ABDUL THE DAMNED.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1288, 5 November 1896, Page 10

ABDUL THE DAMNED.

IMPRESSIONS OF AND OPINIONS

ABOUT I'HS SULTAN.

[By an Old Constantinople Resident.]

1 Vestm invtcr Gazette

Abdul Hamid has always been a bad ruler, but he was not always a bad man. He is not constitutionally cruel, and, unlike his immediate predecessors, sets bounds to mere sensual pleasures. Wine he never touches, and, if palace eunuchs speak the truth, he seldom notices any woman in his harem except the chief kadice. He is certainly a good and affectionate father, and his younger brothers are not harshly treated. Prior to his succession he had the reputation of being a stingy but otherwise amiable person, with a taste for building and a desire to be well-informed. Events have proved that he possesses brains, though they are not of a high order, and run rather to cunning than to ability. His talent for music, of which he is passionately fond, i 3 said to be considerable. As a small Galata banker he would probably have led a respectable life. One can easily picture him cringing to customers and bakhshishingpatrons, cheating discreetly, and in the evening going quietly home to his piano and his wife. Curiously enough, his features are of the type so often seen behind the counter of an Armenian saraff. This physiognomic peculiarity has not escaped sarcastic Turks, who by styling him “ the Coachman " recall to mind an old seraglio-scandal. The dominant traits in the Sultan’s character are avarice and cowardice. These vices, which at the commencement of his reign were mistaken for economy and prudence, have gradually acquired so strong a hold over him that every action of his life may now be traced to their influence. In a word, they have completely enslaved him, and made him what he is.

Even when quite ;i youth Abdul Hamid was notoriously mean, and, despite fraternal expostulations, once engaged in a squabble with his grooms because they claimed the stable refuse as their perquisite. Wealth, mainly acquired by unscrupulously plundering the impoverished exchequer, has only served to increase his lusc for gold. Aided and abetted by the late Agob Pasha, an Armenian who had managed to crawl from a clerkship in the Ottoman Bank to the Imperial favour, he has grabbed a vast quantity of fertile land on the pretext that it originally belonged to the Crown, and compelled proprietors of other valuable estates to sell them to him for next to nothing. When last in Palestine, I found the authorities vigorously pushing on the construction of the road between Jerusalem and Jericho. Astonished at their energy, I asked its cause, and was told that the Sultan had “purchased” property in the valley of the Jordan, and directly afterwards commanded that the road should be finished without delay, j A further source of revenue to His Majesty is derived from encouraging cor- > ruptiun. He shares the bakhshish levied by his secretaries and chamberlains on j every concession granted and on every order given fer arms, horses, &c. By such means Abdul Hamid has grown enormously rich. His money is principally invested in foreign stocks. It is worth mentioning that the avowed intention of certain members to examine his Civil List was what finally determined the Sultan to dissolve Midhat’s Parliament. To avert the threatened inquiry he suspended the Constitution. His parasites were naturally delighted, and since then they have done all possible to assist him in stealing for their mutual benefit. Says a Turkish proverb, “The Treasury is a sea, and those who do not drink out of it are fools." Abdul IJarnid is assuredly not numbered among the fool 3, and, moreover, he plunges his hand deep into every private pocket which may be picked with impunity. We know the result. I have seen it in my journeys through his dominions. The wretchedness is simply appalling, and in many districts the Moslems are worse oft than the Christians. A few years ago their distress found, vent in a pamphlet which threw the Sultan into paroxysms of fury. “ We Mussulmans,” cried the author, “ are left to perish beneath this inhuman monster. In our cause no Power will raise a hand Abdul Harnid may rob and slay us without fear of consequences.” Keener still was the pen of Sir Henry Elliot. His article in the Nineteenth Century affected the

emasculated despot to such an extent that those about him thought his reason gone. He has never forgotten that attack. Sir Heury Layard had in his famous despatch exposed the ruler ; Sir Henry Elliot, Turkey’s staunch friend, stripped the man of his last rag of pretended virtue, and shewed him as he is—incorrigibly false, vicious and cowardly. Of the Sultan’s hospitality a good deal has been written. Ho was not the first Turkish sovereign to entertain Europeans. His easy-going father even visited them, and Punch records in a cartoon how he was present at a ball given at the British Embassy. In the beginning of his reign Abdul Hamid only pretended to dine when acting host to foreigners. Now he has dropped that sham, and plies knife and fork. Christians find excellent champagne and claret at the palace feasts. In short, he tries to make himself agreeable, his guests comfortable, and succeeds. But who pays for these banquets and the choice gifts sent in large vans to his Majesty’s princely visitors ? Ask his subjects, yelling under the screw which is squeezing out their last few piastres. A Chinese emperor, dying of slow poison, prayed Buddha that w-hen born again it should be to any state but that of Royalty. His Celestial Majesty would hardly have preferred the lot of a Turkish peasant. Early Sultans were despotic and shed blood freely in war or open rebellion, but they proved themselves men, ever foremost in the press of battle and ready to die for their country. Whatever their view r s of duty they did it conscientiously. Abdul Hamid thinks of himself alone. He dwells in a petty fortress, garrisoned by an army. His poltroonery is such that he could not disguise it even for the first year of his reign. Ilis behaviour during the Russo-Turkish war stamped him in the eyes of the whole empire an utter craven. The mock trial of his brothers-in-law and others accused of assassinating Sultan Aziz was suggested by sheer terror. They had deposed two princes and might treat him in like fashion. Because ironclads had menaced Dolma Bagtcheh Palace on the night of Aziz’s dethronement the whole fleet must rot in harbour. To mention the name of ex-Sultan Murad is high treason. In the dungeons of Yildiz Kiosk torture is freely employed to extort confessions. The press in gagged, the post-office a department for reading and intercepting correspondence and stifling news. Throughout Albania and Asia Minor brigandage is rampant, and must continue so while the palace instructions —that no Moslem be executed or severely punished —remain in force. His Majesty dare not run the risk of setting a hundred or two Mohammedan ruffians against him. Conscious that Arabia and Syria detest the Ottoman Khalifate, he has called round him the most fanatical sheiks of Islam in the hope that by truckling to them he may secure their influence with the disaffected tribes. And the Armenians ! For the purpose of currying favour with those Kurds and other Moslems who hate and oppress their Christian neighbours, he armed them to the teeth and let them loose. Driven to desparation, the Armenians rose, and then came the massacres, first in the provinces, afterwards in the capital. The vices of Abdul Hamid lie at the foot of all this misery. Gross misgovernment existed befoie his time, but it seldom reached its present heighc. He might have achieved a great deal towards reforming the administration, and his conversations with Europeans show that he understands how to go to work. Instead of doing right he has deliberately done wrong, coerced thereto by his avarice and cowardice. He may be mad, mad with terror. That he is unfit to reign a day longer has been established beyond dispute, and Europe ought to want no better reason for dethroning him. It may safely be taken for granted that the Powers would have no serious trouble in deposing Abdul Hamid. He is hated throughout the Empire, and, except a handful of scoundrels, all Ottomans, Mohammedan and Christian, would gladly be rid of him. The idea of restoring Murad need not be discussed on account of his insanity and the wording of the fetvah which put him aside. Lteschad Efendi, the next brother, who is said to resemble in disposition his grandfather, Mahmoud, would succeed. Fears expressed that an attempt to remove Sultan Hamid would be the signal for a general massacre of the Armenians. My view is that the authorities in the provinces and capital would be too much alarmed for the consequences to permit an outbreak of Moslem fanaticism, eveiqif the Mussulmans, left to themselves, meditated one. The Europeans would be in no danger. In his rage at the news of Navarino, Sultan Mahmoud proposed to slaughter the foreigners in Canstantmople. His plainly told him that unless he abandoned the idea they would depose him. A real difficulty might be caused by the fact that Abdul Hamid has hia brothers, cousins and nephews under lock and key in Yildiz Park. I cannot, however, believe that he would proceed to the length of murdering all of them in order to leave himself the last male of the House of Othman, particularly as he could not complete the crime without killing his own sons. It has been stated that Sheik-ul-Islatn, being Abdul Hamid’s creature, would not consent to issue the fetvah , which is a legally-necessary sanction of a Ministerial resolution to dethrone a padischah. Creatures of Sultaus are usually the quickest to desert them in moments of peril, and, moreover, pashas have not always waited for the fcfvah s as was

notoriously the case in 1807, when Albanian Bairactar tore Mustafa from the throne and proclaimed Mahmoud. Pressure might have to be brought to bear on the Ministers to compel them to decree the Sultan’s deposition, but blockading squadrons at the Dardanelles, Smyrna, Salonica, and Bey rout would furnish them with a sound excuse for obeying. The safest plan would probably be also to send a fleet up to Constantinople, and keep it there until Abdul Hamid were lodged in prison. As Kussia could in that event bring her Black Sea ships into the Bosphorus, the Turks would not dare dispute the passage of the Dardanelles. But whether or not foreign ironclads were off the Golden Horn, I am convinced that the Sultan would not resist. The Ministers would, of course, have secured the support of some popular general, like Ahmed Mukhtar Pasha, and, with him in command at the Seraskeriate, they might depend on the adhesion of the army as a body, the more so since the rank and file are always discontented and often mutinous. It might be that the Kurdish troopers at Yildiz Kiosk, and perhaps the Albanians, would be ready to fire, but Abdul Hamid could never nerve himself to give the word. At any rate, a single shell pitched into Yildiz Kiosk would produce his instant surrender. The decay of the Ottoman Empire has gone too far to be arrested by any means lesr radical than those which are now fast bringing Egypt back to life and vigour, and the application of such a cure is apparently impracticable. On the other hand, there may be a possibility of restoring comparative quiet to Turkey for a period long enough to permit the Powers to endeavour peaceably to settle the final partition of the Sultan’s dominions, and the best chance of obtaining that breathing-time unquestionably lies in first and immediately dethroning Abdul Hamid.