86 



BULGARIA. 



BURTON, SIR RICHARD F. 



diplomacy always extended in Bulgarian affairs 

 when Prince Bismarck was in office. On July 

 23 M. Nelidoff presented a note characterizing 

 the Bulgarian demands as manoeuvres to 

 strengthen the tottering throne of Ferdinand of 

 Coburg, whose rule is illegal, and saying that the 

 Forte's condescension to the Bulgarian Govern- 

 ment was an unfriendly act toward Russia which 

 might lead to serious consequences. This was 

 after the Porte had announced its decision re- 

 garding the investiture of Bulgarian bishops 

 for Macedonia. Three were appointed to ad- 

 minister dioceses in which a large majority of the 

 inhabitants are Bulgars. The Greek Government 

 took no active part in opposing the creation of 

 the bishops, and the Greek patriarchate, made 

 cautious by Stambuloff's threat to expel the 

 Greek bishops from Bulgaria, only stipulated 

 that they should be officially designated as schis- 

 matics, and that the Bulgarian popes should not 

 be permitted to wear the same vestments as the 

 Greek clergy. The Russian ambassador, after pre- 

 senting M. de Giers's strong protest against any 

 concessions to the illegitimate Bulgarian Govern- 

 ment, intimated that favors shown to the Bul- 

 garian people would not displease the Czar, and 

 accordingly the irade creating the- Macedonian 

 bishoprics was not issued till a formal request 

 came from the Bulgarian exarch. 



At the same time that his ministers were urg- 

 ing his claims for recognition, Prince Ferdinand's 

 Orleanist relatives, who desire to keep well with 

 the Czar, were employing vainly all their powers 

 of persuasion to induce him to abdicate. Before 

 the question of the bishops had been settled, 

 Stambuloff presented to the Porte a project for a 

 military alliance between Turkey and Bulgaria 

 on the basis of the demands contained in his 

 note. The terms of the treaty he offered were 

 outlined in the following definite proposals: (1) 

 The Porte should sanction the election of Prince 

 Ferdinand, and bind itself to protect the inde- 

 pendence of Bulgaria by all the means, diploma- 

 tic and military; (2) Bulgarian dioceses should 

 be established in all the Macedonian districts 

 where the Bulgarian element forms an incontest- 

 able majority, that is, in the districts of Veless, 

 Samakovo, Skoplia, and Ochrida; (3) Bulgaria 

 should undertake, in case of an attack on the 

 frontiers of the Ottoman Empire, to place at the 

 disposal of the Sultan a force of at least 60,000 

 men, to be armed, equipped, and maintained at the 

 expense of the Bulgarian Government. Notwith- 

 standing the protests of the Russian and Serv- 

 ian governments the Sultan granted berats for 

 the creation of Bulgarian bishops for the districts 

 of Skoplia or Ueskub, Ochrida, and Koeprulu. 

 The ethnographical constituents of the popu- 

 lation of Macedonia, according to statistics col- 

 lected through the French consular agencies and 

 free from political bias, are as follow : Bulgars, 

 5.50,000 ; Greeks, 300,000 ; Arnauts or Albanian 

 Mussulmans, 110,000; Bulgarian Mussulmans, 

 60,000 ; Ottoman Turks, 180,000 ; Greek Mussul- 

 mans, 15.000; Albanian Christians, 30,000 ; Jews, 

 Wallachians, and gypsies, 80,000; Armenians, 

 10,000 ; European foreigners, 5.000. The claims 

 of Servia to Macedonia are based on the histori- 

 cal ground that at one time it formed part of the 

 Servian Empire, and on the fact that in language 

 and customs the Macedonian Slavs approach 



more nearly to the Servian than to the Bulgarian 

 type. Ethnologists say that there is only a small 

 trace of Servian blood in the Macedonians, and 

 they themselves have from time immemorial 

 called themselves Bulgarians, and have taken an 

 active part in the ecclesiastical and educational 

 struggle against Hellenism, arid many of them in 

 the Bulgarian contest for political independence. 

 Mass meetings were held in Belgrade for the 

 purpose of calling on the Czar, the Sultan, and 

 the Greek patriarch to preserve from the Bulga- 

 rians the only territory left for Servian expan- 

 sion since Austria frustrated their aspirations 

 for a Great Servia in the region to which the 

 Serbs have a valid ethnological claim. 



BURTON, Sir RICHARD FRANCIS, Brit- 

 ish explorer and author, born in Tuam. Galway, 

 Ireland, March 19, 1821 ; died in Trieste, Aus- 

 tria, Oct. 20, 1890. His father, Lieut.-Col. Jo- 

 seph Netterville Burton, was a retired officer of 

 the British army, and made his home in France, 

 but sent his son to England to be educated. 

 The son attended a private school in Richmond, 

 and entered Trinity College, Oxford, with the 

 understanding that he was to prepare for the 

 Church. But the routine of college life and 

 study seemed intolerable. He found it hard to 

 learn by regulation methods, but developed a 

 passionate love for languages, of which he finally 



n uired twenty-nine, not counting dialects. He 

 his own way of learning even the Latin and 

 Greek. Scientific studies, especially those con- 

 nected with travel and exploration, were also of 

 intense interest to him ; and such was his desire 

 for active life that before his course was finished 

 he had persuaded his father to let him enter the 

 army in British India. A commission was ob- 

 tained for him, and in 1842 he reached India. 

 Sir Charles Napier, who soon discerned his tal- 

 ents and peculiar aptitude for Oriental service, 

 appointed him upon his staff. He passed an 

 examination in eight Oriental languages, among 

 which were Hindoostanee, Persian, and Arabic ; 

 and soon became an expert horseman and shot, 

 and so fine a swordsman as to receive from 

 France the honor of a brevet de pointe. He 

 published, in 1853, a system of bayonet exercise. 

 He was connected for nineteen years with the 

 Bombay army, during eight of which he was in 

 active .military service. The other eleven were 

 devoted to the Oriental scientific research for 

 which nature had marvelously fitted him. He 

 acquired such mastery of native tongues and 

 dialects that, with his Arab face and wonderful 

 power of adapting himself to new manners and 

 customs, he could pass unchallenged and unsus- 

 pected among any people whose dress he chose 

 to assume. In 1853 he made an expedition to 

 Mecca and Medina. Besides gathering material 

 for a valuable and interesting volume, he was 

 enabled to suggest to the English War Depart- 

 ment measures of protection for the coasts of 

 the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, which, if 

 taken, would have prevented a massacre at Jed- 

 dah and an increase of the slave trade. His 

 next expedition, 1855, was to Harar, in Moslem 

 Abyssinia, which he explored thoroughly, going 

 thence to Somali Land, in east Africa. Ho 

 commanded n expedition in which was Capt. 

 J. H. Speke, then an independent explorer, who 

 was afterward Burton's associate, and Lieuten- 



