 
 THOMAS BOSWORTH, REGENT STREET. 
 
 1855.
 
 SRLF 
 URL 
 
 TO 
 
 THE HON BLE - MOUNTSTUART ELPHINSTONE. 
 
 MY DEAR SIB, 
 
 It was at Constantinople, and a quarter of a century 
 ago, that I first met you, and had the honour of making an 
 acquaintance which, to me, has been attended with inesti- 
 mable advantages. I am not quite sure that you regard this 
 Turkish question in precisely the same light as I do ; but I 
 take the opportunity of humbly showing my esteem, affec- 
 tion, and gratitude, by inscribing this little volume to you. 
 
 I am, my dear Sir, 
 
 Your devoted friend and servant, 
 CHARLES MAC FARLANE. 
 
 Canterbury, Uth September, 1853.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 Important queries. Evidence of decline. Keforms of Abdul 
 Medjid. Degeneracy of the Turks. Vice of intoxication 
 New military system. Russian war of 1828-9. Military 
 dress, organisation, &c. Results of the new system. Old 
 and modern Turkish cavalry. Bad riding. Cavalry review. 
 Want of good horses. Poverty of the Turkish people. 
 Turkish artillery, &c. Military schools. Extensive cheat- 
 ing. Conscription and its sad effects. The Kurds. Decay 
 of all patriotism. The navy, &c. Falsehoods of European 
 newspapers. Admiral Sir Baldwin Walker. Naval school. 
 Medical school. Reschid Pasha's amalgamation. Turkish 
 atheism. How the Pashas live. The harem system. Turkish 
 ladies. Encampments. Depopulation of the empire. Opinions 
 of different travellers as to the actual condition of the empire. 
 Von Boehn. Misgovernment. Prophecies of the downfall of 
 Turkey 1147 
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 Abuses. Increase of crime. Frequency of fires. Custom- 
 house annoyances. Turkish censorship. Maximum prices. 
 Famines. Monopolies. Bishop Southgate. The Pasha of 
 Brusa, his council, oppression, and tyranny. ~~J*asEas__Sttd-- 
 Armenians. Despair of the people. Brutality of a chief of 
 police. Cruelty exercised against Christian rayahs. Value 
 of the Tanzimaut. Religious persecution. Value of European 
 protection. Turkish roads. Fiscal extortion. Farming the 
 revenue. How taxes are collected. Extreme poverty of 
 Turkish villages. Underground lodging. Monopolies. 
 Turkish reforms. Lord Palmerston's opinion. Mr.Cobden's
 
 VI CONTENTS. 
 
 evidence. Vakouf property and its seizure and wasteful 
 expenditure by government. Total neglect of mosques, col- 
 leges, roads, fountains, bridges, &c. Degradation of religion. 
 Extirpation of the old Turkish aristocracy. The janissaries. 
 Imperial manufactories at Nicomedia, Heraclea, Beykos, 
 Zeitoun-Bournu, and Macri-Keui. English miners in the 
 service of the Sultan. Coal-beds, copper-mines, silver-mines, 
 &c. Monopolies again. Dr. Davis and the Sultan's model 
 farm. Wretched state of agriculture, and failure of every 
 attempt to improve it. The Hebrus, the port of Euos, and 
 Turkish engineering. English trade with Turkey, and how 
 to increase it 148 346 
 
 BOOK III. 
 
 Slavery and slave-markets of Constantinople. Active slave- 
 trade both in blacks and whites. Human beings cheaper than 
 horses. Slaves advertised for sale in the government news- 
 paper. Prevalence of forced abortion. Child-murder in the 
 Sultan's own family. Frightful story of Mihr-ou-Mah 
 Sultana and Ateya Sultana, sisters of the reigning Sultan. A 
 war with Russia, and revolution all over the continent of 
 Europe. Lord John Russell's work on the evil effects of the 
 establishment of the Turks in Europe. More religious per- 
 secution. Massacre of 10,000 Nestorian Christians. Mr. 
 Layard. Russian progress. Apology for Russia. False 
 alarm as to the views of Russia on India. Contemplated 
 government for Turkey. Greeks and Slaves. Proposed 
 solution of the Turkish question. Austria and her Slave 
 subjects. Turkish conversion to Christianity. The Bektash 
 and secret societies. Belief of the Turks in a Millennium and 
 the coming of our Saviour. Facility with which the poorer 
 Turks might be converted to our faith . . . 347410
 
 CONTENTS. VII 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. Artillery, &c 411 
 
 II. Portraits of Sultan Mahmoud . . . .415 
 
 III. Recruiting, or man-catching . . . .417 
 
 IV. Navy 420 
 
 V. Difficulties of language ..... 421 
 
 VI. Turkish ladies 422 
 
 VII. Amusements of the Sultanas .... 423 
 
 VIII. Shoorahs, or councils ...... 424 
 
 IX. Persecution and massacre of Albanian Christians 
 
 in 1845-6 425 
 
 X. The Sultan's Merino sheep. Untiling houses for 
 
 taxes. Specimen of justice .... 442 
 
 XI. Holy places 446 
 
 XII. The Grand Vizier Reschid Pasha , 448
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THIS little work was first issued in the autumn of 
 last year (1853), when I humbly conceived that 
 the costly and dangerous extremity of a war with 
 Russia might yet be avoided ; and that every effort, 
 however weak, which tended to the preservation of 
 peace, was praiseworthy in itself. 
 
 I also considered it as a matter of the highest 
 consequence that, if our Government were to go to 
 war, with Turkey and France for allies, they should 
 be warned beforehand what sort of allies the Turks 
 were likely, or rather sure, to prove themselves. 
 When other writers, and many speakers, as well in 
 Parliament as out, blinded and transported by a 
 Russo^phobia which I cannot yet understand, were 
 holding up Turkey as a reformed, regenerate, 
 powerful state, I endeavoured to show, by an array 
 of facts carefully collected in the country, at two 
 different periods, that the pretended reform had 
 done little else than mischief; that the^Turks__\tere_ 
 degenerate and not regenerate; and that if we aided
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 and joined them in a war for the preservation of 
 their national independence, or rather for the main- 
 tenance of their power in Europe, they would want 
 everything from us, men, money, arms, ammuni- 
 tion, clothing and provisions; and require the English 
 and French (with a very uncertain and unreliable 
 assistance on their own part) to fight out their battle, 
 and bear the entire expenses of the war, last as long 
 as it might. 
 
 At the moment these opinions were not received 
 with much favour. I did not expect that they 
 would be. But of late, if I am not much mistaken, 
 there has been a considerable change in public feel- 
 ing ; and, certainly, nearly every Englishman that, 
 since the commencement of the war, has written 
 and published letters upon Turkey, whether as a 
 correspondent to " The Times" or other influential 
 journal, or as an officer or mere traveller, has 
 (more or less decidedly) adopted my views as to the 
 mischievous effect of the late changes, and the real 
 helplessness and decrepitude of the Ottoman State. 
 
 In all that I have written upon the subject, from 
 1829 to the present date, I have drawn a strong 
 distinction between the virtues, or many good 
 qualities, of the Osmanlee people, and the detestable 
 and incurable vices of the government, and all the 
 classes of men connected with, or, in the slightest 
 degree, forming a portion of, the machinery of that
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Government. And is there one of these recent 
 English writers on the state of Turkey that has not 
 agreed with me, and my predecessors and contem- 
 poraries (travellers from nearly every civilised na- 
 tion in the world), that the Ottoman system of 
 taxation and general administration_-is barbarous, 
 ruinous, monstrous; that the Ottoman sway has 
 been a curse and an extermination to some of the 
 finest regions of the earth; that the Armenian 
 
 jseraifs and farmers of the revenue Have, a of late, car^ 
 ried rapacity and corruption to^theirjujniQstJmagin- 
 
 jtble limits ; that there is the grossest corruption in 
 the Ottoman Court, in which are involved not only 
 the women and eunuchs, but the brothers-in-law and 
 all the connections and near friends of the Sultan ; 
 that there is the same corruption in the Porte or 
 Cabinet, in the Army, the Ordnance, the Navy, 
 the Dockyard, and in every other department, 
 dependence, or office, of Government? 
 
 Not one of these gentlemen, if he have moved a 
 little about the country, will accuse me of exagger- 
 ating the poverty and nakedness to which it has 
 been reduced by barbarous misrule, or will deny 
 that all the fatal causes, from which I, in common 
 with many other close observers, have predicted the 
 inevitable, and not distant dissolution of the Empire, 
 are still at work and in increased and increasing 
 activity. Read any English letter recently writtcii
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 from Trebizond or Erzeroum, Kars, or any distant 
 Pashalik, and then judge of the value of Tan/.iinaut 
 and the blessings enjoyed under the Pashas of the 
 Reschid-Pasha reform school! 
 
 But does not every communication from that 
 unhappy country, and no matter from what part, 
 from the capital, or near to it, or far from it, bear 
 some testimony or other to the frightful oppression 
 of the people, more especially of the Christian 
 Rayahs, and to the mingled imbecility, perverseness, 
 obstinacy, greed, extortion, rapacity, extravagance, 
 and barbarous luxury of the government ? 
 
 For reasons which are sufficiently obvious in 
 his lordship's name, character, and station, and 
 for other reasons and from grateful remembrances 
 which need not be explained in this preface, it 
 gives me pleasure to see that some of the most 
 material of my statements are confirmed by the 
 Earl of Carlisle, in his "Diary in Turkish and 
 Greek Waters." This work was published quite 
 recently, but the " Diary," or the portion of it re- 
 lating to Turkey, was written chiefly in that coun- 
 try in the course of the summer and autumn of last 
 year (1853). His lordship had, of course, easy 
 access to the best sources of information. Some of 
 the most startling of his revelations are derived from 
 able British consuls and other respectable English- 
 men, long resident in the Levant, and thoroughly
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 acquainted with its peoples (whether Turks, Greeks, 
 Syrians, Arabs, Bulgarians, Jews, or Armenians), 
 and equally familiar with the languages of the 
 country. Now, not one of these gentlemen speaks 
 of the Ottoman Empire as being otherwise than in a 
 condition of irretrievable and most rapid decadence. 
 
 On landing at Varna on the 23d of June, Lord 
 Carlisle found the Turks preparing for the war, and 
 boasting that they would beat the Russians in fair 
 fight. His lordship quietly says, " I cannot share 
 this anticipation ; everything seems done in such a 
 slip-shod manner." On reaching Constantinople his 
 lordship has this entry, " I was not prepared for 
 the shocking details I hear of the state of morals : 
 I do not wish to dwell on such topics ; they are such 
 as, if fully known, would, I imagine, tend much to 
 arrest the somewhat profuse flow of English sym- 
 pathy for the Ottoman race." He soon saw grounds 
 for doubting the long-vaunted, but always fabulous, 
 integrity and incorruptibility of the Vizier, Rescind 
 Pasha, and for believing in the childish prodigality 
 of the Sultan, and the base venality of his ministers. 
 
 Of the Sultan, personally, his lordship draws a 
 portrait much more unfavourable than that which 
 I presented in my larger work, "Turkey and its 
 Destiny ;" from which I conclude, not that his lord- 
 ship is prejudiced or mistaken, but that Abdul 
 Medjid has not improved in externals since 1848.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 lint, leading his life, what else could be expected 
 than a deterioration both physical and moral? 
 
 Whatever industry Lord Carlisle saw or heard of 
 in Turkey was carried on by the Christian Greek 
 Rayahs; the Greeks were rapidly increasing and 
 multiplying, the Mussulman Turks as rapidly dying 
 out and disappearing from the face of the land, 
 even as I had twice asserted on the evidence of my 
 own senses. 
 
 At Therapia, on the Bosphorus, Lord Carlisle 
 picked up an intelligent Turk to be his guide to the 
 Roman aqueducts and the forest of Belgrade. 
 
 "As we rode through one of the villages from which 
 the Turkish inhabitants have disappeared, my companion 
 chimed in with the universal view of the rapid decay of 
 their numbers. He gives them from twenty-five to forty 
 years, before, without the help of war or violence, they 
 would entirely vanish from the land. He portrayed 
 their demoralisation in very emphatic terms." Diary. 
 
 His lordship obtained a good deal of valuable in- 
 formation from Mr. Calvert, our active, enterprising 
 consul at the Dardanelles; and these obligations, 
 like others of the same nature, are gratefully and 
 very gracefully acknowledged by the noble author. 
 Mr. Calvert affirmed that, when they could be in- 
 duced to work as farm servants, the labour of three 
 Turks was not worth that of one Greek. This con- 
 sul bore ample testimony to the decay of morality, 
 spirit, patriotism, and population, in the Mussulman
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 or Turkish element, and to the still more rapid 
 increase and development of the Christian Greek 
 element : 
 
 " A Turk himself had told him (Mr. Calvert), the other 
 day, that it was becoming inevitable that gradually all the 
 chief employments, and the army itself, must be recruited 
 from the Christian population ; and then, some day, the 
 ministers would tell the Sultan that he must become a 
 Christian, and he would do so. Will it, then, be a convert 
 or a conqueror, a Constantino or a Ferdinand, who will be 
 first crowned in Saint Sophia ?" Diary. 
 
 Over and over again does his lordship dwell on 
 the note or notes, for striking which (only twelve 
 months ago) I was vituperated as a careless, incom- 
 petent, prejudiced observer, an enemy to liberal 
 institutions and all progress, a man absolutely ena- 
 moured of despotism (if despotism be not in the 
 Ottoman system, where is it?), as a miserable 
 tool, if not a corrupt, traitorous retainer and pen- 
 sioner of the Emperor Nicholas. 
 
 Now, the Earl of Carlisle tells precisely the same 
 story, and his narrative is at once received as a re- 
 velation of solemn truth. I am only too happy that 
 it should be so received. 
 
 It were idle to multiply quotations from a well- 
 timed, interesting work, which has already reached 
 a third edition, and from which copious extracts 
 have been given in reviews, magazines, and journals, 
 of all sorts and of all parties ; but I must find room 
 for two other short passages.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 At Volo, his lordship remarks, 
 
 " This town has the usual thriftless, crazy appearance. I 
 should like to walk with one of our fervid Ottomaniacs at 
 home one of the last thirty-years' progress men through 
 any real Turkish town." Diary. 
 
 The following was written by his lordship, on his 
 leaving the Turkish waters, on the 1 5th of Novem- 
 ber, 1853. I earnestly recommend it to the atten- 
 tion of all of our Ottomaniacs, and thank his lordship 
 for that word : 
 
 u Among the lower orders of the people there is consider- 
 able simplicity and loyalty of character, and a fair dis- 
 position to be obliging and friendly. Among those who 
 emerge from the mass, and have the opportunities of helping 
 themselves to the good things of the world, the exceptions 
 from thorough-paced corruption and extortion are the most 
 rare ; and in the whole conduct of public business and 
 routine of official life, under much apparent courtesy and 
 undeviating good-breeding, a spirit of servility, detraction, 
 and vindictiveness appears constantly at work. The bulk 
 of the people is incredibly uninformed and ignorant. I am 
 told, that now they fully believe that the French and 
 English fleets have come in the pay of the Sultan ; and 
 when the Austrian special mission of Count Leiningen 
 arrived in the early part of this year, and led, by the way, 
 to much of what has since occurred, they were persuaded 
 that its object was to obtain the permission of the Sultan 
 for the young Emperor to wear his crown. Upon the state 
 of morals I debar myself from entering. Perhaps the most 
 fatal, if not the most faulty bar to national progress, is the 
 incurable indolence which pervades every class alike, from 
 the Pacha, puffing his perfumed narghile, in his latticed 
 kiosk on the Bosphorus, to the man in the ragged turban 
 who sits cross-legged, with his unadorned tchibouque, in 
 front of a mouldy coffee-shop in the meanest village. In 
 fact, the conversation of every man whom I meet, who is 
 well informed on the state of the population, with very few 
 exceptions, might be taken down as an illustration, often 
 very unconsciously on their parts, of the sense usually
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 assigned to the prediction in the Apocalypse of the waters 
 of the Euphrates being dried up. On the continent, in the 
 islands, it is the Greek peasant who works and rises ; the 
 Turk reclines, smokes his pipe, and decays. Statesmen 
 who do not see these matters with their own eyes, if told 
 of the rotten state of the Ottoman empire, are apt to say 
 they do not at all perceive that : this Prussian General 
 inspected their army, the other day, and was highly pleased 
 with its efficiency ; this English captain went on board 
 their fleet, and saw them work their guns, and said that it 
 could not be better done in any English ship. I believe all 
 this to be true ; and I can well conceive that in one or two 
 campaigns, on a first great outburst, the Turks, might be 
 victorious over their Russian opponents ; but, when you 
 leave the partial splendours of the capital and the great 
 state establishments, what is it you find over the broad 
 surface of a land which nature and climate have favoured 
 beyond all others, once the home of all art and all civilisa- 
 tion ? Look yourself ask those who live there deserted 
 villages, uncultivated plains, banditti-haunted mountains, 
 torpid laws, a corrupt administration, a disappearing 
 people." Diary. 
 
 In one thing I will confess that I have been some- 
 what mistaken. Composed, officered, and disciplined 
 as I saw it in 1848, and knowing that no important 
 improvement had been introduced since then, and 
 that the Turks do not possess an educated class of 
 gentlemen from which to draw competent officers, 
 I certainly never thought that the Sultan's army, in 
 face of the disciplined Russians, could have made 
 the stand on the Danube which it appears to have 
 done. But, it must be remembered that, here, the 
 Sultan's troops had almost invariably the advantage 
 of fighting in position, and under strong cover, and 
 that the Turks, even since their rapid decline, and
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 long before they had any European discipline at all, 
 nearly always fought obstinately in these circum- 
 stances. 
 
 I must still retain my opinion that, en raze cam- 
 payne, such troops could not stand a quarter of an 
 hour before the Russians, or any disciplined Eu- 
 ropean army. Conscious of their deficiencies, Lord 
 Raglan could not venture to bring up the Turks, or 
 to put them in line, at the battle of the Alma, In 
 the subsequent disastrous affair near Balaklava, it 
 was deemed expedient, or absolutely necessary, to en- 
 trust to them the defence of a portion of our lines; 
 and we but too well know the immediate and fatal 
 consequence I Not being sufficiently covered they 
 really went off like chaff before the wind, abandon- 
 ing their guns (apparently without spiking one of 
 them), and leaving a Highland Regiment, the im- 
 mortal 93rd ! to stand the brunt, and our brilliant 
 but far too weak Light Cavalry to be smashed and 
 all but annihilated I 
 
 England has drawn the sword we are in the war; 
 and, though I could fain wish we had kept out of it, 
 I am about the last man living to contemplate with 
 indifference any inglorious termination to hostilities, 
 or to see in any other light than that of the greatest 
 of national calamities any signal reverse to our 
 arms. But, if victory is to be wooed to our standard, 
 let no dependence or confidence, in the field, be
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 placed in the Turks, whether irregulars, or so called 
 regulars of Sultan Abdul Medjid. 
 
 C. M. F. 
 
 P.S. To the sorrow and mortification which 
 I feel upon public grounds, and in common with 
 every true-hearted Englishman, for the Light Ca- 
 valry affair on the 25th of October, I, like so many 
 others, add the poignancy of private grief and 
 personal loss. Captain Nolan was my close friend, 
 and one whom I cherished and respected in the 
 very highest degree. He was not less distin- 
 guished by his coolness of head than by his warmth 
 of heart, by his prudence and circumspection 
 than by his valour. Brave he was heroically 
 brave ; but those who best knew him will not 
 quote his courage as his only virtue, or even as 
 his most characteristic, distinctive quality. I have 
 rarely known a man (a young cavalry officer never) 
 possessed of so cultivated a mind, so clear a head, 
 so calm a temper, and so sound a judgment. This 
 is not the place for his Eulogium, nor am I in a 
 frame of mind to deliver it. I would only implore 
 his countrymen, in common justice to a brave, 
 most able, amiable, and accomplished officer, to 
 suspend their judgment upon Captain Nolan's con- 
 duct until facts be collected, and official reports
 
 PREFACE, 
 
 sifted, compared, and critically examined, as they 
 are sure to be. 
 
 I would also enter my feeble protest against 
 those who seem disposed to judge of my dear 
 friend's System, as set forth in the book he pub- 
 lished last year (" Cavalry ; its History and Tac- 
 tics "), by the mournful, fatal result of the charge, 
 in which he so prematurely fell. He would not 
 have made that charge in that way. His system 
 was not adopted, it still remains untried, un- 
 tested ; and, now that he is gone, I fear it may 
 long continue to be regarded as a mere theory 
 in a clever book. Our Light Cavalry, on the 
 25th of October, had none of the desiderata, or new 
 conditions, which he required as elements of suc- 
 cess and glorious victory. At least, as far as my 
 information goes, except in paying a little more 
 attention to the sharpness of the men's sabres, not 
 one of his hints had been taken, not one of his 
 suggested changes adopted. He did not pledge 
 himself to achieve wonderful deeds in war with 
 our cavalry as it was, and is. He certainly never 
 entertained the idea that six hundred sabres (a 
 handful of light horse, not nearly equal in number 
 to a single cavalry regiment of the enemy), without 
 reserves, without supports of any kind, could rout 
 a whole corps d'amide, composed of men like the 
 Russians, strong in their positions, and furnished 
 with a terrible artillery and troops of all arms. 
 His book abounds in warnings against such niad
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 charges. He is constantly insisting on the im- 
 perative necessity of having reserves in hand to 
 prosecute success or to cover defeat, as the case 
 may be. He clung to the cavalry axioms of the 
 DUKE which some of our journalists are now 
 quoting as unknown novelties, or like things obso- 
 lete and forgotten as a conscientious, devout man, 
 may cling to an article of Faith. 
 
 " Officers," said he, " must bear in mind, that 
 however resolute and brave a body of horsemen 
 may be, there is a limit to everything. . . . Reserves 
 must always be at hand." 
 
 Where, I would ask, were the reserves at 
 Balaklava ? 
 
 He repeatedly urges that, whether the force be 
 large or small, a whole brigade or a mere squadron, 
 no charge ought to be undertaken without reserves 
 well up and disposable on the moment; and he 
 enumerates the cases in which, through the neg- 
 lect of this golden rule, reverse and terrific loss 
 have fallen upon our cavalry, in spite of all their 
 valour, and their superiority over the enemy in 
 men and horses. He shows how Oliver Cromwell 
 and Frederick the Great alike gained their de- 
 cisive victories by keeping in hand strong reserves 
 of horse ; but he never exhibits a field gained by 
 cavalry charging without supports. No, not even 
 when there was no enormous disproportion of force 
 in favour of the enemy so charged. Yet a man, 
 who is no soldier, who has never read Captain
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Nolan's book on Cavalry Tactics, and who does 
 not even know the title of that book (naming for 
 it an earlier, much shorter work, simply on the 
 training of cavalry horses), in writing from the 
 Crimea to a London newspaper, talks of my 
 friend as a dashing sabreur, as a brave, incon- 
 siderate, rash officer; and as a writer who had 
 emitted the unsound, perilous heresy, that a weak 
 cavalry, without supports, could, by itself, cut 
 through and dispose of a great army ! 
 
 A friend of Captain Nolan, and one whom I 
 am proud to call my own friend a gentleman and 
 scholar, long conversant with military matters 
 writes to me, " Had Nolan been spared, with the 
 experience he must have gained in this campaign, 
 he might have carried all his proposed cavalry 
 reforms, and have enjoyed the reputation of being 
 one of the brightest ornaments of the service. It 
 is almost distracting to think of it." 
 
 Truly it is so. But there is this consolation, 
 Nolan died like a hero; and his fair fame will 
 not nay, shall not, be sullied or obscured. For 
 the rest, as always and in every case, FIAT VOLUNTAS 
 DEI. 
 
 LONDON, November 14, 1854.
 
 KISMET; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 CAN the effete, expiring Ottoman Empire be sup- 
 ported and renovated by the alliance and armed 
 intervention of England and France? 
 
 Ought the attempt to be made at the risk of a 
 general continental war, which will again let loose 
 the very unwise and violent revolutionists of 
 Europe, who played such deplorable pranks in the 
 years 1848-9 ? 
 
 Can highly civilized Christian powers really 
 league together to support a barbarous anti-Chris- 
 tian government, the oppressor of Christianity in 
 all its forms ? 
 
 Have the changes which go by the name of 
 Reforms been beneficial or injurious to Turkey ? 
 
 Has there been introduced any real liberty, 
 justice, or religious toleration ; or is not the 
 Christian majority (the Rayah subjects of the 
 
 B
 
 2 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Porte) still cruelly oppressed in the European do- 
 minions by the armed Mussulman minority ? 
 
 Are not the Turks dying out and disappearing 
 from the face of the earth, as well in Asia Minor 
 as in their European provinces ? 
 
 These are important questions which now oc- 
 cupy the minds of all who think seriously of public 
 affairs, and have at heart the tranquillity of the 
 civilized world. For years the subject has occu- 
 pied much of my attention ; and I will now 
 attempt to give a brief solution of the problems, 
 without prejudice or dogmatism. If any of my 
 arguments be wrong, my facts cannot be otherwise 
 than right. The reader may make his own de- 
 ductions from them. They were collected at two 
 different periods, at the cost of much time, toU, 
 and trouble and no inconsiderable expense, in 
 health as well as in money. 
 
 I first went to Turkey in the summer of 1827, 
 was there when the battle of Navarino was fought, 
 and remained in the country until the end of the 
 year 1828.* After the long interval of twenty 
 years I returned to the beautiful but desolated 
 country, and continued my researches from the 
 
 * In the spring of 1829 was published my first work on the 
 subject: 'Constantinople in 1828 ; or, a Residence of Sixteen 
 Months in the Turkish Capital and Provinces." London: 
 Saunders and Otley.
 
 PRESENT CONDITION OF TURKEY. 3 
 
 month of August, 1847, to the month of July } 
 1848. I had no other occupation or business to 
 attend to, and I had every possible facility afforded 
 me for collecting information and getting at the 
 truth. I certainly spared no trouble. I examined 
 everything with my own eyes. Except the harems 
 and the inner recesses of the serraglio and the 
 other palaces of the Sultan, I saw everything in 
 Constantinople, where I resided about five months. 
 I travelled over the best province in Asia Minor, 
 proceeding as far as Kutayah, and making nume- 
 rous excursions in various directions. On the 
 European side, I took a careful and minute survey 
 of all the country which lies between Constanti- 
 nople and Adrianople, and passed some time at 
 the latter city and a neighbouring village on the 
 banks of the Hebrus. I occupied myself mainly 
 in examining the state of agriculture, and studying 
 the condition of the people, or the various peoples, 
 nations, or races that live under the rule of the 
 Sultan. Scarcely less then than now I considered it 
 of the highest political importance to England that 
 the true condition of the Ottoman Empire should 
 be made known.* 
 
 * At the beginning of 1850 was published my -work entitled, 
 ' Turkey and its Destiny : the Result of Journeys made in 1 847 
 and 1848 to examine into the State of that Country.' London : 
 John Murray. 
 
 B 2
 
 4 THE DOOM OF TURK I IV. 
 
 I never should have thought of going to Turkey 
 in 1847 if I had not been induced to believe that, 
 since my sojourn there in 1827-8, the government 
 and the condition of the people had both been 
 greatly improved ; that by the vaunted Tanzimaut 
 an equality of rights had been established between 
 the Mussulmans and the Christian and other Ra- 
 yah subjects of the Sultan ; and that the cor- 
 ruption, tyranny, and grinding oppression on the 
 part of the Pashas, and all men in office and 
 power, which had so harassed my feelings during 
 my former residence, had been restrained and had 
 almost ceased since the accession of the present 
 Sultan, Abdul Medjid, and the rise of his noted 
 vizier Reschid Pasha. Without taking au pied de 
 la lettre all that was told to me by Prince Calli- 
 maki, then Ottoman Minister at our court, and 
 by other persons in the service of the Turkish 
 Government and closely connected with Reschid 
 Pasha, I yet felt confident, from their solemn and 
 often repeated assurances, that Turkey had made, 
 and was then making, a considerable progress in 
 order, justice, and civilization, and more especially 
 that the Christian portion of the population had 
 been rescued from the barbarous tyranny under 
 which I had seen them groaning. I went honestly 
 in search of this improvement ; but to see and
 
 KAPID DECLINE OF TURKEY. 5 
 
 judge for myself. Cruel, in every way, was my 
 disappointment ! I had not been a week at Con- 
 stantinople before I saw good grounds to suspect 
 that the boasted Tanzimaut was a sham and an 
 imposition ; and during the eleven months (in all) 
 that I remained in the country, this mournful con- 
 viction was everywhere, and nearly every day, 
 forced upon my mind that Turkey was in an 
 incomparably worse condition than that in which 
 she stood when I left her in 1828. Those twenty 
 years had been not years of progress, but years of 
 rapid awful decline. In that interval the Os- 
 rnanlee Turks had lost not only their old fanaticism, 
 but their very religion ; and with their creed and 
 faith tbeir patriotism has died out and is extinct. 
 Among the people, and more particularly on the 
 European side, it was rare to find a man who 
 seemed to care anything for his Koran, his mosque, 
 his sultan, or his country. All of them had an 
 entire belief of the speedy fulfilment of the old 
 prophecy that the Turkish empire is to be broken 
 up by the yellow-haired races from beyond the 
 Danube.* Of this they were constantly speaking 
 
 * It is well known that, even during the existence of the 
 Greek empire, there was an ancient prophecy that some Northern 
 people would one day get possession of the Eastern Seven-Hilled 
 City. This prophecy, it seems, was handed over to the Turks 
 when they conquered Constantinople ; and the progress made
 
 G THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 without the least emotion or a single expression of 
 regret. It was their kismet ! Fate would have it 
 so ! The Mussulmans are all poor, overburthened 
 with taxes, and decreasing in numbers. Those 
 who should survive the storm must retire far into 
 Asia, towards the regions where their race had its 
 origin. 
 
 Wherever I went, in cities, towns, villages, or 
 lonely khans, I heard these notes of woe and de- 
 spondency. The Reforms of Abdul Medjid and his 
 father have taken heart and soul out of the people. 
 The war between the Sultan and Ibrahim Pasha 
 in 1832 was, on the part of the Turks, one con- 
 tinued exhibition of blundering and rank cowardice. 
 They fought nowhere, and Constantinople was 
 
 by the Russians since the time when Peter the Great captured 
 Asoph has not allowed the prophecy to escape the recollection of 
 these fatalists. When, towards the close of the last century, the 
 Empress Catherine laid the foundation of Cherson at the mouth 
 of the Dnieper, she placed over the western gate an inscription 
 which sufficiently indicated her ulterior object, " This is the 
 road to Byzantium." In fact, the ancient prophecy is already 
 fulfilled. The Turkish empire is virtually dissolved the term 
 of its lease is nearly expired ; and he who has possession of the 
 keys may enter the premises whenever he finds it convenient to 
 do so, or whenever he can do it without quarrelling with his 
 neighbours, or whenever he finds himself strong enough to dis- 
 regard the consequences of such quarrel. 1 
 
 1 This was said twenty-four years ago by an able writer in the 
 ' Quarterly Review.'
 
 DEGENERACY OF THE TURKS. 7 
 
 saved from easy capture by the Arabo-Egyptian 
 army only by the timely arrival in the Bosphorus 
 of the fleet and land forces of the Emperor of 
 Russia. Our diplomacy was all en retard and all 
 at fault. Our fleets were away, and France and 
 England could have done nothing in time to stop 
 the victorious, rapid progress of Ibrahim. This 
 man was a savage, but, besides bravery, he had 
 many of the qualities which constitute a soldier ; 
 he maintained excellent discipline in his army, and 
 upon occasion he could be affable, accessible, kind, 
 and generous. After the Sultan's troops had run 
 away and disbanded, he met with no opposition on 
 the part of the populatioD. Not a musket was 
 fired, not a sabre drawn against him. Turks 
 Osmanlees of some rank and condition were heard 
 to boast at Kutayah, Brusa, and elsewhere, not 
 of the valour with which they had fought the in- 
 vaders of their country, but of the agility with 
 which they had run away, or of the cunning by 
 which they had avoided the slightes chance of 
 endangering their precious persons. One Effendi 
 of Brusa was constantly dwelling on this theme. 
 Without a blush he would tell how he had hid 
 himself on the eve of battle. Previously to the 
 arrival of the Russians in the Bosphorus, Ibrahim 
 Pasha sent down from Kutayah a handful of men
 
 8 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 with two or three officers to Brusa : this handful 
 of men passed unmolested through a most difficult 
 country, abounding in mountains, rocks, ravines, 
 rivers, torrents, and most perilous passes, where a 
 few brave men might hold a great army at bay ; 
 but Ibrahim's people marched quietly along, and 
 to this handful of men the great city of Brusa 
 offered to surrender ! The poor villagers on the 
 way treated them as friends and deliverers. They 
 were in that deplorable state when men expect 
 that every change may be for the better. And in 
 this deplorable state are the Turks of the present 
 moment. As far as the people are concerned, I 
 am persuaded that even a Russian army, preserving 
 good discipline and carefully abstaining from any 
 insults to the women (there remains little or no 
 religious feeling to offend), would not encounter, in 
 any of the parts of Asiatic or European Turkey 
 I visited, the slightest resistance from the Mus- 
 sulman population, although the people are all 
 armed. 
 
 Nor was the conduct of the Sultan's army a 
 whit better in 1839 than it had been in 1832. In 
 this second war with Ibrahim Pasha they were 
 beaten and crushed or scattered at the very first 
 onset (in the battle of Nejib, June 25th). They 
 lost all their artillery, all their baggage every-
 
 TURKISH REFORMS. 9 
 
 thing that gave them the character or at least the 
 appearance of an army. They rallied nowhere, 
 but continued their flight in the most precipitate, 
 headlong, scandalous manner. Ibrahim, dividing 
 his forces into three columns, sent one towards 
 Diarbekir, a second towards Erzeroum, and ad- 
 vanced with the third upon Iconium on the direct 
 road to Constantinople. This time the Turkish 
 capital was saved, not by Russian intervention in 
 the Bosphorus, but by the appearance of a British 
 fleet on the coast of Syria and the subsequent 
 bombardment and reduction of Acre. Assuredly 
 the Turks could have done nothing for their own 
 defence. Sultan Mahmoud died of rage, disap- 
 pointment, hard drinking, and other excesses ; and 
 his son and successor, Abdul Medjid (a sickly 
 youth only in his seventeenth year), had no second 
 army to oppose to the Arabo-Egyptians : and, 
 even if he had possessed such army, it would un- 
 doubtedly have run away as the others had done. 
 
 In seeking to Europeanise the Osmanlees, the 
 Reformers or innovators have miserably bastardised 
 the whole race, and left a people who are neither 
 Turks nor Christians, neither Asiatics nor Euro- 
 peans. Even when the public press of all Europe was 
 applauding to the skies the changes forced upon the 
 Mussulmans by the late Sultan Mahmoud, many
 
 10 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 enlightened persons who were well acquainted with 
 the countries, institutions, and manners of the 
 Orientals, predicted that such would be the in- 
 evitable consequence of the Sultan's borrowed, 
 exotic system. It is now twenty years since an 
 able writer thus expressed himself : " The extra- 
 ordinary changes which of late years have taken 
 place, under the influence of the ruling sovereign, 
 in Turkish manners and habits, the improvements 
 which he has attempted to introduce into the 
 military system, above all, the extinction of the 
 Janissaries, are indications of the decay of the an- 
 cient Turkish spirit, rather than of recruited strength 
 or reviving energy. The Turk can only be formi- 
 dable as a Turk ; attempt to modernise, to Euro- 
 peanise his habits, his mind, or even his costume, 
 he will lose all the power, the energy, the grandeur 
 of his native and original character, without ac- 
 quiring the quickness, the dexterity, the vivacity 
 of that which is so foreign to his nature. The 
 turbaned, the scimitarred, the loose-trousered Turk 
 will never fall into the trim and disciplined line of 
 an European regiment ; if he does, his movements, 
 instead of being free, majestic, and vigorous, will 
 be awkward and constrained ; as he is initiated in 
 modern habits, the staid and solemn dignity of his 
 manners will depart ; and what will replace it ?
 
 INTEMPERANCE OF MODERN TURKS. 1 1 
 
 The large cannon of the Dardanelles will no more 
 perform the part of the flying artillery in modern 
 warfare, than their grave masters habituate them- 
 selves either to the military evolutions, or to the 
 busy, peaceful pursuits of the West. To acquire 
 European habits, the Turk must forswear that po- 
 tent drug, which of old used to intoxicate his valour 
 to desperate enterprise,* but which now stupifies 
 
 * The Turks have foregone the habit of swallowing opium to 
 take up that of hard drinking. In 1847-8 we hardly met with 
 one opium-eater, but we were constantly meeting Osmanlee 
 dram-drinkers. Among the more prosperous classes of Turks it 
 is rare to find one that has the least scruple about drinking the 
 forbidden wine, or the raw ardent spirit of the country, which is 
 called raki, or, indeed, any other intoxicating liquor. They 
 have no sense of moderation. They may sometimes abstain, but 
 they can never refrain. When they drink, they invariably do 
 it to excess. Before sitting down to dinner, a tray, with raki, 
 baked nuts, biscuits, pieces of salted fish, olives, &c., is brought 
 in, handed round, and generally kept in circulation for a good 
 quarter of an hour, or more. I never saw a Turkish gentleman 
 sit down to his dinner with any appetite. The danger of dining 
 with one of them is, getting fuddled before the dinner com- 
 mences. Their stomachs are deranged and vitiated, and the 
 effects of this way of living are visible on the persons of most of 
 them. The example of this outrage on the law of the Prophet 
 proceeded from the highest quarter from the representative of 
 the Prophet, the Sultan himself. The late Mahmoud was a noto- 
 rious toper, and so were all his pashas, or all the officers most 
 about him. 
 
 I certainly did not expect to find that the habit had spread 
 very widely among the common people ; yet, with a few excep- 
 tions, every Turk we met, whether in Asia or in Europe, would 
 drink raki without any scruple and quite openly ; and it was not
 
 12 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 him to a stately indifference to his humiliation. 
 He must emancipate his mind from the moral 
 opium of predestinarianism, which, in the same 
 manner, during the days of his ambition and glory, 
 bred the noble defiance of danger and the con- 
 tempt of death, now reconciles him to his most 
 inglorious destiny. Mashallah ! (as God will !), 
 once the proud exclamation of constant victory, is 
 still the consolation of complacent apathy under 
 defeat. It appears almost impossible that the 
 most intimate connexion with Europeans should 
 work a complete revolution in a national character, 
 to a certain degree inborn, and confirmed by cen- 
 turies of pride or security ; and that change, either 
 repelled by the inert resistance of ancient habit, 
 or but partially admitted, it seems more incon- 
 ceivable how it is to compete with the rapidly ad- 
 vancing activity of the rest of Europe ; alone to 
 stand still, or advance but slowly, in the midst of 
 the heady current which is flowing with such vio- 
 lence throughout the Christian world."* 
 
 often that they would refuse to partake of our wine. Delirium 
 tremens was a malady by no means unknown among them. 
 
 Twenty-five years ago it would have been difficult to find in 
 Asia Minor (a little inland) the Turkish peasant who would not 
 have been furiously incensed if a Christian had offered him 
 the forbidden drink. 
 
 * 'Quarterly Review.' vol. xlix., April to July, 1353.
 
 NEW MILITARY SYSTEM. 13 
 
 There can be no doubt that the arm of Turkish 
 power was greatly weakened by the adoption of 
 the new system, by the destruction of the Janis- 
 saries, and most of all by the subversion of that 
 splendid old irregular cavalry called Spahis. Ge- 
 neral Valentini observes, that " an enlightened 
 sovereign, far from attempting to introduce among 
 them anything of European practice, would rather 
 seek to develope those peculiar qualities of which 
 the germ evidently exists in these extraordinary 
 people." There is something in this, but, after all, 
 there is no efficient force like that of a regular 
 army. The Spahis, like the Cossacks, were wild 
 and disorderly in their attacks, spreading them- 
 selves in small bodies among the rocks and bushes, 
 dashing down narrow passes and through places 
 apparently impracticable, appearing suddenly and 
 unexpectedly on the flank or rear of an enemy. 
 " Two or three men," says an experienced witness, 
 " will advance and look about them ; then you will 
 see all at once five or six hundred, and woe to the 
 battalion which marches without precaution, or 
 which is seized with a panic I" The new system 
 put an end to the wild assaults of these native 
 guerrillas, and Mahmoud was thus left with a half- 
 formed army, easily thrown into a complete state 
 of disorganisation.
 
 14 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Having destroyed one species of effective force, 
 and being hurried into the field by the Russian 
 war of 1828-9, before there was time to consoli- 
 date another, Sultan Mahmoud required all his 
 iron nerves to contemplate his situation. After 
 the battle of Prevadi his new troops scarcely ven- 
 tured to face a Russian force, however small The 
 result was, that the army of the Tzar crossed the 
 Balkan without meeting with any opposition what- 
 ever, and dictated terms of peace at Adrianople. 
 Reduced as it was, it might have marched on to 
 the capital. 
 
 In the course of my first travels in the country 
 I often heard a well-bearded Turk an Osmanlee 
 of the old school declare that the European dis- 
 cipline, training, and dress, would never do for his 
 countrymen ; that the Turks, who had been accus- 
 tomed to fight bravely enough when left to fight 
 in their own national way, would turn out poltroons 
 if set to the work in the European fashion that 
 they would lose their skill in their own methods of 
 warfare, and never perfectly acquire the art of 
 moving and fighting like French, or Germans, or 
 Russians. I saw Sultan Mahmoud's tacticos or 
 regulars in the earliest stages of their formation, 
 and very strange soldiers they were. In 1828 
 their uniforms were half European half Oriental.
 
 RUSSIAN WAR OF 1829. 15 
 
 Those very imperfectly disciplined troops, com- 
 posed in good part of unformed striplings, torn 
 by force from their homes and families, almost dis- 
 appeared in the defensive war against the Rus- 
 sians, which was terminated in the summer of 
 1829 by the treaty dictated at Adrianople by the 
 victorious generals of the Emperor Nicholas.* 
 
 * When the Russian army reached Adrianople, it counted 
 only some 10,000 wearied, very sickly men. The Turks had at 
 hand a force of from 30,000 to 40,000 irregulars; yet they dared 
 not attempt a combat. They would have capitulated if the 
 Russians had been only half the number, and twice as sickly 
 as they were. The Mussulman population of Adrianople 
 looked on with a stupid wonder or a total indifference ; the 
 Rayahs, whether Greeks, Bulgarians, Armenians, or Jews, 
 secretly rejoiced at the approach of the Tzar's army. Some of 
 the pashas absconded ; others were too much frightened even to 
 run away. 
 
 A council was called, which was very thinly attended, and 
 which concluded nothing. All was terror and confusion. The 
 poor inhabitants were more afraid of the Sultan's irregulars 
 than of the Russians. My friend Mr. E. Schnell, a merchant of 
 the place, first went out to arrange the terms of capitulation with 
 the Russian generals, and, but for his forethought and perfect 
 self-possession, it is doubtful whether any conditions would have 
 been made. There was not a thinking man who witnessed that 
 day's proceedings, and that utter prostration of the once proud 
 Osmanlees, but was convinced in his own mind and heart that 
 the knell of the expiring Ottoman empire had sounded, and that 
 for a brief and precarious remnant of existence it must be 
 indebted to foreign steel and foreign ranks, or to the jealousy 
 borne by the great powers of the West towards Russia. 
 
 In 1848, and on the spot, I took much pains to ascertain the 
 truth : during eight days I spoke with many persons of different 
 races, interests, opinions, and religions, and they one and all 
 affirmed that the feeling of the Turks in general was one of
 
 16 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Some portions of the present regulars are com- 
 posed of better materials, but the mass of the 
 army is now, as it was then, unwilling conscripts, 
 forcibly enrolled, and loathing the regular service 
 and the restraints of life in barracks, which is vio- 
 lently opposed to their prejudices, habits, and 
 usages. In one sense the men may be said to be 
 better dressed. With the exception of the ugly, 
 inconvenient, and unhealthy fezz or red skull-cap, 
 their uniforms are now entirely European. The 
 best regiments, the Sultan's guards, would look, 
 tolerably neat but for a terrible slovenliness about 
 the legs and feet. All the soldiers are slipshod : 
 their boots and shoes, which are evidently never 
 touched by brush, much less by blacking, are badly 
 made and big and clumsy, and go far to spoil the 
 whole appearance of the wearers. When cleaned 
 at all, they are put under the spout of a fountain, 
 and then rubbed over with a birch broom. Hence 
 a source of constant catarrhs and other maladies, 
 which, in the trying climate of Constantinople, are 
 
 total indifference, and that, when they had a few days' experience 
 of the excellent discipline which General Diebitch maintained 
 among his troops, the majority of them were rather friendly than 
 otherwise with the Russians. The Albanians and the rest of the 
 irregulars broke up and made for their own homes, plundering 
 and butchering on their way their own people or fellow-subjects, 
 and making little distinction between Mussulmans and Christian 
 or Jewish Rayahs.
 
 At^i * AK7 DRESS. 17 
 
 very apt to terminate in bronchitis and consump- 
 tion, more especially among the young recruits 
 who are dragged over from the warm, sunny parts 
 of Asia Minor. In the dreary winter nights of 
 1847-8 it was distressing to hear the poor sentinels 
 and men at the different corps de garde coughing 
 as if they would cough their lungs out. The sol- 
 diers must not enter the barrack -rooms with their 
 shoes or boots on. These are thrown off at the 
 door : if the men have slippers they put them on ; 
 if they have not (which is usually the case), they 
 must walk on the soles of their cotton socks. But 
 the same rule obtains everywhere : there is no 
 walking a hundred yards in Constantinople with- 
 out being covered with mud in winter and dust in 
 summer : and then the Mussulmans, with almost 
 the strictness of a religious observance, consider 
 their carpets and mattings as things to be trodden 
 only by clean slippers or bare feet. In other mat- 
 ters the habits of the people are strongly opposed 
 to the European costume to our succinct jackets 
 and tight pantaloons. Every Turk now in office, 
 or at all connected with the government, whether in 
 a military or in a civil capacity, now dresses much 
 as we do when out of doors ; but once returned to 
 his own house, the European garb is thrown aside, 
 and the loose, easy old dress of the Turk is put on. 
 
 c
 
 18 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Our costume is unnatural to them, and an exceed- 
 ingly great gene the poor soldiers were always 
 complaining of it. Where the intentions of the 
 Sultan are carried out, or where there is in com- 
 mand that rara avis an honest pasha, the men 
 are tolerably well fed and paid ; but corruption 
 and peculation are almost universal. 
 
 Marshal Marmont, no incompetent authority, 
 declared that nothing could be worse, as a military 
 exhibition, than a Turkish review or field-day, and 
 that these men ought not to be looked upon as 
 troops, but merely as a mass of people bearing the 
 stamp of misery and humiliation ; and that, from 
 the private to the colonel, not an individual 
 amongst them has any conception of his duty. 
 " Moreover," adds Marmont, " the men are dimi- 
 nutive in stature, and wretched in appearance : 
 many of them are too young for service, and 
 we are led to inquire what has become of that 
 noble Turkish people, the lofty, proud, majestic, 
 handsome race of former days ; for now we find no 
 trace of them in the existing troops. 
 
 " I have endeavoured to discover why they have 
 not hitherto succeded better with the Nizam or new 
 system, and I thus account for the failure. The 
 Sultan was desirous of organizing troops according to 
 the European mode, and his ambition was to form an
 
 MILITARY ORGANIZATION. 1 9 
 
 army on the ID slant. He accordingly raised at 
 once a great number of regiments ; but the Euro- 
 pean instructors being merely individuals of an 
 inferior station of life, without capacity or talent, 
 who had been led to Constantinople by the circum- 
 stances which attend revolutions, were unfitted to 
 accomplish the object in view. 
 
 " The new organization commenced simultane- 
 ously in all the corps, and the same description of 
 person was universally employed in endeavouring to 
 carry it into effect. In none of the grades had any 
 man confidence either in himself or in others, and no 
 one, therefore, had a right to the command, which 
 should always be derived from some superior 
 claim. It is only as a consequence of such a prin- 
 ciple that men are ever found disposed to yield 
 obedience. In the troops of all the other powers of 
 Europe there are two admitted titles to precedence, 
 birth and merit. The former has its basis on a higher 
 social grade, which, by giving opportunities for 
 better education, leads to the expansion of the 
 mind ; the latter, on the experience and informa- 
 tion resulting from previous service. In Turkey 
 there are no gradations in the social order, and 
 the son of the water-carrier is on a par with the 
 Vizier's child, having often the saine education. 
 Hence there is no admitted superiority in those 
 
 c2
 
 20 Till: DOOM OF TURKF.V. 
 
 invested with power, and the previous equality in- 
 disposes others to obey authority obtained through 
 mere caprice. 
 
 " As to the right derived from merit or experi- 
 ence, there can be none where all are novices."* 
 
 The first military instructors taken into pay by 
 Sultan Mahmoud, after the bloody destruction of 
 the Janissaries in 1826, were, with a very few 
 exceptions, desperate adventurers (chiefly from 
 France, Italy, and Poland), and men of no breeding 
 or education. I believe that very few of them 
 had ever risen to a higher grade than that of ser- 
 geant or sergeant-major. Some, I know, were 
 common soldiers when they left the West for the 
 East There was not a good drill among them all. 
 They were quite ignorant of the language and 
 the Turks whom they had to instruct ; they were 
 disgusted with the people, and with the service, 
 in which they were retained only by their poverty 
 and their inability to gain a livelihood in any other 
 way. Of late years some educated officers of 
 various nations have been engaged as instructors ; 
 but, one after the other, they have all been driven 
 
 * ' The Present State of the Turkish Empire,' by Marshal Mar- 
 mont, Due de Kaguse. Translated, with Notes and Observations 
 on the Relations of England with Turkey and Russia, by Lieut- 
 Col. Sir Frederick Smith, K.H., of the Corps of Royal Engineers. 
 London : John Ollivier, 1839.
 
 MILITARY OFFICERS. 21 
 
 away in disgust. They found themselves thwarted 
 at every step by the ignorant, indolent, rapacious 
 Turks put over their heads. Shoemakers, pipe- 
 venders, backals, common boatmen to-day, and 
 colonels of regiments, generals of division, and 
 pashas to-morrow ! fellows who plundered their 
 men, and who could never be brought to under- 
 stand the most simple military formation or evo- 
 lution. Then, again, these well-qualified Frank 
 officers were never allowed to take the command, 
 or really to fill the post of officers in the Sul- 
 tan's army ; for these things must be reserved 
 exclusively for Turks and Mussulmans. Omer 
 Pasha, an ex-sergeant and deserter from the Aus- 
 trian army, has fought in the field with Turks, and 
 has held high commands ; but the said Omer, a 
 reprobate in all things, became a renegade and 
 sham Mussulman before he was admitted to such 
 honours. So of some others; but the men of 
 honour and character were retained merely as drills 
 and instructors no very honourable or pleasant 
 position. As I have said on a previous occasion, 
 " in their intolerance or their pride, unless a Frank 
 officer turn renegade, they will not allow him to 
 exercise any command ; they will not even permit 
 him to wear a sword in the ranks. He can be little 
 more than a good drill sergeant. He may or may
 
 22 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 not be well paid ;* but he cannot take real rank as 
 an officer, or, in fact, be a part of the army. Here 
 and there you may find a Polish, German, or Italian 
 renegade, usually a deserter and always a scoundrel. 
 Hardly one of these fellows has ever been more 
 than a non-commissioned officer in his own country. 
 Here they suddenly become captains, majors, 
 colonels. These are the men the great Pashas 
 prefer. Low-born and low-bred, they can submit 
 to Turkish arrogance, and to treatment which no 
 gentleman can possibly tolerate. One may con- 
 ceive how competent are these renegades to the 
 conduct of an army in the field ! Then, who would 
 answer a single hour for the honour or common 
 honesty of such a canaille ? They have deserted 
 their colours ; they have deserted their religion ! 
 Let Russia or any other assailant of Turkey tempt 
 them with a good bribe, and they will desert the 
 Sultan, and sacrifice his troops." f 
 
 But let these Frank renegades be true as men 
 may be to the Sultan's salt, and still this army 
 would be incapable of standing in the field against 
 the well-disciplined, veteran Russians, and would 
 prove most inefficient and troublesome auxiliaries 
 to any European troops that might join and endea- 
 
 * The pay is always most irregular, 
 t Turkey aud its Destiuy.
 
 INEFFICIENCY OF THE ARMY. 23 
 
 vour to support them in the contest. A French 
 officer who had studied them well, who had lived 
 long in the East, and who was also perfectly ac- 
 quainted with the Russian army, said to me at 
 Constantinople that it was the most idle of dreams 
 to fancy that these forces of Abdul Medjid could 
 meet the troops of the Emperor Nicholas in the 
 field. He considered that the degree of discipline 
 to which they had obtained did not at all com- 
 pensate for the loss of the fanaticism and enthu- 
 siasm which animated their undisciplined prede- 
 cessors ; that they might make a stand behind 
 stone walls or tambours, but that en rase campagne 
 they would fall like corn before the reaper's scythe, 
 or go off like chaff before the wind : Us n'ont 
 point d'officialite ; they have hardly any com- 
 petent officers. As you ascend the scale of rank, 
 instead of finding more science and experience, 
 you usually encounter more ignorance and inex- 
 perience. Generally, the great Pasha, placed by 
 court intrigue at the head of an army, has never 
 been a soldier, and is, in military affairs, about the 
 most ignorant man in the army. He takes some 
 inferior officer into his favour, and relies for a time 
 on his judgment and advice ; then he changes and 
 takes another adviser ; or, should his difficulties 
 become complicated, he will seek advice of a dozen
 
 24 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 men, who may very probably entertain twelve 
 different opinions and plans. After this, it is easy 
 to understand the jumble of every field operation. 
 A few weeks before our arrival in 184-7 there was 
 a grand field-day down in the valley of the Sweet 
 Waters, the Sultan being present. I was told that 
 they manoeuvred about 10,000 men, of all arms, 
 but I now believe that the number was considerably 
 exaggerated. They went through a sham fight, 
 with a crossing of bridges, a passage by boats or 
 pontoons, &c. A Swiss officer who was on the 
 ground described it as a pitiful affair. Instead of 
 being mounted on his charger, as his robust father 
 would have been, the weak and effeminate Sultan 
 sat cross-legged under a tent, among cushions of 
 silk and velvet, and so looked on at his ease. 
 
 It was very rarely, indeed, that they were put 
 through any evolutions whatever, or brigaded toge- 
 ther, or collected in any number on the same 
 ground. They are kept stationary, to lead a seden- 
 tary life in barracks, or they are scattered about 
 in small parties in innumerable guard -houses, 
 where they are left for months at a time, and 
 from which they seldom stir a hundred yards. 
 The garrison of Constantinople being concentrated 
 in four or five great barracks, this distribution o f / 
 whole battalions or regiments in koulooks or guar-.i- 
 
 /
 
 RESULTS OF MILITARY SYSTEMS. 25 
 
 
 
 houses is found convenient, and saves shoe-leather, 
 a desideratum in a service where the issues of shoes 
 are irregular. It results, however, from this system, 
 that the men are hardly ever drilled, even to com- 
 pany work ; and that, with the exception of the 
 common manual exercise, they know nothing of a 
 soldier's duty, and have nothing of a soldier's 
 carriage or manly bearing. 
 
 We rather frequently passed the great enclosed 
 square of the Seraskeriat, by the celebrated tower 
 in Constantinople Proper ; but, although here were 
 the head- quarters of the army, we seldom saw the 
 soldiers doing anything except smoking pipes. But 
 one afternoon, in the month of March, we witnessed 
 a great show of activity in this square. About 
 1500 men of the Imperial guards were exercising 
 under the eye of a fat Pasha, and the great 
 Seraskier, or commander-in-chief, himself was look- 
 ing indolently on from a distant window, with a 
 pipe in one hand and an eyeglass in the other. 
 The majority of these men were not young recruits, 
 but soldiers of some standing ; yet their perform- 
 ance was loose and slovenly. When they formed 
 in line, their line was far from being a right one ; 
 their formations into squares, hollow and solid, 
 were but poor exhibitions. The men all looked 
 slip-shod, and were dreadfully dirty about the feet.
 
 26 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Their jackets and pantaloons had never known the 
 clothes-brush. With such shoes as they wear it is 
 scarcely possible for them to march well ; they might 
 as well try it in their old unheeled papoushes. It 
 was rather dangerous to stand too near these bat- 
 talions when they came to fire blank cartridge, 
 their ill-made muskets being so apt to burst. I 
 could not but agree with some greybeards of the 
 old school, that an equal number of janissaries, 
 armed and fighting in their own way, would have 
 made mincemeat of these tacticos. Yet here was 
 the elite of Abdul Medjid's infantry. 
 
 The cavalry is still more deplorable. I quote 
 what follows on this subject from the recently pub- 
 lished work of a good friend and excellent British 
 cavalry officer : 
 
 " For ages the finest cavalry seen in Europe was 
 indisputably that of the Turks. In great part, both 
 men and horses were brought over from the Asiatic 
 provinces of the empire, and the rest of the men 
 and horses were principally of Asiatic descent. The 
 horses, though not large (seldom much exceeding 
 14 hands), were nimble, spirited, and yet docile, 
 and so trained and bitted as to be perfectly under 
 control : the hollow saddle was rather heavy, but 
 all the rest of the appointments were light. The 
 soldier rode in the broad, short stirrup, to which
 
 OLD TURKISH CAVALRY. 27 
 
 he and his ancestors had always been accustomed, 
 and on which they had a firm and (to them) na- 
 tural seat, and off which it was most difficult to 
 throw him. His scimitar was light, bright, and 
 sharp ; and, in addition to it, he generally carried 
 in his girdle that shorter, slightly curved weapon 
 called the yataghan, with an edge like that of a 
 razor. Some of the Spahis carried long lances or 
 spears, but these were always thrown aside as use- 
 less in the melde of battle. Their tactics were few 
 and simple. If they could not get in the small 
 end of one wedge, they tried another and another 
 wedge : if they penetrated the hostile line they 
 dealt death around them, their sharp weapons 
 usually inflicting mortal wounds or lopping off 
 limbs. If the enemy gave way, they spread out 
 like a fan, and, while some pressed on the front, 
 others turned the flanks and got into the rear. 
 Occasionally, to gain time, the Turks mounted 
 some of their infantry en croupe behind their 
 Spahis. Thus, early in the battle of Ryminik, 
 when they had to contend with Marshal Suwarrow 
 and some Austrians, a body of 6000 janissaries 
 jumped up behind an equal number of Turkish 
 horsemen, and were carried at full speed to occupy 
 a commanding eminence, of which the Austrians
 
 28 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 were also desirous of taking possession.* We have 
 seen, quite in our own day, this effective and really 
 brilliant cavalry disciplined alia Franca, or in 
 Christian fashion. Mahmoud imported a number 
 of French, Italian, and German non-commissioned 
 officers, to teach his men to ride with long stirrups, 
 and to form, dress, and look like Europeans. To 
 the disgust, and even dismay, of his Moslems, 
 he buttoned them up in close jackets, and put 
 them into tight pantaloons. With a most perverse 
 determination the system has been continued and 
 extended these last twelve years, under his son 
 and successor, the present Sultan, Abdul Medjid, 
 and it may now safely be said that the Turkish 
 cavalry is the very worst in the world. The men, 
 always accustomed to sit cross-legged, and to keep 
 their knees near the abdomen, cannot be taught to 
 ride with the long stirrup, d la Franqaise ; they 
 are always rolling off, and are frequently ruptured. 
 They are armed with the lance, and have seldom 
 any other weapon except an ill-made, blunt, 
 awkward sabre. Their horses are now wretched 
 rosses : the good breeds have died out, and the 
 Imperial, centralizing tyranny masked under the 
 
 * Marshal Marmont, Travels in Turkey, &c.
 
 MODERN TURKISH CAVALRY. 29 
 
 names of reform and civilization which has been 
 raging with more or less intensity these last fifty 
 years, has not left on the surface of the empire a 
 man of hereditary rank and wealth, or any private 
 country gentleman, with the means of restoring 
 the lost breeds, or of supplying such good light- 
 cavalry horses as existed in abundance at the com- 
 mencement of the present century. The Karas- 
 man Oglus, the Paswan Oglus, and all those great 
 Asiatic feudatories, together with the hereditary 
 Spahi chiefs of Roumelia, who kept up the prin- 
 cipal studs, are all gone ! Mounted as they are, 
 armed as they are, and riding as they do instead 
 of dealing with European horsemen after the 
 summary fashion of the good old Turks any 
 English hussar ought to be able to dispose, in a 
 minute, of half a dozen of Abdul Medjid's troopers, 
 trained alia Franca, though he (the hussar) were 
 armed only with a stout walking-stick. Add to 
 these effects of ill-considered European imitation 
 (which has scarcely been better as applied to the 
 Turkish infantry), the decline, or rather utter ex- 
 tinction, of religious fervour and all national feel- 
 ing, and it will be understood how well prepared 
 is the army of the Ottoman Empire to resist an 
 attack, let it come whence it may, or when it 
 may.
 
 30 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 " The cavalry of the Russians and Austrians im- 
 proved much during their wars with the Turks ; 
 and of the knowledge thus practically obtained 
 the Austrians made good use in their first cam- 
 paigns against the Prussians in the Seven Years' 
 War. 
 
 " These Turkish horsemen, without discipline, 
 rushed in like a whirlwind, in swarms or irregular 
 columns, and swept over all that came in their 
 way, leaving death alone in their track, so effec- 
 tually did they ply their scimitars.* 
 
 " Neither discipline nor the fire of artillery and 
 infantry could save the Christians from these 
 fanatic horsemen ; then* only safety lay in the 
 chevaux-de-frise with which every column was 
 provided, and each battalion had two light carts 
 to carry them. 
 
 " When in the neighbourhood of the enemy the 
 men took the chevaux-de-frise on their shoulders, 
 formed a skeleton column, and, when an attack 
 was threatened, they wheeled into line, fixed the 
 joints in the ground, and fastened them together. 
 
 " To these arrangements the Russians owed 
 their first success against the Turks, as far back 
 as 1711. 
 
 "When General Munich marched out against 
 
 * Berenhorst.
 
 OLD TURKISH CAVALRY. 31 
 
 the Turks in 1736, he did not consider the che- 
 vaux-de-frise a sufficient protection, and again 
 armed part of his infantry with long pikes. His 
 troops marched in large oblong squares; these 
 were at a moment's notice surrounded by the iron 
 spikes of the chevaux-de-frise, and flanked by artil- 
 lery. At this impassable barrier they received 
 their turbaned assailants, and poured upon them 
 a destructive fire in perfect safety. 
 
 " No European cavalry, with all its tactics, large 
 squadrons, cuirasses, and lances, ever inspired such 
 dread, or brought infantry to the necessity of seek- 
 ing safety behind impassable obstacles. The Mos- 
 lems alone inspired sufficient dread to call forth 
 on the part of the infantry a humiliating confession 
 of their weakness in the precautionary measures 
 they adopted ; for, unless surrounded by these 
 formidable engines of war, the Turks seldom failed 
 to burst in amongst them, and then handled the 
 sword quick, masterly, and without cessation, until 
 checked by the re- action brought on from the ex- 
 cess of their own fury. * 
 
 " With European cavalry they dealt in the same 
 summary way whenever they got amongst them : 
 but, to prevent this, the cavalry were formed in 
 masses, with guns and infantry on their flanks ! 
 * Berenhorst.
 
 32 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 " Now, if the individual prowess and skill in 
 single combat, the horsemanship and sharp swords 
 of the Turks, made them so formidable as history 
 here relates, how irresistible would cavalry be which 
 to these qualities should add that discipline and 
 method in which they were wanting, and which 
 was the cause of the disastrous termination of all 
 their wars after the close of the seventeenth century ! 
 
 " The Mamelukes of Egypt kept up their high 
 qualities as bold horsemen until they were anni- 
 hilated at the commencement of the nineteenth 
 century; but they can scarcely be said to have 
 belonged to the Turks. If these brave Mame- 
 lukes, drawn from different races and from dif- 
 ferent countries, but chiefly from the ancient 
 Thessaly and Macedonia, and from the back- 
 grounds of European Turkey, which we now call 
 Servia, Bosnia, Albania, etc., had been backed by 
 only a tolerable infantry, the sanguinary affair at 
 the Pyramids would have been a defeat and not a 
 victory to the French. Single-handed the French 
 troopers had no chance with those daring horse- 
 men and expert swordsmen. 
 
 " While the Russians and Austrians were im- 
 pelled by the Turks into an improvement of their 
 cavalry, pains were taken by the Prussians to add 
 to the efficiency of that arm. Wherever there was
 
 MODE OF RIDING. 33 
 
 war, or a probability of it, it was seen and felt that 
 cavalry must bear an important part, and that 
 there was much to change or modify in it. No- 
 body thought that, while infantry and artillery 
 were improved, cavalry could be left in statu 
 quo." * 
 
 In 1828, when the regular cavalry was as yet 
 in its infant stage, under the management of 
 Colonel Calosso, a Piedmontese officer, I saw a 
 good deal of it, and confidently predicted that it 
 would be a failure. In spite of the fondness of the 
 Turks for horses, and their reputed good horse- 
 manship, it was most rare to find one of these re- 
 gulars that liked the service, or that rode at all 
 well. The fact is, they were in a constrained, un- 
 natural position, with our smooth saddles and long 
 stirrups. " The seat we take on horseback is 
 natural or intrinsically habitual to us (which is 
 much the same thing), for we sit on chairs with 
 our legs extended or pendent ; but the Turks, on 
 the contrary, double their legs under them, and sit 
 on their heels. Their own mode of riding, with 
 the leg contracted towards the groin, and their feet 
 supported by broad shovels of stirrups drawn under 
 the body, was in accordance with their habits and 
 
 * Cavalry : its History and Tactics. By Captain L. E. Nolan, 
 15th Hussars. 1 vol. 8vo. London : Bosworth. 1853. 
 
 D
 
 34 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 easy to them, though most inconvenient and in- 
 supportable for any distance to one of m For 
 myself, I can say that the few times I rode on a 
 Turkish saddle I was in purgatory ; and once, after 
 a short journey of twenty-four miles, I thought my 
 legs and back were broken. I conclude that our 
 saddle and our posture must be equally painful 
 and gcnant to the Turks, and I, indeed, saw that 
 hardly any of the lancers had a good, firm, close 
 seat Calosso had the greatest difficulty to make 
 them keep their stirrups at the proper regulation 
 length ; they were always for tricking them up, 
 so as to approach what I must call their natural 
 posture ; and I several times saw fellows, despatched 
 from the barracks, dismount as soon as they were 
 out of sight, and take in ' a point or so ' to make 
 themselves comfortable. Accustomed, moreover, to 
 saddles from which it is impossible to fall (except 
 with the horse), they do not feel comfortable in 
 Frank saddles, from which a descent is easy enough, 
 as they often exemplify in their own persons."* 
 
 One morning (1848) we were roused from our 
 slumbers up at Pera by a loud drumming and trum- 
 peting, and were told the troops were going out to 
 manoeuvre, and that there would be a grand display 
 
 * Constantinople in 1828, &c.
 
 CAVALRY REVIEW. 35 
 
 on the neighbouring heights of Daoud Pasha. We 
 forthwith took the road the troops had taken. 
 They had only been toddled out to a ridge about a 
 mile and a half from Pera ; they had deployed 
 there near a German beer-shop ; and as we ap- 
 proached the spot they were toddling back again. 
 It could not, by any stretch of courtesy, be called 
 marching, though, here, was one of the very few 
 places near Constantinople that offered a tolerably 
 smooth and good road. First came two very dirty 
 trumpeters ; then followed a very corpulent Pasha 
 mounted on a heavy underbred horse, and attended 
 by a numerous ridiculously-disproportioned staff, all 
 riding very sorry ungroomed nags. This group 
 was succeeded by a regiment of lancers of the Im- 
 perial Guard, riding in a most loose and slovenly 
 manner, yet with evident suffering to themselves. 
 It needed only to look in the men's faces to know 
 how ill at ease they were in their Frank saddles : 
 they were altogether in a mean, dirty plight. The 
 blades of their lances, their stirrup-irons, their bits, 
 were all rusty. Horse-knackers or costermongers 
 in London would be ashamed to turn out in such 
 a condition. The pennons under the heads of the 
 lancers were little better than dirty red rags. The 
 men wore single belts of white glazed leather, with 
 sabres in rusty steel scabbards hanging from them, 
 
 D 2
 
 36 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 and dangling and rattling in all manner of direc- 
 tions with a fearful noise. All the horses were 
 poor wretched-looking creatures, ungroomed, un- 
 trained to the march, and scarcely in hand at all. 
 Neither in men nor in horses would this elite of 
 the Turkish irregular cavalry be a match for the 
 Cossacks. I believe that half the number of the 
 irregular cavaliers from the Don would have given 
 a good account of these awkward squads. We were 
 struck with the great number of hunchbacks 
 among the lancers. This cavalry was followed by 
 three numerically strong regiments of infantry, 
 also of the Imperial Guard. The foot did not 
 shame the horse. To an eye accustomed to the 
 sight of any European awny they were "tag-rag 
 and bobtail all." We were much struck with the 
 number of Nubian blacks employed as officers. 
 Some" of these men had, I believe, belonged to the 
 disciplined Egyptian army of Ibrahim Pasha ; 
 others had been slaves to pashas and effendies ; 
 and some, I was told, had undergone in their child- 
 hood the process which qualifies males for employ- 
 ment in seraglios and harems. But take the best 
 of. these emancipated black slaves, and say what 
 education, what military knowledge, what spirit, 
 what sense of honour or patriotism, can be ex- 
 pected from them? Yet Nubians are frequently
 
 TURKISH LANCERS. 37 
 
 found in the very highest posts of the army, and 
 commanding and leading white Mussulmans. 
 
 A few months later, as we were riding back from 
 Adrianople to Stamboul, we met some of these 
 lancers of the Imperial Guards on the march. 
 They formed two regiments, and were proceeding 
 to the Danube to stop the progress of revolu- 
 tionism in Moldavia and Wallachia. Although 
 
 o 
 
 this was their first day's march, the appearance 
 both of horses and men was altogether deplorable. 
 We could see no baggage-train, no camp-equipage, 
 nor any provision for the food, accommodation, 
 and comfort of the troops. The men were strag- 
 gling along in loose, most irregular, single line ; 
 and they appeared to have scarcely an officer with 
 them. All the superior officers had gone by sea as 
 far as the port of Rodosto, in order that they 
 might lessen the fatigues of the journey up to 
 Adrianople. Infantry had been hurried off to the 
 Danube in steam-boats. The lancers suffered 
 much loss from sickness before they got across the 
 Balkan mountains : by the middle of June the 
 terrible Danubian fever began its attacks ; the ma- 
 lady prevailed until October, and in the course of 
 that summer and autumn the mortality among the 
 Sultan's ill-provided troops was said to be awful. 
 The medical staff of the Turkish army is still, for
 
 38 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the far greater part, composed of very ignorant 
 Turks or Frank quacks. 
 
 I had other opportunities of closely inspecting 
 both horse and foot. The best cavalry specimen 
 I saw was up at Kutayah, but it was only 340 
 strong. It was under the command of one Achmet 
 Pasha, a young man who had travelled in Christen- 
 dom, had resided two or three years at Vienna, 
 had studied military matters in the midst of an 
 Austrian army (no bad school), and had acquired a 
 good deal of the manner, bearing, and even look 
 of an active Hungarian cavalry officer. He was, 
 beyond all comparison, the most active Turk, and 
 the most frank and straightforward, we ever met 
 with, holding anything like high rank. Accus- 
 tomed to Austrian neatness and precision, he had 
 introduced, among other things, the useful arts of 
 cleaning shoes and beating and brushing clothes. 
 His men were tolerably clean and tidy ; the arms, 
 kept in separate apartments, were clean and 
 bright ; but there was a good deal to criticise in 
 the state of the stirrup-irons and bits. This corps, 
 like all the cavalry we saw, was armed with a lance, 
 a weapon for which the Osmanlees have no peculiar 
 affection or aptitude, and one that has not been 
 found very efficient in any of our European armies. 
 The weapons national and proper to the Turk are
 
 WANT OF GOOD HORSES. 39 
 
 the sharp scimitar and the razor-edged yataghan ; 
 with these in the bygone times they gained their 
 splendid victories over the ill-armed, heavily and 
 badly accoutred, hosts of Christendom. In the 
 stables there was not much to praise ; the horses, 
 though in good condition, were small, weak, and 
 underbred. The Pasha agreed with me (and 
 deeply regretted) that there were hardly any 
 horses fit for cavalry-mount left in the country. 
 Up here, at Kutayah, and all the way round from 
 this ancient city to the mournful ruins and beauti- 
 ful lake of Nicsea, we certainly saw none but crip- 
 ples and weeds. In 1828 eight pounds sterling 
 would buy at Smyrna, or at Brusa, a good, com- 
 pact, spirited, fourteen-hander ; and the price was 
 not much higher in the capital. At present, any- 
 thing like a horse is much dearer than in England, 
 and you may hunt a very long time before you 
 find one. This alone is a most serious impediment 
 to the formation of a native cavalry. These troops, 
 as usual, were kept too stationary ; they had been 
 up here more than three years, and were likely to 
 remain as much longer, without ever being moved 
 from Kutayah, or making a day's march. A picket 
 of lancers was now and then sent to a village that 
 would not pay its taxes, or was employed, on very 
 rare occasions (as pashas never travel when they
 
 40 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 can help it), to escort some great man ; but this 
 was about all. On account of the horrible state of 
 the roads, or rather of the non-existence of roads 
 anywhere in the country, the removal of even a 
 small corps was a difficult operation, and attended 
 with expense and loss. The horses were very apt 
 to founder among the rocks and steep mountains ; 
 and the soldiers rather apt to desert in the woods 
 and wildernesses. Desertion prevails to a very 
 great extent in all parts of the Sultan's army ; and 
 the rural populations, if Mussulman, invariably 
 sympathise with the deserters, and conceal and 
 protect them if they can. 
 
 Well treated as they were by this honest and 
 active Pasha, who looked to everything himself, 
 Achmet confessed that not many of his people 
 liked the service. They were quiet, orderly, obe- 
 dient, respectful, but certainly not cheerful ; and 
 cheerfulness in a soldier is good 25 per cent, in his 
 value. The Pasha complained of the almost total 
 want of educated men, anywhere in the empire, 
 from which to draw efficient officers. In general 
 at Kutayah and everywhere else the officers were 
 scarcely superior in manners or intelligence to the 
 common soldiers, and the majority of them were 
 drawn from the same class of society as the men. 
 
 Achmet Pasha was far too good and honest an
 
 POVERTY OF THE PEOPLE. 41 
 
 officer to be left very long in command : he was 
 recalled a few months after our visit, and his place 
 supplied by a Pasha with the ordinary qualities of 
 that genus. The same fate befell a very clever 
 young Corsican surgeon, who had contributed to 
 keep the troops at Kutayah in a rare good state of 
 health. And thus is it always : if the Turkish 
 government get a good man, they are sure, very 
 soon, to dismiss or shelve him. 
 
 In this heart-saddening journey, as in others we 
 made in the direction of the Lakes Apollonia and 
 Magnass, and the river Granicus, we saw little 
 among the Turkish element but poverty, absolute 
 misery, and a decaying population. We passed 
 many of the spacious chiftliks and konacks of the 
 old hereditary nobility, who had been wont to breed 
 the beautiful nags and greyhounds of Asia Minor, 
 and to keep up very numerous studs. These country 
 residences some of them very extensive and of a 
 pleasing Oriental architecture were all deserted, 
 all empty, all in ruins, or fast falling to pieces. 
 Here and there a poor Osmanlee has taken pos- 
 session of a corner of the spacious edifice 
 
 " Dogs, men, and horses, all are gone, 
 And he the sole survivor." 
 
 The great " Timars" or fiefs, which existed in 
 this part of Asia, could furnish the empire in time
 
 42 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of war with 25,000 well-mounted horsemen, who 
 rode well, because they rode fearlessly in their 
 national saddles, and with their natural seat ; but 
 Sultan Selim smote these fiefs ; Sultan Mahmoud 
 followed up the blows with blind fury, and with- 
 out mercy or forethought; and Sultan Abdul 
 Medjid, Reschid Pasha, and the other new-school 
 Turks, have completed their utter destruction. 
 Hence, they will never again get the brilliant light 
 cavalry of former days from those districts, which 
 are a prey to disorder, or to an apathy worse than 
 disorder, and which exhibit, in all directions, the 
 elements of a rapid dissolution. It is true that in 
 the midst of this decay (at least towards the sea- 
 coasts) Greeks, Turks, Armenians, and Jews, are 
 increasing their numbers in spite of their general 
 poverty ; but these classes cannot enter the army, 
 nor would they if they could. The Armenians 
 and Jews would quietly submit to any new master ; 
 the Greeks would certainly fly to arms and aid a 
 foreign invader, particularly if he belonged (as the 
 Russians do) to the same Christian Church as 
 themselves. 
 
 <l The artillery," says a British officer of en- 
 gineers, "are the best soldiers in the Turkish 
 army, and, notwithstanding the defective nature of 
 the carriages, they work their guns with great
 
 TUEKISH ARTILLERY. 43 
 
 dexterity." * I was a frequent visitor at their 
 great artillery barracks, where the Pasha (another 
 Achmet by name) treated us to the sight of some 
 horse-artillery exercise and manoeuvres. The guns 
 were all brass ; and a few of the carriages were not 
 badly made ; but neither guns nor carriages were 
 kept clean. The harness was badly made and abo- 
 minably dirty. The horses were all white or very 
 light greys. They told us that they were bred at 
 home, in Roumelia, in the country up above Phil- 
 lipopoli. I was much mistaken if they were not 
 all Transylvanian or Hungarian horses they bore 
 a very close family resemblance to a breed I had 
 often admired in the Emperor of Austria's army. 
 In the European provinces, no more than in the 
 Asiatic, have the reformers, plunderers, and level- 
 lers, left anywhere the men of family and property 
 who kept up the good studs. The Spahis of Rou- 
 malia have utterly succumbed and disappeared in 
 the grave, or in the obscurity of poverty, like the 
 Beys and Timariots of Asia Minor. From Con- 
 stantinople to Adrianople, and back again by a 
 roundabout route, we saw not one good horse. 
 These Turkish artillery horses would be considered 
 by us undersized for that service ; but they were 
 
 * Lieut.-Col. Sir Frederick Smith, in the work of Marshal 
 Marmont. See Appendix I.
 
 44 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 compact and strong, and not at all deficient in 
 pluck ; they were well broke in to their work 
 were admirably in hand and the artillery drivers 
 drove them in good style. About a dozen light 
 field-pieces were very well handled in an enclosed 
 field in front of the barracks. It was by far the 
 best specimen of military exercise we saw in 
 Turkey ; but the Pasha showed us only his very 
 best men. The instructing officer was a German, 
 who had, I believe, been a sergeant of artillery in 
 the Prussian service. A few young Turkish sub- 
 alterns appeared to be both active and intelligent ; 
 but the superior officers were sitting down on 
 stools, looking listlessly on, and smoking their 
 tchibouques. All of them seemed too fat to move. 
 It is one of the uncountable calamities of this 
 doomed empire, that as soon as a man attains to 
 any rank he fattens. I can scarcely remember to 
 have seen a thin pasha. The causes of obesity are 
 evident enough. A grandee must not run or ride 
 about like common mortals, but must keep his 
 state all day long on a divan, or broad, low sofa, 
 propped up with cushions, and being attended by a 
 score or two of officers, servants, and slaves, who do 
 his every bidding at the motion of his hand or the 
 glance of his eye ; and if he walk across the room 
 two servants support him by holding him under
 
 ARTILLERY EXERCISE. 45 
 
 the arm-pits ; and if he go abroad on horseback, 
 there must be two men walking on foot at the 
 horse's head, two more at the stirrups, and at least 
 two more in the rear of the horse's tail : thus he 
 can ride only at a walk. If I were reformer in 
 Turkey, I would alter all this : I would burn all 
 these fattening, indolence-promoting divans, and 
 declare inexorable war against the adet (custom) 
 which makes it fashion and etiquette for a man to 
 be lazy and grow fat so soon as he attains to high 
 rank. We were told that the artillery was not 
 better paid than the infantry, but that the cavalry 
 was of late receiving some slight additional allow- 
 ance. 
 
 We afterwards saw some horse-artillery exercises 
 which could not be praised. The number of good 
 artillerists was evidently very limited. The sta- 
 tionary artillery in the batteries and castles on the 
 Bosphorus and the Dardanelles seemed to be very 
 stationary indeed, and to be rarely exercised in 
 anything beyond the firing of salutes. Of this 
 practice they had an abundance up at Constan- 
 tinople, but I never saw or knew any of the artil- 
 lery, horse or foot, to be practised in firing ball. 
 I once, indeed, saw a single shot fired from a 
 battery on the Dardanelles ; and that shot went a 
 hundred yards wide of its mark. The Turkish
 
 46 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 gunpowder is excessively bad the worst that was 
 ever used, in modern times, for purposes of war. 
 At the earnest request of Reschid Pasha two dis- 
 tinguished officers were sent out to Constantinople, 
 to teach them to make better powder, to set up a 
 laboratory, &c., and to act as instructors in putting 
 their artillery into order. These officers, who are 
 both living, and who can answer for the correctness 
 of my assertions, were Colonel Williams of the 
 Royal Engineers, and Major Dickson of the Royal 
 Artillery. At first the Turks received them with 
 an ostentatious parade and volleys of stereotyped 
 compliments ; but when they had got them they 
 never gave them anything to do, but left them in 
 involuntary and irksome idleness, to draw, with 
 more or less regularity, pretty good pay, which 
 they felt they had not earned. They were not 
 supple enough to be mingled with Turkish pashas 
 and haughty and most ignorant Grand Masters of 
 artillery ; they were far too honest to be active 
 parts of a system where all was corruption and dis- 
 honesty. As far as the Sultan's service was con- 
 cerned, they might as well have been at the anti- 
 podes. At the instance of Sir Stratford Canning, 
 Colonel Williams was included in a commission to 
 survey and settle the long-disputed frontier between 
 Turkey and Persia ; and he took his departure for
 
 EDUCATION OF OFFICERS. 47 
 
 those barbarous, desolated regions. Major Dick- 
 son, tired of an idle, profitless life, and utterly 
 disgusted with the governing Turks, threw up his 
 appointment and returned to England. The Pashas 
 had previously treated clever and well-intentioned 
 French officers quite as badly as these English. 
 They really seemed to entertain a settled plan for 
 humiliating and insulting, turn and turn about, all 
 the nations of Christendom, for, (with the exception 
 of Russia), they had begged officers from all, and 
 had then treated them in the like manner. 
 
 For some years the government has entertained 
 the plan of providing for the education of officers 
 by hiring foreign professors and masters, and open- 
 ing schools and academies. The senior military 
 school is a long, ugly building without, but it has 
 far-extending, pleasant corridors and good apart- 
 ments and class-rooms within. At our first visit 
 we found about thirty young men taking lessons in 
 French. The lecture-room was excellent ; so was 
 the hall set apart for the physical sciences. This 
 last large room was well provided with apparatus 
 and instruments, English, French, and German : 
 at the upper end of it there was a small library, 
 consisting almost entirely of French books, treating 
 of the sciences or of the art of war. We were 
 shown a portfolio of drawings made by the students ;
 
 48 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 all mere copies from French or German engrav- 
 ings or lithographs, but neatly executed. A few 
 mechanical drawings, sections of maps, and plans 
 of fortifications, were as neat as could be produced 
 by any hands. This school had been erected only 
 some three or four years before our visit to it. 
 There were now one hundred and one students. 
 The majority of them were coarse and vulgar in 
 their countenances and persons. Some few had an 
 intelligent expression, but not one the appearance 
 of a born Turkish gentleman. They were very far 
 from being well set up, although we were told that 
 they were pretty regularly drilled once a day. The 
 infantry instructor, a Neapolitan by birth, but an 
 Irishman by descent, said that they had exceed- 
 ingly little taste for military exercises or for any 
 other kind of exercise, and that the greater part of 
 them hated the drill-ground. In age they seemed 
 to vary from seventeen to twenty-one. Four 
 Frenchmen were employed as military teachers ; a 
 Prussian conducted the artillery instruction. Der- 
 vish Pasha, who, at that time, superintended the 
 establishment (but who has since been removed to 
 a different post), was another extraordinary man for 
 a pasha : he had travelled a good deal on the con- 
 tinent of Europe, and had travelled with his eyes 
 open. His scientific and philological acquirements
 
 MILITARY ACADEMIES. 49 
 
 seemed to be considerable ; his conversation was 
 animated, frank, and unaffected, and we had the 
 assurance of many that he was most honest and 
 assiduous in his office. Unluckily he was ham- 
 pered by two other pashas, of other grades, who 
 were receiving enormous salaries for doing nothing, 
 or for doing only what was mischievous. The 
 salaries of these two pashas, and of certain other 
 useless officials, nearly doubled the expense of the 
 schools to the Sultan. More Turco I Every public 
 establishment was encumbered in the like manner. 
 At this school there was no mosque no provision 
 whatever for religion. 
 
 The junior military academy is at a short dis- 
 tance from the senior, standing on the ridge of 
 hills behind the Sultan's new stone palace of 
 Dolma Baghchi, in a very airy and pleasant situa- 
 tion. We visited it several times, and generally 
 found the director and the professors smoking 
 pipes under a few shady trees in front of the 
 academy. There was a small mosque, not built of 
 late years, attached to the school. The number of 
 pupils was between two and three hundred. They 
 are admitted at the age of twelve. They remain 
 here five years, then pass to the upper school for 
 three or four years, and then into the army or to 
 some government employment, with the rank of
 
 50 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 captain.* Some become engineers ; some go into 
 the artillery, some into the cavalry, and others 
 become infantry officers ; but they all pursue the 
 same line of study. From the day of their en- 
 trance they are lodged, fed, and clothed at the 
 expense of the Sultan, receiving also a small 
 monthly gratuity, which is increased as they ad- 
 vance in age. In spite of all the encouragements, 
 a good many of them get heart-sick of study and 
 confinement, and abscond. I was told the same 
 thing at the Galata Serai, or medical school. As 
 at that school, the students were drawn from poor 
 Turkish families: they were sons of boatmen, 
 porters, papoush-makers, &c. One of the masters, 
 a Perote Frank, told me that out of the whole 
 number (here and in the upper school) there were 
 not above six or seven that could be considered as 
 the sons of gentlemen ; and that these few were 
 the children of effendies who had been utterly 
 ruined in their fortunes. Others told me that the 
 reforming government preferred the rawest mate- 
 rials, and found the children of the uninformed, 
 dependent poor more submissive and ductile than 
 
 * Private interest or caprice was constantly interfering with 
 the terms of residence, as with all other matters. Some lads 
 were turned out for service before they had been a year in the 
 senior department, &c.
 
 MILITARY ACADEMIES. 51 
 
 the children of the superior classes. But those 
 superior classes are proud, averse to the precipitate 
 changes which have been made, disaffected through 
 loss of property and of interest, and thus not at all 
 disposed to send their sons to the governmental 
 establishments. The drawing-master at this school, 
 the son of a Frenchman, but a native of Pera, 
 praised the docility of the pupils, and, in general, 
 their intelligence ; but he complained that they 
 were quite insensible to the point of honour, or to 
 punishment by shame. Here it was necessary to 
 make use of the bastinado. As much might have 
 been expected from the premises and the materials. 
 This Frank added that they showed no inventive 
 talent whatever, but a good deal of imitative ability, 
 and a considerable facility of execution, as well in 
 music as in drawing. He said that, whatever a 
 Turk could do or learn cross-legged or sitting at his 
 ease in a quiet corner, he did or learned pretty 
 well ; but that there was no overcoming their natural 
 indolence or dislike to active, stirring occupation. 
 Pointing to the shady side of a quadrangle, where 
 from twenty to thirty youths were sitting on their 
 heels, doing nothing not so much as talking he 
 said, " Those students have been there these three 
 hours, and there they would sit three hours longer 
 if they were allowed to follow their own inclina- 
 
 E 2
 
 52 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 tions." Few of these Turks here ever seem young ; 
 like their old green-heads, they seem to think that 
 the best of pastimes is to sit still and do nothing. 
 You can hardly begin the light drill too early, yet 
 these boys were not drilled at all until they were 
 drafted into the senior school I inquired whence 
 the pupils in these two schools were drawn : they 
 told me, almost entirely from Constantinople and 
 its neighbourhood, because military schools had 
 been erected in the provinces at Brusa, Kutayah, 
 Konia, Damascus, Adrianople, Salonica, &c. Fudge ! 
 There was not one such school there was no go- 
 vernmental provision for education in any of those 
 places. Yet would I not accuse these gentlemen 
 of intentional falsehood. Long since, Abdul Medjid 
 had decreed and ordered that there should be such 
 provincial schools ; and when the Sultan orders a 
 thing to be done, the Turks consider that it is 
 finished ; and the paid French journalists of Pera, 
 in well-rounded paragraphs, confirm them in their 
 illusion. It is the same with roads, with the open- 
 ing and cleansing of harbours, and with everything 
 else. How many rugged and almost impassable 
 tracks have I travelled over that had previously 
 been described in the 'Journal de Constantinople' 
 as finished and commodious roads made by the 
 wisdom and munificence of the Sultan ! I was
 
 RELIGIOUS SCRUPLES. 53 
 
 repeatedly asked in the capital whether the new 
 military school at Brusa, or Kutayah, or Adrian- 
 ople was not in a flourishing condition ? Here, 
 above Dolma Baghchi, the favourite pursuit seemed 
 to be drawing ; I never saw the boys doing any- 
 thing else. They were copying, with charcoal or 
 black French chalk, Parisian prints landscapes, 
 architectural pieces, ruins, ornaments, scrolls, flow- 
 ers, fruit, and, in bold defiance of the Koran, wild 
 beasts, and fancy portraits of women as well as of 
 men. A few of the elder pupils were working in 
 acquarella, copying coloured prints in French water- 
 colours. Practically, these new-school Turks never 
 go thorough. If they get rid of one scruple, they 
 adhere with more tenacity to another. They are 
 constantly straining at gnats, and swallowing camels. 
 The pupils were allowed to draw nothing from the 
 round or the real, the Ulema having decided that 
 the faithful must not draw from objects which cast 
 shadows. As artists, the youths must thus remain 
 mere mechanical copyists. Yet is there not great 
 hollowness and contradiction here? The Com- 
 mander of the Faithful seems never to be happier 
 than when sitting for his portrait to some Frank 
 artist. Rescind Pasha and all his colleagues have 
 been painted and repainted, and I never knew of 
 a common Turk being at all unwilling to sit while
 
 54 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 you made a sketch of his person, face, and costume.* 
 Like other men the Ulema, after giving up vital 
 principles of faith and practice, cling with a des- 
 perate grasp to mere trifles ; and the reformers, 
 who have ridden over them rough-shod, who have 
 infringed the law of the Prophet in numberless im- 
 portant points, draw rein and bow the head at 
 petty scruples suggested by the Ulema, but mat- 
 ters of indifference to the people. Nearly in every 
 way, and in everything, this boasted reform school 
 is a prevarication. This junior academy was first 
 established by Sultan Mahmoud. The refectory 
 was very neat and clean, the diet liberal. We saw 
 the tables laid : there were clean table-cloths, clean 
 pewter plates, neat knives and forks, decanters, 
 drinking-glasses, Frank benches, French chairs, &c. 
 Twenty years ago such things would certainly have 
 appeared most marvellous and unorthodox. 
 
 On the left bank of the Golden Horn, in a low, 
 damp, most unhealthy situation, there was another 
 military school, erected by Hahinoud's cousin and 
 predecessor, Sultan Selim, whose reforms and 
 inroads on the janissaries and Ulema led to his 
 dethronement and murder. Into this small, 
 
 * For a remarkable account of one of the means adopted by 
 the late Sultan Mahmoud to ride over the religious scruples of 
 his subjects, see Appendix II.
 
 LORD STRATFORD'S ADVICE. 55 
 
 wretched establishment I could never gain access. 
 I believe that hardly anything was done in it, and 
 that the Turks were ashamed of its being seen. 
 Some told me that there were about thirty young 
 men in it, finishing their studies as engineer 
 officers ; others assured me that there were only 
 two lazy old Turkish professors, and five or six 
 students, who were all obliged to run away from the 
 unhealthy spot so soon as the hot weather set in. 
 
 In these military schools there is no mixture of 
 races or of faiths ; for, in this reformed and to be 
 amalgamated empire, none, as I have observed, 
 can be soldiers, unless they be Mussulmans. A 
 distinguished diplomatist, who was taken into 
 council by the late Sultan Mahmoud when his 
 affairs were very desperate, told that sovereign 
 that his remedy would be to allow his Christian 
 Rayah subjects to be soldiers as well as the Turks ; 
 and that from the day he. raised and armed a 
 Christian regiment his empire would be safe.* 
 Entertaining, as I do, the greatest respect for this 
 adviser, I cannot agree with the advice ; for I 
 believe that, if the Rayahs of different races were 
 
 * I conceive that there is no further need of reticence. The 
 diplomatist was Sir Stratford Canning, now Lord Stratford de 
 Redcliffe. He has since related the incident to very many per- 
 sons both at home and abroad.
 
 56 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 regimented, their inveterate antipathies would 
 lead them to employ their arms against one 
 another ; and that, whatever the Armenians might 
 do, the Greeks would not be long ere they fell 
 upon their co-militants the Turks. Apart from 
 the religious antagonism, there is a four-hundred- 
 years-old hatred to the Osmanlee, on the part of 
 the Greek, which no political schemes or devices, 
 no merely mortal means, will ever eradicate If 
 in European Turkey the Greeks were trained and 
 armed in anything like the same proportion as the 
 Mussulmans, and if the combatants were left to 
 themselves, the Mussulmans would be speedily 
 driven back into Asia ; for the Greeks of the pre- 
 sent day excel them as much in numbers, daring, 
 and activity, as they do in wit and intelligence. 
 But if only a few Greek regiments were raised, 
 what would happen in the case of a Russian inva- 
 sion ? The Greeks would fire into the Turks with 
 whom they were brigaded, and, with shouts for the 
 Cross and Holy Virgin, would pass over to their 
 co-religionists the Russians. Or, put them into a 
 fortress for garrison-duty, and yon would have 
 open gates at the first appearance of the head of a 
 Russian column of attack. I feel as certain of 
 this as of the physical, unalterable fact, that the 
 river Danube flows downward from its sources in
 
 MILITARY SCHOOLS INEFFICIENT. 57 
 
 the Alps to its mouths on the Euxine. I never 
 met with the man in the country that entertained 
 a different opinion. Besides, this blending of 
 Turk and Rayah, of conqueror and conquered, 
 would trample out the last lingering spark of 
 pride, nationality, and esprit de corps in the bosom 
 of the Osmanlees. Of all the means suggested to 
 save a rotten empire which cannot be saved, this 
 really appears to be about the least promising. 
 
 Even with military schools under a far superior 
 management, and with better materials to work 
 upon, it would yet take the Turkish government a 
 good many years to turn out a sufficient number 
 of educated native officers of men duly qualified 
 for the more scientific branches of the service. 
 There is also this drawback. There is no fixity of 
 plan or purpose. Many of the young men, after 
 being trained for soldiers, are turned into civilians, 
 secretaries of Pashas, clerks in public offices, tax- 
 collectors, &c. 
 
 Wherever I extended my observations I became 
 the more convinced that the Sultan was paying for 
 a great many more men than were actually under 
 arms, and that his so-called regular disciplined 
 army did not come near to 120,000 men. [There 
 seems no limit to the number that their retained 
 journalists are now putting down upon paper.]
 
 58 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 At Brusa, for months together, there was not a 
 single soldier, horse or foot; yet, in Government 
 returns, Brusa was honoured with a considerable 
 garrison ; up at Kutayah, where we were told we 
 should find 3000 men, we found exactly 1340; at 
 Adrianople we found 2300 instead of the 5000 
 which had been reported to us by a high military 
 authority in the capital. So of other places, as the 
 Dardanelles and Smyrna Nothing more likely 
 than that the Sultan was in every case paying for 
 the larger number, and that the Pashas and their 
 satellites were putting the cash difference into their 
 own pockets. By limiting the term of service to 
 five years, Abdul Medjid had greatly injured his 
 chance of having anything like well-trained veteran 
 soldiers. In numerous instances, however, in spite 
 of declarations to the contrary, the men were not 
 discharged or allowed to return to their homes on 
 the expiration of the five years, being kept together 
 under another name. They were called Redif, or 
 militia, but they were in fact troops of the line, or 
 of the guards, doing the same duty, receiving the 
 same pay, and leading precisely the same life. 
 The plan of a local militia, which would leave the 
 Turkish population to till the now abandoned soil ; 
 the plan of establishing militia corps of mounted 
 rifles, which might guard the frontiers without
 
 PROPOSED MILITIA. 59 
 
 being, dragged from their native fields ; and other 
 projects for uniting economy with defence, and 
 restoring the ruined agriculture of the country, 
 had, I found, been repeatedly proposed and as 
 often rejected by the Porte by Reschid Pasha, as 
 well as by other Viziers. I urged some such 
 schemes myself with several of the pashas, who 
 met me with Mashallahs and Baccalums. The 
 fact is, very few Turks had a notion of what we 
 really mean by the term militia. They could 
 understand calling out a number of men on a 
 special emergency, and for a specific service ; but 
 they had no idea of having men regularly embo- 
 died, to be drilled and exercised at certain periods 
 of the year, and to be ready at call on any emer- 
 gency. Most of them were afraid of arming any 
 portion of the Mussulman population, unless it 
 was immediately under the eye of government and 
 linked with the regular forces. "Were we to arm 
 and drill our people over in Asia Minor, or up in 
 the provinces of Roumelia, they would not pay their 
 taxes ! " So said a member of Reschid Pasha's 
 government ; and the experience which I had then 
 gained as to the state of the country prevented 
 my contradicting him. 
 
 Meanwhile the conscription, or forced annual 
 levy (for there is no proper conscription), is eating
 
 60 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 up the wasted remnant of the Mussulman people, 
 and consuming the heart's core of the empire. 
 Twelve years before the time of my last tour, an 
 intelligent and thoroughly truth-telling English 
 traveller, who took a much wider range, noted the 
 lamentable effects produced by this system of 
 impressment : he found villages and towns depo- 
 pulated, and for the greater part in ruins, unin- 
 habited houses crumbling to dust and rubbish, and 
 immense tracks of the most fertile soil left utterly 
 neglected through want of men to till them. 
 Everywhere he saw the same destructive elements 
 at work. " The new conscriptions and levies were 
 everywhere described as most oppressive measures, 
 the effect of which was to depopulate whole dis- 
 tricts, in consequence of the young men being 
 removed to the capital."* He saw the poor people 
 crushed to the earth, disheartened, despairing, 
 dying out The American Bishop Southgate, who 
 followed this Englisji traveller, the enterprising 
 Mr. Layard, who followed the bishop, my esteemed 
 friend Mr. Longworth, who followed Mr. Layard, 
 all agreed in their accounts of the fatal effects of 
 the forced levies and the over-taxation. Let him 
 be of what country or political creed or party he 
 
 * William J. Hamilton, Esq. ' Researches in Asia Minor, 
 Pontus, and Armenia.' London : John Murray. 1842. For 
 further particulars about the conscription, see Appendix III.
 
 CONSCRIPTION. 61 
 
 might, I never met an European traveller in 
 Turkey that did not entertain precisely the same 
 views and notions as to its condition, and the 
 effects of what has been impudently and pertina- 
 ciously called a light, regular, organized, and un- 
 oppressive conscription. 
 
 In the month of May, 1849, 50,000 men and 
 boys are said to have been dragged from Asia 
 Minor over to Constantinople to act as irregulars. 
 If credit could be given to the lying Constantinople 
 papers in the pay of Rescind Pasha, more than 
 150,000 were thus caught and removed from their 
 homes over the whole face of the empire ! Seeing 
 what I have seen, I can scarcely conceive how they 
 got 50,000, nor can they have done it without 
 taking a most extensive range and depriving many 
 places of well-nigh their entire male population. 
 At the time a friend wrote to me from the plain 
 of Brusa : 
 
 " This levy was conducted quite a la Turque. 
 Poor fellows were surprised, knocked down, and 
 bound, and then told that they must go as volun- 
 teers to Stamboul, to help the Sultan to fight the 
 Muscov ghiaours. Old and young, from fourteen 
 to sixty years of age, were seized and sent to Con- 
 stantinople. In fact almost every Turkish villager 
 that could be found to hold a musket was packed
 
 62 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 off Some 12,000 or 14,000 were embarked from 
 this neighbourhood, at Moudaina and Ghemlik. 
 You know what was the state of the country be- 
 fore this, and you may well imagine the present 
 distress and misery. Detachments of those poor 
 miserable creatures were escorted by dragoons and 
 forwarded to the capital in steamers. Some thou- 
 sands, however, have already escaped and found 
 their way back, 'and the dragoons are now employed 
 in hunting them down as if they were game or 
 wild beasts. Such of them as are caught are 
 brought down to Brusa in chains, or tied together 
 with ropes and cords. Fancy what splendid troops 
 they will make ! Fancy how valorously they will 
 fight the Kussians, should it ever come to that ! 
 Then imagine the fine sport and free quarters of 
 these dragoons let loose upon the villagers, and 
 generally without any officers with them. The 
 Yuz-Bashis, the Bim-Bashis, averse to fatigue and 
 trouble, smoke their tchibouques in Brusa, or under 
 the plane-trees and fountains of Bourna-Bashi, or 
 up the cool Dere, which you so much affected, and 
 the troopers go rampaging about, and doing what- 
 ever they like best to the people. It is a complete 
 reign of terror. They say that a camp of 100,000 
 men is to be formed over in Europe at Daoud 
 Pasha ; that there is to be another camp of 50,000
 
 THE KURDS. 63 
 
 men in Asia to watch the Russian frontier on this 
 side ; and that a great corps de reserve is to be 
 collected at Trebizond on the Black Sea. How 
 they will be able to feed and give any pay to 
 these hosts of irregulars, who have not left behind 
 them hands to reap the crops, far surpasses my 
 power of comprehension/' 
 
 On these Asiatic frontiers the levies of 1849 
 would not have fought at all, but would have run 
 away from the Russians just as they did in 1828-9. 
 At that time it proved all a false alarm, and an 
 incalculable amount of misery and a great loss of 
 human life were inflicted for nothing. But come 
 when they will, I firmly believe that the troops of 
 the Emperor Nicholas will be received with open 
 arms by the people dwelling near his Asiatic fron- 
 tier. The Christian Rayahs in those parts are all 
 looking to their coming as to a millennium. The 
 Mussulman Kurds, the bravest, the most active, 
 and best mounted of all the Sultan's subjects, are 
 decidedly and notoriously disaffected. They are 
 enraged at the overthrow of Bedr-Khan-Bey, and 
 eager to retaliate on the Turks the cruel chastise- 
 ment some of them received at their hands in the 
 campaign of 1847. Towards these frontiers the old 
 Mahomedan fanaticism is fitful and uncertain in its 
 operation and limited in its range. You will find
 
 84 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 fanaticism here, indifferentism, or a leaning to 
 Christianity ^ there. In some regions the popula- 
 tion is Mussulman in little more than in name. 
 For example, at Sivas the people are furious Ma- 
 homedans, at Mosul they are much more tolerant, 
 and desirous of the society and friendship of Chris- 
 tians. These people of Mosul are descended from 
 Chaldean Christians who were forcibly converted 
 to the Koran. They make no secret in saying 
 among Christians, " Our forefathers became Mus- 
 sulmans when the Turks were strong, and we and 
 our children will become Christians when the Rus- 
 sians take this country and are strong in it." 
 Even now these people, though exposed thereby 
 to horrible persecution, to torture, and to death, 
 frequently conform to Christian rites.* 
 
 Nothing has been done to put this frontier in a 
 state of defence. It is now as it was in 1836, when 
 Mr. Hamilton travelled along it; and it was in 
 1836 as it had been in 1828, and during the whole 
 of that losing and most humiliating war with 
 Russia. Mr. Hamilton says, "Not a place of 
 arms, not a fort, not a blockhouse has been erected ; 
 nay, in the long space of twenty years they have 
 not strengthened nor in any way repaired the old 
 
 * On this subject, and on others of equal moment, I refer the 
 reader to the interesting Travels of Bishop Southgate.
 
 TURKISH PATRIOTISM. 65 
 
 walls which the Tzar's artillery knocked about 
 their ears in 1828, when Eyoub Pasha, with 50,000 
 irregulars, fled before a small vanguard of Russian 
 horses. On the other side the Russians have 
 strengthened their works and erected new ones ; 
 and the neighbouring Turkish governors, as devoid 
 of patriotism as of common honesty, have sold 
 them timber and other materials. From the 
 Turkish forests of Soghanli Dagh the Russians 
 were supplied with timber for the erection of their 
 fortress at Gumri; the Turkish peasants were 
 compelled to cut the wood gratis, and the Pasha 
 of Kars received 70,000 ducats from the professed 
 enemies of his country for selling it" * 
 
 This is a fair measure of patriotism among the 
 high-class Turks : the opportunity occurring, nine- 
 tenths of the Pashas would conduct themselves 
 in the same manner. 
 
 On the European side nearly every thing favours 
 the' Sclavonian subjects of Austria and the Rus- 
 sians. In 1829, when the Russians were descend- 
 ing upon Adrianople, and when they took up their 
 head-quarters in that city, they found in nearly 
 every man they met a co-religionist ; for the Bul- 
 garians, who swarm in the upper valley of the 
 Hebrus, are, like the Greek Rayahs, of the same 
 
 * Researches in Asia Minor. 
 
 F
 
 66 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Eastern Church as themselves, following the same 
 creed with none but the slightest variations, prac- 
 tising the same ritual, keeping the same fasts and 
 holidays, and worshipping the same Virgins and 
 saints. The country people from far and near 
 flocked to Diebitch's quarters to sell their fruits, 
 vegetables, poultry, and all manner of provisions, 
 and nobody could remember the market of Adri- 
 anople ever to have been so well supplied as during 
 the stay of the Russians. Heaven knows it was a 
 hungry market in 1848, when we were there and 
 the Russians not 
 
 The abhorrence of the forced levy system has 
 tended, and is still tending, to check population at 
 the primal source. It was no mystery at all, or a 
 mystery covered only with the thinnest and most 
 transparent veil, that forced abortion is a common 
 practice among Turkish women. The horrible 
 secret as to the means and the drugs to be em- 
 ployed is pretty generally known, and where igno- 
 rance prevails there are " wise women," old hags, 
 professional abortists, who go about the country 
 relieving matrons of their burthens for a few piastres 
 apiece ; and it is said that these hell-dames not 
 only destroy the present embryo, but prevent all 
 chances of future conception. I was told of these 
 practices at Constantinople by three Frank physi-
 
 EFFECTS OF THE CONSCRIPTION. 67 
 
 cians of the highest standing there, and by two 
 Perote doctors ; I was told of them again at Brusa 
 by two Frank doctors, by the English Consul, by 
 one of the American missionaries, by the French 
 Consul, and by others. At the same place another 
 friend, who knew the country and the people 
 better than any other man then living in it, de- 
 clared that the fact was notorious, that everybody 
 in Brusa and in the Plain knew it, as also that the 
 life of the mother was often destroyed by the in- 
 fernal potion. A young Turkish woman of Brusa 
 recently married, and then healthy and handsome, 
 
 though very poor, told Madam that she was 
 
 determined to have no children ; that no son of 
 hers, after being suckled at her breast and brought 
 up with care and cost, should be taken from her to 
 live far away in barracks and be a tactico. While 
 we were at Brusa this young Turkish woman, gaunt 
 and haggard, was crawling about the streets ; she 
 had no children, nor had she any health left. I 
 had medical authority for the prevalence of the 
 practice up at Kutayah and the regions beyond. 
 Some confirmation of the horrible fact met me 
 wherever I went. The Sultan's limiting, or pre- 
 tending to limit, the soldier's service to five years 
 had not abated it the growth of poverty was in- 
 creasing it it had never been so common as within 
 
 F 2
 
 6-8 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the last two or three years, a period during which 
 the speedy resurrection of the Ottoman empire 
 had been daily predicted by the salaried journalists 
 at Constantinople, whose vaticinations seem to have 
 been accepted as accomplished facts by many 
 people in Christendom predisposed to expect 
 miracles from everything that bears the name of 
 " Political Reform." The march of Turkish reform 
 has trampled out the deepest feeling, the most 
 glowing affection of the human heart ; it has 
 dashed the mother's joy at the birth of her first- 
 born ; it has deprived the father of his love and 
 pride for his progeny. Twenty-five years ago I 
 heard nothing of these horrors. Add to them the 
 universal prevalence, among all the more pros- 
 perous classes of the Turks, of the unnameable vice, 
 which sank the Cities of the Plain into the fiery 
 abyss, and then, without reference to other abomi- 
 nations, let my readers pause and ask themselves 
 whether Christian nations can league to support 
 the Turkish empire without committing an outrage 
 on humanity and on the faith they profess ? 
 
 I cannot believe that, as a fighting force, the 
 Sultan's navy is at all superior to his regular army. 
 A few days after our arrival in the capital (in 
 August, 1847) we saw the Capitan Pasha, who, 
 as usual, was a landsman, and wholly ignorant of
 
 THE TURKISH NAVY. 9 
 
 maritime affairs, get under weigh with a squadron 
 of five or six ships of the line, three or four 
 frigates, a corvette, and two very large brigs. 
 Most of these vessels were well-modelled beautiful 
 hulls, having been built entirely under the direction 
 of foreigners. The corvette, built in America, and 
 purchased by the Sultan, was thought to be as per- 
 fect a hull as ever floated. I certainly never saw 
 anything more graceful. But in all these ships the 
 rigging, the trim, the handling of the yards, the 
 setting of the sails, were deplorably bad. A friend 
 who was with us at the time, and who was an old 
 and thorough British seaman, said that they were 
 enough to throw a sailor into fits. Since the war 
 of Greek independence, the Porte is very shy of 
 employing the Greeks, who made and make ex- 
 cellent mariners, and who almost entirely manned 
 the Imperial fleet before the breaking out of the 
 Greek revolution. The Turks are decidedly anti- 
 aquatic an anti-maritime race and those who 
 are sailors to the Sultan are never kept long enough 
 afloat at a time, or sent far enough to sea, to learn 
 much of their business. They are generally ashore, 
 in barracks (chiefly), nine months in the year, or, 
 if on shipboard, it is only at anchor in the Golden 
 Horn, in the Bosphorus or Dardanelles, or some 
 very snug nook in the Sea of Marmora. In the
 
 70 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 spring of 1848, between marines and shipmen 
 (they could not be called sailors), Abdul Medjid 
 had nearly 12,000 men for his navy, all doing 
 nothing. This caused a prodigious, and, for the 
 most part, a very unnecessary expense. Since the 
 preceding autumn, the bulk of the fleet, dismantled, 
 had been lying in the Golden Horn. A good 
 squadron of steamers is all the fleet that Turkey 
 really requires, and is more than all she can use 
 without the aid of foreigners. In fact, without the 
 aid of English engineers, she could not move a 
 single steamer into the Black Sea, or out into the 
 Mediterranean. The poor Turkish peasants that 
 are seized in Asia Minor, or up in the European 
 provinces, and Tsent to the arsenal to be turned 
 into marines or sailors, really dread the sea, and 
 hate it with a more than Celtic hatred. There 
 was a talk of again impressing Greeks, but the 
 Turkish officers were evidently afraid of having 
 any of them on board, well knowing that the 
 sympathies of these men are with the Hellenes of 
 King Otho, and their co-religionists the Russians. 
 In a time of trouble or of war Rescind Pasha's 
 amalgamation theory or vision would be but slight 
 security, should a Turkish ship of war, half manned 
 with Greeks, come alongside of a Russian ship in 
 the Black, or an Hellenic ship in the White Sea.
 
 TURKISH SAILORS. 7 1 
 
 The Armenians, a thoroughly Asiatic, inland people, 
 are as averse to the sea as the Turks, and have still 
 less stomach for fighting than for sailing. Over in 
 Asia, in Armenia Proper, and in some of the 
 regions which their hardy and warlike ancestors 
 conquered and occupied, the case may be somewhat 
 different; but the Armenians of Constantinople, 
 and the neighbouring provinces of Europe and 
 Asia Minor, are the greatest poltroons that can be 
 met with. The Jews, though very numerous, are 
 not to be thought of for sailors. 
 
 We went over the fleet more than once. The 
 first time Osman Pasha, a vice-admiral, would take 
 us off in his own boat and in good style. I shall 
 not soon forget the awkwardness displayed by the 
 poor Turks : at starting, one of the boatmen caught 
 a crab, and another let his oar fall overboard. Old 
 Osman, who was one of the very few among them 
 that knew anything of practical seamanship, grew 
 as red as a turkeycock. He had served with 
 British men-of-war at the bombardment of Acre, 
 and he had been a good deal in England. We 
 had to cross some hawsers ; the steersman sent us 
 bang upon one of them, and if there had been any 
 sea we must have been turned keel uppermost 
 The pasha's objurgations only made the poor fellows 
 more confused and stupid ; and if at last we got
 
 72 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 free of these hawsers without a wet jacket, it was 
 more than I had expected. We went over the 
 Capitan Pasha's ship, and three other ships of the 
 line, carrying from 80 to 120 guns each. As the 
 masts were struck, and nearly all the rigging down, 
 the points in which the Turks are so deficient were 
 not observable. The decks were tolerably clean 
 and orderly. Stores, arms, and all things below 
 deck were admirably arranged. There was a 
 proper place for everything, and everything was in 
 its place. This was a great improvement on the 
 practice of former days, and I believe the Turks 
 have been indebted for it to Admiral Sir Baldwin 
 Walker while in the Sultan's service. The guns 
 were good and kept clean; many of them were 
 English, and they had all good locks. We visited 
 a frigate with a very beautiful hull, and found it in 
 much the same condition as the ships of the line, 
 everything below deck being in good order. 
 
 We went over an enormously large brig, which 
 was very solidly built, and said to be a first-rate 
 seaboat. Of course our friend Osman Pasha took 
 us only to the ships that were in best condition. 
 [We afterwards visited, by ourselves, some that 
 were in a wretched plight, and two that were cer- 
 tainly not seaworthy that must have gone to the 
 bottom if taken out into the open sea and exposed
 
 THE NAVY. 73 
 
 to a stiff breeze. All these tubs are now included 
 in the formidable list of the Ottoman navy so 
 artistically drawn up by the Constantinopolitan 
 journalists and so credulously repeated by some of 
 our newspapers at home.] We next visited, with 
 Osman, the war-steamer Medjidieh, which had been 
 launched the preceding summer at the arsenal. 
 She was a roomy, splendid-looking vessel, but far 
 too heavily timbered. She was of 1600 tons, and, 
 with Maudslay's fine engines of 400 horse-power, 
 she scarcely made more than five knots an hour 
 in descending the sea of Marmora with the current 
 in her favour. What she would make against 
 wind and current may be conceived. An English 
 engineer on board told me that she was next to 
 useless, and that so she must remain unless engines 
 of much higher power were put into her. Her 
 cabin was most elegantly fitted up and decorated ; 
 there was a fireplace of pure white marble, orna- 
 mented with gold arabesques, and as pretty a 
 thing as could be seen. The whole cabin was like 
 an elegant drawing-room, but nothing in it had 
 been done by Turkish hands or by the hands of 
 any of the people of the country. It was all the 
 work of Italians and other foreigners settled in 
 Galata and Pera, though, should this war-steamer 
 ever come to France or England, the cabin will
 
 74 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 be shown as an evidence of the rapid progress the 
 Turks are making in the arts. Near to this Med- 
 jidieh lay the Tahif, another war -steamer of about 
 the same size and force. Her engines also were 
 found of insufficient power. This capital mistake 
 has been committed over and over again. The 
 pashas in the arsenal, instead of relying on the 
 English shipwrights and engineers in their employ- 
 ment, depend entirely on their Armenian seraffs 
 and agents, and transmit the orders for the machi- 
 nery to England, invariably getting fine commis- 
 sions and pickings thereby, and almost invariably 
 committing some monstrous blunder. Mr. Philips? 
 of Hastings, with four English workmen, and such 
 wretched aid as he could obtain from a score or two 
 of Turkish and Armenian blacksmiths, managed 
 to build them an iron steamer. While the work 
 was in progress, and before the order for the 
 engines was transmitted, he gave them, not one, 
 but three drawings and plans, showing the form, 
 proportions, and size of which the engines ought to 
 be constructed. But the Armenians sent a plan 
 and instructions of then: own, and when the engines 
 arrived they did not fit, or in any way suit the 
 vessel for which they were destined. The Med- 
 jidieh and the Tahif were the only war-steamers 
 we saw. The Vasitei Tidjaret, built in 1846-7 by
 
 THE NAVY. 75 
 
 Messrs. White of Cowes, though a frigate in size, 
 and a truly beautiful craft, is too slightly built 
 ever to be fit for war.* All the splendid steamers 
 on the Black Sea, built by Pitcher on the London 
 river for the Russians, are extra kneed, bulwarked, 
 and thoroughly fit for war a great advantage 
 (besides the numerical one) which the Tzar has 
 over the Sultan. The Turks may have about 
 fifteen or sixteen common steamers of inconsider- 
 able size employed as packets, passage-boats, and 
 for carrying merchandise ; but these, except as 
 tugs, would not be available in war, and, as tugs, 
 their risk of destruction would be great. I believe 
 that two steamers which I saw on the stocks in 
 the arsenal have been launched and fitted out as 
 warlike ships since my return home, but as yet 
 the Sultan can scarcely be said to possess more 
 than the embryo of a steam navy. There were 
 but few men afloat in the ships we visited with 
 Osman Pasha, and these poor fellows seemed quite 
 out of their element. Instead of round jackets, 
 they all wore long, loose, grey, great-coats, coming 
 nearly down to their heels, an unseemly, slovenly 
 garment, and the most inconvenient of all on 
 board ship. They looked rather like sick men in 
 
 * The excellent builders were not allowed by their contract to 
 make her stronger.
 
 76 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 an hospital than sailors ; they were docile and dull ; 
 there was no life or spirit among them, although 
 they were nearly all young fellows. We could 
 tell, from their countenances, that many of them 
 were peasants from the interior of Asia Minor, 
 and that they were yearning to be back among 
 their native daghs and deres.* In every ship 
 there was a forecastle, fitted out as an hospital, 
 with iron-post bedsteads ; but we saw no sick ; the 
 patients had been removed to the badly-situated 
 navy hospital, where people were dying rapidly of 
 cholera. Their chances of recovery would have 
 been far greater on board. Osman Pasha thought 
 so too ; but the hekims did not like the trouble of 
 going off to the ships in rough, cold, rainy weather, 
 and the Capitan Pasha had ordered that they 
 should all be sent to the hospital. The officers 
 wore brown frock-coats with a little gold embroidery 
 on the collars, brown being the colour chosen for 
 the uniform of the Sultan's navy. They were 
 civil, very quiet men, but not one of them had the 
 look or carriage of a sailor. 
 
 Of all the young men who have been educated 
 in England and France (and not without some 
 trouble to the governments and officers of these 
 
 * Mountains and valleys.
 
 EUROPEAN EDUCATION OF TURKS. 77 
 
 two friendly nations) we scarcely saw one in the 
 fleet Their number, in active service, in the army 
 appeared to be exceedingly small. Many of them 
 had been entirely neglected after their return from 
 Christendom set aside as if they were suspects. 
 Others had been put in very inferior places, in 
 which their acquirements were of no use. Some 
 had rapidly forgotten all that they had learned, 
 and were fast returning to the vegetable life of a 
 mere Turk. One of the smartest of them all, a 
 gentlemanly young man who had passed an ap- 
 prenticeship in English men-of-war, and who as 
 yet spoke our language like an Englishman, had 
 never any higher employment than that of occa- 
 sionally taking charge of a tub of a steamer that 
 ran in summer-time between the capital and the 
 near-at-hand Prince's Islands. The fortunate few 
 who had been rapidly promoted by subserviency, 
 favour, and intrigue, had been put in all sorts of 
 places (never being left long enough in one to 
 learn its proper duties), had linked themselves 
 with the corrupt Armenian saraffs or bankers, had 
 become pashas, and were growing fat, idle, rapa- 
 cious, and useless. Such, I solemnly assure the 
 reader, is a correct sketch of the general history 
 of the young Turks that have been sent into 
 Christendom for education. It may be suspected
 
 78 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 that few of them returned true Mussulmans, or 
 carried back with them any religion whatever. I 
 was, however, told of several of them who had 
 gone strongly into the fanatical and anti-reform 
 line. This may have proceeded in part from their 
 wish to remove unfavourable impressions in cer- 
 tain prejudiced quarters, and in part from their 
 disappointment and irritation at not obtaining em- 
 ployment and promotion. All the boudeurs in 
 the empire, however small their belief, or however 
 loose their practice, seemed to be taking to fana- 
 ticism. Wherever it could be done safely, they 
 held up Rescind Pasha, little Ali Pasha, and all 
 the rest of the Reform party, as infidels and 
 atheists A-ommes sansfoi et sans loi who would 
 one day be sacrificed to the just fury of the still 
 believing part of the Osmanlees. 
 
 Admitting that six of them were old, crazy, and 
 worthless, Osman Pasha said that the Sultan had 
 eighteen ships of the line. We could never count 
 more than twelve, and of these three seemed to be 
 past all mending ; and five others, I was assured, 
 were in so bad case, that, were they to fire a broad- 
 side, half of their sides would follow the fire. Of 
 frigates and corvettes we did not see more than 
 ten. There may have been a ship of the line and 
 one or two frigates laid up in ordinary in the Gulf
 
 FALSEHOODS OF EUROPEAN JOURNALS. 79 
 
 of Salonica, and a similar force in the nook oppo- 
 site Gallipoli, at the inner mouth of the Darda- 
 nelles ; but other force there certainly was none.* 
 Yet not a few of our French and English jour- 
 nalists were confidently asserting at the time that, 
 without counting frigates, the Sultan's splendid 
 fleet counted forty sail of the line ! ! And I now 
 see these fables repeated. But even if the Turks 
 had such a number of big ships, of what service 
 would they be with such crews? The Russians 
 may not be the best, but they are prime sailors 
 compared with the Turks, and they are animated 
 with a heart and courage which seems to have 
 totally deserted these poor de-nationalised, de- 
 religionised Osmanlees. An American, one of the 
 officers of Captain Lynch,f said, that out at sea, in 
 
 * A very competent English judge, who had had his eye upon 
 them for years, assured me that not more than five ships of the 
 line were fit for war, or were even seaworthy. Since then one of 
 their best ships of the line has been blown up, with all in her, 
 close to the arsenal wharf, through Turkish stupidity and care- 
 lessness ! I never (particularly when my son was with me) 
 felt quite comfortable or safe for ten minutes in any of their ships. 
 
 If the explosion on board that ship of the line had taken place 
 only ten minutes later, the Sultan and half of his grandees would 
 have gone into the air with the rest of the victims, for Abdul 
 Medjid, with a long train of three-tailed pashas, was on his 
 way to visit her, and was only at a short distance when the 
 tremendous explosion took place. 
 
 t The conductor of the American expedition for surveying the
 
 80 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 a fair sea-fight, with a wind to manoeuvre, and 
 enough of it to make manoeuvring a necessity to 
 the Turks, he thought that two heavy United 
 States or English frigates ought to be able to give 
 a good account of the whole Ottoman fleet. This 
 was said by a very clever young man, in no brag- 
 gadocio spirit ; it was merely a conclusion to which 
 the American officer had come after examining the 
 ships, the composition of the crews, their habits, 
 and notorious want of seamanship.* 
 
 The ingratitude of the Turkish Government is 
 as monstrous as its folly. Over and over again the 
 Porte applied to the British Government for some 
 good officer to put the fleet in order, and to act 
 as instructor. That distinguished officer, Captain 
 (now Admiral Sir Baldwin) Walker, was sent out 
 to Constantinople. Well ! and what happened 
 then, and how was he treated ? After he had toiled 
 
 Dead Sea, and the author of the now well-known book on that 
 always interesting subject. 
 
 * It will be remembered that at Navarino the Turks and 
 Egyptians were all moored in a close harbour, with the protection 
 of land batteries, etc. They did not manoeuvre ; they did not so 
 much as move ; they were merely floating batteries. 
 
 I forget what force my friend the late Captain Hamilton had 
 with him a few days before that battle, but I think that it was 
 only his own frigate, two other frigates, and a sloop of war ; yet 
 he (the most modest of men) said that, if he had fallen in with 
 them well out at sea, and had had the requisite orders, he would 
 not have hesitated to attack.
 
 TURKISH INGRATITUDE. 81 
 
 in the fleet, and had shown their ships how to go 
 into battle on the coast of Syria, after he had 
 done all that mortal man could do to improve both 
 arsenal and fleet they put him on the shelf, they 
 slighted him, and they finally, by a crowning in- 
 sult, induced him to send in his resignation. The 
 Pashas would not, could not, have him in the 
 arsenal ; he stood between them and their nefa- 
 rious profits. As a British officer he could not go 
 shares in their plunder, but was always ready to 
 expose their iniquity. They would not have him 
 in the fleet, because he was always insisting that 
 the poor men should be fairly and regularly paid, 
 without addio, or any of those deductions which are 
 constantly exacted by sea-treasurers and seraffs. 
 He was more hated by the Armenian money- 
 mongers than by the Turkish pashas ; and when 
 these two bodies are united together and allies in 
 hostility, no honest man, powerful as he may be, 
 can hope to stand against them. Though he fought 
 in one of their ships at Acre, they never really 
 allowed Sir Baldwin the rank and free action of a 
 commander ; an ignorant booby pasha was over his 
 head. In his person the Queen and Government 
 of Great Britain were insulted and outraged, as well 
 as himself. * 
 
 In their way the American shipbuilders, who 
 
 o
 
 82 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 had rendered them such essential services, and who 
 had constructed for them the only really good ships 
 they have upon the water, were treated with equal 
 grossness and ingratitude. Mr. Eckford, who took 
 out to them from New York that most beautiful 
 corvette, was induced to enter their service. He 
 attempted to organize their arsenal and ship-yards ; 
 he was very irregularly paid, was often insulted, 
 and constantly thwarted ; he lost his health and 
 spirits, and soon died of malaria fever, caught in 
 the foul unwholesome arsenal, or as some con- 
 fidently asserted of poison. Mr. Rhodes, of Long 
 Island, who succeeded him, was a light-hearted, 
 bustling man, full of rough energy, and he had the 
 luck to become an especial favourite with the then 
 active Sultan Mahmoud, who looked to things 
 with his own eyes, and frequently dropped into 
 the ship-yard without any previous announcement. 
 Moreover, Rhodes, who soon picked up a good deal 
 of Turkish himself, had the rare good fortune to 
 find an honest dragoman with courage enough to 
 translate faithfully to any great man whatever 
 his employer said. Another vast advantage was, 
 that he had free access to the Sultan nearly at all 
 times. He bullied the pashas as they had never 
 been bullied before ; and bullying is the only 
 effective process with these Turks. Whenever he
 
 TURKISH INGRATITUDE. 83 
 
 caught them tripping, he threatened them with 
 exposure. One day he ordered the men to stop 
 work, left the arsenal in a towering passion, and 
 leaped into his caique. They asked where he was 
 going. " I am going to the palace," said he, " to 
 tell the Sultan that you are all thieves all!" 
 In spite of Armenian seraffs, he brought down 
 more than one great man with a run. In a dispute 
 about accounts, the nazir, or superintendent, being 
 hard pressed and losing his temper, called Rhodes 
 a pezavenk. Not satisfied with calling him another, 
 and something worse, the American citizen broke 
 his pipe-stick over the head of the Mussulman 
 effendi. It was by energy like this that the Long- 
 Islander was enabled to complete immense, truly 
 splendid seventy-gun frigates, and to do a great 
 deal more of very useful work. But when Sultan 
 Mahmoud died he lost his power and prestige. 
 Abdul Medjid was then a mere boy ; a new set of 
 pashas came into office, and did as they liked. 
 Rhodes presently sent in his resignation, which was 
 eagerly accepted ; except it be that very brave men 
 rarely meet that fate, it was wonderful that he was 
 not assassinated. His brother-in-law, Mr. Reeves, 
 who had been his foreman in the arsenal, then 
 took his place, but only to be scandalously used. 
 For three whole years he never received a para of 
 
 G 2
 
 84 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 pay ! With an unsettled account he left in dis- 
 gust. He returned to Constantinople while we 
 were there, to press for payment of what the 
 government owed him. He brought with him the 
 model of a cheap, most convenient, excellent 
 steam ferry-boat, which might be most usefully 
 employed in carrying the people who were con- 
 stantly passing and repassing between the capital 
 and the Asi'atic suburb of Scutari. They were 
 keeping him in play, trotting him from pasha to 
 pasha, procrastinating in their ujsual way, and tor- 
 menting him sadly. 
 
 I could multiply instances of Turkish ingrati- 
 tude, which was never displayed in more odious 
 colours than in the case of Mr. Frederick Taylor, 
 the able English engineer and architect, who, 
 amoDg other valuable works, had erected for the 
 Sultan the fine English machinery at Tophana for 
 the boring and finishing of cannon, and the splendid 
 Mint in the Seraglio, the one perfect thing the 
 Turks possess ; but the repetition would be tedious, 
 and in a work like this out of place. 
 
 Many years ago I believe before the time of Sul- 
 tan Selim a feeble attempt was made to establish 
 a naval school for the instruction of young officers. 
 There is one now in the arsenal, in a respectable 
 building which was once the Admiralty ; but at the
 
 NAVAL SCHOOL. 85 
 
 time of our first visit in February, 1848, no school 
 was open, and no instruction had been given there for 
 many months. Old Halil, the new Capitan Pasha, 
 must needs signalize his accession to office by re- 
 modelling the establishment and by enlarging the 
 building, which, for all useful purposes, was quite 
 large enough before. The place was in the pos- 
 session of Armenian masons, carpenters, plasterers, 
 &c., and was not likely to be evacuated by them 
 for months to come.* 
 
 They were spending a great deal of time and 
 money in fitting out a reception-room for the Sul- 
 tan, in which were to be a splendid sofa, a gilded 
 fauteuil, and all those paraphernalia, of which 
 every item is contrary to the law of the Prophet 
 Maps, books, instruments, were all locked up in 
 closets, to preserve them from the terrible dust the 
 Armenians were making. Nominally, there were 140 
 students ; but we saw no more than about twenty 
 dirty youths, who were doing absolutely nothing. 
 They were keeping up all the while a numerous 
 and expensive teaching staff, including one or two 
 
 * Halil Pasha's additions to the building were almost entirely 
 of wood wood-work tacked to the original stone-work. When 
 the wood takes fife, as it is sure to do some day, the stone will 
 hardly be safe. 
 
 The average life of a house in Constantinople is calculated, 
 I believe, at seven years.
 
 86 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Frenchmen. The new Capitan Pasha, who knew 
 nothing of the sea, or of navigation or astronomy, 
 or any other science, was in no hurry. No doubt 
 he was contented with reflecting that he was making 
 the building a good bit bigger, and that some day 
 or other the Sultan would come in state to see it 
 finished, and with its first varnish on. 
 
 We saw the same processes in many more of the 
 governmental establishments, and in nearly all of 
 them a lavishing and throwing away of money 
 of money cruelly extorted from an absolutely im- 
 poverished people of money which, with very 
 little metaphor, might be said to be wet with the 
 tears and heart's blood of rayahs and Mussulmans ! 
 Here, again, the Armenian hoof or paw is most 
 visible. The architects, the contractors, and the 
 builders are invariably Armenians, who are sup- 
 ported by, and go shares with, the great Armenian 
 seraffs one of the greatest curses of Turkey. 
 These bankers, who had brought every establish- 
 ment of government, and well-nigh every grandee, 
 into their debt, were constantly urging the pashas 
 to commit fresh acts of extravagance ; and when 
 the Armenian creditor vigorously pushed any plan, 
 it was not often that his Turkish debtor grand 
 pasha as he might be could offer any long oppo- 
 sition.
 
 NAVAL SCHOOL. 87 
 
 About the beginning of the month of June 
 (1848), the naval school was made accessible to 
 the students, whose real number, instead of being 
 140, was somewhat less than 50. After long de- 
 lays, equivocations, and intrigues (carried on more 
 by the Armenians than by the Turks), they had 
 done one good thing, for they had engaged an 
 excellent teacher of mathematics, geography, and 
 astronomy. This was the very able and amiable 
 Mr. Lang, a civil engineer from Edinburgh, a man 
 with an extraordinary range of scientific and prac- 
 tical knowledge, who had been kept five years in 
 the country, in the pay of government, without 
 having been allowed the opportunity of doing one 
 useful thing to earn his not inconsiderable salary. 
 He was now too happy to have something to do. 
 He spoke and read Turkish with perfect ease. 
 This gave him a great advantage in the school and 
 elsewhere. He had only about twenty pupils, but 
 they were docile and willing, and he thought that 
 ten or twelve of the number might really make 
 good mathematicians. Besides Emin Pasha, who 
 was favourably known even at Cambridge, several 
 others who had been educated in Europe were said 
 to have given proofs of a facility in acquiring ma- 
 thematical knowledge. But mathematics alone 
 will not make either a sailor or a soldier, and will
 
 88 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 certainly not prop up this tumbling empire. Be- 
 sides, how few, how very few Turks have incli- 
 nation or the means to acquire such knowledge ? 
 
 As in the days of Anastasius, the Turkish fleet 
 (except on very rare occasions) is sent to sea only 
 during the -fine smooth summer weather. It then 
 cruises for two or three months among the closely 
 clustered islands of the Archipelago, or rather it 
 creeps from one convenient island, port, or road- 
 stead to another, passing far more time at anchor 
 than at sea ; and the conventional period of trial 
 being over, it returns to Constantinople, and is 
 made snug in the Golden Horn. Yet these annual 
 trips never pass off without some of the accidents 
 and blunders which Anastasius has so pleasantly 
 recorded. The Sultan makes Capitan Pashas, or 
 Commanders-in-chief of the navy, of all manner 
 of men, without any reference whatever to their 
 specific qualifications. A man may be commander 
 of the cavalry one day and capitan pasha the next. 
 Then they are never left long enough in the post 
 to learn anything of the profession, or to acquaint 
 themselves even with the details of the administra- 
 tive part of the service. Between June 1847 and 
 June 1848, the Capitan Pasha was changed three 
 times, but never to give place to a sailor. There 
 was not one of these great pashas that could go to
 
 THE CAPITAN PASHA. 89 
 
 sea without being dreadfully sea-sick, or that did 
 not loathe that element. They intrigued and 
 caballed for the post on account of its honours and 
 distinctions it being, of course, one of the very 
 first in the Empire and also, and perhaps still 
 more, on account of the enormously high salary 
 attached to it, and the glorious pickings to be made 
 in it. 
 
 In 1846 the Capitan Pasha of that date set out 
 with the Sultan and his suite, in a fine large 
 steamer, to make a short voyage in the Black Sea. 
 The Sultan was going to visit Adrianople, and I 
 believe his intention was to land at Varna, and 
 proceed thence, overland, through the Thracian 
 peninsula. They had scarcely got out of the 
 smooth water of the Bosphorus ere they began to 
 be seriously incommoded by the swell of the 
 Euxine ; and when they had got two or three 
 leagues beyond the blue Symplegades it was a 
 rapid " 'bout ship " with them ! The Sultan was 
 thought to be dying, the Capitau Pasha was still 
 worse ; all were very bad ! Such of them as could 
 speak were cursing their forehead for having em- 
 barked, or making vows that they would never 
 again trust themselves to that horrible Black Sea. 
 The ludicrous scene was described to me by a Eu- 
 ropean who was on board, and who declared that
 
 90 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 it was a beautiful day and quite calm weather. 
 The steamer was run back into the Bosphorus, 
 where the Sultan and all his grandees immediately 
 landed. The Capitan Pasha was in so reduced and 
 pitiful a state that he had to be carried into the boat 
 in men's arms. The poor Sultan was not much 
 better.* Fancy such a Lord High Admiral as this 
 in command of the fleet, at sea, and in presence of 
 a bold enemy ! 
 
 As an adjunct to army and navy, and as one of 
 the most conspicuous of the modern improvements, 
 the Medical School at Galata Serai, in Pera, calls 
 for some attention. In our time (in 1848) the 
 president of it was one Ismael, a renegade Greek, 
 a supple courtier and an accomplished buffoon, 
 who had been advanced to his high dignities 
 through the favour of the enlightened Reschid 
 Pasha I had a letter for him from the Ottoman 
 Consul- General in London, but I could never get 
 sight of him ; he was always engaged in paying 
 court to the courtiers, or in buffooning for the 
 amusement of the pashas. I called at least a dozen 
 times at the Galata Serai, in the hope of finding 
 him there at his post ; I trudged twice through 
 deep snow and slush to his private residence, at 
 
 * My friend Mr. Porter, the American Consul, saw this 
 curious disembarkation. See Appendix IV.
 
 MEDICAL SCHOOL. 91 
 
 rather an early hour in the morning : he was in- 
 visible. I left my letter, and he took no notice of 
 it or of me. At last I resorted to that step which 
 hardly ever failed me.* I walked into the Medical 
 College, spoke with some of the people, said I was 
 an English traveller, and asked to be conducted 
 .over the establishment. The Kehayah, or super- 
 intendent, though a very ignorant and a very 
 rapacious man, was sufficiently civil, and a Turkish 
 professor of ' Clinica,' a Stamboulee, who had never 
 quitted his native city, but who yet spoke French 
 fluently and correctly, was not only exceedingly 
 polite, but attentive and communicative. I repeated 
 my visit, and afterwards spent two whole mornings 
 in examining these schools. I say nothing of the 
 paltriness and perilousness of the wooden buildings, 
 for they served only as a temporary lodging, and a 
 spacious stone edifice, appropriately situated in the 
 great cemetery, was now almost finished, and this 
 edifice was to be the Medical College. No harsh 
 criticism could apply to the liberality of the young 
 Sultan in providing the sums necessary for stocking 
 the establishment with implements, museums, cabi- 
 nets, and other means and facilities of study. All 
 the last improved instruments of Paris, London, 
 
 * It failed me, however, at the Seraskier's great prisons, and 
 at several other places.
 
 92 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 and Vienna, were to be found in the Galata Serai 
 There was a small but not bad botanical garden ; 
 there was a Natural History Museum, with a col- 
 lection of geological specimens attached ; there 
 was a very sufficient medical library, the books being 
 nearly every one French; there was a good ana- 
 tomical theatre, and an excellent " Gabinetto 
 Fisico," stocked with electric machines, galvanic 
 batteries, hydraulic presses, and nearly every ma- 
 chine and adjunct necessary to teach, or to experi- 
 mentalize in, the physical sciences ; and all these 
 things were of the most perfect kind, having been 
 purchased of the best makers in Christendom ; 
 and, thanks to the vigilant care and scrupulous 
 neatness of some Germans employed in the esta- 
 blishment, they were all, as yet, in excellent order. 
 I fear, however, that this apple-pie order denoted 
 that they were very seldom used. I was told 
 afterwards that, except a big electrical-machine, 
 whicli the Turks were pretty constantly employing 
 as a mere plaything, hardly any machine or appa- 
 ratus in this cabinet was ever touched. 
 
 What first or most powerfully roused my repro- 
 bation was the grossness of two attempts at decep- 
 tion. By the French journalists, and by other means, 
 the' world had been given to believe, 1. That 
 the number of resident fixed students was nearly
 
 MEDICAL SCHOOL. 93 
 
 double that which I found it. 2. That young 
 Greeks, Armenians, and even Jews, were admitted, 
 each in a number nearly equal to that of the 
 young Turks. The mudir, or superintendent, had 
 himself told me that there were more than 700 
 students. I now learned from some of the students 
 and two of the professors that there were not 400 
 inmates in all ; that the Turkish students amounted 
 to about 300 ; that of Greek students there were 
 ojily 40, of the Armenians only 29, and of Jews 
 no more than 15 I The mudir, who was a great 
 rogue and a dirty, had assured me that, collectively, 
 the Kayah students were rather more numerous 
 than the Mussulmans. It was not a Rayah, but a 
 Mussulman, who told me that the number of stu- 
 dents had been materially reduced since this 
 mudir's accession to the office, and who -gave me 
 to understand that the Sultan was still paying for 
 the larger number, and that the mudir and some 
 of his confederates in cheating were every month 
 putting the difference into their own pockets. Not 
 long ago the expenditure and accounts of the col- 
 lege had been managed and kept by an honest 
 conscientious man ; but such men can never long 
 retain their posts in Turkey. This present mudir 
 had previously been the superintendent of some 
 mines near Salonica, and it was said that (among
 
 94 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 friends) be would boast bow cleverly be bad 
 cheated the Government in that capacity. 
 
 Not only did the students pay no fees, but they 
 were paid for studying and living in the college. 
 Among the Turks there were none that could have 
 paid, and, in their regard, there was a strong reli- 
 gious prejudice to overcome.* To entice students, 
 the Sultan had granted monthly salaries, varying 
 from 20 piastres for the youngest boys, to 300 pias- 
 tres for the maturer students. Many of them were 
 mere children, who were doing nothing but learn- 
 ing French. The only really busy man in the 
 establishment was the French master. "They 
 must all wait for me," said he ; " the rest of the 
 professors can do nothing without me ! Until 
 these gar9ons shall have learned French they can 
 learn no other science. French is the only lan- 
 guage of science ! Science cannot be taught in 
 Turkish." In his last assertion he was not very 
 wide of the truth. The students were lodged as 
 well as boarded in the college. The money allowed 
 by the Sultan was ample for a good dietary, even 
 if the numbers had been filled up ; but the food 
 dispensed by the old mudir was of very inferior 
 quality. Clothes were also allowed by the Sultan. 
 
 The prejudice against dissection.
 
 MEDICAL SCHOOL. 95 
 
 The students had a uniform, or a blue frock-coat, 
 with light-green collar and facings, with the device 
 of ^Esculapius embroidered in silver. But this fine 
 coat was worn only when out of doors : the students 
 were, to the last degree, slovenly when within the 
 college. They all seemed to be taken from very 
 poor classes : I was told that the Turks were one 
 and all of the lowest grades, the sons of boatmen, 
 horse-keepers, petty dealers, bazaar porters, and 
 the like ; and that no Turk of the high or even 
 middle classes ever sent a son to the college. A 
 very considerable portion of the whole gave up all 
 thoughts of medicine as soon as they quitted the 
 college ; some being taken by government and em- 
 ployed in totally different services ; and others of 
 themselves renouncing a profession which was 
 badly paid and led to no promotion. I was assured 
 that scarcely one of these students, on quitting 
 Galata Serai, was well grounded in his profession, 
 or fit to be more than a dresser, or hospital mate. 
 I certainly never found one, either in the barrack 
 hospitals, or in any other hospital or establishment 
 of Government, occupying a higher post than that 
 of hospital mate; and of those I heard of, who 
 were acting as surgeons of regiments, / heard no 
 good. The young men found that they could turn 
 the advantages of their education to better account. 
 By 'entering the service of pashas or other great
 
 96 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 men, as secretaries, dragomans, and factotums, 
 they could at once get double the pay, and more 
 than double the chances, of a poor hekim they 
 could get upon the crooked road of state business 
 or state intrigue, with a fair or foul chance of be- 
 coming great pashas themselves. Of the really 
 clever young men who had completed their term 
 and were now out in the world, I could scarcely 
 hear of more than two that were hekims. The 
 medical school of Galata Serai, therefore, does not 
 make many doctors or surgeons. On every oppor- 
 tunity the Sultan's journalists presented a charm- 
 ing picture of the harmony, union, and brotherly 
 love which reigned in the college. And was it not 
 beautiful to see Osmanlees and Rayahs, Turks, 
 Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, living together in 
 peace and amity within the same precincts, and all 
 united by the same studies and the common love 
 of science ? The picture was charming, but it was 
 not true : the students, like George Colman's holy 
 friars, " quarrelled most invernally." The Turks, 
 being so much the more numerous, bullied all the 
 Rayahs, ate and lived apart from them, and would 
 not associate with them ; the Greeks hated the 
 Armenians, and the Armenians the Greeks, and 
 both united in treating the very feeble minority of 
 poor Jews with the greatest contumely. 
 
 I had heard a great deal in London and Paris
 
 KESCHID'S POLICY. 97 
 
 about the profound, mysterious, statesmanlike views 
 and theories of Reschid Pasha, and I heard a good 
 deal more about them at Constantinople. Several 
 times when I was complaining that I could see no 
 practical adoption of any such views that I could 
 see only that the country was getting every day 
 into a worse condition I was answered that I 
 must wait a little ; that I should soon see some- 
 thing wonderful ; that Reschid was known to enter- 
 tain the profoundest administrative views ; and 
 that some day, when he could bring his whole 
 system into play, it would act like the sacred fire 
 which Prometheus brought down from heaven. 
 Now, in reality, that Vizier never had any notion 
 or theory beyond this amalgamation of races and 
 religions. He was strictly a man of one idea. If 
 this idol theory of amalgamation could have been 
 tried anywhere with success, it was here, with boys 
 and striplings who were under government and 
 collegiate regulations, whose prejudices had not 
 attained to the stubbornness of age, and whose 
 religious scruples (whether Mahometan, or Chris- 
 tian, or Jewish) were pretty well obliterated by 
 bad French books and materialism. But there 
 was no amalgamation, or even the slightest ap- 
 proach to it. The antipathy of castes and races 
 was as strong and violent as ever. There was a 
 
 H
 
 98 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 negative, but no positive : Galata Serai had given 
 or was giving them one disbelief, but it had done 
 and was doing nothing that could give them one 
 belief, and blend them together, or make a one- 
 hearted people of them. Yet forms and cere- 
 monies were preserved, and great delays, interrup- 
 tions, and confusions, arose out of the differences 
 of religion : the Turks kept their sabbath or holi- 
 day on Friday, the Jews on Saturday, the Chris- 
 tians on Sunday, &c. ; and on these several days 
 they left the college and went home to their fami- 
 lies. The two French and two German professors 
 found these three holidays in a week exceedingly 
 inconvenient to themselves, and prejudicial to their 
 classes. 
 
 The professor of botany was a Turk, but he was 
 assisted by a skilful German gardener, a practical 
 botanist. There was a pretty good collection of 
 botanical engravings, coloured, and very neatly 
 executed at Paris and Vienna, and a few botanical 
 drawings, which had been copied from French 
 prints by some of the students. In the dissecting- 
 room about a dozen young Turks, by themselves, 
 were cutting up the body of a negress; on a 
 "sideboard" lay the uncovered and horrible- 
 looking corpse of a negro ; and in an ante-room 
 were slovenlily scattered the head, arms, legs, and
 
 MEDICAL SCHOOL. 99 
 
 all the disjecta membra of another Nubian. The 
 Mussulman students were talking and laughing, 
 handling the black human flesh with as little 
 scruple as if it had been mutton or lamb, and 
 working away with scalpels that were shorter than 
 our pocket silver fruit-knives. I asked one of 
 them whether all this were not somewhat contrary 
 to his religion.* He laughed in my face, and said, 
 " Eh ! Monsieur, ce n'est pas au Oalata Serai 
 qu'il faut venir chercher la religion I " One of 
 the Greek students, who was accompanying me, 
 enjoyed the Turk's sally very much, and assured 
 me that in this college they all became philosophes 
 a la Voltaire. I had reason to believe that they 
 went far beyond or below Voltaire. "You see," 
 said one of the professors, " how we extirpate pre- 
 judices ! Did you ever expect to see Turks open- 
 ing and cutting up a human body?" I replied, 
 " No ! " and, feeling rather sick, walked out of the 
 room and into the garden. I there learned from 
 those with me that the victory over prejudice was 
 very far from being complete. The Mussulmans 
 out-of-doors had a horror of dissection, and neither 
 Christian nor Jewish Rayahs could bear the idea 
 
 * The Koran says, "Thou shalt not open a dead body, 
 although it may have swallowed the most precious pearl belong- 
 ing to another." 
 
 H 2
 
 100 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of the body of one of their own family, or their 
 own sect, being given to the hospital. At the 
 time of my visits the cholera was carrying off daily 
 many Turkish soldiers, and particularly in the 
 arsenal barracks, just below Galata Serai, and very 
 many of the poorest Rayahs, but they never got a 
 body from either of these classes ; they never got 
 a white subject, except when some miserable, un- 
 friended, unknown Christian or Jewish convict in 
 the Bagn.o gave up the ghost ; they depended 
 almost exclusively upon the mortality among the 
 Nubian slaves, and now most rarely got any sub- 
 ject except a negro or negress. But of these there 
 was a plenty. Usually the master of the dead 
 slave was paid twenty or twenty-five piastres for 
 the body on delivery at the school 
 
 There was a tolerable chemical laboratory, with 
 a fair supply of apparatus. In this room I was 
 told that a good many of the Turkish and Arme- 
 nian students preferred chemical to any other 
 studies or experiments, because they hoped to find 
 out the art of transmuting the baser metals into 
 gold, or to discover the elixir vitce ! One credu- 
 lity takes the place of another. See the history of 
 the great French Revolution. Our neighbours had 
 never so many credulities, wild beliefs, or aspira- 
 tions, as when they had renounced all religious
 
 MEDICAL SCHOOL. 101 
 
 faith'. Among the books in this medical library 
 there were but too many of that bad period. It 
 was long since I had seen such a collection of 
 downright atheism. A young Turk, seemingly 
 about twenty years of age, was sitting cross-legged 
 in a corner of the room, reading that atheist's 
 manual, the Systcme de la Nature ! Another of 
 the students showed his proficiency in French and 
 philosophy by quoting passages from Diderot's 
 Jacques le Fataliste, and from that compound of 
 blasphemy and obscenity, Le Compere Mathieu. 
 "Les Turques se civilisent" Yes ! with a ven- 
 geance ! And when they are thus civilized, 
 what next ? 
 
 I saw a few works in German, and there ap- 
 peared to be a few French translations of English 
 medical works, but the bulk was wholly French. 
 CabaneYs Rapport de la Physique et du Morale 
 de I'Homme occupied a conspicuous place on the 
 shelves.* I no longer wondered it should be com- 
 
 * After visiting all these newly-formed European libraries I 
 again looked in vain for the old Oriental libraries attached to the 
 mosques and medressehs of which D'Ohsson has left us so splen- 
 did a description. In his time there were in the city of Con- 
 stantinople alone thirty-five of these Kitab-Khanes, or public 
 libraries, open every day except on the Tuesdays and Fridays. 
 He describes them as being crowded with MS. books, all beauti- 
 fully enclosed in morocco cases, and elegantly and conveniently 
 arranged in bookcases which covered the four sides of each 
 library. There is nothing of the sort now remaining ; at least
 
 102 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 monly said that every student who came out of 
 Galata Serai, after keeping the full term, came out 
 always a materialist, and generally a libertine and 
 rogue. 
 
 I met with the Systeme de la Nature in other 
 quarters. It appeared to be the book most dili- 
 gently perused in the great Military Hospital over 
 at Scutari. 
 
 The hospital attached to the Galata Serai was 
 not very creditable, the rooms being small and 
 crowded, and the patients' beds (sixty in all) 
 abominably foul. But in the new College then 
 building they were to have a spacious, well-venti- 
 lated hospital, with a proper division of walls, with 
 
 I never saw more than a few dirty MSS. very carelessly kept. 
 Yet it is not more than seventy years since D'Ohsson published 
 his work. Sultans Mahmoud and Abdul Medjid and their hungry 
 governments have eaten up the mosque and medresseh property, 
 and the vindictive, beggared professors and students have de- 
 stroyed, scattered, or sold the books. It was a well-known fact 
 over at Brusa that the students of one of the colleges there had 
 spitefully torn up or burned all the MSS. In Constantinople, 
 instead of being open, the libraries were almost hermetically 
 sealed. The Olema were evidently ashamed of exposing their 
 poverty and nakedness. I was again told of a wonderful library 
 in the innermost recesses of the serraglio, rich not only in Turk- 
 ish, Persian, and Arabic MSS., but also in ancient and middle-age 
 Greek MSS. ; but I could never gain access to it, nor could I ever 
 meet the person who had ever seen, even at a distance, or who 
 had ever known any one that had had a glimpse of it. I no more 
 believe in it than I do in the existence of that vast hidden 
 treasure of silver, gold, and diamonds that was so long fabled to 
 exist in the same recondite place.
 
 MEDICAL SCHOOL. 103 
 
 new . beds and bedding, and all things proper. I 
 here had additional evidence as to the prevalence 
 of a certain disease which twenty years before was 
 almost unknown among the Turks. I found sad 
 victims of it at Brusa, at Kutayah, and even in the 
 remote Turkish villages of Asia Minor. In nearly 
 every case the sufferer had been in the army, and 
 had contracted the disease in Constantinople, or 
 on the coast of Syria. Close by the library of 
 Galata Serai they had set up a German lithogra- 
 phic printing-press ; and two Armenians were 
 printing the skeleton forms of daily hospital re- 
 turns, in Turkish. These returns, I was told, were 
 duly filled up and sent every morning to our 
 invisible renegade friend Ismael Effendi, who 
 hardly ever came near the place. Soon after our 
 departure from the country this Hekim Bashi, or 
 Physician-in-chief, was suddenly turned into " Mi- 
 nister of Commerce ;" and only those who are on 
 the spot can tell how many different and opposite 
 places he may have been put into since then. This 
 is one of the innumerable proofs of Reschid Pasha's 
 administrative purity and ability. Ismael was a 
 beggar and almost starving in the streets of Paris 
 when Reschid first picked him up. He was, as I have 
 said, an accomplished buffoon. He could always 
 make the Grand Vizier laugh, and hence the secret
 
 104 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of his rapid promotion. We were told that some 
 elementary works in Turkish were in preparation, 
 and would be printed at this lithographic press. 
 But precisely the same information was given years 
 ago, and not one of tbese books has yet appeared 
 the Turks are so slow and indolent, the language is 
 so cramped and confined, the work so difficult* 
 Under the superintendence of a Frank professor, 
 some of the senior students had recently per- 
 formed various surgical operations. Two young 
 Greeks were pointed out as having uncommon 
 quickness, nerve, and address, and as being likely 
 to make excellent operators. 
 
 This Galata Serai had very different occupants 
 in the year 1828. I doubt, however, whether it 
 was much more moral then than now. It was 
 erected by Achmet III. as a place of education for 
 the imperial pages. Sultan Mahmoud converted 
 it into a Medical School ; and it is said that he 
 was so pleased with the innovation, that he traced 
 with his own hand the original inscription, which 
 is now copied in large letters of gold over the 
 grand entrance gate "All who look upon this 
 edifice will exclaim Aferim ! " (well done !) The 
 school was originally intended as a nursery, ex- 
 clusively for military and naval surgeons ; but 
 * See Appendix V.
 
 .TURKISH INSOLENCE. 105 
 
 these changing, fitful, capricious administrations 
 never adhere to any original plan. 
 
 Wherever I found them, the Frank professors 
 complained of the hauteur and incapacity of the 
 Osmanlees, and of the difficulty they found in 
 living amicably with them. 
 
 The insolency and contempt with which this 
 ignorant, haughty nation was long permitted to 
 treat foreigners was strongly marked in the mode 
 of reception by the Sultan at the public audience 
 given to a Christian ambassador. The representa- 
 tive of France or of England, of Austria or of 
 Russia, used always to be represented as a ghiaour 
 come to throw himself at the feet of his Highness, 
 and the Sultan pronounced the very flattering 
 formula, " Feed and clothe the infidel, and let him 
 come in." The infidel accordingly got a dinner, 
 and was then, together with his suite, clothed with 
 a caftan. At a sign given they proceeded to the 
 audience-chamber, where the arms of the ambas- 
 sador were laid hold of by two Turks of the impe- 
 rial household, and thus pinioned he was led before 
 the Sultan, who was seated on a bed-shaped throne, 
 with a diamond girdle round his loins and a dia- 
 mond aigrette on his turban, and who scarcely 
 deigned to speak to, or even to look at, the repre- 
 sentative of a Christian sovereign.
 
 106 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 For more than a quarter of a century his pride 
 has been rebuked and this insolency more than 
 checked. The Turks have been beaten into civi- 
 lity ; but, among the grandees, the hatred and 
 contempt of us still lingers in the innermost heart 
 Their forced and affected politeness to strangers is 
 very evidently a burthen to them, and they strongly 
 dislike our social and all other habits. The exer- 
 cise of hospitality beyond the giving of a cup of 
 coffee with the pipes seemed to be utterly un- 
 known to all the great Turks except two or three, 
 and even these never had (for Christians or Frstnks) 
 private friendly dinners, or anything like what we 
 understand by the word society. On their return 
 from the Porte in the afternoon they shut them- 
 selves up with their creatures, dependants, and 
 flatterers ; with them they dined and with them 
 they passed their evenings, until it was time to 
 withdraw into their harems, where they remained 
 until levee-hour next morning. After their levees 
 they went to the Porte, and from the Porte they 
 returned home to do as they had done yesterday. 
 This was their habitual life. You could never see 
 them in their houses except early in the morning. 
 You might indeed have audience of them at the 
 Porte, where their chief occupation appeared to be 
 smoking. Most of the great Pashas enlivened the
 
 LIFE OF THE PASHAS. 107 
 
 after-dinner hours by calling in professional buf- 
 foons and filthy old dervishes who could tell the 
 most smutty stories. In the detached government 
 offices it was not rare for some of the grandees to 
 take this solace in the daytime, and in what were 
 considered business hours. The Mint and the 
 Treasury, which are both situated within the second 
 gate of the Serraglio, were haunted at all times of 
 the day, and nearly every day of the week, by an 
 old dwarf of a dervish of the peripatetic order, 
 who was excessively filthy in his person, and still 
 filthier in his conversation. Yet this concrete of 
 filth and obscenity was almost constantly to be seen 
 in the Treasury, seated on the same divan with 
 Sarim Pasha, the Minister of Finance, who had 
 been for a considerable time the Sultan's Minister 
 Plenipotentiary in London ; or if the dervish was 
 not with the Minister of Finance he was pretty 
 sure to be found seated at the elbow of old Tahir 
 Pasha, the white-bearded Director-General of the 
 Mint. However important the business to be 
 transacted might be, or whatever might be the 
 quality of the persons repairing to the offices of 
 these two great government officers, if the dervish 
 chanced to be with either, he kept his seat of 
 honour in perfect ease and confidence. He was 
 very fat, being about as broad as he was long ; he
 
 108 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 had a hideous countenance, and the complexion 
 and carbuncles of a long-confirmed drunkard. 
 
 With such sociable tastes as these, with their 
 unchanged and unchanging harem system, and 
 their other thoroughly barbarous domestic arrange- 
 ments (a system and arrangements departed 
 from by none of them), it may be imagined that 
 these members of Reschid Pasha's reforming 
 government were not at all disposed to cultivate 
 European Society, or to give access to their houses 
 to men like me. 
 
 I might possibly, by exertion, have extended 
 the number to three; but it was only from one 
 Turk in the service of government that I had 
 friendly invitations, such as are given in civilized 
 countries ; and even this good and clever man, 
 superior as he was to all the Mussulmans I knew, 
 did not dare infringe the established usage of 
 women, or the laws of the harem, which in reality 
 are not strictly laws of the Prophet. We were at 
 his house rather frequently ; we dined there and 
 we slept there ; we heard the voice of his wife 
 we saw and played with her child ; but we never 
 saw her, even under her yashmac; we never so 
 much as caught a glimpse of the skirt of her 
 firidjee, and we could not inquire after her health 
 without a great breach of etiquette. And this was
 
 THE HAREM SYSTEM. 109 
 
 in the house of one who had lived long in Chris- 
 tendom, and who was, beyond all comparison, the 
 most enlightened, the most Europeanized, and 
 witty Osmanlee I ever encountered. In his 
 sitting-room were Shakspeare and Milton ; and 
 the EfTendi read with ease these works in their 
 original English, and took in the spirit of them ; 
 and his wife (he was too wise to have more than 
 one) was shut up in the harem! Even the Turks 
 who had long ago set at defiance the rules of the 
 Prophet ; who publicly drank the prohibited juice 
 of the grape, and to excess; who read French 
 novels and studied French materialism, and who 
 laughed at the Koran as " a creed outworn," had 
 not willed, or had not dared, to change their 
 abominable harem system. Yet, in the daytime, 
 their women, veiled and robed in such a manner 
 that their own husbands could not know them, 
 were constantly gadding about the city, or making 
 parties of pleasure to the Valley of the Sweet 
 Waters, or to other frequented places ;* and if half 
 the stories I heard were true, the seclusion, the 
 segregation within doors, was no check to intrigue 
 and immorality without.-^ 
 
 * See Appendix VI. 
 
 f "There they sit, upon carpets spread upon the ground, 
 making a society of themselves, and entertaining one another as
 
 110 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Before proceeding to discuss the Tanzimaut and 
 its blessings, the civil government, the state of 
 
 they best may with gossip, sweetmeats, and tobacco ; every one 
 of them veiled to the upper part of the nose and eyes. Men are 
 also there, sitting together and smoking, and taking no notice 
 whatever of the women. However, as we see both sexes in public 
 places, it cannot be said that the women are entirely cut off from 
 the men. The groups under the trees are very picturesque, 
 especially in a picture. In reality, although nature herself is 
 fair and free, the women are lifeless and awkward ; for this ever- 
 lasting sitting on the ground, which never permits you to see 
 more than half of the female form, is a terrible destroyer of 
 grace. Yet, well for these women when they are caught sitting. 
 For what a gait ! what crooked legs ! what turned-in feet are 
 theirs ! Not a dancing-master, but a drill-sergeant, would I 
 send them to cure that ugly waddling ! It is common to all the 
 Turkish ladies. Well, it is better, after all, that they should 
 settle down cross-legged on their carpets. A few provisions are 
 unpacked and spread upon the green grass ; and so, between 
 eating, drinking, talking, and tchibouque-smokiug, the Turkish 
 ladies manage to get through the best pan of the day in the open 
 air. Gaily-dressed children play about, and exhibit a little more 
 animation than their mammas, whilst dealers in confectionery, 
 sherbets, iced water, and fruit, walk gravely among the' sitters, 
 bawling their wares for sale." Letters from the Orient, &c., by 
 Ida, Countess of Hahn-Hahn. 
 
 This is a very pretty and (as far as it goes) correct picture of 
 Turkish out-door life in summer-time. But a great deal more 
 goes on at these gipsying parties than the fair countess knew, 
 or than she could as a lady describe. [See Appendix VII.] But 
 the great scenes for the consummation of intrigues are certain 
 accommodation houses kept by the vilest of the Franks of Pera 
 and Galata. A Turkish lady, attended by a female slave, drops 
 into one of these. Nobody can tell who she is or whence she 
 comes. No Turk must invade the sanctity of a Frank domicile. 
 The gallant is already within, smoking the pipe of expectation, 
 having arrived two or three hours earlier than the lady in order 
 to prevent suspicion or remark. These
 
 THE WOMEST. Ill 
 
 agriculture, &c., I may be allowed a few more 
 remarks on the military resources of the country, 
 and the decay of military spirit in it. If the 
 Turks cannot even aid in helping themselves, 
 assuredly no European alliance and armed inter- 
 vention can keep them long in Europe. 
 
 I have already presented some startling facts, 
 but these I could sustain with many more derived 
 from my own actual observation, or from the pub- 
 lished works of at least a score of the best of my 
 predecessors in Turkish travel. Good thirty years 
 ago the Rev. Dr. R. Walsh, who resided several 
 years at Constantinople, and who made more than 
 one journey through the European provinces (those 
 now more immediately menaced), was convinced 
 that all military ardour was becoming extinct ; 
 that the once proud Osmanlees no longer felt, in 
 any degree, the stimulus of glory, patriotism, or 
 religion. That the loss of martial virtue in a 
 people is speedily followed by the loss of every 
 
 These Turkish ladies, when abroad, muffle up their faces, and 
 yet heed not the exhibition of their bosoms. These, indeed, are 
 generally exposed in a most unbecoming, gross manner. They 
 glory in the lascivious evolutions of the Alme, and the still more 
 indecent performances of those horrible wretches the dancing 
 boys, and yet they will affect to blush at the immodesty of an 
 English lady in going without a veil. These remarks were 
 made by my old friend Dr. Madden (' Travels in Turkey, Egypt, 
 &c.') more than a quarter of a century ago, but they are equally 
 applicable at the present moment.
 
 112 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 other natural virtue, is a truism which is worn 
 threadbare, and which will not be disputed even 
 by Messrs. Cobden and Bright, or any of their 
 meek-eyed Manchester neophytes. 
 
 How different from what they now are were the 
 Turks under the early Mahomets, Selims and 
 Suleimans ! When they first came into Europe 
 they were the most warlike people then in the 
 world ; their armies were the best weaponed, best 
 organized, best disciplined ; they were thoroughly 
 masters of castrametation, of the art of making 
 trenches and approaches, and of nearly every other 
 art that conduces to speed and success in war. 
 Now, in spite of all their reforms and military 
 schools, they know next to nothing of these matters 
 I repeatedly saw them encamped. Nothing more 
 unscientific, more irregular, more slovenly, more 
 disgraceful. Up at Adrianople, where they were 
 preparing for an encampment, we found a vast 
 heap of tent-cloths lying on the damp ground, in 
 a corner of the mournful ruins of the Eski-Serai or 
 old palace of the Sultan's ; they were heaped up 
 like rubbish, and were torn, filthy, and even offen- 
 sive to the nostril. Thus are armed materials con- 
 stantly wasted through sheer indolence and care- 
 lessness ! Not a hundred yards off there was a 
 spacious and dry magazine in which they might
 
 ENCAMPMENTS. 113 
 
 have been stored.* The canvas had been originally 
 strong and good ; most of the tents had been 
 smeared over with shabby pea-green paint. When 
 good tents are thus treated, it may be understood 
 how the camp equipage of the army forms such a 
 heavy item of expenditure. The expense is still 
 further swelled by roguery and plunder. It is the 
 custom of the Turks to remove the men out of 
 barracks about the middle or the end of May, and 
 to keep them under canvas until the beginning of 
 September. The bimbashis or battalion com- 
 mandants almost invariably return more men than 
 are present under arms, and thereby obtain more 
 tents than are needed ; the mir allai or colonel 
 usually doubles this false return : so that, between 
 colonels and chiefs of battalions, some fifteen or 
 twenty tents are obtained per regiment, half of 
 which are never sent back to the stores. Some- 
 times, when accounts are kept, the colonel is charged 
 with the deficit, and then the colonel throws it 
 upon his subordinates ; but, except on very rare 
 occasions, payment and punishment are alike 
 evaded. Where people are so likely to be burned 
 
 * Among the same ruins we saw, huddled together under a 
 damp open wooden shed, a number of good brass field-pieces : 
 the gun-carriages were worm-eaten, and rotting through want of 
 a little care and paint. Certainly these pieces could not be used 
 oil any sudden emergency. 
 
 I
 
 114 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 out of house and home as at Constantinople, the 
 possession of a few tents is an important considera- 
 tion. Whenever a great fire happens, people are 
 of necessity driven under canvas. One night, in 
 the month of April, more than half of the large 
 and populous village of Arnaout-Keni, on the 
 Bosphorus, was burned to the ground ; and when 
 we passed the spot, two or three days after the 
 catastrophe, it was covered with dirty green tents. 
 Such is the fatuity of these men, that they almost 
 always encamp their troops on unhealthy ground, 
 by which means sickness and mortality are greater 
 under canvas than in barracks. It was so at 
 Constantinople, and so was it here. With abund- 
 ance of room to choose, they were going to pitch 
 the tents for the soldiers on a low, flat, damp, 
 triangle, between the hills, the Tounja, and the 
 Hebrus. In every branch of the public service 
 the system of peculation is indeed unlimited ; but, 
 from what I saw at Adrianople and elsewhere, I 
 am disposed to believe that the Sultan loses 
 annually quite as much by negligence as by 
 plunder. If a superior officer would check this foul 
 system, he must do everything or see to everything 
 himself, like our friend Achmet Pasha at Ku- 
 tayah.* 
 
 * Turkey and its Destiny.
 
 FOKMER GLORY. 115 
 
 The boasted reforms, of which I have been 
 speaking or writing, will not account for all the 
 decay and putridity of the Ottoman Empire. It 
 is not to be doubted that the whole Turkish nation 
 had lost, ere these reforms or miseries began, much 
 of that fierce and enthusiastic zeal for the propa- 
 gation of the doctrines of the Koran which for a 
 long time made their very name formidable to all 
 Christendom ; and nearly all that skill and disci- 
 pline which carried victory with them wherever 
 they penetrated among the as yet disorganized 
 nations of the West. For the space of 200 years, 
 and perhaps rather more, the Crescent has been 
 growing pale in Europe. To apply a good jest 
 which Prince Talleyrand put upon that very super- 
 ficial man (another man of one idea) Lafayette 
 the Turks " out bien sautes pour reculer." At 
 present they seem hardly to have a recollection of 
 the days of their European glory. They really 
 have lost the tradition of it. In their successive 
 wars against the venerable House of Austria (a 
 house as useful as venerable), in order to secure 
 possession of Hungary, and thus open the road to 
 Western Europe, they twice succeeded in crossing 
 the Upper Danube, and in reaching the gates of 
 Vienna ; and it is a well-known historical fact that 
 it required the united efforts of most of the princes 
 
 i 2
 
 116 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of the German Confederacy and of the Poles and 
 considerable time to boot to drive them back to 
 their own European territories. The feeling which 
 the power of the Turks then inspired may be 
 gathered from that excellent old diplomatist and 
 writer, Busbequies, who was for a considerable 
 time ambassador from the Emperor Ferdinand to 
 Suleiman the Great. Honest Busbequies (for 
 though a diplomatist of those ages, he was honest) 
 says, " When I compare the difference between 
 their soldiers and ours, I stand amazed to think 
 what will be the event ; for certainly their soldiers 
 must needs conquer, and ours must needs be van- 
 quished ; both cannot stand prosperously together ; 
 for on their side there is a mighty, strong, and 
 wealthy empire, great armies, experience in war, 
 a veteran soldiery, a long series of victories, pati- 
 ence in toil, concord, order, discipline, frugality, 
 and vigilance. On our side there is public want, 
 private luxury, strength weakened, minds discou- 
 raged, an unaccustomedness to labour or arms, 
 soldiers refractory, commanders covetous, a con- 
 tempt of discipline, licentiousness, rashness, 
 drunkenness, gluttony ; and, what is worst of 
 all, they used to conquer, we to be conquered. 
 Can any man doubt in this case what the event 
 will be?"
 
 DR. WALSH'S IMPRESSIONS. 117 
 
 When such apprehensions were entertained by 
 an old and able diplomatist, who had travelled 
 much, and had seen, and even lived with, most of 
 the continental armies, we may form some judg- 
 ment as to the then defective state of European 
 armies in general, which, since that period, have 
 made such signal improvements in materiel, tac- 
 tics, and discipline; while the Turks, really im- 
 proving in nothing, have lost, particularly since 
 the destruction of the janissaries and spahis, that 
 fiery, indomitable spirit which led them on to con- 
 quest; and seem, indeed, to have lost all confi- 
 dence in their rulers and leaders, and all respect 
 and affection for them.* 
 
 On reaching the frontiers of the empire, Dr. 
 Walsh pauses, looks back, and sums up his impres- 
 sions in the following truthful and eloquent piece 
 of writing : 
 
 " I had now travelled more than 300 miles 
 through the Turkish dominions in Europe, from 
 their capital to the last town of their empire. 
 When I contemplated the extent of territory, the 
 fertility of the soil, the cattle and corn it produced, 
 and its interminable capability of producing more ; 
 the large cities of Adrianople, Shumla, Rutschuk, 
 and the multitude of villages scattered over the 
 
 * Quarterly Review, vol. xli. p. 485.
 
 118 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 country ; when I considered the despotic govern- 
 ment that had absolute power over all these re- 
 sources, to direct them in whatever manner, and 
 to whatever extent ; and that this was but a small 
 portion of the vast empire which extended over 
 three parts of the globe, it seemed as if the 
 Turkish power was as a sleeping lion, which had 
 only to rouse itself and crush its opponents. But 
 when, on the other hand, I saw the actual state of 
 this fine country its resources neglected, its fields 
 lying waste, its towns in ruins, its population de- 
 caying, and not only the traces of human labour, 
 but saw all the people about them advancing in 
 the art of civilization, while they alone were sta- 
 tionary, and the European Turk of this day differ- 
 ing little from his Asiatic ancestor, except only in 
 having lost the fierce energy which then pushed 
 him on ; when I considered this I was led to con- 
 clude that the lion did not sleep, but was dying, 
 and, after a few violent convulsions, would never 
 
 rise again The circumstance most striking 
 
 to a traveller passing through Turkey is its depo- 
 pulation. Ruins where villages had been built, and 
 fallows where land had been cultivated, are fre- 
 quently seen, with no living things near them." * 
 
 * Narrative of a Journey from Constantinople to England. 
 By the Kev. R. Walsh, LL.D. 12mo. London, 1828.
 
 BAYLE ST. JOHN'S VIEWS. 119 
 
 With the exception of Mons. M. A. Ubicini,* 
 who appears not to have been quite free from 
 that far-reaching Keschid Pasha influence which 
 has so mystified and hoodwinked the world, I 
 scarcely know one recent traveller (at all worthy of 
 credit or attention) that takes a more cheerful 
 view of the present condition of Turkey than that 
 which was taken by Dr. Walsh. The latest of our 
 English writers on the subject, Mr. Bayle St. John, 
 describes the old lion as all but dead ; and strongly 
 exposes the folly and futility of any attempt on the 
 part of England and France to resuscitate him. 
 This gentleman says in his Preface, " I was pre- 
 paring a work intended to show the impolicy of 
 allowing the Ottoman Empire to remain as a kind 
 of diplomatic Low Country, on which the battle 
 of influence was perpetually fought with varying 
 success, when the news of the arrival of Prince 
 Menchikof in Constantinople came to interrupt 
 me. It is evident at once that it would be no 
 longer possible at present to discuss so momentous 
 a question with due calm and completeness in the 
 midst of the rumours of wars. Every day, too, 
 might change its aspect. Abandoning, therefore, 
 all idea of a complete political treatise, I resolved 
 
 * Lettres sur la Turquie, ou Tableau Statistique, etc. Paris, 
 1853.
 
 120 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 to publish such of my notes and materials as had a 
 direct bearing upon the point which is now dis- 
 cussed in every political circle, and may be decided 
 by arms whilst I write ; namely, Is it possible for 
 the Ottoman Empire any longer to exist as part of 
 the European States' system ? 
 
 " I have long been convinced that a negative 
 answer is necessary ; and that some proposal, such 
 as that maintained in three pamphlets recently 
 published, one entitled, ' Hints on the Solution 
 of the Eastern Question ; ' another, ' The Eastern 
 Question in relation to the Restoration of a Greek 
 Empire ; ' and the third, just put forth in French 
 at Athens, called ' A few Words on the Eastern 
 Question/ must at no distant period be enter- 
 tained. As I have said, I was quietly preparing 
 to suggest this solution when similar suggestions 
 began to break forth in the press, and a shoal of 
 pamphlets made their appearance. My brother 
 Percy, too, with his usual energy, having pursued 
 his studies quite independently, suddenly came to 
 me to say that he intended to agitate the idea 
 which we had discussed as a mere vision ten years 
 ago, when we were working to found an Hellenic 
 Association. It was evident, therefore, that the 
 plan of founding a new empire on the shores of 
 the Bosphorus was not a mere literary invention,
 
 BAYLE ST. JOHN'S VIEWS. 121 
 
 but that it was the natural product of the present 
 situation. 
 
 " It may perhaps be premature to talk of an 
 arrangement which, to be carried into effect, would 
 require a revolution in Turkey, or the combined 
 action of European Powers. But the pen of an 
 outside politician may overpass a limit which that 
 of a,n official wpuld not dare to approach. I there- 
 fore have little compunction in saying that what 
 is now taking place proves that the presence of 
 the Turks in Europe, as a governing nation, is a 
 nuisance ; and that we ought no longer to allow 
 ourselves to be periodically convulsed and dis- 
 turbed in our commerce and our domestic policy, 
 and compelled to man fleets, and throw our Chan- 
 cellors of the Exchequer into fits, by telegraphic 
 despatches via Vienna, announcing that the crazy 
 ship, which every one knows must sink at length, 
 has sprung another leak, and that all hands are 
 called to the pumps. It is possible that, if the 
 Turks be now put to the test, they may make a 
 much more gallant stand than their inconsiderate 
 enemies will give them credit for. If so, this must 
 be taken into consideration in the future settle- 
 ment, and convince us that Abdul Medjid and his 
 people have a fair claim to be removed to the 
 sovereignty of Bagdad. But we cannot positively
 
 122 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 afford to be constantly backing a brave little fellow 
 who almost defends himself against a big antago- 
 nist. If the Russians are kept off this time from 
 conquest, it will only be by the combined strength 
 of Europe either developing itself in action or 
 menace. Moral force is a great power ; for it is 
 the threat of physical force. 
 
 " However unwilling, therefore, be the result 
 of the present complication what it may, states- 
 men must soon seriously set about the task of 
 finding a successor or successors to the Turkish 
 government. If there were no danger of external 
 aggression, perhaps things might right themselves. 
 The Christian races are rapidly rising into import- 
 ance, and the Ottomans are dying away of them- 
 selves. Many causes conspire to produce the latter 
 result. Setting aside the prevalence of libertinage 
 of a gross character, the custom of polygamy, with 
 its necessary companion, bachelorship, prevents the 
 Turks from supplying the places left in their ranks 
 by death. The army, too, until very recently, has 
 been recruited entirely from the Muslim popu- 
 lation, who are, moreover, from their carelessneSvS 
 and ignorance of the art of medicine, more liable 
 to be swept away by disease. It has already been 
 said, that in a given time the Sultan will find 
 himself without a single subject in Europe of
 
 BAYLE ST. JOHN'S VIEWS. 123 
 
 Asiatic origin ; and that, if we possessed accurate 
 statistical tables, we might fix that time with pre- 
 cision/' * 
 
 This traveller forcibly points out the horrible 
 mixture of corruption and barbarism in the Turkish 
 element of the empire. "I wish," says he, "that 
 I could discover simplicity by the side of bar- 
 barism. There is always hope of an uncorrupted 
 people, however limited may be their knowledge, 
 and however coarse their habits. The Turks, how- 
 
 * ' The Turks in Europe : a Sketch of Manners and Politics 
 in the Ottoman Empire.' By Bayle St. John, author of ' Village 
 Life in Egypt,' etc. London : Chapman and Hall, 185.3. I can 
 on no account agree with this writer in calling .Russia " a bar- 
 barous empire." There are uncivilized people living under the 
 Russian rule, even as there are others under the rule of Great 
 Britain ; but the empire is not barbarous, nor has it been so any 
 time since Peter the Great. Take away the freaks of the Em- 
 peror Paul, which were attributable to insanity, and which were 
 very soon stopped, and the government of Russia will be found to 
 have been civilized, wise, and enlightened, and always aiming 
 at the civilization of its subjects of all races, castes, and religious 
 faiths. Everywhere in Russia there is progress ; everywhere in 
 Turkey there is decay or consummated ruin. I doubt whether 
 at this moment any nation in Europe can boast of so many able 
 statesmen, administrators, and accomplished diplomatists as 
 Russia. 
 
 Mr. St. John's notion of taking measures " to create a con- 
 stitutional government on the shores of the Bosphorus" must be 
 treated as an impracticability and a dream. He ought to have 
 considered how the constitution is working among the united 
 Christian Greeks, the subjects of King Otho!
 
 124 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 ever, are not only barbarous, but are infected with 
 vices the very thought of which excites unmiti- 
 gated condemnation I may add, that the 
 
 only civilization which is rising up in Turkey, in 
 spite of the efforts made to repress it, was that of 
 the Greeks." 
 
 Mr. St John also publishes a translation of an 
 official document or firman which was issued in 
 the course of the year 1850. In this curious 
 paper the universal prevalence of extravagance and 
 corruption among the sen-ants of government is 
 fully admitted : 
 
 " We published some time ago a long article 
 on the deplorable consequences of peculation and 
 corruption, and we desired to put an end to such 
 disastrous things by compelling all functionaries 
 employed under us to take a public oath ; and we 
 hoped that this obligation, together with the pains 
 and penalties which necessarily accrue, would 
 prove an efficacious remedy against the evil of 
 which we complain. We are sorry to see, how- 
 ever, that our paternal remonstrances and our 
 salutary reprimands have not borne fruit, and that 
 we are obliged to repeat them with reference to 
 facts which have recently come under our notice. 
 It is well known that many times certain persons
 
 BAYLE ST. JOHN'S VIEWS. 125 
 
 have abdicated their dignity in favour of pecula- 
 tion, in order to suffice for the extraordinary 
 expenses which they have created for themselves 
 in objects of luxury, and compelled therefore to 
 deprive themselves of what is necessary in order 
 to procure that which is superfluous. It is most 
 evident that such a conduct is condemned both by 
 provisions of the law and by common sense. Its 
 necessary consequence is, that those who follow it 
 overpass the bounds which the amount of their 
 fortunes would permit, and thus arrive at the goal 
 of universal dishonour. Far from perceiving these 
 unfortunate consequences, they have become accus- 
 tomed to make use of very costly furniture, and of 
 objects of luxury perfectly unproductive. They 
 imagine that they are obliged to procure these and 
 to make use of them on account of the rank which 
 they occupy, and console themselves in the delusive 
 hope that they will thereby win the esteem of the 
 public ; whilst, on the contrary, in order to meet 
 these ruinous expenses, they are reduced to the 
 necessity of compromising their characters by dis- 
 graceful acts and malversations. Now is it not 
 evident that the brilliancy of the rank occupied by 
 our functionaries, according to the grades and the 
 decorations which have been conferred upon them 
 by the imperial magnificence, nowise requires to
 
 126 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 be enhanced by vain luxury, and that the only 
 means of doing honour to it is by a scrupulous 
 fidelity towards the sovereign, and a constant obser- 
 vation of duty ? This is why we recommend the 
 functionaries of the empire to establish a prudent and 
 moderate equilibrium in their personal expenses, 
 so long as they do not possess any other revenue 
 than their salary, to meet extraordinary expenses ; 
 and we warn them that they will thereby gain 
 much in the precious esteem of his imperial majesty, 
 and that, on the contrary, those who persist in 
 creating for themselves immoderate expenses will 
 entirely lose his confidence."* 
 
 It may be predicted, with perfect safety, that 
 this lesson will be thrown away like so many 
 others. Honesty and morality are not to be 
 created by Imperial firmans. Perhaps Imperial 
 example, in the way of economy, might do some 
 good; but the example exhibited by Court and 
 Porte is anything rather than orderly and econo- 
 mical The Sultan is always throwing away money 
 in toys and trivialities : his mother, the Validd 
 Sultana, was the greatest spendthrift in his domi- 
 nions; his chief favourites, and the Pashas who 
 have been allowed to marry his sisters, or rather 
 
 * The Turks in Europe, etc.
 
 M. BLANQUI'S ACCOUNT. 127 
 
 half-sisters, the daughters of the late Sultan Mah- 
 moud, are all scandalously extravagant, and deeply 
 in debt with the Armenian seraffs or bankers, in 
 spite of their enormous disproportioned salaries, 
 and their picking and plundering. 
 
 Monsieur V. Fontanier, who travelled or resided 
 in Turkey by order of the French Government 
 from the year 1821 to 1829, and who witnessed 
 the introduction of most of the so-called reforms, 
 has left a deplorable picture of the state of the 
 country and the vices of its administration. He 
 found corruption in the army, corruption in the 
 navy, gross corruption in every department. In 
 the Asiatic provinces he found nothing but poverty, 
 misery, ruin.* 
 
 Monsieur M. Blanqui, who was despatched by 
 the late Louis Philippe on a mission to Bulgaria 
 and CoDstantinople in the summer of 1841, draws 
 a still more gloomy picture of Turkey in Europe : 
 
 " From Adrianople to Constantinople is a dis- 
 tance of about fifty leagues. The vast space be- 
 tween the two cities is entirely destitute of trees, 
 and presents the aspect of a long, wide, undulating 
 plain, traversed by more than thirty watercourses. 
 .... It took us four days to ride the distance on 
 
 * See 'Voyage en Orient.' Paris, 1829.
 
 128 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 horseback. One may risk the journey in a car- 
 riage ; but as the high road is nothing but a rough 
 track, and the ground very clayey, one is exposed 
 to the risk of being stopped by a single day of 
 rain, which is quite enough to render the road im- 
 practicable. The greater part of the watercourses, 
 having no bridges across them, become dangerous 
 in case of stormy weather ; and the villages are so 
 few and far between, that a man might die of 
 hunger if he were surprised en route by any un- 
 foreseen obstacle. I more than once asked myself 
 what would be the fate of a traveller if he were 
 to fall from his horse, or receive any serious wound, 
 in these solitary wilds ; it is evident that he would 
 be exposed to great peril. The first condition for 
 travelling in this country is to take good health 
 with you, and to carry with you all that you may 
 want ; for there are some stages, lasting twelve 
 hours of constant march, in which you will not 
 meet . or see a man, a house, a tree, a bush. Be- 
 tween Adrianople and Chavsa there is nothing but 
 cemeteries ; between Chavsa and Eski-Baba, a 
 plain stretching beyond the reach of sight, im- 
 mense, silent, sad as the grave ; between Eski- 
 Baba and Bourgas you have still the plain and 
 the desert ; still the desert, and nothing else, from 
 Bourgas to Karischtiran !
 
 M. BLANQUI'S ACCOUNT. 129 
 
 " There is something more tristful in the un- 
 paralleled journey between these two capital cities. 
 This is the countless number of cemeteries one 
 finds, in places where every sign of human habita- 
 tion has disappeared. What signify these ceme- 
 teries ? When were they formed ? Why do they 
 exist in their entirety, while one cannot find the 
 slightest trace of the towns and villages which 
 stocked them with so many dead ? . . . . But there 
 are things even more sad than these cemeteries 
 without villages I mean, villages without inha- 
 bitants. I saw a good many such between Adria- 
 nople and Constantinople : the houses were open 
 to wind and rain, the roofs had fallen in, the 
 domestic hearth was empty. Lizards, rats, screech- 
 owls, bats, had taken the place of human beings, 
 destroyed by plague or by poverty, or dispersed 
 by emigration ; and these villages were sur- 
 rounded by fertile lands, and everywhere flowed 
 rivulets and brooks, and the sky overhead was 
 pure and serene ; and if, now and then, a tree 
 existed near a fountain, it was so grand and so 
 beautiful, that fifty men on horseback might shelter 
 themselves in its shade. What, then, has trans- 
 formed these fertile countries of Thrace into 
 desolated steppes ? What but Mussulman bar- 
 barity? The mosque alone stands erect in the 
 
 K
 
 130 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 midst of the ruins which it has caused.* . . . The 
 only living creatures we saw were birds of prey. 
 These absolutely pullulate, and gather in such 
 crowds that there are moments when they veil the 
 light of the sun. As the Turks are in the habit 
 of abandoning the dead bodies of their animals, 
 and as the plains of Thrace are traversed by con- 
 siderable flocks and herds, one is constantly coming 
 upon fragments of carcases, which attract all the 
 
 * This is not quite correct. Nearly at every place between 
 the capital and Adrianople, and between Brusa and Kutayah, I 
 found the mosques and minarets falling fast to ruin. So were 
 the baths and the beautiful old roadside fountains, and the cara- 
 vanserais. The town of Khavsa was little more than a heap of 
 ruins ; so of the town of Tchorlu. The last-named place had 
 three mosques, the principal one being surrounded by ruins, and 
 bearing on its own walls the marks of musket-ball and cannon- 
 shot. 
 
 " Another of the mosques had had its dome cracked by artil- 
 lery. The town was the scene of a fearful conflict between the 
 reformers and anti-reformers of Sultan Selim's time (in 1807-8), 
 and, together with Bourgaz and several other towns in these 
 regions, it had suffered very severely. Some large houses with 
 gardens, which had been konacks of rich and prosperous ayans 
 the hereditary provincial aristocracy were levelled with the 
 ground, or, being curtailed of their dimensions, were turned into 
 hovels for the poor Turks, or into stables for cattle. All the 
 Turkish houses were in a dilapidated condition ; and most of 
 their occupants seemed miserably poor. Such has been the 
 march, or such the consequence, of reform all over this wretched 
 empire ! The rich have, indeed, been sent away empty, but 
 the hungry, instead of being filled with good tilings, have be- 
 come far more hungry and bare than before." Turkey and its 
 Destiny.
 
 M. CYPRIEN ROBERT. 131 
 
 most voracious birds, as eagles, vultures, hawks, 
 crows, &c. The Turks trouble them so little in 
 the exercise of their functioos as ediles, that they 
 come into the streets, and seek their foul food in 
 perfect tranquillity. At times they dart through 
 the air by thousands, and engage in furious combats 
 with one another over the skeleton of an ox or of 
 a horse. . . . . The desert extends to the very 
 ramparts of Constantinople. As we approached 
 the capital, we expected to find some sign of road- 
 making ; there was none. The Turks have every- 
 thing to begin."* 
 
 Monsieur M. Cyprien Robert, who devoted much 
 time to the European provinces of the Empire, and 
 their Sclavonian Christian occupants, found that, 
 wherever that element of the population was freed 
 from direct Turkish tyranny and oppression, it was 
 prospering and increasing and multiplying ; and 
 that wherever the Turks had the upper hand, and 
 were strong enough to oppress the Rayah subjects, 
 there was depopulation, an expiring agriculture, 
 and want and horror. This traveller calls the vast 
 plains of which we have been speaking " Cette 
 Arabic Europeenne I " He adds, " Les Turcs y ant 
 
 fait table, rase On pent se croire en pleine 
 
 Arable, en traversant les portions de la Roumelie ou 
 * Voyage en Bulgarie. Paris, 1845. 
 
 K 2
 
 132 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 domine la race Turque. Pour ^assurer de vastes 
 pdturages en meme temps qu'un espace plus libre 
 pour leurs courses a cheval, les Osmanlis ant arrache 
 tons les arbres, et les seuls minarets des mosquees 
 dessinent comme des jalons aeriens sur les versants 
 des montagnes."* 
 
 An old English traveller of the time of James L, 
 when Achmed I., a conqueror and an aggrandiser, 
 was seated on the throne of the Sultans, declared 
 even then that the empire was becoming waste 
 and desolate, and that the rule of the Turks was a 
 scourge and curse to all who fell under it. He 
 attributed this to their false religion and cruel in- 
 tolerance. He says, " We may conclude that the 
 Mahometan religion, being derived from a man in 
 life so wicked, so worldly in his projects, in his 
 prosecutions of them so disloyal, treacherous, and 
 cruel, being grounded upon fables and false reve- 
 lations, repugnant to sound reason and that wisdom 
 which the Divine hand hath imprinted in his works ; 
 alluring men with those enchantments of fleshly 
 pleasures permitted in this life, and promised for 
 the life ensuing ; being also supported with tyranny 
 and the sword (for it is death to speak there against 
 
 * ' Les Slaves de Turquie, Serbes, Montenegrins, Bosniaques, 
 Albanais, et Bulgares: lews Ressources, leurs Tendances, et 
 leurs Progres Politiques.' Par M. Cyprien Robert. Paris: 
 1844.
 
 MAHOMMEDANISM. 133 
 
 it) ; and, lastly, wherever it is planted, rooting out 
 all virtue, all wisdom and science, and in sum all 
 liberty and civility, and laying the earth so waste, 
 dispeopled, and uninhabited, that neither it came 
 from God (save as a scourge by permission), nor 
 can bring them to God that follow it."* 
 
 But if the Mahommedan religion has been so 
 antagonistic to all improvement and to all pros- 
 perity, it long kept the Turks together as a one- 
 hearted nation ; it held up some of the Divine pre- 
 cepts which the false prophet or his collaborateurs 
 took from our Scriptures, and the zeal of the Mus- 
 sulmans was exhibited in the erection of those 
 mosques, medressehs, caravanserais, aqueducts, 
 public baths, and beautiful fountains, which are 
 now all going to ruin, and disappearing from the 
 face of the earth. I repeat, once more, my inner- 
 most conviction : Better the worst religion that 
 was ever framed by uninspired, erring men than 
 no religion at all ! The Turkish reformers have en- 
 tirely overlooked the solemn words in the Koran : 
 " Do not disquiet yourself if you see the state 
 perishing, provided only that your religion remains : 
 for it never happens that the state continues to 
 exist when religion perishes." 
 
 * Sandys's ' Relation of a Journey begun A.D. 1610. Contain- 
 ing a Description of the Turkish Empire, of Egypt, of the Holy 
 Laud, &c.'
 
 134 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Hubert von Boehn, a very intelligent and right- 
 minded Prussian officer, has just produced a short 
 but important and very remarkable work upon the 
 present condition and future prospects of the Otto- 
 man empire. After a careful examination on the 
 spot, he declares that nothing has been improved 
 by the reformers, except a portion of the army. 
 " Overvalued as it is by the Turks themselves, and 
 by the other nations who have never seen it, the 
 life-breath of Turkey is her army. In the whole 
 Turkish government there is only one branch in 
 which they really know what they intend, and this 
 is the army ; but even this knowledge has come 
 too late. A regular and efficient army would no 
 longer be able to stay the ruin of the empire ; and 
 in the final decision, the unripe fruit of army re- 
 organisation could hardly act any important part."* 
 
 This writer indignantly and strongly exposes that 
 arranged system of deceit and falsehood by which 
 Reschid Pasha and the Porte have been so long 
 endeavouring to throw dust in the eyes of Christen- 
 dom, and to leave all other countries in the dark 
 as to the rottenness and decay of all internal insti- 
 tutions. All his observations are founded on facts 
 collected by himself, and they all tend to this con- 
 
 * 'Zustand der Tiirkei im Jahre der Prophezeihung, 1853.' 
 Von Hubert von Boehn. Berlin: 1853.
 
 VON BOEHN. 135 
 
 elusion that the empire of the Turks is already 
 gone, and that nothing in the power of mortal man 
 can restore it : 
 
 " By the system of falsehood and misrepresenta- 
 tion the Porte has succeeded, to some extent, in 
 turning a little of our general attention from the 
 embroiled and incomprehensible affairs of Turkey, 
 and so much the more as during the last few years 
 nearly every country in Europe has been absorbed 
 by its own internal affairs ; but the Turkish Go- 
 vernment has carried this system of deceit too far 
 for the safety of its integrity. By hastily building 
 up fragile imitations of European institutions with- 
 out bases, it has given flagrant evidences of its 
 imbecility and enervation ; and by no means of its 
 striving for civilization, or awaking to intrinsic 
 new strength, as has been so often and so loudly 
 trumpeted by its ' Journal de Constantinople/ 
 
 " It is not the rebellions in the frontier provinces, 
 not the dreadful financial embarrassments of the 
 Grand Seigneur, not even the conflict with the po- 
 pulations of his empire arising out of difference of 
 race and of faith, that press for a solution : it is the 
 negative principle that has set up its seat on the 
 ramparts of the Sublime Porte itself. That state 
 which does not take for its basis the principle of 
 religion and enlivening faith is morally dead ; and
 
 136 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 just as European society would hasten towards its 
 end if the coryphaei of democracy were ever to suc- 
 ceed in replacing the two columns of our civilization 
 Christianity and classicism by indifferentism 
 and realism, so the vital principle of the Mahom- 
 medan state must of necessity expire by attempting 
 to replace the Islam (which is for it the encyclo- 
 pedia of all religion and politics, of all jurispru- 
 dence and literature) by bits and fragments of 
 modern French literature and state artifices, and 
 by changing the turban for the fezz. Civilization of 
 Islam, in a Christian European sense, is a contra- 
 diction in itself. At most it would be kindling a 
 fire in the dark a fire which might blaze, and yet 
 diffuse no light. 
 
 " It ought to be clearly understood that Turkey 
 is not a state which in civilization, culture, institu- 
 tions, and material welfare, differs but slightly and 
 gradually from other states of the world. The dif- 
 ference is radical, enormous, and most deeply rooted. 
 The Turk of Europe, as well as the Turk of Asia 
 Minor, belongs for the most part to the Semitic 
 tribes of Turkomans and Tartars, those wild hordes 
 of Central Asia which never received culture, but, 
 on the contrary, at all times and in all places, trod 
 it under foot and destroyed it. The Turk is natu- 
 rally slothful, indolent, unideal, and impervious to
 
 VON BOEHN. 137 
 
 high mental improvement. He may acquire some 
 mechanical arts in perfection, but he is incapable 
 of original, independent, and procreative thought' 
 nay, even of following up the most simple logical 
 idea." 
 
 With remarkably few exceptions, my experience 
 of the Turks would go entirely to corroborate the 
 correctness of these remarks. Like all the Tartar 
 races, the Turk, if roused to exertion, can copy 
 what he sees before him, but he has no invention 
 whatever. Many of their young men, formed into 
 bands under European instructors, have learned to 
 play French, Italian, and German music, but not 
 one of them has ventured on original composition. 
 The few marches and airs which are called Turkish 
 are really the productions of Greeks or Armenians. 
 
 Our Prussian officer goes on to say, " Of all the 
 great resources of the Turkish empire, little more 
 has remained than a neglected and thinly popu- 
 lated land, and a lazy strengthless population. 
 Richly as nature has endowed the land, man has 
 recklessly turned its gifts into curses. The forests 
 lie waste, the fields uncultivated, and the most 
 fruitful and most beautiful districts, changed into 
 dreary deserts, are no longer able to nourish a 
 tribe of beggars. The rule of the Turks has not 
 built a village nor tilled an acre, nay, hardly
 
 138 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 planted a tree ; and the often dreamt of southern 
 vegetation has hidden itself in some corners of the 
 Bosphorus ! The stranger who knows Turkey only 
 from historical traditions about her former power 
 and splendour may well be astonished, on his first 
 visit, at the misery and the ignorance dappling in 
 darkness that rule unboundedly over the land. He 
 will take those old traditions for fables, for exagge- 
 rated inventions dressed in the flowery language of 
 the East ; but many a one still remembers the pomp 
 and luxury which formerly characterised all classes 
 of the people, the display of riches even among the 
 lower classes, the signs of superfluity and squan- 
 dering which had become as proverbial as the high- 
 flown vanity and the Eastern pride which scorned 
 to receive advice from the illumed Christians. 
 
 " But, say the defenders of the Government, the 
 country is in a state of transition ; some of the 
 worst traits of Turkish despotism have disappeared, 
 and it requires only time to remedy all the evils. 
 Alas ! Time knows only a sad and comfortless tale 
 to tell of sickness and imbecility ; and it requires 
 more than blind fatalism to rescue the land from 
 threatening ruin. 
 
 "The robber-like rapacity of former Ottoman 
 Governments, and the venality of all state officers, 
 are too well known to require proofs. Thereby a
 
 VON BOEHN. 139 
 
 feeling of fear and insecurity was engendered, which 
 soon penetrated all minds in such a manner that 
 the endeavours of every individual were only di- 
 rected how to hide his own property and to appear 
 poorer than he was. 
 
 " At present artifices and disguise are no longer 
 of use ; the misery and the unspeakable filth shown 
 by the great mass are the real expression of the 
 state of things ; and the treasures accumulated in 
 former days are in the hands of few. In the face 
 of these undeniable facts the Turkish papers assert 
 that the social and material condition of the country 
 has improved ! In all European papers such un- 
 truths find an echo, and even in Constantinople 
 men allow themselves to be deceived by them. 
 
 " Although, indeed, the present Government no 
 longer publicly claims the right of plundering the 
 rich Rayahs in order to fill the exhausted treasury, 
 still the hiding and secreting of the property pre- 
 vails in all classes, and this hinders the industrial 
 progress of the nation. 
 
 " In the darkest age of Turkish despotism, when 
 every town was ruled by an absolute governor, De'- 
 re'bey (Count of the Valley), the class of mechanics 
 enjoyed greater liberty in their occupations than 
 has been the case since Government has taken the 
 whole administration in hand ; misuse of power in
 
 140 TIIE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 olden times was, for the lower classes at least, re- 
 compensed by a certain degree of protection, and 
 they have therefore the best cause for complaining 
 at such a change of their condition, since they have 
 now become quite defenceless, whereas the host of 
 their oppressors is innumerable, and they fall every 
 day lower and lower into slavery and wretchedness. 
 On that account the hiding and secreting of the 
 property has seized every one, even the poorest ; 
 the actual property is thus morally lost to the 
 country, and the productive powers of Capital, 
 entirely withdrawn from commerce and traffic, are 
 dead and annihilated. 
 
 " There was a time when Turkish manufactures 
 were scattered over the country, and afforded occu- 
 pation to a great part of the populace ; and as the 
 produce of those manufactures was adapted to 
 Eastern manners and trade, they caused a consi- 
 derable inland traffic, by which, for example, the 
 small producers were enabled to sell such products, 
 which would not have borne the cost of a far trans- 
 port. Although the greater part of these institu- 
 tions was not in accordance with European wants, 
 still considerable business was carried on with 
 foreign markets for example, to Egypt, and then 
 to Africa and Asia. By this commerce many fron- 
 tier towns (Trebizond, Smyrna, Beyrout, Alexan-
 
 VON BOEHN. 141 
 
 dria) flourished, which in later years have fallen 
 into insignificance and ruin. 
 
 " Of late, it cannot be denied, that a great in- 
 crease of commerce with Europe has taken place, 
 and this circumstance is, of course to advantage, 
 alleged by those who wish to prove the improve- 
 ment of the country, and either intend to deceive 
 the world, or are themselves deceived by the miser- 
 able sham reforms hi Constantinople. As there is 
 an entire want of statistical tables, it would be 
 difficult to furnish numerical proofs pro or contra ; 
 however, on a more accurate examination, such a 
 quantity of facts are brought out that one soon 
 arrives at the firm conviction that the inland and 
 frontier commerce has fallen a victim to the Eu- 
 ropean commerce, of which only the European 
 merchants have the profit, while all the bustle of 
 foreign trade in Constantinople is tracelessly lost 
 to the country. These are the fruits of the thought- 
 lessness of the Government, who, at any price, 
 wished to force a revenue, not caring whether the 
 measures led to rum. The taste of the nation has, 
 with their gradual restitution, changed, and whole 
 classes of mechanics have disappeared. Many who 
 have lived long in the country observe the visible 
 alterations in the personal appearance of the inha- 
 bitants, who formerly, in dress, domestic manage-
 
 142 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 ment, and suites, bore the external signs of industry, 
 activity, and cleverness. There you saw the rich 
 many-coloured dresses of the higher and middle 
 classes, embroidered turbans, scarfs, shawls, fine 
 veils, silk stuffs, and fantastically woven silks, linen, 
 and cotton, rich carpets, splendidly embroidered 
 cushions and velvet bolsters, magnificent rich 
 hangings and ornaments of horses, fire and side 
 arms most artificially wrought and inlaid, and 
 the suites in rich garments. Indeed, not only for 
 the benefit of the rich, but also for that of the 
 lower classes, art and industry were practised in all 
 branches, so that even the poorest could indulge 
 the national taste of the East for personal state 
 and luxury. The poorest villager was proud of the 
 wreaths of gold and silver coins which adorned 
 the brow of his wife and children, and of the 
 shining copper vessels that decorated his hearth. 
 Now the mechanic has lost his occupation ; not only 
 the countryman, but also the townsman, make 
 shift with wretched earthenware vessels, instead of 
 the glittering copper vessels and the gaudy, coloured 
 dresses have made room for the coarsest and 
 cheapest woollen and cotton manufactures of 
 England. 
 
 " If any one should doubt the correctness of 
 these statements relative to the decline of the
 
 VON BOEHX. 143 
 
 country, and of its industry in particular and it 
 is almost natural that everybody not convinced by 
 his own eyes must be a disbeliever let him be 
 told by any merchant what a number of things 
 was manufactured in the country before the time 
 of the Greek revolution, things of which now hardly 
 the names are known, and which have long since 
 disappeared from the bazaars. Far away from 
 Persia and Khorassan are now those thousand sorts 
 of things bought which the stranger and traveller 
 brings home as admired curiosities. The enthu- 
 siast may hence explain that great anomaly, that 
 with the rising of European commerce the popula- 
 tion of Turkey evidently decreases, which could 
 never be explained but by the fact that European 
 commerce crushes the industry of the country. 
 
 "Pressed by financial embarrassments, the Go- 
 vernment encroached at first on the industry of the 
 country, afterwards it completely destroyed it by 
 the grossest fiscal errors imaginable ; few persons 
 will risk time and capital on the introduction 
 of machinery and manufactures, to be then exposed 
 to the chicane of ignorant subordinates, and to 
 the unlimited arbitrariness of an equally ignorant 
 Government. Of course it cannot be denied that, 
 even under the most favourable conditions for 
 Turkey, and in the natural course of traffic and
 
 144 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 commerce, the greater number of other countries 
 would, in mechanical arts and industry, destroy the 
 parallel branches of Turkish industry ; but, on the 
 other hand, it can never be said that Turkey is 
 without any chances for a successful competition ; 
 for, as every climate possesses extraordinary re- 
 sources and compensations which, through a wise 
 and appropriate economical administration, enable 
 it to bring to bear its superiority over less favoured 
 countries, so there are in Turkey abundant re- 
 sources, as well in the nature of the uncultivated 
 rich soil, in the favoured cultivation of the vine and 
 olive-tree, of the growth of silk, as in the unmea- 
 sured forests full of the best timber, and in the 
 hardly-known mines, which, with a little work, 
 would yield an abundant profit."* 
 
 I will endeavour hereafter briefly to show how 
 these rich mines are worked by the Turks on ac- 
 count of the Government, which will not allow 
 skilful Europeans to farm or touch them ; how all 
 these superabounding natural resources and foun- 
 tain-heads of wealth are monopolised and neglected 
 by the state or the Sultan's family ; and how every 
 day the people of the country have reason to repeat 
 the memorable words with which Masaniello began 
 
 * ' Zustand der Tiirkei im Jahre der Prophezeihung, 1853." 
 Von Hubert von Boehn. Berlin : 1853.
 
 MISGOVERNMENT. 145 
 
 his revolt against the Spanish Viceroy of Naples, 
 "God sends us abundance, but bad government 
 makes us perish of want" 
 
 Setting aside other considerations, is it possible, 
 in these crowded days, when Europe is throwing 
 her surplus population to the Antipodes, and to all 
 distant quarters of the globe, that Turkey, so near 
 at hand, should be left thus to play the part of 
 the dog in the manger ? or is it to be expected 
 that the most civilized of Christian powers will per- 
 sist in a league and expend treasure and blood in 
 supporting a barbarous, unbelieving race, who shut 
 their eyes to their own direct advantage, who can- 
 not help themselves, and who will not allow others 
 to help them, who are finishing to turn some of 
 the fairest portions of God's blessed earth (which 
 might support millions upon millions of industrious 
 people) into unhealthy swamps and absolute de- 
 serts, and who continue to " scourge their kind," 
 not only in the persons of the Rayahs, but in those 
 of men of their own race and faith ? 
 
 It will not be left in the power of diplomacy to 
 answer or settle these questions. The instincts of 
 nature and self-interest, the rapid expansion and 
 want of room of the civilized European family, the 
 feelings and aspirations of religion and of philan- 
 thropy, will soon be found things far stronger 
 
 L
 
 146 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 than musty old treaties, wordy protocols, or any 
 span-new diplomatic complications or political 
 arrangements. Christian Europe will soon see the 
 Turks out of Europe ; nor will she long halt on 
 the western side of the narrow Dardanelles and 
 narrower Bosphorus : she will pour eastward, and 
 then, in the course of two or three generations, all 
 the lower part of Asia Minor will be turned into 
 another Italy, another Hesperides, another Land 
 of Promise, and land of beauty ; for the soil is as 
 fertile, the sky as bright and genial, the scenery 
 as lovely, as any that can be found between the 
 Alps and the sea of Reggio. 
 
 I might suggest many means for taking care of 
 the poor, thin Turkish population, for improving 
 it, and even for gradually converting it to our own 
 faith ; but the first condition, the one sine qua 
 Turn, is, "Down with the Turkish Government!" 
 Once more I repeat, and with all the earnest- 
 ness of which my nature is capable, " Puzza 
 al naso d'ognuno questo barbaro dominio." 
 
 Lieutenant von Boehn has drawn attention to 
 an old Turkish proverb, which is more definite and 
 less generally known in Christendom than the one 
 which I have quoted. It is simply this : " Four 
 hundred years shall the people of Ismael rule in 
 Stamboul !" The term for the fulfilment of the
 
 PROPHECIES. 147 
 
 prophecy has arrived, and all the European Turks 
 seem to be looking for that fulfilment as the unal- 
 terable decree of Fate. Stamboul or Constanti- 
 nople was taken by Sultan Mahommed II. on the 
 29th of May, 1453. We are now in the month of 
 August, 1853 : thus the four hundred years are 
 elapsed. 
 
 Prophecies from a holier source are in existence. 
 The Rev. G. S. Faber wrote in June of the present 
 year, " With our best commentators I consider the 
 downfall of the Ottoman empire to be clearly pre- 
 dicted in Scripture. Hence, whenever the des- 
 tined time shall arrive, all the complications of 
 modern political diplomacy will be found totally 
 unable to prevent the ruin of that once formidable 
 empire."* 
 
 * The Rev. author adds, " But though its downfall is thus, I 
 think, absolutely certain, we have no warrant for specifying any 
 precise year." See 'The Predicted Downfall of the Turkish 
 Power,' &c. By G. S. Faber, B.D., Master of Sherburn Hospi- 
 tal, and Prebendary of Salisbury. London: T. Bosworth. 1853. 
 
 L 2
 
 148 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 " AND are you really so credulous in England and 
 France as to believe that Abdul Medjid is an ener- 
 getic Sultan, that Rescind Pasha is an honest 
 Vizier and enlightened statesman, and that this 
 Tanzimaut, or constitution as some people call it, 
 is worth more than that ? " 
 
 Thus spoke, on the day I landed at Smyrna in 
 1847, a clever, observing old Frank whose life had 
 been passed in Turkey, and who, as he finished 
 his interrogatory, knocked off the ashes of his 
 cigar with the tip of his finger. I replied that 
 I had come to see and to judge leisurely and 
 impartially. 
 
 " I will tell you what you will see," continued 
 the old Frank ; " you will see a country going 
 headlong to ruin ; you will see everything in a far 
 worse condition than that in which it was when 
 you left us twenty years ago. To have some im- 
 mediate proof of this, only go through Turk town 
 and take a ride to the Turkish villages in the plain 
 of Boudja. Abdul Medjid is a true Turkish Sul-
 
 ABUSES. 149 
 
 tan and nothing else effeminate, weak in body 
 and in mind, governed by his mother and the 
 women and eunuchs of the Seraglio. Sultan Mah- 
 moud was at least a man ; this is a poor puny 
 creature, who passes nearly the whole of his time 
 in the harem. Reschid Pasha ha ! Parlez moi 
 de gela ! Je le connais ! With all the preten- 
 sions to European civilization which he has set up, 
 or which have been set up for him by journalists 
 and other scribblers in his pay, he is a true Turkish 
 grand Vizier and nothing else mercenary, rapa- 
 cious, unwise, indolent, and corrupt as any of his 
 predecessors. As for Tanzimaut, it is all bosh! 
 The approach to an equality of rights which it pro- 
 mised to the Christian and other Rayah subjects 
 has never been and never will be effected. 
 
 " Until the Turks cease to be Turks and Mussul- 
 mans it must remain a sham. Shams may impose 
 upon Europe, but they cannot deceive any man 
 who has ears and eyes and who lives and travels in 
 the country. Tanzimaut has put down the use of 
 the bastinado, but this is only in the great seaport 
 towns where there are European consuls. Up in 
 the country the stick goes its round just as usual : 
 so does the use of torture, so does the extortion 
 of the governors and sub-governors, so does every 
 other irregularity !"
 
 150 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 The old Frank did not think that the morality 
 of Smyrna had been improved by the recent re- 
 forms. A good many murders had been recently 
 committed, and the murderers had all been Mus- 
 sulmans who had taken to the mountains as ban- 
 ditti. My old Frank confessed that capital punish- 
 ments had become less summary and far less 
 frequent than they had been a few years previously. 
 This struck me on my first arrival in Constanti- 
 nople in 1847. In 1827-8 all the sentences were 
 summary and the punishments dreadful Some- 
 where or other in the capital or in the provinces 
 the yataghan or the bowstring was constantly at 
 work. It was not often that you could go by the 
 gate of the Seraglio without seeing a ghastly exhi- 
 bition of bleeding heads. If a Turk made any 
 observation about these executions, it was merely 
 to say that Sultan Mahmoud was a very strong 
 Padishah ; and then he would slightly shrug his 
 shoulders and talk about Kismet (destiny). They 
 were all familiarised with the sight of blood, and 
 this no doubt tended to increase the popular fero- 
 city. On the accession of Abdul Medjid a milder 
 spirit on the part of government certainly began to 
 manifest itself. As executions became rare, the 
 Turks began to consider them with emotion, and 
 even with horror. It will be understood that I
 
 CHIME. 151 
 
 am speaking only of the Turks of the capital and 
 great cities.* 
 
 The increase of crime in Constantinople was 
 undeniable, was self-evident and enormous. The 
 Christian part of the suburbs certainly seemed in 
 the way of becoming uninhabitable for decent, 
 quiet people. It was not safe to go after sunset 
 through the lower streets of Galata and Tophana, 
 unless you went armed and attended. Nocturnal 
 house-breaking, street robberies, and the like, did 
 not stop down by the water-side ; they ascended 
 the diplomatic hill of Pera. Between the 8th of 
 August and the 7th of September we had them 
 every night as regularly as the fires. I know not 
 how many murders or stabbings were crowded in 
 that brief space of time. It was a revival of Juve- 
 nal's Ancient Rome by night. Then, again, 
 
 * Just before our arrival there had, however, been several 
 executions. One was for religion. The Tanzimaut had pro- 
 claimed that every subject of the Porte was free to profess 
 whatever faith he pleased. Not so, said the Koran and its com- 
 mentators: with them the brief dogma was, "Ouce a Mussulman 
 always a Mussulman, or death." A wretched Armenian had re- 
 nounced Christianity and embraced Islam, and, after living for 
 some years as a Mussulman, he had renounced the Prophet, and 
 had sought a reconciliation with the Christian Church of his 
 fathers. He was presently arrested. All the fanatics of Con- 
 stantinople, together with a great many Turks who were not 
 fanatics, but only trimmers and time-servers, insisted that, in so 
 solemn a case, the law must take its course ; and in the end the 
 poor Armenian was led out and publicly executed by having his 
 head severed from his body.
 
 152 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 over in Constantinople Proper, among the Turks 
 themselves, unwonted robberies and assassinations 
 were now and then heard of in spite of all the 
 care taken to conceal them. Highway robberies, 
 which for many years had been rare, were now 
 alarmingly frequent. Twice within a week, over in 
 Asia, couriers were stopped and robbed ; and a little 
 later, a poor courier who was on his way from the 
 capital to Belgrade was robbed and murdered. 
 
 I am well aware that many of the crimes com- 
 mitted in Constantinople proceeded not from the 
 Turks, but from professing Christians native 
 Greeks and Armenians, Sclavonians, Rayusans, 
 Italians, our own protected subjects, the Maltese 
 and the Ionian Greeks, and the Hellenic subjects 
 of King Otho. By our old capitulations (as in the 
 case of France, Austria, Russia, and other Chris- 
 tian powers), our subjects of all degrees, when 
 detected or suspected, were to be given up to our 
 Consuls, and not to be subjected to any precipitate, 
 partial, or corrupt Turkish law-court, but to be 
 tried in our own manner, according to our own 
 laws. This clause in the capitulations was an 
 imperative necessity, for in Turkish law the oath 
 of a Christian cannot be taken in evidence where 
 a Mussulman is concerned, and all their courts, 
 kadis, and mollahs were and are notoriously par- 
 tial, venal, and corrupt. The very necessity which
 
 CKIME. 153 
 
 produced the clause is a proof that the Turks 
 ought not to be left in Europe, and in possession 
 of a capital where the foreign protective Christians 
 are increasing as rapidly as the Turks are decreas- 
 ing. The Sultan's government cannot or will not 
 maintain an effective police, and the European 
 Consuls cannot do it for them. The Christian has 
 no equality of rights in the eyes of Turkish law, 
 and if the protected subject of a Christian power 
 he cannot possibly be abandoned to the decisions 
 of the Turkish courts, which (in addition to their 
 other enormities) have swarms of false witnesses 
 ready to swear anything upon hire.* 
 
 It comes to this : the Osmanlees cannot govern 
 their own capital. How, then, can they hope to 
 keep it ? 
 
 All that vision of wonderful local improvements 
 which had been reported in Rescind Pasha's news- 
 papers disappeared the moment we landed at 
 Tophana. The quays, wharfs, streets, and all 
 other things, were as I had left them in 1828, or, 
 
 * " Every department, judicial and administrative, has in- 
 creased in venality and corruption. There may be less violence, 
 but there is more fraud. At Constantinople the state of things 
 is bad enough. The evil grows in proportion to the distance 
 from the centre. . . . The Turks are subjecting the provinces 
 from which they must be driven to a hurried plunder the old 
 habit of a hostile corps about to decamp from an occupied city 
 at news of the approach of a superior force." Bayle St. John, 
 ' The Turks in Europe,' &c.
 
 154 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 in many respects, they were in a still worse con- 
 dition. On our walk up to Pera we passed 
 through a street, the principal communication 
 with the diplomatic quarter, which was littered 
 with the carcases of dead dogs, dead rats, and 
 other abominations. Nothing, absolutely nothing, 
 had been done to improve the place, or to facilitate 
 communication To novices it was really difficult 
 to avoid falling or stumbling. The streets looked 
 as if they had been paved by having loose stones 
 thrown down haphazard ; most of the stones had 
 their roughest sides or sharpest angles uppermost ; 
 many of them were loose, and rolled as we trod 
 upon them, and every here and there were gaping 
 interstices or deep holes between. They were 
 never swept ; the dust was almost suffocating, and 
 it annoyed the eyes as much as the stenches did 
 the nostrils. "We ran through a gamut of stinks ; 
 when we got past the carrion, an odour would 
 come out of some of the houses too pungent to be 
 borne with any patience ; or a crowd of garlic- 
 feeding Armenians would send whiffs at us that 
 made us stagger as though we had been hit by 
 grape-shot.* We groped our way through void 
 
 * " I counted two and seventy stenches 
 All well defined and several stinks." 
 
 Coleridge on Cologne. 
 
 But the foulest part of Cologne is clean, pure, and sweet,
 
 FREQUENCY OF FIRES. 155 
 
 spaces left by some recent fires, and whereon they 
 had left all the unsightly ruins, and the cinders, 
 and pungent ashes, which affect a stranger like 
 cephalic snuff. 
 
 Our first night's sleep at Pera was murdered by 
 the beating on the rough pavement of heavy iron- 
 shod clubs, and the shrill, wild, often-heard, and 
 well-remembered cry of 
 
 " Yangin var ! Yangin var ! " (Fire there is ! 
 Fire there is !) 
 
 We had two conflagrations before the morning, 
 but we were told that only some four or five dozen 
 of the wooden houses had been burned to the 
 ground. During the four weeks that we remained 
 this time at Pera or in the neighbourhood, there 
 was a fire greater or smaller every night, besides 
 three by daylight. No improvement had been 
 introduced, no additional means adopted to check 
 this constant destruction of labour and capital. 
 
 The Porte was enforcing a rigid passport system, 
 which its employe's and understrappers were turn- 
 ing into a copious source of revenue for them- 
 selves. A poor Greek, or other Christian Rayah, 
 could not go a mile beyond the walls of Stamboul 
 without a teskere, for which he had to pay. This 
 passport system had no effect, either in preventing 
 
 compared with any part of Constantinople, or any portion of its 
 suburbs.
 
 156 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 crime, or in detecting or securing the criminals. 
 If it has not been found to have had any such 
 effect in populous and highly civilized countries, it 
 can scarcely be expected to produce any in a wild, 
 most thinly-peopled country like Turkey, where 
 there are no high-roads, no enclosures, where every 
 man may choose his track, and keep far wide of 
 police stations and guard-houses, and where hardly 
 any man can read. Compared with what we had 
 to give for signing and countersigning our pass- 
 ports in certain Christian countries, it was a small 
 matter that we paid at the teskere-office ; but the 
 sum was of importance to the impoverished people, 
 and the Rayah peasant in the provinces was often 
 made to pay double the prescribed fee. In fact, 
 the amount of his payment depended on the ne- 
 cessities or greed of the Turkish official 
 
 Turkey has been described, over and over again, 
 as a land free from the annoyances of custom- 
 house officers. It was so once : even twenty years 
 ago a traveller might take on shore whatever he 
 thought proper, and might move his baggage from 
 place to place without being molested by douaniers, 
 or any of that irksome family. But that happy 
 time is past and gone : now we could not embark 
 a small portmanteau and a carpet-bag for the 
 Prince's Island, or Therapia, or San Stefano, with-
 
 CUSTOM-HOUSE ANNOYANCES. 157 
 
 out being hailed and stopped by dirty little Turks 
 with sticks in their hands. We generally got out 
 of the difficulty by giving backshish. If you re- 
 fused to bribe, they hauled your effects away to 
 the custom-house, and made you lose the steamer, 
 or incur another expense by keeping your hired 
 caique waiting. The number of these creatures of 
 prey must have been very great. I believe they 
 lived entirely on their bribes. But, sometimes on 
 returning to Constantinople, this species of bribery 
 would not carry one through. In Tophana and 
 Galata the cavasses and soldiers would stop the 
 Armenian hamals or porters bearing the luggage, 
 and (heedless of Tanzimaut) kick them and thrash 
 them soundly, if they had not a custom-house tes- 
 kere to show for it. This had so worked upon the 
 sensibilities of the hamals that they would hardly 
 carry the smallest parcel for you from the wharfs 
 to Pera, or even from one house to another in 
 Pera, unless you went through all the custom- 
 house forms, and submitted to all the delay. Thus 
 was departed one of the few real comforts the tra- 
 veller had enjoyed in the Ottoman dominions. 
 The new-school Turks said that all this was alia 
 Franca quite Frank fashion according to the 
 usage of civilized nations. " Ha ! " said an old 
 Frank merchant of the place, " you see what
 
 158 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 comes of civilizing Turks ! People have been 
 putting fiscal notions and European systems into 
 their heads. They cling to the worst of these, and, 
 as they are now so poor, they render them more 
 and more oppressive." There was, however, an- 
 other reason ; the customs, nearly all over the 
 empire, were farmed by the sharp confederated 
 Armenian seraffs, who paid for them fixed annual 
 sums to government, and who, of course, made by 
 them as much money as they could possibly extort ; 
 not but that they were constantly robbed by the 
 understrappers of their own race, and by the 
 Turks they were obliged to employ.* 
 
 * "The customs of each pashalik or district are in general 
 farmed to private individuals. There is no auction, no compe- 
 tition of any kind. The ministers treat directly with their 
 favourite Armenian, Jewish, Turkish, or Greek bankers; and a 
 public agreement is made for a certain sum, whilst private stipu- 
 lations are of course entered into, so that official interest may be 
 rewarded. I might mention an instance in which a pasha has 
 sold a certain 1 revenue of 8,000,000 piastres for 560,000. In 
 farming the other branches of the revenue, as for example the 
 tithe, which is paid in kind, similar recklessness is displayed ; 
 for even when the semblance of an auction is attempted, every 
 ene knows beforehand who is to be the successful bidder, and 
 under whose patronage." Bayle St. John, ' The Turks in 
 Europe,' &c. I believe that no Jewish or Greek bankers ever 
 get these contracts. The whole business seemed to me to be iu 
 the hands of the " favourite Armenians," whose rapacity is as 
 boundless as is their indifference to the decay and extinction of 
 the empire. The Armenians deal directly with the Porte and 
 the pashas. There are Turkish middlemen, but, properly speak-
 
 CENSOESH1P. 159 
 
 I also found on my first arrival that the Turks 
 had established a censorship, and were allowing a 
 fierce war to be carried on against bibles. They 
 stopped and carried to their frightful, filthy, dan- 
 gerous dogana my case of books. Upon inquiring 
 the reason, I was told, to my astonishment, that 
 this too was alia Franca ; that they knew I was 
 not a dealer ; that the books, &c., were for my pri- 
 vate use, and that, as they would be carried away 
 with me back to England, no duty would be 
 charged upon them ; but that the Porte, some 
 time ago, had thought it expedient and proper, 
 and conducive to morality, to establish a censor- 
 ship, or a board to examine all the books that 
 were brought into the country, and that my books 
 must pass through this ordeal before I could have 
 them. I believe that the mention of morality 
 drew from me a bitter smile, for I knew, before 
 now, the prevailing morals of the place, and this 
 time I had already seen shops in Galata and Pera 
 stocked with the most demoralizing and obscene of 
 
 ing, no Turk exercises the calling of a banker. The profession 
 is absolutely forbidden by the Koran. Besides, the Turk is too 
 indolent and too ignorant to acquire the science of keeping long 
 and intricate accounts. 
 
 I do not entertain quite the same opinions in politics or in 
 political economy as Mr. Bayle St. John, but I agree in nearly 
 every view he has taken of the condition of Turkey, and thiuk 
 that his book ought to aid and assist in removing many illusions.
 
 160 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the spawnings of the modern press of Paris. My 
 books consisted of a few historical works, some 
 volumes of old travellers, and some books of re- 
 ference, mostly in English a language as yet 
 known to very, very few of the Sultan's subjects, of 
 whose rnorals the government was taking so much 
 care. After twenty days' delay, a great deal of in- 
 convenience, and no small amount of fatigue in run- 
 ning down from Pera to the filthy custom-house, and 
 from the custom-house up the steep hills back to 
 Pera, I recovered my books, but was forced to pay 
 137 piastres for them, and was otherwise cheated 
 and insulted. In an up-stairs room of the dogana, 
 where I found my treasure (the case broken open, 
 and the books tumbled all about quite alia Turca), 
 we saw another and a larger case standing close 
 by, and addressed to somebody up at Pera. It was 
 rudely burst open and disordered like our own ; 
 and in a corner of the room, thrown on the dirty, 
 dusty floor, were a number of volumes which had 
 been abstracted from it, and which there was no 
 intention of restoring to it. The Turk, who spoke 
 a little Lingua Franca, brought us a parcel of these 
 books, saying, " Non passare ! fi/m star buona ! " 
 These indirected volumes were translations of the 
 New Testament in Turkish-Armenian and modern 
 Greek, published by our London Bible Society. I
 
 CENSORSHIP. 161 
 
 asked the man why they could not pass why he 
 called them not good ? He replied, like a parrot, 
 " Non star buono I star Protestante I star buono 
 per fogo" I told him that I was a Protestant, and 
 that those books had been printed in my country. 
 He repeated, " Protestante non star buona ! " 
 Here another secret oozed out. The intolerant 
 Armenians, who were supreme over all the custom- 
 houses, and who had earnestly recommended the 
 establishment of this censorship, had turned the 
 machinery to their own purpose, being alarmed at 
 . the progress made by the American missionaries 
 in bringing over some of their own people to Pro- 
 testantism. This custom-house officer was a Mus- 
 sulman, an illiterate, ignorant Turk ; what did he 
 know of the difference between Protestantism and 
 Romanism, or of any of the divisions of the Chris- 
 tian Church ? Assuredly nothing. The Turks 
 had only recently learned the word Protestante ; 
 and to them or to the believers and bigots among 
 them all denominations of Christians were ghiaour 
 were birds of a feather, or swine of the same 
 hide and bristles. This new notion must have been 
 put into their heads by the all-prevailing Arme- 
 nians, who may, however, have been aided by some 
 of the Frank bigots of Romanism living in Pera. 
 The censorship had been first recommended to the 
 
 M
 
 1G2 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Porte upon other grounds, and as a state measure, 
 and a branch of political police. The Greek sub- 
 jects of King Otho were said to be inundating 
 Turkey with Greek books and pamphlets, cal- 
 culated to excite the Greek subjects of the Sultan 
 to revolt and rebellion against his paternal govern- 
 ment. " Stop the introduction of these wicked 
 books, and you will be safe," said the Armenians. 
 I was told that the ignorant Turkish bey who 
 played the part of censor-in-chief was aided by 
 certain Armenians who had some skill in the lan- 
 guages of Europe, and by a renegade Greek priest 
 who could read the Romaic. During our stay the 
 bey was translated to some other and totally dif- 
 ferent office ; and one of Reschid Pasha's news- 
 papers, which was incessantly boasting that the 
 toleration of the government was perfect, and that 
 thought was nowhere more free than in Turkey, 
 in announcing his removal, applauded him for 
 having discharged his duties as censor with zeal 
 and intelligence.* It must be noticed that it was 
 after the promulgation of the decree of full re- 
 ligious toleration obtained by our ambassador, Sir 
 Stratford Canning, that this war was waged in the 
 Turkish capital, under the very eye of the Porte, 
 against the word of God against the translations 
 
 * ' Turkey and its Destiny.'
 
 THE "MAXIMUM." 163 
 
 of the Scriptures, which had been made and printed, 
 at immense cost, by the voluntary association and 
 contributions of pious and philanthropic English- 
 men. 
 
 The internal workings of the reformed system of 
 administration broke upon me by degrees, and 
 most frequently through accidental observations. 
 It was in this way I first learned that the govern- 
 ment had fixed an octroi duty on all the provisions 
 consumed in the Christian suburbs, and had at the 
 same time established maodmum prices for meat, 
 fish, fruit, &c. One morning we saw a Greek gar- 
 dener selling beautiful ripe, fresh figs. We were 
 going to buy some, when two Turkish cavasses 
 came up and seized the Greek in a savage manner. 
 What had the gardener done ? He had been selling 
 his fruit for a few paras more the oke than the price 
 fixed by the governor of Tophana. " But my figs," 
 said the poor Greek, " are figs of the best quality 
 are very fine figs ; people willingly pay the price I 
 ask for them. I cannot force them to buy. People 
 will pay a poor man a few paras the more rather than 
 eat the common figs. Where is my sin ? Amaun ! 
 Amaun ! What wrong have I done?" The ca- 
 vasses told him that figs were figs ; that he had 
 thrown dirt upon the law, and must go to prison 
 for it ; and, making the gardener put his basket of 
 
 M 2
 
 164 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 luscious figs on his head, and giving him a kick be- 
 hind to quicken his pace, they marched off with 
 him to those filthy, abominable dungeons in To- 
 phana, which are left unimproved, unaltered, and 
 are enough to give disease or death to the victim 
 that is shut up in them for any time. How long 
 the poor grower and vendor of figs remained there 
 I cannot say, but I was assured by one who well 
 knew the usages of the authorities, and the secrets 
 of the prison-house, that there was no chance of 
 his being liberated until the Turks had eaten up 
 all his figs, and had made him pay a fine in money. 
 This, thought I, is a pretty way of encouraging a 
 man to grow good fruit. 
 
 Figs, grapes, and melons, and all the fruits we 
 got up at Pera, though not very dear, were detest- 
 ably bad. Most other articles of consumption, in 
 spite of the maximum, were dear as well as bad. 
 Living there in a comfortless lodging-house was 
 quite as expensive as living in a comfortable Lon- 
 don hotel. 
 
 The octroi and the maximum were not confined 
 to Constantinople. Over at Brusa matters were 
 still worse. There, in the plain, we saw large 
 fields of melons (they grow them here, not in 
 gardens, but infields}. They were most delicious, 
 ripe, bursting, but falling to rot on the ground.
 
 THE "MAXIMUM." 165 
 
 The Pasha had fixed the price of melons at so low 
 a mark, that it would not pay the expense of 
 carrying them into town. The pernicious mon- 
 strous folly of the maximum, operated upon figs 
 and grapes, nor did it stop at fruit or vegetables : 
 it fell with a blight on meat, maize, wheat, barley, 
 game, everything. No regard was paid to differ- 
 ence of quality. The Pasha and his Council, or 
 rather the Pasha and his Kehayah Bey for the 
 Council, set up by the Tanzimaut, was a nullity 
 had the same philosophy as the police officer who 
 arrested the Greek gardener in Tophana. Figs 
 were figs ! grapes were grapes ! melons were 
 melons ! and the best must be sold at the same 
 price as the worst This system had already 
 caused a great abandonment of gardening and 
 agriculture ; this had happened and was happen- 
 ing in the plain, and near to a great city, which is 
 not what it was, but which must still be called a 
 populous city. Higher up the country, a little 
 farther away from Brusa and every other con- 
 siderable market, the case was getting still more 
 desperate, the cost of carriage over those wretched 
 tracks (roads, I repeat, there are none in Turkey) 
 being so much the heavier. We saw fields which 
 had recently been under cultivation, totally aban- 
 doned, and we heard men say that they would
 
 166 TIIE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 grow only just enough to feed themselves and 
 families. And why should Greek or Turk sweat 
 and toil where he is not allowed a free market for 
 his produce ? The poor farmers say that the 
 system is enforced solely for the benefit of the 
 rich for the special advantage of a dozen or so 
 of Turkish families, who live up in Brusa, with 
 absurdly numerous households. And these pashas, 
 beys, and effendis, show no bowels of compassion 
 for the poor. During the horrible famine, in 
 1845, when men, women, and children from the 
 interior were seen in the plain of Brusa eating 
 grass like cattle, these grandees did nothing for 
 them, and shut their doors against them. The 
 poor Mussulmans gave, but they had soon nothing 
 left to give, and were themselves in danger of 
 being famished. The general display of hard- 
 heartedness, and of a contempt for the charity so 
 repeatedly enjoined in the Koran, was noted by 
 all, and most among the richest of the Osmanlees. 
 "The ghiaours, the Franks, and strangers, the 
 very Jews, have more compassion on us than our 
 own people and brethren ! " said the starving 
 father of a starving family, who received in a 
 Frank house the bread for which he had vainly 
 applied at the door of nearly every rich Mussul- 
 man in Brusa. We hear of but few of them in
 
 FAMINES. 167 
 
 Europe, and only of the most terrible, but these 
 famines are every year occurring in some part or 
 parts of the interior. One district can hardly suc- 
 cour another, because there are no roads, and 
 because each district now grows little more than 
 what suffices for its own consumption. There 
 have, however, been cases where there was plenty 
 in one district, and famine in another not ten 
 leagues off. In a desolate village we found a 
 Turk who had more corn than he knew what to 
 do with. We asked him why he did not carry it 
 down to Brusa? "Mashallah 1" said he, "it 
 would take me four days to get there ! It must 
 be carried, in light loads, on the backs of horses. 
 The horses would eat nearly all the corn before I 
 could get to Brusa ! " 
 
 Few know better than I do that the monstrous 
 evils resulting from the utterly neglected state of 
 internal communications, and from the octroi and 
 maximum systems, have been forcibly and re- 
 peatedly represented to the enlightened govern- 
 ment of Reschid Pasha, and that they have been 
 so represented without leading to any change 
 without producing any effect whatsoever. 
 
 But it was in the winter season of 1848 that I 
 and my son most felt the effects of the maximum. 
 We were nearly starved, or doubly starved, by cold
 
 168 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 and by hunger. A week after our return from 
 Asia Minor we found that there was a dearth of 
 charcoal. 
 
 All cooking operations are performed by means 
 of charcoal ; no fuel is consumed in kitchens except 
 charcoal ; and even up in diplomatic and civilized 
 Pera, very few houses could be warmed except by 
 the pan-gals, or pans of charcoal ; while in the 
 Turkish, Greek, Armenian, and Jewish quarters, 
 both on this side and over at Constantinople, and 
 at Scutari, and all the way up the Bosphorus, 
 charcoal was almost the only fuel that could be 
 used either for cooking or for warming. An im- 
 mense quantity had been consumed at the most 
 extravagant, rude, and thoroughly, barbarous fetes 
 given by the Sultan, in the preceding month of 
 September, to celebrate the circumcision of his 
 eldest son.* An unusual consumption had taken 
 
 * These disgusting fetes, which -were held in the Asiatic 
 suburb of Scutari, and which lasted nearly a whole week, besides 
 costing the impoverished Sultan an immense sum of money, led 
 to many acts of violence and oppression, and, while they lasted, 
 put a dead stop to all business, public or private. There was an 
 immense demand for the ice, or congealed snow, of Mount Olym- 
 pus, to make ices and sherbets for the feast. Messengers came 
 spurring over from Constantinople to Brusa, and by order of the 
 Pasha of Brusa they seized all the horses and mules in the town 
 to send them up the mountain to bring down snow, and then carry 
 it fifteen or twenty miles, to Moudania or Ghemlik, where it was 
 to be embarked for Scutari. The Turks were no more exempted
 
 RESULTS OF THE "MAXIMUM." 169 
 
 place, through the early beginning and the great 
 severity of the winter ; but that which had tended 
 in a far greater measure to the present scarcity 
 was the fixing, more than a year ago, a very low 
 maximum price a price so low that many of the 
 wood-cutters and charcoal-burners had given up 
 the business in despair. At short distances from 
 Constantinople there was wood and forest enough 
 to furnish charcoal for the whole of the charcoal- 
 burning portion of Europe ; but it could not re- 
 main in wet and snowy weather ; from many of 
 these places it could not have been brought with- 
 out a dreadful expense for carriage, and then these 
 nearest places did not enjoy the right of making 
 
 from the perquisition than were the Rayahs. Some of them got 
 an exemption by bribing the pasha's people who were heading 
 this hunt after horses and mules. We saved one poor Turk's 
 horse by putting him in the stable of a Frank gentleman, wherein 
 the pasha's vagabonds dared not venture. The animals that 
 were pressed into the service were nearly all lamed or otherwise 
 injured, for the ice-purveyors were in a fearful hurry, and drove 
 them on unmercifully. I never heard that the poor owners 
 received any recompence. 
 
 According to the proclamation of Gul-Khan6, Tanzimaut, 
 and all that fatras of nonsense and humbug, forced corve'es were 
 to cease for ever, as well for the rayahs as for the Osmanlees, and 
 the lying journalists of the Porte had assured the whole world that 
 they had ceased, and were no longer known except as traditions. 
 Besides the Brusa case, I witnessed with my own eyes twenty 
 corve'es cruelly enforced, at the distance of only a few miles from 
 the capital. These, however, fell entirely upon rayah subjects 
 mostly upon the poorer sort of Greeks.
 
 170 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 charcoal at all, and no man in them could have 
 thought previously of making it for the fixed 
 prices, even if he had had the necessary licence.* 
 The article rose to a fearful price in Pera, and 
 also over in Constantinople Proper. The crescendo 
 movement continued until charcoal was as dear as 
 bread, and until it was not to be obtained at any 
 price. In the streets of Pera and Galata people 
 went about from house to house begging for a 
 little, or offering extravagant prices for a little. 
 In our lodging-house we were reduced to ex- 
 tremities. But even the renowned Ali Pasha, 
 Minister for Foreign Affairs, had not charcoal 
 enough to light his mangal or cook his dinner. As 
 this dearth happened when the weather was coldest 
 when it was sleeting, snowing, and blowing as 
 in Siberia the poor people suffered exceedingly. 
 Wood was very scarce, and presently became 
 enormously dear. The Turkish women over in 
 Constantinople collected in great numbers, way- 
 laid the Sultan as he was going to mosque, and 
 told the representative of the Prophet that they 
 and their children were perishing for want of 
 charcoal 
 
 * It has been proclaimed to the world by the sonorous organs 
 of Reschid Pasha that these restrictions on trade and industry 
 have all been set aside ; and so they have been upon paper.
 
 RESULTS OF THE " MAXIMUM." 171 
 
 At last, three steamboats were taken off other 
 duty and sent down the sea of Marmora and 
 across to Asia, to tow a few charcoal-boats to the 
 Golden Horn. I and my son saw the arrival and 
 the impartial distribution of the precious ma- 
 terial. The Turks rushed to the water's edge 
 and got nearly all of it, the poor Greeks, Ar- 
 menians, and Jews not daring to join in the 
 scramble ! A Jew, shivering at our side, and 
 looking at the charcoal, just as a famishing Lon- 
 doner might look at the viands in the windows 
 of a cook-shop, said with a groan, " The Turks 
 will get all the charcoal, and not a morsel for us 
 Israelites ! " I told him that there was Tanzi- 
 maut, establishing an equality of rights, and that 
 he had as good a right to go with his paras and 
 get some of the fuel as the Turks could have. 
 " Misericordia ! " said the Jew, " I should get 
 beaten and have my clothes torn off my back if I 
 were to go among those Mussulmans ! Tanzimaut 
 says one thing and Turks do another. What is 
 Tanzimaut ? Dirt ! " 
 
 The maximum had produced similar effects on 
 the supply of food. But for the unusual abund- 
 ance of game, we must have been as badly off for 
 food as for fuel. Beef was rarely to be procured at 
 all, and mutton rose to a price that put it altogether
 
 172 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 out of reach of the poor. In quality both were ex- 
 ecrably bad. The severe cold was at once a friend 
 and an enemy, for it brought down an immense 
 quantity of game, and especially of woodcocks and 
 wild ducks. During three months our principal 
 food was woodcock But for the diabolical 
 cookery of the place we should not have fared 
 so very ill ; but our birds were always sent up 
 swimming in that rancid, foul cart-grease which 
 goes by the name of Odessa butter.* The Turks 
 prefer this grease on account of its cheapness ; 
 the richer among them, however, prefer a Kussian 
 butter, which is made from sheep's milk, and is 
 imported in skins of that animal In some cases 
 this is replaced by melted grease from the broad, 
 fat, enormous tails of Asiatic sheep. Butter made 
 like ours, from the milk of cows, is completely 
 unknown except at some of the ambassadorial 
 residences. The Turks boast that they have fifty 
 preparations of milk, but they have not yet learned 
 how to make either butter or cheese. 
 
 All Europe had been assured, long before 
 
 * I hardly know what this horrible stuff really is. I see that 
 some travellers call it " beef-grease," and say that it is imported 
 from Wallachia in huge bags of ox -hide, with the hair outside. 
 1 have often seen these ox-hides, but I believe that they nearly 
 all come from Odessa, or from other Russian ports on the Black 
 Sea.
 
 MONOPOLIES. 173 
 
 the year 1848, that the monopolising Esnaffs, or 
 Guilds, had been abolished, as well as the restricted 
 system of licences. Our stomachs gave a mournful 
 lie to the assertion. The very staff of life, or the 
 preparation of it, was a monopoly. Our bread was 
 always sour, and generally very gritty, with frag- 
 ments of Turkish mill-stones: it was made with 
 leaven which turns acid upon the stomach ; when 
 two days old it was so sour as not to be eatable. 
 Some of the Perote families made better bread in 
 their own houses ; but the bakers form a powerful 
 Esnaff, and their corporate privileges and the 
 right of poisoning people are not to be interfered 
 with. Many times representations had been made 
 by medical men, and other Europeans, that sour 
 leaven is a bad compound, very injurious to 
 persons in delicate health, and that they would 
 make far better bread if they would only use yeast, 
 of which there was a plenty in the country. But 
 this was contrary to their religion or to custom, 
 which is now about the only religion left among 
 them. Mussulmans had always made their bread 
 with leaven, and ought always so to make it ; it 
 was their adet In Frankistan they made their 
 bread with yeast, that was their adet ; but could 
 the Franks pretend that Mussulmans were to 
 make bread after their fashion? By reason like
 
 174 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 this, my friend Dr. Millengen, Physician to the 
 Sultana Valide, had often been defeated, not 
 merely in this, but in other efforts at still more 
 important improvementa In the winter of 1 848, 
 however, that high and mighty dame, the mother 
 of Abdul Medjid, who ab origine was a purchased 
 Circassian slave, had a long and alarming illness. 
 In her convalescence her stomach rejected nearly 
 all food. Seizing the favourable opportunity, Dr. 
 Millengen recommended light sweet bread, made 
 with yeast Long and solemn deliberations were 
 held ; astrologers were consulted ; but it was finally 
 agreed that the Doctor should himself, and with 
 his own hands, make and compound some of his 
 Frank bread, with flour furnished to him out of 
 the Sultana Valide's own stores.* The loaves 
 
 * Nothing can pass through the bands of Turkish placemen 
 or couriers without plunder. A certain quantity of flour was 
 named to the doctor, with which he was to make a given number 
 of loaves ; but before the Sultana Valide's flour reached his 
 hands it was reduced by one-third. 
 
 In the same way, of rations for three horses, allowed him by 
 the Valide, the doctor never got more than two. On the recovery 
 of that august personage, her son, the grateful Sultan, ordered 
 the doctor a present of 100,000 piastres, but the sum paid to Dr. 
 Millengen was 70,000 piastres. The rest of the money had 
 stuck by the way in the hands of the chamberlains, &c. 
 
 Dr. Millengen was a great favourite at court, a perfect master of 
 the Turkish language, and well acquainted with the tricks of the 
 country. Other men fared far worse than he.
 
 MONOPOLIES. 175 
 
 were presently made ; the Doctor ate of them in 
 the presence of the Sultana's eunuchs and chiefs 
 of her household, to show that there was no poison 
 in them. The chief eunuch and chamberlain also 
 ate, and pronounced the bread to be good ; and 
 after some further exorcisms and ceremonies, a fine 
 white slice was presented to the Sultana, who ate, 
 and pronounced it to be most excellent. The 
 bread sat lightly on her imperial stomach, and 
 without any acidity. Dr. Millengen was extolled 
 to the skies ; and by imperial rescript, pompously 
 announced in the Vizier's own newspapers, he 
 was authorised to have ovens of his own, and to 
 sell bread made in his own fashion, without re- 
 gard to the esnaff of bakers. The Doctor took 
 premises in Pera, put into them some intelligent 
 Greeks, and left them to make the bread with 
 yeast and to sell it. I believe his bakehouse was 
 burned down in the great fire of June, 1848, when 
 more than 2000 houses were reduced to ashes ; but 
 he was free to build another, and when we left, in 
 July, Dr. Millengen was, or had the right of being, 
 head baker to the Sultana Valide, as well as 
 Hekim Bashi,-or Chief Physician, to her Highness. 
 Before proceeding to Asia, I made, in the neigh- 
 bourhood of Constantinople, the acquaintance of 
 Dr. Horace Southgate, Bishop of the Anglican
 
 176 THE DOOM OF TURKEY". 
 
 Church in the United States of America. This 
 enterprising divine had travelled over nearly the 
 whole Ottoman empire, together whh some parts 
 of Persia, and altogether he had resided nearly 
 twenty years in Turkey. He read and spoke with 
 fluency the Turkish language and the modern 
 Greek. He had written and had published at New 
 York three interesting volumes of travels. I found 
 his conversation quite as interesting as his books. 
 He abounded with information, and was always 
 ready to impart it I was indebted to him for 
 many details respecting the state of Turkish society 
 in the remote provinces in Asia, the workings of 
 the system of reform, and the general condition of 
 the empire, all drawn from personal and repeated 
 observation and patient inquiry. Dr. Southgate's 
 books and his conversation had certainly the effect 
 of dissipating some of those dreams in which I still 
 indulged. " This young Sultan," said he, " is 
 mild and kind, but his education in the harem has 
 been most defective. Now he lives almost entirely 
 in his harem, and is governed by the caprices of 
 women, who are not only emptying his treasury 
 by their extravagances, but ruining his mind and 
 body ; and this is the life he has been leading ever 
 since he ascended the throne as a boy of sixteen. 
 Truth can seldom penetrate the walls of the im-
 
 DR. SOUTHGATE. 177 
 
 perial harem, and the most enlightened of his 
 ministers stand in dread of the intrigues of his 
 women and eunuchs. Although he has made two 
 or three short tours, he really knows nothing of the 
 wants and miseries of his country. They hood- 
 wink him wherever he goes. The places and dis- 
 tricts through which he passes are dressed up for 
 the occasion, like mere scenic representations. He 
 means well as far as his very limited knowledge 
 allows, so perhaps do two or three of his present 
 ministers, but they have no instruments to work 
 with. The employe's of Government are as corrupt 
 and rapacious as ever they were ; and when they 
 are at a distance from the centre of government, 
 and the criticisms of the European ambassadors 
 and consuls, they are just as oppressive and cruel. 
 Now and then you may find an exception ; but I 
 never knew a good Pasha to be left long in his 
 place. As for this Tanzimaut, which prescribes 
 something like an equal treatment of Mussulmans 
 and Christian and Jewish subjects, it is an incon- 
 sistency and an impracticability in nine cases out 
 of ten, so long as they adhere to the Mahommedan 
 law ; but go over into Asia, and at the distance of 
 a day's journey from the capital you will find that 
 the ' beautiful ordonnance ' counts for nothing at 
 all These precipitate Turkish reformers have built 
 
 N
 
 178 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 withcmt a basis. They do not rely upon the old 
 religious feeling of the Turks ; they are doing all 
 they can to uproot it ; that feeling has been going 
 rapidly these twelve years, and is now almost gone. 
 They have not substituted any other religious 
 feeling. They have been mixing up the spirit of 
 Voltaireism with the forms of Mahommedanism. 
 They have been patching up an Oriental system 
 with shreds and fragments of various European 
 systems. There is no congruity : the opposite qua- 
 lities will never blend together." 
 
 Dr. Southgate had seen all the provinces or 
 pashaliks, the worst as well as the best. I con- 
 fined my researches to what were called the very 
 best. More than one of Reschid Pasha's satellites 
 allowed that many of the districts remote from the 
 capital were in a very sad condition, and that it 
 would yet require a good deal of time to introduce 
 the new organization and all the blessings of the 
 Tanzimaut into them. " But," said they, " take a 
 view of the country near the capital, the pashalik 
 of Adrianople and the great pashalik of Brusa, and 
 there you will see what improvements have taken 
 place since the establishment of our reform system. 
 There you will see how the Tanzimaut is working." 
 This I did see, and that with disgust and horror. 
 Everybody admitted that Brusa, the nearest of the
 
 MUSTAPHA NOUREE. 179 
 
 Asiatic pashaliks, was more fertile, more beautiful, 
 richer, and better governed, than any other in the 
 empire. " If you find things bad there," said an old 
 friend, " to get at the condition of the other Asiatic 
 provinces you must multiply the badness by ten." 
 
 The Pasha of Brusa was then Mustapha Nouree, 
 a man of note, a personnage historique, as his 
 little French doctor called him. He had been 
 considered as a right-hand man of the reform ing 
 Sultan Mahmoud ; he had been Arch-Chancellor of 
 the empire, and Seraskier, or Commander-in-Chief, 
 and had filled all the highest governmental posts 
 except that of the viziriat. I saw a good deal of 
 him personally, and a great deal more of his doings. 
 He was a bloated, coarse, vulgar, mercenary, and 
 most ignorant man most ignorant even for a Turk. 
 He was as indifferent to cruelty, bloodshed, and all 
 human suffering, as he was insensible of honour, 
 and unsusceptible of the feeling of shame. He 
 had a kehayah, or lieutenant, or sub -governor, 
 who was a greater scoundrel than himself. But 
 his chief minister and agent the man by whom 
 or through whom he governed this vast pashalik 
 was his chief of the police, a rapacious and fero- 
 cious Arab, who was called Khodja Arab, and 
 whose very name was a terror all over the coun- 
 try. I shall never forget that villain's fallen 
 
 No 
 Z
 
 180 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 countenance ; it still (and not ^infrequently) 
 haunts my dreams. He must have been of the 
 very darkest tribe of Araby : his face was almost 
 black, but did not betoken any negro mixture ; 
 his eyes were deep set, small, and rather red- 
 dened, but they were the quickest, and at once 
 the cunningest and fiercest eyes I ever looked 
 into ; he was very tall and very sinewy ; he was 
 no longer young, not even middle-aged ; his beard 
 was very grey, but his activity and vigour were 
 great ; the strength of his right arm, of which 
 many a poor fellow in the town and plain could 
 speak from experience, was said to be prodigious. 
 It was suspected, and indeed very generally 
 believed, that he did a good deal of business h la 
 Jonathan Wild. His pay was very small, but he 
 was believed to be rich ; next to the Pasha he had 
 about the best house in Brusa, and his harem was 
 said to be well stocked. Bit by bit he had got 
 together a wide tract of the very best land in that 
 fertile plain. Forced possession formed his only 
 title-deeds. His ordinary force of Tufekjees, or 
 irregular musketeers (who, by the way, were 
 generally armed, not with muskets, but with 
 pistols and yataghans), was small ; but it was said 
 that in any case of emergency Khodja Arab could 
 collect in the city and in the villages of the plain
 
 THE PASHA'S COUNCIL. 181 
 
 600 volunteers and followers of course Mussul- 
 mans all. Some of the Khodja's thief-takers had 
 been thieves themselves aforetime, and were con- 
 sequently well acquainted with the haunts, secrets, 
 and ruses of the profession. The Arab had cer- 
 tainly put down the banditti who infested the 
 plain a few years ago. He allowed nobody to rob 
 on a considerable scale except himself. His fol- 
 lowers, of course, got their incerte their little 
 pickings. But the Pasha, his Kehayah, and this 
 model chief of police, were robbing at such a rate 
 that there was no room left for other depredators. 
 By means of Khodja Arab, Mustapha Nouree had 
 turned his horrible prison into a mint. I will pre- 
 sently explain how the money was coined. 
 
 The Tanzimaut, or " beautiful ordonnance," the 
 Magna Charta and Bill of Rights, " the Turkish 
 Constitution," as it has been styled, decreed and 
 ordained that in every pashalik there should be a 
 Shoorah, or Council, that the Pasha should do no- 
 thing of moment without consulting this Council, 
 and that respectable Christian and Jewish Rayahs 
 should have a seat at the council-table as well as 
 Osmanlees. The Greeks, the Armenians, and the 
 Jews were to elect the Council members from among 
 their own notables, and these Councillors were to 
 have freedom of speech, free votes, and all the im-
 
 182 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 munities enjoyed by Turkish members. There is no 
 denying that all this looks very pretty upon paper. 
 But, on close examination, I found these provin- 
 cial councils the very hollowest of all the shams 
 set up by Tanzimaut. They were worse than 
 shams ; they served as screens to the Pashas and 
 their villanous satellites. During our residence in 
 the pashalik of Brusa, when some transactions of 
 most extraordinary corruptness and nefariousness 
 excited comment and remonstrance on the part of 
 the English and French Consuls (the only parties 
 who could safely remonstrate), Mustapha Nouree 
 Pasha said, with perfect gravity, "Why do you 
 complain of me ? These are not my acts. The 
 Council did this, not I ! Does not Tanzimaut say 
 that the Pasha governs through the Council ? " 
 And to remonstrances proceeding from the Eu- 
 ropean diplomatists at Constantinople, K-eschid 
 Pasha and his very -minute satellite Ah' Effendi, 
 Minister for Foreign Affairs, would unblushingly 
 say that there was no longer any despotism in 
 Turkey, that municipal institutions were now 
 establishing and cherished, that Pashas now-a- 
 days could do nothing without the consent of their 
 Councillors, and that, without any distinction as to 
 race or religion, all the communities were fairly 
 represented in these Councils.
 
 THE PASHA'S COUNCIL. 183 
 
 And how was this " Amphyctionic" Council of 
 Brusa composed ? Nominally it consisted of thir- 
 teen members, every man of whom was named and 
 appointed by the Pasha himself. Added to the 
 Jewish element, the Christian Rayahs the Greeks 
 and Armenians far outnumbered the Turks of the 
 province, but out of the thirteen members of council 
 nine were Mussulmans. What chance had the Rayah 
 minority of four against the proud and contemptuous 
 majority of nine ? But, in reality, the minority did 
 not amount to four. One of them, the Rabbi of the 
 Jews, having painfully perceived that his presence 
 in council was of no use in checking oppression, in- 
 justice, and cruelty, had retired more than a year 
 ago ; and another of them, the " notable" of the 
 Roman Catholic Armenian community, had re- 
 solved two years ago never again to set his foot in 
 the council-chamber because they had most iniqui- 
 tously condemned his son to death for a murder of 
 which the poor youth was perfectly innocent, and 
 allowed the real murderer, whose guilt was proved 
 beyond the reach of a doubt, to go at large in 
 Brusa, where he is now living, and where he is 
 held to be, next to Khodj& Arab, the greatest 
 ruffian in the place. After the retirement of this 
 notable they had not been able to find any member 
 of his community willing to take his place. As
 
 184 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the notable who represented the Greek community 
 never attended except when summoned, and never 
 spoke in council except to say " Evat Effendim" 
 (Yes, Sirs), there was in fact only one Rayah 
 member, and this was the infamous Cabackji 
 Oglou, a notable of the Eutychian Armenians, 
 who was banker, agent, and factotum to the Pasha.* 
 By the universal consent of Turks, Greeks, Arme- 
 nians, and Jews, this Cabackji Oglou was worse 
 than the Pasha, worse than the Kehayah Bey, 
 worse than the chief of the police, the most sordid 
 and selfish wretch, the most unmitigated rogue in 
 all the pashalik. During my long stay in the city 
 and plain a great many of his practices came 
 directly to my knowledge. The facts were under 
 my eyes. After our return from the interior we 
 found this true specimen of an Armenian Seraff 
 furious against a Frank merchant of Brusa for 
 having lent money to some Armenians at 15 per 
 cent interest : he himself got from 25 to 50 per 
 cent, never less than 25. The Armenians, who 
 belonged to a quiet, retired village in the plain, 
 wanted the borrowed money for a church they were 
 repairing and decorating ; their priests had got 
 hold of the piastres and had spent them, they 
 could give no account in what manner, and were 
 * See APPENDIX VIII.
 
 ARMENIAN BANKERS. 185 
 
 not at all prepared to pay interest, although their 
 seals, as well as those of the lay notables of the 
 village, were to the bond ! ! Two years' interest 
 was due, and the Frank merchant was pressing 
 for payment ; but, through the influence he pos- 
 sessed over the Pasba, and consequently over the 
 Kadi, or judge for civil matters, Cabackji Oglou 
 baffled the Frank in his legal pursuit, and neither 
 interest could be got nor capital recovered. The 
 griping Armenian was determined to make the 
 .merchant feel the monstrous impropriety of re- 
 ducing the rate of interest. This enormous rate 
 of interest stops all agriculture, all industrial pro- 
 gress whatsoever, and is in itself, and by itself 
 alone, enough to give the finishing stroke, the coup 
 de grace, to this long-perishing empire. But of 
 this hereafter. 
 
 I found Armenian greed, covetousness, corrup- 
 tion, grossness, and (after all) rank imbecility, in 
 everything and in every place. These bloated, 
 foul Seraffs now make the Pashas. 
 
 By the new system, which took the far greater 
 part of the collection of the revenue out of the 
 hands of the Pashas, and farmed out the taxes, 
 these great governors of provinces, and many of 
 their sub-governors, were appointed to regular an- 
 nual salaries. They were to be paid like the public
 
 186 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 servants of civilised nations, and were no longer to 
 be left to the sole resources of jobbery and extor- 
 tion. In many instances these salaries are enor- 
 mously high, and altogether disproportionate to 
 the means of the country. Mustapha Nouree was 
 receiving at Brusa a salary of some 8500?. per 
 annum.* The ministers at Constantinople are paid 
 far more than any members of the British cabinet. 
 The custom also was introduced of giving retiring 
 pensions to the displaced servants of Government ; 
 and the odd and very sharp practice of seizing 
 upon and appropriating the money, goods, and 
 chattels of a disgraced or dismissed Pasha, or other 
 great man, was entirely given up by the Sultan, 
 whose father, Mahmoud, very frequently reple- 
 nished his purse in that way. But the diminution 
 of temptation to jobbery and extortion has not 
 been attended with any visible decline of the old 
 evil practices. A shrewd old Turk said to us, 
 " Our Pashas are as hungry as ever. Their posts 
 
 * Mustapha Nouree's French doctor, un homme dti Midi (of 
 whom I have said little, because I could not say any good), was 
 constantly boasting that Son Excellence got three times more 
 money than his pay. " Alors !" said that honest Frenchman 
 M. G , " alors votre Pasha il vole ! " 
 
 " Pardonnez moi," said the hekim, " mon Pasha ne vole pas, 
 mats il s'arrange." 
 
 From the evening on which we heard that discourse, we 
 always turned the verb " voler" into " arranger."
 
 PASHAS AND AEMEXIANS. 187 
 
 are not sold quite so openly as they used to be, 
 but they are hardly ever obtained without bribery, 
 and they are not to be retained without intrigue 
 and a heavy annual outlay in the shape of presents 
 to the Sultan's women, to the people about the 
 Court, and to some of the ministers. The Pashas 
 rob the people, but few of them grow very rich, or 
 long keep their wealth. They begin by contracting 
 enormous debts with the Armenian seraffs, in order 
 to obtain their places and have the means of enter- 
 ing upon them with state and dignity ; some Arme- 
 nian or other becomes the seraff of each of these 
 great men, receiving his money, keeping his ac- 
 counts, and all the rest ; and I have noticed that 
 whenever a man gets into debt with the Arme- 
 nians he is sure never to get clear again. The 
 Armenians are eating us all up ; they are getting 
 all the money of the country into their own hands, 
 or under their control. The Armenians have as 
 much to do with Government appointments as they 
 had when the places were sold. I should like to 
 see the man that can step into a high place and 
 keep it without their assistance. This Reschid 
 Pasha has appointed many poor fellows to office ; 
 but it was the Armenian gold that paved the way 
 for these men at Court ; it was the money of the 
 seraffs which gave them their outfit their horses,
 
 188 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 their fine dresses, their costly rings, their diamond- 
 mounted pipes ; and it is by robbing with the 
 seraffs that they keep up their interest over at 
 Stamboul. The Armenians must have heavy in- 
 terest for their advances ; and when you want to 
 leave a ruined estate and a family to poverty, only 
 allow an Armenian to manage your affairs for you ! 
 Believe me, under this boasted new system there 
 is quite as much extortion as under the old. In 
 Mahmoud's days these Armenian seraffs and rapa- 
 cious pashas now and then had their heads taken 
 off, which was some comfort to us, although we did 
 not get back the money of which they had robbed 
 us; but now they rob and plunder as much as 
 ever, and no punishment overtakes them. Now 
 the pashas always screen themselves behind their 
 shoorahs or councils, and no one is really respon- 
 sible, and the Armenians, with their nishans and 
 their honourable decorations embroidered on their 
 caps, hold up their heads higher than the best of 
 us Osmanlees, and are even allowed to entertain 
 the Sultan at dinner in their own houses." 
 
 An English gentleman, for whose experience and 
 opinions I entertain the highest respect, had come 
 to very melancholy conclusions as to the practica- 
 bility of checking official corruption, and purifying 
 the provincial administration of Turkey. He had
 
 AN ENGLISHMAN'S CONCLUSIONS. 189 
 
 lived thirteen or fourteen years in the country ; he 
 had travelled well nigh over every part of the vast 
 unpeopled empire ; he was impressed more deeply 
 than any man I knew at Constantinople with the 
 political necessity of sustaining the tottering go- 
 vernment, and preserving the independence and 
 integrity of the Ottoman dominions ; he had been 
 most ultimately acquainted with Turks of all classes 
 and conditions ; he had relations of close friendship 
 with some few Turks of rare attainments, who had 
 never been spoiled by power or ambition, or the 
 intrigues necessary to attain to greatness ; he enter- 
 tained a high opinion of the morale of the Turkish 
 peasantry. In short, my amiable and accomplished 
 friend might be called a Philo-Turk, yet these were 
 the conclusions he had come to in the year 1847 : 
 " Corruption is still a heavy clog. .... It is an 
 evil, moreover, which can only be slowly eradi- 
 cated ; the remedy, too, is more easily indicated 
 than applied. In the first place, it is absolutely 
 necessary that the fountain-head should be un- 
 tainted that the ministers, from whom all other 
 dignities and appointments flow, should be them- 
 selves men of integrity ; next, that they should 
 select honest governors for the provinces ; and, 
 thirdly, that these in their turn should choose 
 honest men for local and subordinate functionaries.
 
 190 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 t 
 
 Now, here already is the rub : where, in Heaven's 
 name, are so many honest men to be found ? At 
 Constantinople, where they may be easily counted, 
 I do not think they can possibly amount to more 
 than half a dozen : that is to say, honest function- 
 aries. As for men of untried public virtue, there 
 are thousands, to be sure, who desire no better than 
 to have it put to the proof ; and by these the Grand 
 Vizier is pestered night and day for places and 
 appointments. In the hope, therefore, of bettering 
 the public service, he has extensively employed 
 this class of individuals himself, and recommended 
 others to the governors of provinces. I am afraid, 
 however, that, on the whole, the experiment has 
 proved a failure, and that some other qualification 
 for office besides untried integrity will generally be 
 found necessary. To make head against the tide 
 of corruption requires great superiority of character, 
 to say nothing of experience in the business of life. 
 Most of the new men, being, I suppose, deficient in 
 both these respects, have found it easier to go with 
 than against the stream, while the more resolute 
 have been thrust aside as impracticable."* 
 
 * Extract from a letter dated Damascus, March 2, 1847. 
 This letter was one of several which appeared in London in the 
 4 Morning Post,' during our friend's extensive tour in Asia 
 Minor, Syria, &c.
 
 TCHORBAJEES. 191 
 
 By ancient usage, as well as by modern Tanzi- 
 maut, the Greek communitors were to choose their 
 own primates, or tchorbajees,* as they are called 
 over in Asia Minor, and these men were to settle 
 the respective quotas of taxes and imposts, and 
 to regulate the municipal affairs of their several 
 towns or villages. The elections were to be annual, 
 and perfectly free. No pasha or sub-governor, no 
 kadi or mufti, was to interfere with them : the 
 Turks were to have nothing to say or to do in them. 
 Thus it stood, and yet stands, in theory and upon 
 paper. But, in reality in active operation how 
 were these municipal institutions managed, or how 
 respected ? The pasha, through his Kehayah Bey 
 and chief of police, named all the tchorbajees, and 
 kept them in office two, three, or more years as 
 long as it suited his purpose, or as long as they 
 were entirely subservient to his will. Though so 
 near to the capital and centre of government, 
 except the very large and strong village of Demir- 
 desh, there was not a village in the plain of Brusa 
 that dared to choose its own primates. They were 
 all obliged to take the men whom it pleased the 
 pasha to appoint These rogues, besides committing 
 all manner of irregularities, were constantly forcing 
 the poor farmers and peasants to pay far more than 
 * Soup-men, or dispensers of soap.
 
 192 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 their just share of the taxes. Of course, the tchor- 
 bajees divided their spoil with some of the potent 
 Turks who had nominated them, who kept them 
 in power, and who backed them in all their acts of 
 spoliation, and in ail their abuses of power. Some 
 of the tchorbajees had in the course of a few years 
 grown comparatively rich by oppressing and 
 robbing their countrymen and fellow Christians. 
 But the pasha made the same use of the institution 
 as he did of his council ; he turned it into a screen 
 and a fence to conceal his own iniquities. In a 
 very painful case, where I in vain endeavoured to 
 obtain something like justice for a poor Greek 
 villager, who had been robbed by his tchorbajees, 
 and put to torture by one of Khodja Arab's men, 
 the pasha said to me in his own konack (from 
 which he hardly ever stirred), "This is not my 
 affair. The Greek tchorbajees are apt to be very 
 great rogues. The Greeks ought to change them. 
 The elections are free and uncontrolled by the 
 Mussulmans. The tchorbajees settle the accounts 
 of the villagers, and, if the Greeks have bad tchor- 
 bajees, it is all their own fault !" Now Mustapha 
 Nouree Pasha knew better than any one how the 
 municipal elections were managed, how the poor 
 Greeks did not dare to nominate a tchorbajee that 
 was not approved by his own authorities, and how
 
 MUSTAPHA'S TYKANNY. 193 
 
 the Kehayah Bey and the chief of police sustained 
 those who were nominated in all their iniquities. 
 
 There was not one single day out of the very 
 many days we spent at Brusa and the villages of 
 the plain that did not present some act of oppres- 
 sion and tyranny on the part of this foul Pasha, 
 who had been held up to us as one of the very best 
 of Turkish governors. 
 
 Over at the mountain village of Philladar, a 
 Turk, well known in that neighbourhood and 
 never known for good went into the coffee-house, 
 armed and dressed like one of the Pasha's own 
 tufekjees, and shot a Greek, against whom he was 
 known to have an old grudge. His pistol-ball not 
 only killed the man he hated, but badly wounded 
 another Greek of the place, who was sitting by 
 him; and with whom the savage had no quarrel. 
 The assassin, having other arms, while the Greeks 
 had none, escaped. Upon the case being re- 
 ported at Brusa, Khodja Arab and the Pasha's 
 tufekjees were sent to the village, and there, in- 
 stead of looking after the Mussulman murderer, 
 they seized the keeper of the coffee-house and all 
 his family, and every poor Greek that was said to 
 have been in the coffee-house or near to it when 
 the murder was committed. These innocent people 
 were chained, brought from Philladar to Brusa (a 
 

 
 194 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 distance of about 1 6 miles), and thrown into the Pa- 
 sha's filthy, pestilential prison, where we saw them. 
 The cafejee, or keeper of the coffee-house, had fallen 
 ill in that horrible hole, and was believed to be in a 
 dying state. His aged mother went weeping to 
 the house of the English Consul, to know if any- 
 thing could be done for her son, whose crime 
 amounted to this : a Christian had been murdered 
 by a Turk in his coffee-room. As the poor fellow 
 was not an Ionian Greek, or in any way a protected 
 British subject, our Consul could not interfere offi- 
 cially. My friend the French Consul did interfere 
 officiously, and I went to the Pasha's konack with 
 him, and did all I could in aid M. C., who spoke 
 Turkish as a Turk, strongly exposed the whole 
 case, and asked the Pasha what he thought would 
 be the opinion entertained of such barbarous pro- 
 ceedings in civilized Europe, or among the diplo- 
 matic corps at Constantinople. Mustapha Nouree 
 appeared to be considerably flustered ; but in the 
 end he told the Consul that he had liberated the 
 Philladar prisoners that very evening, and that 
 they had been brought over to Brusa only to be 
 examined as witnesses. Begging his Excellency's 
 pardon, this last assertion was notoriously and 
 monstrously untrue. But if it were true that the 
 Greeks had been brought over only for the sake of
 
 MUSTAPHA'S PRISON. 195 
 
 evidence, what could be thought of a system of 
 justice which loaded witnesses with chains, threw 
 them into a horrid, infectious prison, and kept them 
 there more than a week, and did not allow them 
 to depart (as we learned the next day) until they 
 had paid very heavy fines to Khodja Arab ? and 
 what of a system of justice which (thus treating 
 witnesses) makes no perquisition after the cri- 
 minal? And what, again, of the blessed Tanzi- 
 maut, and all the liberal and humane rescripts and 
 ordinances of which we have heard so much, when 
 the united evidence of all the Christian Greeks 
 and Albanians living in Philladar would not have 
 sufficed to convict the Mussulman murderer, if 
 he could have brought only two Turks to swear 
 to an alibi, or to swear that the Greek victim 
 had first struck the murderer and traduced the 
 Prophet ? 
 
 The reader will now understand how the pasha's 
 prison was his mint ! That horrible dungeon, in 
 true Turkish fashion, stood within the strong stone 
 walls of his konack, under and immediately op- 
 posite to the apartment in which Mustapha 
 Nouree was accustomed to smoke his tchibouque 
 for hours at a time, and to receive his Frank and 
 other visitors. It was always crammed full of 
 panting victims. These, of course, were chiefly 
 
 2
 
 196 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 rayahs Christian Greeks, Christian Armenians, 
 and Jews. But the Osmanlees were not always 
 free from the net which the chief of police threw 
 in the broadcast manner, and in every direction 
 where there were people believed to possess a little 
 money. Day after day used we to see Khodja 
 Arab or some of the tufekjees driving poor 
 people to the den, chained or bound with ropes, 
 and goaded on like negro slaves in a kafila. The 
 falsest charges were trumped up and sworn to by 
 the agents of the police, or by some of the Mussul- 
 man false witnesses who are always retained in a 
 Turkish court of justice. But very often the poor 
 rayahs were never put upon any trial at all. 
 They were merely kept captive until they or their 
 friends could and would pay money enough to 
 satisfy the pasha's lieutenant and his chief of 
 police. Some who were obstinate and who clung 
 to their piastres, had been lying in their chains 
 for many months. One of these, a handsome 
 Greek in the prime of life, who was falsely accused 
 of not having paid his full quota of taxes, either 
 committed suicide or was murdered one night in the 
 month of November. Others died of gaol fever. 
 The only protection against Khodja Arab lay in 
 rags and downright and visible destitution. Except 
 to cudgel them now and then, the chief of police and
 
 MUSTAPHA'S PRISON. 197 
 
 his diabolical followers never interfered with the 
 poorest of the people. 
 
 Shortly after our departure from Brusa the 
 pasha's prison, more and more crowded, became 
 more and more pestiferous ; the gaol fever had 
 leaped over the stonewalls of the palace-yard and 
 was spreading in the town, and the arrival of 
 cholera, with all its terrors, was daily expected. 
 In the month of January my friend M. George 
 Crespin, the French consul, waited upon the 
 Pasha, spoke to him about the frightful state of 
 the prison, and asked his Excellency to go into 
 it with him, and see things with his own eyes. 
 Mustapha Nouree excused himself, saying that, 
 only the evening before, he had ordered the prison 
 to be swept out and perfumed, il I'avait fait 
 balayer et parfumer. " It is nevertheless true," 
 said my friend, " that the prisoners are still heaped 
 one upon another, and that some of them are 
 every day brought out dead or dying. Will the 
 government at Constantinople continue to shut 
 its eyes to such horrors ? " * Later in the 
 season, when the cholera was committing awful 
 ravages in the town and in the villages of the 
 plain, the Pasha began to tremble for his own 
 
 * Letter from the French Consul of Brusa, dated January 24, 
 1848.
 
 198 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 safety and that of his family, and a new scheme 
 was adopted. Instead of being carried to prison, 
 Khodja Arab's victims were driven to a great farm 
 he had acquired in the plain, and were there set 
 to work like slaves for the benefit of the chief of 
 the police. An English friend, who has been 
 nearly thirty years in the country, wrote to me at 
 the time from Brusa, " Instead of being sent to 
 prison, people are now conducted to Khodja Arab's 
 estate, and are there taught agricultural pursuits 
 and improvements gratis. His collection of la- 
 bourers is composed of Turks, Greeks, Armenians, 
 Jews, the poorest of Brusa. Some of these 
 men have changed their occupation from silk- 
 weaving to ploughing, and a pretty business they 
 make of it ! All stray cattle in the plain are 
 immediately marked with the Arab's stamp, not 
 much thought being given as to where they may 
 come from. Thus, you see, men and beasts are 
 taken up for the laudable purpose of working 
 Khodja Arab's farm." * 
 
 I believe, however, that most of these poor 
 creatures were working for the Pasha himself, who 
 had hi the neighbouring country several farms or 
 estates, immense in extent, but lying in fallow, 
 
 * Thus, poverty was no longer a protection. The poorest 
 might be made to work, though they could not be made to pay !
 
 DESPAIR OF THE PEOPLE. 199 
 
 neglected, almost totally abandoned, and getting 
 rapidly into the condition of wildernesses. 
 
 Some months after my return to England I 
 received from my old English friend a letter dated 
 Brusa, March 28th, 1849. I know the contents 
 of that letter to be as true as they are sad. " Mus- 
 tapha Nouree Pasha still keeps his post. I think 
 it high time he should be off; but whether we 
 should be benefited by a change is uncertain, 
 they are all bad. .... I hear that a change is to 
 take place, and that the Porte has determined to 
 send three wise honest men to overlook our Brusa 
 council. Where would Rescind Pasha find ad- 
 ministrative wisdom? Where does honesty exist 
 in this unhappy, fast-perishing country? You 
 know the class too well to expect any honesty 
 among the employe's of Government. If these 
 three overseers should come, we shall only have 
 three more hungry mouths to fill. A Turk said to 
 me the other day, ' The Pasha did always leave us 
 something; but now everything we have will be 
 devoured.' Old Khodja Arab, our chief of police, 
 is also to have a supervisor, and high time is it 
 that his tyrannical proceedings should be con- 
 trolled. But, in all probability, the supervisor will 
 be as bad as the Khodja, and so the poor people 
 of Brusa and the villagers of the plain will have
 
 200 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 two tyrants instead of one. You wanted them to 
 make roads and bridges ; these are in a far worse 
 condition than when you left us. The plain is all 
 flooded and in a deplorable state ; nothing under 
 the size of a camel can get through the mud of 
 
 our best road The people at one village can 
 
 hardly communicate with those living in another 
 a mile or two off. The Turkish school is as you 
 left it ; except in ruin, there has been no progress ; 
 all the town is now ruins ; tumble-down houses 
 and prostrate walls meet me at every turn ; and as 
 the snows are melting, and no care taken to give 
 the torrents from the mountain a proper course, 
 our streets are all like rapid mill-streams .... I 
 begin to believe that life in one of your Union 
 workhouses must be better than any existence in 
 this naturally rich but absolutely ruined country. 
 There is no trade of any sort. The silk- works are 
 all stopped and bankrupt ; universal poverty and 
 wretchedness have increased since your departure. 
 And yet there are asses among the Turks who are 
 talking of going to war with the Russians, and of 
 .the glory and conquest to be obtained.* But 
 
 * The reader ought to be reminded that this vapouring, which 
 was much louder at Constantinople, was exhibited months before 
 the question of the extradition of Kossuth, the renegade Bern, 
 and their numerous and desperate gangs. In fact, the Porte 
 assumed a hostile bearing towards \ustria and Russia as early
 
 BRUTALITY OF KHODJA ARAB. 201 
 
 these boasters are few ; the majority of the Os- 
 manlee population would not care a cocoon if the 
 Kussians were here to-morrow, and they would be 
 welcomed by the rayah subjects." 
 
 We were ourselves eye-witnesses of a good deal 
 of the Khodja's ferocity and barbarity, and we had 
 accounts of many other of his brutal proceedings 
 from persons who had witnessed them. By Tanzi- 
 maut, no Turk was to beat or strike a rayah, and 
 no rayah was to be punished until after fair trial. 
 The chief of police and his men never made an 
 arrest without beginning with a severe beating. 
 One day a poor peasant thought to save himself by 
 speed of foot : the Khodja levelled his piece at 
 him, and shot him dead. Although the victim 
 
 as the spring of 1848, or as soon as the revolution of Paris had 
 threatened to convulse and disorganize all Europe. I know that 
 Keschid Pasha's men chuckled over the revolutions at Vienna, 
 Berlin, &c. They got frightened afterwards, but at the moment 
 they rejoiced at the march of anarchy, and madly hoped to profit 
 by it. All this did not prevent the Emperor Nicholas from 
 sending an army into the Principalities to assist the Turks in 
 putting down insurrection and wild revolution in those countries. 
 The Russians did the work wisely, moderately, and well. By 
 themselves the Turks could not have done it. They might have 
 wasted Moldavia and Wallachia with fire and sword ; they might 
 have repeated the atrocities they committed against the insurgent 
 Christian population of Bulgaria in the summer of 1841 ; but 
 they never could have restored order and tranquillity and a 
 rational government. But for the Emperor of Russia, the two 
 principalities would be now two deserts.
 
 202 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 was a Mussulman, no stir was made about it. 
 Another day a poor Greek was found in the 
 bazaars without his kharatch ticket, or receipt for 
 his capitation tax. He said that he had paid the 
 money, and that those who stopped him knew it 
 was paid. This might be true or otherwise, but, in 
 either case, what immediately followed was revolt- 
 ing. A tufekjee aimed a blow at his head with a 
 heavy club ; the poor Greek guarded his head by 
 holding up his right arm, but that arm was broken 
 by the violence of the blow, and in that condition 
 the Greek was dragged away to prison. I could 
 enumerate many more individual cases, but the 
 work would be loathsome. Taking good care not 
 to enter great Greek villages like Demirdesh, the 
 Khodja and the tufekjees had the range of all the 
 little hamlets in the plain, and for miles beyond 
 the plain. They quartered themselves on the 
 poor peasants, consumed their best provisions, and 
 did what they liked. Most frequently these forays 
 were on private account ; but others were made in 
 a more formal manner, by order of the Pasha or 
 his lieutenant. A poverty-stricken village would 
 be unable to pay all the taxes demanded from it, 
 Presto ! A dozen or two of tufekjees were let 
 loose upon it to live at free quarters until the 
 money should be forthcoming. I am describing
 
 THE TUFEKJEES. 203 
 
 what I have repeatedly seen with my own eyes. 
 One particular case deeply affected me. We were 
 slowly riding towards a Greek village, when we 
 came up with a merry, festive party. The vil- 
 lagers were conducting to the home of her husband 
 a young Greek bride, very charming in person and 
 very prettily attired. The bride was preceded by 
 singers, and followed by musicians; she walking 
 between, in the midst of all the young women of 
 the place, who danced as they went, and beat little 
 tambourines. The scene was quite classical it 
 was more, it was Scriptural. It brought to the 
 mind the days and the very words of the Royal 
 Psalmist : " The singers go before, the minstrels 
 follow after : in the midst are the damsels playing 
 with the timbrels."* We dismounted from our 
 sorry horses, walked into the village with the gay 
 procession, and were invited to partake of the 
 feast prepared at the house of the bridegroom, 
 where we had more music and dancing, and an 
 abundance of other sports and pastimes. Every- 
 thing was indeed going "merry as a marriage 
 bell," when an old Greek came in much excited, 
 and pronounced the fearful word ' tufekjees ! ' The 
 merriment was stopped in a moment ; every face 
 grew either red with anger, or pale with fear. 
 
 * Psalm Ixviii. 25.
 
 204 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 The poor people said and vowed that they had 
 paid their fair taxes for the year had paid them 
 all, and to the uttermost para. But, unhappily, 
 they had had an unusually good harvest, and the 
 fact had got to the eyes or to the ears of Khodja 
 Arab and his partners in iniquity, and some days 
 previously they had received intimation that more 
 money would be expected from them. The 
 tufekjees were presently among us with their 
 pistols, clubs, and sharp yataghans. They brutally 
 insulted the poor villagers, consumed the best part 
 of the feast, drank most of the wine, and ordered 
 the best apartments to be prepared for their 
 accommodation. We took our departure imme- 
 diately : the ruffians did not take theirs until the 
 money was paid to a vile Armenian agent of the 
 Armenian farmers of the revenue. I believe 
 they stayed rather more than a week. 
 
 The Greeks of the small decaying town of 
 Apollonia, which stands on the very margin of the 
 beautiful lake of that name, were perennially 
 exposed to the invasions of a turbulent set of 
 Turks from the village of Atchelar, situated about 
 three miles off, near the head of the lake. These 
 fellows are notorious all over the country for their 
 profligacy, debauchery, and brutality ; they come 
 down here to Apollonia, armed to the teeth, and
 
 KUFFIANS OF ATCHilLAE. 205 
 
 in troops ; they force their way into the houses of 
 the Greeks, they swill their wine and raki, they 
 get mad drunk, and then they insult the women 
 and do worse. They threaten certain death to 
 every Greek that dares to lodge a complaint 
 against them, or even to murmur at their pro- 
 ceedings. Not very long ago they surprised and 
 carried off a Greek boy of the place, and followed 
 up the most revolting of all crimes by the foulest 
 murder. The perpetrators of these deeds were 
 well known, but they had never been molested. 
 I know not how to account for this exception to 
 the general rule, for this peculiar viciousness of the 
 men of Atchelar, unless it be by their frequenting 
 seaports. They carry timber and firewood down 
 to the lake, and through the Rhyndacus, into the 
 sea of Marmora; and I believe they occasionally 
 extend the voyage in awkward, crazy vessels, to 
 Scutari and Constantinople. Their bad reputation 
 and evil doings are of no recent date. They were 
 well known to Mustapha Nouree Pasha, as they 
 had been to his predecessors, but he had never 
 made any attempt to stop or correct them. To an 
 energetic remonstrance made by Frank gentlemen 
 of Brusa, one of his predecessors had replied, 
 " You tell me no new thing. I know that the 
 men of Atchelar are scamps, sad wild fellows
 
 206 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 all ; but they are all armed ; there are many of 
 them, and they all fight like devils. What would 
 you have of me ? where is my force ? have I an 
 army ? My tufekjees do not like to go to Atchelar. 
 The best thing I can do is to leave those chapkina 
 to themselves." 
 
 We asked one of the complaining Greeks why 
 they did not unite and throw the villains into the 
 lake when they came to their houses ? The man 
 said that they might do it, but scarcely any of the 
 Greeks were allowed to possess arms ; and then, if 
 they killed a Mussulman, they would bring all the 
 Turks of the country down upon them ; and such 
 of the Greeks as escaped being murdered would of 
 a certainty be loaded with chains, marched off to 
 Brusa, and thrown into the Pasha's prison. The 
 evidence of Christians would go for nothing in 
 such a case ; no allowance would be made for the 
 wrongs the Greeks had suffered ; no plea would be 
 admitted of their having acted in self-defence, or 
 for the protection of their wives and children ; the 
 evidence of any two Mussulmans would convict 
 them all, and they would all be inevitably ruined 
 if a single Turk were killed. To a great personage 
 at Constantinople a mushroom of the day, but 
 very potential for the time, and one of Reschid 
 Pasha's brightest satellites I subsequently made
 
 TREATMENT OF ARMED GREEKS. 207 
 
 a gentle report of these Atchelar proceedings, re- 
 ferring him for full confirmation to the English and 
 the French consuls at Brusa, or to any respectable 
 Turk resident in that city, and unconnected with 
 the Pasha. This man, who, I believe, had never 
 been farther into Asia than the edge of the great 
 burying-ground at Scutari, had the face to tell me 
 that the Mussulmans were all disarmed; that only 
 the regular troops had arms ; that the Tanzimaut 
 gave equal privileges to Greeks and Turks, &c. 
 
 I can most safely aver that never in Asia, and 
 very rarely in Europe, did we meet a Turk tra- 
 velling on the road without arms. In Brusa the 
 Turks paraded about the streets and bazaars, and 
 under the very eyes of the Pasha and chief of 
 police, with pistols, sabres, guns, and yataghans, 
 armed to the teeth as in the olden time ; but if a 
 poor Greek were found in the slightest degree 
 armed within the town, or in any of the neighbour- 
 ing villages, woe betide him ! Khodja Arab's 
 summary process was to shoot him down, and then 
 declare that he had found him in the act of com- 
 mitting a murder, or robbery, or some other heinous 
 offence. 
 
 The acquisition of money was of course the 
 greatest incentive with these administrators of law, 
 justice, and police, but very often the indulgence
 
 208 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of personal spite went along with the gratification 
 of avarice ; and not seldom the Turks were hounded 
 upon Christians by other Christian rayahs. The 
 rival Armenian sects,* having far more influence 
 than any other of the rayahs with the Turks, were 
 the greatest culprits in this particular. An old 
 Eutychian Armenian, who lived in a large village 
 above the plain of Brusa, had a difference and a 
 money quarrel with some Catholic Armenians in 
 the city. One Sunday morning, at a very early 
 hour, as he was on his way to church, some of the 
 tufekjees fell upon him, and demanded instant 
 payment of a debt, which he vowed he did not 
 owe, and good backshish for themselves. The old 
 man begged to be allowed to go and perform his 
 devotions, after which he would accompany them 
 to Brusa. It was entirely an Armenian village, 
 and he was the Oda-Bashi-in -Chief, or head man of 
 the head men. He was wealthy, for a person of 
 his condition (this was one of the few places where 
 the Armenians devoted themselves entirely to 
 agriculture), and he had been good and charitable 
 
 * The vast majority of the Armenians adhere to the old 
 Eutycliiau Church, but many thousands of them are Roman 
 Catholics. They hate each other with an intensity of hatred ; 
 they unite together in hating the Greeks and abusing their 
 Church ; and the Greeks, it must be said, return the compliment 
 in full.
 
 CRUELTIES OF RIVAL SECTS. 209 
 
 to his own people. One and all the villagers said 
 they would be bail and security for their chief ; 
 that the money would be paid if the Kadi should 
 decide that it was owing ; and that assuredly there 
 would be good backshish ; but the men of the 
 police, who in this case must have acted upon 
 special orders, cudgelled the old man, made him 
 get instantly on his horse, and drove him down to 
 Brusa. Upon his arrival there, instead of being 
 brought before the Turkish judge, he was thrown 
 into the Pasha's horrible prison, upon allegation 
 made by the tufekjees that he had resisted the 
 authority of the law, and had tried to make an 
 emeute. In a few days the people of the village 
 came down in a body to petition the Pasha, and 
 reclaim their benefactor, their best friend, their 
 father, who had fed them all during the last dread- 
 ful famine. The old man was unusually popular. 
 Even some Osmanlees, his near neighbours, came 
 and bore testimony to his charity and tranquillity. 
 Instead of ordering that the poor Armenian should 
 be released, or brought into court, the Pasha know- 
 ingly allowed his Kehayah Bey, and the chief of 
 the police, to put fetters and chains upon him. 
 The case excited indignation in such of the Franks 
 at Brusa as were not the interested and submissive 
 slaves of Mustapha Nouree. Several of them re- 
 
 p
 
 210 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 monstrated. To my friend the French Consul, who 
 did so in a very gentle manner, the Pasha said, 
 " What is this Armenian to you ? He is not of 
 your people. It is his kismet to be chained and 
 in prison. What will you have of it ? It is the 
 man's destiny." The respectable old man was 
 sent out in his fetters, with some common felons, 
 to do the duties of a scavenger in the most public 
 part of the town ; and that the humiliation might 
 be the more complete, the punishment the crueller, 
 the time chosen for this exposure was the holy and 
 festive season of Easter, when the streets of Brusa 
 were thronged with the Christian part of the popu- 
 lation. The fact was quite recent : it was the 
 Easter of 1847, about four months before our 
 arrival. The English and French consuls reported 
 the affair to their respective ambassadors at Con- 
 stantinople ; and Mustapha Nouree was given to 
 understand that he must put the Armenian upon 
 his trial in the Turkish court, or set him at liberty. 
 The Pasha preferred the latter alternative ; and 
 after being imprisoned and cruelly punished, and 
 after considerable sums of money had been ex- 
 torted from him in gaol, the Armenian was libe- 
 rated without any trial or examination whatsoever. 
 But, let me ask again, if a trial had been granted 
 to him, what would he have gained by that ? The
 
 SYSTEMATIC PERJURY. 211 
 
 tufekjees would have sworn to their allegation ; 
 hired witnesses would have sworn that they had 
 seen the old Armenian in flagrant resistance to the 
 law, and, if necessary, the whole village up in arms 
 and in open rebellion against the Sultan. The 
 testimony of three Mussulmans is conclusive. You 
 may bring three hundred Rayah Christians, and a 
 score of Frank Christians to boot, but their evi- 
 dence cannot be taken against that of the three 
 Mussulmans. No ! not even if all the three be 
 known to get their daily bread by the practice of 
 perjury. The expounders of Turkish law say that 
 it is an article of their religion, and that the evi- 
 dence of unbelievers never was or can be taken 
 against that of true believers. To a well-informed 
 Frank, a merchant, many years resident in the 
 pashalik, who was explaining these matters to me, 
 I said, " What, then, can signify this Tanzimaut, 
 and these fine professions of Rescind Pasha and his 
 school ? With this inequality of evidence, there 
 can be no equality before the law ; the Christian 
 and Jewish rayahs will always be oppressed." 
 The Frank almost laughed in my face, and said, 
 " Did you really believe that Tanzimaut was any- 
 thing more than a flourish V 
 
 The town of Billijik, at the distance of about 
 forty miles from Brusa, was the only place in the 
 
 p 2
 
 212 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 pashalik that exhibited, in the Armenian portion 
 of its population, some symptoms of industry, 
 trade, and prosperity. During our stay there (it 
 was on the morning of the 21st of October, 18^7), 
 our host, an Armenian merchant of the place, came 
 home in a state of great excitement. There had 
 been a terrible fracas. A turbulent Turk, Halil 
 Rule Oglou Abdullah, a member of the Council of 
 the Mudir, or sub-governor, had cruelly beaten the 
 servant of one of the most respectable Armenians 
 of the place ; and, after beating the man, he had 
 beaten the master for remonstrating, and had then 
 followed him to the khan, where all the Christian 
 merchants were assembled, and in their presence 
 had traduced him, had abused his mother and his 
 religion, calling him by the prohibited name of 
 Ghiaour, defiling the cross, and doing or saying all 
 those things which have been proscribed by the 
 Tanzimaut, and by so many of the Sultan's mani- 
 festos and declarations. The silk-merchants had 
 not courage enough to knock the bully down, or 
 turn him out of the khan ; for he would have 
 brought all the Turkish rabble of the place down 
 upon them, and this rabble was armed to a man. 
 Halil Kule Oglou Abdullah EfFendi was the famed 
 maker of many disturbances, and all quiet men 
 stood in dread of him. He was a most violent,
 
 ABDULLAH EFFENDI. 213 
 
 passionate brute. Our host and others were of 
 opinion that if this one man were removed, and 
 one good lesson given to the Turkish mob, Billijik 
 would be a quiet, happy place. Assuredly the 
 Government owed as much as these two simple 
 measures of justice to the Armenians, whose capital, 
 industry, and enterprise had made the place what 
 it now was, and had introduced whatever improve- 
 ment was in it. The Mudir, or governor, was 
 absent this morning ; but the head men of the two 
 sections of Armenians, with their spiritual chiefs, 
 went before the Kadi. The passionate Turk swore 
 that the Armenian servant was digging a trench to 
 carry off water, close by the wall of his house, in a 
 way which very much offended him ; and he had 
 two or three Mussulmans who were ready to swear 
 anything, even to the incredible perjury that the 
 poor Armenian had begun the affray, had given 
 the first blow, and had abused the Prophet Ma- 
 homet. The Armenian pleaded that the trench 
 was dug within his own grounds, and did not go 
 near to the house of the Turk, or in any way offend 
 him or anybody else ; that, even if the trench had 
 been dug otherwise, Abdullah Effendi would not 
 be justified in beating his servant and himself, 
 and blaspheming the religion they professed ; that 
 by the Tanzimaut it was as unlawful for a Mussul-
 
 214 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 man to abuse the Cross as for a Christian to abuse 
 the Prophet ; that he and his people had always 
 been known as good subjects to the Sultan, and as 
 quiet, decent, respectable people ; and he claimed 
 for himself that protection which the law promised 
 him, and for his assailant the punishment which 
 the law awarded. He had a shoal of witnesses to 
 speak to the facts. The first merchants of the 
 place had seen how he had been treated at the 
 khan, and had heard the revolting blasphemies of 
 the Turk in the khan-yard ; but they were Chris- 
 tians, and, as such, their evidence could not be 
 weighed in the scale against that of Mussulmans. 
 Had he been a man of less note, and less strongly 
 supported, the complainant would either have been 
 kicked out of the court, or have been bastinadoed 
 upon the evidence of the Turks. As it was, the 
 Kadi dismissed the case without so much as remon- 
 strating with the brutal offender, and recommended 
 the Armenian to make up his quarrel with his 
 neighbour, and not let him hear any more about it. 
 Timid and submissive as they are, nearly all the 
 Armenians cried out against this denial of justice. 
 From the Kadi, the Bishop of the Catholic Ar- 
 menians and the head priest of the Eutychian 
 Armenians came to me to tell me the whole story, 
 and to implore me to make the facts known to
 
 ABDULLAH EFFENDI. 215 
 
 Rescind Pasha, the Vizier, or to some other member 
 of the Sultan's present Government. The two eccle- 
 siastics did not say so, but their manner seemed to 
 express that they considered it altogether useless 
 to make an appeal to the Pasha of Brusa, within 
 whose government they were living, and within the 
 limits of which they had witnessed many acts of 
 oppression far worse than this. 
 
 The Catholic bishop and his companion assured 
 me that the two Christian communities were con- 
 stantly exposed to the violence and insolence of the 
 Mussulmans ; that Abdullah Effendi, although he 
 was employed as an agent by some of the Arme- 
 nian silk-merchants, and gained much money by 
 them, professed to be a rigid Mussulman, and fierce 
 hater of all Christians whatsoever; that it was 
 through his violence that the most immoral Turks 
 of the place were roused to their display of fanati- 
 cism ; and that the better portion of the Turks, not 
 being acted upon by such agency, were generally 
 tranquil, and even friendly. No longer ago than 
 at the Bairam of this year the Turkish mob had 
 insulted the Armenians and their clergy as they 
 were going to pay their accustomed ceremonial 
 visit to the Governor. They did not talk to them, 
 but at them. " There are pezavenks that ought to 
 be scourged ! Here are pretty karatas I Some
 
 216 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 whoreson ghiaours are now honoured by authority, 
 who ought to be bastinadoed and hanged by au- 
 thority ! See ! the sons of the sow have gold em- 
 broidery on their fezzes. What taushans (hares) 
 we Osmanlees must have become to allow Ar- 
 meeny dogs like these to do the dirty thing on our 
 beards, and defile the graves of our fathers and 
 mothers ! They are dirt ! Shaitan ! May the 
 devil have them all !" 
 
 Our host had previously told us of another 
 recent outrage. There were no Greeks living in 
 the town, but the particulars of the story were 
 now related to us by the Catholic Armenian 
 Bishop, and by other Armenians who came into 
 our room, and who, assuredly, were not to be 
 suspected of any partiality for a Greek. During 
 the late Ramazan, Hadji Dhimitri, of Ascia-Keui, 
 a picturesque village in the ravine, situated among 
 high rocks, which we had seen on our right hand 
 in coming up from Keuplu to Billijik, had been 
 miserably crippled and otherwise injured by 
 order of the Turkish Court, which had let off 
 Abdullah Effendi without so much as a reprimand. 
 Turks as well as Greeks lived at Ascia-Keui. One 
 day poor Hadji Dhimitri had with great toil 
 brought up water from a fountain, and had filled 
 his reservoir in order to irrigate his little garden
 
 KARA ALI. 217 
 
 and mulberry-ground. A Turk, his neighbour, 
 one Kara-Ali, came to him and said that he 
 wanted that water for his garden and must have it. 
 The Greek said that he might have brought up 
 water for himself, but that he was free to take 
 part of it. The Turk got into a towering passion, 
 called the Greek a ghiaour and pezavenk, and swore 
 he would have all the water. The quarrel was 
 hot but short. Dhimitri, fearing consequences if 
 he resisted, went away and left the Turks to take 
 and wantonly waste the water, merely saying that 
 he submitted to violence and injustice, and that 
 the Tanzimaut meant nothing. The Turkish 
 savage went to the Mudir and Kadi at Billijik, 
 and vowed that Hadji Dhimitri had wanted to rob 
 him of his water, and had uttered horrible blas- 
 phemies against the Koran and the Prophet. 
 Tufekjees were sent to Ascia-Keui, and Hadji 
 Dhimitri, being first of al] soundly beaten, was 
 handcuffed and chained, and brought up to Billijik. 
 The Greeks of the village were afraid of appearing 
 in such a case or against a Mussulman ; but four or 
 five did follow the unfortunate Hadji to the hall 
 misnamed of justice, and were there to depose that 
 it was the Turk who had taken by violence his 
 water, and had traduced his religion ; and that he 
 (the Hadji), though excited by anger, had not said
 
 218 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 a word against the Koran or the Prophet. But 
 the testimony of these Christians could not be 
 taken against Mussulman witnesses, and Kara-Ali, 
 the Turk, was provided with two false witnesses, 
 one being Shaker Bey, his own son-in-law, and the 
 other Otuz-Bir-Oglou-Achmet Bey. The pair 
 were false witnesses of notoriety, and generally 
 reputed to be the two greatest scoundrels of the 
 town. There were scores upon scores of people 
 who had seen them at the coffeehouse in Billijik 
 at the hour and time they pretended to have been 
 at Ascia-Keui, four miles off But of those who 
 had thus seen them the Mussulmans would not 
 appear, and the Christians could not get their 
 evidence received in court. Kara-Ali swore to the 
 truth of his statement ; his two false witnesses 
 swore that they had heard the Greek blaspheme 
 their holy religion ; and by sentence of the Kadi 
 poor Hadji Dhimitri received, then and there, 300 
 strokes of the bastinado. His toes were broken by 
 the blows, his feet were beaten to a horrible jelly, 
 he screamed and fainted under the torture. There 
 were some among our narrators who had seen this 
 forbidden torture inflicted, and others who had 
 heard the poor man's shrieks. The victim was 
 carried home on the back of an ass ; he had been 
 laid prostrate for more than six weeks ; it was
 
 USE OF THE TANZIMAUT. 219 
 
 only the day before our arrival that he had been 
 able to attend the Billijik market, and then he was 
 lame and sick a hobbling, crippled, broken man. 
 " The law," said one of our party, " is equal in the 
 two cases. If Hadji Dhimitri were guilty, he was 
 only guilty of that which we have all heard from 
 the lips of Abdullah Effendi this morning in the 
 khan ; yet the Hadji is cruelly bastinadoed and 
 lamed for life, and this same Kadi does not even 
 reprimand the Effendi. What, then, is the use of 
 this Tanzimaut?" "The use of it," said Tche- 
 lebee John, " is just this : it throws dust in the 
 eyes of the foreign ambassadors at Constantinople, 
 who recommended its promulgation ; and it hum- 
 bugs half the nations of Christendom, where people 
 believe in newspaper reports/' Before taking our 
 leave, the Catholic bishop begged me also to make 
 a statement of the facts to the British Embassy, 
 which, under Sir Stratford Canning, had always 
 been the best friend of the Christian rayahs, and 
 the steadiest champion for religious toleration. I 
 complied with this wish on my return to Constan- 
 tinople ; but Sir Stratford had not arrived, and, as 
 far as any effects were produced, I might as well 
 have told the story to the babbling waters of the 
 Kara Dere. 
 
 I could multiply examples of the barbarous ap-
 
 220 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 plication of torture cases which came under my 
 own notice, as well in European as in Asiatic Turkey. 
 
 After all this, how senseless, or rather how 
 revolting, the paragraphs of the Tanzimaut and 
 the wordy professions vamped up by Reschid Pasha 
 and his phrase-mongers ! 
 
 When on his short tour in the provinces of the 
 empire, the Sultan had received into his presence 
 deputations of Greeks, of Armenians, and of Jews, 
 as well as deputations of Mussulmans ; he had 
 treated them all with equal regard, and had en- 
 deavoured, as well by words spoken and by short 
 addresses delivered for him, as by his manner and 
 demeanour, to impress on the minds of all that 
 henceforward they were to be equal before the 
 law ; that they were no longer to be divided into 
 the adverse, rancorous classes of oppressors and 
 oppressed ; that, as natives and co-inhabitants of 
 the same fair country, as children of the same soil, 
 they ought to live in peace and friendship together, 
 and share in a common patriotism, however divided 
 by religions and sects. " That which the Sultan 
 wishes for is the strict observance of justice to wards 
 his subjects of all classes, without any distinction ; 
 for, unto whatsoever religion they may belong, they 
 are all children of the same country. Thus the 
 Sultan desires that a perfect union may reign
 
 RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION. 221 
 
 among them, and that all may concur, as far as in 
 them lies, to promote the happiness and the honour 
 of their common parent." Such were the words 
 pronounced, in the name of the sovereign, to the 
 Greeks, Armenians, and Jews at Selyvria on the 
 Sea of Marmora. Here, at Brusa, Abdul Medjid 
 himself spoke words nearly to the same effect 
 The rayahs went that day to their homes with a 
 new heart within them ; but the Sultan had not 
 been gone a week when they practically found that 
 these pretty declarations meant nothing at all- 
 were all bosh ! (nonsense). 
 
 The flames of religious persecution have ceased 
 nowhere no ! not even in the capital, and when 
 Lord Stratford de Redcliffe is there. What renders 
 this the more revolting are the facts that this per- 
 secution on the part of the Turks proceeds from a 
 mere passion for extortion, and very rarely from 
 any fanaticism ; that it is waged in a great measure 
 by the Armenians, who are so powerful in the 
 state, and such inveterate enemies of the Greeks, 
 and of all who do not belong to their own Church 
 or Churches. It is always with delay and difficulty, 
 and never without a heavy outlay of money, that 
 the Greeks can obtain permission to erect a school, 
 to build a new church, or to repair an old one. 
 For each of these objects an imperial firman is
 
 222 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 indispensable. The Armenians, for ever at the 
 elbows of the pashas, and exercising so direct an 
 influence on the Porte, lose no opportunity of 
 thwarting the Greeks and raising the price of their 
 firman. But the hatred of these gross, sordid, in- 
 tolerant Armenians seemed more especially directed 
 against the creed, doctrines, and practices of the 
 Reformed Church. I have said that the American 
 missionaries had made a good many converts. I 
 ought to add that they have done a vast deal of 
 good in the country, in the way of education and 
 moral and domestic training. These converts were 
 cruelly persecuted by their brethren, whose coarse, 
 unspiritual, and grossly idolatrous Church they had 
 abandoned. The poor people were anathematised, 
 put completely to the ban, and deprived of the 
 means of gaining their livelihoods. Any orthodox 
 Armenian detected in buying their goods, or in 
 employing their services, or in associating with them, 
 was arrested, maltreated, and thrown into the hor- 
 rible prison of the Armenian patriarch, for he too 
 has his prison in Constantinople. The more respect- 
 able of these converts withdrew to the small island 
 of Prote, where, in 1848, they were living entirely 
 by themselves, under one of the missionaries.* 
 
 * This island, in the Sea of Marmora, and at the distance of 
 only some 16 miles from Constantinople, is one of that beautiful
 
 ARMENIAN PERSECUTION. 223 
 
 Sir Stratford Canning, as the champion for tole- 
 ration and religious liberty, and as the especial 
 friend of all the Christian communities, remon- 
 strated with Reschid Pasha, the very breath of 
 whose ministerial life may be said to have de- 
 pended for years upon this ambassador ; but it 
 was not until nearly two years had passed that he 
 obtained from the Porte a declaration that the 
 Reformed faith should be recognised in Turkey, 
 and that the Armenian converts should be free to 
 pray and worship in their own way. And what 
 was the value of this solemn declaration, or what 
 were the effects produced by it ? The fanatical 
 Armenians persecuted the poor converts more 
 savagely than they had done before, and the Porte 
 afforded the converts no protection. But it was 
 not all fanaticism with the persecutors. The pa- 
 triarch, his bishops, and his clergy generally, extort 
 a deal of money from their flocks. They reason 
 thus, " If so many of our people go over to this 
 new-fangled religion of the West, where shall we 
 get our grushes ?"* The Greek priests are igno- 
 
 group called the Princes Islands. My friend the resident mis- 
 sionary observed that it required only a few letters to turn Prote 
 into Protestant. In fact, many persons called the island " Pro- 
 testant Island." 
 
 * Piastres. The word is commonly used for "money." You 
 never meet an Armenian but you find the word upon his lips.
 
 224 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 rant and bad enough, but they are enlightened, 
 respectable clergymen, as compared with the com- 
 mon run of the Armenian clergy. 
 
 I have said elsewhere, and I must here repeat, 
 that Lord Stratford de Redcliffe has been singularly 
 unfortunate in his efforts to protect the Christian 
 element of the population, and to induce the Turks 
 to practise consistently that perfect religious tolera- 
 tion, the merits of which have been so frequently 
 and so loudly claimed by and for Rescind and his 
 partisans. His Lordship (then Sir Stratford) ob- 
 tained in 1845 a decree of full religious toleration. 
 Ever}' Christian rayah was to have entire liberty 
 of conscience and of worship. Those who were 
 Christians in disguise were to declare themselves, 
 and to resort without fear or constraint to their 
 own places of worship. This fine decree led im- 
 mediately to one of the most frightful of religious 
 persecutions to multiplied murders, to massacres, 
 to execrable tortures, to expatriation, famine, dis- 
 ease, and nearly every horror that can afflict hu- 
 manity. And this persecution was not the act of 
 a tumultuary mob, was not the effect of a sudden 
 uncontrollable outburst of popular fanaticism ; no ! 
 it was the act of the Government ; it was directed 
 by pashas, mudirs, and mufties ; and to the Govern- 
 ment the onus and the odium will attach for ever !
 
 EFFECTS OF TOLERATION DECREE. 225 
 
 The frightful story, which admits of no abridgment, 
 will be found in another place.* I saw the sur- 
 viving victims, I verified all the facts and circum- 
 stances, and I was most intimately acquainted with 
 all the Frank Christians who nobly exerted them- 
 selves to put a stop to these Turkish atrocities. I 
 could well enter into the feelings of our Brusa 
 consul and my old friend Donald Sandison when 
 he went to remonstrate with the bloated pasha, 
 who, as usual, received him seated in state on his 
 divan or broad sofa. After some brief compliment 
 Mustapha Nouree motioned the consul to take a 
 seat at his side. "No!" said Donald, with the 
 spirit of a true Highlander, " No ! I will not sit 
 there ! Your divan is steeped in blood ! You are 
 reeking with the blood of Christians !" 
 
 I could go on multiplying cases of horrible per- 
 secution on account of religion or out of antipathies 
 of race, but I have said enough to expose the false 
 pretensions of these Turkish reformers to an en- 
 lightened toleration, to gentleness, and humanity. I 
 merely implore attention to my facts, which I state 
 and repeat with all the solemnity of an oath. Two 
 more short anecdotes may however deepen the im- 
 pression which, as a philanthropist and as a Chris- 
 tian, I am most anxious to make. 
 * See Appendix IX, 
 
 Q
 
 226 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Hadji Costi, a Greek of the little seaport town 
 of Moudania (about fifteen miles from Brusa), 
 chanced one night to carry his raki to excess in a 
 public tippling-shop, and, being exceedingly drunk 
 and provoked by some Christians, he swore that 
 he would turn Turk nay, that he was already a 
 Mussulman. Next morning the poor Hadji forgot 
 all about this freak : not so the Turks and their 
 mollah. They waited upon him "just to insi- 
 nuate " that he had made public profession of 
 Islam ; that he must go through with that busi- 
 ness, and complete the ceremonies; and that a 
 Turk he must be all the rest of his life. Hadji 
 Costi demurred, said that he was very drunk last 
 night, and in a fit of anger had said he knew not 
 what ; swore that he was a baptised Christian, as 
 all men in Moudania well knew ; that he was a 
 recognised hadji, or pilgrim to Jerusalem, and 
 that a Christian and a hadji he would remain. 
 There were witnesses to prove that he had quar- 
 relled in his cups with some other tipsy Greeks, 
 and that anger and inebriety had been the causes 
 of his very indiscreet exclamations in the shop of 
 raki. All this availed not ; the Turks fell upon 
 the Hadji, beat him, bound him, and, with the 
 orders of the agha and mollah, carried him away 
 prisoner to Brusa. Mustapha Nouree Pasha, in-
 
 HADJI COSTI. 227 
 
 stead of dismissing the prisoner, who had been 
 sufficiently punished already, put handcuffs on the 
 poor Hadji, bound his arms behind him with ropes, 
 and sent him off for Constantinople, under the 
 care of one of his ruffianly tufekjees. On embark- 
 ing one night at the port of Ghemlik for Stamboul, 
 we found the Hadji on the deck of the steamer in 
 sad plight, with the tufekjee and his pistols and 
 yataghan on one side of him, and his poor de- 
 spairing old mother and her affections on the other. 
 He had been cruelly ill-treated on his way from 
 Brusa to Ghemlik. His mother kissed our hands 
 and our feet, and implored me to intercede for her 
 son. Even the tufekjee did not pretend to deny 
 that the young man's trouble proceeded from a 
 mere extravagance of drink. We did what we 
 could to alleviate the sufferings of the son and 
 abate the fears of the mother, and, knowing that 
 they would need piastres before they could get out 
 of this scrape, we gave them some. Most fortu- 
 nately the poor woman had once been paramana 
 or nurse in the family of the French consul at 
 Brusa, and through his interest with the French 
 embassy the Greek was liberated with his head on 
 his shoulders. Our indignation was roused by the 
 total indifference shown to the sufferings of the 
 Hadji and his weeping old mother by a number of 
 
 Q 2
 
 228 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 upper-class Armenians who were our fellow-pas- 
 sengers. I believe that there was not an Armenian 
 on board but would have seen the Greek bastina- 
 noed, da capo, there on the deck, with inward satis- 
 faction. Such is the love which these Christians 
 bear to one another ! So likely are they to amal- 
 gamate! 
 
 Now, as a contrast, take what follows : 
 In the same seaport town of Moudania, which 
 had the honour of being the birthplace of Hadji 
 Cost v i, there was living a young man, also a native 
 of the place, but the son of a Frank father, and 
 the nephew of a Frank medico, who, for himself 
 and all his family, enjoyed the protection of Great 
 Britain.* This young man complained that the 
 Turks employed about the Moudania custom- 
 house were always exacting more than their just 
 dues, and resorting to threats and actual violence 
 to extort payment. One of them wanted him to 
 pay far more than the fixed export duty upon 
 some Indian corn which he was shipping for his 
 
 * The father was dead. Signer Michele Galle, the uncle, was a 
 subject of Pope Pius IX., aud a native of the small maritime town 
 of Porto di Fermo, in the marches of Ancoua. He was the most 
 respectable, most gentlemanly European I met with in the course 
 of these Asiatic tours. Besides practising medicine, he attended 
 somewhat to agriculture, traded a little in produce, and acted as 
 Vice-Consul or agent to our Brusa Consul.
 
 VALUE OF EUROPEAN PROTECTION. 229 
 
 uncle.* Young Galle would not submit to the 
 imposition. The Turk abused him and his religion, 
 calling him ghiaour and dog ; and thereupon 
 he soundly thrashed the Turk, who went away and 
 swore to the agha and kadi that young Galle 
 had assaulted him without cause, and had reviled 
 the blessed Prophet. The kadi summoned the 
 young man before him. His uncle and some 
 Christian friends of the town went with him to 
 the mehkemeh. The Turkish complainant was of 
 course provided with his false witnesses, and the 
 kadi would not take the evidence of the Christians. 
 The agha joined the man of the law in abusing the 
 youth ; and they told him that his offence was so 
 heinous (in abusing the Prophet) that they must 
 send him to prison, and thence in chains to Brusa. 
 The young man, who had hitherto merely denied 
 the words attributed to him, was now overcome by 
 rage, and really committed the high crime of 
 which he was accused, for he called them all 
 rogues and liars, he called Mahomet an impostor, 
 and he did the dirty thing on the Prophet's beard ! 
 
 * These export duties, which are nearly always levied in an 
 arbitrary and capricious manner, are' a terrible drawback upon 
 trade. Those who are continually writing or talking about the 
 matchless, entire freedom of trade in Turkey, are simply ignorant 
 of what they are saying. Trade is entrave in a hundred different 
 ways.
 
 230 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 His uncle, having calmed him, fell into nearly as 
 great a passion himself, roundly rating both kadi 
 and agha, reminding them of many preceding acts 
 of iniquity, and defying them to imprison a Frank 
 Christian who enjoyed the protection of Great 
 Britain, as his father had done before him. The 
 Turkish authorities were completely cowed. The 
 youth walked home with his uncle, and not only 
 the Greeks, but many of the Osmanlees of the 
 town, united with them in laughing at the beards 
 of the governor and judge. A flaming report was 
 sent to Mustapha Nouree Pasha at Brusa, whose 
 fanaticism was thereby much excited ; but the 
 Pasha no more dared to molest the young man 
 than the agha and kadi had done. Had it been a 
 Greek rayah, there would have been torture, or 
 even death. The business ended in our consul 
 calling young Galle and some of his witnesses up to 
 Brusa, and in a rebuke from the consul for the con- 
 fessed abuse of the Prophet in the Mussulman court. 
 I saw a great many Greeks at Moudania. The 
 men were all engaged in commerce, chiefly in 
 exporting the produce of the country ; there was 
 not one of them but would have gladly given half 
 he was worth for English, or French, or Russian 
 protection. They said that, as rayah subjects of 
 the Porte, they never could obtain justice where
 
 VALUE OF EUROPEAN PROTECTION. 231 
 
 Mussulman interests were opposed to theirs ; that 
 they held their own by an insecure tenure ; that 
 the Tanzimaut was, as far as they were concerned, 
 a mere sham ; and that injustice and oppression 
 weighed quite as heavily upon them as in the days 
 of Sultan Mahmoud. They complained of the 
 export duties laid upon all the produce of the 
 country, and of the frequently irregular transit 
 duties levied upon produce on its way from the 
 interior to the seaports. They said that they, as 
 peaceful rayah subjects of the Porte, laboured 
 under many disadvantages from which the Frank 
 merchant was exempt, and from which the Greeks 
 of the Ionian Islands were equally free, because 
 they had British protection, and passed everywhere 
 in Turkey for bond fide British subjects. There 
 was not a Greek in the place but would have 
 made himself a protected subject, even of a third- 
 rate Christian state, if he had been able to do so ; 
 for even a Neapolitan, a Koman, or Tuscan, en- 
 joyed in Turkey advantages that were denied to 
 the native rayah subjects of the Sultan. Take 
 away the seraffs and those in the immediate em- 
 ployment of government, there was scarcely an 
 Armenian but would have shown the same willing- 
 ness to pass as the subject of any other power 
 rather than of that he was born under.
 
 232 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 In matters of commerce the protection to a 
 rayah of a powerful nation is a good per centage 
 on every operation. But men are not always 
 trading, and even Armenians, the most plodding, 
 and trafficking, and money-thinking of men, have 
 some sensibilities beyond those which reside in the 
 purse. They are far from being so sensitive or so 
 proud or vain as the Greeks ; but among the 
 Armenians there are many very capable of resent- 
 ing insult. An English gentleman, long resident 
 in Constantinople, told us this story : 
 
 An Armenian (not a seraff) who lived at the 
 village of Arnaout-Keui, on the Bosphorus, could 
 never go to smoke his narguile at the coffee-house 
 without being insulted and reviled by an odious 
 Turk, his neighbour. As a rayah, he did not dare 
 to show his resentment ; he too well knew the 
 value of Tanzimaut and Hatti Scheriff to expose 
 himself to the dangers of a litigation in a Mussul- 
 man court. He bore his wrongs, but grew thin 
 and pale under them. At last, doing as so many 
 rayahs annually do, he shipped himself off for 
 Odessa In about four months he returned, a 
 made Russian subject, with a title to all the 
 powerful protection which the Russian Legation 
 never fails to give in such cases. He went to 
 Arnaout-Keui, and to his old coffee-house ; and
 
 TURKISH ROADS. 233 
 
 there he found his old persecutor, who lost no time 
 in renewing his assault. The Armenian let the 
 Turk void his foul vocabulary ; but then he turned 
 upon him and enjoyed the sweetness of revenge. 
 " Ha pezavenk ! Ha Karata I Ha ! thou eater 
 of dirt ! dost thou not know that I am a Muscov ? 
 that I am protected by the Muscov Elchee,* and 
 that I can spit at thy beard ? " The Turk slunk 
 away, and never more molested the Russianized 
 rayah. 
 
 In riding from Brusa to Moudania we had the 
 road all to ourselves and an execrable road it is. 
 When Sultan Abdul Medjid travelled this way, on 
 his journey to and from Brusa, they made him be- 
 lieve that the road was excellent. Poor young man ! 
 he had never seen a road deserving of the name in 
 all his life. By corvees, by forced labour (brutally 
 enforced), they made the peasants smoothen the 
 rough track, remove the big, jolting stones, and fill 
 up the ruts, and hollows, and holes with stems and 
 branches of trees and underwood, and then cover 
 the superficies with small stones and soil The 
 Sultan travelled in a light European caleche, which 
 went over the ground smoothly and beautifully, at 
 the rate of almost five miles an hour. But the 
 rains and torrents of the next winter washed away 
 * The Russian Ambassador.
 
 234 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 all these repairs, which were meant to serve only a 
 temporary purpose, and left the road worse than it 
 had been before. Also, when the Sultan passed and 
 repassed, pains were taken to make him believe 
 that the condition of the people was smooth, 
 pleasant, and prosperous. The Brusa chief of 
 police and his armed ruffians went beforehand 
 into all the villages, commanding that all such as 
 were in good case, and had good clothes, should 
 dress in their best, and station themselves along 
 the road-sides, and that all that were poor and 
 squalid should keep out of sight as they valued 
 their lives. If one honest, fearless man could have 
 approached the ear of the young Sultan, he might 
 have blown the illusion away like a bubble. But 
 where look for such a man among the timid 
 peasantry, or among any of the Turks and Arme- 
 nians who had free access to him ? 
 
 On our road from Moudania back to Brusa we 
 passed two Greeks and three miserable lean horses, 
 who were most painfully toiling over the muddy 
 track to carry a very few bars of English iron to the 
 last-named city. We saw no other living creatures 
 until we reached the roots of Mount Olympus. 
 
 As a medical practitioner our host at Moudania 
 had had ample means of observation and expe- 
 rience. He more than confirmed the horrible fact
 
 FISCAL EXTOKTION. 235 
 
 of the prevalence of forced abortion among the 
 Turkish women. " Grave virus munditias pe- 
 pulit ! " To my mournful list of deserted Turkish 
 villages he added many more. In Moudania the de- 
 cline of the Mussulman part of the population, in 
 his time, had been rapid. He held it to be utterly 
 impossible for the Turks to meet the demands 
 made upon them for taxes and contributions, and 
 recruits for the army. They were all by nature 
 indolent, and nothing was done to stimulate their 
 industry. The industry of the rayahs was dis- 
 couraged ; for, so soon as they showed any symp- 
 toms of prosperity, the fiscal screw was applied to 
 them. The Greeks were a vain people, fond of 
 show, and very fond of seeing their wives and 
 children finely dressed. Except where they had 
 foreign protection, they were afraid of displaying 
 their finery out of doors. If a cocona went abroad 
 in a new dress, the hadji, her husband, might ex- 
 pect a visit from the tax-gatherer a day or two after. 
 The present sub-governor of Moudania was a rogue 
 without conscience or bowels ; he carried on a little 
 private trade of his own in corn and other produce, 
 and he was always ready to check the trade of the 
 poor rayahs, and to back the other extortioners. 
 
 Complaints had been repeatedly made to Reschid 
 Pasha, but the agha was strongly supported at Con-
 
 236 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 stantinople, and the Armenian bankers described 
 him as an excellent officer for raising revenue. 
 Our host did not attach much importance to his 
 removal "I have seen many of those gentry 
 here," said he, " and they are all alike. In be- 
 coming the governor of a town or of a province, 
 a Turk, however different he may have been before 
 in private life, becomes precisely the same public 
 man as his predecessor. He has none but corrupt 
 instruments wherewith to work. Some have more 
 urbanity and less fanaticism than others, but in es- 
 sentials they are all alike. I have known some of the 
 new school men, and I think, if there is a distinc- 
 tion to be made, they are the worst of all. They 
 are more greedy of money, and more entirely in 
 the hands of the Armenian seraffs. They are nearly 
 all low-born men, brought out of sordid poverty, 
 and promoted either through an intrigue or on 
 account of their indifferentism in religion and 
 their readiness to adapt themselves to any change 
 which may come into the vizier's head. But, in 
 ceasing to be Mussulmans, these men have not 
 become Christians, but materialists and atheists. 
 Some of them are putting on European manners 
 as well as the Frank dress ' md il lupo cangia 
 ilpelo, e non il vizio.' ' 
 
 Signor Galle said that the Turks did not behead
 
 FISCAL SYSTEM. 237 
 
 or hang men half so frequently as in former times, 
 but that the people were more oppressed and more 
 a prey to fiscal extortion than when he came into 
 the country, more than twenty years ago. Under 
 the old system, when the pashas collected the 
 revenues, the government at the capital never 
 knew what it would get. At present the ushurjees, 
 or farmers of the revenue, had given a very de- 
 sirable certainty to the Porte. But our host did 
 not believe that the revenue could long be kept 
 up to its present high standard; and every year 
 the government was requiring more and more 
 money, and the fermiers generauz, who were all 
 in reality Armenian bankers, were absolutely crush, 
 ing energy and life out of the people in their efforts 
 to satisfy the Porte, and make a surplus of profit 
 for themselves. There was no justice or modera- 
 tion in the proceedings of these fiscal tyrants, who, 
 whenever they chose, could command the strong 
 arm of the Turk. We have seen how the tufekjees 
 act on these occasions. I have reason to know that 
 the Sultan's regular lancers do not behave at all 
 better as tax-gatherers. It may be necessary to 
 explain how these fraudulent demands can be made, 
 and how these extortions can be carried out. Pro- 
 perly speaking, there is no contabilitd no sys- 
 tem of accounts. The most false and fraudulent
 
 238 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 entry made by an ushurjee, or by a collector, or by 
 a Turkish mudir, is held to be decisive of the 
 justice of every claim for money that might be set 
 up. None of the Turkish peasants could read or 
 write, and scarcely a Greek of any class could read 
 Turkish. When receipts were given to them they 
 could not tell what sum was set down. A poor 
 peasant of the plain of Brusa paid to his tax- 
 gatherer seven hundred piastres ; the scoundrel 
 wrote the receipt for three hundred and fifty 
 piastres, and very soon fell upon the Greek as a 
 defaulter. When the Greeks in a town or large 
 village (like the village of Demirdesh, which I have 
 named) were united among themselves, and really 
 allowed to elect their own tchorbajees, and when 
 these lay primates were honest men, and not in 
 partnership with the Turkish governor or head of 
 police, or revenue collectors, the Greeks could now 
 and then make a successful stand against injustice. 
 But so happy a combination of circumstances is 
 most rare. The Mussulman part of the population, 
 being more helpless and indolent, was suffering 
 more than the rayahs, although they contributed 
 much less to the state. " The Turks," said my 
 friend the French Consul at Brusa, " could get on 
 tolerably well so long as they could make the 
 Greeks and Armenians do all the work for them,
 
 IMPKOVEMENT HOPELESS. 239 
 
 but now that they are obliged to work for them- 
 selves they break down and starve." 
 
 Signor Galle had attempted to improve the 
 olive-groves of the neighbourhood, and to intro- 
 duce various other agricultural improvements ; but 
 the Turks set their faces against any innovations, 
 and the rayahs were averse to change, and so 
 harassed and taxed, and so afraid of being thought 
 rich, that they would not act upon his suggestions. 
 For some years our host had given up all hopes of 
 effecting any improvement whatever. He said, 
 " To do any good in this country, or to see it done, 
 a man ought to live to a patriarchal age, and see 
 the Turks dispossessed of the sovereignty forth' 
 with. There is a malediction of Heaven, and a 
 self-destructiveness on their whole system. I know 
 them well. I have now lived many years among 
 them. There are admirable qualities in the poor 
 Turks, but their government is a compound of 
 ignorance, blundering, vice of the most atrocious 
 kind, and weakness and rottenness. And what- 
 ever becomes a part of government, or in any way 
 connected with it, by the fact becomes corrupt. 
 Take the honestest Turk you can find, and put 
 him in office and power, and then tell me three 
 months afterwards what he is ! He must conform 
 to the general system, or cease to be in office.
 
 240 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 One little wheel, however subordinate it may be, 
 would derange the whole machine if its teeth did 
 not fit." 
 
 I have myself known the case. There was a 
 small Turkish proprietor, who cultivated his own 
 land, who sold his produce in Smyrna, and who 
 was esteemed by everybody, whether Christian, 
 Mussulman, or Jew. He was the most honest of 
 men, and in his little way the most hospitable and 
 the most charitable. In his almsgiving he followed 
 to the very letter the injunctions of the Koran. 
 Through the interest of a relative who resided in 
 the capital he was suddenly promoted to be the 
 agha, or deputy-governor, of a district in Asia 
 Minor. From that day he was an altered man. 
 He rapidly became rapacious, corrupt, uncharitable, 
 and tyrannical as foul and bad an agha as ever 
 that district had known. 
 
 At Moudania, as in many other places, we were 
 almost starved. As the Greeks were keeping a 
 fast, and as the Turks neither were sportsmen nor 
 had any sheep to kill, there was nothing to be had 
 for the table except some inferior fish, caviare, and 
 cabbage. With great difficulty a few bad apples 
 and dried walnuts were procured. A great deal of 
 fruit used to be grown in the neighbourhood, but 
 the Turks and Armenians had taxed it. and the
 
 TAXATION. 241 
 
 people had cut down their fruit-trees rather than 
 pay the saliane upon them. Signer Galle' said 
 that only the other day a number of fine walnut- 
 trees had been destroyed, the Greeks saying that 
 they had had nothing but trouble with the trees, 
 and had been made to pay more to the tax- 
 gatherers than the fruit was worth. " Next year," 
 said they, " the saliane collectors shall find no 
 fruit-trees to tax ! " 
 
 This process of destruction we found in many 
 other places. The spirit of monopoly met us 
 everywhere. The Greeks of Moudania were talk- 
 ing of altogether giving up their small trade in oil, 
 on account of the obligation they lay under of 
 carrying their olives to the Turkish mill, which is 
 worked on government account. One poor fellow 
 told us that this year, before he got free of the 
 mill, the Turks had gotten more than half of the 
 oil his olives had rendered, and that, when he 
 complained to the agha he was only abused and 
 threatened. In this city or town of Moudania 
 there were about 7000 inhabitants, and of this 
 number not more than 1000 were Mussulmans; 
 and these conquerors of the soil were evidently the 
 poorest of the lot, and, with the exception of three 
 or four families of them, were living in the worst 
 of the houses, in miserable huts or sheds that 
 
 R
 
 242 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 were falling to piecea These tumble-down abodes 
 of men also met us everywhere. 
 
 There was a village named Sorsourluk, in the 
 Brusa plain, which we frequently visited. It is 
 inhabited almost entirely by Greeks ; its farmers 
 are the most industrious and most intelligent 
 agriculturists in the country, and the place is 
 reputed the most prosperous village of the plain. 
 We nowhere saw the land so well cultivated. 
 Most of the fields were even strongly and neatly 
 enclosed ; any sort of enclosure being a great 
 rarity in this country, as also over in the European 
 provinces. The vineyards and mulberry planta- 
 tions were most carefully tended ; the wheat, the 
 maize, the barley, had all been gathered in at the 
 time of our first visit, and the harvest, as usual, 
 had been most abundant proportionate to the 
 care and industry of the people. We saw an 
 unusual quantity of cattle, and the oxen and 
 buffaloes (both are used for the plough and for 
 draught) seemed all in excellent condition. Yet 
 the house of a farmer at which we stopped, and 
 every other house in the village, were half in 
 ruins ; and the Greeks were wringing their hands 
 and tearing their hair, and vowing that they would 
 plough and sow no more ; that they would give 
 up houses and lands and emigrate ; that, through
 
 FERMIERS-GE"NE"RAUX. 243 
 
 the maximum on one hand, and the greed and 
 injustice of the tax-gatherer on the other, they 
 were all going to beggary. All the taxes, as I 
 have said, are farmed out The regime of the old 
 Fermiers-Generaux of France, one of the greatest 
 causes of the revolution of 1789, now obtains in 
 reformed Turkey. Though not so ostensibly, the 
 real Fermiers-Ge'ne'raux are the Armenian bankers 
 and money-lenders, who are backed by the civil 
 and (in case of need) military power of government. 
 Our Greek farmer, who was now joined by some 
 of his neighbours (attracted by the arrival of Gen- 
 tleman John), said that for his part he would ten 
 times rather have Turkish pashas than seraffs ; 
 that among the pashas they now and then got a 
 good and just one, but that they had never known 
 an Armenian with any feeling or any sense of 
 justice ; that they had undergone at Sorsourluk 
 far more oppression and grinding since the intro- 
 duction of the reformed system than they had 
 known in the whole course of their lives under the 
 old system ; and that, whatever people might say 
 to the contrary at Stamboul, the soles of their feet 
 were no safer now than then, if they failed to pay 
 eveiy piastre that was demanded of them, or 
 chanced to give offence to the chief of police at 
 Brusa, or to any of his friends, or to any party 
 
 R 2
 
 244 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 leagued with him. The mire, or Sultan's tenth, 
 upon produce, had been so levied this year, that it 
 was turned into a fifth in some instances into a 
 third of the whole ! Melons, cabbages, vegetables 
 hi general, had been exempted from the tax by 
 written law and immemorial usage, but the ushur- 
 jees or tax-gatherers were levying the mire upon 
 them also, and at a fearfully high rate. Then 
 there were the saliane (a sort of property and 
 income tax) and various other taxes, and frequent 
 forced labour, which last had been abolished by 
 the Tanzimaut, but which was exacted from them 
 as before. One old man said that they might face 
 for a while all those evils, but that the fixing of 
 prices by the Pasha rendered their case hopeless. 
 " The great men who farm the taxes," said another, 
 " and pay so much a year to the Porte for them, 
 sub-let to smaller men ; these again sub-let by dis- 
 tricts, or townships, or groups of villages, to still 
 smaller men, who spread themselves over the land 
 like locusts. All these men must have a profit on 
 what they have paid, the money being chiefly 
 furnished by the serafls, who must have high 
 interest. Some of the little men, being misled by 
 the Armenians, often make bad bargains with the 
 great men, and then, to avoid being ruined them- 
 selves, they ruin us. Generally every ushurjee
 
 USHURJEES. 245 
 
 forces as much from us as he can get. If we resist 
 if we invoke the protection of the Tanzimaut 
 if we tell him that the mire is so much and no 
 more, he brings down the head of the police 
 among us, and that terrible man if he does no 
 worse quarters a troop of his tufekjees in our 
 houses to be fed at our expense until we pay, and 
 tells the Pasha of Brusa, who knows us not who 
 has never seen our village, near as it is that we 
 are in a state of rebellion. And if we go up to 
 the city to appeal to the Pasha, what do we get ? 
 blows, and imprisonment, and expenses, and 
 heavy payments to the chief of the police before 
 we get free!" "They will root us all out," said 
 another of the elders of the village, "and then 
 where will they get mire or saliane, or any other 
 money ? There were Turks here in old times a 
 good many when I was a boy ; now there are 
 only fifteen families of them left, and their families 
 are very small, for they have hardly any children, 
 and the men do hardly anything all the day long 
 but lounge about and smoke. Our Turks will not 
 work. What could these few men pay to the 
 ushurjees? We Greeks defended this bit of 
 country from the torrents, and cleared it, and 
 enclosed it, and cultivated it as you see it. All 
 this is Greek work. If they force us to run away,
 
 246 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 soon the torrents will sweep away the village, and 
 the country will again become a wilderness. 
 Where will they find people to fill our place ? 
 Nowhere ! " 
 
 The Greeks of Sorsourluk had taken extraor- 
 dinary pains to check and bar out a torrent from 
 Olympus a torrent quite fearful to encounter at 
 certain seasons, and popularly called the delhi-sou, 
 or mad torrent. Their engineering was really very 
 good, but, of course, required manutention. 
 
 Now, let us take a glimpse at a Turkish village 
 a village without any rayahs. On our way to 
 Kutayah we stayed nearly a whole day and passed 
 a night at the village of Musal, at the foot of the 
 Ak-Daghlar, or white mountains.* Here every 
 house was toppling to its fall, and every Turk was 
 complaining of the cruel treatment he received at 
 the hands of the tax-gatherers. The ushurjees had 
 seized the carts and ploughs, and the very seed of 
 some, the little household furniture and cooking 
 utensils of others. In one case they had taken 
 copper pans to the value of 400 piastres, for a debt 
 which did not exceed 200 ; and when the victim 
 went and paid what was demanded of him, they 
 would not give him back his property ; and when 
 
 * The Turks probably call them " white" because they are 
 so very black.
 
 TITHES, COKVE'ES, ETC. 247 
 
 he remonstrated and fell into a passion, he was 
 soundly bastinadoed. This man, who told us his 
 own story and told it with tears of shame and rage 
 was a young, very handsome Mussulman, with a 
 most ingenuous countenance. He told the tale 
 aloud, and in the presence of all the best Turks of 
 the village. The ushurjees cheated these poor people 
 in the corn (on which a tithe is levied for the Sul- 
 tan), bringing measures of their own which were 
 not fair measures, throwing aside the inferior grain, 
 taking their tithe only from the best, and making 
 that tithe much more than a tenth by their unfair 
 measures. The collectors of the saliane, or pro- 
 perty-tax (which is not farmed, but collected by 
 the Pasha and the local mudirs), were always taking 
 advantage of their ignorance, and giving them 
 papers and receipts which said one thing, while 
 the collectors with their lips had told them another. 
 One man said that he would do away with his 
 vineyard, and root up his vines, rather than be 
 tormented by the saliane collectors, who had 
 taken from him as much as the produce was 
 worth. Another, who had a small mulberry plan- 
 tation, said he would abandon it, and for the same 
 reason. Another bitter complaint related to the 
 corvces. " The forest," said they, " is our friend, 
 giving us fuel and light ; but the forest is also our
 
 248 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 enemy, for they cut great trees there for the Padi- 
 shah's ships, and they take our oxen to drag them 
 towards the coast. To-day there is a demand upon 
 us for twenty pair of oxen, to drag a giant tree ! 
 We have not twenty yoke left in the village : we 
 could not do the thing even if we left our fields all 
 untilled, and the time for tillage is at hand. We 
 cannot do it, but we shall suffer for it ! When we 
 work ourselves and our cattle to death, we are 
 never properly paid. Yes, it is a bad fate to be 
 born near a forest." They spoke of the conscrip- 
 tion with horror ; and it was vain to tell them, as 
 we did, that some of the Sultan's regular troops 
 seemed to be in much better condition than 
 themselves, or than any of the Osmanlee pea- 
 santry in these parts. They said that a life in 
 barracks was not a life for a true Mussulman. 
 If the matrons of the village could have been 
 admitted into our society, we should have heard 
 much more passionate lamentations about the 
 recruiting. 
 
 In addition to the tenth to the Sultan, and, 
 again, in addition to other taxes, there was another 
 impost called moncatd, the proceeds of which went 
 into the pockets of the ushurjees. They were here 
 paying this moncata at the rate of four paras per 
 deunum upon corn-lands, and sixty paras on vine-
 
 TAXES IN KIND. 249 
 
 yards and mulberry-gardens. As everywhere else, 
 the tenths of corn were levied in kind ; but on 
 other productions they were taken in money. But 
 when money was not forthcoming, the collectors 
 often took produce, fixing their own low price upon 
 it. One of the evil effects of levying the tenth in 
 kind was this it converted the government ushur- 
 jees or farmers of the revenue into corn-merchants, 
 and gave them the control over the markets. Our 
 friends at Musal murmured less at the taxes than 
 at the manner in which they were collected and 
 apportioned. One of them was paying 300 piastres 
 of saliane, which was as much as was paid by a 
 very rich Turk, at that time the agha of Domalich. 
 The wealthy bribe and compound, and get off 
 easily, throwing the burden on the helpless and 
 unfriended poor. On a certain occasion these Mus- 
 sulmans of Musal despatched one of their elders to 
 Brusa, to implore the intervention of the Pasha. 
 Mustapha Nouree handed the old man over to his 
 kehayah bey; the kehayah handed him over to 
 Khodja Arab ; and that terrible chief of the police 
 kept him in prison until a sum of money was paid for 
 his release. It appeared to me that such amount 
 of oppression as might have been removed by the 
 Tanzimaut from the shoulders of the rayah sub- 
 jects must have been clapped upon the Mussul-
 
 250 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 mans "to make the dance even." Except the 
 kharatch, or capitation-tax, which in its highest 
 amount does not exceed ten shillings a-year per 
 head, the Turks were now paying the same taxes 
 and imposts as the rayahs. They cannot bear this 
 all but equal weight; unless their industry be 
 stimulated, unless a new life hardly to be ex- 
 pected be put into them, they must sink and 
 disappear under it This was the opinion of every 
 intelligent Frank who had lived long in the coun- 
 try, and who had attentively watched the workings 
 of the reform system. M. C. said, "The Turks 
 could not keep their ground even then, but they 
 managed to live when they could make the Chris- 
 tian rayahs work for them at the very lowest pay, 
 and when, with the connivance of the pashas, who 
 then presided over the collection of the revenue, 
 there was always a wide difference made between 
 their taxes and those extorted from the Greeks 
 and Armenians ; but, with only the difference of 
 the kharatch in their favour, the Turks will starve 
 and die out, and a little sooner or later all their 
 farms and villages must either be deserted or fall 
 into the hands of the rayahs. There can be no 
 mistake about it. The process is going on. It 
 was in progress even before this farming of the 
 revenue and equalizing of taxes. Thirty-two years
 
 LORD STRATFORD'S REPUTATION. 251 
 
 ago, when I first knew the plain of Brusa, there 
 were villages that were entirely Turkish, and other 
 villages where Turks and rayahs were mixed ; in 
 the first sort there are now more rayahs than Turks, 
 and in the second the Turks have almost entirely 
 disappeared in many cases there is not a Turkish 
 house left in such village." 
 
 The poor men of Musal said that both Sultan 
 and Government must be ignorant of the wrongs 
 they had suffered, and they implored me to make 
 them known to some member of the Government 
 when I returned to Stamboul. They all joined in 
 this earnest prayer; they nearly knelt to me, a 
 Christian, a ghiaour ! When Turks can do this, 
 matters must indeed be desperate with them. The 
 good name of Sir Stratford Canning, or the fame 
 of his generous efforts to do good, had reached this 
 obscure Mussulman village; the people believed 
 that his influence with the Porte was all-com- 
 manding, and never exercised but in the cause of 
 humanity. They implored me to speak also to 
 the upright English Elchee Bey. Nor was this 
 the first or the last place where such a request was 
 made, or where our ambassador was mentioned 
 with affection and reverence. 
 
 At Domalich we found still more misery. Yet 
 the corn-land, which stretched for many miles in
 
 252 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 front of it, was excellent, and the valley was well 
 watered and irrigated by nature. It ought to have 
 supported in comfort and abundance a dense popu- 
 lation, but the thinnest was starving ! Allowing 
 for misgovernment and every abuse, it often struck 
 me that nothing but the doom of Heaven could 
 reduce people to such a condition in such a country 
 as this. 
 
 Our halt on the next night was at another 
 Turkish hamlet called Kukoort-Keui, or the Sul- 
 phur Village. It was far more miserable than 
 Domalich. We lodged in a miserable hovel. The 
 dispenser of hospitality, the poor Oda-bashi, was 
 so very poor that he could furnish us with nothing 
 but some straw matting, a little milk, and a bowl 
 of boiled wheat. The village was entirely Turkish. 
 The chief men gathered round us and kept us 
 company. They were indeed steeped in poverty 
 to the very lips, for they had hardly a pipe among 
 them, and no tobacco until we gave them some. 
 They were gloomy and most sad ; we did not hear 
 one cheerful voice or see a smile in Kukoort They 
 complained that the load of taxation was heavier 
 than they could bear ; that the ushurjees and other 
 collectors never allowed them any peace ; that the 
 village was deeply in debt ; and that, though they 
 were always paying, the Armenian seraffs showed
 
 EMIGRATIONS. 253 
 
 by their papers that the debt was increasing instead 
 of decreasing. The usurers were charging interest 
 upon the debt at the rate of from forty to fifty per 
 cent. The famine of 1845 had visited these dis- 
 tricts. By order of the Sultan seed or money to 
 purchase it was furnished to them that they might 
 rally and escape future starvation ; the seed and 
 money were provided by the aghas and the Arme- 
 nian seraffs at Kutayah, and for these advances 
 they were now paying interest at he rate of .twenty- 
 five or thirty per cent. The poor fellows said that 
 they could never rally ; that it was utterly impos- 
 sible for them to pay the ushur, the moncata, and 
 the saliane, the enormous interest on the old debt 
 of the village, and the heavy interest on the recent 
 advance an advance which the Sultan had in- 
 tended should bear no interest at all ; that there 
 was nothing for it but to stay and die in misery, 
 or to follow the example which had lately been set 
 them by the Mussulmans of two neighbouring vil- 
 lages, who had fled to some distant district, leaving 
 their empty, falling houses, and their untilled fields 
 to pay their flinty-hearted creditors, who could 
 make no use either of the houses or the lands, as 
 there were no people no men to plough and sow ! 
 These sudden desperate emigrations were becoming 
 frequent up the country. The Pasha and the local
 
 254 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 authorities under him did what they could to pre- 
 vent them ; for if the population disappeared, or 
 flowed in secret streams to the capital, or to other 
 places out of the pashalik, what would become of 
 the taxes expected from the province? and how 
 were the farmers of the revenue of this district or 
 that to keep their contracts with the Porte ? Here, 
 indeed, they had adopted, and were to the utmost 
 of their power enforcing, the adscripti glebce prin- 
 ciple ; men were Jo starve upon their lands, but 
 were on no account to leave them to seek a better 
 fortune elsewhere. Our consul at Brusa gave me 
 several instances of the violent operation of the 
 system. Two instances came under our own ob- 
 servation. Some Turks had abandoned their vil- 
 lages, and were migrating with their little flocks 
 towards the lower part of the plain of Brusa ; their 
 Agha came down after them, and applied to the 
 Pasha ; Khodja Arab was let loose upon them, and 
 the Khodja's tufekjees drove the poor people back 
 to their villages, threatening to shoot or hang them 
 if they tried another flight. In spite, however, of 
 all this vigilance and rigour, many families do dis- 
 appear, and some villages are annually deserted. 
 The Turkish population of the capital, as of Smyrna 
 and other large towns, is kept up by these im- 
 migrations. But for them Constantinople, as far
 
 EMIGRATIONS. 255 
 
 as the Turks are concerned, would soon be un- 
 peopled.* 
 
 There were only thirty houses, or thirty small 
 stinted families, in this village of Kukoort, yet six 
 of the strongest men had been taken this spring as 
 recruits for the army, and four had been taken the 
 preceding year. In each case this had deprived a 
 poor family of its mainstay. They said that it was 
 only those who had no money and no friends that 
 saw their sons torn from them. The money given 
 all went in bribes ; it was not employed to provide 
 substitutes ; thus the whole weight of the levy fell 
 upon the miserable poor. One of the old villagers, 
 in losing his son, his fellow-labourer, and his only 
 help in the field, had lost all heart ; he had sold 
 his yoke of bullocks, and was living on the produce 
 of the sale : he said he did not know what he 
 should do when he had eaten his bullocks ! without 
 his yoke he could not till his land. 
 
 * Dr. Walsh has observed, "The Turks, naturally of a robust 
 and vigorous constitution, addict themselves to habits by no 
 means favourable to population ; their sedentary life, the prac- 
 tice of polygamy, the immoderate use of opium, and other indul- 
 gences, so impede the usual increase of families, that the births 
 do little more than compensate the ordinary deaths, and are 
 unable to supply the waste of casualties." Thus are the bless- 
 ings of a mild climate, a fertile soil, and a beautiful country, 
 rendered nugatory, and both the capital and the provinces left in 
 a state of decay and depopulation by the measures of a govern- 
 ment as ignorant as tyrannical.
 
 256 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 In Kutayah we found an increase of Armenians 
 and a fearful decrease of Turks, and another city 
 falling rapidly to ruin. Beyond that place the vil- 
 lages were still more forlorn. We crossed beautiful 
 valleys, where the soil was beautiful, but untouched 
 by the plough. In the bottom of each valley there 
 was a broad running stream. On a long day's 
 march we scarcely met a human being. There were 
 said to be two small Turkish villages in recesses 
 among the hills, but we saw no village, no house, 
 except one log hut on the side of the mountain ; 
 we saw only solitary Turkish cemeteries, in which 
 the graves were marked by shapeless pieces of 
 stone set up on end in the state in which they 
 were found. And this was the once populous, 
 thriving, and highly civilized district of Aizanitis, a 
 region of wealth and beauty, where the ancient 
 Greeks had carried the fine arts, and all the arts 
 that comfort and adorn life, to the utmost perfec- 
 tion. At the wretched Turkish village of Hadji- 
 Keui we found the log huts falling asunder, and 
 had some difficulty in obtaining wood to make a 
 fire. The people could procure us nothing but a 
 mess of boiled wheat, some yaourt and fresh eggs. 
 The fire which warmed us lighted us also ; for can- 
 dles and lamps were unknown. 
 
 As we had been advancing up the country sundry
 
 EXTREME POVERTY. 257 
 
 little things had indicated that we were receding 
 in civilization. At Musal the houses were of two 
 stories ; beyond that place they were of one ; at 
 the Domalich village the houses were roofed with 
 planks and shingles ; at the Sulphur village they 
 were covered with mud and earth, on which grass 
 was growing ; at Domalich our companion could 
 not procure a narguile' ; at the Sulphur village 
 there was not so much as a tchibouque ; at the Sul- 
 phur village (although there was only a separation 
 made of loose planks between stable and sleeping- 
 room) there were two doors to our quarters, one 
 leading into the stable, and the other leading into 
 the room ; at Hadji-Keui there was only one door 
 for man and beast. Down the country fuel, at 
 least, was plentiful ; here there was very little, and 
 if we had gone another day's journey to the east- 
 ward we should have found nothing to burn but 
 dried manure. 
 
 As usual, all the principal men of Hadji-Keui 
 gathered round us. They were all in rags and 
 tatters, and the poor women whom we had seen out 
 in the village were even worse clad than the men. 
 They told us of their sufferings in the year of famine 
 1845, of their present debts and distresses, of the 
 enormous rate at which they were made to pay 
 interest, of the extortions of the revenue farmers, 
 
 s
 
 258 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 and of the abhorrence of the conscription which 
 had taken from them some of their best young 
 men. But for the magnum vectigal these people 
 in the interior could not subsist. No people could 
 live more sparingly. At Hadji-Keui it was quite 
 evident that they scarcely took food enough to 
 keep body and soul together. They had not so 
 much as a straw mat to lend us, so we slept on the 
 hard, uneven boards of the hovel. There was a 
 show of perfect equality in the village : one house 
 or hovel was not richer or better than another 
 all were on one dead level of poverty. Miser ia! 
 Miseria ! The little village mosque was falling, 
 the minaret was down already. Yet here, too, were 
 rich corn-lands and far-stretching pastures ; and on 
 every side were mountains covered with wood and 
 abounding in mineral riches ! 
 
 On our return journey we spent another night 
 at Hadji-Keui. This time, the log hut being filled 
 with Turkish travellers, we were lodged in a hovel 
 under-ground. The retainer of the head man led 
 us beyond the edge of the village, and down a 
 slope between hills, and, stopping at a hole in the 
 hill side to our right, told us that was the best 
 lodging that could be allotted to us. On looking 
 more closely I saw that this hole was closed by a 
 sort of wooden door, and I discovered something
 
 UNDERGROUND LODGING. 259 
 
 like the top of a chimney peeping above the green 
 sward of the sloping hill. It was, in fact, a small 
 underground house, like those described by Xeno- 
 phon in the Retreat of the Ten Thousand, and 
 which are still common in many parts of Armenia. 
 We stooped our heads and entered. On the left 
 hand of the souterrain was a dark recess, in which 
 there was a donkey, and on the right a planked 
 apartment, the planks being raised some two feet 
 from the ground ; and there was a small fire burn- 
 ing brightly on the hearth, and a very old, green- 
 turbaned, dirty Turk sitting cross-legged and 
 warming himself. This emir was a pedler, and a 
 very surly one. Another Turk arrived to lodge in 
 the same hole with us. This honest man was a 
 worker in brass, and not cleaner than the pedler, 
 but, instead of being surly, he was very civil and 
 good-natured. Both of these men partook libe- 
 rally of our raki. The hole was so very small that 
 there was little room for visitors, but two or three 
 of our former friends dropped in, and they brought 
 with them a discharged soldier, who had served in 
 the war of Syria in 1840. The poor fellow did not 
 complain much of ill-treatment ; but he was hap- 
 pier in his native village, in his rags, and with his 
 pinched stomach, than ever he had been while a 
 soldier in the regular army. Such is the natural 
 
 s 2
 
 260 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 aversion of the Turkish peasantry to the gene of 
 discipline. Hunger must be strong indeed before 
 lie can play the part of recruiting serjeant in this 
 country. In various places we met other discharged 
 soldiers, and not a few deserters. One and all they 
 spoke with horror of the regular service. Counting 
 the donkey as one, our sleeping party this night 
 consisted of seven. Yes, " we were seven " in that 
 hungry subterraneous dwelling. We had with us 
 a brave and merry young Turk from the plain of 
 Brusa Halil was the merriest Turk I ever knew. 
 When we rose from our hard boards in the morn- 
 ing we were congratulating ourselves on having 
 been free from vermin on not having found a 
 single flea since leaving the warm Brusa plain. 
 "Fleas!" said Halil, "fleas must feed, and they 
 could get nothing to eat up here !" He could 
 never laugh enough about our queer lodging. 
 Months afterwards, whenever the village of Hadji- 
 Keui was named, he would say, " That was the 
 place where we were jackals, and burrowed in the 
 ground." 
 
 The village of Chauvder, standing on the site or 
 part of the site of an elegant Greek city (Aizani), 
 and within the shadow of that ancient and beautiful 
 temple which is now so well known by descriptions 
 and designs, was little better than a collection of
 
 OPIUM MONOPOLY. 261 
 
 tumbledown pigsties. It contained about eighty 
 hovels. Miseria! miseria I The people seemed 
 poorer than at Hadji-Keui poorer and more spirit- 
 broken. The head-men who looked as if they 
 were dressed in clouts came round us in the 
 smoky wigwam in which we stayed the cravings of 
 hunger with dry bread and a little coffee, to chant 
 the same Miserere we had heard before. Some of 
 them had been accustomed to cultivate the poppy 
 and make a little opium ; but the opium had been 
 taken from them to pay taxes, and Latif Effendi, 
 the governor of A/ion (or Opium) Kara Hissar, 
 the mart of the commodity, had established a 
 monopoly, had fixed low prices, and had driven 
 away the agents who had been accustomed to pur- 
 chase for the markets of the Franks. It was no 
 longer profitable to grow poppies and make opium, 
 and therefore they had given it up. Here, at 
 Chauvder, it had always been a minor object ; but 
 there were villages more eastward and southward, 
 and nearer to Kara Hissar, which depended a 
 great deal on their annual produce of opium. They 
 were ruined by Latif Effendi's arbitrary and illegal 
 proceedings. All monopolies, it will be remem- 
 bered, have been abolished and stigmatised by the 
 Porte ; but up the country and in out-of-the-way 
 corners they are practised as much as ever ; and I
 
 262 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 have good reason to believe that some of the poor 
 Sultan's reforming ministers have an immediate 
 interest in maintaining them. Of this particular 
 case, or the monopoly of the opium at Kara 
 Hissar by Latif Effendi, we had heard a great 
 deal from some of the Frank sufferers thereby, 
 
 and particularly from my old friend R. T , who 
 
 had commissions to purchase very considerable 
 quantities of the drug for two English houses at 
 Constantinople, and who had a smaller speculation 
 on his own account. The Armenian agent he sent 
 up to Kara Hissar, though offering a price very 
 different from that fixed by Latif Effendi, the 
 governor, was not permitted to purchase a single 
 tcheke, and when he ventured to remonstrate and 
 quote the law against monopolies he was in suited 
 and threatened by Latif's people. Upon the com- 
 plaints of the two English houses at Constanti- 
 nople, the matter was taken up by our embassy, 
 and at that instance the Porte gave a vizirieal 
 letter ordering Latif Effendi to come down to 
 Brusa and render an account before the Pasha. 
 The governor neither came nor sent. When Mus- 
 tapha Nouree, the Pasha of Brusa, was applied to, 
 he said, "What can I do in this affair? Latif 
 Effendi may have done that which he ought not 
 to have done up the country ; assuredly the trade
 
 TUKKISH REFORMERS. 263 
 
 in opium is free ; but Latif Effendi is a strong 
 man and has strong friends he is powerfully sup- 
 ported over at Stamboul there are times when 
 vizirieal letters mean nothing." Latif Effendi was 
 the prote'ge', disciple, and friend of Rescind Pasha, 
 the much-applauded vizier, who had procured him 
 his place at Kara Hissar, and had maintained him 
 in it as an honest Osmanlee reformer. Seven 
 months after our visit to Aizani, when we left 
 Turkey, the Effendi had never been brought to 
 account, and the parties whose interests had been 
 injured by his proceedings were waiting to see 
 what could be done for them by Sir Stratford 
 Canning, who had then been only a few days at 
 Constantinople.* As the subject interested me 
 although it had escaped my memory until it was 
 mentioned by the peasants at Aizani we made 
 sundry inquiries afterwards ; and at Hadji-Keui, at 
 Kutayah, and other villages in that neighbourhood, 
 we found these facts to be notorious the governor 
 of Kara Hissar had seized the opium for arrears 
 
 * By a letter dated the 26th of March, 1849, I learn that 
 none of the foreign merchants have obtained any redress, and 
 that the monopoliser, Latif Effendi, instead of being punished, 
 had been promoted. " He was one of Reschid's men," says my 
 correspondent; "we never had a chance against him. I hardly 
 know what was done by our embassy, but Latif is now to be 
 sent governor of Cyprus, with the rank of a full Pasha."
 
 264 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of taxes, a measure which could be lawful only by 
 his taking it at the fair marketable value ; he had 
 arbitrarily fixed a low price, and had prevented 
 the peasants from selling to those who offered 
 higher prices ; and he had despatched his own 
 agents to sell all the opium at Smyrna of course 
 at the highest prices that could be obtained. One 
 poor fellow said, " But why talk of opium ? Why 
 talk of Latif Effendi ? If the agha of my village 
 wants my corn, will he not take it at his own 
 price ? He will, and I can do nothing." " JEvat, 
 Ismael," said half-a-dozen other villagers : " Yes ! 
 Ismael, so it is !" 
 
 Yet, with facts like these staring him in the face, 
 or, rather, in the teeth of damning evidence which 
 must have met him, and of which he must have 
 found a vast deal more if he had travelled about 
 the country instead of staying at Pera to copy false 
 government reports and paragraphs from the 
 Rescind Pasha newspapers, M. A. Ubicini boldly 
 declares that there is no country in the world in 
 which commerce is so free as in Turkey; that, 
 there, monopolies and prohibitions are now alto- 
 gether unknown ; that ever since Mahomet II. took 
 possession of Constantinople, liberty of trade has 
 reigned without any limits ! 
 
 And in much the same spirit, and with an equal
 
 LORD PALMERSTON'S OPINION. 265 
 
 lack of correct information, Viscount Palmerston 
 has just declared in the House of Commons that 
 Turkey is in an improving and happy condition. " I 
 do not at all admit," said his Lordship, " that the 
 Turkish empire is in the state of decay represented 
 by the honourable gentleman (Mr. Cobden). I 
 consider that the maintenance of the integrity and 
 independence of Turkey is not only desirable, but 
 worth contending for, and capable of being success- 
 fully accomplished. The honourable gentleman is 
 wholly misinformed as to the state of Turkey for 
 the last thirty years. I assert, without fear of con- 
 tradiction, that Turkey, so far from having gone 
 back within the last thirty years, has made greater 
 progress and improvement, in every possible way, 
 than perhaps was ever made by any other country 
 during the same period. Compare the condition 
 of Turkey now with what it was in the reign of 
 Sultan Mahmoud, either with regard to the system 
 of government, as bearing upon the interests of the 
 inhabitants, the state of the army and navy, the 
 administration of justice, the condition of agri- 
 culture, manufactures, and commerce, or religious 
 toleration. I venture to say that, in all these 
 respects, Turkey has made immense progress 
 during the period I have mentioned." 
 
 After insulting Russia, and in her the Christian
 
 2GG THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 faith after intimating that the rayah subjects of 
 Turkey are better ruled by the Sultan than the 
 Russians are by the Tzar, the noble Viscount 
 returned to his eulogium of this recent Turkish 
 reform. " It has been the policy of Her Majesty's 
 government to give good advice to the Turkish 
 government, with a view to the internal improve- 
 ment of that country, and in order that on the one 
 hand it might strengthen the Turkish empire, and, 
 on the other hand, contribute to the happiness and 
 prosperity of the people under the rule of the 
 Sultan. I am glad to say that those endeavours 
 have been attended with most beneficial conse- 
 quences, and that, wherever our Consular arrange- 
 ments have been extended in the empire, we have 
 seen tranquillity increased, justice better admi- 
 nistered, oppression cease, and those benefits con- 
 ferred which it must be the anxious object of the 
 English government to promote in every country 
 where its advice may be considered worthy of 
 attention. I am satisfied that Turkey has within 
 itself the elements of life and prosperity." 
 
 Lord Palmerston may not fear my contradiction, 
 but I do respectfully but sternly deny that Turkey, 
 instead of having gone back, has made great pro- 
 gress and improvement in every possible way 
 within the last thirty years. I have given abun-
 
 MR. COB DEN'S EVIDENCE. 267 
 
 dant proof of her retrocession and decay during 
 the last twenty-five years, and I could bring nearly 
 every European resident, and nearly every traveller 
 that has visited the country, in support of my 
 proofs. I deny, in toto, that justice is better ad- 
 ministered than it was before these sham reforms, 
 and that oppression has ceased ; I deny that the 
 population, whether rayah or Turk, is in a con- 
 dition of happiness and prosperity; I deny that 
 the influence of any British Consul, for the pur- 
 poses of good and just government, extends beyond 
 the town where he resides, or that that influence 
 can often be exerted in favour of the oppressed 
 rayah subjects. The residence of a British Consul 
 and an excellent man at Salonica could not pre- 
 vent, in 1846, the perpetration, by a Turkish 
 pasha, of some of the most fearful of atrocities.* 
 
 It is not frequently my fortune to agree with 
 Mr. Cobden. That gentleman, who has travelled 
 in the country, declared that it was going or 
 already gone to irreclaimable ruin ; that in the 
 small towns and villages of the interior it would 
 be found that the Christian population had a very 
 hard lot indeed ; that they were as much under 
 
 * I refer to the torture and slaughter of the Albanian Chris- 
 tians, for their religion, an account of which will be found iu 
 the Appendix to this volume.
 
 268 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the rule and tyrant domination of an insolent and 
 barbarous people as they ever had been ; and that 
 there was not a kadi, not a pasha, not a soldier (for 
 all the soldiers were Mahometans), who might not 
 oppress the peasantry to as great an extent now as 
 they might have done three or four hundred years 
 ago. Here Mr. Monckton Milnes expressed some 
 dissent, upon which Mr. Cobden told him to go 
 and settle down and be recognized as a Christian 
 rayah, and then he might be in a condition to 
 speak of the true condition of things. This is it : 
 the English gentleman, travelling with imperial 
 passes, and all manner of credentials and safe- 
 guards, enjoys liberty enough where all is slavery 
 and oppression around him, and, if he does not 
 look below the surface, he may really fancy that 
 there is a good deal of liberty in the Ottoman 
 empire. But how any such traveller can shut his 
 eyes to the one constant exhibition of ruin, poverty, 
 and abject misery presented by the country, is to 
 me matter of astonishment ! 
 
 Mr. Cobden said, " The fact was, that within 
 the last twenty years there had been a growing 
 conviction on the minds of the people that the 
 Turks in Europe were intruders in Europe, that 
 they were not domiciled there ; that their home 
 was Asia ; and that Mahometanism could not exist
 
 MR. COBDEN'S OPINION. 269 
 
 in civilized states. That was the growing opinion, 
 and the progress of events clearly showed that we 
 could not maintain Mahometanism in Europe, do 
 what we would, with state policy. That was the 
 embarrassment which we felt in this question, and 
 this was the embarrassment which the government 
 felt in dealing with it in the face of a foreign 
 power. An honorable friend had appealed to 
 him when he said that he would have no objection 
 to see Russia at Constantinople, but he had no 
 wish to see Russia there, or occupying any part of 
 Turkey. Our continuing, however, in the policy 
 of keeping the Turks in Europe would not prevent 
 Russia from encroaching upon Turkey. If we or 
 America were the next neighbours to Turkey, 
 judging from what we had done with half-a-dozen 
 Mahometan dynasties in India, we should have 
 swallowed up Turkey long ago. The fact was, we 
 could not maintain the independence of any coun- 
 try if she could not maintain it for herself. But 
 there was another fact which had recently come to 
 light, and that was the existence of a large Chris- 
 tian population in Turkey in Europe. He did not 
 remember that that fact had been so prominently 
 brought forward as now. The Christian element 
 in the Turkish question was now an important 
 , for it was known that there were three Chris-
 
 270 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 tians to every Turk in Turkey in Europe. The 
 question was, then, what were the feelings of the 
 Christian population of Turkey towards the Ma- 
 hometan rulers of that country? He believed 
 himself that the feeling in the interior of the 
 country was not favourable to them." 
 
 Mr. Cobden might have said that the feeling was 
 most hostile, and I believe he might safely have 
 said that there were not three but four Christians 
 to every Mussulman in European Turkey. It is 
 strange that this last fact should not have come 
 sooner to light in our Parliament, as it has long 
 been known to travellers and readers of books of 
 travel. It appears that not farther back than the 
 beginning of the last century the Turks equalled 
 the Christians in number ; but since that period 
 (and never more rapidly than during the last thirty 
 years) the Turks have been dying out, while the 
 followers of the Cross, in spite of all the oppression 
 put upon them, have been increasing and multi- 
 plying. At this rate of progression in decay, the 
 Turks will not require to be turned out of Europe ; 
 they will die out and utterly disappear. 
 
 During the last thirty years and somewhat more 
 the Turkish government has been living by the 
 expenditure of its capital, or rather it has kept 
 some show of life together by consuming the
 
 VAKOUF. 271 
 
 eDtire capital of state and nation, of grandees and 
 people. They have been eating up all the vakouf 
 property. 
 
 Nearly every bridge, every fountain, every pub- 
 lic bath, every solid stone khan (they are all in 
 ruins now), was built and endowed by private 
 munificence. If a sultan or grand vizier con- 
 structed them, it was out of his private treasury. 
 In Oriental countries, in countries of despotism, 
 plague, malaria, civil war, and sudden death, testa- 
 mentary bequests have but small chance of en- 
 during long, or of being applied to the purposes 
 and objects to which they were destined. The 
 trustees of a property would often be beheaded or 
 bowstrung, and then, the sultan succeeding to the 
 property, a strict inquest was not likely to be 
 made as to the portion of it which was held in 
 trust ; the plague would frequently sweep away 
 entire families, when all that had belonged, to them 
 went to wreck ; in the insurrections and civil wars, 
 and clan wars of the great hereditary Ayans and 
 Dere Beys, houses, castles, and strong towers fed 
 the flames, and family archives, and wills and tes- 
 taments and accounts, perished with them. But, 
 more generally, the property bequeathed for the 
 maintenance of these works of public utility was 
 made vakouf, that is, it was put under the pro-
 
 272 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 tection of some great mosque. It might be called 
 church, or church-protected property. It was long 
 held to be sacred. Where the Ulema were scru- 
 pulous honest men, and attentive to their own 
 business, the property was (for some generations) 
 well administered, and its proceeds fairly applied. 
 With the notable decay, within the last century, 
 of Mussulman learning and piety, industry and 
 honesty, the trust property declined, and the 
 annual proceeds were appropriated by hungry 
 kadis and mollahs, or wasted upon other objects. 
 Still, in the great majority of cases, where the 
 property was vakouf, some portion of the proceeds 
 was from time to time devoted to the repairs of 
 the bridges, fountains, khans, etc., and none of 
 these things were left to go utterly to ruin. I can 
 speak confidently to the fact that a considerable 
 number of these works, which are destroyed and 
 useless now, were in a tolerably good state of repair 
 no farther back than the year 1828. But the 
 reformers, who are uprooting religion and all 
 respect for it, have virtually destroyed the security 
 which the mosque, and the mosque alone, could 
 give to any landed property ; they have destroyed 
 the independence of the Turkish church, if I may 
 so call it ; they have laid their greedy hands upon 
 nearly all the vakouf s of the empire, and are pre-
 
 NEGLECT OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS. 273 
 
 tending to undertake to provide, out of the com- 
 mon state treasury, for the subsistence of the 
 Ulema, mollahs, and students, to keep up the 
 mosques and medressehs or colleges, to repair the 
 bridges, khans, &c., and to do go vernmen tally that 
 which the administrators of the vakouf had done, 
 or ought to have done. Hence, with very few 
 exceptions, we see the heads of the mosques and 
 medressehs in abject poverty, the rabble-students 
 in rags, the most beautiful of the temples and 
 minarets shamefully neglected and hurrying to 
 decay, the bridges, fountains, and khans in the 
 state I have described. It is notorious that, since 
 the vakouf property has been administered by 
 government, nothing whatever Ijas been done to 
 maintain the works of public utility, and that, 
 with the exception of the stinted, ill-conducted 
 repairs lately in progress in the interior of Santa 
 Sophia at Constantinople, hardly any of the money 
 has been spent in keeping up the mosques. In 
 that capital, as at Adrianople, Rodosto, and Seliv- 
 ria, and every town we visited on the European 
 side, in Brusa, Kutayah, Nicaea, Domalich, Cyzicus, 
 and every town we visited in Asia Minor, we saw 
 mosques tumbling to the ground, colleges empty, 
 khans fallen in, and baths and fountains spoiled 
 and useless. By the side of the road which leads 
 
 T
 
 274 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 from Brusa to the westward, there were vast 
 numbers of old Turkish tcheshmehs or fountains, 
 standing by the wayside, at short distances from 
 each other : out of these there was scarcely one 
 that had not been broken to pieces and ruined ; 
 not above two that any longer furnished the pure, 
 cool water of Olympus to the thirsty traveller : 
 in the faces of most of them were, or there had 
 been, Turkish inscriptions, commemorating that 
 this or that good Mussulman, out of reverence to 
 God and affection to his kind, had conducted the 
 waters from the rocks, and had, at his own ex- 
 pense, built the tcheshmeh. 
 
 In every part of the empire the same decline 
 and devastation are manifested. At Bagdad the 
 proud temples of former days are gone the far- 
 famed seats of learning have long since been 
 deserted : they are now, for the most part, in 
 ruins, or have entirely passed away. The ancient 
 and celebrated medresseh of the Caliph Mostan- 
 ser is turned into a custom-house ; its numerous 
 array of professors and students has totally dis- 
 appeared. Bishop Southgate says, "The present 
 number of mosques (in Bagdad) is about fifty, and 
 many of these are in so ruinous a condition that 
 prayer is no longer offered in them. The endow- 
 ments of such have been seized upon by govern-
 
 DEGRADATION OF RELIGION. 275 
 
 ment, and sacrilegiously appropriated to its own 
 use, while of others it has made itself the adminis- 
 trator, thus having the control of the revenues, 
 and disbursing for their support only so much as it 
 pleases. In some instances it has curtailed their 
 endowed offices, and retained the salaries for its 
 own purposes. Such acts, practised by the civil 
 ruler, and endured by the Mussulmans, serve to 
 show to what degradation their religion has 
 fallen."* It is to be noted that more than thir- 
 teen years have elapsed since the Bishop wrote 
 these words ; that in this interval the seizure of 
 vakouf property has been consummated and com- 
 pleted, and that decay and ruin have been ad- 
 vancing with strides more rapid and more startling 
 than ever. I cannot be wrong in my conclusion 
 that the decay of religion must bring on a decay of 
 every moral virtue. Down in the plain of Brusa 
 the Mussulman peasants were fast losing their 
 reputation for strict honesty. "Now and then," 
 said a friend, "a few Turks would practise high- 
 way robbery on a grand scale ; but none of them 
 would pick and steal in a paltry manner. Now 
 they do both ! " Several Mussulmans of the plain 
 admitted the fact and deplored it. We had some 
 
 * A Tour through Armenia, Persia, and Mesopotamia. New 
 York: 1840. 
 
 T 2
 
 276 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 time for our neighbour an old Turkish woman, 
 who stole everything she could lay her hands 
 upon, and who could never be brought to justice 
 because she enjoyed the powerful protection of 
 Khodja Arab, the chief of police. " Yes," said a 
 Turk of one of the villages, " we are no longer 
 what we were we are no longer Mussulmans 
 we have no longer faith or charity we are no 
 longer honest men ! But whose fault is this ? It is 
 the fault and the sin of those men over at Constan- 
 tinople, who have broken in upon all our habits, 
 scattered our religious instructors, and uprooted 
 our belief ! They have been changing everything, 
 and you now see some of the effects of the change. 
 But it will be worse with us yet ! " I must say, 
 that up the country, in the little towns and in the 
 villages, where poverty and wretchedness were far 
 greater than in the Brusa plain, we found the 
 Turkish peasant as thoroughly honest a fellow as 
 ever. Though we left everything open and ex- 
 posed, we never lost the least article in the house 
 of a Mussulman, and we never suffered the slight- 
 est extortion or attempt at overcharges. I am 
 sorry that I cannot say quite so much of the 
 Greeks of the country ; although among the better 
 sort of them we found honesty and hospitality, and 
 a cheerful willingness to serve and oblige.
 
 OLD TURKISH ARISTOCRACY. 277 
 
 The old Turkish aristocracy, tubulent and lawless 
 as it was at times (under the rule of rapacious, lux- 
 urious, effeminate, indolent sultans), did yet con- 
 tain, and at all times, noble and improveable 
 elements. All the Dere Beys were not robbers and 
 cut-throats. Far from it ! Some of the districts 
 over which they held sway, and from which they 
 were strong enough to exclude the lawless troops 
 of the Government and the money extortioners of 
 the pashas, were prosperous regions, were " happy 
 valleys." Under their dominion there were roads, 
 bridges, fountains, khans, and stately mosques. 
 Where are they now? Gone, or in ruins past 
 repair. The destroyers of these reputed destruc- 
 tionists (the Dere Beys) have not had the grace to 
 keep erect the houses of God and the Prophet ! 
 
 Some of the virtually independent hereditary 
 chiefs long kept their countries in a flourishing- 
 condition. This was particularly the case in that 
 fair part of Asia Minor which lies about Magnesia, 
 Pergamus, Kara-Atch, Cassaba, etc., regions watered 
 by the classical Hermus and Caicus, and apper- 
 taining during a long line of hereditary succession 
 to the great, generous-hearted, truly noble family 
 of the Kara-Osman Oglou. There agriculture and 
 trade were encouraged ; khans or caravanserais 
 not paltry sheds, or things of lath and plaster, but
 
 278 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 large, stately, stone edifices were built for the 
 accommodation of merchants and travellers ; foun- 
 tains along the waysides were erected for the thirsty 
 caravans ; plunderers were deterred by severe and 
 certain punishment, and the temptations to plun- 
 dering were removed by the prevailing and general 
 prosperity of the people ; the merchant, whether 
 Mussulman or rayah, was under the protection of 
 the law and of the powerful chief; no rapacious 
 fiscal hand was laid upon his bales, and the transit- 
 duties exacted from him were but trifling and fair 
 tolls. The neighbours of this true old Osmanlee 
 family were the great Paswan Oglous, who, within 
 their own territories, acted in like manner. Twenty- 
 five years ago I followed for days the traces of their 
 piety, munificence, and enlightened public spirit. 
 Just a quarter of a century before my first journey, 
 as he told me himself in London, the late Thomas 
 Hope, Esq., the author of ' Anastasius,' had been 
 the honoured guest of the Kara-Osman Oglou at 
 Magnesia, and had been equally delighted with 
 their hospitality and magnificence, and with the 
 happy and thriving condition of their people. The 
 last remnants of this illustrious family are now lan- 
 guishing in poverty and obscurity, in some dingy, 
 dirty quarter of Constantinople. The democratic 
 reformers seem to be afraid of the effects which
 
 OLD AEISTOCRACY. 279 
 
 might be produced by their presence on the 
 Hermus, merely through the magic of their name, 
 and the traditions of their former greatness, splen- 
 dour, justice, and generosity. Of the Paswan 
 Oglous I could learn nothing. A third Asiatic 
 family, that of the Enez Aghas, great and good as 
 the former two, had been erased from the book of 
 life. In 1812-13 Colonel Macdonald Kinneir, in 
 his tour through Asia Minor, came to the conclu- 
 sion that there must be a natural connection be- 
 tween the strength and independence of the local 
 chiefs and the prosperity of the people, for, wherever 
 he found the chief powerful and contumacious of 
 the central government at Constantinople, he found 
 the people comparatively prosperous. In 1828 I 
 mourned over the destruction of the old landed 
 aristocracy, and the visible effects which had been 
 produced thereby. At that time a few roots were 
 yet left in the soil, from which vigorous shoots 
 might have sprung ; but the French-taught minis- 
 ters of Abdul Medjid have fallen upon the little 
 that Sultan Mahmoud had spared, and those few 
 roots have been torn up. It has been a capital 
 misfortune of this doomed empire that all the re- 
 formers, since the commencement of the present 
 century, and the days of the unhappy Sultan Selim, 
 have been indoctrinated and guided by ultra-de-
 
 280 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 mocratic Frenchmen, or by Italians and other 
 foreigners and adventurers of the same Parisian 
 school 
 
 It is not true that Mussulman religion and 
 Turkish law tend inevitably to the low, universal 
 level of democracy. That religion provides for the 
 hereditary descent of property, and the law pro- 
 mises protection to such property. The family in 
 ancient enjoyment of vast estates enjoyed also the 
 consideration and respect of the people. They 
 had no hereditary titles granted by the Court, but 
 they had standing spontaneous patents of nobility 
 from succeeding generations of the people. On 
 their own territories they were barons and princes, 
 and the more ancient their descent and occupation 
 of the soil, the greater was the reverence in which 
 they were held. Their tenure was military, like 
 that of our barons under the feudal system. When 
 the Sultan was engaged in war they furnished him 
 with troops equipped and maintained at their own 
 expense, and sent some of the family to command. 
 But they also paid the Sultan his tenths of their 
 produce, and frequently granted him " benevo- 
 lences." A wise reform would have limited their 
 power, without uprooting and destroying them. 
 Turkey in the nineteenth century was not so ad- 
 vanced in civilisation as England was in the fif-
 
 THE JANISSAEIES. 281 
 
 teenth century, when the might of our barons was 
 shattered and reduced, but not extirpated, by the 
 Wars of the Roses. The grinding extortions of 
 Henry VII. and the bloody tyranny of Henry VIII. 
 were the immediate fruits of our sudden abasement 
 of the aristocracy, the Commons not yet being 
 strong enough to keep and guard their own. In 
 Turkey there was, and there is, no strength and 
 consistency in the democratic element. All 
 strength, all power, is now in the hands of the 
 Sultan, or rather of the men who, by turns, govern 
 in his name, and dispose of his regular army. As 
 I have said before, there is a low, dead level of 
 equality an equality of poverty and insignificance. 
 The Janissary militia had become, in its con- 
 struction and in its very essence, a popular element, 
 and a balance against the absolute and arbitrary 
 power of the throne. If they made bad revolu- 
 tions, they sometimes made good ones ; if they 
 dethroned a Sultan Selim, they also dethroned 
 Sultans who were a disgrace to their country and 
 to humanity ; if they sometimes fought for the 
 maintenance of their own prepotency and ancient 
 abuses, they frequently fought for the good of the 
 people, and for stopping, at the outset, unwise, 
 tyrannical, and dangerous innovations. The day 
 that saw them perish witnessed the extinction of
 
 282 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the last spark of Turkish liberty and Turkish pa- 
 triotism. 
 
 It was from the sources I have indicated (people 
 in Europe wondered where the money came from) 
 that funds were procured for the extravagant 
 court, for the spendthrift pashas, for the ambassa- 
 dors at Christian courts, for the army and navy, 
 and for all that, costly machinery and appareil for 
 manufactures which were purchased of late years 
 for the Sultan, in England, France, Belgium, 
 Germany, and nearly every other country in Eu- 
 rope. 
 
 Turkey, which does not possess a road nor even 
 the elements of agriculture, was to be suddenly 
 turned into a manufacturing country, and to make 
 all things for herself, instead of purchasing them from 
 England, France, etc. Millions of piastres were 
 sunk in setting up a cloth factory in the plain near 
 Nicomedia, and English, French, and Belgians, in 
 succession, were imported to set up the machinery 
 and direct the works. The spot selected was so 
 unhealthy that many of these poor men died, 
 while others speedily returned to their own coun- 
 tries with their livers injured or hopelessly destroyed 
 by the effects of malaria fever. The men we found 
 there, in the spring of 1848, were all sick, and 
 looking like ghosts of men. The Armenian seraffs
 
 IMPERIAL CLOTH FACTORY. 283 
 
 were the supreme managers of this, as of all the 
 other attempts at manufacturing establishments. 
 Their expenditure of the Sultan's money had been 
 enormous. Before they set up this immense 
 factory, they well knew themselves, and were 
 repeatedly warned by others, that the air was pes- 
 tilential ; that the natives could not live in this 
 place, and much less Europeans ; that there were 
 several places in the neighbourhood (with good 
 water-power) that were perfectly healthy ; but 
 here they would have it, and here, in defiance of 
 common sense, they erected their pest-house. Be- 
 sides a separate lodging-house for the Europeans, 
 they had built an immense barrack of a place for 
 the accommodation of the Armenian working 
 people, and they had traced out a regular or irre- 
 gular village ; for this place was to be, in brief 
 time, another Leeds, the great cloth-manufacturing 
 town of the Ottoman empire ! But there was no 
 keeping together a regular resident population ; 
 the Armenians would not sleep here in the summer 
 and autumn on account of the malaria; long 
 before the approach of night they all ran away to 
 the villages on the hills. For six months in the 
 year the great barrack was useless ; and even in 
 the winter-time the people preferred their own 
 villages. In all, there were said to be about 1 50
 
 28-4 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Armenians, men and boys, employed about the fac- 
 tory, but very few of these had learned the mystery 
 of cloth-making, and, as most of them had mul- 
 berry-gardens, or vineyards, or a field or two of 
 corn-land, and as they were irregularly paid, they 
 were very irregular in their attendance. Eleven 
 good fulling machines were sent out from England, 
 but there was only one fulling machine (French) 
 at work. The others were broken, scattered, and 
 could hardly be fitted up at all. The fuller a 
 decent Frenchman with his own machine, could 
 not keep pace with the Belgian looms, and he had 
 been imploring for many months that they would 
 get him other fulling machines. They kept on 
 spinning wool and weaving cloth ; and when the 
 cloth was made, as only a small portion could be 
 fulled, the mass of it was thrown into a damp 
 magazine. Land-rats and water-rats swarmed. 
 The grease in the uufulled cloth attracted the de- 
 structive vermin, and the rats ate the cloth and 
 made their nests in the very heart of the unpressed 
 bales. "You cannot take up a piece of cloth 
 without finding it defiled and gnawed, and with 
 holes through and through." So said the French- 
 man, who would have given us ocular demonstra- 
 tion if the stench of that depot had not driven us 
 from the door. In his own mind he had formed
 
 CLOTH FACTORY. 285 
 
 twenty different theories about the Armenian 
 management ; but he had given them all up, and 
 had, indeed, thrown up the whole subject as an 
 unfathomable mystery. He could allow a great 
 deal for ignorance, obstinacy, and conceit, but this 
 would not carry him through the question, for 
 blunders were committed that no amount of igno- 
 rance could account for : he could also allow a 
 great deal for roguery and gaspillage ; but then so 
 many things were done which looked like a gas- 
 pillage upon themselves so much was like roguery 
 committing suicide upon itself. No ! there was 
 no understanding these Armenian seraffs and their 
 way of managing these imperial manufactories. 
 They were constantly doing and undoing, building 
 up and knocking down, and then building up again 
 as before ; they shut their ears to all sensible and 
 honest advice, telling every sensible and honest 
 man, " This is not your affair this does not con- 
 cern you ! " Most of the cloth manufactured at 
 Nicomedia was coarse, porous, wretched stuff; 
 when turned into soldiers' cloaks or jackets, there 
 was no wear in it. The total quantity was of no 
 amount : four years ago the Fabrica was to clothe 
 the whole regular army, but it never had clothed 
 a fiftieth part of it. Now and then the Sultan 
 and some of his household get a blue frock-coat
 
 286 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 apiece out of the Fabrica, but this fine cloth costs 
 its weight in gold or more. " It would be very 
 odd," said one of the Belgians, " if we could not 
 turn out a piece of the finest cloth occasionally, 
 seeing that we have the best machinery of Eng- 
 land and France, that the finest of wools for the 
 purpose are imported, via Trieste, from Saxony and 
 the best wool countries, and that we, Frenchmen 
 and Belgians, work it. You could not call it Turk- 
 ish cloth it was only cloth made in Turkey by 
 European machinery, out of European material, 
 and by good European hands. We made it as 
 the English before us made it. As for the Turks, 
 we must leave them out of the question, for they 
 hate regular labour and will not work here ; but 
 take these Armenians ; they could not make fine 
 cloth, and it will be long before they learn ; and 
 leave this machinery in their hands without any 
 Franks, and in a month they would spoil and ruin 
 it all. They have no order, no neatness or clean- 
 liness, no mechanical skill." 
 
 The Frenchman and an old German were fully 
 sensible of the absurdity of attempting to force on 
 manufactures in a most fertile country, where agri- 
 culture was in its very earliest infancy. With the 
 money which has been already spent in this place 
 alone the Sultan might have drained the stagnant
 
 CONDUCT OF THE MILITARY. 287 
 
 waters, might have cut down the thick belt of 
 wood and underwood by the lake,* might have 
 made a distribution of proper ploughs and other 
 agricultural implements, might have restored this 
 rich and beautiful plain to perfect salubrity. Again 
 I must say that it made the heart sick and sad to 
 see these profligate blundering proceedings of the 
 Armenians for they, and not the Turks, are the 
 fathers of these manufacturing establishments, and 
 the sole directors of them.^ 
 
 On the northern shore of the beautiful Gulf of 
 Nicomedia, at the distance of some fifteen miles 
 from the cloth factory, they had set up an Im- 
 
 * The Sabanjah, at the head of the Nicomedian plain. 
 
 t The Shoorah, or council of Nicomedia, was composed entirely 
 of Turks : Osman Bey, the governor, would not have a Christian 
 or other ray ah in it. We saw in this sad, ruined, and most 
 unhealthy city several signs and proofs of the operation of 
 Tanzimaut. We heard sad complaints of the conduct of the 
 men-catchers or recruiting parties, to whom an allusion will be 
 found in the Appendix. Though the " beautiful ordinance " 
 abolishes the ancient system of purveyance, and strictly forbids 
 any soldier or officer to take what he does not pay for, and 
 though money is given for travelling expenses, officers and men 
 had helped themselves to whatever they wanted, and had gone 
 away without paying anybody. Then they had pressed into 
 their service so many poor men and their horses to carry them 
 up to Adar Bazaar. Half of the horses would be lamed ; and 
 what security was there for payment ? If the military could 
 behave thus so near the capital, one may fancy the little restraint 
 they would put upon themselves when far away in the interior of 
 Asia Minor.
 
 288 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 penal Silk Manufactory. This silk factory was a 
 large, tall, and rather stately building, and, all to- 
 gether, the works and dependencies formed quite a 
 village, running parallel with the Gulf. There was 
 one really tolerable street, and there was a shorter 
 and narrower one between it and the sea. In the 
 better street there were long rows of dwelling- 
 houses for the European superintendents, doctor, 
 draftsmen, engineers, and working people ; and 
 these houses, though low, were substantially built. 
 Here there was the inestimable benefit of good 
 air : malaria fevers, I was assured, were unknown, 
 and the Europeans all looked healthy. The spot 
 is too distant to be affected by the great foyer of 
 malaria above Nicomedia, and it has no stagnating 
 waters in its vicinity, the beautiful and most co- 
 pious stream which sets the works of the factory 
 in motion descending in a steep deep bed from 
 calcareous rocks close at hand, and having a rapid 
 course and a free outlet to the gulf. Wherever we 
 saw a plan which had originated with the ex- 
 Vizier Riza Pasha, the great rival of Reschid, it 
 was more free of flaws than any other of the 
 numerous new projects, and had more common 
 sense about it He may have been a more daring 
 rogue than his rival Reschid, but, for administra- 
 tive and business talent, and activity and energy,
 
 RIZA PASHA. 289 
 
 Rescbid was not to be compared with him. The 
 merinos sheep project was Riza's.* Riza selected 
 this healthy spot at Heraclea, and first set up 
 these works. Preferring the useful to the orna- 
 mental, he intended the work for a cotton factory, 
 and nearly all the machinery originally set up was 
 for spinning and weaving cotton. It was a private 
 matter, a secret, a " little go " of his own ; but 
 when Riza was declining, and the Sultan came to 
 learn about these great buildings, and was angry 
 thereat (wondering how he could have come by 
 the money), Riza made a present of the whole to 
 his Highness or Imperial Majesty. So runs the 
 story ; but there are various editions of it. The 
 English cotton machinery, brought, fixed, and 
 fitted up by Englishmen, at an immense expense, 
 was then all pulled down, and such portions of it 
 as were not destroyed were sent over to Macri-Keui. 
 I have said before that in this unhappy country 
 one minister or favourite is almost sure to undo or 
 to neglect what has been done by his predecessor. If 
 the work is not undone or neglected, then it is altered 
 from its original intent and purpose. Then, again, 
 the men who divide favour and authority are almost 
 invariably jealous of each other, and ever ready to 
 mar a plan in which they ought to co-operate. 
 
 * Appendix X. 
 
 U
 
 290 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 " Nulla fides regni sociis, omnisque potestas, 
 Impatiens consortis erit" * 
 
 It being resolved to turn the cotton-mill into a 
 silk factory, other costly machinery was bought in 
 Europe. Hohannes Dadian purchased at Vienna 
 the entire fabric of a German machinery, mate- 
 rials, designs, and everything as it stood and he 
 brought out the master of the fabric, his family 
 and workmen, all in a lump, in order that they 
 might make at an immense price at Herek-Keui 
 the goods which they had made at a moderate 
 price in Vienna. English, French, German, and 
 Italian machinery was here all huddled together, 
 and none could work it properly except the im- 
 ported Europeans. Recently some improvements 
 in the making of fancy silks had been announced 
 at Lyons, and thereupon the great Hohannes had 
 made a new purchase and had brought out, at a 
 very great expense, a superior French mechanist 
 to fit up this machinery. M. Riviere, from Lyons, 
 was a sensible, very superior man, with the in- 
 formation and manners of a gentleman. He had 
 now nearly completed his task, and was looking 
 forward with much pleasure to his return home. 
 The account he gave me of the Armenian mis- 
 management was most pitiable. " It is," said he, 
 
 * Lucau.
 
 IMPERIAL SILK FACTORY. 291 
 
 "a mixture of folly and knavery that surpasses 
 comprehension ! Then imagine the folly of setting 
 up such fancy manufactures as these in a country 
 where they do not know how to make a plough !" 
 
 Here, too, there was water-power enough to 
 drive fifty factories ; the water never fails ; it was 
 never known not to be over-abundant ; but to 
 throw away more money the Dadians must have 
 a steam-engine, in case of its falling short ; and 
 here stands a prime English engine, put together 
 on the spot by excellent workmen, imported ad 
 hoc from England. It had never been used, and 
 it never will be used. It was covered with dirt 
 and rust. There was a fine English hydraulic 
 wheel, but it was very far from being kept in such 
 beautiful order as the Belgians at the cloth factory 
 kept theirs; it was dirty and neglected, and I 
 much doubt whether it was often employed. All 
 the looms we saw were hand-looms : of these not 
 more than ten were at work. About 150 spinning- 
 machines and looms were set up, and we were 
 told that this number was to be raised to 300. 
 The Armenians kept adding to the number, 
 although, for want of proper hands, and for want 
 of money to pay the working-people, they cannot 
 use such as are already set up. The Armenians 
 jealously exclude the Greeks ; the rough Armenian 
 
 u 2
 
 292 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 peasants are slow in learning, and do not willingly 
 remain there, as they are miserably and irregularly 
 paid ; the Turks cannot and will not learn, they 
 always want to knock off and smoke pipe ! Except 
 four or five men who remained as door-keepers or 
 porters, and a few boys, all the Mussulmans had 
 bolted long ago. Of course their females cannot 
 be employed in a factory among men. The total 
 number of the Armenians, men, women, and chil- 
 dren, was about 150 ; but we could scarcely see 
 any of them at work. The little that was doing 
 was done by Europeans, who were languidly making 
 narrow ribbons wherewith to hang the Sultan's 
 orders or medals to uniform-coats, and some broad, 
 stiff ribbons for the Sultan's women. Of Euro- 
 peans there were now on the spot 40 Germans 
 (15 of them being females), 11 Italians, and 10 
 French. Though not suffering in health, they 
 were all uneasy or depressed in spirits, complaining 
 of the solitude and barbarism of the place, of the 
 want of good food, of the total want of amusement, 
 of the irregularity of their pay, and of the tricks 
 and blunders they saw daily committed without 
 being able to check them. 
 
 The great framework, the factory buildings, 
 were, indeed, of very superior quality, and the 
 work-rooms were for the most part vast, airy, and
 
 SILK FACTORY. 293 
 
 well lighted. They showed us some uncommonly 
 rich fancy and brocaded silks, of the very bright- 
 est colours, made for shalvars for the Sultan's 
 harem, for pantaloons for his chamberlains, eunuchs, 
 and secretaries ; and some other rich figured silks 
 for curtains, sofa-covers, &c. All that is produced 
 is sent to the Sultan's palace, where everybody 
 helps himself or herself according to fancy or 
 amount of favour ; and then the very little that 
 remains the stuff which nobody prizes is sent 
 to the bazaars of Constantinople to be sold on 
 account of the Sultan. The regenerator of the 
 Ottoman empire is thus made to figure as a retail 
 dealer in gauds and vanities, in things reprobated by 
 the Koran and prohibited to the use of Mussulmans. 
 In the Stamboul bazaars there is a separate shop 
 or warehouse for the sale of these silks, with a re- 
 gular establishment of cashier, clerks, and shopmen, 
 every man so employed being an Armenian, and 
 a connexion or dependent of the Dadians. In 
 wages alone this establishment costs the Sultan 
 about 3000 piastres per month. It is rare that 
 anything is sold, or that anything goes there but 
 refuse : one month they sold in it one pike of 
 figured silk stuff, the price of which might possibly 
 be from 20 to 30 piastres. This fact I learned 
 from an indubitable source, not at Heraclea, but
 
 294 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 at Constantinople. On the same authority I can 
 state that hardly anything was ever sold in the 
 Sultan's cloth-shop in the bazaars, another esta- 
 blishment costing a large sum monthly ! The 
 name of the Sultan's women is Legion, and they 
 have all a passion for finery, and he being so 
 good-natured and so very generous they must all 
 be indulged. It was, however, said that the divi- 
 sion of the produce of these looms led to frequent 
 and fierce contentions among them that the 
 arrival of a new bale of silks from Heraclea inva- 
 riably caused a terrible combustion in the imperial 
 harem. 
 
 The designs of some of the pieces were very 
 pretty and tasteful, but they had all been im- 
 ported from Christendom, and there was nothing 
 Turkish or Oriental about them. They had now, 
 however, three designers, one being a young and 
 clever Italian, and the two others Germans ; and 
 we saw two or three Armenian boys servilely 
 copying ornaments and fancy drawings under their 
 tuition. The Brasa silks, and still less the silks 
 produced and prepared in other parts of the 
 country, were scarcely fit for the fine work A good 
 deal of silk had been imported from France and 
 Italy, and the best, if not the only good piece- 
 goods that were shown to us were made entirely of
 
 THE UNIVERSAL OPINION. 295 
 
 European materials, and by European hands the 
 machinery being of course all European ! And 
 these were displayed to the poor innocent Sultan 
 as evidence that his own subjects, within his own 
 dominions, could rival the productions of Europe ! 
 " It will be some time," said M. Riviere, " before 
 Heraclea shall be able to make Lyon tremble or 
 cause uneasiness in Spitalfields. They are throw- 
 ing away their millions of piastres ! This ma- 
 chinery I am fitting up is complicated and delicate ; 
 I know it will be broken and spoiled before I am 
 gone a month, and then who is to repair it ? " 
 
 Here, at Heraclea, were intelligent, unpreju- 
 diced men, from various countries, and our friend 
 and companion M. R , a native of Constanti- 
 nople, who had seen the greater part of the empire. 
 French, German, Italian, or Levantine Frank, there 
 was but one opinion among them the empire was 
 going to ruin at an accelerated pace ; the substance 
 was gone already, and the Armenians were finishing 
 the dish by picking the bones. One man, who had 
 been in every part of European Turkey, and in 
 nearly every corner of Asia, from Syria to the Per- 
 sian border, from the Black Sea to the Indian 
 Ocean, most solemnly declared that, as far as the 
 Turks were concerned, he had nowhere seen any- 
 thing but a decreasing population, and towns and
 
 296 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 villages in rapid decay. He would not admit of a 
 single exception. Some places were mentioned as 
 having of late years shown symptoms of reviving 
 prosperity and increasing population. " Go to 
 them," said he, "and you will find that the in- 
 crease is only among the Christian and Jewish 
 rayahs." 
 
 I would respectfully ask Lord Palmerston 
 whether he considers all this as progress and 
 rapid improvement or progress and improvement 
 on the part of the Turks ? or whether it is to be 
 contemplated that the oppressors (the Mussulmans), 
 who are thus diminishing, are to be sustained by 
 Christian powers against the oppressed, who are 
 increasing, and who are for the far greater part 
 Christians. 
 
 At Beykos, on the Asiatic side of the Bosphorus, 
 there was another, but smaller, cloth factory, with 
 a leather factory adjoining, worked and managed 
 by Turks and Armenians. Here again the site 
 was very unhealthy. When we visited the place, 
 in the month of June, it had been visited in suc- 
 cession by typhus, malaria fever, and cholera; 
 eleven out of some sixty workmen had died of 
 cholera, and the works were then suspended, though 
 more through want of money than dread of death. 
 Here they were to have made leather for shoeing
 
 CHINA AND GLASS FACTORIES. 297 
 
 the entire army and navy ; for, according to Rescind 
 Pasha's economists, it was fearful to think how 
 much money had been paid to foreign nations for 
 leather. A little lower down, on the same side of 
 the Bosphorus, near the village of Inghir-Keui, 
 were a china or porcelain manufactory, and a glass 
 factory, which had been destined to make all the 
 porcelain and all the glass that could be wanted at 
 Constantinople. The works had cost enormous 
 sums, and could produce nothing except at a dear 
 price. The original dimensions of the plan had 
 been curtailed, and the joint work of these two 
 factories amounted to a very small matter. Ma- 
 chinery, apparatus, workmen, were all Europeans, 
 the few natives employed being merely coal-car- 
 riers and labourers. In the china manufactory, 
 which belonged to the Sultan and his mother, 
 there were eleven Frenchmen and one Englishman 
 (an engineer) ; in the glass factory, which apper- 
 tained to Achmet Fethi Pasha, one of the brothers- 
 in-law of the Sultan, there were fourteen Germans 
 and an old Englishman, who was foreman and 
 chief overseer. The coals which they consumed in 
 their furnaces were Newcastle coals : they had been 
 at a standstill for want of fuel, and a supply which 
 had been sent them would last only a few days, at 
 the end of which they would all come to another
 
 298 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 standstill. Wages and other expenses would go 
 on all the while. There had been a constant chop- 
 ping and changing, as well of workmen as of ma- 
 nagers or administrators : now the workmen were 
 all French, now Italian, now German, now French 
 again, now German again ; while in the adminis- 
 tration there were now Turks, now Armenians, 
 and now Turks again ; Turk or Armenian, every 
 director seeming to have been bent upon spending, 
 wasting, or plundering as much money as he could. 
 The glass-works were nearly at a dead stop already, 
 the Germans merely making, with admirable com- 
 posure and slowness, a few fancy tumblers. A 
 window-glass furnace had fallen in, three months 
 ago, and was now lying in ruina The glass used 
 for this purpose is chiefly imported from Trieste, 
 and very thin and bad it is. In the Turkish quar- 
 ters of Constantinople not one house in a dozen 
 has yet the comfort of glazed windows; in the 
 European provinces a pane of glass was a rare 
 sight, and in Asia Minor we never saw one, except 
 in the very best houses in the large towna If the 
 manufactory had been honestly conducted, and if 
 Achmet Fethi had limited his ambition to the 
 production of cheap window-glass, he might have 
 made money, and have conferred a benefit on the 
 country. But his window-glass furnace had turn-
 
 ACHMET FETHI. 299 
 
 bled down, and all along his factory had been 
 chiefly intended for fancy goods and objects of 
 mere luxury and ornament. They showed us the 
 glass and china goods ornamented tumblers, 
 water-jugs, drinking-cups, coffee-cups, ewers, ba- 
 sins, scent-bottles, vases for flowers, fancy ink- 
 stands, and nick-nacks, all pretty enough to look 
 at, but all costing three times what superior French 
 or German articles might have been bought for at 
 Constantinople. Little of the work would bear a 
 close inspection, yet some of the designs were 
 Oriental and pretty. But what was this except a 
 making of shirt-frills before they had gotten a 
 shirt? Yet Achmet Fethi, or Achmet Fatty, as 
 the English generally called him,* told me that 
 there was no doubt that these enterprises would be 
 very beneficial, and that they would soon enable 
 Turkey to manufacture her own glass and china 
 goods, instead of purchasing in the foreign market. 
 
 My friend Achmet Fatty was also a brick and 
 tile maker. He was the proprietor of clay-fields 
 and kilns in the valley of Buyuk-dere, exercising 
 there a strict monopoly, alike injurious to the 
 people of the country and to his own purse. 
 
 Is this free and unrestricted trade ? are all 
 
 * This brother-in-law of Abdul Medjid was one of the fattest 
 of the Pashas, and one of the most ignorant and stupid.
 
 300 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 these things evidences of progress and rapid im- 
 provement ? 
 
 But these establishments all yielded in rank, 
 importance, and expense, to those set up at Macri- 
 Keui and Zeitoun-Bournu, which were to be the 
 Birminghams and Manchesters of Turkey. These 
 two places are on the European side, on the shore 
 of the Propontis or Sea of Marmora, and at very 
 short distances from the walls of the capital 
 Yes ! the Turks were going to make Manchesters 
 and Birminghams, and they absolutely needed to 
 be taught how to make hay, or how to perform the 
 simplest operations in agriculture ! 
 
 The Grande Fabrique (as it was called) at Zei- 
 toun-Bournu was indeed a grand place in its out- 
 ward dimensions. There was a corridor in it which 
 measured 650 feet in length. They were building an 
 enormous square tower, the height of which was to 
 rival the altitude of the ex-famous tower at Font- 
 hill Abbey. Once this tower of Zeitoun-Bournu 
 had fallen down with an awful crash, killing above 
 thirty of the stonemasons and labourers. Three 
 English engineers had told them that, from the 
 way in which they were proceeding, the tower 
 must inevitably fall. But the Armenian directors 
 would neither make use of the science of these 
 Englishmen, who were all in the pay of govern-
 
 MOKE IMPERIAL FACTORIES. 301 
 
 ment, nor even listen to their advice or warnings. 
 There being no fresh water on the bad spot chosen 
 for these works, the Armenians had employed the 
 Sultan's head gardener, an ignorant Turk, to sink 
 a well. I know not how many accidents happened 
 in that operation ; and when the well was finished, 
 instead of clear, fresh water, it gave the local 
 engineer salt water, heavily charged with sea-sand, 
 to put into the boilers of his steam-engines ! They 
 had been told that they were digging their well 
 too near the margin of the sea, but the Armenians 
 would have it there. In the same clever way they 
 had thrown out a jetty at the very point where it 
 ought not to have been, so that, whenever there 
 was any sea, nothing could be done in the way 
 either of loading or unloading. But, in sober 
 truth, not a single thing had been done or at- 
 tempted in the right way ! 
 
 Their plan at Zeitoun-Bournu was certainly very 
 ambitious. Not only were all manner of goods, 
 hard and soft pen-knives, razors, calicoes, cotton 
 stockings, cannon, ploughshares, iron railing, iron 
 pipes, castings, bits and stirrups, lance-heads, 
 swords, locks, padlocks, &c. &c., but iron and steel, 
 and all the tools and all the machinery to be used, 
 were to be produced upon the spot, instead of 
 being bought as heretofore in England and Ger-
 
 302 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 many. Everything was to be done at home, sur 
 la place ! Of late years immense sums had been 
 spent in England for steam-engines and other 
 machinery. In the Armenian philosophy this was 
 so much money lost to Turkey. Now, or as soon 
 as the works should be finished and set a-going, 
 all these steam-engines, and all this costly ma- 
 chinery, were to be made at Zeitoun-Bournti, by 
 Germans and Frenchmen and Armenians, working 
 under the direction and instruction of a few 
 Englishmen. These foreigners were to be retained 
 until the Armenians had learned to do everything 
 themselves ; and then Turkey would have no need 
 to pay high wages to Franks, and these English, 
 French, and German instructors might all be sent 
 to the rightabout. 
 
 There was also to be at Zeitoun-Bournu a school 
 of arts and mysteries, " Ecole des Arts et Metiers," 
 wherein mathematics, chemistry, geology, mine- 
 ralogy, drawing, civil engineering, &c., were to be 
 taught to the Armenian natives, and to young 
 Turks, on the most approved principles. All the 
 instruments and appurtenances of a Crabinetto 
 Fisico had been purchased in London, Paris, 
 Berlin, and Vienna; a mountain of French 
 drawing-paper and pencils had been imported ; and 
 our American friend, Dr. Lawrence Smith, was
 
 SCHOOL OF ARTS. 303 
 
 provided with a chemical laboratory, geological 
 specimens, and the nucleus of a good mineralo- 
 gical collection. A certain number of young 
 Armenians had been receiving pay to be students 
 in this Ecole, for it appears to be adopted as a 
 principle in Turkey, that nobody will study unless 
 the poor Sultan pays him. But although there 
 was abundant accommodation in the buildings 
 already finished, this school had never been opened 
 except in the Constantinople newspapers, and 
 nothing whatever had been done by the students, 
 who were now (in June, 1848) dispersed by the 
 stop put to their pay. 
 
 Some of the expensive machinery brought out 
 from England was lying rusting on the sea-shore, 
 the waves breaking over it whenever there was a 
 little wind. Other articles (every one of them had 
 cost good money ! ) were scattered over the vast 
 enclosed area, which, in the winter-time, was three 
 feet deep in mud. One of Nasmyth's expensive 
 steam-hammers and its machinery lay scattered all 
 about, some portions of it being quite spoiled, and 
 other component parts carried off There had 
 been a regular plunder of brasses. Nearly every 
 bit of brass they could lay their hands upon had 
 been carried off by the Armenian workmen. The 
 Dadians, the Armenian directors in chief, had
 
 304" THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 been allowed, or had of themselves assumed, the 
 authority of bastinadoing some of these thieves, 
 who had been caught with the stolen property upon 
 them ; but the bold remedy was applied too late. 
 When Mr. Thorman went to work, he found that 
 something was missing in every machine, and that 
 some pieces of machinery had been so despoiled, 
 that they could not be put together until the miss- 
 ing parts were supplied from England. Some of 
 the machinery which he had set up was beautiful 
 of its kind ; but there were other much-used, 
 almost obsolete machines, which had been pur- 
 chased secondhand in England, and charged as 
 new, and at full price, to the Sultan.* 
 
 Care was taken of nothing ; some of the beau- 
 tiful new machinery was broken or deranged before 
 it had been set up a week. Nobody could tell 
 
 how this was done ; Mr. T could only surmise 
 
 that it was done in spite, by some of the Armenian 
 working people, who got very low pay, and hated 
 the Franks, who were engaged on high salaries. 
 But for nearly all their time neither Armenians 
 nor Franks had any work to do. In the month of 
 
 * All the machinery purchased and sent out by M. E. Zohrab, 
 the Ottoman Consul-General in London, was new and excellent 
 of its kind. The Consul went to first-rate English houses, and 
 paid them proper prices. It was Hohannes Dadian, the Armenian 
 manager in capite, who bought all the rubbish.
 
 EUROPEAN WORKMEN. 305 
 
 March, 1848, we saw a few Englishmen and Ger- 
 mans at work, fitting and preparing some of the 
 machinery. As the Armenians had discovered the 
 German files were cheaper than English, a great 
 stock of them had been provided ; these German 
 files broke in the hand, and were driving the Eng- 
 lish workmen crazy. The German artisans were 
 smoking at their work, and tapping and rasping 
 like so many Turks and Armenians, or with an 
 indolence and nonchalance not to be surpassed. 
 They did not receive half the pay of the English ; 
 but one Englishman, once fairly set a going, did 
 more work than three of them. There was an almost 
 total want of proper tools ; on all the premises 
 there was but one grindstone, and that a very bad 
 one. 
 
 About the middle of March all the building 
 operations were suspended, some of the Franks 
 were dismissed, and most of the Armenians, getting 
 no pay, absconded. Of Turks there were none, 
 except some three or four who acted as gate- 
 keepers and porters. In April everything was at 
 a standstill, and more of the foreign workmen 
 took their departure. In May there remained 
 only some half dozen Englishmen, and about a 
 score of Germans, and of these the major part, 
 having nothing to do, were away seeking amuse- 
 
 x
 
 306 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 ment in Constantinople or at Macri-Keui. At the 
 end of May (the 29th, 30th, and 31st) we passed 
 three whole days on the spot with Dr. Smith ; and 
 no spot could well be more desolate. At night 
 the vast enclosure was as lonely and ghostly as the 
 haunted Acropolis of Selyvria, or as the void in- 
 terior of Nicsea, and here, as there, owls hooted, 
 cucuvajas screamed, and bats flitted in the moon- 
 light. We were barely a mile and a half from the 
 walls of Constantinople and the Seven Towers; 
 but in all that part of the city, and all along that 
 range of landward walls, from the Propontis to 
 the Golden Horn, there reigned the same sadness, 
 silence, and desolation. The few tenants were 
 quite lost in these immense barracks. We rarely 
 saw a soul after sunset. That which was intended 
 to be a Manchester and a Birmingham put toge- 
 ther was a wilderness and a waste in money a 
 most awful waste ! Even in the daytime the few 
 working people who remained were scarcely visible 
 in that immense quadrangle. And in this forlorn 
 state was the imperial fabric at Zeitoun-Bournu 
 when we left the country in July. The only thing 
 we saw that had really been made on the premises 
 was a big, heavy, ugly cast-iron fountain for the 
 Sultan's stone palace at Dolma-Baghche. It had 
 been cast some time, and now that it was finished
 
 AN ENGLISH DIRECTOR-IN-CHIEF. 307 
 
 they hardly knew how to get it to the palace, it 
 was so very heavy.* 
 
 The imperial fabric at Macri-Keui was an older 
 and more settled blunder. It had been set up 
 some four or five years before our arrival. The 
 Director-in-chief was an old Englishman, who was 
 not very far from his dotage. He was perfectly 
 indifferent to everything except to his pay and 
 other emoluments. He never attempted either to 
 oppose or to reason with the Armenians. Yet this 
 was the man that the Sultan, at the instigation of 
 the Armenians, had delighted to honour and re- 
 ward, while other Englishmen in his service, men 
 really eminent in science and in their professions, 
 had been left almost unnoticed, and with insuffi- 
 cient salaries that were most irregularly paid. 
 
 * On the 29th Mr. Thorman, for the first time, set a-going 
 the splendid English steam-engine which was to give motion to 
 all the varied machinery within. He had great difficulty in pro- 
 curing water enough from the well. His fire would not draw, 
 for the Dadians, instead of allowing him to build the chimney 
 in his own way, had insisted that it should be built on a plan of 
 their own these bunglers in almost every case pretending to 
 know better than the engineers they had engaged to instruct 
 and direct them. We made a most awful smoke, the engines 
 made a few revolutions, the fire went out and there an end 1 
 I doubt whether the engine has ever been set going since, as all 
 the yrushes have been wanted to enable the government to assume 
 what is facetiously termed "a warlike attitude" towards Russia 
 and Austria. 
 
 x 2
 
 308 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Old H 's salary alone was 1 OOOZ. a year Eng- 
 lish money, and he had allowances for house-rent, 
 for provisions, for keep of horses, &c., which did 
 not fall short of 300. a year more ; and then he 
 got still more money by doing, on these imperial 
 and national works, little jobs for the great 
 Pashas, and gaining good commissions on traps 
 and nick-nacks he imported for them from 
 England ; and in addition to all this, he had I 
 know not how many sons and sons-in-law idling 
 about the place, or scampering over the country 
 with horses, on snug salaries of from 200?. to 300?. 
 a-year each. I scarcely know what I replied to one 
 of these worthies when he remarked to me that 
 Turkey was "getting a sprinkling of manufac- 
 tures !" Furthermore, old H had received 
 
 the Nishan, or Ottoman decoration, richly set in 
 diamonds, and three gold and diamond snuff-boxes. 
 He exercised no moral control over his men, the 
 far greater part of whom much needed such control 
 and the force of a good example. As good Eng- 
 lish mechanics, they could work with no heart 
 with the knowledge that what they were about 
 was ordered to be done in the wrong way, and 
 must end hi a ridiculous failure. A good many of 
 them had been here for months, and had never 
 been set to work at all, because their factories were
 
 WAGES OF WORKMEN. 309 
 
 not ready for them, or because the machinery had 
 not yet arrived from England or from France, or 
 because there was no coal to burn, or because 
 there was no raw material wherewith to work. 
 These men were loitering and drinking all day 
 long in the spirit-shop of the village, or playing at 
 billiards in a Greek coffee-house. Their numbers 
 varied, and had constantly been varying; but I 
 think that, in all, there were about eighty English- 
 men in the spring of 1848, the far greater part of 
 whom were doing nothing for their high salaries, 
 or nothing to any purpose. In the course of the 
 month of February these were joined by two or 
 three score of Frenchmen, Belgians, and Germans.* 
 The pay of all these men commenced from the day 
 they signed their contracts in Christendom. The 
 money wasted in wages alone must have amounted 
 to an enormous sum. Had the government been 
 rich, and the country prosperous, this would still 
 have been a deplorable waste ; but the condition 
 
 * I noted in my journal, under the date of January 23, 1848, 
 " We were told that the steamboat of this morning had brought 
 out seventeen more English artisans, of whom six or seven were 
 people from Nottingham, who wove stockings and elastic drawers ; 
 and that an Austrian steamer which had come in from Trieste 
 two or three days ago had brought four German cutlers, who 
 were to make penknives and razors in the imperial fabric at 
 Zeitoun-Bouruu ! Eh ! vogue la galere ! If this does not save 
 the Ottoman empire, what will ?"
 
 310 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of the country was such as I have faithfully de- 
 scribed, and with very little metaphor it might be 
 said that every piastre was squeezed from the blood 
 of a beggared people. 
 
 At a short distance from these manufactories at 
 Macri-Keui stood what was styled the Imperial 
 Iron-works of Barout-Khaneh. They had been 
 set up close to a great Turkish powder-mill.* 
 
 The sparks from the tall chimney of old H 's 
 
 steam-engine were flying about on one side of the 
 powder-mills, and there were the chimneys of one 
 furnace and two forges on the other side of the 
 mills for in that direction some Englishmen were 
 building an iron steamer for the Sultan. It was 
 difficult to conceive how it happened that the 
 whole of Barout-Khaneh was not blown up. There 
 had been terrible explosions in former times, when 
 the powder-mills had no such inflammable neigh- 
 bours. In the foundry they were doing nothing 
 but fancy-work for the Sultan's new palace. Not 
 a thing useful was to be seen. Dr. Davis (of whom 
 more anon), the director of the Sultan's model- 
 farm, had been waiting many months for some 
 castings for his farm machinery, and for the iron- 
 work of his excellent little ploughs, which the 
 Sultan had ordered him to distribute among the 
 
 * Barout-Khaneh signifies gunpowder works or mill.
 
 DR. DAVIS AND THE DIRECTOR. 311 
 
 farmers of the country. The Doctor had written and 
 sent messages until his patience was tired out. At 
 
 his request I spoke to old H on the subject ; 
 
 but what chance was there that this old man, who 
 sailed with the wind, and was the vassal of the 
 Armenian Boghos Dadian (the Doctor's enemy 
 and persecutor), would be moved by my represen- 
 tations? or how expect that the man who had to 
 make iron roofs and cast-iron curtain-pins for his 
 imperial majesty would condescend to direct his 
 attention to the forging of ploughshares ? He said he 
 would think about it. The Doctor never obtained 
 either a single casting or a single ploughshare. 
 And at this time, with the exception of three or 
 four which the Doctor had brought with him from 
 America, there was not a good or even a tolerable 
 plough in the whole country. There was on these 
 premises a blasting-furnace for converting the ore 
 into iron. One day, in the month of August, 1847, 
 
 old H was making a grand smoke with his 
 
 furnaces and tall chimneys ; but two or three days 
 later the great fire in the blasting-furnace went 
 out for want of coals, and it was never rekindled 
 again while we were in Turkey. An attempt had 
 
 been made to cast iron cannon ; but old H 
 
 knew nothing of the work, and, under Armenian 
 direction, he had dug his moulds so close to the sea
 
 312 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 that the water oozed in, destroying the operation, 
 and very nearly produced a catastrophe. 
 
 The iron steamer looked like a reel in a bottle. 
 They were building it in a filthy creek which had 
 no exit to the sea except by a narrow mouth 
 choked up by a sand-bank. " This boat," said 
 Mr. Phillips, the builder, " will cost the Sultan five 
 or six times the sum for which he might have 
 bought a good iron boat in England. When she 
 is finished if that day ever comes they will have 
 to spend a large sum of money in clearing out the 
 mouth of the creek so as to get her afloat in the 
 Sea of Marmora ; and then I must send her out 
 without her engines. She ought to have been built 
 at the arsenal on the Golden Horn. There are 
 fifty good places for the purpose, without any im- 
 pediments, where she might have been launched 
 from the stocks into clear deep water without any 
 expense. I told the Armenian Dadians that this 
 was not a place for such building ; they told me 
 that that was not my affair, that my contract only 
 bound me to build the boat, and that they would 
 have it here ! Those men will never hear reason. 
 I cannot understand them." Forges, furnaces, 
 buildings, outbuildings, ship-yard, everything, had 
 to be made for the building of this one boat, 
 whereas at the arsenal there was everything ready
 
 IRON STEAMER. 313 
 
 made, with most abundant room. It is not at all 
 likely that they will ever build another boat in 
 this hole, and so many thousands of piastres will 
 have been wasted. The iron of the boat was 
 English, every inch of it; but the poor deluded 
 Sultan had been given to believe that it was made 
 
 from Turkish ore, and prepared here by old H , 
 
 under the auspices and scientific superintendence 
 of Hohannes and Boghos Dadian and their sons 
 and nephews. The master-builder, the workmen, 
 the materials upon which they worked, and the 
 tools with which they worked, were all English. 
 The keel, the ribs and knees, and all the parts 
 requiring skilful blacksmithship, had been brought 
 from England, Mr. Phillips not being able to get 
 them forged here. She was more than half a 
 ready-made craft Then where the honour and 
 glory of building or putting her together here ? 
 And where the use? Neither Turks nor Arme- 
 nians were learning how to do such work them- 
 selves. Greeks were never employed by the thoroughly 
 Armenian Dadians the most ingenious of all the 
 Sultan's rayah subjects were excluded from all 
 these imperial establishmenta The fact is, the 
 government both hates and fears the Greeks 
 another good sign of the much-talked-of amalga- 
 mation! The Turks, who were to learn, found
 
 314 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 that it was hard work with very little pay, and 
 decamped : the few Armenians who remained 
 worked as by corve'e, standing in dread of the 
 power of the Dadians, and getting most miserable 
 pay. Mr. Phillips had only four English workmen 
 with him, and these poor fellows really did all the 
 work. It was a laughable or a sighable sight to 
 see the degree of assistance afforded to them by 
 the skulking Armenians. These four Englishmen 
 had received no pay for the last four months, and 
 they had wives and children in England to whom 
 money ought to have been remitted. By their 
 written agreements all these mechanics were to be 
 paid monthly. But they never were so paid they 
 never received pay with any regularity. This alone 
 was enough to demoralize the colony. When, after 
 long privations, the men got money in a lump, 
 they rushed into excessea Mr. Phillips bitterly 
 regretted ever having come to the country. He 
 was a most respectable man, very intelligent, and, 
 in his own profession, eminent He was kept in a 
 constant fret, and had, like nearly every English- 
 man there, a very serious attack of illness. At his 
 lodging a large, deserted, half-ruined kiosk, built 
 by Sultan Mahmoud we met a Northumberland 
 mining engineer and a Cornwall-man of the same 
 profession. The first had been engaged to seek
 
 ENGLISH MINERS. 315 
 
 after and open coal-mines, and he had been three 
 or four months in Turkey doing nothing : the 
 second was to seek for and work copper-mines, and 
 he had done just as much as the first. Neither of 
 these very intelligent and practical men had 
 ever the labourers, the machinery, or tools neces- 
 sary to make a beginning. It would be very diffi- 
 cult to calculate how much money the Sultan had 
 been made to spend in discovering mines and coal- 
 beds which were well known to European travellers 
 before he was born, and for working mines which 
 had never been worked at all. It was only re- 
 cently that practical men men like our Northum- 
 brian and Cornwall friends, who had worked in 
 mines in the two hemispheres had been imported : 
 previously the Dadians had brought only scientific 
 men. Of these they had had from both hemi- 
 spheres from America as well as from almost 
 every country in Europe ; but they had never 
 really availed themselves of the advice or the 
 services of any of them, although high salaries had 
 been paid to all. 
 
 Over in Asia we had seen sure signs of mineral 
 wealth almost everywhere, and good traces of coal 
 in many places. Our Northumbrian acquaintance 
 told us that, if he had been allowed and provided 
 with the necessary means, he would have begun
 
 316 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 working a good coal-mine, either in the island of 
 Mitylene (Lesbos), or at Chatal-Tepe, about twenty- 
 five miles from Lampsacus, and fifteen miles in a 
 direct line from the Sea of Marmora. " I wanted," 
 said he, "to begin by making a road; but the 
 Armenians told me that this would cost a deal 
 of money, and that the coal could very well be 
 carried down to the sea on the backs of mules and 
 asses ! " This coal-field of good bituminous coal 
 if not first discovered, was for the first time care- 
 fully examined by Dr. L. Smith, on the 31st of 
 December, 1846. In the course of a very short 
 geological tour our American friend made several 
 interesting discoveries. He would have made 
 many other excursions, but whenever he wished 
 to go the Armenians told him that his presence 
 would be wanted at Constantinople where they 
 kept him doing absolutely nothing for more than 
 two years. These unintelligible manoeuvres abso- 
 lutely put it out of the power of any man to do 
 any one useful thing for the country or for the 
 government that was paying him. I concluded 
 that one of the objects of these Armenians must 
 certainly have been to gratify their bloated vanity 
 by seeing gentlemen of education dancing attend- 
 ance on them, and by having the opportunity of 
 insulting and humiliating them.
 
 COAL-BEDS. 317 
 
 The small quantities of coal that were brought 
 from Heraclea, on the Black Sea, not far from the 
 Bosphorus, were merely scratched from the surface ; 
 there was no mining at all. Some months after 
 the blasting-furnace had gone out, through want of 
 fuel, a crazy old Turkish ship was despatched to 
 Heraclea to bring down some of this coal. She 
 went, but never returned : she foundered near the 
 entrance of the Bosphorus, and about sixty Turks 
 perished in her ! No second attempt was made. 
 The arsenal, the steam navy, and the imperial Fa- 
 brics continued to use English coal as long as 
 money could be found to pay for it. Practical 
 men believed that, from the corrupt way in which 
 all things are managed, the native coal, though so 
 near at hand, would, if mined for, cost the govern- 
 ment more than our Newcastle coal In the year 
 1841 some Englishmen attempted to obtain a lease 
 of these mines, or to make some arrangements 
 whereby they might work them very advan- 
 tageously to the Porte, as well as profitably to 
 themselves. Colonel Williams, K.A., Mr. Gran- 
 ville Withers, a practical engineer and forge pro- 
 prietor, and Mr. Anderson, one of the directors of 
 the Oriental and Peninsular Steam Navigation 
 Company, visited Heraclea, and examined the 
 coal-beds. They reported that the beds were of
 
 318 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 immense extent, and that much of the coal was of 
 excellent quality. But nearly everything in Tur- 
 key ends in a report The government would not 
 listen to the liberal terms of the Englishmen, whose 
 report was soon forgotten. A great deal was said 
 at the time about the jealousy of Austria, who has 
 some coal-mines on the Danube ; and about the 
 jealousy of Russia, who was said to fear the in- 
 crease of the Ottoman steam-navy ; but the real 
 truth was, that the promising speculation was smo- 
 thered by the old Turkish spirit of jealousy and mono- 
 poly. These coal-fields had been assigned to the 
 Sultana Valide, who was led to believe that she 
 would get nothing from them if Franks had the 
 working of them. I believe that the same august 
 lady, with a few others of the Imperial house, had 
 the monopoly of all the coal in the vast empire. 
 As I have already insisted, many of the mono- 
 polies exist in all their original and pernicious 
 strength ; and in most of the cases where they 
 have been shaken, the Armenian capitalists have 
 succeeded in establishing new monopolies of their 
 own. It was more through the Armenian jea- 
 lousy than from any other cause that every offer 
 made by Europeans to work the very rich copper 
 and iron mines of the country (paying a rent to 
 government, or giving a pro rota duty on produo
 
 COPPER-MINES. 319 
 
 tion), and formiDg at the same time a native 
 school of practical miners, has been met with 
 equivocation, and, in the end, with a flat refusal. 
 When the Sultan was sorely in want of money, the 
 house of Rothschild tendered a large loan, asking 
 nothing but a grant, for a limited number of years, 
 of some of the copper-mines on the Black t Sea. 
 These mines, as scratched by the Turks, were ren- 
 dering hardly any profit in some instances they 
 were worked at a loss but the Porte altogether 
 declined the advantageous proposal, preferring to 
 finish the consumption of the sacred vakouf pro- 
 perty, to farm the revenue to the Armenian seraffs, 
 and to squeeze more and more money out of the 
 impoverished people. They boast that Turkey is 
 the only country without the burthen of a national 
 debt ; but there are far worse things in the world 
 than national debts, and they have bit upon the 
 worst of all, uprooting all security of property, out- 
 raging the laws which are part and parcel of 
 their religion, destroying man's faith in man, 
 shaking and clouding his very trust in God, and 
 plunging all classes into an abyss of poverty and 
 despair ! And when they shall have eaten up all 
 the vakouf property, and when the decreasing 
 Turkish peasantry shall have almost disappeared 
 from the face of the earth - quand la vache ne rende 
 plus what then ?
 
 320 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 With the inexhaustible riches of her mines, 
 Turkey deals as with her teeming soil : she will 
 not and cannot use them herself, and she will not 
 permit their use to others, though she herself 
 would be the greatest gainer thereby. 
 
 And with these undisputed and indisputable 
 facts before us, English statesmen can persist in 
 declaring in parliament that Turkey is making 
 rapid progress, that monopolies and restrictions 
 on trade are annihilated, and that commerce is no- 
 where so free as in the Ottoman dominions ! 
 
 The Turks have rich silver-mines at Gumush 
 Khaneh, in Asia Minor, but they know not how 
 to use them. They are the source of injustice, 
 oppression, forced labour, and infinite misery to the 
 people, without being of any profit to the govern- 
 ment.* The silver-mines at Argyria are no longer 
 worked at all. The copper-mines at Chalvar and 
 other parts of the Asiatic provinces on the Black 
 Sea are worked in the rudest manner, and have no 
 roads leading to or from them. 
 
 We saw some very good iron-ore, brought from 
 a place close by, on the Sea of Marmora from 
 Mal-Tepe, on the Asiatic coast, nearly opposite to 
 
 * For the wretched way these silver-mines are worked, see 
 Mr. Hamilton's ' Researches in Asia Minor,' vol. i., and Bishop 
 Southgate's ' Narrative of a Tour through Armenia, Kurdistan,' 
 &c.> vol. i.
 
 COTTON- WORKS. 321 
 
 Prinkipo. Samokovo, at no great distance, would 
 have furnished an immense supply ; and the iron 
 from this place was said to be excellent for con- 
 version into steel. The very small quantity of 
 iron-ore that had been used at the imperial works 
 was brought over from Prinkipo, the chief of 
 the group called the Princes' Islands. There 
 they were still occasionally picking up a little as it 
 lay on the earth's surface, for mining there was 
 none. 
 
 I have not yet done with these essays to turn 
 Turkey into a manufacturing country a country 
 that should buy nothing from foreigners, but sell 
 to foreigners all that she could spare of her own 
 produce. Yes, such was the political economy of 
 the Armenian managers, and their enlightened 
 patron Reschid Pasha ! 
 
 Between Zeitoun-Bournu and Macri-Keui, in a 
 swampy hollow near the sea and the choked-up 
 mouth of another creek, they had erected an 
 extensive cotton-mill, calico-manufactory, and 
 print - works. As they had chosen ^eitoun- 
 Bournu because there was no water there, so 
 they must have selected this spot as being about 
 the most unhealthy that could be found ! Twenty 
 years ago I had been warned not to pass the spot 
 after sunset, lest I should catch a malaria fever. 
 
 Y
 
 322 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Nothing more notorious than the unhealthiness of 
 the place. There was a Turkish farmhouse on it, 
 where no natives had been able to live ; but here 
 the Dadians would have their works, and in this 
 very farmhouse they lodged the poor people they 
 brought out from Lancashire to manage the works. 
 The first directors were two brothers, Messrs. 
 Duckworth. The elder of the brothers died of 
 the fever in loco ; the other sailed for England for 
 the recovery of his health, and died at Manchester 
 a very short time after his arrival. The son of one 
 of them, who 'had remained in the country, but 
 who had transferred his residence to the village of 
 Macri-Keui, had been brought to death's door, 
 and was still suffering the horrible ills of a tho- 
 roughly deranged liver. In this bog, at these 
 calico and print works, they were doing hardly 
 any work with the good English machinery which 
 had been set up. This native manufactory was to 
 be supplied by raw materials of native growth ; 
 they were waiting for Dr. Davis's cotton, on the 
 Sultan's model farm ; the Doctor was waiting for 
 ginns to prepare the small quantity of cotton 
 which he had secured last year, and for the means 
 of cultivating that which he had sown this year, 
 and which was now perishing on the ground for 
 want of labourers. Most of the men who ought to
 
 COTTON-WORKS. 323 
 
 have been at work iu the factory were lounging 
 about at Macri-Keui, with hands in pocket and 
 pipe in mouth. Some had gone home, and others, 
 vexed by arrears of pay, and frightened at malaria, 
 were wishing that they had never come. With 
 English twist or cotton-yarn they had some time 
 ago made a few pieces of calico. A dozen or two 
 of Armenians were now working upon warp 
 brought out, all ready and prepared, from England. 
 They could do nothing without the warp. In the 
 same way German or Belgian warp had been 
 worked up in the cloth manufactory at Nicomedia, 
 and the calico and the cloth thus made had been 
 shown to Abdul-Medjid as triumphant evidence of 
 the progress his subjects were making in manufac- 
 tures ! Nor was this all the imposition played off 
 on the Sultan's innocence : removing the marks, 
 they had exhibited to him some of the finest of 
 woollen cloths and most beautiful chintzes made in 
 France, England, Switzerland, or Germany, as 
 productions of his own infant fabrics ! The ex- 
 penses of these calico- works alone must have been 
 very high ; for, in addition to the spinners and 
 weavers, they had bleachers and dyers, pattern 
 designers, block-cutters, &c., all imported from 
 England, and all idle, waiting for that cotton 
 which Dr. Davis was destined never to grow. 
 
 Y 2
 
 324 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 The only works in the country that were carried 
 on with some life and order were those on the 
 Golden Horn, for the manufacture of fezzes, or 
 red skull-caps; and these works were carried on 
 at a loss, and the fezzes cost the Turks much 
 more than the caps of a better quality which 
 they had formerly imported from the coast of Bar- 
 bary.* 
 
 After these facts, for which I answer on my 
 honour and on my oath, and for which I could 
 find a good hundred of Englishmen to vouch, I 
 hope to hear it no more affirmed in the House of 
 Commons that the agriculture of Turkey is in a 
 prosperous state, and that she is making great 
 improvements in manufactures. 
 
 These are melancholy details ; but the story of 
 the Sultan's model farm the precipitate end of 
 the only good beginning was the saddest of all. 
 Dr. Davis, the manager, appeared to be the very 
 man to carry out the plan of agricultural improve- 
 ment, and he was, at first, full of energy and 
 hope. He had been engaged nearly all his life 
 in agricultural pursuits, in a country whose soil 
 and climate did not very materially differ from 
 these. He had been a planter ; he was the son 
 
 * The name of the article was originally derived from Fez, 
 in Morocco.
 
 THE SULTAN'S MODEL FARM. 325 
 
 of a planter, the grandson of a planter. As is 
 common with men of his condition in that part of 
 the United States, he* had studied medicine, and 
 had taken his degree at Charleston. His medical 
 knowledge had been useful on his own estates and 
 neighbourhood, and could not fail of being useful 
 here, as there- was scarcely any medical science 
 in the country. He had been chiefly engaged at 
 home in the production of cotton, but he had both 
 experimentalized and practised in other branches of 
 agriculture, and he was well known in America as 
 a writer on those subjects. He had paid much 
 attention to stock, and the methods of improving 
 the breeds of horses, cows, sheep, etc. ; and as 
 Turkey stood in deplorable need of these improve- 
 ments, he understood that their introduction would 
 be one of his important offices at the model farm. 
 Altogether he combined practice with science to 
 that degree which fitted him to be a teacher. 
 He was to have under his care and control 
 an agricultural school the pupils to be young 
 men of the country, Turks, Greeks, and Arme- 
 nians.* When we first met the Doctor in August, 
 1847, he was busily engaged in writing an intro- 
 ductory lecture, and some elementary treatises, 
 which were to be translated by some learned 
 * Not a single Greek was ever admitted.
 
 326 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Katib into Turkish ; it being, however, implied, 
 that the students were to learn the English lan- 
 guage. The Turkish government had applied to 
 the government of the United States for such a 
 manager and instructor. It was a governmental 
 affair, and the Doctor's contract was signed by Ali 
 Effendi, the Sultan's Secretary for Foreign Affairs, 
 on the one side, and by Mr. Carr, the United 
 States Minister, on the other. Mr. Buchanan, the 
 United States Foreign 'Secretary, testified that 
 Dr. Davis was in all essentials the best man they 
 could send, and the Porte acknowledged the 
 receipt of this letter with warm professions of grati- 
 tude. When the Doctor arrived at Constantinople, 
 Rescind Pasha, by order of the Sultan, gave a 
 dinner to him and Mr. Carr, and treated him with 
 every possible or allowable distinction. The Doctor 
 believed that the heart of the Turkish government 
 was in the project ; but for ways and means he 
 was referred to the Armenian Dadians, who 
 managed the Sultan's gunpowder-mills, the manu- 
 factories at Zeitoun-Bournu and Macri-Keui, and 
 all the other works. Here he at once found impedi- 
 ments which he never could have foreseen. Months 
 passed away before they wculd fix upon a locality 
 for the model farm, and then they fixed upon a 
 most bare and unhealthy one ; and farm buildings,
 
 THE MODEL FARM. 327 
 
 which, according to promise, ought to have been 
 finished by June, 1847, were scarcely begun at 
 the end of August. The Doctor, with his wife, his 
 very interesting children, and his brother, had 
 found temporary shelter in a half-ruined house in 
 the near village of San Stefano. Fourteen agri- 
 cultural pupils were lodged in the corner of 
 another vast and deserted imperial kiosk. All 
 round the farm there lay thousands of acres of 
 good corn-land, which had not been touched by 
 the plough for ages. On our first visit we found 
 two Bulgarians and eight or ten Turks, who had 
 been engaged as farm-servants, and these were all 
 squatting on their hams and smoking their pipes 
 under the shade of a rude tent ; the Doctor had 
 not been able to procure any more native labour- 
 ers, so many were wanted at the imperial manu- 
 factories ; but the Armenians had promised, and 
 were promising every day, that he should soon 
 have a good supply. The only men we saw really 
 at work were four emancipated negroes, whom the 
 Doctor had brought with him from South Caro- 
 lina, and who were fine, athletic, intelligent men 
 incomparably the best agricultural labourers we 
 ever saw in Turkey. On a part of the farm 
 shelving down towards a brook, we came upon a 
 fine cotton-field neatly enclosed and very neatly
 
 328 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 cultivated The seeds had been of the best of the 
 South Carolina or Georgia cotton, each pod of 
 which contains at least six times as much cotton 
 as a pod of that which is usually cultivated in 
 Turkey, the quality of the material being as 
 superior as the quantity. Through want of hands 
 and the other delays caused by the Armenians, the 
 seed had not been sown until six weeks after the 
 proper time ; yet the cotton had come up and 
 thriven beautifully, and was now promising a fine 
 harvest. Our friend considered that the experi- 
 ment had succeeded ; that he had proved that the 
 best American cotton might be grown here ; and 
 that, by distributing the seed and showing the 
 people his processes, one great benefit would be 
 conferred on the country. From other fields he 
 had reaped a tolerably good harvest of wheat, and 
 from another a remarkably fine crop of a large, 
 beautifully white, savoury, and nutritious Indian 
 corn or maize (Cooke's corn), which has been of 
 late years cultivated with so much success in the 
 southern states of the American Union. The bread 
 made from it was decidedly the best we ate in 
 Turkey, and I never saw such corn for getting 
 horses into condition. With his very light and 
 cheap Carolina plough, and the fixed but simple 
 system of cultivation he pursued, the Doctor had
 
 THE MODEL FARM. 329 
 
 produced on one acre more of this corn than the 
 people of the country had produced of the common 
 very inferior yellow maize on six acres. The intro- 
 duction of Cooke's corn alone would have been 
 another vast benefit conferred on Turkey. From 
 some rough meadows, which were partially inun- 
 dated in the rainy season, but which had been left 
 in a state of nature for centuries, abundant crops 
 of not bad hay had been taken. It will appear 
 incredible, but it is an absolute fact, that there is 
 scarcely a place in Turkey where they make hay 
 at all. There was not a single hay-rick to be seen, 
 even in the neighbourhood of the capital, or in the 
 plain of Brusa : we never saw any until we ap- 
 proached Kutayah, and there they were small and 
 almost black, and perched on the roofs of houses. 
 At a distance they looked like large bee-hives. 
 The people have no substitute for hay. They give 
 chopped straw to their horses ; but the cows and 
 sheep are left to shift for themselves, on the unen- 
 closed fields, wild heaths and downs, which are 
 parched up in the summer, and boggy and fre- 
 quently covered with deep snow in the winter. 
 Even in Constantinople it is difficult to obtain 
 good sweet milk during six months of the year. 
 Of the frequent and at times terrible destruction 
 of stock from want of winter food we heard a
 
 330 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 great deal. Several farmers of the country had 
 come from a distance to watch the Doctor's ope- 
 rations, and to obtain ploughs and seed of his 
 cotton and white maize. The Sultan and Grand 
 Vizier had ordered that all these things should be 
 distributed, and at first gratuitously, in order to 
 give improvement an impetus, and to encourage 
 the people to quit their old routine. But with 
 regard to seeds, the Doctor had not as yet any 
 stock to draw upon, and at the imperial iron-works 
 they had not made him a single ploughshare. 
 
 The estate had not a tree had scarcely a bush 
 on its whole surface, and the neighbouring country, 
 for fifty or sixty miles along the Sea of Marmora, 
 was equally bare. Trees would generate, and 
 attract and retain, that humidity for the want of 
 which the land was so bare and burning from the 
 end of May to the beginning of September. All 
 over Turkey there is either too much wood or no 
 wood at all. The Turks have been too lazy to 
 clear the matted forests, and too negligent and 
 ignorant to plant the bare places. Except the 
 cypresses, it may be doubted whether they have 
 set a tall growing tree in the ground since they 
 conquered the country from the Greeks. The 
 Armenians had promised that by the fall of the 
 year the Doctor should have twenty thousand young
 
 THE MODEL FAEM. 331 
 
 trees from the European side of the Black Sea 
 and from the opposite hills of Asia Minor, to dis- 
 tribute over the farm and to stock his nursery- 
 ground ; and this would surely be a good begin- 
 ning. The sylva of the country is rich and varied ; 
 and then the Sultan, or his ministers for him, had 
 intimated that the plants that were wanting might 
 be purchased in all the best nurseries of Christen- 
 dom. As at this time I had not seen how all 
 things were mismanaged, I joined my friend in 
 indulging bright hopes and expectations. But a 
 glance to my left disturbed my pleasant vision 
 In a hollow, towards Stamboul, at the distance of 
 a bare half-mile from the spot on which we were 
 seated, there was a swamp, a tract of marshy land, 
 a narrow tract now, but at other seasons I had 
 seen the water stretching to the distance of two 
 miles, and I knew too well that a river or fiumaro^ 
 which ought to drain the upper country, was 
 choked up at its mouth by broad sand-banks. It 
 could not be other than a caldron of malaria ; 
 " but," said Dr. Davis, " the miasma will not much 
 injure us up here, and I have shown them how easy 
 it is to give a. free course to the water into the sea." 
 On our return from Asia we were again a good 
 deal at the farm. Everything had been going on 
 badly. The Doctor had been tormented almost to
 
 332 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 death by the Dadians ; he had suffered a serious at- 
 tack of illness, and had perilled the sight of an eye 
 in compiling the lessons and lectures for his pupils. 
 Not one of these papers had been translated ; the 
 manuscripts were lying useless in the Doctor's 
 desk. To my knowledge at least twenty earnest 
 applications were made for a katib. Several of 
 the selected pupils, weary and sick of the solitude 
 of the deserted kiosk, had thrown up their ap- 
 pointments and gone home to Stamboul ; others 
 had been turned out to make room for friends of 
 the Dadians. At first the Armenians and Turks 
 were in equal numbers, but the Dadians wanted 
 to get rid of all the Turks, and to have none but 
 Armenians. In April there were fifteen pupils, 
 nine being Armenians and six Mussulmans : these 
 young fellows were all paid by the Sultan, some 
 300, and one (of course an Armenian} 700 piastres 
 a month. They had their lodging gratis, but they 
 had to buy their own food. Out of doors they 
 seemed then doing just nothing; we never saw 
 one of them at the farm, in the cotton-field, in the 
 garden, or, indeed, on any part of the farm-lands. 
 Mr. N. Davis, with the aid of a drogoman, was 
 attempting to teach them English ; but their prin- 
 cipal occupation was smoking pipes at a coffee-shop 
 in the village.
 
 THE MODEL FARM. 333 
 
 Through want of the necessary labour, the Doc- 
 tor was even later in getting his cotton planted 
 than he had been the year before. When the cot- 
 ton was growing there was nobody to attend to it 
 but his four negroes, who had to do everything else. 
 By the month of June it was quite evident that 
 the crop would be a complete failure. For want 
 of ploughs, the Doctor was obliged to see the 
 ground for wheat and Indian corn turned up or 
 scratched by the common wooden ploughshares of 
 the country. For want of pay his Bulgarian labourers 
 all ran away in the midst of this operation. Every 
 representation to the Turks in high authority had 
 been useless. Of the promised stock for the farm 
 none came. The brood mares, the foreign stal- 
 lions, the Syrian cows, the breeding-stock from 
 England were all in nubibus. The Doctor had only 
 a few wretched crawling horses, and two or three 
 lean common cows that did not give milk enough 
 for his own family. The farm had not so much as 
 a sheep on it, but the Dadians were feeding their 
 own flocks on the land. These flocks were tended 
 by Bulgarian shepherds, and on their own adjoining 
 farm those Armenian plunderers had plenty of 
 Bulgarian labourers, when the Doctor could not 
 procure one to work upon the Sultan's model 
 farm. The Dadians paid the men who worked
 
 334 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 for themselves, charging such outlays to the account 
 of the Doctor and the model farm. In the course 
 of the spring and winter they kept grabbing at the 
 Doctor's hay to feed their own horses and the 
 horses of the two imperial fabrics ; but our friend 
 had kept together a good quantity in expectation 
 of the stock, which never came. Of course the 
 Armenians did not set this hay to the credit side 
 of the farm accounts. They made just as free with 
 everything else. Not twenty thousand, but four- 
 teen thousand young trees had been brought over 
 (all from Asia Minor) for plantation on the model 
 farm. The Armenians took the first pick and 
 choose, gave away other trees to their friends, and 
 left the refuse for the Doctor. They had labourers 
 to plant their own portion, when our friend work- 
 ing for the Sultan could get none. In the month 
 of May there were scarcely six of the Doctor's trees 
 that showed any symptoms of vitality ; many had 
 been wilfully destroyed, and the rest had perished 
 from want of necessary attention. At the end of 
 June the roads which the Doctor had traced re- 
 mained only traced. In the winter it was very 
 difficult to ride from the village up to the farm 
 without being bogged ; in the summer the soil 
 was burning like an Arabian desert The Sultan 
 had allotted a sum of 68,000 piastres for sinking
 
 THE MODEL FARM. 335 
 
 wells, making fountains, &c. ; not a well had been 
 begun ; the water had all to be brought by oxe'n 
 and small cars from the creek and swamp below, 
 at the distance of half a mile from the farm-build- 
 ings. One day we had to bring up the water for 
 our own use, as the car-drivers had absconded (not 
 being paid), and the poor negroes were overworked 
 in other business. 
 
 The dwelling-house, which ought to have been 
 finished last summer, was not habitable till the 
 beginning of June, and then it was a comfortless 
 rickety affair, exhibiting almost every possible 
 specimen of architectural blundering and bad 
 workmanship. It had been vain to remonstrate : 
 the Armenians would build in their own way. The 
 situation is elevated and exposed, and at no dis- 
 tant day a gale from the steppes of Tartary and 
 the Black Sea will level it to the ground and howl 
 a dirge over it. The Doctor's arrangement of 
 offices, stabling, cow-stalls, poultry-yards, barns, 
 and outhouses was simple and excellent. But 
 there were no horses, no cows ; and all the poultry 
 consisted of a dozen or two of the miserable fowls 
 of the country. There was a first-rate dairy, but 
 no milk. For want of the means of irrigation a 
 large garden which had been enclosed near the 
 house, and nicely laid out and partially stocked,
 
 336 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 was all parched up and rendered useless by the 
 middle of June. 
 
 But by far the neatest thing on the farm was 
 the ginn-house for cleaning the cotton, and this 
 had been constructed chiefly by the negroes. Six 
 good ginns of English make were lying rusting 
 
 under the nose of old H , but it was not until 
 
 the month of April that the Doctor procured one 
 of them. The negro Joe and his mate Ben set it 
 up, for no assistance could be obtained from the 
 mechanics of the imperial works. When the ginn 
 was ready there were no hands to attend to it, for 
 the four negroes were then most wanted in the 
 cotton-fields. The cotton which we saw go through 
 the ginn was truly of excellent quality. Some bales 
 of it might have been sent down presently to the 
 cotton-mill, where so many people were waiting 
 for it ; but all representations were fruitless our 
 friend could get no workmen. He had told some 
 unpalatable truths to and of the Armenians, and 
 they were determined that the model farm should 
 be made to appear as a failure, and the Doctor 
 himself as the cause of the failure. 
 
 The walls which enclosed all the farm-buildings 
 had been built up not with mortar, but with mud, 
 a little mortar being merely applied externally. 
 The Sultan's orders were that they should be
 
 THE MODEL FARM. 337 
 
 solidly built, and of the best materials ; but Abdul 
 Medjid never once came near the farm, and never 
 sent to make any inquiries about it.* A good kick 
 or two would have knocked down any of these 
 walls. Without such violence, where the ground 
 was uneven they were already cracking and open- 
 ing. But nothing was sound or good about the 
 place except our friend's arrangement and distri- 
 bution of its several parts and offices. 
 
 When the Doctor took possession of the farm- 
 house, he fitted up a good class-room for his agricul- 
 tural students on the basement story, providing 
 them with books, desks, and all things necessary, 
 and insisting that they should attend regularly, from 
 eight in the morning till four in the afternoon. 
 But by this time the number of students was- 
 reduced to six Armenians, whose saints' days and 
 religious feasts were constantly interrupting their 
 attendance. When they came they brought no 
 heart with them, for they, too, were now getting 
 irregular, uncertain pay. One of them, when 
 found asleep over his book, told the Doctor's- 
 brother that a hungry belly could not learn 
 English ! We watched these promising agri- 
 
 * The Sultan's fat brother-in-law, Achmet Fethi Pasha, did 
 once go to the village of San Stefano, where he feasted and slept 
 in the house of Boghos Dadian ; but, though so close to the farm* 
 he did not visit it. 
 
 Z
 
 338 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 cultural students day after day : they never stirred 
 out, saying that the weather was too hot, and in 
 the schoolroom the greater part of their time was 
 spent in sleeping or dozing. 
 
 Though we frequently went to the house and 
 slept there, I was quite sure that the malaria 
 demon was brewing mischief in the swampy 
 hollows below the farm. Morning and evening 
 those hollows were filled with chilly grey vapours, 
 and a Pontine-marsh or Maremma smell came up 
 to the house. On the 27th of June Mrs. Davis 
 was seized with shivering and intense headache. 
 The demon had taken her in his grip. Four or 
 five days afterwards two of the dear children were 
 seized ; and then the Doctor, who had not been 
 quite one month in the house, fled from it with all 
 his family. The invalids were carried down to 
 the sea-shore, put into a caique, and conveyed to 
 Buyuk-dere, on the Bosphorus. In the state of 
 the Doctor's own health and spirits, his friends 
 feared that an attack of the fever would have been 
 fatal to him. Almost from the day that this good 
 and able man set his foot in the country, he had 
 been kept in a constant fret and worry ; and of late 
 his annoyances had been insupportable, for every- 
 thing that he had attempted had been made to go 
 awry, and the Dadians were casting upon him all the
 
 THE MODEL FARM. 339 
 
 weight of their own mingled folly and guilt. Con- 
 stantinople was ringing with reports of the enor- 
 mous sums which had been thrown away at the mo- 
 del farm. These reports were chiefly traced to the 
 Dadians themselves, or to their creatures. Remon- 
 strances were sent in to the government, but they 
 produced no effect. Long before this the Doctor's 
 best friends had come to the conclusion that the only 
 course he could pursue the only chance of recovering 
 his health and tranquillity was to come to a com- 
 promise with the Porte, take such a sum of money 
 as he could get, and return home. He had been 
 engaged for a term of seven years, two of which 
 had now expired. His salary was a very high 
 one, but it had been rnoet irregularly and grudg- 
 ingly paid, and it was now in long arrears. The 
 experience of this, his second season, destroyed 
 every hope ; and the illness of his family now 
 determined him to adopt the course we recom- 
 mended. In the course of a few months a com- 
 promise was effected, Abdul-Medjid paid an in- 
 demnity, and in the spring of the year 1849 Dr. 
 Davis and his family most gladly quitted Turkey 
 for ever, and returned to their own country. So 
 ended this attempt at agricultural improvement, 
 which, all together, had cost the Sultan about 
 35,000?. of our money ! 
 
 z 2
 
 340 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 The Dadians put in a creature of their own an 
 ignorant trading Armenian to manage what was 
 left of the concern ; and Abdul-Medjid's model 
 farm is now in the same wretched condition as the 
 neighbouring Turkish chiffcliks. 
 
 Are these proofs that agriculture is making 
 progress, or is likely to make progress, under 
 Turkish rule ? 
 
 Some will quote statistical returns, which are 
 never correctly made, and tell me that there has 
 been an increase of exportations as well as of im- 
 portations. To a very limited extent I may admit 
 that there has been both these increases ; but I can 
 account for them without injuring my theory or 
 assertion that there has Jbeen, on the part of the 
 Turks, no improvement whatever in agriculture, 
 and no augmented demand for European manu- 
 factures and merchandise. Every one knows that 
 that vast quantity of corn, which England and 
 France have been importing from the Black Sea, 
 is grown in Russian, and not Turkish provinces, 
 and is shipped at Odessa, Taganrok, etc. in 
 Russian and not Turkish ports. There has, in- 
 deed, been some increase of export from the 
 Danube, and from possessions nominally belonging 
 to Turkey ; but this increase has been all owing 
 to the enterprise and industry of Christians, and
 
 THE HEBRUS. 341 
 
 in no degree to the Turks ; nor could it have taken 
 place if the principalities of Moldavia and Wal- 
 lachia had not been protected from Turkish mis- 
 rule, oppression, and havoc, by the strong arm of 
 Russia. But for the Russian protection, the two 
 principalities would, long ere this, have been 
 left as bare and hungry as the desert between 
 Adrianople and Constantinople. 
 
 On parts of the valley of the Hebrus (now 
 Maritza) cultivation had been a little extended by 
 the Christian rayahs in 1846-7 ; but as the river 
 could be used only during certain months of the 
 year, and then only for rafts and small boats, the 
 moyem de transport were difficult, sometimes dan- 
 gerous, and always expensive. Before leaving 
 England I had been assured that funds had been 
 provided from the Sultan's private treasury to 
 render the Maritza navigable to the gulf of Enos, 
 to repair the embankments of the river, to canalise 
 it where necessary, and to clean out and deepen 
 the port of Enos. We found, indeed, that some- 
 thing had been done ; but how ? While they had 
 skilful civil engineers in their pay (French and 
 English) doing nothing, the Turks sent an ignorant 
 pasha to direct the works, and persisted in turning 
 a deaf ear to those who represented that this 
 magnate was only throwing away money. At the
 
 342 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 choked-up mouth of the port of Enos, which was 
 not to be cleared by a dozen powerful dredging- 
 machines which was not to be cleared at all with- 
 out various preliminary labours they employed 
 one small steam-dredger, brought out from Eng- 
 land and managed by a respectable Scotchman, 
 a good practical man, though not a scientific en- 
 gineer. He found that the sand was rolled back 
 by the waves of the ^Egean Sea quite as fast as he 
 could remove it ; his work was as idle as drawing 
 water with a bucket that had no bottom ; and so 
 he told the pasha, who merely said, "Baccalum, 
 dredge away !" The poor fellow dredged his heart 
 outj caught the malaria fever in its worst form, 
 threw up his employment in the autumn of 1 847, 
 went up for cure to Constantinople, and died at 
 Pera three days after his arrival. Many native 
 labourers died on the spot ; the blundering pasha 
 escaped by keeping himself at a village on the 
 mountains, and by hardly ever coming near the 
 scene of the operations. But these operations were 
 worse on the river than on the seaport, for there 
 the dredging had left matters in statu quo, while 
 here his embankments and dykes, besides inter- 
 rupting such navigation as there was, had done a 
 vast deal more harm than good to the river. All 
 through the year 1847 the busiest year they had
 
 PORT OF ENOS. 343 
 
 ever known the merchants of Adrianople found 
 their produce stopped by an immense Turkish 
 barrage or dam, which was conceived in ignorance 
 and executed in fatuity. Against all advice and 
 remonstrance the pasha had placed this barrage 
 in the very spot and in the very direction in which 
 it ought not to have been ; he had laid his found- 
 ations in the water with small stones, and had 
 kept all his large heavy stones to put at top, and 
 to give the concern a good bold outward appear- 
 ance. That which had been predicted had hap- 
 pened : when the rainy season of 1847 set in, 
 when the Hebrus began to be swollen by the 
 torrents from Haemus and Khodope, the miserable 
 dam was swept away ay, swept away at the very 
 first flushing of the river, as if it had been but a 
 bank of loose sand ! After wasting prodigious 
 sums of money, and pocketing a round number 
 of purses for himself, the engineering pasha had 
 gone back to the capital, the works had been 
 entirely abandoned, and the enlightened govern- 
 ment of Rescind Pasha had come to the conclusion 
 that it was not in their kismet to clear out the 
 commodious port of Enos, and render the Maritza 
 navigable. When we were at Adrianople loud curses 
 had gone and were yet going after this precious en- 
 gineer. He had laid wide tracts of country under
 
 344 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 water, he had converted chiftliks into swamps ; 
 by his blunders he had given the hand to devasta- 
 tion ; for his great works the Turks had laid on a 
 duty of ten per cent on the freight of every boat 
 or raft that ascended or descended the river, and 
 in 1848 they were continuing to levy the toll 
 They will never take off the imposition unless 
 Lord Stratford de Redcliffe or some other foreign 
 minister oblige them so to do. Foreign diplomacy 
 has some right to interfere, for the ten per cent 
 really falls upon the Frank merchants who pur- 
 chase the produce and send it down to Enos. 
 Those who talk so glibly of the beautiful freedom 
 of trade in Turkey can know nothing of these 
 sudden impositions, or of the transit duties which 
 seem to be raised everywhere, and upon every 
 article however poor and mean. The second time 
 we called upon the English consul at Brusa we 
 found his lady much excited by an act of injustice 
 and oppression. A poor Greek who had bought a 
 pair of new shoes at Brusa had been stopped on 
 his way to his village and told he must pay a duty 
 upon his shoes ; and not having money about him to 
 pay, the Turks had taken his shoes from him, and 
 had dismissed him with kicks and the horrible but 
 usual abuse of his religion. " Cases like this/' 
 said the lady, " are constantly occurring." In fact
 
 OUR EXPORTS. 345 
 
 we ourselves saw an abundance of them, and in 
 Europe as well as in Asia. 
 
 The Turks are not only bad producers them- 
 selves, but they also check the productive powers 
 of others. Where the Christian rayahs have been 
 free from their thraldom (as in Moldavia and Wal- 
 lachia) there has been some agricultural progress : 
 remove that thraldom everywhere, and you will 
 soon have everywhere an increased production and 
 a development of energy and industry on the part 
 of the Christian rayahs. These things you will 
 never have to any extent so long as the Turkish 
 dominion is allowed to continue. Is not this argu- 
 ment alone sufficient to justify, if not the total 
 expulsion of the Turks, the overthrow of their 
 monstrous empire and government ? 
 
 The increase of our exports (such as it is) has 
 been caused, not by the Turks, but by the Chris- 
 tian rayahs, and by the people of the two princi- 
 palities who are protected by Russia. Mr. Cobden 
 has very correctly described the returns with re- 
 spect to our exports to Turkey as delusive. Only 
 a part of these exports are consumed in the 
 countries under the dominion of the Turks ; the 
 rest go farther on to the shores of the Black Sea, 
 and to Persia, through the Turkish port of Trebi- 
 zond. We never had any commerce in the Black 
 Sea until Russia took possession of the Crimea,
 
 346 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 and began to extend her conquests on the Asiatic 
 and European shores of that sea. Constantinople, 
 in a great measure, is but a dep6t, whence our 
 goods are conveyed elsewhere. The increasing 
 poverty of the Turkish people checks home con- 
 sumption. Free the Christian rayahs, and you 
 will have, with an increased production on their 
 side, an increased demand for your merchandize. 
 Although I am no merchant, and although I will 
 never believe that great questions like these, in- 
 volving religion and the happiness of millions of 
 Christians, ought to be determined by a mere 
 reference to balance-sheets, I am free to admit 
 that our commercial interests cannot be altogether 
 overlooked. I hope I have shown that that com- 
 merce would gain and not lose by the overthrow 
 of the Ottoman empire. This, I firmly believe, 
 would be the case if Russia were in possession of 
 Constantinople and all European Turkey, and were 
 even to keep up her present tariffs. But no Russian 
 statesman thinks, or ever thought, of such a whole- 
 sale occupation, nor is there a statesman in Austria, 
 Prussia, France, or England, that would not set 
 his face against such an aggrandizement and mo- 
 nopoly of power. Russia may, and assuredly will, 
 have a part of these dominions ; but she will never 
 have, or aim at, the whole.
 
 SLAVERY. 347 
 
 BOOK III. 
 
 IN nothing have the scribblers and retainers of 
 Rescind Pasha taken so much pains as in impressing 
 Christendom with the belief that slavery has been 
 utterly suppresed by Abdul-Medjid and his Grand 
 Vizier. The evening we landed at Constantinople 
 we met a French colonel, who was engaged in a 
 tour of inspection, and who had two attaches with 
 him. They had been up to Trebizond, and had 
 returned thence in a steamer with fifteen young Cir- 
 cassian females, under the charge of two old slave- 
 dealers, who were bringing them for sale to Con- 
 stantinople. " On nous donne a croire joliment," 
 said the Colonel "they make us believe fine 
 things ! The Sultan has ordered the public slave- 
 market to be shut up ; and upon the strength of 
 this ordonnance the newspapers here have pro- 
 claimed that there was an end to slavery every- 
 where in the Sultan's dominions, and Europe has 
 been silly enough to believe I 'Europe a eu la sot- 
 tise de la croire. I have known the country many 
 a year. The slave-trade, black and white, was never, 
 within my knowledge, more active than it now is."
 
 348 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 We had afterwards ocular demonstration and 
 complete confirmation of the accuracy of the Co- 
 lonel's report. The great Yessir Bazary, or slave- 
 market, was indeed closed by order of the Sultan 
 in 1846 ; but slaves are publicly sold in other 
 places. In fact, the Turks have shut up one great 
 slave bazaar and opened seven others. The poor 
 Nubians have been sufferers from the change : in 
 the old market there was at least plenty of elbow- 
 room ; but now they are huddled together in con- 
 fined apartments, or in miserable cellars. One of 
 these semi-subterraneous dens now the most fre- 
 quented of the slave -marts was close to the 
 grand mosque of the Suleimanieh, in the most 
 thronged and busy part of the city. There, six 
 days in the week, the traffic in black human flesh 
 might be seen in full activity the Arab sellers ex- 
 posing their live goods, and the Turks chaffering 
 with them for the prices. The slaves were brought 
 out one by one through a low, narrow, dingy door, 
 something like a trap-door. Whether male or female 
 they were in a state of nudity, shivering with the 
 cold, and often afflicted with chilblains. Except 
 when they were smuggled in, by bribes given to 
 the officers, a duty upon slaves continued to be 
 levied at the Stamboul custom-house. Many 
 black slaves are brought up from Egypt ; but I 
 believe a great many more are imported from
 
 SLAVE-TRADE. 349 
 
 Tripoli and Tunis. The mortality which takes 
 place among them, particularly on their journeys 
 from the interior of Africa to the coast, is said to 
 be enormous. An Arab slave-dealer told a recent 
 English traveller that the mortality, from the 
 period of their quitting the interior of Africa to 
 that of their arrival at the Turkish capital, ex- 
 ceeded sixty per cent.* It was said on the mart 
 near the Suleimanieh that if, for two slaves he 
 bought in the interior of Africa, the dealer could 
 sell one in Constantinople, he did very well. Not- 
 withstanding the decrease of stock en route, the 
 average price of a newly imported young black 
 slave of superior quality was not above 12Z. sterling. 
 You could not have bought a decent horse for 
 thrice the money. I have seen steamers from 
 Egypt and Syria enter the Golden Horn with their 
 decks crowded with black slaves and looking like 
 regular slavers, that would assuredly have been 
 captured and condemned if, instead of being in 
 the Mediterranean, they had only been found by 
 our cruizers outside the Straits of Gibraltar. One 
 morning a steamer came up from the Dardanelles 
 
 with 250 blacks for the market. I collected facts 
 
 
 
 enough to justify the belief that there seldom was a 
 steamer, let her flag be Turkish, Austrian, or Eng- 
 lish, that came down from the Black Sea, or up 
 * Charles White, Esq. : ' Three Years in Constantinople.'
 
 350 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 from the White Sea, without having some slaves, 
 white or black, on board. In English steamers 
 tricks were resorted to to deceive the captain and 
 our consular authorities. Although polygamy is 
 on the decline (on account of poverty), some of the 
 harems and retinues are still numerous, and thus a 
 bevy of veiled young Circassians, on their way to 
 be sold into slavery, might easily be made to pass 
 as some great Turk's harem going to Constanti- 
 nople. False Teskeres or passports for young Cir- 
 cassian girls and boys were made out, not only by 
 the Turkish authorities, but also by some of the 
 native vice-consuls of Christian powers, 
 
 In 1828 I never saw any but blacks sold in 
 the great slave-market. Then, as now, the Cir- 
 cassians and the other whites were landed at To- 
 phana, were there lodged in private houses, and 
 were there quietly sold : or, if they were too young 
 for immediate sale, they were kept in those houses, 
 or sent to other houses over in Constantinople, in 
 which they were educated in singing, posture- 
 making, sherbet-mixing, cookery, and the like, and 
 trained in the language and customs of the Turks. 
 Those houses, and the purposes to which t they 
 were devoted, were just as well known in 1 848 as 
 in 1828. The most frequented cofiee-house in all 
 Tophana was the rendezvous of the old Circassian 
 slave-dealers. Another place of resort to these
 
 SLAVE-TRADE. 351 
 
 white savages, who have been fancifully portrayed 
 as interesting patriots engaged in an heroic strug- 
 gle against Kussia (as if white barbarians that sell 
 their own sons and daughters can be susceptible 
 of patriotism, or worthy of possessing an inde- 
 pendent country), was over in the city near the 
 horse -market. Here are houses where young 
 slaves are in training, and other separate houses 
 where Circassian boys and girls are to be bought, 
 from the age of nine or ten years upwards. No 
 secrecy is affected. Any Mussulman may go in 
 and examine the wares on sale ; and money will 
 open the doors to any curious Frank. The Cir- 
 cassian dealers, like the Arab traders in black 
 flesh, are men of weight and consideration among 
 the Turks, and usually have " agha" put after their 
 names. They are generally fanatic Mussulmans, 
 and far more punctual at mosque, ablutions, and 
 prayers than the Osmanlees. The most turbulent 
 and insolent people we met with were a colony of 
 Circassians whom the Sultan had established at 
 Lubat, on the lake of Apollonia, where they were 
 plundering the poor Greeks of the village, and 
 taking forcible possession of their houses and lands.* 
 
 * These Circassians had been driven from their native homes 
 by the Russians, or by some of their own clans in alliance with 
 Kussia. The Sultan had given them 70,000 piastres, and had 
 sent them over to settle in these parts. They had first come to 
 Lubat in the month of August, 1845, and the place had never
 
 352 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 As a general rule, the price of a young white 
 woman may be taken at from three to four times 
 the price of a black. But, in the Circassian, the 
 common price is greatly enhanced by personal 
 beauty, or by superior Turkish accomplishments ; 
 and, recently, as much as 20,000 piastres had often 
 been paid for a young female. [Beautiful boys now 
 and then fetch still higher prices.] According to 
 Mr. White, the maximum price in 1844-45 was 
 45,000 piastres, or rather more than 400?. ; but 
 such a price could be paid only by the very greatest 
 and richest in the land. I was told that some 
 of the Circassians purchased for Abdul Medjid's 
 harem by his own mother (who had herself been 
 a bought slave) cost more than 60,000 piastres 
 apiece. 
 
 There is still some kidnapping and child-stealing 
 
 been quiet since. All round the Lake of Apollonia there were 
 thousands upon thousands of acres of good corn-land and pasture- 
 land untilled, unoccupied, whereon they might have settled, and 
 have built themselves up a village of their own. But they pre- 
 ferred taking forcible possession of the gardens, the cultivated 
 lands, and the very houses of the Greeks of this village. Strong 
 representations were presented to the Porte I believe by Sir 
 Stratford Canning and the Porte sent orders to the Pasha of 
 Brusa to remove the intruders. But the old Bey or chief of the 
 Circassians rode to Brusa with a girl who was of age for the 
 white-slave market, and the Pasha did nothing. In 1848 the 
 girl was a slave, and probably a concubine, in Mustapha Nouree's 
 harem at Brusa ; and the Circassians were here at Lubat, and in 
 possession of the property they had robbed from the villagers. 
 I have seldom seen a more lawless aud ruffianly set.
 
 SLAVE-TRADE. 
 
 carried on, but, since the conquest or the secured 
 possession of Georgia by the Russians, the supply 
 of slaves from that country, which used to furnish 
 more beauties than Circassia for the Constanti- 
 nople market, may be considered as stopped. 
 During the Russian war and the strict blockades 
 of the coast, the Circassian trade was considerably 
 diminished. If Russia had entirely conquered 
 that country also, an end might have been put, in 
 the course of a few years, to the most detestable of 
 all slave traffic. 
 
 Many of the great Turks, many of the Sultans 
 themselves, have been the children of these Geor- 
 gians or Circassians ; many others of the Pashas 
 have been themselves sold Georgian or Circassian 
 slaves sold as boys, and afterwards obtaining 
 promotion by a course of life which in other 
 countries would consign them to the gibbet, the 
 galleys, or the pillory. When such men come 
 brightest out of the Turkish fountain of honour, what 
 respect can be paid by us to Turkish dignitaries ? 
 
 Is this active slave-trade in blacks and whites a 
 proof of Turkish civilization and progress ? Or do 
 not these facts prove the utter hollowness of all the 
 promises, proclamations, and professions of the 
 Ottoman government ? 
 
 The newspaper in the Turkish language, pub- 
 
 2 A
 
 354 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 lished by government and entirely directed by 
 persons salaried by the Porte, regularly admitted 
 advertisements for the sale of slaves. They adver- 
 tised human beings as they would horses or bales 
 of goods. Whites were advertised as well as blacks. 
 The following appeared in a number of the Turkish 
 paper published in February, 1848 : 
 
 " This is to give notice, that at the Suleimanieh, 
 in Theriaki-market, there is to be sold, for 10,000 
 piastres, a Circassian nurse. Inquire at the office 
 of Achmet Agha, dealer in slaves, and chief of the 
 rope-dancers."* 
 
 Are Turkish progress and civilization denoted 
 by the notorious facts that the Sultan's only brother 
 is incarcerated, and that the male children of the 
 Sultan's sisters are all murdered at their birth? 
 Not even the paid, lying French journalists (a dis- 
 grace to their own country f) can presume to deny 
 
 * It is to be noted that these slave -sale advertisements never 
 appeared in Reschid Pasha's French newspapers. Those papers 
 could be read by Franks and travellers. Very few indeed could 
 read the paper in Turkish, which, in fact, was seldom seen by 
 Christians. While it was advertising slaves in Constantinople 
 Proper, and while slaves were being sold as publicly as ever, 
 the French papers over in Pera were declaring that all slavery 
 had ceased since the issuing of the Sultan's humane decree of 
 1846. 
 
 f I believe that the majority of these scribblers are not true 
 Frenchmen, but mongrels, born and bred in the country, whose 
 fathers or grandfathers may have been French.
 
 ABDUL HAZIZ. 355 
 
 or even to throw doubts on these horrors. The 
 most they venture to do is to pass over the facts 
 sub silentio, and to spin perpetual paragraphs 
 about the humanity of the Sultan and the en- 
 lightenment and gentleness of the modern system 
 of government But, by rarely seeing any mention 
 of these horrors, nine-tenths even of the reading 
 people of Christendom at this moment believe 
 that they have ceased to exist. 
 
 Abdul Haziz, the reigning Sultan's only brother, 
 is, and has been ever since the accession of Abdul 
 Medjid, a mere state prisoner, closely shut up in a 
 harem, like the princes of the blood in the old 
 times, or before Reform and Reschid Pasha were 
 things known or spoken of. At first there were a 
 few flourishes in the Pera French newspapers about 
 this " excellent and enlightened" young prince, 
 and of the affection which existed between him 
 and his imperial brother ; and the visits which the 
 Sultan paid to his state prison were pompously 
 inserted in the court intelligence ; but this had 
 ceased long before 1848, and the name of the 
 captive was now never mentioned. He might 
 have been dead and buried, and yet not more com- 
 pletely forgotten. I found that some people had 
 a vague idea of Abdul Haziz being a much hand- 
 somer, more robust, and cleverer man than his 
 
 2 A 2
 
 356 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 brother the Sultan ; but these persons had no inter- 
 course with the state prisoner; they had never 
 seen him since the death of his father Mahmoud, 
 when he was about thirteen years of age ; and they 
 had not seen him often during the lifetime of that 
 Sultan.* The rule of succession with the Turks is 
 to take the oldest living member of the family, 
 the brother of the deceased Sultan in preference to 
 any of his sons. If Abdul Medjid were to die 
 to-morrow, and were even to leave a dozen of 
 male children, his poor brother would be brought 
 from his state prison and put upon the throne. 
 How fit would the captive be to reign ? What 
 knowledge of the ways of men, what aptitude for 
 government, what energy would he bring out of 
 that barred and latticed harem in which his life has 
 been spent among women, eunuchs, and other 
 degraded and degrading slaves ? 
 
 Some time before the death of the late Sultan 
 Mahmoud, all Constantinople rang with this hor- 
 rible story. His eldest and favourite daughter, the 
 Sun-and-Moon Sultana (Mihr-ou-Mah Sultana), 
 was married to the handsome Said Pasha, who 
 had risen from the very lowest to the highest 
 rank. Aware that nothing could save her offspring, 
 
 Abdul Haziz is now (1853) about twenty-six years of age ; 
 his brother, the Sultan, is three years older.
 
 ABORTION AND CHILD-MURDER. 357 
 
 if a male, from the common doom, and thinking 
 to please her father Mahmoud, the young princess, 
 resolving to destroy her infant before it saw the 
 light, placed herself in the hands of one of the 
 many hell-dames who practise the art to which I 
 have repeatedly alluded. I have said that health 
 is often destroyed by these hags, but here life 
 itself was destroyed, a twofold murder was com- 
 mitted. The constitution of the Sultana was too 
 weak, or the potion too strong ; Mihr-ou-Mah died 
 in frightful convulsions. When the whole of the 
 case was reported to him, Sultan Mahmoud, iron- 
 hearted as he was, wept like a child. It was said 
 that in the first paroxysm of his grief he most 
 solemnly swore that no more lives should be thus 
 sacrificed in his own family ; but he soon followed 
 his daughter to the grave, and no alteration was 
 made not of the law, for it is no law, but an 
 abomination contrary to the Koran and to all law 
 whatsoever but in the adet or custom. In the 
 year 1842, Ateya (the Pure) Sultana, another 
 daughter of Mahmoud, and half-sister of Abdul 
 Medjid, who had become the wife of Halil Pasha, 
 was declared enceinte. She had previously been 
 delivered of a male child, and the child had been 
 murdered. Then, the young mother had nearly 
 gone mad ; now, she hoped and prayed for female
 
 358 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 offspring, for a daughter whom she might nurse at 
 her breast, and rear and love ; but a second time 
 she gave birth to a son. Her husband Halil, high 
 in office and in court favour, borrowed large sums 
 from the Armenian seraffs and distributed the 
 money among those who were considered most in- 
 fluential in this strangely, barbarously, infamously 
 constituted court ; and Ateya was a favourite of 
 her brother the Sultan Abdul Medjid, as also of 
 his mother, the Sultana Valide, whose influence 
 had been paramount ever since her son's accession. 
 The strongest representations were made of the 
 disgust and horror that would be excited in Europe 
 by these infanticides. As the throne was tottering ; 
 as the empire would have been wrested from him 
 at the time of his father's death but for the prompt 
 succour of England ; as there was not now a 
 month's security for the integrity of that empire 
 except in the alliance and support of England, 
 Austria, and Prussia, would it not be wise in the 
 Sultan to put an end to a crying sin, and to con- 
 ciliate the respect of those great Christian powers? 
 The word went forth from the imperial harem 
 that the child of Ateya should live. For two days 
 and nights the happy mother suckled the babe, 
 but upon her awaking on the third morning, and 
 calling for her boy, her women burst into tears
 
 CHILD-MURDER. 359 
 
 and said the babe had died in convulsions during 
 the night. She saw and felt the cold corpse, she 
 fell into a delirium, and then into a mortal languor ; 
 and on the seventy -fifth day her remains were depo- 
 sited in the tomb of her father, Sultan Mahmoud. 
 The child had been murdered like its elder brother. 
 But as the tale was still more horrible than that 
 of Mihr-ou-Mah Sultana, extraordinary efforts were 
 made to mystify the European embassies, and more 
 especially to persuade the British Ambassador that 
 the child had died a natural death. If Lord 
 Stratford de Redcliffe was deceived, I have reason 
 to believe that the deception did not last long. 
 And does not his Lordship know that the other 
 brothers-in-law of the Sultan have no male progeny, 
 and that not a single male infant born of any 
 Sultana has survived its birth beyond a few hours ? 
 And knowing these and . other damning facts, how 
 can he (a man of honour and humanity, a believing 
 religious man) continue to report to our Foreign 
 Office that this is a humane and enlightened govern- 
 ment, and that it is rapidly advancing in civilization ? 
 How can he receive at his own house, and treat with 
 all consideration, the brothers-in-law of the Sultan ? 
 Achmet Fethi Pasha, of whom I have spoken, 
 stood in this near relationship to Abdul Medjid. 
 The second time I was with the burly man, these
 
 360 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 foul and most unnatural tragedies flashed across 
 my mind. Here was I sitting close by the side of 
 a father bound to murder his own offspring, or to 
 be a tacitly consenting party to such murders ! 
 The thought made me sick at heart. 
 
 I have lost the long list of the children born to 
 the Sultan since he ascended the throne as a strip- 
 ling of sixteen. While we were in the country, 
 or between the month of August, 1847, and the 
 month of July, 1848, he had four children, whose 
 births were announced to the world by tremendous 
 and long-repeated discharges of artillery. * The 
 weakness and imhealthiness of the children of the 
 imperial harem is another notorious fact : three of 
 these infants died before they were a month old. 
 After our departure, but early in the month of 
 July, two more children (not twins) were born 
 unto the Sultan on one day and at nearly the 
 same hour. I know not whether these two sur- 
 vive, but in all probability they do not. The 
 puniness of this accelerated offspring is not likely 
 
 * For a male child these salutes were repeated five times 
 a-day for seven successive days : for a female child they kept 
 up the racket only three days. Each salute was fired, not by 
 one, but by a dozen batteries. Nearly all the powder manufac- 
 tured for government by the Armenian Dadians was consumed 
 in this way, or in firing salutes on every Friday when the Sultan 
 went to mosque. Very little of the powder was fit for any other 
 purpose.
 
 CHILD-MURDER. 361 
 
 to be remedied by care and affection : if females, 
 they are but little considered ; if males, they are 
 apt to be regarded as an inconvenient multipli- 
 cation of legitimate heirs,* for, whether the birth 
 of one of the seven kadinns (wives), or of one of 
 the innumerable slaves of the harem, every one of 
 them is held to be legitimate. The infanticide 
 of males was often resorted to when the Sultan 
 had two sons that were healthy and likely to live. 
 The common calculation was, that there ought to 
 be an heir-apparent and an heir-presumptive ; and 
 that, if these two princes were hale and strong, all 
 other male children were but an useless or a dan- 
 gerous surplusage. This is the calculation still! 
 The old courtiers, the eunuchs, the mollahs, the 
 women, and all the indescribable elements of this 
 unreformed, unaltered, and uncountable imperial 
 household are constantly haunted by the tradi- 
 tional terror of disputed^ successions and intestine 
 wars, and, in their view, the chances of such catas- 
 trophes are best prevented by keeping down the 
 living number of male children. Then the mothers 
 of the first-born princes entertain a dread and 
 hatred against all the post nati, while the mothers 
 of these entertain the same feelings towards the 
 first born. Readers of Turkish history or readers 
 
 * Charles White, Esq., ' Three Years in Constantinople.'
 
 362 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of tragedies will remember the dismal story of 
 Roxalana, one of the wives of Sultan Suleiman 
 the Magnificent, who induced the Sultan to put to 
 death six of his family, in order to make way foi 
 the succession of her own son. These causes have 
 aforetime led to the darkest of serraglio crimes ; 
 and they are as strong and unrestrained now as 
 they were at any period. The contemplation is 
 horrible ! Such a domesticity, such an interior, 
 such an Imperial family and household, are not to 
 be regarded without loathing. Once more I re- 
 peat Puzza al naso d'ognuno questo barbar.o 
 domvnio ! 
 
 And again I ask whether Christian nations can 
 league together in order to bolster up such a sys- 
 tem as this ? whether English and French states- 
 men can risk a destructive war for the sake of 
 maintaining this foul government, and keeping in 
 Europe the Turks, who are dying out of them- 
 selves ? Go to war, and at the firing of the first 
 cannon the red republicans will break loose, and 
 you will have civil war and anarchy everywhere ! 
 " Kossuth and Mazzini are ready to start from 
 London at a moment's notice," said one of our 
 sympathising radical papers a week or two ago ! 
 Of course they are ready to start, and so are 
 thousands of other political refugees still more
 
 KOSSUTH AND MAZZINI. 363 
 
 desperate ; and all are ready to repeat the mad 
 experiments, the blunders, and atrocities of 1848-9. 
 
 I know it to be the opinions of many of these 
 anarchists, that the only fault they committed at 
 that insane period was in showing too much gen- 
 tleness and mercy while they had the upper hand ; 
 and that, when they next gain the upper hand, 
 they must put the guillotine -en permanence. But 
 their adversaries and all the friends of order on 
 the Continent know this intention, and every go- 
 vernment is likewise determined to be more severe 
 against these disturbers of the tranquillity of the 
 world than they were before, and is well provided 
 with the means of meeting them and crushing 
 them. By conspiracy the Rouges might obtain a 
 momentary success a permanent one is beyond 
 their reach. But we all too well know the mis- 
 chief that can be done, the horrors that can be 
 committed, in a single week of revolution, and in 
 the reaction which follows it. 
 
 About a quarter of a century ago Lord John 
 Russell published a work on the ' Establishment 
 of the Turks in Europe/ The object of that little 
 book, as I remember it,* was to demonstrate that 
 
 * Although I have taken much pains to procure a copy of 
 this historical Essay, I have not been able to do so. It appears 
 to be quite out of print and out of sight.
 
 364 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 this establishment had been a malediction, not 
 only to the countries occupied, but to civilization 
 in general, and that the sooner the Turks were sent 
 across the Bosphorus the better would it be for 
 civilization and humanity. I know that, as late as 
 the year 1830, his Lordship entertained the same 
 opinions on the Turkish question as the late Lord 
 Holland, who was for driving the Turks out of 
 Christendom, even at the risk of the vast aggran- 
 dizement of Russia. In speaking with me on the 
 subject, in the winter of 1830, Lord Holland said, 
 " The first thing to do is to drive the Turks back 
 into Asia. In Europe they have been nothing but 
 wasters and destructionists. Nothing thrives, but 
 everything perishes, under their sway. This jea- 
 lousy and dread of Russia may prop up the Otto- 
 man empire for a time, but nothing can keep it 
 up long ! It is rotten at the foundation, and in 
 all its parts. In a few years it must fall, even 
 though Russia should not touch it again." * Even 
 a few years later than 1830 Lord John Russell 
 is said to have coincided in these views. But 
 how different are now the notions (as expressed 
 
 * I believe that Lord Holland inherited these convictions 
 from his uncle, Mr. Fox, but his Lordship had bestowed much 
 study on the subject, and was a diligent reader of every new 
 book of travels in Turkey.
 
 LORD JOHN RUSSELL. 365 
 
 in Parliament) of that statesman ! I will not 
 speculate on what may have so changed the 
 author of the work on the ' Establishment of the 
 Turks in Europe ; ' I will only conjecture that his 
 Lordship, misled by ignorant and hasty or pre- 
 meditated, false reports, believes that there has 
 been of late years a rapid improvement in the 
 Ottoman Government and in the condition of its 
 subjects. From all that I have seen, from all that 
 I have heard, and from all that I have gathered 
 from other travellers, and from old residents and 
 close observers, I can humbly assure his Lord- 
 ship that he is sadly 'misinformed and misled when 
 he asserts that the Christian subjects of the Porte 
 prefer its sway to that of Russia, as the people 
 of England preferred the rule of the profligate 
 Charles II. to that of his bigot brother James. In 
 any way to compare Russian with Turkish govern- 
 ment is not merely to offer an insult to an old ally, 
 but also to Christianity and to common sense.* 
 
 * In the debate to which I allude (that of Tuesday, the 1 6th 
 of August, 1853) Viscount Palmerston, among other sharp 
 things aimed at Russia, said, " Turkey, it is certain, has no 
 Poland and no Siberia." A Russian might have retorted, " Has 
 not Great Britain an Ireland and a Botany Bay ? " 
 
 But why these sarcasms at the expense of a power which, 
 at the most critical stage of our political existence, stood true 
 and firm, and hastened the downfall of the most formidable foe 
 with whom we ever had to contend ? Surely our statesmen
 
 366 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 I do not say that the Russian Government is per- 
 fect (far from it), or that it would suit a country 
 like England, but I believe it to be well adapted 
 for a country like Russia and for a county like 
 Turkey, and that the mixed races or peoples who 
 form the vast majority of the population of Eu- 
 ropean Turkey would greatly prefer it to that 
 which they have. I am not quite sure that many 
 of the Turks themselves would not at once give 
 it the preference. 
 
 But the most astonishing conversion from opi- 
 nions previously entertained, and published is that 
 of Mr. Layard. This very distinguished traveller 
 and discoverer of ancient remains has visited every 
 part of the Ottoman empire; has seen all the 
 nakedness of the land, and abundant specimens 
 of all the persecutions and crimes committed in it 
 Not four years, ago Mr. Layard thrilled the heart 
 of all Christendom by his eloquent account of the 
 persecution of the Nestorian Christians by Bedr- 
 Khan-Bey and his Mussulman Kurds. In these 
 two persecutions (both of quite recent date) 12,000 
 helpless Christians men, women, children, in- 
 fants were massacred by the savage Mahom- 
 medans ! ! It may now suit Mr. Layard to plead 
 
 and parliamentary orators might indulge in their dreams of 
 Turkish progress without twitting Russia with barbarity.
 
 MR. LAYARD. 367 
 
 that the Kurds are not quite Turks, and are very 
 unruly subjects; but can Mr. Layard believe that 
 such atrocities may not be renewed to-morrow, 
 and can he say that the Ottoman Government is 
 vigilant, energetic, and strong enough to prevent 
 their recurrence ? Did he find any law, justice, or 
 established order at Mosul, or in any of those re- 
 mote parts of the Asiatic dominions of the Sultan ? 
 He has told us himself and that repeatedly 
 that he did not. To exist, and to have any claim 
 on extraneous support, a government must not 
 only not commit massacres and atrocities itself, but 
 it must be strong enough to prevent atrocities and 
 massacres being committed, within its dominions, 
 by others. The Ottoman Government has not this 
 strength whatever might be its will in any of 
 the distant parts of the empire. What affection 
 or what allegiance can the Christian element, con- 
 stantly exposed in property and in life, entertain 
 for such a government? Are these Christians 
 likely to fight against or for the Russians ? Can 
 they prefer the Ottoman to the orderly Russian 
 rule? 
 
 But it cannot be said that the Turks the real 
 Osmanlees and the Porte were free of guilt in 
 the Nestorian massacres. It was a set of green- 
 turbaned Turks who gave origin to the slaughters ;
 
 368 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 many Turks took an active part in both the mas- 
 sacres, while all fanatics of that race applauded 
 the bloody deeds when they were done ; the ma- 
 jority of the Turkish population in that part of the 
 empire were the declared enemies of toleration 
 and reform, and regarded the Kurdish chief as 
 their champion and the champion of the Koran ; 
 and Bedr-Khan-Bey was moreover supported by 
 the whole strength of the fanatical party else- 
 where. It was more than suspected that he had 
 favourers and friends in Constantinople, in the 
 Sultan's own palace, in some of the departments of 
 government ! Reschid Pasha was Grand Vizier at 
 the end of 1846, when Nazim Efiendi was sent to 
 Mosul to examine into the circumstances con- 
 nected with the second massacre, in which 2000 
 Christians had perished. This Nazim Effendi, in 
 passing through Djezira, the stronghold of the 
 Kurd, had several friendly interviews with the 
 sanguinary monster, whose crimes it was pretended 
 he had been sent to investigate. He took large 
 sums of money from Bedr-Khan-Bey, and when 
 lie reached Mosul he would hear no evidence 
 against the butcher. The language he held to the 
 French and English Consuls on the subject of the 
 second massacre was as unreasonable as it was in- 
 solent as false as it was ferocious. In fact, he jus-
 
 MASSACRES OF NESTORIAN CHRISTIANS. 369 
 
 tified both massacres the indiscriminate slaughter 
 of 12,000 Christian subjects of Sultan Abdul Medjid 
 by affirming that the Nestorians were rebellious 
 infidels, whom it was the duty of all good Mussul- 
 mans to exterminate. The Consuls asked whether 
 the women and children of the Nestorians ought 
 not to have been spared even if the men had been 
 guilty of rebellion (which they had not). The im- 
 perial commissioner, the agent of the enlightened 
 and humane Reschid Pasha, Nazim Effendi, coolly 
 replied, that they were all infidels all the same 
 dirt and were doomed therefore, and deservedly,, 
 to the same fate. * 
 
 When the chief officers of Bedr-Khan-Bey were 
 reposing after the labours of the second massacre, 
 some Kurds, who sought to obtain favour, brought 
 to them, as slaves, about sixty of the most beautiful 
 women and children they had been able to find 
 in the Nestorian villages ; but Tyagar, the Go- 
 
 * The imputed rebellion of the Nestorians an industrious, 
 quiet, most orderly people was a pure invention. There had 
 been a quarrel about some lands : some Turkish Emirs had in- 
 truded on the territory of the Nestorians (as the fugitive Cir- 
 cassians have done on the lands of the Greeks at Lubat). On 
 the complaint of the Christians, and by order of the Pasha of 
 Mosul, the intruders were sent to another part of the country. 
 The green-heads and their co-religionists were furious. As 
 soon as the intruders had retired to a distance, a report was 
 maliciously spread that they had been assassinated by the Nes- 
 torians. This led to the second massacre. 
 
 2 B
 
 370 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 vernor of Djezira, exclaimed, " We want no more 
 slaves for infidel ambassadors at Stamboul to set at 
 liberty. Slay these prisoners ! Kill them all !" 
 The Kurds immediately fell upon the women and 
 children and despatched them in cold blood. 
 Three girls alone, whose beauty made an impres- 
 sion on the chiefs, were spared ; but it was more 
 than suspected that they subsequently, with addi- 
 tional circumstances of atrocity, shared the same 
 fate. 
 
 The infidel ambassador to whom the Governor of 
 Djezira alluded was Sir Stratford Canning, who, 
 by his humane and active interference, had secured 
 the liberation of some of the Nestorians who had 
 been made slaves at the time of the first massacre. 
 Alas ! other instances might be quoted in which 
 the humanity of Sir Stratford has only given a 
 keener edge to Turkish cruelty. 
 
 These events, which must sound like horrible 
 fables in the ears of most Englishmen, took place 
 quite recently, in the reign of Abdul Medjid, in 
 the years 1843 and 1846 ; and at a time when a 
 Turkish ambassador was residing at London, and 
 making constant declarations that the reign of 
 fanaticism and cruelty was over in Turkey, that 
 the use of torture was for ever put down, that 
 full religious liberty had been established on the
 
 MASSACRES OF NESTORIANS. 371 
 
 broadest and most solid base, and that the re- 
 formed Ottoman empire ought now to be allowed 
 to take a foremost place among the civilized 
 nations of the world. Yes ! in 1846, when the 
 salaried journalists of Constantinople were pro- 
 claiming to the universe that Turkey was now a 
 well-governed and most happy country, Christian 
 blood was flowing like water on the banks of the 
 Tigris, and an innocent people was suffering every 
 indescribable horror, was undergoing torture and 
 extermination ! 
 
 I state the preceding particulars on the autho- 
 rity of a friend, who is also the friend of Mr. 
 Layard, and who, as well as that enterprising and 
 accomplished gentleman, was in the country in 
 1846, at the time of Nazim Effendi's visit. 
 
 For a time the lying, purchased report of 
 Nizam Effendi found favour in the sight of Go- 
 vernment. And at last, when the grand vizier 
 sent an army against the Kurd butcher, it was not 
 on account of his butcheries, but because he was 
 making himself the head of a great party, and 
 rallying round his standard, in the mountains of 
 Kurdistan, some thousands of disaffected Turks, 
 sworn foes to Reschid Pasha and his reform 
 system. If Bedr-Khan-Bey had not been a poli- 
 tical enemy, and in a position to become a very 
 
 2 B 2
 
 372 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 formidable one, he would never have been seriously 
 molested by the Porte. 
 
 And even when the great Kurd butcher fell 
 into the hands of the Porte, they let him off with 
 gentle banishment in the beautiful island of Crete. 
 Many of his adherents were taken into the em- 
 ployment of government, and many fanatical 
 Turks, who had favoured the monster's enterprises 
 against the Nestorians, were continued in their 
 places, or promoted ! This happened in 1847, 
 while I was in Turkey. 
 
 How the eloquent historian of these massacres 
 of the Christian Nestorians can stand up in defence 
 of a government under which they were perpe- 
 trated, and under which the like atrocities may be 
 committed to-morrow how he has allowed his 
 politics to subdue his loathing of oppression and 
 frightful cruelty how he can maintain that Turkey 
 is on the high road to improvement, and that 
 Christian populations ought to be left under her 
 dominion, are things which altogether pass my 
 comprehension. In the Parliamentary debate to 
 which I refer, some one ought to have proposed a 
 reading of extracts from Mr. Layard's affecting 
 narrative of the slaughter of the Eastern Christians 
 in 1843 and in 1846. These would have strikingly 
 illustrated the positions of Lord Palmerston, and
 
 HATRED OF RUSSIA AND AUSTRIA. 373 
 
 especially his declaration that the people living in 
 Turkey were in the enjoyment of religious tolera- 
 tion. They would also have shown how probable it 
 is that, if it comes to an open war between the Tzar 
 and the Sultan, the Turkish government will find 
 its Christian subjects prompt to support it, and 
 heroes in its defence. The same extracts from Mr, 
 Layard's book might also have shown how very 
 rational was Lord Dudley Stuart, when, in putting 
 Turkey above Kussia in the scale of nations, he 
 declared that ' to every other species of tyranny 
 the Emperor of Russia adds that which is the 
 worst of all tyrannies religious tyranny !" 
 
 All this violent abuse of Russia, which I hear 
 or read every day, and which I have read or heard 
 for many years, is raised and kept up by men who 
 know nothing of the country, and who are heated 
 by theories of government and political antipathies. 
 Every man who calls himself a liberal hates 
 Russia and Austria, because they have crushed 
 revolutionism, and because they will not set up 
 democratic constitutions constitutions for which 
 their countries and peoples are about as well 
 suited as England is for an absolute monarchy. 
 But for Russia and Austria, these fanciful theorists 
 conceive that they might erect their constitu- 
 tional or republican Utopias in every country in
 
 374 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 continental Europe, and bring about a millennium 
 of democracy. This feeling on the part of the 
 liberals seems growing in intensity and in blind- 
 ness ; and hence it is that our orators are roaring 
 against Russia, and describing her as a barbarous 
 power. 
 
 I have not taken up the pen to be either the 
 eulogist or apologist of the Tzar Nicholas or his 
 government ; but for the sake of fairness and 
 common sense I would fain do something to stem 
 this torrent of prejudice and abuse, which may 
 lead to results injurious to my own sovereign and 
 my own countiy. There are administrative defects 
 in the Russian system, and foremost among these 
 I take to be the inadequate pay given to Russian 
 employes of all ranks, except the highest a 
 parsimony which leads to bribery and peculation 
 and corruption ; but, as I have said, everything in 
 Russia is in progress, while everything in Turkey 
 is in decay and retrocession. Although portions 
 of the empire are not yet highly civilized, the 
 Russians are excellent pioneers of civilization the 
 Russians have improved the condition of the com- 
 mon people wherever their power has been firmly 
 established (Poland itself not being an exception) 
 the Russians have promoted agriculture, and 
 established order and law where none existed before
 
 RUSSIAN PROGRESS. 375 
 
 the Russians have put down anarchy, feuds, and 
 incessant internal wars, which (as in India before 
 our dominion) depopulated whole towns and vil- 
 lages, whole districts and provinces, and kept the 
 poor people at the lowest ebb of wretchedness, or 
 in the most agonizing state of uncertainty the 
 Russians have everywhere given security to in- 
 dustry, and to property which is its result the 
 Russians have propagated the Christian faith 
 wherever they have advanced the Russians are 
 driven upon the barbarous, depopulated, prostrate 
 regions of Turkey and Persia, by the same irre- 
 sistible impulses, circumstances, and necessities, 
 which have impelled and are impelling us in 
 India. Scarcely an argument can be used in 
 justification of our far-spreading conquests and 
 aggrandisements in the East but is as available to 
 the Russians as to us. They have, moreover, one 
 strong argument which we cannot plead in India. 
 The Greeks and all the Sclavonian races Bulga- 
 rians, Servians, Montenegrins, Bosniaks forming 
 a vast majority of the population of European 
 Turkey, are not only fellow Christians, but 
 members of the same Greek Church as them- 
 selves. In every way they are co-religionists. We 
 never found in India oppressed Christian popula- 
 tions to call for our sympathy and protection, and
 
 376 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 invite us to conquest and occupation, by the easy 
 process of dispossessing an infidel minority of 
 oppressors. This sort of invitation, this kind of 
 temptation, sanctioned by religious feeling, has 
 now been presented to Russia for ages. The sub- 
 jects of the Tzar look upon every war with the 
 Turks as a war of religion, as a conflict between 
 Christianity and Islam, as a Crusade and Holy 
 War. The sentiment of the people impels the 
 sovereign, and the Church is disposed to sanctify 
 his ambition ; for, is it not a holy work to succour 
 oppressed fellow Christians, and to raise the Cross 
 of Christ above the Crescent ? In any year since 
 1829 the Emperor Nicholas might have marched 
 to Constantinople, and taken possession of a country 
 of which certainly more than three-fourths of the 
 inhabitants are Christians of the Greek Church and 
 well disposed to live under his rule. When I look 
 at the strength of his temptations, at his undisputed 
 power to strike the great blow, at the value of the 
 prize to be obtained thereby, and at all the feel- 
 ings, Christian prophecies, passions, and interests 
 which urge him forward, I confess I stand asto- 
 nished at the Tzar's moderation. 
 
 In his last move, in this occupation of the prin- 
 cipalities, Nicholas has not as yet broken any 
 treaty or given any cause for war. Lord John
 
 RUSSIA NOT THE AGGRESSOR. 377 
 
 Russell has stated in the House that the Turkish 
 Government had a clear and undoubted right to 
 regard this occupation as a casus belli. Now, in 
 fact, Russia, by her treaties with the Porte, is free 
 to enter the principalities how and whensoever she 
 pleases. Therefore her present entry is not a 
 casus belli. " Russia," says Mr. Layard, " has 
 established her right to interfere in all the internal 
 affairs of the principalities, and her present occu- 
 pation of them has proved that Moldavia and 
 Wallachia are to all intents and purposes Russian 
 provinces." But why are they Russian provinces? 
 Not by any coercion or force of arms employed 
 against the native population, but because that 
 population has for so many years been benefited 
 by Russian protection, and has found under the 
 shield of the Tzar that security for life and pro- 
 perty, that tranquillity, and that entire freedom in 
 religion which cannot be looked for in any of the 
 non-Russianised provinces of the Ottoman empire. 
 I again assert that, but for Russia, Moldavia and 
 Wallachia would have been turned into hungry 
 deserts. 
 
 But this time Russia did not cross the Prath 
 until the fleets of France and England took up 
 their menacing position in Besika Bay, at the dis- 
 tance of only three English miles from the entrance
 
 378 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 of the Straits of the Dardanelles.* Russia did not 
 enter the principalities until England and France 
 
 * I believe that there was nobody in our Foreign Office who 
 knew (a few weeks ago) where Besika Bay really was. I have 
 seen all manner of mistakes as to its whereabouts. Mr. Robert 
 Phillimore, in his recent pamphlet on Turkish affairs, makes a 
 bold leap in the dark, and says that Besika Bay is about 150 
 miles from the Dardanelles ! The distance is what I have 
 stated, or is at most between three and four English miles. The 
 spot ought to have been well known, for it is not the first time 
 that English squadrons have anchored there, and it is the very 
 spot where the Greeks landed for their siege of Troy. It is 
 just behind the island of Tenedos, and near the mouths of the 
 Scamander. Old Homer tells us how the Greeks fell at this 
 shore of the Trojan plain by plague, and pestilence, and sudden 
 death. The officers and men of the French and English fleets 
 are at this moment suffering something like those heroes of 
 antiquity. Malaria fever of a very bad sort has crept into 
 every ship ; many of the men have perished, some officers have 
 died, and others have come home in a deplorable state. I look 
 upon all this as the result of a deplorable folly. Why does our 
 fleet remain at Besika Bay, or why did it go thither at all ? 
 There was not the slightest chance, there was not the possibility 
 of the Emperor Nicholas sending his fleet to the Bosphorus or 
 Dardanelles. I believe that our ships might have been safely 
 moored, and have been out of the reach of the miasma, under 
 Tenedos. At all events they might have found good shelter 
 and pure air in the island of Lemnos, only a few leagues farther 
 from the mouth of the Dardanelles. Except as the nearest 
 bullying position that could be taken up (short of entering the 
 Dardanelles) except as a point en Evidence, I cannot possibly 
 see of what use is this Besika Bay with our ships and the ships 
 of France anchored in it. The Admirals ought to have known 
 beforehand that the spot was pestilential. Is the health, are 
 the lives of brave men to be thus sported with ? These are, of 
 necessity, too much exposed in various parts of the world without 
 our going to seek, unnecessarily and bootlessly, & foyer of ma- 
 laria.
 
 APOLOGY FOR RUSSIA. 379 
 
 had taken up a formidable position within the 
 dominions of the Sultan. " But/' says Mr. Phil- 
 limore, " the English and French were invited by 
 the Sultan, but the Russian army was not invited 
 by anybody. [This last assertion is not quite cor- 
 rect : the Russians were invited or welcomed by 
 the mass of the Christian population of the prin- 
 cipalities. But let that pass.] Turkey had no 
 right to invite two formidable navies, while Russia 
 had a treaty right to enter the principalities, which 
 right she did not enforce until she saw herself 
 menaced by the two fleets. Let us take a familiar 
 illustration. My next-door neighbour may invite 
 whom he pleases, so long as his guests cause me 
 no annoyance or danger ; but if he brings in two 
 big bullies armed to the teeth, and threatens me 
 and my family, have I not a right to take posses- 
 sion of my next-door neighbour's postern gate, if I 
 think that by so doing I may provide for my own 
 safety and get rid of his two guests ? 
 
 Never was there so much vacillation at first, 
 and so much imprudence at last, as in this question 
 of sending our fleet to join that of France in Be- 
 sika Bay. Once there, it was impossible for the 
 Emperor Nicholas to act otherwise than he did ; 
 and by remaining there with the French fleet in 
 an attitude of menace it could not but indispose
 
 380 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the Emperor to accept of our mediation in his 
 quarrel with the Sultan. As a witty Russian 
 diplomatist is reported to have said "No man will- 
 ingly accepts as umpires his adversary's seconds." 
 I do not believe that the Tzar will withdraw a man 
 from the principalities while the two allied fleets 
 continue at the mouth of the Hellespont. And, 
 whatever diplomatic arrangements may be made 
 to patch up temporarily the present difficulties, 
 Russia will always retain the power of crossing the 
 Pruth whenever it suits her purpose so to do. Nor 
 does Russia require an army in the principalities 
 to secure their submission and allegiance, for these 
 are secured by the good-will of the people, and by 
 past, present, and prospective advantages deriv- 
 able from the orderly rule and government of the 
 Emperor. 
 
 For many years Turkey has been upheld not by 
 the sympathies, but by the jealousies of surround- 
 ing nations. Anxious about the balance of power 
 which is now becoming little more than a theory 
 our politicians are saying, " If we drive out the 
 Turks, what are we to do with Turkey?" I have 
 not undertaken to answer that question. I have 
 merely undertaken to prove that the effete, expiring 
 Ottoman Empire cannot be supported and reno- 
 vated; that the attempt ought not to be made;
 
 FALSE ALARM AS TO RUSSIA. 381 
 
 that Christianity ought not to arm and fight for 
 Mahometamsm ; that the Christian rayahs, form- 
 ing the majority of the population in Europe, are 
 barbarously oppressed by the Mussulman minority ; 
 and that the Turks are dying out and disappearing 
 as well in Asia as in their European provinces. I 
 trust I have demonstrated that the vaunted re- 
 forms have either been shams and impositions, or 
 have been most mischievous in their operation and 
 effects ; and that the Ottoman Empire is falling to 
 pieces and crumbling into dust. I have not the 
 presumption to lay down any positive plan either 
 for the reconstruction of a Christian empire, or for 
 the distribution of its parts and fragments. I con- 
 fess, however, that, in spite of all the outcry against 
 Russia, I cannot enter into the exceedingly great 
 alarm as to her aggrandisement. I do not wish 
 to see the crown of the Constan tines on the same 
 head that wears the imperial crown of Russia j 
 but, with very little abatement, I feel on the whole 
 subject much as I did twenty-four years ago. 
 
 " To the politician the subject of the subversion 
 of the Ottoman empire may present feelings of a 
 less agreeable nature, and fear and jealousy of 
 those who are to overthrow the idol may almost 
 create an affection for the monster. I scarcely 
 presume, in matters of such importance, to give
 
 382 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 an opinion directly opposed to the ideas which 
 more generally obtain, but I have contemplated 
 with pleasure the possibility, the probability, that 
 none, or but few (and those few but temporary) 
 of the evils apprehended from the occupation of 
 Turkey by the Russians would be felt in Europe. 
 The vast empire of the Tzars, a collection of 
 multitudinous parts, rather than a great whole, 
 feels already within itself the symptoms of dissever- 
 ance ; and those symptoms will be matured by 
 time, and by that improvement which, however 
 slowly it advance, is advancing in its semi-bar- 
 barous dominions. Until the effects of that im- 
 provement be felt, Russia, however strong on her 
 own territories, in a defensive war, or against such 
 powers as Persia and Turkey in an offensive one, 
 can never be formidable to the liberties of Europe, 
 or contemplate a struggle with the league of Eng- 
 land, France, and Austria ; but the consummation 
 of those very effects, by inducing the separation 
 hinted at, will reduce Russia to a discreet and 
 compatible size. It was to cover the wildest flight 
 of his own ambition that Napoleon drew an exag- 
 gerated and startling picture of " the giant of the 
 north," and of the use or abuse it would make of 
 its power: but the fashion of trembling at the 
 bugbear of his creating is gone by ; we have been
 
 FALSE ALAKM AS TO RUSSIA. 383 
 
 accustomed to look to Russia as she is, without 
 any great apprehension for our own existence ; and 
 when we see a remedy growing up with the growth 
 of the evil that alarms us, we may await the future 
 with confidence. 
 
 " The extension of the Eussian empire to Turkey 
 would hasten the disseverance. The same em- 
 peror would not long reign on the Neva and the 
 Bosphorus ; and it seems, indeed, to have been, 
 from the time of Catherine, the project of Russia 
 never to attach Turkey in Europe to the Muscovite 
 crown, but to place a prince of the same dynasty 
 on the throne of Constantinople, the capital of a 
 new and friendly empire. 
 
 " Political history does not teach us that the con- 
 sanguinity of princes implies uninterrupted friend- 
 ship and identity of interests, but its pages are full 
 of the wars of royal brothers and cousins, and 
 proofs that the qualities, the interests, the pre- 
 judices of the governed must direct the conduct of 
 those who govern, and rise superior to the sym- 
 pathies of blood, and the spirit of family compacts. 
 
 "England and Europe were filled with alarm 
 when the ambitious Louis XIV. revealed his pro- 
 ject of placing a prince of the Bourbon race on 
 the throne of Spain. Already the monarchs of a 
 powerful kingdom (it was reasoned in those days),
 
 384 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 should the French dynasty extend to Spain, the 
 two great countries will be as one ; the balance of 
 power will be destroyed in Europe, and no state 
 secure from Gallic encroachment. Blood and trea- 
 sures were expended to prevent the aggrandize- 
 ment of the French dynasty : the measures of 
 Louis were successful in spite of them, and his 
 grandson Philip was invested with the crowns of 
 Spain and the Indies. But the overwhelming 
 evils the annihilation of the independence of Eu- 
 rope did not result from the success of the Bour- 
 bons, and circumstances soon proved that we had 
 been combating a chimera, and literally throwing 
 away money and life. In a few years the Bourbon 
 prince was identified with the Spanish nation ; his 
 successors became intrinsically Spanish ; and at 
 their Courts the voice of an English or a German 
 ambassador was known to be as influential as that 
 of the family ambassador, or envoy of France; 
 and for ourselves, whenever Spain has joined 
 Fiance in a war against England, it may be 
 doubted whether community of descent in the 
 princes of the two countries had anything to do 
 with it, and whether the position of affairs would 
 not have led to precisely the same alliances if any 
 other dynasty had reigned to the south of the 
 Pyrenees.
 
 CONTEMPLATED GOVERNMENT. 385 
 
 " The parallel may, it is true, be objected to ; 
 for Spain was an old and established nation, 
 whereas Turkey will first have to be formed into a 
 nation, and must be longer dependent on Kussia ; 
 yet the rise of the new state, with an active and 
 intelligent Greek population for its basis, might 
 be rapid, and the treaties of the great European 
 powers might be of such a nature as to relieve it 
 from subserviency to its mighty neighbour." * 
 
 By the same treaties the passage of the Darda- 
 nelles and Bosphorus might be thrown open to the 
 mercantile flags of all Europe, the United States of 
 America, etc., and a freedom of commerce or 
 system of liberal tariffs might be regulated to the 
 satisfaction and advantage of all parties. Under 
 such a Christian government as I here contem- 
 plate, the commerce of Turkey would, indeed, and 
 very rapidly, become flourishing and highly import- 
 ant to England, France, Italy, and Germany. 
 
 But even were the Emperor Nicholas for a 
 time in possession of Constantinople and the neigh- 
 bouring provinces, without being restrained by 
 any such treaties,'! do not conceive that any great 
 danger, or risk of danger, would arise to us by his 
 occupancy. He would have something else than 
 
 * Constantinople in 1828,' &c. Second edition. London, 
 Saunders and Otley, 1829. 
 
 2 c
 
 386 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 India to think about. His days and nights would 
 be occupied in setting his new house in order a 
 task which will be found of extreme difficulty, let 
 who will undertake it, and however favourable 
 may be his auspices. Mr. Layard says, that, " with 
 Russia at Constantinople, our tenure of India 
 could never be other than a military tenure." But 
 what is it now, and what has it ever been, except a 
 military tenure ? A tenure supported, indeed, by 
 prestige and moral influence, but still essentially a 
 military tenure. This very rapid politician carries 
 Eussia at once from Constantinople to Egypt and 
 Syria (where Eussia will never be), and puts her 
 in possession of the valleys of the Euphrates and 
 the Tigris, the high roads to India. But how 
 with her inferior navy is Eussia to get to Egypt in 
 the teeth of two such naval powers as England 
 and France ? We could blockade the Dardanelles 
 so as not to allow so much as a Eussian row-boat 
 to get out into the Mediterranean. With equal 
 ease we could blockade the Eussian fleets in the 
 Baltic. Eussia would be mad to make any demon- 
 stration or to attempt anything in the Mediterra- 
 nean. Perhaps in a hundred years she might have 
 such a navy as could face one of the two great ma- 
 ritime powers ; but what events, what new combi- 
 nations may arise in that long interval ! Statesmen
 
 RUSSIAN SUPPLIES. 387 
 
 and treaty -makers ought really to give up the idea 
 of legislating for remote posterity of binding the 
 futurity of nations with diplomatic clauses and 
 sheets of parchment. The experience of late years 
 has not gone to prove the durability of such 
 arrangements. Where are now half of the articles 
 of the great 1815 treaty of Vienna ? Some of them 
 were not binding even for the short term of 1 5 
 years ! 
 
 As for the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris, 
 why, Russia is nearer to them now than she would 
 be if a.t Constantinople. If Russia should ever 
 contemplate operations against India, her basis 
 would be not Constantinople but Trebizond, on the 
 Black Sea, close to her own resources close to 
 that land of plenty, the Crimea. For many a year 
 to come Constantinople and its contiguous provinces 
 could afford next to nothing in the shape of sup- 
 plies. At this moment, by maintaining a simple 
 ukase, the Emperor Nicholas might half starve the 
 city of Constantinople itself. I saw this almost 
 happen during the Russian war of 1828-9. About 
 the end of August, 1828, Nicholas did issue a 
 ukase, cutting off the supplies of corn from all his 
 ports on the Black Sea, which are, as I have said, 
 the real great exporters of corn. Bread, butter, 
 salted meats, and all the many articles of food 
 
 2 c 2
 
 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 which the Turkish capital derived then, and still 
 derives, from Russia, immediately became dear and 
 soon alarmingly scarce ; and it is certain that not only 
 the Turkish army in the field, but Constantinople, 
 Adrianople, and all the larger towns of Thrace, 
 suffered severely in consequence of the ukase. In 
 the winter of 1848-9, except some very bad mutton 
 and some game, nearly every morsel of victuals 
 we put into our mouths at Constantinople was 
 brought down from the Russian ports on the Black 
 Sea. Nearly all the bread consumed was made of 
 Odessa corn. At that period, when some of Res- 
 chid Pasha's silly vapouring Turks were talking of 
 going to war wijth Russia, our Pera host told one 
 of them that he hoped they would do nothing of 
 the sort ; for that, if they did, Turks, rayahs, and 
 Franks, would soon be starved out of the city. It 
 is strange that, in these long Parliamentary de- 
 bates, no one should have noticed the fact that 
 Turkey is dependent upon Russia for the very staff 
 of life. 
 
 With the alarming state of the corn market in 
 every country in the west of Europe, are England 
 and France in a condition to supply the wants of 
 Turkey ? Alas ! in spite of all the brilliant pre- 
 dictions of our free-traders, we may soon find to 
 our terrible cost, that Russia has a famine power
 
 UNREASONABLE FEAR FOR INDIA. 389 
 
 over us and a considerable portion of the continent. 
 This year the crops in Moldavia and Wallachia 
 have been most abundant, and but for this unwise 
 quarrel with the Emperor Nicholas their exports 
 would have kept down our prices. By closing the 
 ports and embargoing all the shipping in the 
 Black Sea, the Tzar can fight a more effective 
 battle than he could do with cannon-balls and 
 bayonets ! My ingenious and experienced friend, 
 Robert Schneider, Esq., told the free-traders at 
 the hour of their triumph, that the alteration of 
 our corn-laws would throw this tremendous power 
 into the hands of Russia. 
 
 Every allusion to India is sure strongly to excite 
 our susceptibilities and this because we all feel 
 that we hold the country by a military tenure, and 
 that, as we gained the country by the sword, so 
 must we maintain it. But Constantinople, I repeat, 
 is not the way to India ; and, to use a Turkish 
 figure, a great deal of water will flow down the 
 Danube ere Russia seriously turns her eyes in the 
 direction of the Himalaya mountains and the 
 plains of Hindustan. But, after all, the truth is, 
 that a Russian invasion and conquest of India is 
 but a fantastic dream. No thinking, well-informed 
 man, in his waking moments and sober senses, 
 imagines the possibility of the thing, or fancies it
 
 390 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 even probable that any nation whatever, without 
 the command of the sea and of immense pecu- 
 niary resources, would be mad enough even to 
 make the attempt, 
 
 Supposing Russia to have marched safely through 
 Persia, and to be in possession of Herat, it would 
 then take that army five months to march from 
 Herat to the nearest British frontier ; and after that 
 there would be a march (to Calcutta) of at least 
 1 500 miles, which would occupy four months more, 
 even supposing the climate, our armies, and our 
 fortresses, offered no resistance, and that John Bull 
 (who in one half the whole time mentioned could 
 send an army from the banks of the Thames) were 
 to look on with his hands in his pockets and do 
 nothing.* By taking possession of the island of 
 Karrack in the Persian Gulf (as we did in 1838), 
 we can at any time have the Shah of Persia's do- 
 minions completely within our grasp ; we can dis- 
 embark any force we please at Bushire within a 
 fortnight of its quitting Bombay, and possess our- 
 selves of some of the chief towns of Persia before 
 the people at large could be made aware that hos- 
 tilities were intended. It has been pointed out 
 by a distinguished foreign traveller and writer, 
 
 * See an excellent article in the 'Spectator' of July 27th, 
 1839.
 
 MR. LAYAED. 391 
 
 that, if all the powers of the Russian empire were 
 exerted in equipping an army for the invasion of 
 India, and if that mighty army, overcoming obsta- 
 cles that are scarcely to be overcome by any army 
 of any size, reached the western borders of Be- 
 loochistan in safety, with its complete mate'riel, a 
 descent by the British on Bushire would put us in 
 possession of all the communications of that army, 
 compel Persia at her peril to act against it, and 
 place the rear of that army, and the line of its 
 advance and relief, completely at our mercy.* 
 
 Although few things done or said now-a-days in 
 the House of Commons excite my surprise, I am 
 astonished that so clever and so original-minded a 
 man as Mr. Layard should take up this hackneyed, 
 worn-out, ridiculous idea of Russian conquest in 
 India, or that he should invoke a bugbear which 
 really ought not to frighten a babe in the nursery. 
 
 I perfectly agree with this distinguished tra- 
 veller that it would never do to set up a Greek 
 empire or kingdom in Constantinople, with domi- 
 nion over all the Sclavonic races now dwelling in 
 European Turkey and, this in good part, because 
 these races are antagonistic to the Greeks, and a 
 deep-seated, ancient antipathy separates the Greeks 
 
 * ' The British Empire in the East.' By Count Bjornstjerna. 
 Translated by H. Evans Lloyd. London : 1840.
 
 392 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 from them. I believe, with Mr. Layard, that the 
 Greeks would be oppressors and persecutors in 
 matters of religion, and that in nearly all other 
 matters they would, for a long time, make very 
 bad masters, and be quite insufferable as a domi- 
 nant race. But I can believe that the Greeks 
 would improve, and that, if left to themselves and 
 by themselves, they might be formed into a settled, 
 thriving, and distinct state, occupying the Turkish 
 ports on the Black Sea, Constantinople, and the 
 whole of Thrace as far as Adrianople, or rather as 
 far as Philippopoli in the upper valley of the Hebrus, 
 Above Philippopoli the Bulgaro-Slave element pre- 
 dominates, and (with the Sclavonian intermixture 
 of the Servians) may be said to have the soil 
 almost entirely to itself. But Mr. Layard is de- 
 cidedly wrong in asserting, or insinuating, that the 
 Greek population is confined chiefly to the pro- 
 vince of Thessaly, and that elsewhere they are 
 merely scattered through the country in detached 
 communities, living among Sclavonians and Bul- 
 garians, " who form the real Christian population 
 of Turkey in Europe." * Now, save and except at 
 
 Mr. Layard adds " The language of these races is not 
 Greek." Of course not it is Slave. But all these races belong 
 to the Greek Church, and the community of faith would unite 
 them with the Greeks against the Turks. But there would 
 remain as I allow the antipathy of races.
 
 GREEKS AND SLAVES. 393 
 
 the town of Kirk-Klissia (Forty Churches), where 
 there are about 1 00 families, there is not a Bul- 
 garian housekeeper, or any other Slave household, 
 between Constantinople and Adrianople. As fixed 
 population, the Slave element does not descend 
 below Philippopoli. In Thrace, or between the capital 
 and the Hebrus, there are Bulgarian shepherds and 
 Bulgarian farm-labourers ; but these do not bring 
 their families with them, and they generally come 
 down in the spring, and return in the autumn to their 
 own country above Philippopoli. The Greeks people 
 those numerous, large, crowded villages of the Bos- 
 phorus ; they swarm in the capital, at Selyria, at Ro- 
 dosto, at Tchorlu, at Bourgas, at Demotica, and at 
 every town between Constantinople and the Hebrus, 
 in which not a Slave is to be seen as a fixed resident. 
 In the city of Adrianople itself there were, in 1848, 
 80,000 inhabitants, the Greeks far out-numbering 
 all the other rayahs and all the Turks put to- 
 gether, there not being a single Bulgarian or other 
 Slave family in the place.* Wherever we saw a 
 little village denoting something like neatness and 
 prosperity, it was Greek; wherever we saw a 
 tolerably good patch of cultivation, the ground was 
 
 * All the Bulgarian ladies that M. Blanqui saw dancing at the 
 French Consul's at Adrianople were Greek ; but this traveller, 
 like his compatriot M. Cyprien Robert, was looking for Bul- 
 garians, and framing a political theory, and was predetermined 
 to find Bulgarians everywhere.
 
 394 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 tilled and cropped by Greeks. I know not where 
 he got his statistics in a county where there are no 
 returns to be relied upon ; but Mr. Layard (no 
 doubt in the heat of debate) confidently affirmed 
 that the Greek population, in all European Turkey, 
 was only 1,750,000. I will not be confident, but 
 I believe that, if you multiply Mr. Layard's figures 
 by 2, you get nearer to the amount. 
 
 Some theorists would either erect Bulgaria into 
 a separate state, or join it to Servia, which is 
 peopled by Slaves, and which has now for nearly 
 a quarter of a century enjoyed, under the pro- 
 tection of Russia and Austria, and the guarantees 
 of the other Christian powers, an almost total in- 
 dependence of the Sultan and the Porte. Thus 
 three, or only two, Christian states (of the same 
 faith, though otherwise differing) would occupy 
 the whole of European Turkey, about one-half of 
 the country being held by the Slaves, and the 
 other by the Greeks. But, unfortunately, as yet, 
 Servia has shown little aptitude for self-govern- 
 ment, and the traditions of Bulgaria are all grim 
 and bloody. Since their emancipation the Ser- 
 vians have made almost as many revolutions, or 
 attempts at revolution, as the French essayed be- 
 tween the years 1829 and 1850: they have two 
 rival dynasties of pig-drivers who are never quiet, 
 and who are at this moment threatening the
 
 CONGRESS OF CHRISTIAN POWERS. 395 
 
 country with fresh revolution or civil war. But, 
 say the theorists, Servia, Bulgaria, and the Greek 
 states might be governed or directed by a 
 Protective Council, composed of Russians, Aus- 
 trians, French, and English, and for some years a 
 joint military force might be maintained to keep 
 them in order and show them the right way. I 
 am thoroughly convinced that the Greeks, and still 
 more the ruder Slaves, would require such coercion 
 and guidance ; but I much doubt the feasibility of 
 the scheme. Yet let even this be tried rather than 
 sustain the moribund Ottoman government or go 
 to war with a Christian power for its support. The 
 distribution of the parts of the empire of the 
 Sultan must and will, at some not distant day, be 
 left to the decision of a congress of all Christen- 
 dom. If such a decision could be made without 
 being preceded by the horrors of a warfare among 
 the Christian powers, the advantage of dispossess- 
 ing the Turks would be unalloyed, and the blessing 
 complete. Wage war as you will, it must come to 
 this at last a Congress, and the expulsion of the 
 Turks, as a governing power, from Europe and 
 good part of Asia Minor. No arrangement or 
 lasting settlement can be effected on any other 
 conditions ; prop up Turkey and leave her as she 
 is, and she will be a standing casu-s belli, exposing 
 every year the peace of Christendom to a sudden
 
 396 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 interruption. At present, as Mr. Layard has said, 
 the question is not settled, but only deferred. 
 
 There is some fanciful matter in it, and there 
 are in it some of those baseless fabrics which com- 
 pose visions ; but one of the best plans of distri- 
 bution which I have seen appeared recently in a 
 London weekly journal.* I feel great pleasure in 
 quoting the whole of the scheme. 
 
 A " SOLUTION" OF THE TURKISH QUESTION. 
 
 " Vois 1'empire d'Othman dcroulant de toutes parts 
 Ce grand corps d6chirc, dout les divers dpars 
 Languissent disperses, sans honneur et sans vie ; 
 Sur ces debris cT fslam elevens la Chretiennete"." 
 
 MAHOMET de Voltaire. 
 
 " Whatever may be the result of the negotiations 
 now pending on the much-vexed Turkish question, 
 no man in his senses can believe that the aspect of 
 political affairs is about to assume anything like a 
 settled appearance in European Turkey. 
 
 " The subject of the Russian occupation of the 
 Danubian provinces will still remain a fruitful 
 source of anger and jealousy to those diplomatists 
 who are bent upon upholding the entirety of the 
 Ottoman empire. 
 
 " Now I will venture to make two categorical 
 affirmations, however startling and unpalatable 
 they may be to our statesmen : 
 
 * 'The Press,' of Saturday, July 30th, 1853.
 
 PROPOSED SOLUTION. 397 
 
 " 1st. That Russia will never quit the princi- 
 palities. 
 
 11 2nd. That the progress of events will compel 
 her to cross the Balkan and advance upon Con- 
 stantinople. Time will show the error or truth of 
 this opinion. 
 
 " But supposing everything proceeds according 
 to the wishes of England and France, and that we 
 get the Sultan out of his present difficulty a diffi- 
 culty, be it remembered, which he has brought 
 upon himself by his own vacillating and deceitful 
 conduct towards Russia in the question of the Holy 
 Places* what guarantee have we that ere another 
 year elapses some fresh dilemma of our old and 
 faithful ally (/) may not force us again to rush to 
 the rescue, while all the commercial and political 
 relations of the civilised world are thrown into 
 convulsion ? It must be conceded, that while the 
 Sultan is at Constantinople the peaceable condition 
 of Europe is never secure for a day. We stand 
 perpetually on the brink of a volcano. Now, in 
 place of the Christian powers preparing to cut each 
 other's throats for the ridiculous purpose of up- 
 holding a throne which is crumbling to pieces, how 
 much more sensible would it be on their parts to 
 unite cordially, and intimate to the Sultan that lie 
 must withdraw from the false position in which 
 * See Appendix XI.
 
 398 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 he now stands, and accept an arrangement which, 
 though limiting his present empire, would really 
 place him in a condition much more befitting a 
 sovereign power? Let them escort him with all 
 honours to Brusa, the capital of his ancestors. 
 Asia Minor would make him a magnificent king- 
 dom, larger and more fertile than France. While 
 the Taurus, the Caucasus, and the Mediterranean 
 would be the boundaries on three sides, he would 
 retain the southern bank of the Dardanelles, which 
 should be open to the fleets of all Christian nations 
 indiscriminately, the forts on both sides being de- 
 molished. All interference by the Christian powers 
 on behalf of the Christian population of Asia Minor 
 should cease at once and altogether. The Sultan 
 should be left perfectly master of his own house. 
 What an efficient Mohammedan State would thus 
 be formed ! What agricultural resources would be 
 developed by the Mohammedan population which 
 would naturally congregate on its now barren 
 plains ! and it is needless to add what a wide 
 opening for British merchandise would here pre- 
 sent itself ! Smyrna might be declared a free port. 
 In place of substituting on the Bosphorus an Hel- 
 lenic empire, which the Christian powers would 
 have to uphold just as they are now doing the /Sultan, 
 and which would make Constantinople a focus of 
 intrigue and rival jealousies another Athens, in
 
 PROPOSED SOLUTION. 399 
 
 fact, on a larger scale the Grand Duke Constan- 
 tine, second son of the Emperor of Russia, should 
 be called upon to assume the Byzantine crowa, 
 having for a 'new and independent kingdom Mol- 
 davia, Wallachia, Bulgaria, and Roumelia east of 
 the Rhodope mountains. Bosnia, Servia, and the 
 Herzegovine would be given to Austria. Greece 
 would be enlarged by the addition of Epirus and 
 Thessaly, and some islands in the Archipelago. 
 England, in possession of Sarpente, Mytilene, and 
 Rhodes, would be in a position to maintain her 
 maritime influence in the Mediterranean. Egypt 
 and Syria would be erected into one kingdom, of 
 which the crown might be offered to His Royal 
 Highness the Duke of Cambridge. The Christian 
 sects in Syria, so jealous of each other, would thus 
 be secured from the evil effects of sectarian hatred, 
 under the tolerant sway of a Protestant dynasty. 
 The Christians of Asia Minor might be at liberty 
 to emigrate into this new Christian state. The 
 Mosque of Omar at Jerusalem should be restored 
 to the Jews, who might thus once more offer up 
 worship to Jehovah in their beloved temple. How 
 the sons of Judah and Israel would flock to Pales- 
 tine under such a dispensation ! How soon would 
 Syria become the glory of all lands, with its har- 
 bours cleared out, its communications facilitated, 
 the capabilities of its wondrous soil evoked ! France
 
 400 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 would extend her sceptre over Tunis and Tripoli, 
 and, having one or two of the islands of the 
 Archipelago in addition, would be enabled to take 
 her fair share in the balance of power" in the Medi- 
 terranean. Morocco would be guaranteed for ever 
 its independence. Thus at each end of the Medi- 
 terranean would exist two bond fide Mohammedan 
 states, while Christian kingdoms would arise 
 along its shores. Now, I ask, with such an arrange- 
 ment what has England or France what has any 
 power to fear from seeing the Grand Duke Con- 
 stantine at Constantinople? Nothing, absolutely 
 nothing. Greeae would be the natural ally of 
 France ; Egypt and Syria, together with the new 
 Turkey, of England. Would it not be much 
 more sensible for the Christian powers to act 
 thus in concord, for the benefit of humanity and 
 civilisation, than to proceed in the mad career 
 of squabbling about the maintenance of a power 
 which is virtually defunct ? Christianity has only 
 to will its ascendancy over Islamism, and it is 
 effected, and, when once accomplished, the Moham- 
 medans themselves will be the first to bless the 
 change." 
 
 I believe that the proper place for the Turks is 
 not merely beyond the Bosphorus and Hellespont, 
 but beyond the Euphrates ; and I do not believe
 
 AUSTEIA AND HER SUBJECTS. 401 
 
 that the Jews, in the teeth of a divine prophecy, 
 will be re-established, now, at Jerusalem. But, for 
 the present moment, these are minor considerations. 
 It will be a great deal to get the Turks fairly out 
 of Christendom. The populations of Servia, Bos- 
 nia, and the Turkish portion of the Herzegovine 
 (for Austria has already a part of that country) 
 would assimilate, blend, and amalgamate with their 
 neighbours the Slave populations of the Austrian 
 empire. But I would give to the House of Haps- 
 burg a much larger share in the partition, and 
 secure to her, by a European treaty, and the gua- 
 rantee of all the great powers, the free navigation 
 of the Danube, from the frontiers of Hungary to 
 the embouchures on the Black Sea. Wanting 
 this free outlet, the superabundant productions of 
 the Hungarian kingdom must be dwindled and 
 almost stifled within the limits of that kingdom. 
 In spite of the diurnal abuse heaped upon the 
 government of Austria, it is a government admi- 
 rably suited to semi- civilised races of men, and 
 a disorderly or bad government for none. The 
 Croatians, and all the Slave tribes under its rule, 
 are making not a rapid but a steady progress in 
 civilisation. From what I have seen and know of 
 it I am not disposed to congratulate Europe on 
 the vast expansion of the Slave element. But we 
 
 2 D
 
 402 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 cannot help this element's being so very numerous, 
 and really so very powerful. The Slaves must 
 have room and dominion. But I would copiously 
 interfuse the Germanic element ; I would plant 
 colonies of industrious Saxons, such as Austria has 
 long since established and with immense advan- 
 tage to the country and to herself in Transyl- 
 vania I would introduce colonies of other labo- 
 rious Germans along the banks of the Danube, 
 in Bosnia, Bulgaria, Servia, and the Herzegovine, 
 where millions of acres have been lying fallow 
 for many centuries. These colonies would abate 
 the spirit of Panslavism, and greatly improve the 
 Slaves. There is abundance of room for the poor 
 Germans without their quitting the Fatherland 
 for ever to repair to the backwoods of America or 
 the wilds of Australia. 
 
 Sir Stratford Canning, in 1828, contended long 
 and manfully, though in vain, for a very different 
 frontier to the new kingdom of Greece. He would 
 fain have rendered that kingdom far more extensive 
 he would have given to her a part or the whole of 
 Thessaly, a region inhabited almost exclusively by 
 Greeks. I cannot credit that he, as Lord Stratford 
 de Redcliffe, will oppose in 1853 that which he pro- 
 posed and vehemently urged in 1828. The frontier 
 of Greece ought to be advanced towards Thrace.
 
 TUKKISH CONVERSION EASY. 403 
 
 For years to come the Byzantine kingdom (Con- 
 stantinople being the capital) ought to be ruled by 
 an absolute sovereign, of an iron will and an iron 
 hand. Nothing short of this will keep the 
 Greeks within the limits of toleration, law, and 
 order. Encourage their municipal institutions, for 
 which they have great aptitude, as much as pos- 
 sible ; let them administer the internal affairs of 
 their own cities, towns, villages, and communities ; 
 let them apportion their own taxes ; but avoid 
 granting them anything like a democratic or liberal 
 constitution, which would be nothing but an apple 
 of discord, and a letting loose of all the mischiefs 
 and woes of the box of Pandora. Look at the 
 condition of the constitutionalised kingdom of 
 King Otho, and take warning from it ! 
 
 I reassert my conviction that the conversion of 
 the Turks to Christianity (were its ascendancy 
 once established) would not be found so difficult a 
 matter. I never met the Turk that was not grati- 
 fied by having passages of our Old or of our New 
 Testament translated to him. As I have repeatedly 
 said, they are fast ceasing to be Mahometans. 
 In 1848 nearly every day afforded us some ocular 
 proof, of more or less importance, that the devo- 
 tional feelings of the Turks were rapidly on the 
 decline, and yet that their hatred and injustice 
 
 2 D 2
 
 404 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 towards the Christian rayah subjects were not at 
 all decreasing. In walking through the streets of 
 Constantinople (generally on our way to the house 
 of our good friend Mr. Sang, at Psammattia) we 
 two or three times came upon some Turks who 
 were beating small drums and playing off a 
 strange masquerade. Some of them were tall 
 young men, wearing white turbans of unusual 
 dimensions, bearing old Turkish shields on their 
 left arms, and carrying and brandishing scimitars 
 in their right hands. They performed a sort of 
 wild war-dance in the street, striking their shields 
 with their swords, and making, all together, a terrible 
 clatter. People from some of the Mussulman 
 houses threw them out small coins. We took them 
 for troops of morrice-dancers, but were informed 
 that they were collecting money for the annual 
 pilgrimage to Mecca, and that some of the mock 
 warriors intended to go on that holy expedition. 
 The Turks have introduced the fashion of perform- 
 ing the pilgrimage vicariously. In former times a 
 rich and devout Turk would, out of his own single 
 purse, defray the expenses of the long journey, and 
 give a considerable sum to the man that repre- 
 sented him at the tomb of the Prophet, taking 
 credit with Heaven for the outlay, and assuming 
 that what was done by his delegate was done by
 
 VICARIOUS PILGRIMAGES. 405 
 
 himself and for himself. As they grew poorer, 
 two or three Turks would club together to pay a 
 poor fellow, and make a hadji of him, dividing the 
 spiritual advantages among themselves. As they 
 grew irreligious, the beys and effendis gave up 
 these practices ; and it is now-a-days most rarely 
 that Turkish gentlemen of Stamboul have any 
 concern whatever in these pilgrimages. Such 
 liadjis as go from the capital are a set of hungry, 
 destitute men, who dance and beg through the 
 streets for the wherewithal ; and it not unfrequently 
 happens that some of them, after thus levying con- 
 tributions, desert the caravan on the first day's 
 march, or go no further into Asia than to the 
 suburb of Scutari. It was only from the poorest 
 houses that the donations of halfpence and farthings 
 were made ; the Turks of superior condition seemed 
 to regard the dancing hadjis as mere mummers. 
 The substance is gone, but the shadow remains. 
 On the 14th of June a great firing of guns at 
 Constantinople announced the departure for Scu- 
 tari of the Surre Emini, or chief of the pilgrims 
 and commander of the caravan, who is annually 
 appointed with great form and ceremony by the 
 Sultan, receiving from that representative of the 
 Caliphs a certain green flag and a round sum of 
 money. The Surre Emini remained a few days
 
 406 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 at Scutari that the pilgrims might collect around 
 him, and he then took his departure for the interior 
 of Asia, followed by a motley group of some few score 
 of ragged desperate vagabonds. We did not see 
 the sight, being engaged elsewhere, but we were as- 
 sured by some who went over to Scutari that it was 
 a deplorable expedition, far worse this year than the 
 year before, and that for the last fifteen years the 
 pilgrimage to Mecca had been growing more and 
 more a sham, and thinner and meaner. The very 
 few Turks of condition that now go to Mecca 
 shorten the fatigues of the journey by repairing 
 to the coast of Syria or Egypt in steamboats. 
 
 The Mussulman Church, if we can give it that 
 name, is being rent asunder by schism and infidelity. 
 
 There is a numerous and a rapidly increasing 
 sect called Bektash. According to the account I 
 received from a Bektashji, some of their tenets 
 bear a certain resemblance to those of the Waha- 
 bees, or Mussulman reformers of Arabia: they 
 hold our Saviour to be greater than Mahomet ; 
 they regard with scorn the notion of an hereditary 
 Caliphate, and the claims of the Emirs, or green- 
 heads, to be entitled to reverence as the descend- 
 ants of the Prophet ; they despise circumcision, 
 and all rites and ceremonies whatsoever; they 
 esteem charity, mutual benevolence, tranquillity,
 
 BEKTASH. 407 
 
 and an unmurmuring submission to whatever may 
 befall them, as the cardinal and saving virtues. 
 Then- faith is limited to the belief in the one God, 
 and in the immortality of the soul. Christians or 
 Israelites are admissible in their ranks, and are to 
 be treated as brothers, if their conduct prove them 
 to be true Bektashjis. They are bound to befriend 
 one another on all occasions, and to stand by one 
 another in all cases of attack or other danger. 
 They have signs and a shibboleth, and a sort of 
 secret society, gergo, by which they can make 
 themselves known, and express their freemasonry. 
 I should have apprehended the contrary, but my 
 informant a Greek Christian assured me that, 
 if the Bektashjis were not better, they certainly 
 were not worse than the other Turks. He con- 
 fessed that in the towns many of the men who 
 more or less secretly banded together as Bektashjis 
 were very depraved men, who turned religious 
 liberty into libertinage. "But then," said he, 
 " these men are not true Bektashjis, for they be- 
 lieve not in a God they are Turkish atheists ; and 
 I am told there are many of them. They make 
 their happiness and glory consist in gratifying all 
 their passions, however violent and brutal they 
 may be. The true Bektashji prides himself on 
 subduing his passions and despising pleasure and
 
 408 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 pain : your true Bektashji is a stoic as I am, by 
 practice and necessity." These sectarians abounded 
 at Mohalich, and in all the country round the lakes 
 of Apollonia and Magnass ; they were known to 
 be numerous at Brusa and all through that plain ; 
 so at Kutayah, and in the country beyond that 
 city. All that I gleaned concerning them tended 
 to the belief that, though not engaged in any 
 positive conspiracy, like the Carbonari in Italy, 
 they would gladly witness the overthrow of the 
 Ottoman government, and would be not unlikely 
 to conspire at a favourable opportunity. The re- 
 ligious indifferentism of the Turks will continue to 
 swell the ranks of the Bektashjis. All those of 
 our acquaintance who had travelled much in Tur- 
 key were aware of the existence and great extension 
 of this society, although, like myself, they were 
 not admitted into its penetralia. They all believed 
 that its tendency was adverse to Church and state, 
 and that, if the sect continued to grow and expand, 
 there would be an end in Turkey to the Maho- 
 metan faith. 
 
 The prospect might be agreeable if we could see 
 at the end of the vista a purer belief. But for 
 that the ground is nowhere laid. Bishop South- 
 gate than whom few travellers have seen more of 
 Turkey came to the conclusion, some years before
 
 TURKISH MILLENNIUM. 409 
 
 I did, that the spirit of Islam was already nearly 
 extinct. He told me that he found proofs of this 
 wherever he went, whether in European Turkey, 
 in Asia Minor, in the regions lying along the Tigris 
 &2.A Euphrates, or in those beyond Mount Taurus ; 
 and he has given numerous instances in his very 
 interesting volumes of travels, which are before 
 the public, though less generally known in Eng- 
 land than they deserve to be. 
 
 The Turks themselves seem generally to be con- 
 vinced that their final hour is approaching. " We 
 are no longer Mussulmans the Mussulman sabre 
 is broken the Osmanlees will be driven out of 
 Europe by the Ghiaours, and driven through Asia 
 to the regions from which they first sprang. It is 
 Kismet ! We cannot resist Destiny !" I heard 
 words to this effect from many Turks, as well in 
 Asia as in Europe ; and the like were heard by 
 Bishop Southgate in many and remote parts of 
 the empire. Some consoled themselves with the 
 dream of a very strange Millennium : after a long 
 series of years, and an entire abasement of the Mus- 
 sulman creed and of Mussulman peoples, Jesus, 
 the Great Prophet, would return to earth, gather 
 up the scattered fragments of the believers of 
 Mahomet, reanimate their faith and their ancient 
 valour, and give them, until the world's end, do-
 
 410 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 minion over all the world ; with one religion, and 
 one unbroken, undisturbed peace and happiness. 
 
 This belief was startling. I repeatedly asked 
 whether it was not the return of Mahomet that 
 they looked for ? but I was as constantly told that 
 it was not Mahomet, but Jesus the Jesus wor- 
 shipped by the Christians whom they expected 
 in the fulness of time to complete the great scheme 
 which Mahomet had only begun. 
 
 I can conceive and hope that at no great dis- 
 tance of time some Christian missionary, perhaps 
 some gifted youth now in training in the Church 
 of England Missionary College of St. Augustine's, 
 Canterbury, near to the restored walls of which 
 I first wrote these lines, may avail himself of this 
 remarkable belief, and turn it to the spiritual ad- 
 vantage of those who entertain it. The Turkish 
 government once broken up, I cannot believe that 
 the conversion of the poorer Turks to Christianity 
 would be a work of very great difficulty.* 
 
 * I will bestow, in the Appendix, a few words upon Rescind 
 Pasha, leader of Turkish Reform, Grand Vizier, &c. &c.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 I. ARTILLERY, TC. 
 
 "WHEN last summer General Wrangel took leave of his 
 Majesty the Emperor Nicholas, the latter presented him with 
 a letter, and said, ' When you get to Constantinople look a 
 little more closely at the Turkish artillery ; it is one of the 
 best in Europe. We owe this to you Prussians. It will 
 require hard teeth to crack that nut.' General Wrangel has 
 looked at the Turkish artillery and pronounced its efficiency 
 excellent. 
 
 " In the arsenal of Tophana, in Constantinople, there are 
 1500 tubes for field-artillery quite newly cast. The manu- 
 facture of Tophana, managed by an Englishman, and fur- 
 nished with a steam-engine, works away continually. A 
 great number of new field-carriages now mounting form a 
 pretty considerable reserve."* 
 
 But General Wrangel could not have seen much artillery 
 of this high order. From what I learned by my own obser- 
 vation and from information of others I do not believe that 
 even at this moment the Turks could turn out more than 
 six field-batteries of such artillery. 
 
 But what signify fine guns in the hands of a people so 
 habitually negligent and careless? At the time of the 
 quarrel about Kossuth, Bern, and Co., when the Porte was 
 raising such an obstreperous and ridiculous war-cry, and 
 when we were sending our fleet to the Dardanelles to beard 
 
 * Zuftand der Turkeii im Jahre der Prophezeihung 1853. You- 
 Hubert von Boehn. Berlin, 1853.
 
 412 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the Tzar, an English officer passed some artillery on march : 
 the carriages were good, the guns excellent and cleanly kept, 
 and all the appliances were in tolerable order ; but when he 
 came to look at the ammunition he found that there was not a 
 ball would fit the pieces or enter the mouth of one of them. 
 The guns being of one calibre, they had carried ball of another! 
 Fancy such artillery in the face of an enemy. 
 
 The artillery has long been the favourite and honoured 
 arm with the government. It was with his artillery that 
 Sultan Mahinoud destroyed the Janissaries. 
 
 So early as the year 1796 General Aubert Dubayet, am- 
 bassador from the French republic to the Porte, introduced 
 a reform in the personnel and materiel of the Turkish artillery. 
 The famous Baron de Tott had laboured on the same object a 
 good many years before this French general. Dubayet also 
 organised a squadron of cavalry in the French manner (which 
 was certainly no improvement), and taught the French drill 
 to a few hundreds of infantry soldiers. The Janissaries 
 obstinately refused to be instructed. Some of the-disciplined 
 troops, acting under Sir Sidney Smith, behaved very well at 
 the defence of Acre, and this so delighted Sultan Selim that 
 on their return he created them a special and independent 
 corps, increased their pay, built them a spacious barrack, and 
 denominated them Nizam Djeditts or New Regulars. He 
 attended their exercise and appeared to be delighted with 
 their manojuvres. They were instructed by Europeans, who, 
 however, were never admitted as officers in the corps unless 
 they previously renounced their faith. 
 
 The Mufti, Oulemas, Sheiks, and Imams, regarded these 
 military establishments with jealousy and alarm. They 
 secretly denounced the new order of things, which they re- 
 presented as contrary to the laws and religion of the empire, 
 and soon succeeded in exciting the Janissaries to rebel. The 
 regulars were attacked, their barracks set on fire, and those 
 who escaped death fled into the provinces and were dispersed. 
 The deposition of Sultan Selim followed. His imbecile 
 cousin Mustapha became sultan, but only for a few months.
 
 APPENDIX. 413 
 
 Mustapha Bairactar, Pasha of Rudshuk, who remained faith- 
 ful to his deposed sovereign, a rare instance in Turkey, 
 effected another revolution, and with a chosen troop forced 
 the serraglio, and demanded the person of Selim. Sultan 
 Mustapha, suddenly advised of what was in progress, got 
 privately into the palace and sent a black eunuch to tell the 
 Bairactar that his old master should immediately be delivered 
 up to him, at the same time ordering another of those black 
 wretches to strangle Selim forthwith. The Bairactar found 
 only the corpse of his master. Mustapha, however, was seized 
 and condemned to the same prison in which he had kept 
 Selim, and his own brother Mahmoud, whom also he would 
 have put to death if time had been allowed him, and if Mah- 
 moud had not concealed himself beneath a heap of carpets 
 and mats, where he was found by the Bairactar. At this time 
 Mahmoud, father of the present sultan, was the only living 
 male of his race. He was at once proclaimed, and the Bairactar 
 became grand vizir. In this capacity the Pasha of Rudshuk, 
 on the day of his installation, caused thirty-three heads to 
 fall by the sword of the executioner : the assassins of Selim, 
 and the favourites of Sultan Mustapha, with a great many 
 officers, were strangled and thrown into the Bosphorus : all 
 the women of the serraglio attached to Mustapha were sewn 
 in sacks and cast into the sea. 
 
 The Bairactar recommenced the military reform, and consti- 
 tuted a special regular corps in the army under the name of 
 Seymens. In a short time the Janissaries rose in arms. 
 One night the whole neighbourhood of the Bairactar's house 
 burst out in flames, and he saw himself surrounded by fire 
 and his deadly enemies. The conflagration reached his house, 
 and the Janissaries put to death all who issued from it. But 
 no Bairactar made his appearance. It was afterwards found 
 that the unhappy old man, having got together his valuable 
 jewels and several bags of gold, shut himself up with one of 
 his favourite women and a black eunuch in a stone tower, in 
 the hope of escaping both the fire and the sword of his
 
 414 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 enemies. On digging out the ruins the three bodies were 
 discovered with the treasure lying by them. They had been 
 suffocated. 
 
 The Janissaries were now determined to reinstate Musta- 
 pha. To put this beyond their power his own brother Mah- 
 moud immediately caused him to be strangled. To disperse 
 the Janissaries, Cadi Pasha, who had got together the best of 
 the artillery, was sent out against them, and Cadi with his 
 guns swept the streets of Constantinople, and massacred all 
 who attempted to oppose him. The barracks of the Janis- 
 saries were burnt down. But even after this victory Mah- 
 moud was under the necessity of disbanding his regular 
 infantry and returning to the old order of things. An ana- 
 thema was denounced against any man who should even 
 speak of the military system of the Franks which had been 
 the cause of so many evils. 
 
 It took Sultan Mahmoud seventeen long years to prepare 
 the way for making another attempt at military reform. 
 The system of open front attack was changed for a slow, 
 insidious system of operation. Some of the Janissary chiefs 
 were won over, some were exiled, some privately murdered. 
 At last a majority of the Janissary officers signed a written 
 obligation to furnish from each of the ortas a hundred and 
 fifty men ready to submit to the new discipline ; and they 
 attached to the obligation, in the names of themselves and 
 their respective corps, an unqualified approval of the Sultan's 
 measure. Officers who had survived the sanguinary reactions 
 under Selim and the Bairactar, and other tacticians furnished 
 by the Pasha of Egypt, were appointed to drill and form the 
 men, whose prejudices were flattered with the change of a 
 word ; Nizam-attic (old regulation) being substituted for the 
 odious appellation of Nizam-djeditte (new ordinance). 
 
 Unusual attention was paid to the artillery, for it was 
 expected, and indeed desired, that there should be more 
 street fighting ; that the stupid Janissaries would rise, and 
 so give an opportunity for their total destruction.
 
 APPENDIX. 415 
 
 This happened in June, 1825. It was an affair of artillery 
 and grape-shot. The hero of the day was an artillery officer 
 known by the significant name of Kara-djeTiennem (or Black 
 Hell). When his people hesitated to discharge a cannon 
 loaded with grape against a dense mass of their countrymen, 
 fellow-citizens, and former comrades, this officer rushed to 
 the piece and fired it by discharging his pistol over the 
 priming. This gun, and another with the same officer, may 
 be said to have pealed the knell of the Janissaries. Of 
 course the artillery rose still higher in estimation. 
 
 II. PORTRAITS OF SULTAN MAHMOUD. 
 
 Bishop Southgate says, " The scene of the departing pil- 
 grims seemed to me, at the moment at least, a small proof 
 of the remaining vigour of Islamism ; but it was followed in 
 a few days by another which looked more like decay. On 
 the 4th of August (1836) it was announced that a portrait 
 of the Sultan was to be presented to the cavalry barracks 
 near Pera, and I thought the occasion worthy of attention. 
 A similar honour had already been conferred on several 
 public buildings, and it was intended that others still should 
 share it. Before my final departure from Constantinople in 
 the summer of 1838, a woful misrepresentation of the royal 
 features was to be seen in most, if not all, the barracks, in 
 several of the public offices, and in the cabins of some of the 
 ships of war. Upon the day of which I spoke the Sultan 
 himself was expected to be present, and the crowd collected 
 to witness the ceremony was immense. There were pointed 
 out to me representatives of twelve different nations, 
 among whom were Turks, Arabs, Persians, Greeks, Arme- 
 nians, Jews, and Circassians, distinguished by their different 
 garbs and features. Then came the races of Europe, homo- 
 geneous at least in their outward man ; and here and there
 
 416 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 appeared a solitary American. I was astonished at the 
 throngs of Turkish women, aud to see them moving about at 
 liberty, excepting some of those belonging to the harems of 
 the great, who were seated in gaudy arubas drawn by grey 
 
 oxen After the crowd had remained for hours in the 
 
 most exemplary endurance of a hot sun and clouds of dust, 
 the approach of the calvacade was announced by the roar of 
 cannon, and long trains of cavalry and infantry soon ap- 
 peared, followed by the Keraskier Pasha, the commander-iu- 
 cbief of the army. He was a short and stout personage, 
 with an intelligent face and a silvery beard, the same that 
 now holds the first place in the councils of the new Sultan. 
 After him came a beautiful carriage drawn by four horses, 
 moving in solemn state in the van of the Sultan's body- 
 guard. The crowd beat eagerly forward to catch a glimpse 
 of the royal person. But he was not there. The interior 
 was occupied only by the likeness of himself ; the portrait 
 for which all this stir and ceremony had been created lay 
 carefully \ipon luxurious cushions and covered with a rich 
 cloth. The procession entered beneath the arch that led to 
 the interior court of the barracks, where the act of presenta- 
 tion was performed. It consisted simply of a prayer offered 
 by an Imaum, at the close of which the multitude responded 
 with a loud Amen. 
 
 " I went away from the scene lost in reflection. Here, 
 said I to myself, is a palpable violation of the commands of 
 the Koran, and a gross outrage upon the prejudices of Mus- 
 sulmans, perpetrated by the acknowledged head of the reli- 
 gion, and the avowed successor of its founder. And it is 
 just such as would most scandalize serious and devout Mo- 
 hamedans. It is the representation of the human form, 
 which is of all most offensive to them ; and even that is not 
 a work of fancy, which would be regarded with greater in- 
 dulgence, but an actual resemblance of a living person ; and 
 to aggravate the insult to religion as much as possible, with- 
 out commanding adoration, this painted resemblance is con-
 
 APPENDIX. 417 
 
 veyed along the public ways with military pomp and amidst 
 the roar of cannon, consecrated by the sacred forms of reli- 
 gion, and set up before the eyes of all men. Even to the 
 subjects of a Christian prince such an act would appear like 
 an aspiration to divine honours, but to a Mussulman it must 
 seem downright idolatry."* 
 
 III. RECRUITING, OR MAN-CATCHING. 
 
 In the spring of 1848 we were going from Constantinople 
 to Nicomedia. The deck of the Turkish steamer was filthy, 
 and very much crowded with deck passengers ; and as they 
 had just smeared over the cabin with stinking paint, we could 
 not go below at all. The passengers were Turks military 
 officers and soldiers who were going into the interior of 
 Asia Minor men-hunting ; or, as they expressed it, for levy- 
 ing the conscription and collecting the recruits. 
 
 These Nimrods were in all about 160. They were divided 
 into eight gangs ; each gang having a captain, a katib or 
 clerk, an imaum to give spiritual comfort, and a hekim or 
 doctor to examine the recruits and to attend to the health of his 
 party. There were also three colonels, who were to fix them- 
 selves in the principal towns of the interior, and there see 
 the different gatherings collected and put in order to march 
 for Constantinople. Of the hekims, one was a grey-mous- 
 tached old Venetian, one was a young Frenchman, and the 
 third a melancholy young Swiss : the other five doctors were 
 Franks from Pera and Galata, who were said to have had no 
 sort of medical education. These last had not even studied 
 in Galata Serai. This man-catching up in Asia was consi- 
 dered very rough work. Such of the students of the Medical 
 
 * Tour through Armenia, Persia, &c. New York, 1840. Vol. i. 
 pp. 79-81. 
 
 2 E
 
 418 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 School as followed the profession tried to get better appoint- 
 ments. The Swiss was so melancholy, and the young 
 Frenchman seemed so ashamed at being found on such 
 service or with such a dirty vulgar rabble, that they shunned 
 our advances and would enter into no conversation. The 
 old Venetian, on the contrary, was only too forward and 
 talkative ; as he was dressed in Turkish uniform and wore a 
 sword, we needed no one to tell us that he was a renegade. 
 Not having followed his example, the Frenchman and the 
 Swiss had plain clothes and no sword. I have treated in 
 another book of the Venetian's politics, of his republicanism, 
 and of his predictions (which in the course of a few months 
 were pretty well verified), that Charles Albert would go out 
 like the snuff of a candle, and that the Italian liberals would 
 upset Pius IX. He was one of the cunningest and most roguish- 
 looking men I ever met with ; even in this country of sinister 
 countenances his struck us at the first glance. He was all 
 over thin and spare ; there was nothing of him for disease to 
 catch hold of, and, aged as he was, he was quick, hardy, and 
 alert. Without speaking kindly of his two Frank com- 
 panions, he spoke most contemptuously of the Perote hekims, 
 saying that it was because government employed such 
 fellows as those that there were so many hunchbacks and 
 miserable objects in the Sultan's army. From his own ac- 
 count of his history before he became a hekim in the East, I 
 saw reason to doubt whether he himself had ever received 
 even the rudiments of a medical education. He had been a 
 common soldier and a common sailor under Bonaparte, and 
 he had been a prisoner of war in England on board the 
 hulks. But whatever skill he might have acquired since, he 
 gave me fully to understand that he had not busied himself 
 with the acquisition of common honesty ; and from his own 
 narrative and comments I suspected that he too must have 
 sent a good many miserable objeots into the Sultan's army. 
 He had been man -hunting in the interior four or five years 
 successively. He told me that, though not very pleasant, it
 
 APPENDIX. 419 
 
 \vas rather profitable work ; and he explained how money 
 was to be made. The son of a Turk that has same property 
 is drawn to serve. Well ! the father or mother of the youth 
 secretly slips 200, 300, or mayhap 500 piastres into the palm 
 of the examining hekim bashi, and the hekim testifies that 
 the young man is unfit for the service, having a narrow, 
 weak chest, a flat foot, bad sight, or some other disqualifica- 
 tion. If the recruiting officers should, in certain cases, be 
 curious and doubtful, and examine the man drawn or to be 
 drawn, it is so easy, by the application of an unguent, to 
 raise a frightful-looking sore and to declare it to be an incur- 
 able ulcer. " These Turks," said the astuto Veneziano, 
 " are such born fools, such asses by nature, that a clever 
 fellow may do almost anything with them ; not but that we 
 medical officers are often obliged to divide our spoils with 
 the military officers ; and frequently the recruiting officers 
 do business on their own account, selling discharges without 
 our knowledge. As for conscription, as practised in Bona- 
 parte's time in France and Italy, it is all a c ... a (fudge) ; 
 it never touches the Turks who have money to spend ; the 
 Turks who have no money run away and hide themselves as 
 our parties approach, and we catch some of them as we can, 
 hap-hazard ; and if, when they are caught, any of them have 
 parents, or relatives, or friends, that can unpurse (chipossino 
 sborsare}, why, then, as a general rule, we let them i r o and 
 begin to hunt down others." Officers and men (the better 
 sort avoid this service and are apparently never sent on it) 
 were a most slovenly, ragged, frowsy company ; some were 
 dressed in uniforms that were greasy and out at elbow, 
 while others, for comfort and convenience, wore the old 
 Turkish costume, only without the turban ; none sporting 
 turbans except the imaums. Officers and men were mixed 
 in amicable confusion, laughing, talking, and smoking to- 
 gether. The captains had not only very dusty and ragged 
 coats, but also very dirty shirts. The imaums, as usual, 
 looked cleanly, and their big turbans were of a spotless 
 
 2 E 2
 
 420 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 white, but they were the only men on board that were un- 
 civil and insolent. One of the colonels, a man apparently 
 not above five-aud-forty, was an unwieldy mass of fat and 
 blubber, with an alarmingly short neck and a monstrous 
 abdomen. He had kept on a dirty pair of French boots and 
 a loose pair of black cloth pantaloons, but over these he wore 
 a Turkish silk jacket, padded within, and offering without 
 the delicate, feminine hue of the turquoise : sky-blue is not 
 the word, it was turquoise-blue a colour of which the Turks 
 are very fond. As we got into warm shelter under the 
 mountains of Asia he lay down in the sun, coiled up under 
 an umbrella, and he slept and snored during the greater part 
 of the voyage. I could not help wondering how this tub of 
 a man was ever to get over the tremendous mountains of the 
 interior ; nor could I help doubting whether he would ever 
 get back alive to Stamboul.* 
 
 IV. NAVY. 
 
 My old friend Captain Adolphus Slade, R.N., is making a 
 second essay to teach seamanship to the Turks. I cannot 
 believe that he will succeed where Admiral Sir Baldwin 
 Walker failed. I am astonished that he should have ven- 
 tured a second time on so hopeless and dangerous an experi- 
 ment. When he cruised with the Capitan Pasha in the 
 Black Sea, in the year 1829, he was every day astonished 
 that the ship was not blown up ; so careless were the Turks 
 about their gunpowder. If I remember right, the Lord High 
 Admiral of that date had shortly before been a barber, or a 
 vender of papoushes. The obstinacy of these Capitan Pashas 
 is commensurate with their ignorance. In the course of a 
 few months (1847-8) the Capitan Pasha was changed three 
 times, but the post was never filled by a sailor, or by a man 
 who knew anything of sea affairs. 
 
 * Turkey and its Destiny.
 
 APPENDIX. 421 
 
 V. DIFFICULTIES OF LANGUAGE. 
 
 To render European scientific terms, they are obliged to coin 
 new words, or to introduce some Arabic word, moulding it into 
 a new form or meaning. For scientific purposes they have 
 indeed to make almost an entirely new language ; and when 
 this is made, it is found to be unintelligible to the students. 
 I was told that a young man might learn French, so as to-be 
 able to read scientific books in the original, in a very little 
 more time than was necessary to him for acquiring this new 
 Turkish language of science. Then, again, people complained 
 that this last language was neither complete nor fixed ; that 
 many ideas, and even simple things, could not be expressed 
 in it ; that very often the translators were obliged to retain 
 French or Latin terms ; that the new word-makers did not 
 proceed upon any uniform system or principle, and that the 
 terminology of one was not that of another. In mathematics, 
 and, I believe, to a certain extent, in chemistry, the learned 
 katibs could get over the ground pretty well with the help 
 of Arabic ; but then the students had to learn this Arabic. 
 In all other sciences the difficulty was exceedingly great. 
 
 The Arabic characters used by the Turks, because the 
 Koran is written in them, are not at all suited to the genius 
 of the Turkish language. The Armenian characters suit it 
 far better, and the Armenians, who always correspond in 
 Turkish, and of whom exceedingly few know anything of 
 their own ancient tongue, use their own ancient letters. 
 
 I was sitting one morning with a very great Pasha, when 
 his secretary brought in the draught of a letter a simple 
 letter of business, and consisting of not more than six lines. 
 The Pasha glanced his eyes over it, said it was full of errors, 
 and called for pen and ink that he might correct it. He soon 
 gave up the task in despair, threw the paper on the ground, 
 and told the secretary that it must be re-written. In the 
 excitement of the moment he told me what I take to be the
 
 422 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 only truths I heard from his lips. He said that the Arabic 
 character was perplexing, and very ill suited to the Turkish 
 language ; that there was hardly a Turk in the empire that 
 could write his own language correctly, and that serious 
 misunderstandings were constantly occurring in government 
 correspondence. I afterwards heard that another very great 
 Pasha always sent some trusty servant to explain, viva 
 voce, the contents of his letter or despatch. I have seen 
 Turks of literary reputation spend half an hour in making 
 out the meaning of two or three lines of MS. 
 
 The Court Turkish is interlarded with Arabic and Persian 
 terms, of which the common people know nothing ; and it is 
 considered the perfection of style to render every sentence as 
 difficult as possible. Even of the Turks who have been to 
 school, there is not one in a thousand that can read off a 
 paper written by a courtly scribe. Thus the pasha of a 
 province is often left in almost total ignorance of the mean- 
 ing of the instructions or despatches he receives from head- 
 quarters. I believe that that great man, Mustapha Xource, 
 Pasha of Brusa, could neither read nor write. Not many of 
 the Pashas can do either. 
 
 VI. TURKISH LADIES. 
 
 It would be a great mistake to consider them merely as 
 the inmates of the harem, or as recluses or caged birds. 
 In 1848, if the Sultan's own women were caged, none others 
 Avere. His married sisters, as well as his mother, were con- 
 stantly abroad. The women of the pashas and other high 
 employe's were more out of doors (in the daytime) than our 
 fashionable and most stirring ladies during the London 
 season : they were to be seen every day, when the weather 
 was fine, on the Bosphorus, in the Golden Horn, in the 
 bazaars, on the great square, near the Seraskier's Tower, and
 
 APPENDIX. 423 
 
 in the streets; they were incessantly going and coming, 
 shopping and paying visits ; they were greater gadabouts 
 than the belles of Paris in the old and gay time. The 
 younger and handsomer of them took care that their yash- 
 macs should not conceal their faces. The gauze worn by 
 these dames of highest fashion was as transparent as the 
 famed textile of old Cos, and it was drawn across only the 
 chin and forehead. The bosom was exposed, as I have 
 already mentioned. From some of the handsomest and 
 greatest, one not unfrequently heard language which a 
 nymph or matron of Billingsgate would not use. 
 
 The poor Turks of the capital, who had got somewhat 
 accustomed to the spectacle, thought little of it, or said it 
 was Tanzimaut or Kismet. But the Osmanlees from the 
 interior, or from the Asiatic provinces, were struck all of a 
 heap. Not one of these Asiatics, if he returned soon to his 
 native district, but would report that the Prophet's beard 
 was denied in the Holy City, that the Osmanlees of Stam- 
 boul were all turning ghiaours, and their women worse ! 
 We saw one old Asiatic take his beard in his hand, toss his 
 nose in the air, and turn away from the sight, muttering 
 curses. 
 
 VII. AMUSEMENTS OF THE SULTANAS. 
 
 Mr the Consul of was walking one afternoon 
 
 in that most lovely valley of the Bosphorus called the 
 "Sweet Waters of Asia." Near an imperial kiosk, in the 
 midst of the valley, he saw, dancing or posture-making on 
 the fresh greensward, some half-dozen of itinerant dancing- 
 girls, of the lowest and most abandoned kind. Their per- 
 formance was so revolting, so barbarously obscene, that he 
 was about to quit the spot, when the Sultan's two married 
 sisters drove or rumbled up in a cochee (followed by nume- 
 rous and well-known attendants), and, alighting at the kiosk,
 
 424 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 joined some other ladies who had been witnessing the exhi- 
 bition from the windows of that building. After this august 
 arrival, and a short rest, the vile posture-makers went to 
 their work again. Shouts of laughter, and showers of small 
 coin, came out of the windows ; the more indecent the move- 
 ments or combination of movements, the louder was the 
 laughter ; and when the performance reached its utmost 
 climax, the ladies in the kiosk applauded with voice and 
 hand, and then threw out more money. 
 
 VIII. SHOORAHS, OB COUNCILS. 
 Here is a list of the Brusa Council : 
 
 TUBKS 
 
 1. MUSTAPHA NOUBEE PASHA, Governor. 
 
 2. MUSTA EFFENDI, Kehayah Bey, or Tefterdar. 
 
 3. THE KADI, Judge for Civil Matters. 
 
 4. THE MUFTI, Judge for Matters of Religion. 
 
 5. THE SHEIK SAFFETUI EFFENDI, Chief of a Religious 
 
 Institution. 
 
 6. HADJI ALI EFFENDI, Manager of Vakouf Property. 
 
 7. HADJI MULKTAB, Notable. 
 
 8. ABIF EFFENDI, Notable, and first Katib, or Clerk of 
 
 the Mekhemeh, or Turkish Law Court. 
 
 9. HADJI OMER EFFENDI, Notable. 
 
 RAYAHS 
 
 10. CABAKJI OGLOU MATTIOS, Notable of the Eutychian 
 
 Armenians, and Banker and Factotum to the Pasha. 
 
 11. MICHELACKI VASSITEBI, Notable of the Greek Com- 
 
 munity. 
 
 12. THE RABBI of the Jews. 
 
 13. SANDALJI OGLOU AGOB, Notable of the Catholic Ar- 
 
 menian Community.
 
 APPENDIX. 425 
 
 Of the Council of Nicomedia I have spoken elsewhere. 
 
 A little anecdote will convey a good idea of the Council at 
 Kutayah. We were staying with the Greek bishop of the 
 place, who was, ex-officio, a member of the Shoorah, but he 
 was never summoned to attend, and was too prudent to 
 intrude without being called. No rayah ever went thither. 
 One morning a Turk waited upon him from the sub-governor, 
 and told him that he must put his seal to a document, as a 
 member of the Council. Although he spoke Turkish flu- 
 ently, the poor bishop could not read a single word of it. 
 " For all that I know to the contrary," said he, " this may 
 be an order to cut off my own head, or something to commit 
 me with the Pasha of Brusa ; but be it what it may, I must 
 put my seal to it !" And so he did. He had many annoy- 
 ances, but he considered the Council the greatest of all. 
 
 In Europe, up at Adrianople, the Pasha rarely summoned 
 the Council, and never allowed the rayah members to take 
 part in its deliberations. They had nothing to do but to 
 seal now and then, as the bishop did at Kutayah. 
 
 Yet how much ink and paper have been consumed by the 
 Pera joiirnalists in applauding these Shoorahs, and in at- 
 tempting to persuade Christendom that the rayahs now 
 enjoy equal privileges with the Turks ! 
 
 IX. PERSECUTION AND MASSACRE OF ALBANIAN 
 CHRISTIANS IN 1845-6. 
 
 Scopia, the native country of these persecuted Albanians, 
 lies close upon the frontiers of Christian Servia, and has 
 some little traffic and communication with the Austrian 
 dominions. It is very mountainous, and altogether pastoral. 
 Every man in it was a shepherd or a herdsman, tending his 
 own flocks and herds, or those of his father ; for every head 
 of a family was a proprietor, and there were no hired
 
 426 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 servants. The mountains they occupied in Scopia, and 
 where they had their detached cottages, their cow-stables, 
 and their sheepfolds, were remote and solitary. The town 
 nearest to them, and the chef-lieu of the district, was Ghil- 
 lano, and that was at some distance, and rarely entered by 
 the shepherds and herdsmen. The Turkish governor of 
 Ghillano was a certain Malik Bey Anglice the Angel Bey 
 a fierce fanatic, and, as Padre Antonio expressed it, " }>crse- 
 cutor in capita." He was well seconded by his kadi, Tahir 
 Effendi. The whole country was governed by Selim Pasha, 
 who resided in the town of Scopia. This Selim had pre- 
 viously been Pasha of Beirout, and for his evil conduct there 
 he had been recalled and relegated for some time at Brusa. 
 For the misfortune of that part of Albania, some court 
 intrigue or caprice had restored him to favour, and given 
 him the pashalik of Scopia. 
 
 For generations this pastoral tribe had been Christians of 
 the Roman Catholic Church ; and although they practised 
 their worship with reserve or secrecy, it was suspected by a 
 good many of the Turks that they were not true Mussul- 
 mans. By the enforcing of the conscription for the Sultan's 
 army, which three years later (in the spring of 1847) drove 
 one half of the Albanians into open revolt, and caused an 
 internal war, which was not finished without great cost to the 
 Turkish government, two of the young shepherds of Scopia 
 were seized, carried to Constantinople, and put into an infantry 
 regiment. One of these young men was the Albanian I 
 have spoken of as being afterwards in the service of our 
 Consul at Brusa. They both detested the military service, 
 and pined with grief at this forcible separation from their 
 priest, their families and clan for a clan it was, and the 
 clannish feeling was and is strong among them all. The 
 decree of full religious toleration obtained by Sir Stratford 
 made more noise than any governmental measure had done 
 in Turkey since Sultan Mahmoud's destruction of the 
 Janissaries. It filled, for a time, the hearts of the Chris-
 
 APPENDIX. 427 
 
 tian rayahs with joy, and drew down well-merited blessings 
 upon our Christian-hearted ambassador. Being in the 
 capital, the glad tidings could not but reach the ears of the 
 two young recruits. They well knew that no Christian 
 rayah could be allowed to serve in the Sultan's army ; the 
 imperial decree screened them from being punished as Chris- 
 tians ; therefore, if they declared their faith, they had 
 every reason to expect that they would be discharged from 
 the regiment, and allowed to return to their beloved moun- 
 tains. They were too eager to lose any time ; they at once 
 declared to their colonel, and to a Mollah who acted as a 
 sort of military chaplain, that they were Christians, and had 
 always been so. The Mollah asked whether there were 
 many concealed Christians in their district ? The two Sco- 
 pians, relying on the imperial decree, and imagining no 
 danger, spoke out and said, " We are att Christians ! " 
 " Then you cannot serve the Sultan," said the colonel ; 
 " you are discharged ! Go home ! " But before they were 
 allowed to go, the sly Mollah made them count the number 
 and give the names of their co-religionists in Scopia. 
 
 The sharp sword of persecution, which Abdul Medjid and 
 his reforming government had solemnly pledged themselves 
 never more to use, or to allow to be used, was kept in 
 the scabbard for some time ; but it was unsheathed at last. 
 On the 1st of November, 1845, on the solemn feast of All 
 Saints, their little district was surrounded, the poor shepherds 
 and herdsmen were all arrested, their household property was 
 seized or destroyed, their cattle and their sheep were driven 
 from the mountains, and they themselves were carried down 
 to the town of Scopia, and there, without any examination, 
 thrown into a horrible prison by order of Selim Pasha. This 
 Selim was said to have received his persecuting, torturing 
 orders from the Porte direct ; and, scoundrel as he was, he 
 would not have dared (in Europe) to resort to such extreme 
 and extensive measures, and to make such an employment of 
 the public armed force, if he had not received instructions from
 
 428 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 Constantinople. Until the return of the two liberated soldiers, 
 there had been no molestation or any sort of quarrel about 
 religion. The neighbouring Turkish authorities did not know 
 or seem to care who were Christians or who true Mussul- 
 mans, and the Mussulmans, who were better informed on 
 these points, lived in good harmony with the Christians. 
 There had been feuds, and sometimes bloody ones, among the 
 mountaineers ; but these were ancient and hereditary, and 
 had no connection with the Gospel and the Koran. But 
 now, excited by the Kadis and Mollahs, the Mussulmans 
 gave way to a merciless fury against their Christian neigh- 
 bours. They would have remained quiet as they had done, 
 but, being once roused, their hate, their fury, knew no 
 bounds. And, alas ! I fear that it will always be in the 
 power of a few Mollahs or Dervishes to rekindle the flames 
 of the old fanaticism among these ignorant people. Tolerant as 
 we found them, and many reasons as we had to think well of 
 the greater portion of the Turkish peasantry here in Asia 
 Minor, I yet fear that a Selim Pasha, or a Malik Bey, par- 
 ticularly if favoured by some adventitious circumstance, 
 might at any day excite them to madness. Up at Scopia 
 the Angel Bey behaved like a devil, and his Kadi, Tahir 
 Effendi, was worse than he. The shepherds were half- 
 starved, beaten, and put to the torture in their prison at 
 Scopia. The demon of avarice co-operated with the foul 
 fiend of fanaticism ; they were tortured that they might give 
 up money they did not possess, and reveal hidden treasures 
 of which they knew nothing. After enduring this treatment 
 for four months, they were, on the 4th or 6th of March, 
 taken out of prison and sent down towards Salonica. On 
 the road they were loaded with chains, were driven and 
 goaded along like cattle, and were beaten by nearly every 
 Turk they met. Women, with infants at the breast, drop- 
 ped from fatigue and inanition, and died on the mountain- 
 path or by the road-side. They were twenty-six families in 
 all ; and as these poor mountaineers cherished their infants,
 
 APPENDIX. 429 
 
 instead of destroying them (as the Turks are now destroying 
 their progeny in the womb), the families were nearly all 
 numerous, making a total of more than one hundred and 
 sixty souls. At the time of our visit to Philladar two of 
 these families were wholly extinct, and two had purchased, 
 by apostacy, relief from present suffering. 
 
 On reaching Salonica they were as barbarously used by 
 Salih Pasha as they had been up at Scopia by Selim Pasha. 
 This Salih had only a few years before been Pasha at Brusa, 
 and had there been distinguished by the gentleness of his 
 rule rather than by any ferocity ; he had fed the poor 
 debtors in the Brusa prison from his own table, and in other 
 respects he had seemed to be animated by the spirit of the 
 Koran, which enjoins charity as the first of Mussulman 
 duties. But now, at Salonica, he acted like a monster of 
 cruelty, being earned away, apparently, by that sudden 
 invasion of fanaticism which had overrun the country. An 
 hour before entering Salonica, one of the patriarchs of the 
 clan a poor old man who had counted much more than the 
 threescore years and ten died on a miserable hack which 
 had been allotted to him, because he could no longer walk 
 and keep up with the march. The Turks would not stop for 
 him, nor leave him behind to die more at his ease by the 
 road-side, so, being supported by a friend on either side of 
 him, he breathed his last on the horse's back. Thirteen 
 more of them died in the filthy, pestiferous prison of Sa- 
 lonica. 
 
 Padre Antonio, their sole priest, was not arrested when 
 they were seized ; he was only warned that he might leave 
 that country. Instead of taking the hint he followed his 
 affectionate flock to Scopia, and there did what he could to 
 alleviate their sufferings. Our sturdy friend, who appeared 
 to be a man approaching his fiftieth year, had an Austrian 
 passport, and was a bond fide Austrian subject, being a 
 native of the island of Lesina in Dalmatia. His mother- 
 tongue was Sclavonian, but he spoke Italian with a pure
 
 430 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 accent and a very good idiom, for he had studied at Rome, 
 and had there been engaged as a missionary by the Propa- 
 ganda Fidei. The Turks stood in awe of his Frank quality 
 and Austrian pass, but, as he was most active and importu- 
 nate for his flock, Selim Pasha ordered his arrest, and after 
 being knocked down he was carried to the prison at Scopia 
 on the 26th of February, six or seven days before his poor 
 friends were removed from that prison to be sent down to 
 Salonica. On the 10th of March he was sent away for the 
 same seaport. The weather was dreadful, and so was the 
 road, and the Padre, though a strong, hale man, was very 
 corpulent. He was allowed to have a horse, paying for it, 
 as well as for the rascally Turkish guard who accompanied 
 him ; but his legs were tied under the horse's belly by ropes. 
 They also put manacles on his wrists, and the irons being 
 too small made his wrists and hands swell dreadfully. He 
 bore this torture two days. Non ne poteva piu he could 
 bear it no longer ! By paying a sum of money he got his 
 handcuffs removed. Every night on the road he suffered 
 prison, chains, and some kind of torture. At Deiran there 
 was a human fiend of a gaoler named Hussein Bey. " I 
 shall never forget that terrible man," said Padre Antonio ; " a 
 year and a half has passed since I was in his grip, but I still 
 see him every night in my dreams." In this prison the 
 priest was tortured all night long ; he had his feet squeezed 
 by screws, and some of his toes broken ; an iron collar was 
 put round his neck, a chain attached to this collar was passed 
 through a pulley fixed in the ceiling, and he was pulled and 
 jerked up and down until he was almost hanged, to the tune 
 of " Money ! Money ! Give money, thou Muscov, or die ! " 
 The Padre got his neck out of the collar by giving fifty pias- 
 tres. They accused him of having stolen among Mussul- 
 mans and secretly converted the people of Scopia. He replied 
 that those people were Christians before he ever came among 
 them, before he came into this world ; that their forefathers 
 for several generations had secretly professed Christianity.
 
 APPENDIX. 431 
 
 At first he had made a bold stand on the Sultan's declaration 
 that there should be no more religious persecution, but this 
 seemed to excite only more wrath. 
 
 He reached Salonica on the 18th of March. Here there 
 was an Austrian Consul, M. Mehanovich, a Dalmatian like 
 himself, and a man of spirit, who frightened Salih Pasha 
 almost out of his senses, and obtained the priest's liberation 
 that very evening, still leaving the Pasha very uneasy about 
 the consequence of all this barbarous treatment of a subject 
 of Aiistria. 
 
 On the following day, the 19th of March, Padre Antonio 
 set off by steamer for Constantinople, to lay the whole case 
 before Count Stunner, and get it represented to the Sublime 
 Porte. In the simplicity of his heart he believed that the 
 Sultan would act up to the promises he had made to Sir 
 Stratford Canning, and the declaration he had given to the 
 world (a declaration which, according to the paid French 
 journalists at the capital, placed the name of Abdul Medjid 
 at the very head of those enlightened liberal sovereigns who 
 had gained immortal fame by their toleration), and that the 
 Porte would not merely give him satisfaction for the wrongs 
 he had suffered, but instantly liberate and restore to their 
 homes, with full restitution of property and compensation 
 for the injuries and losses sustained, all his poor, imprisoned, 
 tortured flock. 
 
 In the mean while Mr. Charles Blunt, the English Consul 
 at Salonica a gentleman of active humanity, who for a long 
 series of years has been the friend and champion of the 
 afflicted and oppressed gently interfered and remonstrated 
 with Salih Pasha, reminding him of the Sultan's declaration, 
 and of the anxiety so long expressed by the Porte to take 
 rank among civilized nations. Salih generally considered 
 a weak and irresolute man was shaken at first, but his 
 courage was sustained by some fanatics who surrounded him, 
 and he told Mr. Blunt that this was not his affair; that these 
 were not British or British-protected subjects, but rayahs ;
 
 432 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 that he had his orders for what he was doing ; that one of 
 these orders was to send the Arnaout dogs into exile in Asia, 
 and that to Asia, by the help of God, he would send them. 
 
 The Consul then drew up a strong report and forwarded 
 it to Sir Stratford. At a very early hour on Wednesday in 
 the first week of April (1846) the poor Albanians were sud- 
 denly embarked in two small Turkish vessels with a very 
 short allowance of bread and water. It was represented to 
 the Pasha that they might die of hunger and thirst during the 
 voyage. Salih replied, " Mashallah ! so much the better I 
 we wish all the dogs dead." Among men, women, and 
 children twenty-six of the Christians died on the voyage 
 and were thrown into the sea as if they really were dogs. 
 At last the two slow, ill-navigated vessels reached the road- 
 stead of Moudania, near Ghemlik. In that town thirteen 
 more expired of famine, diseases contracted in prison, or of 
 the brutal treatment received from their Turkish guard. 
 The Mussulman savageness almost exceeded belief. As they 
 were landing, one of the Turks annoyed by the crying and 
 screaming of a terrified child, took up his heavy oar, struck 
 it, and broke its limbs. They were not left at Moudania 
 no plan seemed to have been adopted, no place fixed for their 
 exile. They were presently re-einbarked, carried round to 
 the mouth of the Rhyndacus, and there landed, to be marched 
 on foot to Mohalich. In this short tour thirteen more died 
 and two went mad. At Mohalich they were thrown pele- 
 mele into some horrible, filthy sheds, standing in a large 
 court-yard surrounded by walls, which had once served as a 
 plague hospital, but which of late had been the receptacle of 
 garbage, meat-bones, offal, and other dirt of the town. Here 
 disease soon swelled the list of mortality by thirty more 
 victims. The living found no charity from the many 
 Christians of Mohalich. These men pretended to stand in 
 dread of the excited Turks ; but as they were all either of the 
 Greek or the Eutychian Church hating one another as 
 usual it is to be feared that they felt no sympathy for the
 
 APPENDIX. 433 
 
 sufferers because they were Eoman Catholics. Two Romish 
 priests from Europe, who happened to be travelling in that 
 part of Asia Minor, heard, by the merest chance, some parti- 
 culars of the frightful story, and visiting the spot, they re- 
 ported to the Christian Legations at Constantinople. Ever 
 the first to move in such cases, Sir Stratford Canning was 
 the first to send succour in this. He instantly despatched 
 our government steamer with Mr. Alison, one of the gentle- 
 men of the embassy, and a Dr. Dickson, who was at that 
 time in Constantinople. These gentlemen landed at Ghem- 
 lik, came on to Brusa, took up our friend John Zohrab, who 
 volunteered his services, and then proceeded by land to 
 Mohalich, as fast as bad horses and bad roads would allow. 
 
 The scene which presented itself at the pest-house was 
 almost too revolting and horrible to be borne. On crossing 
 the gateway, and entering the yard, the stench of decomposing 
 animal matter nearly knocked them down. At the door of 
 the largest of the rooms, which was small enough, and 
 crowded and crammed with the dying and the dead, the 
 doctor paused and turned pale, and Mr. Alison rushed back 
 in horror, said it was too much, and would not enter. John 
 entered at once, and was followed by the English doctor. In 
 one corner was an elderly woman, stark naked, and raving mad. 
 In another corner there was a filthy, ragged piece of matting 
 thrown over something. John removed the matting and 
 found two dead infants. At the sight of them their mothers 
 set up a feeble moan, being too weak, too much reduced by 
 hunger and sickness, to make any louder lament. A young 
 unmarried woman, who had traces of beauty, appeared to be 
 almost at the last gasp. Men, women, and children, e;iten 
 up by vermin, lay huddled together on the rough, hard floor, 
 without covering, with nothing on them but their clothes, 
 and those all tattered and torn. Their heads were all light 
 and wandering ; they were past the stage at which nature 
 can complain ; they scarcely comprehended what was said 
 to them by a Bulgarian who spoke their language. With 
 
 2 F
 
 434 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 the exception of the maniac and the dead children (two 
 features in the frightful picture which our stout-hearted 
 friend and comrade could never name without shuddering), 
 the other rooms exhibited the same horrors. A few days 
 more and not one of these victims would have been left 
 alive. The very Turks appointed to watch the prison-house 
 had been scared away. But for the prompt assistance sent 
 by Sir Stratford Canning, whose private purse was open 
 upon this as upon so many other occasions, the last remnant 
 of the Christian clan of Scopia would have perished at Moha- 
 lich, and little would ever have been known of their fate, or 
 of the noble constancy with which they sustained their faith 
 under such tremendous trials. 
 
 The first thing to do was to remove the sufferers from that 
 pest-house. The Turks offered no obstacle to this removal ; 
 they had broken faith with Sir Stratford Canning but they 
 dared not resist his humane intentions as strongly expressed 
 by a gentleman of his Legation. From the moment of Mr. 
 Alison's arrival the persecution ceased. Through the activity 
 of John Zohrab two clean, well-aired houses, in healthy 
 situations, were found and hired, and to these the Albanians 
 were carried on stretchers and on two old hand-brancards, on 
 which the people of Mohalich had been accustomed to convey 
 the plague-stricken to the pest-house. 
 
 The next thing was to pass them all through hot baths to 
 rid them of the vermin and thoroughly cleanse them. Several 
 of the men had upon them uncured wounds aiid deep fester- 
 ing gashes inflicted by the Turkish yataghan. Clothing and 
 other comforts were then provided for them all, and Dr. 
 Dickson administered medicine to them. The fearful mor- 
 tality was stopped at once ; in some cases the convalescence 
 was long and doubtful, but no one death occurred after their 
 removal from the pest-house. Our Consul at Brupa, when 
 made fully acquainted with the case, went to the Pasha and 
 had rather a stormy audience. The Pasha said that he had 
 nothing to do in the affair. The Consul told him that
 
 APPENDIX. 435 
 
 atrocities had been committed within his Pashalik, at Mou- 
 dania and Mohalich ; that the Sultan's promises and solemn 
 declaration had been set at nought within the Pasha's juris- 
 diction, and that he ought to call the offenders to account, 
 and send some succour to such of the unhappy Christian 
 rayahs as yet survived this most barbarous persecution. 
 The Pasha Mashallahed, and Inshallahed, and Baccallumed, 
 thought that the Consul's words were severe ; said that lie 
 had not been the persecutor ; and that he would think about 
 the rayahs, as they verily were now in his Pashalik. The 
 next day he sent to Mohalich a piece of cheap English calico, 
 which, if equally divided, might have made about the fourth 
 of a shirt for each of the Albanians. And ever, after this 
 act of splendid generosity, when the subject was referred to 
 in his presence, Mustapha Nouree said, " / was not the per- 
 secutor ; / did the Albanians no harm ; / did them good. 
 / sent them calico that they might be clean and clothed." 
 
 Strange was the conduct of his excellency Count Sturmer, 
 as related to me by the priest himself strange and incredible, 
 but for the fact that this Austrian diplomatist is a Levantine, 
 having been born and bred at Pera. In his first interview 
 he told the excited Padre Antonio that this was a matter to 
 be kept quiet ; that nothing could be gained by making a 
 noise and stir about it ; that as for the Albanians, they 
 being subjects of the Porte, he could not interfere ; but that 
 he would try and get from the Turkish Government a money 
 compensation for the Padre, as he was indisputably an Aus- 
 trian subject. In subsequent interviews he told the earnest 
 priest, who could not be quiet, that he was a very obstinate, 
 turbulent man ; that he ought to have nothing more to do 
 with the Albanians ; that this was a state affair, un a/are 
 di stuto, the management of which must be entirely left to 
 him and the Austrian Legation ; that' when undiplomatic 
 men thrust themselves into any business with the Porte they 
 only spoiled it ; and that his (the priest's) life was in the 
 hands of the Internuncio and the Legation. The end of all 
 
 2 F 2
 
 436 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 was that the Count informed the priest that he must accept 
 from the Sultan's Government the sum of 10,000 piasters, 
 as comj)ensation and full satisfaction, for all injuries whatso- 
 ever. The sturdy Dalmatian replied that money was no 
 satisfaction to him ; that he did not do his work for money ; 
 that he was not a trader, but a priest and missionary, em- 
 ployed and sustained by the Propaganda Fidei at Eome ; 
 that his thoughts and his cares were rather for the remnant 
 of the little flock over which he had presided ten years, but 
 that he must remind the representative of the Emperor that 
 he, a faithful subject of the Emperor, had been imprisoiu-d, 
 chained, and put to torture, contrary to capitulations 
 with the Porte, contrary to all usage and established inter- 
 national law, as well as contrary to the Sultan's declaration. 
 To all this the Internuncio rejoined that the priest was not 
 a free agent ; that he must do as he was commanded ; and 
 that he, Count Sturmer, insisted that he should take the 
 money, make the best of his way back to his own country, 
 and leave the Albanians to themselves. 
 
 Padre Antonio took the paltry ten thousand twopences, 
 but he would not take his departure for Dalmatia, nor 
 abandon his suffering flock. He purchased a few comforts 
 for his people, went to Ghemlik by the Turkish steamer, 
 and thence found his way by land to Mohalich, where he 
 arrived on the 14th of May. By that time the Albanians 
 were in their comfortable lodgings, were well provided with 
 everything, and were rapidly recovering their health. But 
 their joy at the arrival of their pastor was described by those 
 who had seen it as being most affecting. 
 
 Having done all that could be done, Mr. Alison, Dr. Dick- 
 son, and John Zohrab returned to Brusa. On their way they 
 met some Sisters of Charity, who had come over from Con- 
 stantinople to assist those who no longer needed assistance ; 
 find the Sisters were accompanied or followed to Mohalich 
 by an English papist, named Nayler, who had been practising 
 in Egypt and Turkey as an oculist, and who was supposed
 
 APPENDIX. 437 
 
 to have some knowledge of medicine. On the 24th or 25th 
 of May most of the Albanians were removed to this mountain 
 village of Philladar, which the Porte had appointed for their 
 residence. The priest staid at Mohalich with such of the 
 sick who as yet could not be removed, but in a few days he 
 and they made the journey without any accident, and ever 
 since then (some sixteen months) they had been living in a 
 tedious, melancholy idleness at Philladar. 
 
 At the time of our visit on the last day of September, 
 1847 there were living eighty-six individuals, including 
 seven little children that had been born here in the village. 
 Through the offices of the Sisters of Charity, four boys had 
 been sent over to the Lazarists' school at Galata, but of this 
 number one had died. Most of the children at Philladar 
 had picked up Greek, and were attending the Greek school 
 kept by a worthy phlebotomist who paid us a long 
 visit, and who spoke very favourably of their intelli- 
 gence and behaviour. Ten children some male, some 
 female and running from five to ten years old, were forcibly 
 separated from their parents and kindred at Ghillano and 
 Scopia, and distributed among Turks ; it was not known 
 where they now were, or whether they were alive ; their 
 fathers and mothers, without one exception, were dead ; but 
 brothers of some of them were alive and in good health at 
 Philladar. The family affections of these poor mountaineers 
 are remarkably strong and lasting, and of this we saw some 
 proofs ourselves. " The women who lost their children in 
 this way," said the Padre, "died absolutely of grief assolu- 
 tamente dal dolore. Not quite so quick, but they died of 
 grief as much as one shot through the heart or brain dies of 
 that shot." 
 
 After the representations of Sir Stratford the Porte could 
 not allow these poor people to starve. They allotted to them 
 six houses to live in, and paid them at the rate of 105 paras 
 per diem a head, and allowed the priest Padre Antonio six 
 piastres, or about thirteen-pence a day. There had once
 
 438 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 beeu a talk of giving them an extensive farm whereon they 
 might live as other exiles had done as an agricultural 
 colony ; but of agriculture the mountaineers knew nothing. 
 It was then said that they should have a range of pastoral 
 country in the mountains where they might live according 
 to their native habits, and that a stock of cows and sheep 
 should be furnished them wherewith to make a beginning. 
 In this manner they would be able to keep themselves and 
 even to grow prosperous. But nothing had been done or 
 Begun, and there was no prospect of a beginning. Some of 
 them, wearied to death with their inactive, useless life, and 
 imprisonment in the village (beyond the precincts of which 
 they were not allowed to move), would gladly have fallen 
 into the second of the two schemes ; but by far the greater 
 number were strongly set against it, saying that, if they 
 gained their own livelihood and made themselves useful in 
 the country they would never be allowed to quit it ; where- 
 as, if they continued to be idle and useless, and to increase 
 the numbers of their families, the Turks might get weary of 
 keeping them, and so, instead of sending them money, would 
 send them back to their own dear mountains. 
 
 The men we had seen before, but, after taking notes of 
 Padre Antonio's details, we went to one of their houses and 
 there saw five or six families with the women and children. 
 They were decidedly a good-looking people, with frank, honest 
 countenances. Some of the young women might be called 
 handsome, and none more so than poor Cucu, the damsel seen 
 by John Zohrab in the pest-house, and rescued at Mohalich 
 from the very jaws of death. But Cucu was no longer a 
 damsel, but a wife and mother. One of the young men had 
 married her, and she was now nursing her first child, a fair- 
 skinned, pretty little boy, born up in the airy village of 
 Philladar. Her gratitude to Tchelebee John was affecting. 
 Men and women, being joined by those from the other houses, 
 all implored me to speak in their behalf to Sir Stratford 
 Canning, and to do whatever I could to get them sent back
 
 APPENDIX. 439 
 
 to their own country. They knew from their priest, who 
 went now and then to Brusa and to the English Consul's, 
 that Sir Stratford had left for England, and that he was now 
 expected back at Constantinople. They said that if that 
 best of good men, that friend and champion of all the 
 oppressed Christians of the country, had been at his post, 
 they would have been liberated ere this, and they hoped, 
 now, that his return would lead to their liberation. But 
 again and again Padre Antonio joining in the prayer as 
 earnestly as any of them they beseeched me to speak to Sir 
 Stratford, to express their gratitude for all that he had done 
 for them, and to tell him how unhappy they were in their 
 exile. " The Turks," said they, " have burned our houses 
 and driven away our cows, and eaten our sheep, and taken 
 all that was ours ; but they cannot take away our mountains. 
 Send us back, hungry, naked, to our own dear mountains, 
 and we will be happy, and bless you every day we live." 
 
 / never saw a stronger love of the native soil. As the 
 crumbling, tumbling houses let in the wind at every side, 
 and the rain at some corners ; and as, even in this cheap dis- 
 trict, people cannot wallow in luxury upon five pence and 
 the fourth of a farthing per diem ; and as the winter is cold 
 up here, and as some of the younger matrons were in the 
 " interesting situation," we gave them some money not 
 what we would have given, but what we could afford ; and 
 after many acts of reverence and gratitude from the poor 
 people, and one or two warm accolades with Padre Antonio, 
 we took our leave and mounted our sorry beasts. I believe 
 that the little money we left with them was the very last 
 thing they thought or cared about ; their gratitude was given 
 for the interest I had taken in their story, and was in part 
 anticipatory for the good I might do them by speaking to our 
 ambassador. 
 
 Before leaving it we rode through Philladar, which, for this 
 country, is rather a prosperous and a large village. It is 
 occupied almost entirely by Greeks, who seemed to be good
 
 440 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 specimens of their race, and who lived, upon the whole, on 
 exceedingly good terms with the exiles, taking their children 
 into their school, and never molesting Padre Antonio at his 
 masses. Their comparative prosperity as no doubt their 
 good humour also depended upon their having had for a 
 good number of years, a kind old Turkish Agha, or governor, 
 who had himself farmed the taxes of the village, who was 
 incapable of injustice and extortion himself, and who pre- 
 vented the exercise of them in others. He made little or 
 nothing by his contract ; but he was contented to get back 
 what he paid to the government, and to see the people happy 
 and thriving. Some efforts had been made to oust him by 
 out-bidding him ; but the Agha would not be out-bidden ; 
 and he had told the people that until the angel of death 
 called him hence, he would be the sole Ushurji of Philladar. 
 
 We did not take the road by which we had come, but a 
 much rougher and steeper one a path which plunged head- 
 long down a ravine in the mountain. As I was sliding down 
 the steep, expecting my steed (the tailor's nutmeg pony) to 
 be on his knees at every move, two of the exiles, who had 
 come running after us, took the pony by the head, propped 
 him up with their shoulders, and began to conduct me over 
 the worst and most slippery part of the road. They could 
 not go far ; we parted on a level strip of ground ; and at 
 parting the poor fellows kissed my hands, my knees, my feet, 
 and with tears in their eyes once more implored me not to 
 forget them. 
 
 I did not forget them. 
 
 On my return from Asia to Constantinople, I gave a tole- 
 rable expose' of this Mustapha Nouree, to Ali Pasha, Minister 
 for Foreign Affairs, and, next to Reschid Pasha, the greatest 
 man in the government. I put no softening varnish upon 
 the pictures of woe and horror I had to present. I told him 
 of the miserable state of the peasantry, of the iniquitous pro- 
 ceedings of the farmers of the revenue, of the effects pro- 
 duced by the enormous rate of interest, of the torturing of
 
 APPENDIX. 441 
 
 the poor Greek of Billijik. I related the whole story of the 
 Greek peasant who had been barbarously tortured in a village 
 in the plain of Brusa ; and I spared neither Mustapha Nouree 
 nor Khodha-Arab. As he was to see the Vizier this morning, 
 I put into his hands a petition which had been drawn up for 
 the Brusiote peasant. I told him, sans phrases, that Musta- 
 pha Nouree was absolutely ruining the finest province of the 
 empire. The little great man AH allowed that many things 
 were done amiss. He excused the Pasha of Brusa's heart at 
 the expense of his head : he said that he was a man of very 
 limited intellect, and far in the rear of his epoch tres borng, 
 et excessivement arriere but then he was strongly supported 
 at Constantinople ; and though he had no genius, he had so 
 much talent for intrigue, that it was much better for the 
 present government that he should be at Brusa, than that he 
 should be near the court ! Here oozed out the whole secret. 
 Mustapha Nouree was left to exercise his tyranny at Brusa, 
 because it was thought here that his return to Stamboul 
 might overset Reschid Pasha, with little AH and all those 
 precious reformers. The old boor had boasted to me of his 
 great intimacy with the late Sultan, with the Sultana Valide, 
 with all the notabilities of the court, and even with Abdul 
 Medjid, whom he had known from his infancy, and had 
 very often nursed in his arms. He said he could not count 
 how many times the reigning Sultan (when a babe) had 
 
 upon him. " Do you think, after this, that the 
 
 Padishah will ever forget me! Yok! Tok! No! no!" 
 And as he added these words he chuckled, and seemed to 
 feel, that though no longer seraskier, or commander-in-chief, 
 he was, through his court favour, a more powerful man than 
 Reschid Pasha or any of them. 
 
 I need not say that no notice was taken of the poor 
 Greek's petition, that no redress was given to the Armenians 
 at Billijik, and that the effect of my other representations 
 was nil.
 
 442 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 X. THE SULTAN'S MERINO SHEEP. UNTILING HOUSES 
 FOB TAXES. SPECIMEN OF JUSTICE. 
 
 When Prime Minister, Riza Pasha undertook to improve 
 the degenerate breeds of Turkish sheep. He procured a 
 good stock of merinos from the immense estates held in the 
 Crimea by Count Woronzow, who, like other Russian noble- 
 men, has paid at all times a laudable attention to every sort 
 of rural improvement, and who, many years ago, imported a 
 stock of magnificent merinos from Spain, and some of our 
 finest breeds of sheep from England. The merinos pros- 
 pered and increased wonderfully in the Crimea ; and so they 
 might have done, under proper management, in many parts 
 of Asia Minor. 
 
 In November, 1847, I visited the Sultan's merinos esta- 
 blishment, situated in a solitary out-of-the-way spot, near 
 the town of Khirmasti, and at only a short distance from the 
 Rhyndacus. There was no living creature on the spot when 
 we arrived. After a time a Greek traveller and a Bulgarian, 
 one of the head shepherds, rode up. Some buildings which 
 had been erected by Riza were empty and falling to decay. 
 We said that the place seemed going to " the gentleman 
 that is afar off" a local periphrasis for the word devil. 
 " Yes," said the Greek, "and so is everything in this country. 
 And yet what purses of gold the Sultan has spent here ! and 
 how much good might have been done to the country-people 
 if they could have had some of these foreign sheep ! " The 
 Pasha of Brusa had told us that, counting the lambs of this 
 year, there were 30,000 merinos. The old Bulgarian told us 
 that there were not 6000. A great many had died and were 
 dying. There was not a truss of hay for winter food, not a 
 turnip, there was nothing ; so that the sheep that were 
 sick or too weak to seek their food on the hill-sides were 
 sure to perish in the course of this season. At first there 
 were some shepherds of the Crimea and two skilful Russians
 
 APPENDIX. 443 
 
 to superintend the establishment, and attend to the mi- 
 grations of the flocks from the hot plains to the hill-country 
 at the approach of summer, and from the hills to the plain 
 at the approach of winter. These Franks also acted as doc- 
 tors to all the sick merinos. But one of these Franks had 
 died, and the other had gone, or had been sent away. The 
 concern was then left entirely to Turkish management and 
 to an inadequate number of rude, ignorant, Bulgarian shep- 
 herds. Of course it went headlong to min. At the time of 
 our visit the Turkish Agha, or manager-in-chief, was away 
 at Brusa ; his Kehayah, or locum tenens, was away some- 
 where else ; neither had been seen near the sheep for a long 
 time, and another Turk, who, with a good salary, had been 
 appointed to look after the health of the flocks, had never 
 been seen at all, for he had another employment at Constan- 
 tinople, and lived in that city. Ever since the downfall of 
 Riza and the establishment of his rival Eeschid, the merinos 
 had in fact been neglected entirely. The flocks were not 
 regularly moved, nor moved at all ; they were left in the 
 same pastures, here at GhSrdema, and for months in the 
 year these pastures were inundated. The sheep got rot in 
 the feet and other diseases ; and, as the sound were not 
 separated from the unsound, maladies spread over all. In a 
 swampy hollow, we came upon a hundred or two of the im- 
 perial stock. Earns, ewes, lambs, are all thin, filthy, and 
 diseased sick unto death. Two had died in the night and 
 the jackals had picked their bones. 
 
 I repeat that it is the standing principle in Turkey for 
 every grand vizier to neglect or undo that which has been 
 done by his immediate predecessor. Thus, this establish- 
 ment, which had, indeed, cost immense sums, found no 
 favour in the eyes of Rescind Pasha. Riza's idea of im- 
 proving the wool of the country and bringing in the merinos 
 breed was excellent in itself; but, at no time, had the 
 enterprise been conducted in a large or proper spirit. The 
 grand advantage to be derived by the importation of the new
 
 444 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 stock was clearly by spreading it among the people, and 
 improving the wool of the country. Riza Pasha only con- 
 templated keeping and increasing the stock for the Sultan. 
 Abdul Medjid was to be the great wool -merchant of his 
 empire, or the wool of his merinos was to be worked up into 
 fine cloths within his own dominions, in the Imperial Fac- 
 tory at Nicomedia ; and this would relieve Turkey from the 
 hard necessity of buying fine cloths from England, France, 
 and Belgium, and keep all that money at home. The sale 
 of a merinos ewe was strictly prohibited, and they would 
 not sell a young ram under 500 piastres a price far beyond 
 the means of the impoverished people of the country. A 
 few industrious and intelligent Greeks of Khirmasti, who 
 would have paid the price, were not allowed to be pur- 
 chasers. 
 
 Verily our declaimers in parliament, and our phrase- 
 makers in journals well know what they are talking and 
 writing about when they praise the Turks as model free- 
 traders, and declare that trade is nowhere so unshackled as 
 in Turkey ! 
 
 In this not often visited corner of Asia Minor I witnessed 
 acts of violence and oppression, of injustice and corruption 
 which would have appeared to me almost incredible, if I had 
 not seen them with my own eyes. In several of the neigh- 
 bouring villages we found houses unroofed, though still oc- 
 cupied by wretched Turks. The tax-gatherers had taken off 
 the tiles to pay the Saliane. The year before they had seized 
 the copper utensils of the poor villagers. What they would 
 find to take the next year it was hard to say. The tax- 
 collectors pretended that they had money, and were hiding 
 it. The peasants most solemnly vowed that they had 
 nothing, not even a stock of food for the winter, which was 
 coming on with unusual rigour. They had had much sick- 
 ness among them, and had been previously passing through 
 the hands of the usurious Armenians, and suffering from 
 unfair levies of the tax on produce. The tiles, which could
 
 APPENDIX. 445 
 
 not be sold in the place, were scarcely worth carrying away ; 
 but they were gone, and those wretched dwellings were open 
 to wind and rain, hail and snow. We could not conceive 
 that in a place at all inhabited by men, ruin could well go 
 farther than it had done here ! Yet this district was in the 
 pashalik of Brusa, and not a hundred miles from Constan- 
 tinople. 
 
 Our host at the town of Khirmasti, a Greek, a hadji (he had 
 made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem), and a primate of the town, 
 was in a great rage at the moment of our arrival, for he had just 
 then come from the Mehkemeh, or Turkish court of justice. 
 
 Yesterday, a well-known rogue and vagabond of a Mussul- 
 man, had stolen his mare and colt. This morning an Ar- 
 menian and some Turks, coming from Brusa, recovered the 
 animals and brought them in to the Agha of the town, havin^ 
 first permitted the horse-stealer to escape. The Armenian 
 told the Agha that he knew the mare and colt belonged to 
 Hadji Stauvracki, and he sent to inform the old Greek 
 where he might find his property. The hadji went forthwith 
 to recover his mare and colt ; but the affair was now in the 
 hands of the kadi, and this strict, scrupulous, and upright 
 judge must have evidence that the hadji was the true, bond 
 fide proprietor of the beasts. " But," said the hadji, " every 
 man and boy in Khirmasti knows the old brown mare and 
 her filly, and to whom they belong ! " "No matter ; I must 
 have witnesses." The old man went and fetched in two 
 Greeks. The kadi would not take their evidence, because 
 they were Christians, and a Mussulman was the party ac- 
 cused of the theft. He must have Mussulman witnesses. 
 Well ! the old Greek went and brought in three Turks, who 
 had often borrowed the mare to carry their corn to the mill. 
 The kadi took his beard in his hand, and pretended to won- 
 der how these three men could be so very sure that this 
 mare was that mare, and this filly that filly ! He went on to 
 raise more difficulties and obstacles to a restitution of the 
 stolen property ; but another Mussulman also a man of the
 
 446 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 ] aw sitting by, was struck with some sudden shame, and told 
 the kadi that he must really accept the evidence of the three 
 Turks, and restore the mare and filly. "And so I will, 
 quoth the kadi, " but the primate must first pay me thirty 
 piastres." The old Greek demurred. " Well then, twenty- 
 five piastres." " No," he could not. " Then twenty." At 
 last they settled for sixteen piastres ; and having paid this 
 money Hadji Stauvracki took home his mare and filly. 
 
 The Agha or Mudir of Khirmasti, after fixing his own 
 price on that produce, had been monopolizing all the sesame 
 of the district, just as Latif Efiendi had so successfully 
 monopolised the opium up at Kara Hissar. Freedom of 
 trade ! Why there is not a rayah, there is not even an Os- 
 manlee, free to sell his produce, if his Pasha or Mudir 
 wishes to have it or to trade in it. 
 
 XI. HOLY PLACES. 
 
 In the loud and apparently never-ending contentions be- 
 tween the Latins and Greeks on this subject, we have never 
 heard the name of England mentioned. Yet England, and, 
 in a minor degree, every country which adheres to the doc- 
 trines of the Reformed Church, have had abundant reasons to 
 complain. 
 
 It was through English policy, intervention, and arms, 
 that Syria, Jerusalem, and the whole of Palestine were torn 
 from the Pasha of Egypt, and restored to the Sultan in 1840. 
 Yet when England applied to the grateful Porte for permis- 
 sion to erect a proper church of her own at Jerusalem, her 
 application was met with shuffling evasions and mortifying 
 delays ; and it was five long years before the necessary 
 firman was obtained by our ambassador. During this long 
 interval Sir Stratford Canning was propping up Reschid 
 Pasha, and obtaining from him all those proclamations in
 
 APPENDIX. 447 
 
 favour of religious toleration, freedom of worship to the rayahs, 
 r^hts of conscience to Armenians, &c. of which we have 
 seen the value. 
 
 At the village of Boudja, near Smyrna, it was many years 
 before the English, Dutch, and American merchants could 
 obtain permission to enclose a Protestant cemetery. No 
 doubt the obstacles were raised by the Armenian Romanists. 
 None such was offered to the formation of a Roman Catholic 
 cemetery at the same village. There, an English church was 
 violently stopped in its building some fifteen years ago. In 
 this case I was told that the Turks were impelled by the 
 united bigotry of Armenians, Greeks, and Papists. A pri- 
 vate house, built by my dear American friend, Joseph Lang- 
 don, of Boston, is now used for our worship. The Romanists 
 of the village have been freely allowed to build a regular 
 stone church, and to have a bell a thing prohibited to the 
 Greek and Armenian rayahs. In 1848, the Protestants had 
 ventured to claim the last-mentioned privilege ; but " the 
 church-going bell " at Boudja was only the small old bell of 
 a broken-up American steamer. Low as was its tone it gave 
 great offence to the bigots of the place, who were threatening 
 either to pull it down, or to get it stopped by the Pasha. 
 Before dealing in generalities, and interfering for the Sultan's 
 subjects, our diplomatists ought certainly to have secured for 
 Englishmen the right of having decent churches for their 
 worship, and decent and well-secured cemeteries for their 
 dead. But these things would not have had, in dispatches 
 and newspapers, the grandiose air of edicts of Universal Tole- 
 ration, Equality of Rights for all, Unlimited Liberty of 
 Conscience in the Ottoman Empire, &c., &c. 
 
 Our church at Jerusalem was at last allowed to be built, 
 and was, I believe, finished and opened for worship in 1850, 
 ten years after we had given back Jerusalem with all Pales- 
 tine and all Syria to the Turks. I am told by an eminent 
 English clergyman, who has recently returned from the Holy 
 Land, that the church, though small, is a very pretty Gothic
 
 448 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 building. It stands at the entrance to the Frank quarter, 
 on the sacred eminence, Mount Sion, and near to the gate 
 called by the various names of Jaffa, Hebron, and Beth- 
 lehem. 
 
 XII. THE GRAND VIZIER RESCHID PASHA. 
 
 If ever there were a man that got into reputation by 
 empty professions and false pretences, this is he. 
 
 Reschid had been originally a poor clerk in one of the 
 offices of the Porte. He was fortunate in obtaining a good 
 French master, and, for a Turk, he learned that language 
 exceedingly well. Linking himself with the rising reforming 
 party, he obtained promotion with a rapidity known only in 
 this country. He was soon sent as Ambassador to Paris, 
 Avhere good-natured people, astonished to find a Turk that 
 knew anything, set him down as quite an accomplished 
 person, and homme d'esprit. The easy dictum was accepted, 
 and soon half the society of Paris was talking about V esprit 
 and les connaissances of the Turkish Envoy. When a 
 fashion takes it runs for a time. From Paris Reschid was 
 transferred to London, where he resided a considerable time, 
 and easily maintained the reputation which he had so easily 
 acquired. He had then the advantages of a good person, and a 
 seemingly intelligent and open countenance. But his stock 
 of information was exceedingly limited, and extracted solely 
 from French books from works of which no good French- 
 man of the present day will approve. The expression of 
 anything like an original idea never fell from his lips. He 
 dealt in stereotyped notions and theories, as well as in stereo- 
 typed French phrases. He sneered at his own faith without 
 expressing any respect for the religion of others. II avait 
 I'esprit Voltairien, says a Frenchman. Of the wit of the 
 great enemy to Christianity he had none ; but he had dili- 
 gently read Voltaire's fiomans, Dictionnaire Philosophique,
 
 APPENDIX. 449 
 
 &c. His scepticism certainly did not improve his morality. 
 I have detailed elsewhere, at full length, a case, in which he 
 stood committed with M. Guizot, that proves him to be, in 
 his own private affairs, lacking in honour, humanity, and 
 in common honesty. See the story of his model farm, and 
 M. Francois Barreau, his French manager, in ' Turkey and its 
 Destiny,' vol. ii., chap. xxv. After his return to Turkey he 
 nearly fell from the ladder of promotion, but he was sus- 
 tained by Sir Stratford Canning, upon whom he imposed by 
 professions and promises, and who thought him at least an 
 honester and mon enlightened Turk than his great rival 
 Riza. He has depended entirely on Sir Stratford for his 
 retention of office. Whenever Sir Stratford, or Lord Stratford 
 de Redcliffe, has had any disagreement with the Court, or 
 whenever he has left the country, Reschid has been bowled 
 out by the very first ball, like a bad batter in cricket, or has 
 been knocked over like a ninepin. I wonder that our dis- 
 tinguished diplomatist has not grown tired of so often setting 
 him up again. His present Grand Vizieriat commenced in the 
 summer of 1848. Previously he had been out for some months, 
 because Sir Stratford was away ; but so soon as it was known 
 that Sir Stratford was really returning, and that he had reached 
 Athens, they brought him in again. Should Lord Stratford 
 leave Turkey to-morrow, out Reschid will go once more. 
 
 In 1847-8 I collected facts more than sufficient to prove 
 that he is not a man of energy that he is not a man of 
 business and that, as a government administrator, he has 
 displayed neither honesty nor ability. As much as he could, 
 he shut his door to all the Franks (travellers and others), 
 who were above the meanness of flattering him, or eulogising 
 him for unfulfilled intentions, or rather for professions and 
 promises which he had never intended or cared to keep. 
 Like the rest of the Pashas, he had grown obese and indolent. 
 The first time I saw him, in the streets of Tophana, I did 
 not recognise him as the Reschid of a few years ago. He 
 was said to be a man of quiet habits and decent life, and not 
 
 2 G
 
 450 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 a rake or debauchee like Riza. But the opinion appeared to 
 be almost universal, that Riza was by far the better man of 
 business and administrator. "But," said an acute old 
 Perote, " it is all one whether Riza is up and Reschid down, 
 or Riza down and Reschid up. The one cannot govern 
 worse than the other, nor better ! Neither of them can be 
 more than a part of a bad and complicated machine neither 
 of them can alter the system of government, or check the 
 influence of the serraglio, or create honesty and good faith 
 where none exist, or awaken conscience in men who have no 
 conscience, or rouse a feeling of honour and patriotism in 
 those who never knew the meaning of such words ! " 
 
 This reformer had surrounded himself with all the absurd 
 state and magnificence of a vizier of the old unreformed 
 times. The French colonel whom I have before quoted, 
 said : " Resehid Pasha has lived a good deal in Paris and in 
 London. He knows the usages of civilized society ; he knows 
 perfectly well what an incongruous and monstrous thing it 
 would be thought if the domestics of the Prime Minister of 
 France or England were to run down stairs after every visitor, 
 clamouring for backshish. I have been to the Vizier's several 
 times, and whether it were on business or to pay a visit of 
 ceremony, down came the domesticity upon me as soon as I 
 was on the staircase. He keeps three or four hundred 
 servants and retainers ! Why does he keep them if he cannot 
 feed and pay them ? Why, in any case, have such an army 
 of unproductive, useless idlers? How many servants has 
 M. Guizot? I do not believe that Lord Russell has very 
 many.* And here is this prime minister of a ruined country 
 with three or four hundred! It is the same system chez 
 little Ali Effendi, the Minister for Foreign Affairs. These 
 are the two men with whom foreigners are most frequently 
 brought into contact ; these are the intellectual summities of 
 
 * When this was said M. Guizot and Lord John Russell were 
 Premiers.
 
 APPENDIX. 451 . 
 
 the Em] are the leaders, par excellence of civilization and 
 reform the men who have most loudly proclaimed, in France 
 and in England, that the manners and customs of the Turks 
 were changed, and that where they were not changed they 
 would soon change them. Parbleu .' you cannot go to their 
 houses without being robbed. And see how they live at 
 home : their wives and women separated, and shut up out of 
 sight, just as they were when the Turks first came to Con- 
 stantinople ! " 
 
 I very soon found, to my cost, that the French colonel had 
 not been guilty of exaggeration. Wherever I went a dozen 
 or so of servants followed me to the head of the staircase, 
 enunciating " backshish." From a very great man's house 
 I could seldom get free under fifty piastres. Every time 
 Lord Cowley went to visit Rescind Pasha, the Vizier, it 
 cost him 500 piastres. His Lordship was only Minister 
 Plenipotentiary. From Sir Stratford Canning, who had the 
 full rank of Ambassador, a higher backshish Avas expected. 
 One payment did not make you free of the house ; you had 
 to pay again whenever you returned. At the Courban 
 Bairam, when the heads of the Rayah Christian churches 
 paid their forced annual visits of ceremony and congratu- 
 lation to the chiefs of the Turkish government, the Armenian 
 Patriarch, on quitting the house of little Ali, the Minister for 
 Foreign Affairs, gave 1000 piastres as backshish. The 
 Minister's major-domo put on a sulky countenance, and told 
 him that this was too little ; and the patriarch thought him- 
 self obliged to increase the sum, and did increase it on the 
 staircase ! This fact was communicated to me by an English- 
 man, who was an eye and ear witness. As a still greater 
 sum would be expected at the Grand Vizier's, and as the 
 patriarch was bound to visit many other pashas, this annual 
 tax must have been a very heavy one. The chief of the 
 Catholic Armenian Church, the Greek Patriarch, and the 
 Head Rabbi of the Jews, were equally bound to pay these 
 annual visits. The 'Journal de Constantinople' inserted
 
 452 THE DOOM OF TURKEY. 
 
 accounts of the visits as striking proofs of the cordiality 
 which existed between Mussulmans, Christians, and Is- 
 raelites ! ! But, say the apologists, " this is only an ancient 
 custom, common to all Oriental people only a remnant of 
 barbarity, which it is difficult for the Turks to get rid of." 
 But no attempt has ever been made ; and with the con- 
 tinuance of such barbarous usages, how can Turkey pretend 
 to take its rank among civilised nations ? Were there not a 
 hundred of other and far more weighty objections, backshish 
 alone is enough to put a veto on any such claim or pre- 
 tension. Backshish ought to be sent beyond the Euphrates. 
 I have given proofs that Rescind Pasha is ignorant of the 
 first principles of political economy, or that he allows men 
 who are in that state of ignorance to do what they like under 
 his government ; that he has never really exerted himself in 
 the cause of civil justice or religious toleration ; that he has 
 shut his ears to the strongest representations of the spoliation, 
 oppression, and torture of Christian rayah subjects of the 
 Porte.; and that his pretended reforms have brought the 
 Ottoman Empire nearer and nearer to its dissolution and 
 total evaporation. To have done with him and his creatures, 
 I will say of them, in the slightly altered, well-known words 
 of a French writer, West un astre ou faille ou malfaisant, 
 entoure par des pales satellites. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 LONDON ! PRINTED BT W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, 
 AMD CHARING CROSS.
 
 University of California 
 
 SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024-1388 
 
 Return this material to the library 
 
 from which It was borrowed. 
 
 01 OCT o 3
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 A 000 720 361 5