THE RULE OF THE TURK.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 217, 13 September 1877, Page 4

THE RULE OF THE TURK.

The following is an extract from a review wbioh appeared in the Australasion of August 25, of " The Ottoman; Power in Europe : Its Nature, its; Growth, and ita Decline. By Edward A. Freeman. London: MaomiUan and; Co., 1877.":— The history of the Ottoman power given in the following chapters ig : marked by the fullness of knowledge which characterises Mr Freeman's historical writing.. Although but an outline sketch, it conveys to the most superficial reader a seose of the vast range of historical accumulation from which it has been condensed. In the summary which its author appends to the sketch he affirms that " Tiiere never has been in European history, perhaps not in the history of the whole world, any other power which was so thoroughly a fabric of wrong as the power of the Ottomans. There has been co other dominion of the same extent, lasting for so long a time, which has been in the same way wholly grounded on the degradation and oppression of the mass of those who were under its rule." He proceeds:— " Others among the great empires of the world have done much wrong, and caused much suffering, but they have, for the most part, done something else besides doing wrong and causing suffering. . . . The rule of the Ottoman Turk has no such balance of good* to set against evil. His mission has been simply a mission of destruction and oppression. From him the subject nations could gain nothing and learn nothing, except how to endure wrong patiently. His rule was not merely the rule of strangers over nations in their own land. It was the rule of the barbarian over civilised man, the rule of the misbeliever over the Christian. The direct result of Turkish conquest has been that, while the nations of Western Europe have enjoyed five hundred years of progress* the nations of South - Eastern Europe have suffered five hundred years of bondage, and of ali that follows on bondage. The rule of the Turk, by whatever diplomatic euphemisms it may be called, means the. bondage and degradation of all who come beneath its rule, buch bondage and degradation is not ao incidental evil which may be reformed; it is the essence of the whole system, the groundwork on which (he Ottoman power is built. The power which Othtnan began, which-Mabomet the Cot-queror firmly established, which Sulieman the Lawgiver niied to its highest pitch of power and splendor, is beyond all powers that the world ever saw, the embodiment of wrong. In the most glorious regions of the World the rule of the Turks has been the abomination of desolation, and nothing else." Later chapters recount the history of the disintegration of the Turkish Empire, commencing with the deliverance of Servia, and proceeding to the success which crowned the struggle for Greek independence. With. respect to one incident of the Servian war for liberty, when Servia was for the first time overcome by the power of the Turks, our author observes:—- --" The old tyranny was brought back again. The Turk did after his wont; every deed of horror whioh is implied in the suppression of an insurrection by Turkish hands wus done in the suppression of the insurrection of Servia, When Belgrade submitted, the Turks promised to put no man to death. Turk-like, they beheaded and impaled the men to whom tliey had promised their lives. Men still live who retnem-b-*r seeing tbeir fathers writhing on the stake before the citadel of Belgrade. For these good services Servia has been told by the man who'rules the counsels of England, that she ought to be grateful to the Turk I " It is impossible to write of the rule ol the Turk without devoting some attention to the horrible subject of the massacres which with the Turks are ordinary anJ systematic means of government. This, probably, ia not, and -ever was,* the oase with any other dominion, liut the explanation of this is the circumstance so forcibly and repeatedly insisted on by Mr Freeman, and that there is not, and never was, any other permanent domination resembling that of the Turks in Europe. Given the case of au alien military caste of barbarians ruling by the law of mi^ht subject populations more civilised an I pacific than themselves, it is seen lhat a syat.m of terrorism, enforced by wholesale massacre on the slightest provocation, is admirably adapted to effect its purpose. We read, "Fifty years and more ago men were shocked by the massacres of Chios, Kasandra, and Cyprus, just as we have been' shocked by the story of the maseacres of Bulgaria." It must be remembered that eince thesa words were written there huve been moie "massacres in Bulgaria," apparently more wide-spread —they couid not be more inhuman — titan those here referred to by Mr Freeman. This reflection deepens very considerably the impression of the following sentences:—" We are apt to think of some sudden and speoial outburst, like the doings of the Turks in Bulgaria last year, as if it stood by iiseit. In truth those doings in no way stand by themselves. The kind of deeda which were done then, and at which all mankind shuddered, were nothing new, nothing rare, nothiog strange. They were the ordinary relations between the Sultan and his subjects, the ordinary exercise of hia

at in effecting the work desired to be done by a oharge, without any waste of powder.