264 



REVIEW OE REVIEWS. 



manded when there is no advantage to 

 be got from their weakness. Humanly, 

 this is not a beautiful motive, but hither- 

 to it has been the method adopted in 

 the policy of this world. The Balkan 

 States had found the necessary quiet to 

 become strong which Turkey longed for 

 and was unable to obtain, and they 

 utilised the favourable moment when 

 they were at one and had the least re- 

 sistance to expect to make their attack. 

 That was their right, philosophises the 

 Field-Marshal. Their mode of proce- 

 dure should prove a warning against 

 the theory of the pacifists who would 

 regulate the great questions of existence 

 of nations by mutual esteem of the 

 rights of others. Each party has its own 

 conceptions of what these rights are, and 

 when the question is a serious one a 

 mere mutual understanding is bound 

 to fall to pieces. To be strong is the 

 only means by which to demand success- 

 fully justice from others. 



II.— BY SIR HARRY H. JOHNSTON. 



Sir Harry H. Johnston was ever a 

 cheery optimist, and only he would be 

 capable at this time of attempting to 

 forecast " The Final Solution of the 

 Eastern Ouestion.'"" Sir Harry gives the 

 readers of the Nineteenth Century and 

 After the results of his diagnosis of the 

 disease of rivalry which afflicts the 

 Christian Powers, and the ])rescription 

 for the suggested cure is : — 



(1) Free Trade over the whole of the exist- 

 ini? Turkish iMiipirc — tliat is to say, no dif- 

 ferential or preferential tariffs to be levied 

 in Asia Minor, Armenia, Mesopotamia, 

 Aleppo. Syria. Arabia, Egypt, or Cyprus, 

 giving any one Power a commercial advan- 

 tage over the rest. 



(2) The appointment of the Turkish public 

 debt over all the countries which have formed 

 part of the Turkish Empire in Europe, Asia, 

 or Africa since the beginning of the twen- 

 tieth century, the contributions of Egypt and 

 Cyprus not to exceed the present amount of 

 the tribute, and facilities, of course, to be 

 given for the amortisation of the debt 

 charges. 



(3) The transference to Great Britain of 

 Turki.sh suzerainty over Cyprus, Sinai, and 

 Egv'pt ; the assumption by France of a pro- 

 tectorate over Syria and the. Lebanon ; the 

 creation in Palestine and Midian of a mainly 

 Jewish State, guaranteed and supervised by 

 the Great Powers; independence to be 

 granted to Turkish Arabia (the Hijaz and 



Yaman) ; a Russian protectorate over Trebi- 

 zond and Armenia; the retention of Rhodes 

 by Italy — lif only <&s an acknowledgment of 

 the part played by Venice in the past in 

 trying to aave the civilisation of Greece and 

 Cyprus- and. lastly, the re.striction of direct 

 Ottoman rule to a new Turkish Sultanate, 

 extending jjerhaps from Coai-stantinople — at 

 any rate including all Asia Minor, the Aleppo 

 di.strict, and Mesopotamia down to the Per- 

 sian Gulf; this Sultanat-t', however, to be 

 und<'r German protection -and with its foreign 

 affairs conducted and its financo controlled 

 by the German Ambassador, much as Egypt 

 is supervised by Great Britain. 



THE WRECKERS. 



This is certainly a drastic but essen- 

 tially a business-like solution, and is not 

 therefore likely to commend itself to the 

 chancelleries. The genial .Sir IIarr\' 

 allows himself the pleasure of casti- 

 gating the Turk : — 



The Turks of (>astorn, central, and western 

 Asia have been respectively the ruin ot 

 China, of Persia, and of the Aryan civilisa- 

 tion of central Asia ; they Iwoxight Arab 

 Egypt into ruin and nullity, and reduced it< 

 population frorr eight million.s to two mil- 

 lions; they ruined and depopulated Cypru.<-. 

 a flourishing kingdo.ii of the middle agc^, and 

 still prosperous under Venetian rule; tluy 

 ruined and dejjopulated Tripoli, Tunis and 

 Algeria ; reduced Crete to .semi-savagery, and 

 deva.stated the Morea ; wrecked tho great 

 renaissance of Peirsia under the Sufi .shahs; 

 and made of Thrace and ^facedonia, Rumili 

 and Bulgaria, Servia and Epirus, Bessarabia 

 and Wallachia shambles, deserts, manure- 

 hea]>s; with towns of mean and filthy streets, 

 and populations of .semi-nomads, whose flocks 

 and ln-rds destroyed the for<istfi. becau.se 

 undor the constant rapine of the Turks agri- 

 culture did not pay. Is it to the descendants 

 of these heedless devastators tiiat Europe owe.s 

 consideration? What claim has the Turk to 

 our further patience or to our pity? 



THE TURK'S CH.^NCE. 



The writer, however, resumes his 

 natural cheerfulness when he considers 

 the future : — 



Under the new arrangement of the Turki.sh 

 Empire which the present war may bring 

 about, all these good elements in the popula- 

 tion of Asiatic Turkey will get a chance to 

 expand, increase, and prosper. The Turks 

 themselves may regiain vigour; they may 

 fully embrace the better type of Western 

 civilisation, emancipate their women from 

 the harem existence (which really is the prin- 

 cipal cause of Turkish futility and degrada- 

 tion), so that in course of time, by sheer 

 worth of character as well as valour, the 

 Turks may take a leading place among the 

 peoples of the Near East. 



