claimed at the Gulkhanah on November 3, 1839, three months after 'Abd'al-Majid's accession to the throne, it carried, however, the germ of notable improvements in the assurances it gave to all inhabitants of the Ottoman Empire, without distinction of creed, that they would be protected in life, honor and property; that the taxes would be equitably assessed and levied; that fixed rules would be observed in drafting recruits for the army. The councils or governmental departments of the Ottoman Empire, the civil service and financial administration, the judiciary and the "offices or functions of the sword" were the principal subjects of further regulations while the Hatty Ḥumayun of February 18, 1856, developed in twenty paragraphs the previous dispositions on an ever more comprehensive basis. 65

If some in Britain associated themselves with Lord Palmerston's view and reasoned that after waging the Crimean War to save Turkey from the grasp of Russia, nothing could be better than to encourage a transformation of the Turkish government which would draw it nearer and nearer to the British bosom, others condemned the Crimean War as a big mistake, inclining to the views of Bright and Cobden, firmly convinced that "it would have been far better to have allowed Russia to go in and win, for the Turk [was] a hopelessly irreclaimable ruffian, who should be improved off the face of the earth as soon as may be." They played into the hands of Napoleon who, notwithstanding the sentiments aired in his open letter to the Count de Persigny, wished to regain by some impressive move the clerical support he had lost by certain aspects of his Italian ventures. And there was also the French protectorate over the Christians, more correctly speaking the Roman Catholic Christians, in the Levant. True, it did not amount to much in reality, 67 but it was an excellent point of

65 Cf E. ENGELHARDT, La Turquie et le Tanzimat, and M. A. UBICINI, Lettres sur la Turquie.

66 Cf the Member of the British Parliament M. E. GRANT DUFF's lecture on the Eastern Question, delivered at Inverurie, November 14, 1876. Another fine paraphrase of the opinion of Zebedaeus in FRANCIS BACON's Dialogus de Bello Sacro: “....bellum contra Turcam justum esse, tam jure naturali, quam jure gentium," was furnished by G. J. D. CAMPBELL, eighth Duke of Argyll, speaking in the City Hall of Glasgow, September 19, 1876: "Well then, my Lord Provost, I begin with this proposition, that the Turkish Government is so bad, so execrably bad, that every rebellion against it on the part of its Christian subjects is presumably just and righteous."

67 Le mot était très pompeux mais la chose était très petite." XAVIER RAYMOND, op. cit.

departure for demands that might lead to acts pregnant with glory and aggrandizement, apt to foil the Russians who tightened their hold on the Near East by their protectorate over the Orthodox Greeks;68 the Austrians who claimed a protectorate over the Roman Catholics of Turkey in Europe; 69 the Italians who, refusing to acknowledge the Pope's temporal power, clung with the more tenacity to their rights as champions of the temporal interests of the Mother Church domiciled in their midst; finally the English who were accused of using the Protestant missionaries as a lever for the furtherance of their sinister designs.70 In Syria not only the Protestant missionaries and their converts. The Druzes too: an additional reason for the French to exploit Maronite allegiance to its utmost capacity. So the Lebanon became for England and France what Sicily had been for 68 Assumed on the strength of the Treaty of Kutshuk Kaynarjy, July 10, 1774, which gave substance to claims of much older date.

69 By virtue of which alleged protectorate the Emperor Francis Joseph had, e. g., sent the Prince von Leiningen to Constantinople on a mission in the interest of the Roman Catholic Albanians.

70 Speaking of the disturbances of 1840 and the next two years in Mount Lebanon, M. David, taking perfidious Albion to task in the Chambre des Députés, asked, January 30, 1843, answering himself: "Où donc était la cause de cette guerre civile, si contraire à la sûreté commune des deux populations? On a soupçonné l'Angleterre d'avoir favorisé les missionnaires soi-disant américains, dans un intérêt purement politique." The English view had already found official expression in a despatch to Lord Palmerston from the Viscount Ponsonby, British Ambassador at Constantinople, who wrote under the date of June 8, 1841, "that the French agents (in Syria were] numerous and extremely active; that the object of the French [seemed] to be to aid in placing Syria in a situation which [should] make good the French declared opinion, that the Porte never would be able to govern Syria; that the Pashas and other Ottoman authorities were acting in many things with immeasurable folly and great corruption." Five weeks later Viscount Ponsonby had a letter communicated to him, sent by Baron von Münster, Austrian Internuncio at Constantinople, to Prince Metternich, which was grist to his mill since it confirmed his statements. Forwarded to London, it appeared as Nr 14 in the Correspondence with Her Majesty's Embassy at Constantinople respecting the Affairs of Syria, p. 31. Speaking of Syria, Baron von Münster said: “Cet état de choses devient plus grave par les menées des agens français déjà mentionnés ci-dessus. Il paraît qu'ils emploient tous leurs moyens pour paralyser l'influence anglaise. Leurs missionaires sont rapprochés des Maronites et crient avec ceux-ci contre les Protestans."

71 Seasoned of old with a dash of theatrical display whenever there was an opportunity. In the Maronite churches, for instance, "a place of honour was reserved for the French consul, who was wont to hold his naked sword over the book of the Gospel, in token of his Sovereign's protection." W. MILLER, The Ottoman Empire, 1801-1913, p. 152. A certain "Habib Risk Allan Effendy" relates in his narrative of a voyage through Syria to the Lebanon and also to England and France, that in troublous times the Maronite monasteries hoisted the French flag. Dutch translation, p. 233.

Carthage and Rome, and, to elaborate this comparison of Urquhart's,72 successively for the Byzantines and the Arabs, the Arabs and the Normans, the houses of Hohenstaufen and Anjou, of Bourbon and Savoy. When the French Government broached the idea of sending an expeditionary force to Syria to assist the Porte in restoring order which, the Porte declared, was not necessary at all since it intended to despatch for the purpose, as it did, a capable Commissioner with plenary power and a sufficient number of troops, the other governments showed plainly their deep-seated mistrust. The story of the conferences of their representatives at Paris with M. Thouvenel, then French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and with one another, makes edifying reading. So makes the commentary of the newspapers with their well-informed correspondents in la ville lumière, who furnished their daily bits of information, derived from the "most reliable" sources, immediately followed by démentis; their statements of unimpeachable facts, founded on nothing but rumor; their officially and semiofficially inspired canards. One day France was to go it alone whatever the rest of Europe might say or do; the next day France did not think of such a thing, in fact never had contemplated an expedition. Then again France felt it her sacred duty to avenge the insult to her flag, the burning of her consulates, the pillage of the monasteries under her protection, asseverating withal her intensely pacific intentions, which elicited from the London Times an answer in a strain quite familiar to the constant reader of that organ in the years preceding the present war: barring the substitution of Germany for "la grande nation" some phrases and tirades in its articles of 1859 and 1860 are not only in one key and tune but curiously consonant in wording with its rumblings before the storm that broke in 1914.73 Russia, terribly sore at her recent deprivation of the privileged position she had acquired in 1833 by the Treaty of Unkyar Skelessy, tried hard to recover lost ground and manoeuvred to lead the pour

72 Op. cit., I, 112.

73 "Let France disarm and the effect would be immediately felt in the pacific tendencies of every capital in Europe; but so long as she continues her present state of preparation she imposes on her neighbours the absolute necessity of maintaining a corresponding force;....." Times of August 2, 1860. This sample in proof of the proposition that the same feelings generally seek and find expression in the same words or that leader-writers— and not only those who move in the atmosphere of Blackfriars!-often seek and find inspiration in the work of their predecessors, could easily be multiplied-almost ad infinitum.

parlers into the channel of an amelioration of the condition of the Christians in every part of the Ottoman Empire. Austria wanted to send troops as well as France.74 The Powers intent, as usual, on making the "cause of humanity" serve designs of an entirely different character, could not agree. There were suspensions of the negotiations, ruptures, fears of a general conflagration.

The telegraphic report of the crowning massacre at Damascus reminded the wrangling diplomatists of the urgency of the business they were supposed to attend to. It impressed the British Cabinet to the point of assenting to a French expedition on terms still to be arranged. Not with perfect good grace. In his despatch of July 23, 1860, to Earl Cowley, British Ambassador to the Imperial Court at Paris, Lord John Russell said: "It appears to her Majesty's Government that, although the exceptional circumstances justify this expedition, yet, if the news of the next ten days or a fortnight should justify the hope that the massacres are stopped and will not be renewed, the very hazardous attempt of endeavouring to tranquilise the country by foreign troops should not be resorted to. In that case the French troops should not embark or should return at once. It appears also to Her Majesty's Government that a final term should be inserted in the Convention for the evacuation of Syria by foreign troops." On August 3, a notice was posted up at the Paris Bourse, where speculation about the uncertain issue of the negotiations had been rife, announcing the agreement of the Powers on the conditions of European intervention in Syria. If Lord Palmerston, guiding the destinies of

74 The marching orders issued to a battalion of Tyrolese Chasseurs destined for Aleppo were, however, countermanded and it stayed at home on receipt in Vienna of the formal assurance from the Porte that Fu'ad Pasha, the Turkish Commissioner in Syria, had guaranteed to pacify the country without foreign aid. Reuter telegram of August 10, 1860. It is not at all unlikely that friendly persuasion from another quarter emphasized the drift of the Turkish assurance.

75 Not only the Great Powers but also such lesser ones, considered too insignificant to be admitted to their deliberations, as had an axe to grind, Sardinia for instance, then steering towards union of the Italian States under the auspices of il re galantuomo with Count Cavour at the helm. A very characteristic message à propos of the Syrian affair, sent by the latter, August 3, 1860, to the Marquis Tapparelli d'Azeglio, Envoy of his Majesty Victor Emmanuel II to the Court of St. James, complains of Sardinia not having been invited to the discussions regarding the despatch of a French expedition and ascribes that slight to "les efforts constants de l'Autriche pour nous exclure d'accords qui devraient être à l'abri de toute jalousie politique, et auxquels effectivement l'esprit conciliant des autres Puissances a voulu imprimer le caractère d'une généreuse manifestation de la Chrétienté." Correspondence relating to the Affairs of Syria, 1860–61, Nr 68.

1

Britain, had at last consented to a French expedition, it was, as Lord Russell's despatch proves, but unwillingly, "fearing lest there would be much trouble in getting the French out again.”76 Collective pressure was brought to bear on Turkey to make her submit. The Convention, signed August 3, provided for a body of European troops, whose number might be raised to 12.000, to be sent to Syria for the purpose of assisting the Porte in the re-establishment of peace and order. France was to furnish at once half of the armament agreed upon, a further understanding being necessary to increase its strength. The other Powers, together with France, proposed to maintain on the coast of Syria sufficient naval forces to contribute towards the success of the undertaking, Prussia, however, excusing herself because the distribution of her ships of war at that time did not permit her to co-operate in that manner. The High Contracting Parties fixed the duration of the occupation at six months, trusting that no longer period would be required.

Saving Britain's face, the Times of August 10 called it “a gratifying sign of the accord which prevail [ed] among all civilised powers that, although the state of Europe [was at that moment] far from reassuring and the strength of France [was] so displayed as to be a menace for its neighbours, the European nations [were] yet capable of uniting in a great cause.' Another sign of the touching accord over which Jupiter Tonans of Printing House Square went in raptures, was the necessity of disclaiming all interested motives in a protocol which supplemented for that express purpose the protocol of the convention proper. Still another sign was the anxiety with which the French transports were watched by agents of France's co-signatories, apprehensive that more troops should embark than stipulated." The preposterous plan of saddling Turkey with the expenses of the expedition, undertaken against her will and from which no good to her could accrue, was abandoned because of the bad state of the Turkish finances 78

76 E. ASHLEY, The Life of Henry John Temple, Viscount Palmerston, II, 181.

77 The Times correspondent at Paris, too, was getting uneasy and wrote under the date of August 11: "Letters from Toulon and Marseilles give various particulars concerning the departure of the Syrian expedition which, if correct, would make it appear that considerably more than 6000 men will be sent."

78 "A final article [of the draft of the Convention] saddles the Porte with the expenses of the expedition, but in the present state of the Turkish finances M. Thouvenel was uncertain whether or no he would have it inserted." Letter of July 19, 1860, from Earl Cowley to Lord Russell.