THE BULGARS' DECLINE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1864, 25 September 1913, Page 5

THE BULGARS' DECLINE.

DISASTER AFTER VICTORY,

FINE SOLDIERS, BUT BAD DIPLOMATISTS, (Francis M'Oullagh, fix the New York "Post.") Tho great advantage and the great defect of the Bulgnr is tlhat 'ho is still a peasant. Being a peasant lie makes a fine soldier, but a badi diplomatist. He fights well, but. when, after the fighting is over, the accounts como to be settled up over a green tablo, tho Bulgar's inferiority is at once manifest. For tho peasant is rigid and transparently grasping, whereas diplomacy requires, above all tilings, pliability and opaqueness. By allowing tihe war to drag on for nine months and a now war to break out at tho end of that time, the Bulgarians showed that they had overestimated their own physical strength and the extent of their resources. They had reached tho apex of victory on November 15, when they were in force before tho Tehalalja lines. They began to go downhill next day, when, with deplorable foolhardiness, they attacked these impregnable lines; and, though they persistently shut thejr eyes to the fact, they have been going downhill over since. At Apex of Victory. On November 11 I fell into the hands of the Bulgarian vanguard outside tho Tohatalja linos. The leaders of that vanguard questioned me closely about the Turkish dispositions. I refused to give any information on that subject, but 1 warned theni that they would never get through tho Tchatalja lines. "You have no idea how strongly they are fortified l ," said I, "and you are not aware, perhaps, that the Turks have recovered from their panic and are_ now ready to give you a hot_ reception." They laughed at my warnings, told mo that they had' already engaged lodgings in Shishli (a suburb of Constantinople), and pointed to the gala uniforms 1 which thoy "had brought with thorn for the triumphal entry and for the maBS in Santa Sofia.

At tho same instant the Grand Vizier in Stamboul was ready to sign any terms and to bring the war to an end at once. He would undoubtedly have surrendered Adrianople. Ho would have been extremely glad to have got the Enos-Media line, and to havo made peace instantly, and even, to havo supported the Bulgars in case tho latter had differences with their allies. Old Kiamil Pasha was actually talking of dying on his office stool in the Sublime Porte as the Roman Senators died in their chairs when the' Gauls stormed Rome. A high diplomatist in Constantinople has since assured mo that on that day the Turks would havo signed peace on any torms, provided only that Constantinople wero left to them. „ In this business the generals and the statesmen of Tsar Ferdinand played their cards badly. They should have known that their resources wqre extremely limited, that their losses had been frightfully heavy, that their allies were uncertain, that even if they entered Constantinople they would not bo allowed to remain there. They should have given tho Media-Enos lino to the Turks oil November 11, and retired from Tchatalja with the reputation of generous victors, good diplomatists, and unconquerable soldiers. Like Her Balkan Wolves. t\ • ■; It seemi'at the time of, writing, as if Bulgaria will go down in silence, fighting to the' last, like one of her own Balkan wolve3. Sho has no friends, and sho asks for none. If well-intentioned diplomats and attaches offer suggestions and condolences she invites them to go to a placo which has an ever higher temperature than Sofia. This is characteristic of the dour, dogged Bulgarian peasant of whom I have already spoken. It is, however, a characteristic of which the Bulgars must get'rid of if they moan to succeed.

The Bulgars are much too self-con-tained, -uncivil,' and unyielding. To say or do a thing in. a disagreeable manner seems actually to gratify them. To say something harsh and rasping seems ti give them an appetite. I hope I shall not bring upon myself tho ire of an ancient and illustrious race when I say that the Bulgarian closely resembles tho Scottish peasants, ship's engineer:,, mechanics, and such like. 111 his dislike for verbal frills and embroideries, in his passion for veracity in its hardest and most forbidding form, the Scottish lowlandcr is prono to sketch the truth .witli a logical," uncompromis'ng outline which seems to afford him a certain grim enjoyment-, especially if ho sees that it is chillins the very marroiv in somebody else's bones. In certain aspects of his character,- the Scotchman is to tho Frenchman as tho Bulgar is to the Greek. But thero is the entente between Scotland (not to speak of the remaining, insignificant portions of tho British Empire) and France, whilo tlio Graeco-Gulgar alliance has broken down. As a matter of fact it was bound to break down, for tho Greek was oil and tho Bulbar .water—and very hard water, too.

Bulgaria is ono of those countries in which tho national character strongly resembles the character of the individual citizen, and in which the character of ono citizen strongly resembles that of another. There aro shopkeepers and farmers in-Bulcaria who will £0 bankrupt sooner than compromise, humour oustomers, cajole, employ legitimate diplomacy and suavity, adapt themselves to circumstances.

I once, went into a bookseller's sh-p in Sofia in order to purchase an AngloBulgarian dictionary and somo phrasebooks. The name over the shop door was typically Bulgarian, but the elderly man behind the counter looked like the picture of an old English Puritan. Hard and uncompromising, ho fixed mo with tho eyo of a magistrate _ looking at a prisoner whom he recognises as having been "there" before; and then proceeded to cross-question mo in a.rasping voice as to my antecedents and m? mether-tonguo. His tono was such that I felt m.vseif flush hot with anger, but I wanted tho books and consequently managed to control myself. 110 had not, however, got tho volumes which I iequircd, but ho tried to pa3s off on mo, instead, somo compilations intended for German students and dealing, not with Bulgarian, but with a cognate language. And tho price ho asked in Bulgarian money was slightly higher than tho price marked on tho cover in German money. I tried to negotiate, but ho cut me short by banging down the books 011 the counter and saying: "It's not a question of what you propose to pay. It's a question of what. I demand."

In another book shop I got exactly what I wanted from an accommodating German Jew, who might on occasion bo inclined to imposo 011 tho ignoranco of a foreigner, but who could also jield courteously and pliably when ho 6aw that he was dealing with a person who knew something about tho price of books.

Dlfferonco ol National Traits. Towards tho beginning of Septembor last I left Sofia for Kustchuk, after having been a prisoner of war, and'having been released and allowed to leavo tho country. In tho first-class carriage which I occupied as far as Rustcluik wero some well-dressed Bulgarian civil functionaries of high rank. 011 learning my story, one of them could not restrain his feelings. "If wo had captured Nazim Pash.i—yes, that would be something. But you I A correspondent! Pshaw I"—and ho literally spat on the floor in disgust.

How differently, when I fell into the hands n£ *&() Jaoancse, after Mukdeu,.

was I received, not only by that fine old Samurai, General Kuroki, but oven by the humblest of tho soldiers who escorted mo! The politeness of the Japaneso may have been all pretence, tho frankness of the Bulgarians may have been bare truth, but tlioy each indicated a typo of nnnd which, in ono case, spelt success, and in the other case ruin. When the battlo of Lulo Burgas was beginning, tho American and Rumanian military attaches asked for permission to witness it. Tho Generalissimo re- ; ceivod them with a harsh and forbidding countenance, which ho directed entirely, however, towards, the Rumanian attache. ""When we liavo done with those battlefields," said ho, "you shall see them, but not till then." Sometimes, it is true, the hardness and the comparative honesty of tho Bulgar are grateful. . South of them, in Greece, and north of them, in Rumania,' the peoplo are excessivolv urbano and flexible, but one undoubtedly meets with n lot of imposition and dishonesty. Whether, in the caso of tho Rumanian, this is due to tho natives of the country themselves or to somo of tho subject races that live thero, I cannot say; but tho traveller and tho business man must bo perpetually on their guard. I had hardly passed the frontier into Rumania, a week ago, than I found myself snatching a hasty lunch at a railway restaurant. At the end of the meal, tho waiter, as tho custom is in this country, jotted down on a slip of paper tho price of each plate, but then the proprietor bustlod up and calmly, beforo my very eyes, multiplied the total by two. In tho Palace Hotel, Bucharest, I engaged for twenty francs per day a little room cortainly not worth nino, and, at tho end of the week, it figured on my bill as engaged at thirty francs; and, even whon I paid that extortionate amount, I was swindled to the extent of more than twenty francs in tho change.

Inflexibility Calned Nothing. To return, however, to the question of Bulgaria, there is no doubt that she has gained nothing by her honest but stupid inflexibility. M. Natchevitch, the Bulgarian delegate at Constantinople, opposed during the last few davs an invariable non possumus to all tho demands of the Ottoman Government for the evacuation of tho territory between Tchatalja and the Enos-Midia line, with the result that, instead of retiring gracefully, the Bulgarians wero ignominiousiy ejected from the district in question and from much else besides. By politely parting with Silistra six months ago Bulgaria might now bo free to deal with Greece and Servia. Now sho has had Silistra rudely torn from lifer. By settling with Servia and Greece, a month ago, she would now be free to deal with Rumania and would perhaps havo had tho armed support cf these countries in the struggle. Sho has now been driven out of tho lands which sho would not yield to Servia and Greece.

Tho failure of the Bulgarians is all the more regrettable because her people havo somo of the stem qualities of ancient Rome. They havo all the patriotism, perseverance, unitjr, frugality, and far-seeing ambition which distinguished the' old Republicans on tho Tiber. But how often does history show us small states advancing on the road to empire equipped with the Roman virtues and lacking only one or two fine old Roman vices such as dissimulation, cralt, and doliberato deception, and consequently ending its career in premature and pitiful ruin I Bulgaria may be one of these Romes that will never attain to empire.