Bulgaria and the Machdonian Problem. 



291 



(of Berlin, was tlirust back under the Turkish rule. 

 The same Lord Salisbur>^ who, in the despatch of 

 fanuap.- 4th, 1S77, wrote that there was no ground 

 in history for a belief that a grant of practical self- 

 government to the Bulgarian provinces would de\elop 

 ■ in the population the desire for the incorporation 

 into the Russian Empire," changed opinion as soon as 

 he saw the same great Bulgaria emerge from the Russo- 

 Turkish War and the San Stefano negotiations, and, 

 lontradicting every word he' had written in the begin- 

 ning of 1878, insisted upon the " material reduction " 

 of a " Stiite likely to fall under the influence of Russia." 

 — (General Instructions to Lord Odo Russell, Turkey, 

 No. 39. "SjS.) 



History would, perhaps, have condoned this apostasy 

 of Lord Salisbury from principles he had so warmly 

 defended at Constantinople had he at least insisted 

 upon such a system of government for Macedonia as 

 that which Lord Duflferin, with the aid of a French 

 army of occupation, had established in the Turkish 

 province of Lebanon. Unfortunately, he not only con- 

 tented himself with Art. 23 of the Berlin 'I'reaty, but 

 went so far in his hostility to Russia }hat he refused 

 his agreement to Count SchouvalofT's proposal for its 

 execution, a proposal which had found the support 

 of Germany and Austria. The first plenipotentiary of 

 the latter Power, Count Andrassy, had proposed the 

 following reading : — " The High Contracting Powers 

 look upon the totality of the Articles of the present 

 .\ct as forming a collection of stipulations of which 

 they undertake to control and to superintend' the 

 execution." Lord Salisbury could not comprehend the 

 object of this proposal. " His Excellency," says the 

 eighteenth Protocol of the Congress of Berlin, " knows 

 of no sanction more solemn and more binding than the 

 signature of his Government, and prefers not to accept 

 an engagement which appears to him either to be 

 useless, as it is evident that Great Britain holds to 

 the execution of the Treaty ; or to have a signification 

 of too un<lcfined a bearing." And thanks to this 

 special pleading the Congress rejected the proposal. 



The result of this rejection is what might have been 

 expected. Turkey declined to carry out the law for its 

 European provinces elalioratcd in 18.S0 by the Inter- 

 national Commission appointed under Art. 23 of the 

 Berlin Treaty : and, no one undertaking to superintend 

 and control its execution, that law remained, us one of 

 its signatories, Lord Kdmond Fitzmaurice, predicted, 

 ,1 " fresh talc ol great expectations," 



I'or fifteen long years the deceived inhaliilanls of 

 M.iccdonia and the vilayet of Adrianople hoped against 

 liopc and believed against history that the " solemn 



and binding sanction " given to the Berlin Treaty Ly 

 the Great Powers would put an end to their sufferings. 



At last their patience was exhausted ; in 1895 the 

 first insurrection broke out, and was followed 

 since, especially in 1902 and 1903, by the general 

 uprising in the very districts which had been assigned 

 by Lord Salisbury to the Bulgaria of 1877 on account 

 of the revolutionary spirit they had shown and the 

 sufferings they had endured : in the cazas of Kirk- 

 Klissi and Moustafa-pasha ; in the vilayets of Uskub 

 and Bitolia ; in the three northern cazas of Seres ; and 

 m some parts of the cazas of Stronmitsa, Tikvech, and 

 Kastoria. 



If the atrocities committed during the terrible sup- 

 pression of the revolution — the 215 destroyed villages, 

 the 19,410 burnt-down houses, and the 25,000 killed 

 and wounded inhal)itant.s* — have come to an impartial 

 observer like Dr. E. J. Dillon " like deadly visions oui 

 the plague-polluted mist of hell," one can easilx 

 imagine the profound emotion they produced among 

 the 15,000 Macedonian and Adrianople natives estab- 

 lished in Bulgaria, and among the Bulgarians of the 

 principality themselves. 



The impression made by such excesses upon a popu- 

 lation akin to the sufferers, and the social and econo- 

 mical crisis they produce, were described at the 

 Congress of Berlin, with the evident approval of the 

 high Assembly, by the Greek plenipotentiary, Mr 

 Dclvannis. Speaking of the efTect produced upon Greek 

 public opinion by the news of outrages and atrocities 

 perpetrated across the frontier, he said : — 



" The natives of the Greek provinces of the Ottoman 

 Empire are counted by thousarwls ; a great number 

 occupv high positions in all branches of the Adniini- 

 tration, in the Navy and in the .\rmy ; others, no le- 

 numerous, are distinguished by their commercial and 

 industrial activity. 'The echo which the news of an 

 Hellenic insurrection in Turkey produces in their 

 hearts is too powerful not to move them. Some it 

 drives to cross the frontiers to join the combatants ; 

 others, to empty their purses for the common cause. 

 This excitement is rapidly communicated to all the 

 inhabitants of the country, although not natives of the 

 fighting provinces, and the whole population of the 

 kingdom, which cannot forget what it owes to the 

 former struggles of these disinheritccl brethren, nor 

 remain impiussive in view of their struggle for 

 deliverance, rushes to join their ranks in order to 

 n.ssisl them in reconquering their liberty. 



• " l-T <^>iieslion Mncinloniciinr <l ks k i-formr<irn Tiii.,.i,. , 

 (i;ir I, V, VoiiKiv, r,ui<, l')05. Pp. 11JIJ7, ThU bonk, ili 

 iiewisl on the M:ii:cili>ni«ii ptnlilcm, (;ivr» ilct,-)!!- .ilioiu il 

 iiiiniciic;il strrn(;lli »r the ,M,icc<l<>ninM iiiUinnuiilics in .1 

 llic iiwffiof il< three vi/tiyfli. Aicorilin;; lo llicsc lij;iircs, i<ni . 

 a lol.nl popiitalinn "f 2,25S,J2|; (inclmlini; Jcw«, .Vrnicniai 

 qi|MicS nnil forei;;ni,r») Mmilonia niinilicri. iSl, 3,5(1 |liil);,iti.ii 



