THE .CO/sMITION OF BljliGAR.LA..
0'great subject of the contest in Conference will be the a ppliestion,ef "autonomy," however the word may be 14B defined, to 'Bulgaria, or rather, to avoid misrepresentation, to _the great territory inhabited by Bulgarians. The Turks will :resist :any ,real concessions there, as too dangerous to their ,empire, and the British Government may support them, under the-idea:of:ensuring the safety of Constantinople. it is well, :therefore, that the public should be reminded from time to :time what Turkish.rule in Bulgaria really means, and on this „subject important information has this week been received in .England. In the first-place, Sir G. Campbell, Member for the Kirkcaldy District of Burghs, has written to his constituents, through the Fife Free Press, an account of what he has seen. Sir :George Campbell was an excellent Judge of the High Court, made a most vigorous Lieutenant,Governor, of Bengal, :and is certainly not a person given .to emotional exaggeration. :Ile is an Anglo-Indian of the highest experience, he has seen, as he significantly intimates, a good -deal in his day, and he has no prejudice whatever against ,Mahommedans, and this . is his deliberate verdict—a verdict given, as is evident from his letter, without animosity to the Tory Govern- ment, and with a full perception of the grave political difficulties in the way of serious remedy. !After stating that • the exact truth will never be known, as such heavy interests favour its suppression, and admitting that there may be exaggeration in the Christians' -stories, hersays :— ,,But about the massacres and destruction, burning and plundering, there can, unfortunately, be no doubt whatever. Mies., thiags are, in no degree exaggerated; there is ocular proof of them. An attempt was lately made by the, pro-Turkish party to make. out that a large pro- portion of those supposed to have -been killed have returned to their villages. I have ascertained that there is not the least ground for this assertion. At Batak there are not now nearly so many people as Mr. _Baring reported to be left aliveouid. BO innther places. I confess I did not expect the destruction to be so complete as I found it. Attempts
_have been made to compare these things with what had been done by • ourselves in India, the -French in -Algeria, or the Russians in Central _ Asia. I have,seen.a good deal in my slay,but- never anything for one .moment to...compare with this, and I am satisfied , that ,there has been
notlilng like it in _modern days. It is not what we generally under- Sand by burning villages. I don't think people who have not -been there -even yet „realise -what has really happened. What-are e_aalled -villages here (are:.neally.coneiderable toxins rnot in any _de- gree barbarons,..uneivilised placee, but. good, substt:ntial towns, with • houses as good as those in our towns. It is not -only settlng, fire to them and, letting them barn, the .destruetion was organised and -systematic,--it was all in the May-of making-examples end terrorising others. _Therinare considerable townsawhielt-bad a, popnlation.of e-aeveral.thausanda each, in,,wbieh there is,not a ,aingle house or:part of houserlefknor a corner sper&Lby any acciden.t,—altutterly destroyed. We can't ,get thenxact number killed; we never can, but rather ex- Ipeotingots I did,- to-find same exaggerations,-still after comparing the' =statements of all the most impartial people I could And, Ill= satisfied pthat‘liir,,Bar4se's, statements. on. this subject arer, on. the whole, cer- tainly not over, probably rather under the truth. The French Con- • sal, who is probably in the most impartial position, says that not -less than 15000 at the leastwere killed int the• districts around this. The Austrian Consul, whose political sympathies:are, in the -direction opposed to exaggeration, estimates them. from 12,000. to 115,000, and . there are some massacres in _ether (parts of the country not counted up. Then, , in another way, I think we have hardly realised what it- is -that has happened.' Somehow or -other we accustom -ourselves to hear of great numbers of Africans or Chinese, or ,nther :distant heathen people, perishing in their, bloody .wars and revenges, :hut till I saw, it, I confess I did not realise _ how, pm- pletely these ,Bulgarians areKuropean, fair-haired Christians like our- - selves. The men of the lower ranks are not quite like our men, ..because they wear a peenliarsdress, but.the women an children, I,de- elare, I could not distinguish from so many ,women,and children of ,Kirkcaldy. _It is these decent, civilised people who have been made so. terrible an example of by their semi-civilised rulers because some few of them were supposed to have made a feeble attempt at revolt against the. treatment they received. As Laaid,_for .villages, in the accounts, you must read moderate-sized towns. To,nnderstand what has taken place, imagine that in our own islands a shame and tyran- nical Tory Government had got very much the upper hand, was ruling the country in the most tyrannical fashion with mercenary agents, policemen, etc. Suppose that Lancashire-had broken out into rebellion, and that the feeling in Scotland was much- excited ; suppose an enieute had taken -place in Dundee, in -which, some of the foreign police- men . were killed, and one or two small affairs of the kind had happened in Fife. Suppose that, by way of keeping the country quiet, an overwhelming force came to make an Asample of . our Fife towns, and taking the people quite unprepared, -razed Kirkcaldy and St. Andrew's to the ground, pot leaving one house, and killing a couple of thousand men, women, and children- in-the-one, a thousand in the other. Suppose that Caper was made A etilkaaore dreadful example of, the whole population of both sexes and al1ieFFP1 except a few who escaped in .time, being, elaughteredryou have then just about the sort of thing that occurred. %talc was, in fact, a town considerably larger than Caper. There is only this difference,-that if we Scotch were ripe for rebellion against tyranny, it would need pretty strong measures:to put us down ; while in the ease of these,,poor,Ral- garians there was not this excuse, for they have _been eo leng_aileus- tomed,to political slavery that they. had it •not in, them to make a.serions rebellion • they occupied only open, defenceless towns and villages, and very moderate measures in strong hands would have very easily.aup- pressed any attempt at a rising on the part of a few .youngfnien among them."
We have given that extract, long as it is, because the tune of the writer is as important as his facts, and because he knows how to make his facts clear to-the average British mind, vhieh always refuses to be moved by statements in mass, er about races whose appearance and habits and degree of civilisation it has not clearly realised. The plain fact that the outrages committed in Bulgaria were exactly as badas if they had been committed in Scotland is the one which Englishmen. staneed to take into their minds.
But the outrages have ceased? They never cease where Turks rule, and are sufficiently irritated and sufficiently safe.to let their contempt and hatred for Christian peasants have full sway. On the same day on which Sir George Campbell's letter was republished in the Daily News, there appeared in that journal another despatch from its special c:orresponclent, ,Mr. MacGalian He has revisited Bulgaria, and, he describes a land falling fast into the condition into which Boman provinces fell after barbarian irruptions, or in which parts of ,Germany were after the Thirty Years' War,—a condition in, which government for purposes of protection does not exist,, all peaceful persons, and especially the hardworking agricultu- rists, are at the mercy, not only of the ,soldiery, but of all who claim to be soldiers,—in which the soldier, the bandit, ,andue violent criminal are the only classes who have nothing .ear from the so-called agents of justice. After three, months of travelling about, Mr. Ma,cGahan declares that the irregular soldiery and zaptiehs, or armed police, keep up a reign of terror, take what .they please, maltreat whom they please, ancl4treat the people as cattle are treated by bad drovers,—have, fact, so cowed and harassed the unhappy villages that resistance is never thought of, and he himself witnessed this scene 4' On my way from Sofia to Nish we passed a number of bullock- waggons, driven by Bulgarians, under the escort of two or three zaptiehs. The cattle of the last driver in the train were apparently tired, and unable to keep up to the others, and they droppedbehind some twenty-five or thirty yards, in spite of the efforts of. the -driver. After a while one of the zaptiehs came back with a heavy club. -Re was a young fellow of about twenty ; the bulleck-driver was -an old man of perhaps sixty, with white hair, but tall and stalwart, as many of these Bulgarians are, in spite of the stooped shoulders. The young man began to beat the old one with the club. I counted some twenty blows, laid on with apparently all the strength he could-put 'into, his right arm, while uttering the fiercest imprecations. And-the oldman simply bent his head, put up his shoulders, and took this- eavage beating without a word. The dogs of Constantinople, when -kicked, never - howl ,or whine, :and these .l3nlgarians, when beaten,-never murmur."
In another case, a policeman ordered . a priest to:holdalls horse, selecting him because he was a priest, and when the horse ran away, though it was brought back again, beat the priest senseless. In one -village,-Streltchai the whole Christian population "axe :living in almost as complete a .,s4aAs of slavery as if they had been bought and, paid for tby their 'Turkish neighbours. They are compelled to work fora:a:4441g, they- am beaten and analtreated, the women and igirls.are .in- suited and outraged with impunity In many of the mixed villages the Turks 'have a habit, of inviting theraselyeb to dinner at Bulgarian houses. Five or six and, esent,eight or. ten Turks will suddenly take it , into, their beads JA have an evening out, and, they-will accordingly. go to & _Bulgarian neighbour,,, arid order dinner , ef the best .; of , ,everythAigo tobbe obtained- in the village. If. .--theiBulgarian does nothaffenito have in his house what r they want, they compel him to gelout• and buy it ; they make the women ,of #the house them ;-eat, drink, and carouse a whole night, and if tbo,-,pro- prietor of the house shows the least sign of .irapatienceAthey beat him and threaten him,, with future .vengeance." ,!frihere is absolutely no protection obtainable,,exoept _underuidirect pressure from a -Consul, and when.-. the premium Lap- plied, the punishment is - illusory. The officialsi I in, Jut, look on- the, -Turks eel their railikia, 'and feel that iropunity "Daring one part of the trip our party was augmented by a redif, or soldier of the reserves, who was going home on leave of absence. He wore the uniform of the Turkish soldier, but I observed that in the evening he threw over his shoulders a woman's robe, made of a soft, thin kind of felt—worn by the women in this country—and beautifully embroidered in colours around the neck and bosom. I had the curiosity to inquire into the history of this gown, and could scarcely restrain my indignation at the story I heard. This soldier said he had got the gown at Saitschar. After the discovery of the evacuation of the place by the Servians, he and a party of four or five more entered the town. In one of the houses they found a Sorvian family that had decided to remain in their house, and throw themselves on the mercy of the Turks. This family consisted of an old man, a married daughter with two children, and a girl of fourteen, whose relationship to the rest of the family they did not take the trouble to inquire into. The husband of the woman, if she had one, was absent. They began by fastening all the doors, so that nobody could escape, then they thoroughly pillaged the house, and took and divided everything of value among them- selves. They were in the house a day and a night, for it was a rich one apparently, and it took some time to get everything properly divided and packed ; and besides they were disposed to be merry and mako a night of it. I will not enter into the details of what they did during this night, because there are people who do not apparently object in the least to the commission of these deeds, who object to anybody lifting a finger to prevent them, or even to the expression of any indignation on the sub- ject, but who are dreadfully shocked at the recital of them; and I wish to spare the feelings of these sensitive persons. Suffice it to say that the next morning the question arose as to what should be done with the two women, the two children, and the old man. Some of the party were in favour of letting them go, but the rest were of opinion that it would be amusing to kill them, and a discussion ensued, which lasted more than an hour, in the presence of the weeping, trembling victims, who were wildly begging for mercy, and among whom, it should be remembered, there was a mother begging for the lives of her two child- ren. The narrator said that he, with another of the party, had leant to the side of mercy, but that the majority were against them, and that they finally ended the discussion and the prayers of their victims by falling upon them with their sabres. I asked him how he had come by the gown, and he replied that, seeing what the result was going to be, he had stripped it from the girl while the discussion was in progress, before she was killed, so that it might not be blood-stained. He had taken a fancy to it, because it would just be right for his daughter, who was about the same age; and his companions, perceiving this, made him pay rather high for it,—fifty piastres. He was a heavy, dull-look- ing brute, and it seemed strange to think that he had a daughter, a pretty, tender, joyous little thing, perhaps, who would wear this gown with delight. He told the story in a quiet, phlegmatic manner, and spoke very freely, looking upon me as an Englishman, and therefore as a friend."
That is the direct result, if not also the direct end of the policy of Lord Beaconsfield,—that a Turk of this kind thinks the Englishman under all circumstances his friend.
for outrage is the only ready means they have of paying them for their services in creating and keeping up the terror which they consider in Christian provinces the essence of their government. And they are right. Without terror the ascendancy of the Ottoman caste could not be preserved. So superior is the Christian in all qualities save courage, that if the Christians were not terrorised, and squeezed, and reduced to despair, they would by their thrift and energy acquire all property, and gradually but surely reduce the Turks to the one position they are determined not to accept,—that of men working with hand or head for an honest living. It is to maintain this ascendancy that the Turks are let loose to do as they please with impunity—a position we should dread even for English labourers, who have no divine authority for slaughtering and enslaving their neighbours—and when re- sistance occurs are assisted by soldiery whose "rough side," at all events, may be understood from this final extract :-
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