1895] Bulgarian Politics 179 



matters, or perhaps quite so open in our love affairs, but still the human 

 nature of it is identical, and the peculiarity of the co-existence of much 

 high ideality in principle with passionate love-making in practice. 



" There is much cholera going on in the villages round here. Po- 

 tocki showed me a village to-day where 100 persons have died, a local 

 outbreak, almost confined to the province of Volhynia. 



" 14th Sept. — Spent the day seeing Prince Sanguscko's stud at 

 Christowka, a really magnificent collection of mares, no English or other 

 than Arab blood having been admitted. The flea-bitten greys were 

 some of them quite wonderful. There is, however, a great lack of 

 promising young stallions, the stallions in stud use being away at 

 Slavuta. Christowka is 20 versts — 16 miles — from Antonin across 

 the black earth of the steppe, now all under cultivation — the few vil- 

 lages much swept by cholera. Christowka itself has lost 160 persons. 



" We were received by the manager and his Viennese wife, a young 

 boureeoise who insisted on entertaining us. The Antonin Director, 

 who was with me, is an intelligent man, a Pole from near Riga, and 

 had been for several years in the service of the Bulgarian Government. 

 On the way home he gave me a long and clear account of Bulgarian 

 politics. According to him (his name is Cherkowski) Prince Alex- 

 ander of Battenburg, with his many talents, was too young for the posi- 

 tion he was given, and made many mistakes. The Russians — though 

 as a Pole he had no desire to praise them — were really governing the 

 country well. Their administration was excellent, and they had carried 

 out in Bulgaria the reforms they only talk of in Russia, the finance be- 

 ing especially good. It has gone down rapidly since their departure. 

 Prince Alexander was sustained by Austrian and English help. Prince 

 Ferdinand he likes better. He, Ferdinand, is a quiet man, much ad- 

 dicted to science, especially botany. He would never have thought of 

 accepting a throne but for his mother. Ferdinand is incapable, Cher- 

 kowski says, of having been concerned in Stambuloff's assassination, 

 though Stambuloff treated him with great arrogance. Stambuloff's 

 death was in all probability a private vengeance. He was a man of 

 the most corrupt life, taking advantage of his official position to get 

 women into his power, any who came or whose husbands came to him 

 with petitions. He had violated many women, notoriously a certain 

 singer who was engaged to be married, he and the chief of the police 

 between them. The woman committed suicide on account of it. He 

 was hated for these crimes, and they were probably the reason of his 

 end. He, Cherkowski, was at the head there of the veterinary depart- 

 ment. The Bulgarian Government had required of him to become 

 naturalized, but he had refused, so left their service to enter that of 

 Potocki. The Bulgarians were a clever people with much outward 

 polish, but quite corrupt. They disliked all foreigners, but perhaps 



