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and slavery, were, in general, of a character superior to that of their less favoured countrymen. For an account of the Phanariots, or Constantinopolitan Greeks, we refer to the Handbook for Constantinople.

The mountain-ridges which occupy so large a portion of the surface of Hellas have been in all ages the seat of a wild and rude independence. The Mainotes, as the clans inhabiting the fastnesses of Taygetus in the Peloponnesus are named, were never completely reduced under the Turkish yoke; the same was the case with the dwellers on the precipitous ranges of Ossa, Olympus, and Pindus. Like the Scotch Highlanders of old, these mountaineers infested the inhabitants of the neighbouring plains and valleys by their constant depredations; and the appropriate appellation given to them was that of Klephts (Képra, corrupted from Kλénтαi), or Robbers. But it is to be remembered, that to be a Klepht in Greece under the old Turkish régime was no more considered a disgrace than to be a pirate in the days of Homer, to be an outlaw in the time of Robin Hood, or a "gentleman-cateran" in the Highlands of Scotland a hundred and seventy years ago. On the contrary, the Klephtic chieftains were looked upon with favour and admiration by the mass of their Christian fellow-countrymen, as their only avengers on their Mahommedan oppressors, or, at worst, as merely spoilers of the Egyptians. They were the popular heroes,Hercules and Theseus of modern Greece: in the worst of times they kept alive some sparks of the old Greek spirit; and their exploits formed the chief subject of the national ballads which were sung through the country by the wandering minstrels, the descendants of the bards and rhapsodists of ancient Hellas. (See Fauriel's Chants populaires de la Grèce.) "So," it has been observed, "the English peasants sympathized entirely seven hundred years ago, and still do partly sympathize, with those gallant outlaws who retired from Norman tyranny to the depths of the forests, where they found 'no enemy but winter and rough weather.' A captain of Greek Klephts used to reason like Roderick Dhu, in the Lady of the Lake,

'Pent in this fortress of the North,
Think'st thou we will not sally forth
To spoil the spoiler as we may,

And from the robber rend the prey?""

These robbers of Greece were no vulgar or indiscriminate plunderers. The Turkish Agas were the chief objects of their assaults, though their necessities obliged them at times to levy contributions also on their own compatriots. In the passes of Pindus, at the beginning of the present century, there flourished a Robin Hood, with a Greek priest-a Friar Tuck -in his band. This ecclesiastic used to take up a position in an old hollow oak, and his comrades, on catching a prisoner, were wont to bring him before this Dodona, when a dialogue to the following purport ensued:— Robber-Captain." O holy oak, what shall we do with this captive of our bow and spear?"

Oracle.-"Is he a Christian believer, or an infidel dog?"
Robber-Captain."O holy tree, he is a Christian believer."

Oracle. Then bid our brother pass on his way, after exchanging the kiss of love, and dedicating his purse to relieve the wants of his poorer brethren."

But if the captive were a Mussulman, the answer of the Oracle was decisive: "Hang the unbeliever to my sacred branches, and confiscate all that he hath to the service of the true Church and her faithful children."

It is a proof of the estimation in which the Klephts were held by their countrymen, that the patriotic or national, in contradistinction from t

erotio and satirical songs of Modern Greece, were styled Klephtic ballads (KλÉPTIKα Tрayoúdia). Unable to subdue or destroy them, the Turks treated with the Klephts on favourable terms, recognizing their right to bear arms, and, in many districts, organizing them into a kind of local police or militia, called Armatoles ('Apuarwλoi), and analogous to the Black Watch in Scotland. This species of force was unknown in the Peloponnesus, but was common in Northern Greece, where it became the nucleus of the armies of the war of independence. Each company of Armatoles was commanded by a captain, and the Palicars (Tаλλŋкάριа—а word used in a similar sense with "boys" in Ireland), or common soldiers, were armed with the usual weapons of their country, viz. a long gun, pistols, and yataghan, or dagger. Their arms, in the use of which they were generally expert, as well as their dress and accoutrements, were often brilliant and costly; gay and rich apparel being the joy of half-civilized warriors.

Such, in brief outline, was the condition of the Greeks under the Turkish yoke. Our description of course is no longer applicable to the kingdom of Greece, and but very partially so even to the Greek provinces of European Turkey. For the Ottomans were so thoroughly alarmed by the Greek Revolution, and the policy of Turkey is so completely controlled by the ambassadors and consuls of the great Christian powers, that the Rayahs are now in an utterly different position, politically and socially, from that which they occupied at the beginning of the present century. The Tanzimat of 1839 even professes to be a sort of Magna Charta, and to confer to some extent equal rights on all the subjects of the Sultan, without distinction of race or creed. These privileges were confirmed and extended at the close of the Russian War in 1856. Gross abuses still exist, and great corruption and oppression are occasionally practised; the dominion, too, of aliens in blood and religion must ever be distasteful to their subjects; yet the Rayah of the present day has more reason to hate the ruling caste for what they were of old than for what they now are. He is regarded by the law more as a dissenter from the dominant religion than in any other light, while their increased knowledge and civilization, the number of European travellers whom they see among them, and their adoption of so many European maxims and habits, have undoubtedly wrought a favourable change of character among the Turks.

The first attempt of the Greeks to shake off the Ottoman yoke took place in A.D. 1770, when a few hundred Russians were landed in the Peloponnesus from a squadron fitted out at the command of the Empress Catherine II., who was at that time at war with the Porte. Common hatred of the Turks and common attachment to the Eastern Church have often bound the Greeks to Russia; and the invading force was rapidly augmented by large bodies of insurgents. But as no further succours were sent, and the Sultan let loose a whole army of fierce and fanatical Albanians on the unfortunate country, the insurrection was crushed within the space of a few months, and such a terrible vengeance was inflicted that no other open outbreak took place for the next fifty years.

During this interval many patriotic Greeks, both at home and abroad, sought by their writings to re-animate the spirit of their countrymen, and to prepare their minds for appreciating and regaining their independence. Schools were opened, in which the ancient literature of Hellas and a portion of that of Western Europe were taught, while translations were made into modern Greek of various useful and scientific works. Then, too, Rhigas, a native of Thessaly-the new Tyrtæus,-composed that stirring hymn (Δεῦτε παῖδες τῶν ̔Ελλήνων, translated by Lord Byron), which has since summoned the youth of Greece to many a deed of heroism. Rhigas himself fell an early victim, having been delivered up by the Austrians to

the Turks in 1798, and put to death at Belgrade;* but his place was soon supplied by others equally zealous and more discreet; above all, by the illustrious Coray-a man who has perhaps rendered greater services than any other Greek of modern times to both the language and the liberty of his country. He was born in Chios, but resided during the latter years of his life at Paris, especially favoured and protected by Napoleon. Then too was formed a powerful political society, the Hetairia ('Eraipeía), avowedly for the purpose of forwarding the emancipation of Greece. Its agents and associates spread themselves over the whole of the Ottoman Empire, the chief director being, as is generally believed, the celebrated Count John Capodistria, a Corfiot by birth, but who, after having left his native island in a humble rank of the Russian diplomatic service, speedily rose to be one of the most influential ministers of the Emperor Alexander I. These various plans of agitation had already done their work, when in the spring of 1821 the war between the Sultan and his powerful vassal Ali Pasha of Joannina, by distracting the attention and arms of the Turks, afforded the Greeks a favourable opportunity for open insurrection. The long silent voice of patriotism and nationality had been heard once more. The past glories of Greece, and bright prophecies of future fame and splendour yet awaiting her liberated people, had become themes familiar not only to the scholar in his closet, but which tingled in the ears of the shepherd on the mountain-side, of the vine-dresser among his grapes, of the tradesman behind his counter, of the mariner on the Ionian and the Ægean Seas. Within a few months after that memorable morning, Germanos, the patriot Archbishop of Patras, that Mattathias of Greece, first raised the standard of the Cross on the mountains of the Peloponnesus, the whole of the ancient Hellas, with the exception of a few towns and fortresses, was in the hands of the Christians, and a National Congress had assembled to draw up a code of laws and a constitution.

March 25

April 6

1821, when

Our limits forbid us to detail in this place the disasters which subsequently befell the patriotic cause-the efforts in its behalf of so many of our countrymen (such as Generals Church and Gordon, Lord Cochrane, and Lord Byron)-and the fluctuating fortunes of that long struggle which was terminated really by the battle of Navarino in October 1827, and formally in September 1829, by the recognition on the part of the Ottoman Porte of the independence of Greece in the Treaty of Adrianople. Some account of its subsequent history, under the governments of Count Capodistria and King Otho, will be found in the Introduction to Section II. of this work; for the War of Independence itself we refer the reader to Gordon's History of the Greek Revolution;' Keightley's 'History of the War of Independence;' to the able and graphic History of the Greek Revolution” (Ιστορία τῆς Ἑλληνικῆς Ἐπαναστάσεως), by Trikoupi; and especially to the masterly History of the Greek Revolution,' by Mr. Finlay. To some of the most striking incidents of the war allusion will be made in the following pages, but we shall now conclude this necessarily very imperfect sketch by some general reflections.

"The character of the Greek War of Independence," says Sir George Bowen, "has not been sufficiently appreciated in Western Europe, for it was, if all its circumstances are taken into consideration, the most heroic strife of modern times. There are many excellent persons who seem systematically to refuse all praise and admiration to the great exploits of recent history. In their eyes, events of standard celebrity shine more splendid through the dim obscurity of ages, as mountains loom larger in the mist; to them, in the historical as in the natural world, ''tis distance * A statue of the poet Rhigas has been erected in front of the University of Athens.

lends enchantment to the view,' and they look down with cold disdain on the present people of Greece, even while professing an extravagant veneration for their ancestors. And yet to contemplate Mesolonghi with other feelings than those with which all educated men will, to the end of time, contemplate Thermopyla and Salamis, argues either ignorance or prejudice. If we consider the circumstances under which the struggle was begun and carried on, the late defence of the Greeks against the Turks must appear more admirable than that of their forefathers against the Persians. During their wars with Darius and Xerxes, the Greeks were flushed with recollections of national pride and glory: their several communities were flourishing in all the energy of youth and freedom; they were inured to military life and exercises; they were led by the most distinguished of their fellow-countrymen; there were no foreign powers to interfere in the contest; the population of Attica alone was almost as great as that of all Greece Proper in 1821; and they possessed sailors and soldiers as superior to the Persians in discipline, physical strength, weapons, and spirit, as were the Spaniards under Cortes to the Mexicans, or the English under Clive to the Hindoos. Now to look on the other side of the picture. At the outbreak of the recent War of Independence the Greeks had been enervated and cowed by four centuries of the most cruel slavery

ἥμισυ γάρ τ ̓ ἀρετῆς ἀπραίνυται εὐρύοπα Ζεὺς,

ἀνέρος, εὖτ ̓ ἄν μιν κατὰ δούλιον ἦμαρ ἕληται — *

they had long been forbidden the use of arms; the Turks not only were immeasurably superior in discipline and resources, and could bring against them overwhelming forces by land and sea, but they were already cantoned in all their chief towns, fortresses, and villages; the most wealthy, the best educated, and the most influential of the Greeks themselves were generally either merchants in foreign countries or diplomatic servants of the Porte; the chief Christian Powers to whom they had looked for support, or at least for sympathy, did all they could, during the first five years of the contest, to browbeat and crush the insurgents; and the population of Constantinople alone exceeded that of the whole revolted province. Yet, though driven from their fields and homes to the haunts of the wolf and the vulture, and though appalled to find themselves treated as the common enemies of Christian Europe,-those scanty levies of mountaineers from the continent, and of fishermen and traders from the islands, never lost heart-for six long years destroying and baffling in succession all the fleets and armies which the Sultan sent against them. Nothing, indeed, can be more admirable than the tenacity with which the Greeks have always clung to their race and creed. How few renegades of pure Hellenic blood were found during the four centuries when apostacy not only rescued the renegade from bitter oppression, but opened him a direct path to all the dignities and honours of the empire!

"The cruelties which they in so many instances exercised on their Turkish prisoners have been repeatedly urged against the Greeks. But we must remember that the insurgents saw in their opponents their private as well as their public foemen-not only the bitter enemies of their race and creed, but also the desolaters of their country, the robbers of their property, the dishonourers of their dearest relatives. Their conduct cannot, therefore, fairly be judged according to the humane code of modern warfare. Some of the Turkish leaders, too, set the example of giving no quarter. And

* Od., xvii. 322. In Pope:

"Jove fixed it certain that whatever day

Makes man a slave takes half his worth away."

yet the Greeks never committed any such atrocities during the struggle as the execution in cold blood of the Plateans and Melians by their fellowcountrymen during the Peloponnesian war. Let us at least be consistent in our praise and blame. Moreover, such was the nature of the War of Independence, that, in reading its annals, we behold, in all their simple nakedness, those mysteries of the heart-those fiercer passions and ruder outlines of character which are softened and smoothed down in quieter times and by modern civilization. Hence, not only in the same nation, but often in the same individual, were displayed all the weakness and all the strength of mankind-the meanest vices mingled with the noblest virtues.

"It is true that it was the battle of Navarino which finally assured liberty to the Greeks. Still it would be unjust and ungenerous to deny them the credit of having fought out their own independence against their old master. For the Satrap of Egypt was virtually a foreign ally, and only nominally a vassal of the Sultan; and when Ibrahim appeared in Peloponnesus in 1825, the cause of Turkey was as desperate as that of Greece in 1827. While the energies of the insurgents were fresh, they might probably have baffled the combined forces of the Ottomans and of the Egyptians; but the latter came on the scene when they were already exhausted by their long death-struggle with the former. The allied fleets then only frustrated one foreign interference by another, and placed the Greeks once more on the footing which they had held before the arrival of Ibrahim."

m. SKETCH OF THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE GREEK CHURCH.

The great Christian communion generally known in the West as the Greek Church calls itself the Orthodox Church of the East ('H 'Opeódocos ̓Ανατολικὴ Ἐκκλησία). It includes among its members an overwhelming majority of the population of the Russian Empire, of European Turkey, of the kingdom of Greece, and of the Ionian Islands; and the larger portion of the Christian subjects of the Ottoman Porte in Asia. Altogether it embraces little fewer than seventy millions of souls-a far greater number than is claimed by any other Christian communion, except the Church of Rome.

From an early age the Greek Church has been governed by the four Patriarchs of Constantinople, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria. In the latter part of the sixteenth century, a fifth patriarch, that of Moscow, was created for the Church of Russia, which had previously been subject to the see of Constantinople. But Peter the Great suppressed this office, after it had lasted little more than a century; and since his reign the Church of Russia has been governed by a synod of its own bishops.

The Churches of the East and West have had many acrimonious contro versies from the earliest ages, especially on the subject of images and about the extent of their respective jurisdictions. But the final schism did not take place until A.D. 1054, when Cerularius, Patriarch of Constantinople, was formally excommunicated by the Pope, on account of his refusal to submit to the supremacy of Rome. The Crusades had the effect of embittering the dispute, for the Latin Crusaders in many places plundered the Greek monasteries, profaned the churches, and insulted or expelled the clergy. "At last came the enormous wrong of 1204, one hardly smaller than that of 1453. A gang of western banditti, under the guise of Crusaders, sacked the capital of the East, partitioned the Empire, and held a large portion of the Greek race in permanent bondage. The Greek Church and nation have never forgotten the fourth Crusade. From t

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