October 10, 1918 
LAND ^ WATER 
11 
a few you would still win your point. You could still main- 
tain discipline in the army, and these few would be as 
strong a deterrent to the Allied Fleet as sending all." 
It seemed to me that Enver almost eagerly seized upon 
this suggestion as a way out of his dilemma. 
"How many will you let me send?" he asked quickly. 
The moment he put this question I knew that I had carried 
my point. 
" I would suggest that you take twenty English and twenty 
French — fortj' in all." 
"Let me have fifty," he said. 
"All right — we won't haggle over ten," I answered. "But 
you must make another concession. Let me pick the fifty 
Avho are to go." 
This agreement had relieved the tension, and now the 
gracious side of Enver's nature began to show itself again. 
"No, Mr. Atnbassador," he replied. "You have pre- 
vented me from making a mistake this afternoon ; now let 
me prevent you from making one. If you select the fifty 
men who are to go, you will simply make fifty enemies. I 
think too much of \'ou to let you do that. I will prove to 
you that I am your real friend. Cannot you make some 
other suggestion ? " 
"Why not take the youngest? They can stand the 
fatigue best." 
"That is fair," answered Enver. He said that Bedri, who 
was in the building at that moment, would select the 
"victims." This caused me some uneasiness; I knew that 
Enver's modification of his order would displease Bedri, 
whose hatred of the foreigners had shown itself on many 
occasions, and that the head of the police would do his best 
to find some way of evading it. So I asked Enver to send 
for Bedri and give him his new orders in my presence. Bedri 
came in, and, as I had suspected, he did not like the new 
arrangement at all. As soon as he heard that he was to 
take only fifty, and the youngest, he threw up his hands, 
and began to walk up and down the room. 
"No, no, this will never do !" he said. "I do not want 
the youngest ; I must have the notables ! " 
• But Enver stuck to the arrangement, and gave Bedri 
•orders to take only the youngest men. It was quite apparent 
that Bedri needed humoring, so I asked him to ride with me 
to the American Embassy, where we would have tea and 
arrange all the details. This invitation had an instantaneous 
effect which the American mind will have difficulty in com- 
prehending. An American would regard it as nothing 
wonderful to be seen publicly riding with an Ambassador — 
or to take tea at an embassy. But this is a distinction which 
never comes to a minor functionary, such as a Prefect of 
Police, in the Turkish capital. Possibly I lowered the dignity 
of my office in extending this invitation to Bedri ; Pallavicini 
would probably have thought so, but it certainly paid, for it 
made Bedri more pliable than he would otherwise have been. 
When we reached the Embassy, we found the crowds still 
there, awaiting the results of my intercession. When I told 
the besiegers that only fifty had to go, and these the youngest, 
they seemed momentarily stupified. They could not under- 
stand it at first ; they believed that I might obtain some 
modification of the order, but nothing like this. Then, as 
the truth dawned upon them, I found myself in the centre 
of a crowd that had' apparently gone momentarily insane; 
this time not from grief, but from joy. Women, the tears 
streaming down their faces, insisted on throwing themselves 
on their knees, seizing both my hands and covering them 
with kisses. But finally I succeeded in breaking away and 
secreting myself and Bedri in an inner room. 
"Cannot I have a few notables?" he asked. 
"I'll give you just one," I replied. 
"Cannot I have three ? " he asked again. 
"You can have all who are under fifty," I answered. 
But that did not satisfy him, as there was not a solitary 
person of distinction under that age limit. Bedri reallv had 
his eye on Messrs. Weyl, Rey, and Dr. Frew. But I had one 
"notable" up my sleeve whom I was willing to concede. 
Dr Wigram, an Anglican clergyman, one of the most pro- 
minent men in the foreign colony, had pleaded M^ith me, 
asking that he might be permitted to go with the hostages 
and furnish them such consolation as religion could give 
them I knew that nothing would delight Dr. Wigram more 
' than to be thrown as a sop to Bedri's passion for " notables 
" Dr Wigram is the only notable you can have, 1 said 
to Bedri. So he accepted him as the best that he could do 
'"Mr^ Hoffman Philip, the Counsciller of the American 
Embassy— now American Minister to Colombia— hyd already 
expressed a desire to accompany the hostages, so that he 
might "minister to their comfort. This manifestation o a 
..-:..„ ,^;-:. ..... „..il.;na nPW .n Mr. PhlhP. 
Although not in good health, Mr. Philip had returned to 
Constantinople after Turkey had entered the war, in order 
that he might assist me in the work of caring for the refugees. 
Through all that arduous period he constantly displayed 
that sympathy for the unfortunate, the sick, and the poor, 
which is innate in his character. Though it was somewhat 
irregular for a representative of the Embassy to engage in 
such a hazardous enterprise as this one, Mr. Philip pleaded 
so earnestly that finally I reluctantly gave my consent. 
I also obtained permission for Mr. Arthur Ruhl and Mr. 
Henry West Suydam, of the Brooklyn Eagle, to accompany 
the party. 
Bedri's Little Joke 
At the end, Bedri had to have his little joke. Though the 
fifty were informed that the boat for Gallipoli would leave 
the next morning at six o'clock, Bedri, with his police, visited 
their houses at midnight, and routed them all out of bed. 
The crowd that assembled at the dock the next morning 
looked somewhat weather-beaten and worse for wear. Bedri 
was there, superintending the whole proceeding, and when 
he came up to me, he good-naturedly reproached me again 
for letting him have only one "notable." In the main, he 
behaved very decently, though he could not refrain from 
telling the hostages that the British aeroplanes were dropping 
bombs on Gallipoli ! 
I returned to the Embassy, somewhat wearied, by the 
excitement of the last few days, and in no particularly gracious 
humour for the honour which now awaited me. For I had 
been there only a few minutes when His Excellency, the 
German Ambassador, was announced. Wangenheim dis- 
cussed commonplaces for a few minutes and then approached 
the real object of his call. He asked me to telegraph to 
Washington that he had been " helpful " in getting the number 
of the Gallipoli hostages reduced to fifty ! In view of the 
actual happenings, this request was so preposterous that 
I almost laughed in his face. I had known that, in going 
through the form of speaking t6 the Grand Vizier, Wangen- 
heim had been manufacturing an alibi for future use, but 
I had not expected him to fall back upon it so soon. 
"Well," said Wangenheim, "at least telegraph your 
Government that I didn't 'hetz' the Turks in this matter." 
The German verb "hetzen" means about the same as the 
English "sic," in the sense of inciting a dog. I was in no 
mood to give Wangenheim a clean bill of health, and told 
him so. In fact, I specifically reportad to Washington that 
he had refused to help me. A day or two afterwards Wan- 
genheim called me on the telephone, and began to talk in an 
excited and angry tone. His Government had wired him 
about my telegram to Washington. I told him that if he 
desired credit for assistance in matters of this kind, he should 
really exert himself and do something. 
The hostages had an uncomfortable time at Gallipoli ; 
they were put into two wooden houses, with no beds and no 
food, except that which they had brought themselves. The 
days and nights were made wretched by the abundant vermin 
that is a commonplace in Turkey. Had Mr. Philip not gone 
with them, they would have suffered seriously. After the 
unfortunates had been there for a few days I began work 
with Enver again to get them back. Sir Edward Grey 
— then British Secretary for Foreign Affairs — had requested 
our State Department to send me a message with the request 
that I present it to Enver and his fellow ministers ; its 
purport was that the British Goverr|ment would hold them 
personally responsible for any #ijury to the hostages. I 
presented this message to Enver on May gth. I had seen 
Enver in many moods, but the unbridled rage which Sir 
Edward's admonition now caused was • something entirely 
new. As I read the telegram his face became livid, and he 
absolutely lost control of himself. The European polish 
which Enver had sedulously acquired dropped like a mask ; 
I now saw him for what he really was — a savage, blood- 
thirsty Turk. 
" They will not come back ! " he shouted. " I shall let 
them stay there until they rot ! " 
" I would like to see those English touch me ! " he con- 
tinued. I saw that the method which I had adopted with 
Enver, that of persuasion, was the only ^possible way of 
handling him. I tried to soothe the Minister now, and, 
after a while, he quieted down. 
" But do not ever threaten me again ! " he said. 
After spending a week at Gallipoli the party returned. 
The Turks had moved their military headquarters from 
Gallipoli, and the English fleet, therefore, ceased to bombard 
it. AH came back in good condition and were welcomed 
home with great enthusiasm. 
