Crown Prince Saying Good-by to Prince George at Chalcis.

Majesty authorized me to repeat the following remark to the people of Europe: "I cannot express to you the profound astonishment, no less than grief, with which I have learned that the representatives of the great Christian Powers have not only permitted a Turkish force to employ as a military base a sphere which they have deemed it their duty to take under their protection in order to impose upon it neutrality and peace, but also have positively caused their cannons to be fired upon a Christian people, driven by outrage and massacre to struggle for its life, its

liberty, and its religion. Nothing in the world, until these events occurred, would have induced me to believe in the possibility of such an act."

For a short time after the war it seemed as though the fickle Athenians would make the King pay dearly for his loyalty to the national will. Happily, owing in large measure to the statesmanship of M. Rhallys, Greece was saved from this infamy. Though the result has been fatal, the King's action was that of a true patriot, and it may yet be that history will date from his order of February 10th the beginning of the end of Turkey in Eu

rope.

III

WAR, so far as one could judge, being thus inevitable, a vital question was whether Greece would stand alone or whether any other country would be her willing or unwilling ally. Among the host of fictions that have gained currency in connection with the war, is one to the effect that the Greeks all thought they would win. Nothing could be further from the truth. The inexperience of the army, the lack of stores, transport, and ambulance, were

sible that the Crown Prince's army might hold back the Turks on the Thessalian frontier, while it was confidently believed that the army of Epirus would be able to take Janina, after one considerable fight at Pentepigadia, the Greek fleet having captured Prevesa. In the meantime, the insurgent bands, it was calculated, would have dashed into Macedonia at different points, destroyed Turkish convoys, cut the line of supplies, and in various places raised the Christian population against their oppressors. If such a state of things could be prolonged for a fortnight, it was considered that Christian sentiment, in Bulgaria especially, and to a less degree in Servia,

Roumelia, cross Macedonia, and seize Kavala, on the Ægean Sea. Thus the Turkish army operating against Greece would have been finally cut off from Constantinople. Servia would then have been compelled, as quickly as her defective military organization permitted, to occupy Old Servia; the Christian Albanians on the Adriatic would have declared either their independence or their union with Greece; and virtually the whole of Macedonia, except where the Turkish troops were posted in force, would have risen. Then a demonstration by the Greek fleet before Salonica or Smyrna would have compelled the European Powers to inter

sea, and one Greek cruiser could have destroyed this vital line of communication. But the mysterious inactivity of the Greek fleet left this hope also unrealized. Thus from every point of view the failure of the Greek plans contains a large element of the mysterious. I can make no attempt to clear this up, but, by way of fortifying what I have said about Greek chances, I may tell now the true story of the much discussed relations between Greece and Bulgaria at this time.

vene instantly to prevent the whole Eastern question blazing forth and dragging every European State into the arena of battle. The intervention of Europe could only have taken one form, namely, such an arbitration between Greece and Turkey as would have given the former additional territory in Macedonia and the Greek Islands; while Bulgaria and Servia would have received considerable accessions of Christian territory, and Roumania would, in turn, have demanded and received some compensation for the aggrandizement of her neighbors. Such was the line of Greek hopes. As to fighting Turkey single-handed, it never presented itself to them as a possibility, but they did think that it would be in their power to force other Christian enemies of Turkey into the field, with the certainty of ultimate satisfaction for themselves. In spite of the total collapse of Greece, there is no doubt that this scheme did not fall far short of realization. The attack on Prevesa mysteriously failed, but Janina was at the mercy of the Greek army, the Turkish troops having fled pellmell into it before them, when the mysterious Greek retreat on Arta astounded everybody. The Turks were held pluckily for a time at the Melouna Pass, and could certainly have been made to purchase Larissa with great loss of time and at a fearful cost of blood but for the mysterious evacuation of that city before one of the guns in position had been fired. Finally, the railway line from Constantinople to Salonica, along which troops and supplies were moving day and night, runs at many places within a few hundred yards of the sea, and is totally unprotected. There was not a single Turkish man-of-war at

Juke

When the late M. Tricoupis was Prime Minister of Greece, he desired to come to an un

derstanding with Bulgaria. Therefore he visited Sofia to confer with Stambouloff, then the all-powerful Bulgarian Premier. The latter was quite ready to entertain the idea, but, unfortunately, Tricoupis's proposal turned out to be a preposterous one. He actually suggested that Greece and Bulgaria should divide Macedonia between them first, as spheres of influence, to be convert

Athen, 1897

ed into actual possessions as soon as circumstances should permit, the line of division between the two being the forty-first parallel of latitude. If the reader will glance at the map of the Balkan Peninsula, he will see in a moment the absurdity of this extraordinary proposal. The forty-first parallel gives Greece an enormous slice of the mainland, including the district of Bitolia or Monastir, which is well known to be almost entirely Bulgarian by population; Salonica, with the whole peninsula to the south of it; and the whole coast-line of the Ægean, with only a few miles of land beyond the sea. Thus Bulgaria would have been cut off from the Ægean by a narrow strip of territory, which, even had

she been compelled by force majeure to accept for the time such a demarcation, she would inevitably have broken through at the very first opportunity. Stambouloff listened politely, concealing his surprise, parted cordially from Tricoupis, took the next train for Constantinople, was received by the Sultan, told him the whole story, and in return for this loyalty to Ottoman interests and his repudiation of Greek ambitions, secured a number of ecclesiastical privileges in Macedonia for the strengthening of Bulgarian influence there and the weakening of the Greek Church. There the matter of a Græco-Bulgarian understanding rested until a few months before the outbreak of the late war.

The proposal this time came from Bulgaria, who despatched a highly informed and trusted representative to Athens to propose to the Greek Government joint action of the Balkan States. The six ambassadors of the Powers were engaged at the time in secret conferences for the purpose of drawing up a scheme of reforms to be pressed upon the Sultan by Europe. Bulgaria proposed that Greece, Servia, and Bulgaria should unite in a memorandum to the six ambassadors, informing them that, as the three Balkan States most vitally interested in the future of Macedonia,

they thought it their duty to lay before their Excellencies their views upon the reforms in Macedonia necessary in the interests of all three, without which peace could not much longer be secured. This proposal was in every respect an admirable one, and fully worthy the reputation for political wisdom and statesmanlike caution which Dr. Stöiloff, the Bulgarian Premier, has well won for himself. The fact may seem incredible, but it is true, that the Delyannis Ministry refused to have anything to do with this proposal, and the ground of their refusal was even more foolish than the fact of it. They replied to Bulgaria that they had no faith in any Turkish promise of reform, and that, therefore, it did not seem to them to be worth while to secure such a promise. Of course, Bulgaria rejoined that neither did she attach the slightest importance to any Turkish promise, but that in the interest of Balkan Christianity it was in the highest degree desirable that the three Balkan nations should put themselves on record in demanding certain reforms, as by so doing they would establish an irrefutable precedent in the future when the question should again arise, and would show to Europe and Turkey that dissensions among them could not be counted upon, but that they

were united in sinking their differences. Without the map and a great deal of geographical and ethnological technicality, it is impossible to describe exactly what Bulgaria proposed should be the division of Macedonia among the three. Roughly speaking, she would have consented to Servia occupying Old Servia as far south as the extreme limit of the vilayet of Skoplie (or Uskub), and she would have allotted to Greece the territory north of Thessaly as far as the boundaries of the vilayet of Monastir, which she would have taken for herself, together with the whole territory between eastern Roumelia and the Ægean Sea as far east as the district of Adrianople. She would

have allowed Greece to have all the islands of the Archipelago, and she would have proposed that

apparent and his consort. Perhaps rather, however, they realized, as indeed the Bulgarian Government frankly admitted, that Bulgaria might have to become the unwilling ally of Greece if hostilities once broke out. In this case, however, it was distinctly intimated that Bulgaria would fight for her own hand. At any rate, the

proposal was repudiated, and with it the brightest hope for Greek success was dashed to the ground.

When I discovered that the foregoing was the literal truth, I ventured to point out to the Greek authorities the folly of their action. The King himself, I may add, had been no party to the negotiations and their rupture, as his Majesty's diplomacy would have been incapable of such a blunder. It was in consequence of my suggestion that negotiations were once more entered upon, and if I speak with some confidence on this point it is because I was a party to them. What Bulgaria had been willing to give, however, as an arrangement in the course of peaceful diplomacy, she was, not unnaturally, unwilling to offer as part of a plan of campaign. She, therefore, replied finally in effect that inter arma silent leges-that war must now take its course, with such results as fortune might send. At the same time Dr. Stöiloff assured the Greek Government, first privately, and then publicly, when the Powers pointed to probable Bulgarian demands as an excuse for refusing Crete to Greece, that Bulgaria felt no jealousy in that direction, and would willingly see the Greek island joined to the mother-country.

the peninsula of Mount Athos should be made neutral territory for its religious. significance and occupation. There remained, of course, the question of Salonica, which both Greece and Bulgaria consider essential. That, Bulgaria suggested, should remain to be decided in the future, and would naturally belong to the power which, if a war with Turkey ensued, should have made the most military efforts and national sacrifices. Perhaps the thought of "the City," Tóls, to which all Greek ambitions tend, instigated the Greek refusal, or perhaps M. Delyannis remembered the old prophecy that Constantinople will come back to Greece when the ruler of Greece is named Constantine, and his wife named Sophia-the nam the present heir