CHAPTER XXXII.

TURKEY, GREECE, EGYPT, AND THE EAST, FROM THE TREATY OF ADRIANOPLE IN 1828, TO THE TREATY OF 13TH MARCH 1841.

XXXII.

1828.

1.

Revolt of

distant pro

usual cause

states.

SUCH are the natural strength and incomparable local CHAP. advantages of Constantinople, that it has, both in ancient and modern times, enabled the empire of which it formed the head to survive the usual causes of decay, which, after the lapse of a few generations, generally prostrate vinces the the most powerful Asiatic monarchies. Depending en- of decay of tirely on the vigour and capacity of the chief of the State, Eastern and having no lasting support from the intelligence and energy of his subjects save under such direction, they commonly fall into decay when the corruptions of the harem or the luxury of the metropolis have enfeebled the race of monarchs who wield their destinies. The first appearance of this decrepitude is seen in the revolt or independence of the distant provinces of the empire. Escaping the control of a firm and vigilant hand in its centre, the remote dependencies raise the standard of revolt, hoping merely to avoid the burden of a tribute, and gain the sweets of independence. The Byzantine empire in ancient, not less than the Turkish in modern times, have felt, during the reigns of imbecile monarchs, the influence of this cause of ruin, and the dependencies of the empire began to break off long before the power of the centre was exhausted. But the strength

XXXII.

1828.

CHAP. of Constantinople, and the vast resources it derived from the immense commerce of which it was, and ever will be, the emporium, has in both long preserved it from the ruin which otherwise would centuries before have overtaken it. The Turks were settled in European Turkey, and Adrianople was their capital, long before the cannon of Mahomet II. made the fatal breach in the walls of Constantinople; and statesmen and philosophers have been for above a century speculating on the approaching fall of the Ottoman Empire, and yet the Crescent still predominates over the Cross on the shores of the Bosphorus.

2.

of Turkey

peace of

1 Ante, c.

Although, by the happy audacity of Diebitch, and the Weakness ignorance of the European diplomatists at Constantinople after the of the real state of the army which he had led across the Adrianople. Balkan, Russia made the narrowest possible escape at the conclusion of the late war, and dictated a glorious peace at Adrianople, at the very moment when a disaster XV. § 146. rivalling the Moscow retreat awaited her arms,1 yet was the moral influence of the Osmanlis, and their sway over the various nations which obeyed their rule, not the less weakened by that event. The nations of Asia, equally with those of Europe, were dazzled by what seemed to be so decisive an overthrow; they considered the Muscovites invincible, because during several generations they had never ceased to conquer; and the distant pachas, deeming the ruin of the empire at hand, began to take measures for their separate safety or aggrandisement. had long been the policy of the Divan at Constantinople, as it had of the feudal monarchs of Europe, to veil their real weakness under the strength of their vassals, and to purchase the aid of one feudatory in suppressing another by promising him his spoils. It was thus that in the last age the formidable insurrection of Ali Pacha, which for years defied the whole strength of the Sultan, was at length overcome by the forces of Chourchid Pacha, the satrap of Macedonia. But now there appeared on the

It

XXXII.

1828.

field a more formidable rebel than had yet tried the Otto- CHAP. man arms; and the Muscovite shock roused to the dream of independence the most powerful vassal of the Sultan, and one whose forces, as the event proved, the Turks were unable to resist.

3.

Ali: his

EGYPT, at this critical period, was under the direction of MEHEMET ALI, one of those remarkable men who often Mehemet arise on great emergencies, with talents capable of deter- character mining their direction. Unlike other Asiatic despots, he and policy. was keenly alive to the signs of the times, and not only saw and appreciated the advantages of the European system of government and war, but resolved himself to adopt and profit by it. Too powerful and far removed to be under the actual control of the government at Constantinople, he had, for many years before the Greek war broke out, enjoyed, practically speaking, an independence on the banks of the Nile. Strongly impressed by the result of the war in Egypt in 1801 between the English and French, of which he had been an eyewitness, with the superiority of European discipline and arms, he had laboured assiduously to introduce them into his own territories, and by the aid of several French and English officers, whom he had induced by high rewards to enter his service, he had been eminently successful. Aware of the vital importance of a naval force in all wars in the Levant, he had been indefatigable in his endeavours to establish a respectable marine. His admirals had cautiously avoided disaster, at the expense perhaps of their reputation for courage, in the war with the Greeks; the catastrophe of Navarino had been repaired; and with such success had his efforts been attended, that he now possessed a fleet of seven sail of the line and twelve frigates, a force at least equal to any which the Ottomans could bring against it. Taking warning from the destruction of the French fleet at Aboukir, he had deepened the entrance to the harbour of Alexandria, so as to enable it to admit ships of the line without unload

XXXII.

1828.

CHAP. ing their guns, and its arsenals were amply stored with everything requisite for the equipment of a powerful navy. The superiority of the Egyptian troops and discipline had been fatally experienced by the Greeks in the war of Hellenic independence, and the desultory bands of the Morea had proved unable to withstand their disciplined battalions. It was by their aid that the bloodstained ramparts of Missolonghi had been surmounted,

xv. 400,

401.

1 Ann. Hist. and the Christians reduced to subjection, till the fire of Navarino lighted again the flickering flame of their independence.1

4.

of civil government.

Imitating not less adroitly the civil system of the His system Europeans than their military tactics, Mehemet Ali had contrived to establish a government which united the order and regularity of the European to the force and disregard of private right of the Asiatic, and which gives for a brief space, and till its effects have been fully experienced, an amount of resources and a degree of strength which neither taken separately could by possibility realise. The strength of the European system of government consists in the vast resources which a regular and just administration permits to grow up in the State, and which on an emergency may be rendered available to its necessities; that of the Asiatic, in the ruthless vigour with which, despite all efforts at resistance, these resources can be extorted from its inhabitants. But a system which combines the order, method, and perseverance of the West with the energy and despotic character of the East, must for the time command an amount of resources capable of rendering it invincible. This is the Russian system of government in Europe, and the British in India, and hence the uniform success which for a very long period has attended the arms of both. The French occupation of Egypt, and their system of administration, carried to such perfection under Kleber and Menou, had not been lost on Mehemet Ali. His career had been facilitated by a slaughter of the Mamelukes, which equalled in per

XXXII.

1831.

fidy and rivalled in atrocity that of the Strelitzes by CHAP. Peter the Great, and that of the Janizaries by Sultan Mahmoud; and having thus got quit of the chief of his refractory subjects, he succeeded in establishing a pacific despotism in Egypt, which rendered it for a brief season. one of the most powerful states on the shores of the Mediterranean.

5.

the war.

The war commenced from a trivial incident hardly adequate to account for a contest fraught in its ultimate Origin of results with such disastrous consequences to the Ottoman Empire. Some thousand fellahs, or peasants of the Delta of Egypt, discontented with the endless and systematic exactions of the Egyptian government, had crossed the deserts which separate Asia and Africa, and sought refuge in the territories of the pacha of Acre, by whom they were received with open arms in the autumn of 1831, as likely to bring a valuable accession of agricultural labourers to that province, which, like all parts of the Ottoman dominions, stood much in need of them. For that very reason, however, they were a serious loss to Mehemet Ali, who could ill spare them, and he therefore sternly demanded their re-delivery. This the pacha of Acre, little aware of the magnitude of the force he was going to provoke, refused to accede to, and Mehemet Ali immediately fitted out a powerful army, under the command of his son Ibrahim Pacha, to compel their restitution. In this he had a more important object in view than the recovery of a few thousand runaway peasants. Experience had before this taught him that Syria would form a most important appendage to his dominions, and was in fact indispensable to the dream of independence which already flitted before his eyes. It abounded in all the productions of which the valley of Egypt was destitute. It was watered by the dew of heaven, instead of being an arid waterless wilderness fertilised only by the floods of the Nile; it had woods, pastures, and mines of iron and coal; its inhabitants