EXPLANATION OF THE PORTRAITS OVERLEAF

Above, on the right: Ibrahim Shinassi Effendi, born 1826 (1242 of the Hidshra) at Constantinople; journalist and poet; went to Paris, and on his return attempted to replace the bombastic and generally unintelligible style everywhere in vogue by the simple unadorned Turkish language. In 1859 (1276 of the Hidshra) he founded the newspaper Terdshüman-i-ahwal (“ The State"); removed again to Paris in 1864 (1281 of the Hidshra), and became the founder of modern Turkish literature. He died on September 13, 1871 (Redsheb 5, 1288, of the Hidshra).

Above, on the left: Kemal Bey, born December 21, 1840 (Shewwal 26, 1256), at Gallipoli, or in the mountains of Tekfur (Rodosto); studied in Sofia; was a pupil of Shinassi Effendi from 18571858 (1274 of the H.); the most important Turkish poet and author of modern times; died in Chios on December 2, 1888 (Rebü'l awwel 28, 1306).

Below, on the right: Prince Fazil Mustafa Pasha of Egypt, the brother of the Khedive Ismail Pasha, who died 1895, and the founder of the Young Turkish reform party; he came to Constantinople in 1846 (1262 of the H.); was an Ula of the first class in 1851 (1267), vizier, 1857–1858 (1274), minister without portfolio, 1861 (1278), minister of education, 1862 (1279); appointed to the unremunerative post of finance minister on November 13, 1862 (Resheb 21, 1279); president of the financial board for treasury administration, 1865 (1282); a second time minister without portfolio, 1869 (1286); died abroad, 1875 (1292). The daughter of Fazil Mustafa Pasha, the princess Nazli Hanum, resident in Cairo, also maintains close relations with the Young Turkish party.

Below, on the left: Abd ul Hamid Zia Pasha, poet and publicist, born at Constantinople, 1825 (1241); secretary in the imperial palace, 1855 (1271); translated Spanish and in particular French works (Rousseau's "Emile"); under Abd ul Aziz governor of Cyprus; sent by Abd ul Hamid to Syria, Konia, and finally to Adana, where he died in 1881 (1298 of the H.).

The Young Turkish party are those who desire to revive the constitutional programme of 1876; this was the work of Midhat Pasha, who is not, however, to be reckoned as a member of the party. The more recent leaders of the party are given in the following list. All, with the exception of those mentioned under the numbers 4-6, are still alive. 1. Ahmed Riza Bey, editor of the revo lutionary journal appearing in Paris, the "Meschweret" ("deliberation"). 2. Murad Bey, president of the "Comité Ottoman d'Union et de Progrès," who edited in Cairo for some time the journals "Zeman " ("time") and “Mizân” (“balance”), and now conducts in conjunction with Ahmed Riza Bey the paper "Osmanli," the organ of the Comité Ottoman, which appears twice a month, in Turkish, at Geneva. 3. Halil Ganem, a Syrian Christian of Beirout, collaborator on the "Journal des Débats" at Paris, and once deputy for Syria in the Turkish Parliament; he is now president of the Comité Turco-Syrien, which publishes the paper "La Jeune Turquie," in Paris. 4-6. Zia Bey, Ali Suavi Effendi, and Aghiah Effendi, who published the Turkish paper “Muchbir" ("messenger") in London from 1867 to 1868. 7. Wassif Effendi, now living in Paris, and formerly secretary of Midhat Pasha. 8. Mahmud Djelaleddin Pasha, the husband of Senîha, sister of the Sultan Abd ul Hamid; in 1899 he fled to Paris. 9. Tewfik Ebusia, friend and publisher of Kemal Bey, now in banishment at Konia, a talented poet and author.

One of the most popular and distinguished poets of the present time is Shemsi Bey of Stamboul, whose war songs have attracted particular attention. We may also mention Ahmed Midhat (whose stories and novels are directed against Mohammedan marriage customs), Muallim Nadshi, Sami Bey, Sezâjî Mahmud Kemâl, Mustafa Reshid, Hussâm ed din, and Mehmed Risat; all of these have introduced the culture of Western Europe to their countrymen and are continuing their task.

the creator of modern Osman literature and language, was the most important of all the Turkish poets of the modern period. He published a newspaper under the title of "Ibret" (pattern), in which he actually defended the Commune of Paris. His most important dramatic work was "Silistria" or "Vatan," the Fatherland. Though the details of the heroic defence of the Danube forts in 1854 may not be historically true, yet he secured a striking success through the exalted tone of his love for the "fatherland," a conception formerly unknown to Mohammedanism, and by the popular style of the work. Its success led to the author's banishment, after the production of this piece in Constantinople in 1873. In conjunction with Mehemed Bey, the nephew of the Grand Vizier, Mahmud Nedim Pasha, he founded the Turkish newspaper, "Mukhbir," that is, the "Reporter." The paper was suppressed when the persecution against the Young Turks was begun; the conspirators made their escape safely to Paris. There they came in contact with Fazil Mustafa (Mustafa Fasyl; see the plate facing page 192), the brother of the Khedive Ismaïl, who had been banished on account of his claims to the Egyptian succession. The "Mukhbir " continued to appear in Paris and London, and thousands of copies were smuggled into Turkey; some numbers also appeared in French. To the European public at large, however, this party assumed a mask of toleration, and concealed their fanatical zeal for Mohammedanism under an appearance of free thought. Under Mahmud Pasha they were amnestied and recalled. Zia and Riza Bey, who had formerly been ambassadors in Teheran and St. Petersburg, were then the foremost in enlightening the Grand Vizier upon the complicated Bulgarian question and the problem of the Catholic Armenians.

At this period there was also a Turkish theatre at Stamboul, with a repertoire of forty to fifty pieces, partly original and partly translations of Molière by Ahmed Vesik, or of Schiller by Ahmed Midhat Effendi, the editor of the official Turkish newspaper; Vesik also published some maps in Turkish for the use of schools, and took part in the composition of a great dictionary. Münif Effendi translated part of Voltaire's "Entretiens et Dialogues Philosophiques," and followed the example of Fuad in proposing the extension and regulation of the narrow, crooked streets of Stamboul. Public libraries were founded; Abd ul-Aziz began a zoological garden, and in the medical school of the Seraglio of Galata a museum of natural objects was opened to the public. The foundation of the " University" of Constantinople can only be described as a failure. Strangely enough, some decades later, in the movement for the emancipation of women which found expression in 1895 in the newspaper of Tahir Effendi, "Khanimlara Makhsus Gazeta," female collaborators like Fatima Alija, Nigiar Chamin, Hamijeti Zehra, Fahr-en-Nisa, Makbula Lemian, Emine Wahide, and Renesie, notwithstanding their thorough knowledge of Oriental and European languages and morals, spoke out strongly on the side of the Young Turks on behalf of the strengthening and retention of Mohammedan customs and of the avoidance of European civilization in methods of education. At the same time Vambéry forecasts from this woman's movement an approximation to Western manners and the beginning of a beneficial reform of the State and of society.

Upon the whole, it is by no means easy to gain a clear idea of the theories and ideals of the modern Young Turkish party. Their first official leader was the Cherkess general Hussein Pasha. He was joined by numerous adherents, who called themselves Fedayiji, conspirators or martyrs. Even at that time (1860) this free federation of Osmans was aiming at the following points: a reform of Turkey

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by the Turks without distinction of faith and not by Europe, the abolition of despotic government, a responsible ministry composed of honourable statesmen, and a Chamber composed of members of all the races and religions within the Osman Empire (Bernhard Stern). Khair ed-dîn Pasha and Khalil Sherif Pasha pursued the same objects under Abd ul-Aziz, and were supported by Zia Bey and Kemal Bey in writing and speech, and by A(a)li and Fuad in the government. They developed great plans, and actually succeeded in obtaining approval for some of them from the tyrannical Sultan, who went so far as to summon an Armenian Christian, Agathon Effendi, to the ministry. The programme of Midhat in 1876 was, generally speaking, based upon principles borrowed from the West; the supremacy of law, universal equality, the strengthening of the Divan against the Seraglio, freedom of the press, independence of the judicature, reorganisation of the administrative power with respect for the Mohammedan legal code, but also in accord with Western experience, order in the palace, a change in the Eastern principle of succession, European education for the princes, marriage of the princes with European princesses, and the consequent abolition of slavery, of polygamy, of concubines, and eunuch government. In conjunction with Fazil and Server Pasha, Midhat defended his creations, the constitution, the parliament, and the Senate, in his "Iftihad." He demanded a complete severance of the Caliphate from the Sultanate, and an abolition of theocratic government. This proposal deeply offended the strong ecclesiastical party of the Ulemas. Under the following Sultan he was overthrown; and the inheritors of his ideas, the Reform Turks, or Liberals, as they preferred to be called, continued until recently the struggle to secure the liberation of the Sultan Abd ul Hamid II and his people from the hands of the Court Camarilla; it may be noted that in May, 1904, public attention was occupied with the rumour of the imprisonment of certain young Turks of high position. This party included Ahmed Riza, the editor of the "Meschweret,” Murad Bey, a kind of political chameleon, editor of the "Misan," Theodor Kassope, the brilliant journalist of the "Haial," Ismail Kemal Bey, Vassilaki Bey, Mehemed Ubeidullah, Said Bey, Zia Bey, and Ferdi Bey, and even the Sultan's brother-inlaw Mahmud Damad (died on January 18, 1903, at Brussels).

6. ABD UL-HAMID II (FROM 1876)

IN sad tones does the Turkish ballad recount the deposition of the "beloved ruler Abd ul-Aziz." A gloomy fate, however, still bore heavily upon the Osman throne; on August 31, 1876, Murad V, the hope of the Young Turkish party, was deposed owing to insanity, and placed in confinement until his death on August 29, 1904.

He was succeeded by his brother Abd ul-Hamid II (born September 21, 1842), the thirty-fourth sovereign of the Osman house and the twenty-eighth since the conquest of Constantinople. A reform of education and of the constitution, the improvement of trade and economic life by a vast extension of the railway system, were the objects which this highly gifted monarch set before himself of his own free and vigorous will, for the purpose of raising "this nation of gentlemen," as Bismarck called the Osmans, to the height of civilization. In vain did the Sirdar Abd ul-Kerim drive back the Serbs at Alexinatz (September 1, 1876) into

the valley of the Morava (on November 1 the Bashi-bazouks had made their way beyond Junis and Stolatz as far as the neighbourhood of Belgrade); the telegram of the Czar Alexander II, despatched from Livadia on October 31, commanded a cessation of hostilities. In vain did the diplomatic and peaceful Sultan resolve upon the extremity of compliance in the peace concluded on February 28, 1877.

When the powers demanded an independent administration for Bulgaria, Midhat Pasha, who had been Grand Vizier since December 22, 1876, answered this move by producing a constitution which the Sultan imposed upon his empire on December 23. This representative assembly of two hundred Moslems and sixty Christians declined the proposals of the conference of the powers. Ignatieff then went round the courts of Europe and secured their agreement to the "London protocol," which recommended the Sublime Porte to recognise the autonomy of the two provinces of Bulgaria and Eastern Roumelia under Christian governors. However, Midhat was overthrown on February 5, 1877, by a palace revolution, and Edhem Pasha, his successor, induced the Sultan curtly to decline the Russian proposals on April 9. On April 23 the Czar Alexander II informed his troops at Kishineff that war had been declared. On the night of the 24th the Cossacks crossed the Pruth, and the whole army advanced into Roumania, not, as before, to secure the "liberation of the Christians," but that of their "Slavonic brothers." On April 16 Roumania had concluded with Russia a convention admitting the passage of troops, which was regarded by the Porte as a casus belli in the case of that State also. Thereupon the Chamber at Bucharest proclaimed their independence. The Turks were in position with 180,000 men along the Danube, while 80,000 troops were ready in Asia. Russia was certain of the benevolent neutrality of Germany, and in January, 1887, she had concluded the agreement of Reichstadt with Austria, which secured Bosnia and Herzegovina to Austro-Hungary, in the event of her non-interference. On May 3 the Turks declared the shores of the Black Sea to be in a state of blockade. On May 6 the Sultan assumed the title "Defender of the Faith," and proclaimed the Holy War.

At the outset the Turkish warship "Seifi" was attacked by Russian torpedo boats below Matchin on the Danube and sunk; on May 11 a Russian battery at Braila shelled the Turkish monitor" Lutfi Jalil," and blew up the ship with its crew. On May 17 the Russo-Caucasian army stormed Ardakhan and invested Kars. However, the victory of Mukhtar Pasha over Loris Melikoff forced the Russians to retire to their own country in the middle of July. A Turkish fleet, supported by the revolt of the Cherkesses in the Caucasus, bombarded the Russian forts on the Abkhasian coast and captured Sukhum Kaleh; but this possession was unavoidably evacuated in August, for the Russians had then recaptured Kars and made a victorious advance to Erzeroum. Mukhtar Pasha undertook the defence of Constantinople. The Russians indeed had not been able to cross the Danube at Sistova and Zimnitza until June 29, owing to the floods; but on July 7 they reached Trnovo, and General Gurko crossed the Balkans on July 13 (Shipka Pass). General Schilder-Schuldner was beaten back at Plevna by Osman Nuri Pasha, and the Russian line of retreat was threatened. Had the Turkish commanders been united and able to make a decisive attack upon the Russians, the latter would scarcely have reached the left bank of the Danube. Meanwhile the Russians brought up their reinforcements and the Roumanian army, in order to capture the "Lion of Plevna," who is still celebrated in the Turkish ballad (died

April 5, 1900). On September 11, the birthday of the Russian Czar, after vast preparations the great attack was begun upon the defences of Osman Pasha, and the Russians suffered their greatest defeat during the whole campaign; 16,000 dead and wounded Russians covered the battlefield, the sole result being the capture of the redoubt of Grivitza. Finally, on December 10 the wounded Osman, whose supply of ammunition had failed, was obliged to surrender to a force three times as large as his own, with 40,000 men, 2,000 officers, and 77 guns.

The fall of Plevna encouraged the Serbs at Nisch on January 11, 1878, and the Montenegrins made conquests on the coast of the Adriatic on January 19, 1878; the Greeks crossed the frontier of Thessaly on February 2. In Bulgaria, after endless marching, Gurko had subdued the Etropol district at the end of December, 1877, and had effected a junction with the army of Lom in Philippopolis. On January 29, 1878, the Russians reached the Sea of Marmora at Rodosto, after the capture of the Shipka army, the destruction of the division of Suleimân, and the occupation of Adrianople. On January 31 an armistice was concluded, and then the English fleet entered the Sea of Marmora. The Russians now advanced to the neighbourhood of Constantinople, and on March 3 dictated the peace of Santo Stefano, in which they demanded complete independence for Roumania, Servia, Montenegro, and Bulgaria, the cession of Armenia to Russia and of the Dobrudsha to Roumania, and would also have cut European Turkey in half by the establishment of the States of Roumelia and Macedonia. Thereupon England threatened war, concentrated Indian troops at Malta, and joined Austria in a demand for a congress. Abd ul-Hamid had dissolved the Chambers on February 14 and had never recalled them; on May 20 he had suppressed with bloodshed the conspiracy begun by Ali Soavi in favour of Murad, and on May 25 had appointed Mehemed Rüshdi Pasha as Grand Vizier. He concluded a secret treaty with England on June 4, England undertaking the protection of Turkey in Asia, and occupying Cyprus by way of return. He, however, was replaced by Safvet Pasha on June 4.

The demands proposed in the peace of Santo Stefano were considerably reduced in the Berlin Congress (June 13 to July 13, 1878); in particular, Eastern Roumelia was left under Turkish supremacy (see the historical map facing page 166). Austria, however, was intrusted with the occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was given the right to maintain a body of supervisory troops in the Sanjak of Novibazar, under the supremacy of the Sultan. Roumania's only reward for the valuable service which she had rendered to Russia was the acquisition of the barren Dobrudsha in return for Bessarabia, which was ceded to Russia. Greece secured the right to a better delimitation of her northern frontier, but it was not until 1880 that she secured possession of Thessaly and of the district of Arta in Epirus. The war indemnity paid by the Porte to Russia amounted to 802,000,000 francs. In 1882 Bosnia, which had first to be conquered step by step by the Austrian troops under Jos. Philippovich von Philippsberg, received a measure of civil government, under which the prosperity of this fertile district considerably increased. The Berlin treaty was signed by representatives of all the powers, though all were fully aware that it contained merely the germs of fresh entanglements. Prince Bismarck in his "Thoughts and Recollections" stigmatised the treaty as a "dishonourable fiction," while the Pan-Slavonic party blamed the "infidelity of their German friend" for the unfavourable results of the Berlin Congress. Russia did not feel her military power sufficiently great to begin a war