Turk, or Toork, is the generic name of a great family of nations which has been settled from time immemorial in Western Asia and the adjoining portions of Europe, and of which a branch has been for several centuries in possession of the countries around the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea, which on that account have received from Europeans the name of Turkey. The Turks have generally been considered to be members of the Caucasian variety of mankind; but learned orientalists have now succeeded, by the aid of the Chinese annals, in identifying them with the Hiung-nu, a people who lived to the north-west of China many centuries before the Christian era, and carried on frequent and sanguinary wars with the celestial empire. From that region their migrations can be traced westward, till they finally settled in those parts of Asia and Europe in which they are now found. The Osmanlee, or Ottoman Turks, who live in Turkey, and their brethren the Tartars of Casan, Astrakhan, and Crimea, have indeed some of the physical characteristics of Caucasians; but the Nogais, Kirghiz, Turcomans, and others farther east, who speak pure Turkish dialects, have a different organization, approaching nearly to the Mongolian character. It has therefore been inferred that the Turks originally belonged to the Mongolian tribes; and that the portion of them now possessing Caucasian features must have acquired them by intermixture with the Caucasian races, whom they invaded and subdued. Turkish scholars, however, affirm that researches into ancient history prove that there was a predominant nation of the name of "Tark" established about Balkh, which penetrated into India at some very remote period before the Christian era, and of which nation the Mongols were only a portion, who have preserved their distinctive features and primitive language, as seen in the Nogais; and a branch of the great Tark or Turkish people passing on westwards, and intermingling with the Caucasian races, became assimilated with them in the progress of ages, and acquired their present type.

The existing Turkish empire dates only from the end of the thirteenth century, when it was founded by Osman or Othman, a Turk of a noble family, who had been driven westward from Khorasan by the invasion of Zengis Khan. Osman first invaded the Greek territory of Nicomedia on the 27th of July 1299; but the true era of the empire may be dated from the conquest of the city of Prusa, the capital of Bithynia, which surrendered to his son Orchan in 1326. This Orchan was an enterprising, ambitious, and at first mild, but afterwards stern or cruel prince, who greatly extended the limits of the empire, took possession of Gallipoli, and penetrated into Thrace. Murad I., whom we call Amurath I., his son, subdued without resistance the whole of Thrace from the Hellespont to Mount Haemus, and made Adrianople the seat of a vice-royalty. He established in 1362 the famous military bands called yengi cheri, new soldiers (corrupted into janissaries), once the shield and bulwark of the empire, but in later times the cause of numberless revolts and revolutions. These troops were composed originally of young Christian captives that had been taken in war and educated in the Mohammedan religion, and their numbers were afterwards increased by forced levies of youths from amongst the subjugated Christians. They were trained to warlike exercises, and inured to obedience by severe discipline; and as every sentiment which enthusiasm can inspire, and every mark of honour which the favour of the prince could confer, were employed to animate them with martial ardour, and excite in them a sense of their own importance, these Janissaries soon became the chief strength and pride of the Ottoman armies.

On the assassination of Amurath in 1389, by a wounded soldier of the vanquished enemy on the field of Cassova, he was succeeded by his son Bajazet, more correctly Byazid, surnamed Ildebrim, or the Thunderbolt, whose reign forms one of the most splendid epochs in the Turkish annals. He subdued and stripped of their hereditary possessions the Seljukian emirs of Asia Minor, whose revolts and disturbances had embarrassed the progress of his predecessors, and protracted the downfall of the Greek empire. His conquests in Europe were equally rapid and important, and whatever adhered to the Greek empire in Thrace, Macedonia, and Thessaly, acknowledged his sway. He turned his arms against Sigismund king of Hungary, and in 1396 defeated, in the battle of Nicopolis, a confederate army of 100,000 Christians, the greater part of whom were slain or driven into the Danube. The conqueror, irritated by the previous slaughter of many thousand Turkish prisoners by the Christian army, commanded his prisoners to be massacred in cold blood, with the exception of a few of the chief nobles, who were set at liberty on the payment of a ransom of 200,000 ducats. But Bajazet had now reached the height of his greatness. His conquests in Armenia and on the banks of the Euphrates had brought him into collision with the famous Mogul conqueror Tamerlane; and in 1402 the plains around the city of Angora were the scene of the memorable battle which ended in the captivity of Bajazet, and the temporary humiliation of the Turks. The death of Tamerlane, and the contentions which arose among his sons, relieved the Turkish provinces from the Mogul yoke. Solyman the son of Bajazet obtained the European dominions of his father; Mousa reigned over the remnant of his dominions in Asia; while Mohammed, the youngest of the sons, held Cappadocia. Eleven years elapsed in the mutual endeavours of the sons of Bajazet to supplant each other, before Mohammed effected his final triumph, and assumed the title of sultan. At his death in 1421 he bequeathed an undivided empire to his successor, Amurath II. The reign of this sultan contributed greatly to increase the splendour of the Turkish empire. He made himself master of Adrianople, by which Romania and Anatolia were again united under one sceptre; and reduced to subjection Servia, Macedonia, Thessaly, Albania, and the whole of Greece to the north of the isthmus. He also besieged Constantinople, but was diverted from his enterprise by the dexterity of the Greek emperor, who stirred up against him a competitor for the throne, assuming the name and character of Mustafa, the eldest son of Bajazet. But the impostor was at length defeated and put to death. The conquests of Amurath received a considerable check from the skill and valour of Hunniades, the celebrated wainoode of Transylvania, and of the Albanian chief George Castriot, called also Iskenderbeg or Scanderbeg; but the fatal battle of Varna, in which Ladislaus king of Hungary and 10,000 Christians were slain, destroyed the hopes that were entertained of checking the progress of the Turkish arms. Amurath twice abdicated the throne, and twice was compelled by the exigencies of the empire to resume the sovereignty. He was succeeded in 1451 by Mohammed II., the conqueror of Constantinople. (For a full account of this memorable siege we must refer to the article Constantinopolitan History.) On the 6th of April 1453, the Ottoman standard was planted before the gate of St Romanus; and after a siege of fifty-three days, that Constantinople which had defied the power of Chosroes, the Chagan, and the khalif, was irretrievably subdued by the arms of Mohammed the Second. Her empire only had been subverted by the Latins; her religion was trampled in the dust by the His dominions extended from Algiers to the river Euphrates, and from the farther end of the Black Sea to the extremity of Greece and Epirus. The latter years of his reign were embittered by domestic dissensions and cruelties. During the siege of Sigeth, a city of Hungary, before which the Turks lost 30,000 men, Solyman expired, in the seventy-fourth year of his age and forty-sixth of his reign.

His son and successor, Selim II., besieged and took Cyprus; but in the famous sea-fight at Lepanto, in 1571, the Turkish fleet was utterly destroyed by Don John of Austria. Selim afterwards invested and took Tunis by storm, putting the garrison to the sword. On his death, Amurath III. ascended the Ottoman throne, and extended his dominions on both sides by the addition of Tigris in Persia, and of Raab, one of the strongest fortresses in Lower Hungary. His son, Mohammed III., has no claim to notice, except on account of his barbarity. He began his reign by strangling nineteen of his brothers, and ordering twelve of his father's wives whom he suspected to be pregnant to be drowned. The war with Hungary was carried on throughout the whole of his reign, which lasted about nine years. During the inglorious sway of his son, Ahmet I., the affairs of Turkey underwent a material change for the worse. Peace was concluded with Hungary; but the sultan was involved in a disastrous war with Persia, in which the Turkish troops were entirely defeated. On his death, his brother Mustapha ascended the throne; but his actions having clearly proved his incapacity and imbecility, the janissaries and the divan compelled him to resign the government after a reign of five months, and threw him into prison. His nephew, Osman, the son of Ahmet, a boy of twelve years of age, was then proclaimed emperor. This prince having formed the design of curbing the power of the janissaries, these turbulent soldiers rose in insurrection, deposed and murdered the sultan, and recalled his uncle Mustapha from his prison to the imperial throne. These atrocious proceedings, however, excited general indignation throughout the Asiatic provinces; and Abasa, the powerful pasha of Erzeroum, took up arms to avenge the murder of Osman. After the lapse of a few months, the janissaries themselves abandoned the cause of Mustapha, who was again deposed, and was soon afterwards strangled. Under Amurath or Murad IV., surnamed Gasi the Intrepid, affairs assumed a new appearance, and the glory of the Ottoman empire was in some measure restored. He put to death great numbers of the janissaries, and by his energetic and ferocious measures reduced these mutinous and formidable troops to a state of subordination. He took Bagdad from the Persians, and massacred the greater part of the inhabitants, after an obstinate resistance, which cost him the flower of his army. A debauch of wine put an end to his life, in the thirty-first year of his age and the seventeenth of his reign. His brother Ibrahim, who succeeded him, was a weak and imbecile prince, deformed in body and destitute of courage. The administration of the government was wholly in the hands of the vizier Mustapha and the sultana Valideh, the widow of Ahmet I.; while Ibrahim gave himself up entirely to the prosecution of his pleasures, till at length his vices rendered him so odious that he was deposed and strangled. During his reign, a bloody war broke out between the Turks and the Venetians, which, after being carried on with great fury for the space of twenty-four years, ended in the extinction of the Venetian power in the Egean Sea. The alleged ground of quarrel was the reception into a Venetian port of six Maltese galleys which had captured an Ottoman ship of war. The divan used various pretences to allay the sus-

1 Some affirm that Djem claimed the crown because he was the eldest son, others because he was the first-born after his father became sultan. 2 He was killed by a soldier of the 65th orta or company of janissaries, which was in consequence suppressed, and never renewed. History. picions of the Venetians, and throw them off their guard, till, in May 1643, the Turkish fleet set sail for the important island of Candia, and disembarked an army of 70,000 men on the island. As the Venetians had provided no means for its defence, the whole island, with the exception of the capital, was, after a sanguinary resistance, reduced in less than two years. Mohammed IV., the son of Ibrahim, was scarcely seven years of age at the deposition of his father. His minority was one continued scene of intestine discord and revolt. During this reign, war again broke out between the Austrians and Turks, and after having been carried on for some time with varied success, was concluded by a treaty for twenty years. On the termination of this war, the power of the Ottoman empire was directed against the city of Candia. The siege was actively carried on during the space of twenty-nine months, when the garrison was at length forced to capitulate; and thus ended one of the most memorable sieges of modern history, in which the Venetians lost above 30,000 men, and the Turks more than 120,000. About this period, the Zaporogian Cossacks threw off the Polish yoke, and placed themselves under the protection of Turkey. A war in consequence broke out between the Turks and the Poles; but the result was advantageous to the Porte, who obtained the sovereignty of the important districts of the Ukraine and Podolia. Shortly after, however, the Hetman of the Cossacks having been treated with contempt by the sultan, these proud and fickle barbarians abjured the Turkish service, and transferred their allegiance to the Russian czar.

In 1683 the distracted state of Hungary induced the divan to break the treaty with Austria; and the Turkish army, under the grand vizir Cara Mustapha, penetrated to Vienna, and formed the siege of that city on the 14th of July. The siege was protracted till the 12th of September, when the allied army, under the famous John Sobieski, attacked the besiegers, routed them with prodigious slaughter, and obtained possession of their camp, together with their artillery, baggage, and magazines. A succession of battles followed, in all of which the Turks were overthrown. The number of their enemies speedily augmented, and in the short space of four years all the vast conquests of the Turkish sultans, westward of the Danube, were wrested from them, with the solitary exception of the fortified city of Agram. These extraordinary reverses caused the army to revolt against their commanders, and excited a general insurrection, which cost the sultan his throne. His brother, Solyman II., who succeeded him in 1687, was distinguished for his austerity, sobriety, and devotion. He was happy in his domestic government, but unsuccessful in his wars. He was succeeded in 1690 by Ahmet II., the youngest son of Sultan Ibrahim. He, too, was a weak and credulous prince; and though the affairs of the empire were conducted with great prudence and vigour by the grand vizir Kopruli, the Ottoman empire declined, and the Turks during this reign were driven out of Hungary and Transylvania. The accession of his nephew Mustapha II. to the Ottoman throne gave a new turn to the affairs of the Porte. Possessed of greater vigour and ability than his predecessor, he resolved to command his troops in person. He accordingly took the field, passed the Danube at the head of 50,000 men, carried Lippa by assault, and, falling suddenly on a body of Imperialists under Veterani, one of the bravest and best officers of the emperor, he defeated them, and closed the campaign with success. But two years afterwards he was defeated by Prince Eugene, in the bloody battle of Zenta, a small village on the western bank of the Theiss, in the kingdom of Hungary. About 20,000 Turks were left dead on the field, and 10,000 were drowned in their attempt to escape; and the magnificent pavilion of the sultan, and all his stores, fell into the hands of Prince Eugene. These terrible disasters compelled Mustapha to solicit a peace, and a treaty was shortly after signed at Carlowitz, which guaranteed Hungary, Transylvania, and Slavonia to the Austrians; Azoph to the Russians; Podolia, the Ukraine, and Kaminiec to the Poles; and the Morea, with a strong frontier in Dalmatia, to the Venetians. Shortly after these misfortunes, an insurrection was excited among the soldiers by a sense of the national disgrace, and Mustapha was deposed.

His brother and successor, Ahmet III., gave an asylum to Charles XII., king of Sweden, at Bender, a Turkish town in Moldavia, after his defeat at the battle of Poltowa. (See Russia and Sweden.) A war broke out between the Russians and the Turks, in which the Czar Peter, having imprudently suffered himself to be cooped up in an angle formed by the River Pruth, was reduced to the greatest extremities, and compelled to make peace on terms dictated by the Turkish general. Being unsuccessful in his war against Tahmas Koulkhan and the Persians, Ahmet was deposed, and was succeeded by Mahmoud I.

From the deposition of Ahmet III. in 1730, to the accession of Mustapha III. in 1757, nothing of importance occurs in the history of the Turkish empire. During the reign of this latter sultan, was begun and carried on that destructive war with Russia which broke out in 1769, and lasted till 1774, when the successes of the Russians compelled the sultan, Abdul Hamid, to terminate the unequal contest by the dishonourable treaty of Kainargi. By this treaty Russia obtained possession of the tract between the Bug and the Dniester, known by the name of New Servia, the forts of Yenikaleh and Kerch in the Crimea, and the fortress of Kilburn, at the embouchure of the Dnieper, opposite to the town of Ockzakow. The Krim Tartars were declared independent, and Russian merchant-vessels were admitted to the free navigation of the Bosphorus. About this time a formidable rebellion broke out in Egypt, which was suppressed chiefly by the wise conduct and intrepid behaviour of Hassan, the capitán pasha, who, at the age of seventy, fought with all the ardour of youth and all the skill of the most consummate general. That veteran, however, was recalled before he was able to carry all his patriotic designs into execution, that he might aid the divan with his counsel in the critical situation into which the empire was brought by the arrogant claims of the court of Russia. The result of the deliberations was a precipitate declaration of war against that power, contrary to the better judgment of the old pasha. The war commenced in the autumn of 1787, and the hordes of Tartars which were first brought into the field were everywhere defeated by the superior discipline of the Russian troops, commanded by Prince Potemkin. Some enterprises which were undertaken by the Turks against the island of Taman and the Crimea, were attended with as little success as the attempts of the Tartars, while the Emperor Joseph declared to the Porte that he would assist his ally the Empress of Russia with an army of 80,000 men. Four Austrian armies were accordingly assembled, one at Carlstadt in Croatia, under the command of General de Vins; another at Peterwaradin in Hungary, commanded by General Langlois; a third on the borders of Lithuania, under General Febris; and the fourth in the Buckowine, under the orders of the Prince of Saxe-Coburg. Other two generals, ten lieutenant-generals, and thirty major-generals, were all ordered to prepare for active service in the frontier armies.

The war between the Turks and the Austrians was carried on with varied success. At first the advantage was evidently on the side of the former, and the Austrians were repulsed with disgrace in their attempt to obtain possession of Belgrade. The Prince of Saxe-Coburg displayed indeed prodigies of valour; but, being opposed to a superior force, he was long obliged to act only on the defensive. He was at length joined by a body of Russians under General Sol- History, tifof, and preparations were made for commencing in form the siege of Choczim, which was surrendered to the allied armies on Michaelmas day 1780, after a defence which would have done honour to the ablest general in Europe. Still, however, success seemed to lean to the side of the Turks. The grand vizir made a sudden incursion into the Banat, and spread consternation and dismay to the very gates of Vienna. The Austrian affairs seemed approaching to a very alarming crisis. Not only the splendid views of conquest, which were beheld in the imagined partition of a tottering empire, had totally disappeared, but had left in their place the sad and gloomy reverse of a discontented and impoverished people, an exhausted treasury, and an army thinned by pestilence and desertion. In this situation of affairs, Marshal Laudon was with some difficulty drawn from his retirement to take the command of the army in Croatia; and under his auspices fortune began to smile on the Austrian arms. He quickly reduced Dubicza and Nevi, though they were both defended with the most obstinate bravery. He then sat down before the Turkish Gradisca; but the autumn rains ensuing with such violence that the Save overflowed its banks, he was compelled to raise the siege. During this period the war in the Banat raged with the utmost violence. Much desperate valour was displayed on the one side, and many brave actions were performed on the other; while a great part of that fine but unfortunate country suffered all the desolation and ruin that fire and sword, under the dominion of vengeance and animosity, could inflict.

In the midst of these military operations, Selim III., the only son of the Sultan Mustapha, mounted the imperial throne. The new emperor did not want either courage or prudence, and he continued the war with Russia and Austria with great spirit and resolution. Marshal Laudon renewed his attempts upon Gradisca as soon as the season would permit, and, after a brave defence, it fell into his hands. This, with some other successes, roused the emperor from his state of inactivity, and made him seriously determine on the attack which he had long meditated on Belgrade. The enterprise was entrusted to Laudon, who, with his usual good fortune, made himself master of the place in less than a month. The rest of the campaign was little else than a series of the most important successes. While one detachment of Laudon's forces took possession of Czernitz in Wallachia, another made itself master of Cladova in Servia. Bucharest, the capital of the former of these provinces, fell without opposition into the hands of Prince Coburg, while Akerman, on the Black Sea, was reduced by the Russians, and Bender surrendered to Prince Potemkin, not without suspicion of sinister practices.

Soon after this the Emperor Joseph died, and his successor, Leopold, showed a desire for peace. After the reduction of Orsova, therefore, which happened on the 16th of April 1790, the war was carried on with languor on the part of Austria; and in the month of June a conference was agreed on at Reichenbach, at which the ministers of Prussia, Austria, Britain, and the united provinces assisted, and at which also an envoy from Poland was occasionally present. After a negotiation, which continued till the 17th of August, it was agreed that a peace should be concluded between the Austrians and the Ottomans; and that the basis of this treaty should be a general surrender of all the conquests made by the former, retaining only Choczim as a security till the Porte should accede to the terms of the agreement, when it also was to be restored.

In the meantime the Empress of Russia persevered in hostilities, and carried on the war with great vigour and success. In the campaign of 1790, the Russian general Suwaroff carried the strong fortress of Ismail by assault, which for violence and bloodshed has no parallel in modern times. The Ottoman empire seemed on the verge of destruction, when the empress at length, induced by the darkening aspect of European affairs, concluded with the Porte a definite treaty of peace at Yassy on the 9th of January 1792. The stipulations of the treaty of Kainargi were renewed. The River Dniester was recognised as the boundary of the two empires. Oczakow was ceded to Russia, with the territory between the Bog and the Dniester; and the cession of the Crimea, of the Isle of Taman, and part of the Kuban, was again formally confirmed.

It was evidently the desire and endeavour of the Ottoman government to keep aloof from the terrible wars and changes which accompanied the French Revolution; but the invasion of Egypt by the French compelled the sultan to abandon the system of neutrality which he was anxious to maintain. (A full account of this event will be found under the article EGYPT.) On the recommencement of hostilities with France, attempts were made to induce the Porte to take part in the war against that country. "Russia and England united their strength against France in the divan, and the sultan was the sad spectator of a contest of which he was himself the unwilling umpire, the ostensible object, and the proposed prey. The victory of either party alike menaced him with ruin; he had to choose between the armies of France and the fleets of England. Never was sovereign so situated between two negotiators, one armed with the power of the land, the other with that of the sea; both to all appearance able to destroy, but neither capable of protecting him against his antagonist. The precipitate flight of the British ambassador had scarcely relieved him from the embarrassment of making a selection between the menacing parties, when his capital was alarmed for the first time by the presence of a hostile force, and the last of calamities seemed reserved for the reign of Selim." The good fortune which interposed to save the seat of empire was not extended to the sovereign, and the evils which were inevitable from the triumph of either party gathered fast around him from the day that saw the city of the faithful delivered from the insults of a Christian flag."

The year 1807 witnessed one of those sanguinary insurrections which have so often convulsed the Ottoman empire. The cause of this revolt, which cost Selim his throne, was an attempt to introduce the improved system of European tactics into the military and naval establishments. The sultan had evinced, at an early period of his reign, a determination to attempt some changes in the organization of the military force, and for this purpose new regulations were issued in 1796. The chief arrangement was the levy of 12,000 men, who were to be disciplined according to the principles of European tactics, and armed in every respect like British or French soldiers. The new troop were to wear a uniform, and were to be taught the manual exercise; and, in order to detach them as much as possible from the janissaries, it was resolved they should belong nominally to the corps of bostangis. For these bostangi fusiliers, as they were called, were erected handsome barracks three miles to the north-east of Pera, capable of containing 15,000 soldiers. For the same purpose, barracks were also constructed at Scutari, with exercising ground and all other conveniences. The inspector of the new

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1 About three weeks after the departure of the British ambassador from Constantinople, Admiral Duckworth, with eight sail of the line, two frigates, and two bomb-vessels, passed through the Straits of the Dardanelles, and advanced within two leagues of Cape St Stefano. But a sudden calm having rendered the English fleet stationary, the fortifications of the capital were so strengthened that it was soon rendered perfectly free from danger, and the British admiral was under the necessity of hastening from the Propontis before his return was rendered impracticable.

2 Hobbhouse's Letters on Albania. troops was one of the principal men of the empire. A reform was introduced into all the military departments. The topgis, or cannoniers, were improved in every respect. Their old barracks were demolished, and new ones were built on a regular and better plan. The arabdis, or troops of the waggon train, were also reformed. The gunpowder manufactories, which had been in a most inefficient state, were placed on an entirely new footing. The bombardiers, anciently furnished from the ziameths and timars, or military fiefs, underwent a total change by the new regulations. The miners, a corps much neglected, were increased, and attached by the new constitution to the bombardiers. The marine was put under the superintendence of a ministry formed on the plan of European admiralties; and the command of vessels, which had usually been set up to sale, was given only to those who were qualified for the office. Dry docks, caulking basins, a harbour for fifty new gun-boats, and all the necessary appurtenances of a great arsenal, were built at the edge of the water at Ters-Hanch, and designs for similar contrivances were to be applied to the other principal harbours of the empire. In addition to these institutions for the formation of the new troops, and the improvement of the Ottoman navies, a general regulation provided that the janissaries should be regularly exercised in the use of the musket, with their sabres and other assistants. Magazines for victualling the armies were constructed on the Danube, and at other points near the seat of war. In order to provide for the increased disbursements of the public exchequer, a new revenue was created; and for this end a treasury was formed, under the control of a great state officer, chosen from among the chief men of the empire. Such is a brief outline of the new regulations issued by Selim; and skilful and enlightened though they were, they excited great dissatisfaction in most classes of the community. The janissaries, in particular, foresaw in the formation of the new troops the extinction of their own influence, and therefore determined upon revolt. Their discontent was privately fomented by Mousa Pasha, the kaimacam, a cruel and ambitious character, who entertained the most deadly hatred against the superior officers of the divan, and had long resolved to excite a revolution for the purpose of destroying them. The first symptoms of insurrection manifested itself among the troops belonging to the garrisons of the Dardanelles. A certain number of adventurers, under the name of yamaks, or assistants to the batteries, had shortly before been added to the nizam-jedid, for the service of the batteries of the Bosphorus. They carried the same arms as the nizam-jedid, and were trained to the same discipline. It was at length resolved to incorporate them with the other troops; and accordingly, on the 25th of May 1807, an order was issued for clothing them in the new uniform. The yamaks immediately rose in open mutiny, and put to death the reis-effendi, who had brought the commands of the sultan. Hali Aga, the commandant of the batteries on the Asiatic shore, was murdered on the same day, and his corpse was also thrown into the Bosphorus. On the next morning, the yamaks, to the number of three thousand, having assembled in the plains of Buyukdere, elected a chief, and marched directly to the capital. At this juncture, the kaimacam intimated to the several ortas of janissaries that the time was come for overturning the new institutions; and, accordingly, on the 27th they rose, and, as the signal of insurrection, carried their camp-kettles to the well-known place called Etnedan, an open square near the aqueduct of Valens, which has been from time immemorial the camp of the insurgents. "The sultan," says Sir John Hobhouse, "was now awakened to a sense of his danger; he assembled his ministers at the seraglio, and the 28th of the month was passed in negotiation with the insurgents in the Etnedan. During the day, the fate of Selim was on the balance; he transmitted to the Etnedan an offer to abolish the new institutions, to which the janissaries returned no other answer than a demand for the immediate execution of all the ministers who had advised and presided over the nizam-jedid. Then it was that the kaimacam insidiously assured him that the sacrifice was necessary, and would appease the rebels. All was not yet lost. If, at that moment, the gates of the seraglio had been shut, a cannon had been fired, and the head of Mousa Pasha himself had been struck off and thrown over the walls, Selim would have triumphed and retained the throne of his ancestors. But the instant peril and the presence of his enemies bewildered the faculties and so absorbed the resolution of the sultan, that he seems to have despaired of resistance, and to have placed all hopes of safety in submission alone. It was not suggested to his mind, that with the new troops of Scutari and Tchiflik, and other soldiers in the vicinity of the capital, he might speedily assemble 30,000 men, not less devoted to himself than inimical to the janissaries; and that until their arrival he could maintain the seraglio against the rebels, by arraying the forces of his numerous body-guard. Yet the testimony of all the reports prevalent at this day in Constantinople concurs in the persuasion that such an opposition, with the instant death of the kaimacam, would have dismayed the insurgents and crushed the rebellion. But the traitor prevailed, and with a cruel ingenuity contrived to include in the prescription the names of two old and innocent men, the khayah-bey and the reis-effendi, who were called to a conference with Mousa, and, on leaving the room, unsuspicuous of their danger, were carried away to the second gate and strangled. The number of heads presented to the janissaries early on the morning of the 29th was seven; but the ruffians, rising in their insolence, were not satisfied with the bloody offering, and, on recognising the aged victims of the resentment of Mousa, declared that they had required another sacrifice. "The heads were not those of the enemies whose punishment they had demanded." The sultan hearing this last intelligence, sent for the multi, and on learning that he withheld his advice, found that he had ceased to reign.

"The janissaries, headed by the traitor Mousa, had already found their way into the seraglio, when the sultan retired to the mosque of the palace, and wrapping himself in the robe of Mahomet, took his seat in the corner of the sanctuary. Here he was found by the mufti, who entreated him to submit to the wishes of the people, and to resign the crown. Another report says that, previously to this moment, he had told his attendants that he would reign no more, and ordered them to bring his successor before him. The circumstances of this actual deposition were not exactly known; but on the evening of the same day (the 29th) it was understood in all the quarters of the capital that the most injured, if not the best, of the Ottomans had stepped from a throne to a prison, and that the reigning monarch was his cousin, Mustapha the Fourth, eldest son of Sultan Abdulhamid." This prince was thirty years old when he was placed on the throne. Of a feeble character and limited attainments, he became a mere instrument in the hands of others, and was the servant rather than the master of the armed multitude to whom he was indebted for his elevation. The supreme power was in the hands of the janissaries, the new institutions were abolished, the new troops dispersed, and their principal officers executed. Their triumph, however, was but of short duration, and the punishment which they so justly deserved was speedily inflicted. Mustapha Bairactar, the pasha of Ruschuk, owed his elevation to the personal regard of the deposed sultan, and determined to avenge his fall. So early as October 1807, he formally intimated to the sultan that he should advance to the capital to reform the abuses of the state, and to assist him in the administration of public Accordingly, having collected an army of forty thousand men, he marched to Constantinople, and encamped on the plains of Daout Pasha, four miles from the city. There his camp soon became the centre of the business and affairs of the Porte, whose chief officers directed their visits of ceremony to the tent of the triumphant general. But the pasha, conscious that his authority in such a state of affairs was unstable, resolved upon the restoration of the Sultan Selim. The 28th of July 1808 was fixed upon for the enterprise; and as Mustapha had appointed that day for a hunting expedition, Bairactar determined to enter the palace during his absence, and, by preventing his return, exclude him from the throne. Unfortunately the secret transpired; and when, at the appointed time, Bairactar marched to the seraglio, he found the gates closed, and the body-guard under arms. Orders were given for an immediate assault; and after a brief contest, the insurgents forced their way into the seraglio. But the interval proved fatal to Selim. At the commencement of the contest, the emissaries of Mustapha were despatched to his apartments, and after a powerful resistance, that ill-fated prince was thrown down and strangled. After the murder of Selim, the strictest search was made for Mahmoud, the youngest son of Abdulhamid, and the only remaining prince of the blood-royal. But a faithful slave had concealed him in the furnace of a bath, and before the place of his concealment could be discovered, the insurgents had forced their way into the interior of the palace. Advancing to the third gate, they called aloud for the instant appearance of Selim, when the eunuchs of Mustapha, casting the body of the murdered monarch before them, exclaimed, "Behold the sultan whom you seek!" Bairactar, overpowered by his feelings, threw himself on the disfigured corpse and wept aloud; till Seid Ali, the capitán pasha, exhorting him to seize the moment for revenge, he instantly aroused himself, and commanded that the Sultan Mahmoud should be proclaimed, and Mustapha arrested. The command was immediately obeyed; Mustapha was consigned to the prison of the seraglio, and Mahmoud was released from his painful concealment, and placed on the Ottoman throne. On the ascension of Mahmoud, Bairactar was of course made grand vizir; and he avenged with unsparing severity the death of his benefactor. The traitor Moussa Pasha lost his head, and all the officers of the yamaks and the most seditions of the janissaries were strangled and cast into the Bosphorus; and the females of the harem who had rejoiced at the death of Selim were sewed up in sacks and precipitated into the sea near the shores of Prince's Island.

The vizir openly avowed his intention of reforming the system of the janissaries, and retrenching their privileges; and it was resolved to revive the order of the Seimens, who might supply their place, and be regulated according to the discipline of the nizam-jedid. The name of this corps was more odious to the janissaries than even that of Selim, as belonging to an institution more ancient than their own; and they were only the more resolved to ruin the author of the innovation. Bairactar, however, becoming elated by prosperity, began to despise their enmity; and, blinded to the danger by which he was surrounded, came to the fatal resolution of dismissing the greater part of the provincial troops, and thus remained almost unprotected in the midst of an infuriated soldiery thirsting for his destruction. On the night of the 14th of November, several thousands of janissaries, issuing from their quarters, surrounded the palace of Bairactar, and set fire to the building. The vizir and his friends escaped from the conflagration into a strong stone tower, used as a powder magazine, which the janissaries attacked in vain. But in the middle of the night the whole city was shaken by a tremendous explosion; and it was found that the magazine, with the grand vizir, had been blown into the air, whether by accident or design is to this day unknown.

During the two following days the contest raged with unabated fury, till the forces of the arsenal and of Tophana united themselves to the janissaries; and the death of Bairactar becoming known, the Seimens withdrew from the combat. In the meantime, the officers of Mahmoud had strangled the imprisoned Mustapha; and the sultan having no longer anything to fear from the partiality of the janissaries for his predecessor, commanded the cannonading to cease, and at the same time announced to the janissaries that the Seimens were abolished for ever. The friends of the late vizir saved themselves by embarking on board a vessel at the Seraglio Point; but the victorious janissaries completed their vengeance by the destruction of the magnificent barracks of Sultan Selim at Scutari and Ramiz Tchiflik, at the latter of which five hundred Seimens defended themselves with desperate valour against a multitude of assailants, until their quarters were fired, and they all perished in the flames. Thus terminated the most tremendous revolution that Constantinople had experienced since it fell under the power of the Turks, and which, after dethroning two monarchs and spilling the best blood of the empire, ended in the destruction of the meditated reforms, and the entire re-establishment of the ancient institutions.

During these events, the war with Russia had languished; but on the accession of Mahmoud, the armies on both sides were augmented, and the contest was carried on with great ferocity. The campaign of 1811 was short, but disastrous to the Porte, the main body of the Ottoman army having surrendered as prisoners of war. The result might have been fatal to the Turkish empire; but in 1812 the prospect of the arduous struggle with France induced Russia to make peace with the Porte, on the latter ceding Bessarabia and part of Moldavia. At the peace of Tilsit, Napoleon left the Turkish empire single-handed to fight or fall, though it had been induced to take up arms solely by French promises and intrigue. The neglect was deeply felt by the Ottomans, and it received its just punishment when the unexpected pacification of 1812 released the Russian army just in time to interrupt the distressed French troops in their attempt to pass the Beresina. The sultan being now happily freed from foreign enemies, resolutely entered on the difficult task of reducing to obedience the great officers of his empire, who during the distracted state of the country had virtually exercised independent power; and in the course of a few years, the famous Ali Pasha and the other powerful and rebellious satraps were all deprived of their governments, and most of them executed. In 1821 began that celebrated insurrection which, after a bloody war of eight years, terminated in the complete emancipation of the Greeks from the Turkish yoke. (See Greece.) Meanwhile, the janissaries were dissatisfied with certain members of the divan, particularly Halet Effendi, keeper of the signet, then high in power, but who had begun to give umbrage also to the sultan, and he was put to death in November 1822, and four of the other ministers exiled. The disorderly excesses of the janissaries, and their inefficiency in the field during the war in Greece, rendered more urgent the necessity of introducing a new system of discipline, which had long been apparent to every thinking man, and the government was anxious to do so; but every attempt had hitherto proved fatal to the innovators. The sultan resolved to make the effort, long meditated and preparing, and if the janissaries resisted, to extirpate them altogether. In conformity with these designs, 150 men were selected from each orta of the janissaries, who were instructed in European tactics by Egyptian officers. As it was declared that this was merely a revival of an exercise used by Solyman, matters proceeded quietly. for some time, till, in June 1826, when the troops were brought together for exercise, they discovered for the first time that they were practising the very evolutions which they had all determined to resist. A furious insurrection immediately took place, the palace of the Porte was pillaged and stripped; and the insurgents, to the number of 10,000 to 15,000 men, assembled in the well-known Etmeidan. The sultan perceived that the crisis which he had both expected and feared had now arrived, and he determined at once to put an end to a domination which had been found so intolerable. He directed the sacred standard of the prophet to be raised, and the zealous Mussulmans rushed from all quarters to range themselves under it. He issued orders to the pasha aga, and to the topgi bashi or commander of artillery, to hold themselves in readiness with their troops. Before, however, proceeding to extremities, four officers of rank were despatched to the Etmeidan, with offers of pardon if the insurgents would immediately disperse; but the offers were scornfully rejected, and the officers were wantonly put to death. The aga pasha had by this time collected about 64,000 troops, besides vast numbers of the population; and surrounding the Etmeidan, where the janissaries were assembled in a dense crowd, totally unsuspicious of the sultan's intention, he opened upon them a general discharge of grape-shot, which killed vast numbers. The survivors retired to the barracks, which were close by, and there shut themselves up. But orders were immediately given to set fire to the buildings. The artillery thundered upon the walls; and after a desperate resistance, with little loss to their assailants, the janissaries were utterly exterminated. For two days afterwards, the gates of the city continued closed, and strict search was made for such of the janissaries as might have escaped the slaughter in the Etmeidan, of whom many when found were immediately executed. By the official records preserved, but which may not reveal the full number of the victims, only about 2000 of the most guilty, after being identified, were thus put to death in the capital, besides thousands who perished in the conflict and by the flames in their barracks, and many were sent into exile in the provinces. Thus, after four centuries and a half, this formidable and capricious corps, once the great bulwark of the empire, but eventually the pest and disturber of the community, and an insuperable barrier to all improvement, was totally destroyed, and the imperial throne freed from its intolerable yoke.

In 1828 war again broke out between Turkey and Russia. The first campaign was unfavourable to Turkey, but not completely decisive; it ended with the loss of Varna. In 1829, however, the Russian general Diebisch succeeded in passing the formidable barrier of the Balkans; and the war being closed in September by the peace of Adrianople, Turkey consented to several articles both humiliating and injurious.

Shortly after occurred that rupture between the sultan and Mehemmed Ali, the pasha of Egypt, which shook the Ottoman empire to its foundations. In every conflict the Turkish troops were completely overthrown. The battle of Homs decided the fate of Syria, and the victory at Konieh placed the sceptre almost within the grasp of the ambitious pasha. In this extremity the sultan was reduced to the humiliating necessity of applying for aid to Russia; and, through the intervention of the representatives of France and England chiefly, peace was concluded, and the whole of Syria, with its dependent territories, rewarded the successful rebellion of Mehemmed Ali.

In 1839, the sultan and his powerful subject again came into collision; and the Turkish army, under the seraskier Hafiz Pasha, crossed the Euphrates, but was completely routed by Ibrahim Pasha at Nezib, near Aleppo, and the camp, artillery, and baggage, fell into the hands of the Egyptians. This disaster was followed by the loss of the Turkish fleet, which Ahmet Fevzi, the capitán pasha, carried to Alexandria, and delivered up to Mehemmed Ali. The sultan, who had long been diseased, survived this engagement only three days, and was succeeded by Abdul Medjid, a youth of nineteen years of age. The young sultan was taken under the protection of the five great European powers; and on the 15th of July 1840, a treaty was concluded by Britain, Austria, Russia, and Prussia, for the settlement of the eastern question, France having refused to become a party to it. By the terms of this agreement, Mehemmed was offered the hereditary government of Egypt and of the pachalik of Acre. Having, however, refused to comply with the terms, he was excommunicated, and his forfeiture proclaimed by the sultan and the uléma; and the fleets of the allied powers proceeded to reduce the fortified places on the coast of Syria. They soon obtained possession of Beyrouth, Saide, and St Jean d'Acre; the last of which was evacuated by the Egyptian troops after a bombardment of only three hours' duration, on the 3rd of November 1840, though it had cost Ibrahim a siege of seven months to reduce it in 1832, and though he had subsequently made it one of the strongest fortresses in the world.

Soon after, Ibrahim's troops, unable to make further resistance, evacuated Syria. But, with the concurrence of the allied powers, Mehemmed Ali was confirmed in possession of the government of Egypt; which was also made hereditary in the line of his descendants, on payment of an annual tribute to the Porte of 1,333,000 dollars. In other respects, and being entirely excluded from Syria, Palestine, and Arabia, he was placed on the footing of a vassal pasha, subject to the laws of the empire.

By the treaty, dated the 13th July 1841, France joined with the other powers in confirming the rule for shutting the passage of the Dardanelles to foreign ships of war, and in guaranteeing the integrity of the Ottoman territory. Its division under two rival rulers had long been felt as a great source of weakness; and the policy of the British ambassador from 1833 had been to effect the restoration of its unity under the full sovereignty of the hereditary sultan. Arabia was next brought under the direct rule of the Porte, which drew from it a tribute of several millions of hard dollars conveyed to the capital. Kurdistan was also subjected to a state of order and obedience; and commissioners, jointly with those of the great powers, were employed to adjust the long unsettled boundaries between Turkey and Persia. Troubles in Bosnia, arising from aversion to the new system of taxes and military conscription, were suppressed, and Turkey enjoyed a repose of some years, undisturbed by internal commotion or foreign pressure. Some contentions in the Lebanon, never yet healed up, between the Druses and the Maronite Christians, and predatory turbulence of the Arab tribes of the Syrian and Mesopotamian desert, were the only exception. The great shocks throughout Europe caused by the French Revolution of 1848 did not affect Turkey, where the Massalians have little of the revolutionary element. The tributary Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia alone became agitated, and the liberals there, composed of the younger and more ardent of the educated classes, weary of the country being overruled by Russia, established provisional governments of their own, which were of a very democratic stamp. They were still desirous to preserve amity with the Porte, or willing to remain under its suzerainty, and one grand vizier of the day was even favourable to their independence. Such was not then the policy of Russia, and the Divan was induced (why, is still unaccounted for) to solicit her joint military occupation of those countries, by which the previous order of things was restored. Meanwhile Hungary had engaged in war with the House of Austria, to regain her full constitutional rights. The Porte was favourable to the Hungarian cause, and seemed disposed to support it by arms had she received encouragement, with which view probably she was collecting the promised regulars from her nearest Asiatic provinces. But England would countenance no step tending to bring on general war, and Turkey remained passive. She was involuntarily placed in jeopardy when the surviving Hungarian leaders, after falling in their struggle, took refuge on her soil, and whose she refused to deliver up in compliance with the remonstrances of Austria, and the threats of Russia, that the alternative would be actual war. Kosuth and his associates were treated with hospitality, and finally lodged for some time at Kutachia, in the enjoyment of liberal pensions. The mission of a British fleet to the Dardanelles Turkey.

History.

effectually protected Turkey from hostile invasion on the occasion, and changed the attitude of Russia. It cost much persevering trouble and efforts to remove the Russian troops, as far as length permitted, from the Danubian Principalities. The Emperor Nicholas was not the least intent on carrying out the long cherished project of his house to extend their dominions to the Bosphorus, and occupy the throne of the Constantines; and secret overtures, coldly received, had several years before been made to the British Cabinet to share in the spoils of "the sick man, whom they would soon have on their hands." Again, those overtures were renewed to the British minister at St. Petersburg, in course of the disputes relating to the rights of Russia and France to certain churches in the Holy Land. This led to the claim on the part of Russia to a protectorate over the subjects of the Porte who were members of the Greek or Oriental Church; and Prince Mensikoff was despatched to Constantinople to make the most imperious demands of that nature, as the ultimatum of the czar. Those pretensions, founded on an overstrained construction of the treaty of Kainargi, and which would virtually have handed over to the supremacy of Russia several millions of Ottoman subjects, were resisted. Russian troops marched in consequence into the Danubian Principalities, which England and France waived treating as a cause belli; and negotiations were opened at Vienna to effect an accommodation. The terms thus agreed upon as a basis were rejected by the Porte, as bearing a contradiction to favours the policy of Russia, as afterwards admitted. And in October 1853 the Porte declared war against that power.

The Russian forces crossed the Danube, and took possession of some minor forts at its lower extremity, also of the Dobrudja. A contest took place higher up the river at Oltenitz, chiefly by a cannonade, in which Omer Pasha, the Turkish general-in-chief, gained the victory. Widin was secured and rendered impregnable, protected by the fortified position of Kalafat, on the opposite side of the Danube. The British and French fleets, long anchored outside the Dardanelles, at length passed up and took their stations in the Bosphorus. They only entered the Black Sea, when a Turkish squadron sent there and anchored at Sinope was attacked and destroyed, with the crews, by a large superior fleet from Sebastopol. The disaster and massacre attendant roused public feeling in England, which called for war against the aggressors. It was declared in the month of March 1854 by Great Britain and France, whose joint armies, collected at Gallipoli and around Constantinople, proceeded by sea to Varna. Whilst encamped in that quarter, fever made formidable inroads in the British ranks on the swampy borders of the Lake of Derin. Cholera had already accompanied the French army from home, and was spreading in the local fever. From their joint ravages a French division sent on an expedition into the wholesome Dobrudja, was almost annihilated without meeting an enemy. Omer Pasha, having established his head-quarters at Schumla, there remained stationary with his army, as did the Allies in their positions near the sea, whilst the Russians directed all their might against Silistria.

Alone the Turkish garrison of that fortress, animated by the example and counsels of two British officers who, as volunteers, shared their peril, made a most gallant and determined defence, one of the most distinguished on record. After sustaining immense losses in men, and having had all their generals engaged in the siege either wounded or killed, the Russians retired. They had never been able to take the Arab Tabia, so called, an outwork which formed the key of the defences, guarded by a handful of men, chiefly Egyptian troops. The Russian campaign on the Danube had totally failed. Their army next retired from the Principalities, which, in virtue of a treaty with the allied powers then lately made by Austria, was occupied by her troops, and the war was transported to another theatre.

It had been finally resolved in the allied councils of France and England to attack Sebastopol, the great stronghold and arsenal of Russia in the Black Sea. Their joint armies, in September 1854, were conveyed to the western shore of the Crimea, in vast array of transports, escorted by their splendid fleets, exhibiting the most grand spectacle ever beheld on the ocean. Their wonted valour shone in the battle on the Alma, when they carried its heights in the face of a tremendous shower of grape from the Russian batteries. On the march inland which followed, their artillery, saved from the engagement, lay unknown a little to the right, exposed to the grasp of the allies. On their appearance before Sebastopol in the south, they might have marched into it, as now admitted, so dispirited were the Russians by their previous defeat, and unprepared for defence. An immediate assault had been proposed by Lord Raglan, the British commander, but declined by St. Arnaud, the French. The moral energies were now exhausted which had sustained the enfeebled and dying frame of that gallant spirit up to the fight on the Alma.

The army of Omer Pasha had been later transported to the Crimea, but no active nor glorious part was assigned to it in the operations before Sebastopol. Previous to its capture on the 8th September 1855, the Turkish force, after much hesitation in coming to the decision, were about to make a diversion in Mingrelia, for the relief of Kars, then hemmed in by the Russians, and reduced to extremity. But Omer Pasha landed at Sokoum Kalé, which lost him three weeks' march, instead of at Redan or Kalé, only a few days' distance from Kutais, on which he was to move. After defeating the Russians, with the loss of 500 men, who opposed his passage of the Ingour, he stopped short, as the wet season had set in, and never proceeded to Kutais (the capital of Mingrelia), which lay close at hand, open to his occupation. He had, however, alarmed Mouravieff, who, to arrest his progress in that quarter, weakened his own army before Kars, but unnecessarily; and that important place was left unaided to its fate.

The war in Asia had commenced by the capture, on the 3rd of November 1855, of the Fort of Shef kélit, on the Gouriel, by a Turkish division from Batoun; and under the direction of Yordan, a gallant Polish officer, it resisted a subsequent attack by the Russian fleet, which afterwards destroyed the Turkish fleet at Sinope. The force at Batoun river exceeding 6000 to 7000 effective men, and wasted by sickness to a skeleton at the end of the war, did nothing further memorable, save advancing on Uzurgheli, under Selim Pasha. When following the Russians, who had evacuated the town, a little further, he was attacked in turn, routed, and his troops narrowly escaped total destruction. They formed the extreme left of the army of Ermolieff, originally composed of nearly 40,000 of the best Turkish troops, and stationed at Kars. In the end of 1853 it sent two detachments of 7000 men each back against Gumri and Akiski, which were repulsed. The rest of the time, though then weak, was wasted in skirmishes with the Russians until September 1854, when General Guyon, distinguished for his energy in the Hungarian war, having been sent to reorganize the Kazak army, recommended a well combined offensive movement; at the moment of execution he was, however, contemptuously set aside by the Turkish general-in-chief (Tarif Mustafa Pasha), who lost the battle of Ingédéré, which he ought to have won, and retired in utter disorder from the field. The Russians, who had suffered the most, might have got into Kars before him. They had meanwhile occupied Byared, from before which, on their advance, a Turkish division of 7000 men dispersed. In October the British military commissioner, General Williams, arrived at Kars, and then returned to Erzeroum for the winter, to make arrangements there for the future. The season was spent at Kars in strengthening the defences; and in May following (1855) General Mouravieff debouched from Gumri with 45,000 men, scouring with his cavalry the country whence any supplies could reach Kars. It must finally have surrendered from famine. But Mouravieff, afraid of Omer Pasha's coming on from Mingrelia, and after having sent off 6000 men to oppose him, ordered an assault in September, though without cannon. His troops penetrated into the intrenchments, but were nobly repulsed, with terrible slaughter, leaving 6000 dead on the spot. They again resumed the siege, encamped before the place, which was forced to surrender in November. This was the last feat performed during the war, and was some counterpoise in favour of the arms of Russia to the greater triumph of the allies at Sebastopol.

The Circassians had been invited by an agent of the British government to take part in the hostilities against Russia, as favourable to their national independence, but this was counteracted by the representatives of the Porte, and Schamyl's deputy, the Nabi, was preaching Socialism to the Caucasian mountaineers; so no combination could be formed with them, and the Russians themselves, after first blowing up their forts along the coast, retired from it. Anapa was recaptured by them on the return of peace, in which terminated the armistice which followed the taking of Sebastopol. In the latter part of the war, Sardinia had sent an army to co-operate with those of the allies in the Crimean campaign, and which signalled itself in the action at the bridge of the Tchernaya.

By the Treaty of Paris, signed on the 30th March 1856, between the belligerents, and with the participation of Austria and Prussia, Russia was interdicted from possessing any fortified port or naval station on the Black Sea. Nicolaief, as an inland station, was not included in the restriction. But her fleet had already been sunk at Sebastopol, to block up the port against the advance of the allies, the magnificent docks there were destroyed before their departure; and it was stipulated as a condition of the treaty that the ships-of-war which Russia and the Porte might have in the Black Sea should be limited to a small flotilla of specified force, for police and revenue purposes. All right of foreign intervention in the internal concerns of Turkey was expressly debarred. Previous territorial limits between Russia and Turkey were re-established, save that the former ceded to the Porte such portion of the Bessarabia as gave access to the Danube. Other stipulations provided for the freedom of its navigation, and the future form of government of the two Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, the immunities of which, as also of Servia, were placed under the protection of the five powers. Turkey now took a place also as a member of the European confederation of states.

There ensued, in consequence of some equivocal geographical designation, a serious question as to the right of Russia to retain Belgrade, a place which left communications open to her with the waters of the Danube. But this point, as also the occupation of the Isle of Serpents, opposite to the mouth of that river in the Black Sea, was settled in conformity with the firm and sustained representations of the British government. It also opposed the union of the two Danubian Principalities into one state as voted by the population, supported by France and Russia; and the double election of the same prince for Moldavia and Wallachia led to a compromise, the Porte confirming the election on the express condition, that in future a different prince should be chosen for each.

The main objects of the war may be said to have been attained. The formidable bulwark of Sevastopol, which gave to Russia the command of the Black Sea, and formed a standing menace to Turkey, was dismantled, with the obligation imposed that it should not be restored. The aggressions of Dominance of Russia in relation to Turkey were officially checked, and its security greatly strengthened—since it is not easy to overrun the country by an invasion overland, and Russia will have no equipped navy at hand, whilst the Porte has her fleet at command in the Bosphorus for immediate dispatch into the Black Sea on any threatened peril, and to repel any expedition which might attempt a coup de main on Constantinople, or a landing elsewhere on her coast.

It is only the small population of Montenegro that has since given trouble to the Porte on its frontiers. Claiming complete independence, and discontented with their confined territory, those wild mountaineers, after sanguinary conflicts with their Musulman neighbours, were on the point of being overwhelmed by Omer Pasha some years before but for the intervention of Austria. A fresh outbreak of those boundary contentions led to the appointment, in 1859, of commissioners from each of the Great Powers to adjust the limits. But their labours, interrupted by the war in Italy, have not yet been brought to a close. When being renewed, a Turkish force of 3000 men, imprudently sent by the superior in command into an exposed position, was totally destroyed by the Montenegrins and during the alleged assistance of a truce.

In June 1858, an excursion to Jeddah to shock the civilized world, the massacre of the British and French consuls, and a number of other Christians, by a fanatic population. This was on account of the re-boiling of the British flag on a ship from India of disputed ownership, from which it had been hauled down by the authorities on shore. The Porte undertook to afford full satisfaction for the atrocity; but before advice of this being accepted reached the Red Sea from home, it was too late to countermand previous orders for the bombardment of the town, as carried into effect by a British ship of war. The chastisement thus inflicted on the port of transit for pilgrims to the holy cities caused much sensation among the Mussulmans for a time, particularly in Syria, but which subsided without any ill consequences. Two of the greatest criminals concerned in the massacre were, after the bombardment, executed on the spot, but unhappily also eleven persons who were innocent, having been denounced by influential parties really guilty, were sacrificed in their stead.

In January 1856, Turkey lost, by the death of Reshid Pasha, the most distinguished of her statesmen of modern times, and the most accomplished public character she had yet produced. He was the author of the treaty concluded at Ghent in 1839, and guided the councils of the Porte in most of the leading questions of his day, but was not in power when war was declared against Russia in 1853. His successor in the post of grand vizir was Aali Pasha, also an acute diplomatist, who represented Turkey at the Congress of Paris when peace was concluded. He has been displaced since the discovery of a conspiracy against the government, when on the point of breaking out on the 17th September 1859. Its object was to seize the sultan on the street on his way to the mosque, and dispose or put him to death, placing his brother on the throne, in case he should refuse to accede to the scheme to be presented to him for measures of retrenchment, and the re-establishment of the ancient religious system in full vigour—the obnoxious ministers, with the actual serasker Riza Pasha as the chief, were to be got rid of, and doubtless by sacrificing their lives, with all others in office about the palace who were considered of the same party. The originator of the plot was a sheik from Suleymanié, in the Kurdistan, and his chief accomplices, two Ferik pashas in the army—the one Hussein, a Circassian, the other Djafer, an Albanian—who, on his way up the Bosphorus to the place of trial, jumped overboard and was drowned. His moral reputation was such as throws some discredit on the professed patriotism of those connected with such an associate. Only thirty-nine persons were brought to trial as Statistics implicated, of whom the two surviving leaders, after capital sentence passed against them, were, in commutation of punishment, condemned to perpetual imprisonment in a fortress; others were sentenced to confinement for a limited term, and some to exile; a number were set at liberty. No leading members of the ulama, nor other personages of much note, appear to have taken part in the plot, but the full ramifications of it are involved in uncertainty. Part of the army had been gained, and two regiments fixed upon to act as guard for the safety of the Christians at the capital. The timely detection of the conspiracy in its last stage for execution saved the empire from a perilous reactionary shock, and is calculated to be a serious warning for doing away with the same causes of grievance.

List of the Sultans of Turkey.

| Sultan | Reign | |-----------------|-------------| | Osman | 1299 | | Orchan | 1326 | | Amurath I | 1390 | | Bajazet I | 1399 | | Soliman I | 1462 | | Musa-Chelbi | 1410 | | Mohammed I | 1413 | | Amurath II | 1451 | | Bajazet II | 1481 | | Selim I | 1512 | | Soliman II | 1529 | | Selim II | 1566 | | Amurath III | 1574 | | Mohammed III | 1595 | | Ahmed I | 1603 | | Mustapha I | 1617 | | Osman II | 1623 | | Amurath IV | 1623 | | Ibrahim | 1640 | | Mohammed IV | 1649 | | Soliman III | 1657 | | Ahmet II | 1691 | | Mustapha II | 1695 | | Ahmed II | 1703 | | Mahmood I | 1730 | | Osman III | 1757 | | Mustapha II | 1771 | | Abdul Hamid I | 1788 | | Selim III | 1788 | | Ibrahim | 1807 | | Mustapha IV | 1808 | | Mahmood II | 1839 | | Soliman IV | 1839 | | Abdul-Medjid | 1839 |

STATISTICS.

The Turkish empire extends continuously into the three quarters of the old world, occupying the contiguous south-eastern corner of Europe, the south-western corner of Asia, and the north-eastern corner of Africa; between 11° and 48° N. Lat., and 8° and 48° E. Long. Its area has been very variously estimated, but is probably not less than 1,800,000 square miles, of which one-ninth is in Europe, upwards of a third in Asia, and the remainder in Africa. The empire is thus naturally divided into three very distinct portions—the European, the Asiatic, and the African.

Turkey in Europe, in its present reduced dimensions, excluding Greece and the islands, but still including the dependant states of Moldavia, Wallachia, and Servia, has an extent of about 700 miles from east to west, between the western border of Croatia and the channel of Constantinople, or the mouths of the Danube, and of 650 from north to south, between the frontier of Greece and the northern extremity of Moldavia; and includes an area of upwards of 200,000 square miles.

In its general aspect Turkey may be described as divided into two great portions—the one consisting of the low country between the base of the Balkan range on the south and the Carpathians on the north, extending north-eastward to the borders of Russia, and forming the basin of the Lower Danube; and the other all the rest of the country southward to the frontier of Greece. The nucleus of the latter portion is formed by various ranges of mountains, which have been considered to be only a prolongation of the Alps, or at least as connected with that range by the very hilly country which is found at the north-eastern corner of the Gulf of Venice. The principal chains of mountains may be enumerated in the following order:—1. The Tchar (ancient, Scardus), a high and extensive range, which forms the western part of the central range. 2. The Despoto dagh (ancient, Rhodope), which begins near Dubniza and Djumaka, and runs in an east-south-east direction, diminishing in height till it terminates rather abruptly about 6 leagues south-west of Adrianople. Its loftiest summits are towards the west, and reach an elevation of 8000 feet, or probably more. 3. The group of hills which occupies a large and very wild tract of country between 42° and 43° 30' N. lat., and 19° and 21° 20' E. long., and is but little known. 4. The chain of Pindus, which extends from Metzovo (39° 50' N. lat.) to the north-west, beyond the lake of Ochrida, where some parts of the chain reach an elevation... Statistics of 6000 or 7000 feet. Its southern extremity is connected with Olympus by a somewhat lower chain, which separates Thessaly from Macedonia. 5. The true Balkan (ancient Haemus), which extends eastward from the neighborhood of Sophia, to Emineli Burun on the Black Sea. It is a much lower chain than the Despoto-dagh; the southern slopes are generally very steep, but on the north side it is only the highest ridge which is much inclined, and on that side also the country falls by a series of parallel ridges, diminishing in height towards the Danube, which flows past a series of small hills on the Bulgarian side, while on the Wallachian side the country is flat. 6. The western part of the Balkan, which probably reaches an elevation of 4000 feet; but near the sea, the summits are only from 1800 to 2000 feet above its level. 7. The preceding chains are connected by a large undulating high country or plateau, extending from east to west between Sophia and Pristina, and forming the upper part of the basin of the Morava. From this plateau ranges of mountains extend in every direction into Servia, Macedonia, Albania, and Thrace, some of which attain the elevation of 5000 or 5500 feet. 8. South of Adrianople, between the Maritza and the Dardanelles, are the low ridges and plateaus of the Tekir-dagh, which rise only to the height of about 900 feet; but to the south-east of Ainadtschik there is a somewhat higher range, which, near the Sea of Marmora, is probably 300 or 400 feet higher than the Tekir. 9. Along the south-western shore of the Black Sea, a very low chain extends from the Bosphorus to the north-west, forming the water-shed between that sea and the basin of Adrianople. It is not in immediate connection with the Balkan; while, on the other hand, towards the Bosphorus it becomes divided into a number of small hills, situate on low-lying plateaus. 10. Between the lower Strymon and the lower Vardar, on the coast of Macedonia, there is a group of low hills, of which the almost insulated ridge of Athos may be considered as the south-eastern extremity. A prominent character of the orography of European Turkey is the presence of vast cavities or high plains at the foot of the mountains, and the number of extensive cross-fractures in the latter. The plains may be regarded, for the most part, as longitudinal valleys, and some, if not all of them, appear to have been once the beds of lakes. Only a few lakes, however, now remain, as those of Ochrida, Kastoria, Joannina, and Scutari, and even these are rapidly filling up. The only river of any importance is the Danube, which has been already described. (See Danube.)

In a country consisting of so many high plains, and intersected by so many lofty mountains, the climate must necessarily be very various. Along the western coasts the climate partakes somewhat of that of Italy, though colder, owing to the vicinity of the mountains; but the maritime regions along the east coast are exposed to the north-east winds, which blow frequently, and bring intense cold and thick fogs and rain from the Black Sea. At Constantinople the climate is extremely changeable. Indeed it depends upon the north or the south wind, whether one is shivering in the cold of Russia, or luxuriating in the balmy air of Greece. The winters are extremely long and severe; the roads are often blocked up with snow, and the wind on the Bosphorus is often so violent, that all communication between the city and the villages far up the channel is cut off. Upper Macedonia and Thrace (the modern Rumelia) were considered by the ancients to be cold countries; and it was in the former that they placed the residence of Boreas. The country, nevertheless, is rich in corn and woods, and well adapted for the vine. (For the climate and natural productions of the other provinces, see the articles Albania, Bosnia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Moldavia, Wallachia, and Servia.)

Turkey in Asia.—This large and important part of the empire is situated between 31° and 42° N. Lat., and 26° and 48° E. Long. Its greatest length, measured diagonally from the mouth of the Dardanelles to the mouth of the Euphrates, exceeds 1200 miles; and its greatest breadth, from the southern border of Palestine to the north-eastern extremity of the paschal of Akhalzik, exceeds 900. Its area may be about 660,000 square miles. It is bounded on the north by the Black Sea and a part of the Russian territory; on the south by the deserts of Arabia; on the east by Persia and Russian Armenia; and on the west by the Mediterranean Sea, the Archipelago, the Dardanelles, the Sea of Marmora, and the channel of Constantinople. It consists naturally of four very distinct portions, namely—1. The peninsula of Ana-doli or Asia Minor, situate between the Black Sea and the Levant part of the Mediterranean; 2. The high tableland of Armenia and Kurdistan to the north-east; 3. The low countries of Assyria, Babylonia, and Mesopotamia, traversed by the Euphrates and the Tigris; and, 4. Syria and Palestine, which together form the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, and extend between it and the Arabian desert.

Armenia and the northern part of Kurdistan form an elevated tableland, or series of plains and valleys, some of which are 5500 feet above the level of the sea, intersected and overtopped by ranges of mountains. This is, however, a fertile corn country, and abounds also in pastures, though the climate is cold, and in winter the whole region is covered with deep snow. From Armenia two ranges of mountains proceed westward. One of these, the ancient Taurus, runs parallel to the shore of the Mediterranean Sea, and then dividing into a number of branches, which intersect the western part of the peninsula, forms as many fertile valleys watered by fine rivers, and terminates on the shores or in the islands of the Archipelago. The other chain, Anti-Taurus, extends in a south-westerly direction into the interior of the peninsula, where it is probably connected, not only with the ranges of Taurus, but also with the lofty mountains which under various names occupy the country between the Kizil-Irmak and the Sea of Marmora. The central part of the peninsula, supported on all sides by these mountains, forms a series of elevated tablelands, nearly destitute of trees, but abounding with pasture. Some of its valleys are so completely surrounded by mountains as to have no outlet for their waters, which not only overflow large tracts of country in the rainy season, but also form a number of permanent lakes. The climate of this upland region is very severe. The summer is of very short duration, and the low country along the coasts is so much affected by the vicinity of these cold mountains, that neither the aloe nor the cactus, nor any succulent plant, is to be seen. Orange and lemon trees are with difficulty preserved in the sheltered valleys; the olive seldom flourishes, even in a similar situation; and they are all inferior in growth to those of Sicily, Calabria, and Greece.

The countries watered by the Euphrates and Tigris may be distinguished, by their configuration, climate, and natural productions, into three zones. The first, or most northern, comprises the mountainous country traversed by the ranges of Taurus, where the winters are cold and the summers hot, and where the productions are forest and fruit trees, olives, wine, corn, and pasture. The second zone consists of stony or sandy plains, the fertile parts of which produce mulberry-trees, cotton, maize, sesame, tobacco, and hardy labiate and composite plants. The climate is characterized by great dryness, combined with great variations of temperature; and the zone comprises Northern Syria, Mesopotamia, and the low country to the east of the Upper Tigris. The third zone, which extends from Feluja to the Persian Gulf, consists of low, watery, alluvial plains, which produce date-trees, rice, and pastureage, or saline plants, reeds, sedges, and rushes. The plain is intersected in every direction by the remains of ancient canals, and is still capable of that Statistics, extensive irrigation which made it in ancient times the richest country in the world. But at present it is nearly a desert, and cultivation is only found like a fringe along the banks of the rivers. (For the description of the remaining parts of the empire, see the articles SYRIA, PALESTINE, ASIA MINOR, EGYPT, TRIPOLI, and TUNIS.)

The dominant race are the Osmanli Turks; but they do not call themselves Turks, nor apply the term to each other but in disparagement, as denoting uncouthness or barbarism, whilst they take a pride in the name of Osmanli, from the ancient splendour of the dynasty. Their language has received so large an intermixture of Arabic and Persian as on that account to be denominated Mulassane, compounded. Having become blended with various of the nations they conquered, which joined to the introduction of Circassian and Georgian blood, has improved their original type, and hence they are in general a robust, well-formed race, of rather harsh yet grave and noble physiognomy. Some are of fair, but the most part of brownish, complexion and dark-brown hair. All the men wear moustaches,—many of them also beards, as usual with those advanced in years, which adds much to their natural dignity and their mien. They are intelligent, capable of high culture, and of acquiring almost every kind of knowledge; in manners they are hospitable, courteous to each other and to strangers, and respectful to their superiors; in character they are grateful for benefits and mindful of them, and constant in their attachments and friendships for those they esteem. They may contrast favourably for honesty with the Greeks and Armenians who live under the same rule, but cannot be signalled for national honesty more than for veracity. The fatalism inculcated by their religion tends to make them improvident, the despotism of their government to render them addicted to simulation, of which they are perfect masters. They are deficient in humanity and in sympathy with the sufferings or death of their fellows from violence, and their morals are tainted by the notorious prevalence of a disgraceful vice common to eastern countries from the most remote ages, and which exercises a most pernicious, degenerating influence on their social condition and career as a nation. They receive from infancy a most vicious education in the harem, which initiates them in loose principles and the familiar use of grossly indecent expressions, whilst the separation of the sexes removes them from the true pleasures of a home. They have little taste to turn for art, or appreciation of its beauties, save as loaded with the ornament of wealth and fond of ease, they are the more pliant to authority, and easily governed. The best qualities of the population would be more conspicuous, their morals more regulated, were a better example given them by the higher classes and those in authority over them. It is mostly to the industry of its Christian subjects, both in the culture of the soil and in trade, that the empire is beholden for its resources; and the Greeks especially far surpass the Turks in acuteness, activity, and that spirit of enterprise which generates and extends commerce.

European Turkey is inhabited by a variety of races, of which the Wallachs or Roumans and the Slavonians tribes are the most numerous. Very erroneous statements made at random or from political bias have continued to be published of the elements of the population, of which a regular census is taken every ten years and preserved at the Porte, though not made public. The following is from an authentic source:

- Osmanlis, of Turkish origin and speech: 3,000,000 - Greeks: 1,150,000 - Albanians: 1,600,000 - Slavonians: 4,000,000 - Wallachians of the Greek Church (in Mace-donia, Bitolia, &c.): 600,000 - Armenians: 300,000 - Jews: 250,000 - Franks: 50,000 - Gypsies: 200,000

Add population of Wallachia and Moldavia, Servia and Montenegro: 5,620,000

Total population of European Turkey: 16,200,000

Of which 5,900,000 are Musulmans, 420,000 Catholics in Bosnia, Albania, and Philippopolis, the rest of the Greek Church to the number of 9,080,000, besides the Jews, Franks, and Gypsies.

The population of Asiatic Turkey is still more various. The Osmanlis are very numerous in Asia Minor, which, from the priority of their settlement there, they consider as their own country. They are there chiefly intermixed with Greeks and Armenians, and with Kurds along the Tigris and Euphrates. The Yezedes dwell in the Sinjar, and Jews in more or less number in the towns. Large tracts of the interior are abandoned to the wandering tribes of Turcomans or Yuruk (who are identical), and of Kurds, who pasture their flocks and herds on the hills, wide uplands, and plains. The Turcomans in some places also cultivate the soil, and are burners of charcoal for sale. All the wheat is raised by them which is grown on the fertile range of Emir Dagh, bordering on Konia, and renowned for the superior excellence of the quality. Pastoral and migratory like the Arabs, living in tents and wicker huts, they rove to a great distance where they can best find subsistence for the various animals which constitute their wealth. They breed many horses, which, with their wool, butter, and milk, they sell to the Turks and to others who buy in return arms, clothing, coffee, &c. The women spin wool and make carpets; the men knit coarse socks or stockings, of general wear among the people of the country. They settle disputes amongst themselves according to their customs, and were wont to acknowledge some superior chief; but instead of former mere dues for freedom of pasturage, they now pay regular taxes to the government, according to their station and substance. They are of the Turke family, and in their dialect and pronunciation approach nearest to the genuine Turkish as spoken by the Tartars.

The Kurds differ much in manners and totally in language from those tribes. They are a wealthy and independent people, and live entirely in tents. They dwell on the eastern flanks of Mount Arjish, and in the great plain of the Haimanesh, towards Angora. They are found also among the ridges of Taurus, in Northern Syria; but their proper country is the mountainous region to the north-east of the Tigris, which from them takes its name of Kurdistan, and which is nominally divided between Persia and Turkey, without being fully subjected to either. (See SYRIA, PALESTINE, ARABIA, ARMENIA, KURDISTAN.)

The population of Asia Minor, Syris, and Arabia, which is of a very mixed heterogeneous character, amounts to... 16,100,000

Of Egypt to... 3,000,000

Of Tripoli and Tunis to... 1,800,000

Add population of European Turkey... 20,900,000

Total of Turkish Empire... 37,100,000

Population according to Religions.

| Creed | Europe | Asia | Africa | Total | |----------------|--------|------|--------|-------| | Musulmans | 5,900,000 | 12,870,000 | 3,800,000 | 22,570,000 | | Greeks | 9,450,000 | 2,500,000 | | | | Armenians | 300,000 | | | | | Roman Catholics| 450,000 | 640,000 | | 1,090,000 | | Various other Christian sects | | | | | | Jews | 70,000 | 150,000 | 300,000 | 520,000 | | Dervishes, Azeris, Yezedes, &c., | | 80,000 | | 80,000 | | Total | 16,200,000 | 16,100,000 | 4,800,000 | 37,100,000 |

This enumeration corresponds in essentials with the last census in 1852, and with some uncertainty as to the numbers of the small tribes of the Lebanon and Sinjar. There are, further, the wandering Arab tribes of the Nejd, and Syrian and Mesopotamian deserts, by some reckoned at 2,000,000, by others affirmed to amount to 4,000,000, making the entire population of the empire about 40,000,000. The Mussulmans continue decidedly to predominate, but from inherent causes still in progress their numbers have long been decreasing, without any sign of a counteracting impetus to arrest the decline.

Unleavened towards the mass of the lower orders and more remote provinces, which remain nearly unchanged, the state of society in great Turkey cannot be judged from the past. On the sea-coast, steam navigation, which is everywhere established, has facilitated communications, and added to the conveniences of life. In the capital and principal maritime towns, as also in the larger cities adjacent in less degree, the native merchants, Greek and Armenian, have made great progress in general knowledge and the cultivated manners of society. French, and likewise sometimes English, are generally spoken in the families of the better class, especially in those of Sarafis and persons in the employment of the state. Their women have laid aside the oriental dress, and adopted the French fashions; and the custom extends to many of the lower orders, and to towns in the interior. Turkish gentlemen of all ranks mix at ease in European or other good society among the Christians, and have imbued all its tone and spirit. Polygamy among the Turks of every class is wearing out and becoming rare; but the secrecy and The government is an absolute monarchy or despotism, vested in a Padishah or Emperor of the race of Osman, founder of the dynasty. As successor to the last of the Abassid Caliphs of Egypt, he is also Kalif or Vicar of the Prophet, and, as such, supreme head of the Mohammedan religion. He thus unites in himself the power of the Kétab and Kilitch, the book and the sword, and is consequently endowed with an absolute authority, spiritual and temporal. His legitimate power is necessarily bounded by the law of the Koran, in practice it has no limit save his will, and necessity or expediency. He cannot in general infringe the rights of property, nor inflict punishment without a formal condemnation. The arbitrary putting to death of subjects at his command has only been by virtue of the prerogative. He also bears the title of Khan, and by the Turkish people is commonly called Hunkiar (in Persian the shepherd of blood). There being no hereditary nobility, all the predilections of the people in favour of antiquity and sovereign rank are concentrated upon the family of Osman. This illustrious line, the object of their reverence, has been happily preserved amidst successive revolutions. When nearly extinguished in 1829, at the time Mustafa IV. was being dethroned, who had despatched executioners in search of his brother Mahmoud, the only other surviving scion of the family, he was saved by lying concealed under some covering in a bath, where he was discovered by his deliverers. On the death of Mustafa, Mahmoud having become the sole representative of his line till he had sons who grew up, this undoubtedly tended to consolidate his power, and preserve his life during the stormy periods of his reign.

Immediately on the overthrow of the janissaries, in 1825, a great change took place in the court forms and system of administration. This reform was further greatly advanced soon after the accession of his son, Abdul Medjid, to the throne, by the famous edict of Ghulhane. All sanguinary exercise of the prerogative against law was abrogated; and though the sultan is no longer the uncontrolled master of the lives and property of his subjects; the head and fortune of a fallen minister is but no more exposed to forfeiture. The sultan may choose, dispose, even sometimes disapprove and re-instate his ministers at will, but he must select counsellors of state capable or willing to carry his commands into execution, or submit to the measures they recommend. Formerly the Sheikh-al-Islam could exercise a great restrictive power, being entitled to interpose his veto on any act declared by him contrary to the religious law. Sultan Mahmoud took an easy way of evading this intolerable obstacle to his policy and will, by the dismissal of any refractory Sheikh-al-Islam, and the substitution of one found more pliable. No difficulty in this respect has since been experienced in legalising all the reforms and innovations successively introduced. The changes in the composition of the Divan also now take place with as much placidity as in Christian countries. An order to remain in temporary retirement at his house, or removal to some provincial port, is the worst that befalls a discarded minister, unless charged with some flagrant misconduct. The Ulama, having been least exposed to reverses of fortune, and spoliation of their property, have preserved amongst their order the greatest number of old and opulent families. The actual regimen which affords common protection to this class of subjects is however not has lasted a generation. But from the promotion to high office and dignity of the sons of great pashas and ministers, who become also the heirs to their wealth, which is sustained by alliances between these families, a superior hereditary class of Turkish gentry may be in progress of formation. Some of the old courtiers, ignorant of any language but the Turkish, are still in power, but this is no longer a usual passport to office. On the contrary, a knowledge of French and of European politics are now indispensable qualifications of Turkish statesmen, save the very few survivors of the old school, and communications written or verbal may take place between the sultan's ministers and the representatives of foreign powers without the intervention of a dragoman. Turkish diplomats also, in their state papers and more intimate intercourse with the politicians of Christendom, evince a keen perception of the interests of the Porte and tact in maintaining their own views.

The succession to the throne does not pass to the eldest male heir in lineal descent from the last sultan, but to the senior in years of the Imperial family. Abdul Medjid's brother, and not his eldest son, is therefore now the heir presumptive to the sovereignty, and it would be dangerous to attempt to subvert to his prejudice the ancient established rule. Far, however, from being an immured captive, jealously guarded, as would have been his fate in former ages, he has his own establishment in the country close to the capital, and moves about in his pleasure yacht or otherwise at Statistic freedom.

From the time of Byzaid II., who had to maintain a contest for the throne with his brother Djem, such competition had caused trouble or anxiety to the reigning Sultan, and the great Soliman even strangled his eldest son, whether from the discovery of his being really engaged in projects of rebellion, or on a false accusation instigated by the celebrated favourite known as Ronslan, to secure the succession for a son of her own. Thenceforward the imperial princes were pent up in the seraglio, attended by eunuchs, and the female slaves of their harems past the age of childbearing. Thus the immature princes vegetated, debarred from the world, and ill educated for the business of life and government. And hence the Osmanli sultans from being mere warriors and head of armies as well as rulers over their peoples, degenerated from the most part into effeminate slaves of every sensual vice, and tools of eunuchs or women and other worthless intrigues around them. Few amongst them were distinguished for strength of character or intellect. Of those rare exceptions the most illustrious until his time was Selim III., though unfortunately not endowed with resolution to enforce, equal to his sagacity in framing enlightened plans of reform. But he had trained to his views his favourite nephew, the stern and determined Mahmoud, for whom it was reserved to break the brutal, debasing thrall of the janissaries, and smooth the path of government for his son. Abdul Medjid has enlarged the rights of the subject, advanced education and toleration, organised the civil administration and the military and naval force of the empire. Esteemed for humanity and mildness, but partaking too much of weakness in a sovereign, he carries to excess his passion for expensive ceremonies, edifices, and luxuries. No sultan has been so costly in the maintenance of his harem.

This establishment is still kept up with the ancient etiquette. There is still a Kialar Aga,—superintendent of the women,—now styled Daraadat Agassi, chosen among the black eunuchs, but who no longer retains any political influence whatever. The female train in the harem consists of about 300, composed of the Kadenis or Sultanas, the Ikban who are next, Odalikas, and the attendants besides the slaves. First in station are the Kadenis, who may be of the number of seven, who are accounted the wives of the Sultan, but he is prohibited from marrying any of them who are slaves. It is now become authentically known that jealousies, with consequent intrigues and brawls, constantly prevail amongst those high placed rivals, and that they lead but a very uneasy existence. One of the Kadenis, of great beauty and attractions, being an emancipated Circassian, and therefore espoused by the ceremony of nikah to enter the harem, after having for some years been a ruling favourite of the sultan's, was not long since divorced. She was then by the imperial order wedded to a military pasha, and of a sudden exiled, unprovided, with her husband to Brusa,—a proceeding considered very harsh, owing to her former station,—without any assigned cause, though various were surmised. Such is one unique epitome of the vicissitudes in the drama of seraglio life. Sisters and daughters of the sultan are married to pashas at an early age, as are also the daughters of these princesses. But no male offspring of theirs has yet survived the sanguinary custom of the seraglio officials, more powerful even than the will of the sultan, by which they are strangled at their birth. Sorrow for such bereavement caused the death of one mother, who was a daughter of the late Sultan Mahmoud.

The sultan is not obliged to be present, and very rarely is at fires. An inflexible usage requires his public attendance at midday prayer in one of the mosques every Friday. This is never omitted, save when suffering from serious illness, and absence is always apt to breed dangerous surmises and discontent. Instead of Highness, as formerly, the sultan is now styled Majesty or Imperial Majesty by foreign courts, and always by the higher title in Turkish etiquette. The office of Grand Vizir had been suppressed towards the close of the last reign; but it was renewed under the present. He is not only Prime Minister but Vakeel or Viceregent of the Sultan, and is usually called the Sandi Azem, literally Great President. Next in dignity is the Sheikh al Islam, the chief judge of the law and faith. Other ministers and functionaries take precedence, as follows:—The two Presidents of the Councils of Afkiam Ashig and Tanimat in like succession; the Seraskier, who is commander-in-chief and minister at war; the Capudan, Pasha, or high admiral; the Malley Naziri, minister of finance; Harigle Naziri, minister for foreign affairs (formerly called Reis Efendi); the minister of public instruction, Marif Naziri; the Zarbanie Emiri, master of the mint; Tigliaret Naziri, minister of commerce; Diava Naziri, minister of justice; Effikaf Naziri, administrator of

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1 The ablest of the Turkish literati of the day, however, affirm it to be derived from the Chinese Changpur, White Eagle, a title still given to Tartar princes, and pronounced in different Eastern dialects Songur and Khongur, whence, with a slight variation, the Turkish Hunkiar. Statistics, mosque property and charitable trusts; and the Zabibé Naziri, minister of police. These personages form the ministry or cabinet. Pashas have long ceased to be distinguished by the number of their tails. Those of three, who were also vizirs, are now styled Mushirs, equivalent in military rank to marshals. The pashas of second class are Periks, equivalent to lieutenant-general. Those of the third class are named Mirman when in the army, or brigadier-general; in the civil service they are called Lima. European foreigners in the Turkish service and Christian subjects of the Porte have also been made pashas of inferior grade, without changing their religion,—some from merit, the most part from intrigue and patronage. Heads of official departments have each their separate establishments and functions, the highest also their Mustéshars or coadjutors, each with an immense staff of clerks, who are termed of the "Kalem," literally pen, as denoting a government office. In the Afkian Adilé or supreme council are discussed and determined all important matters of state; it is also a court of appeal or revision for causes, civil and criminal, judged in other courts. The other grand council of Tansimat takes cognisance of all matters relating to the internal administration or home department, projects for railroads, &c. The war and admiralty offices are situated apart. All other business of the state is conducted at the Porte, called the Babaliyé, and Bah Humayun, or the Sublime Porte, as the Turkish government itself is also designated, but often without the epithet "Sublime" in our diplomacy.

The seat of the Divan or Council of the Porte, formerly described as of mean appearance, is now the Great Saloon of the Arz Odasi,—the superb court-room of the Grand Vizir, and his Highness, as he is styled; and his colleagues have all their commodious, stately apartments for the usual transaction of business at the Porte. It is contiguous to the old seraglio, at the entrance of the Golden Horn, which has not been used as the imperial residence since 1823, when it was transferred to one of the palaces on the Bosphorus, where is collected all that forms the court, and where audiences are given to foreign ambassadors.

Turkey in Europe is divided into nine eyalets or provinces, which are those of Adrianople, Bosnia, Silistria, Roumellia, Macedonia or Salonica, Widin, Nish, Yanina, and Candia. Asia Minor or Anatolia contains twelve eyalets,—Brusa, Aidin, Castambuli, Angora, Sivas, Trebizond, Harput, Van, Diarbekir, and Gerrar, or the islands of the Ottoman archipelago in Asia. In Syria and Palestine there are three eyalets,—Aleppo, Damascus, and Saïda. In Arabia, two,—Jedda and Yemen. In Africa, Egypt; and the Somal form two eyalets; Tripoli, in Barbary, a third; and Tunis is still counted as a fourth. Serbia and the two Roman principalities on the Danube, as tributaries under the suzerainty of the Porte, also form part of the Ottoman dominions.

The power of life and death has long been taken away from provincial pashas, save the Viceroy of Egypt, to whom it was granted in 1852 for seven years, now expired. And according to the last Hati Humayoun, no penal sentence can legally be passed against any individual without previous trial before a criminal court. But there is none yet established in a great part of the interior,—an anomaly which leaves scope for following the barbarous forms and practice of the old law. Mushirs who command eyalets receive salaries amounting to Ls.500 a month, and Kaimakams of sanjakis according to their rank. They do not, as in former times, on payment of a small sum to the Porte, collect the revenue on their own account. For each eyalet there is a Defterdar or receiver-general of taxes, the quota of which for every caza or parish is known and registered at the Porte, and the individual assessments are settled among the communities themselves. An aggregate is thus to be accounted for to the imperial treasury, any deficiency in which can easily be detected. This applies to the fixed annual contributions. Variable imposts, as tithes and customs, are farmed at the capital in mass to contractors, who re-let the tithes in minor lots. Both principalities and subleagues may lose as well as gain by the bargains. In 1839, the administration of the tax-devils direct those variable imposts, through local governors named kaimakams; but owing to the enormous defalcations, it failed, and has never since been renewed. So that as no effectual checks can be devised to render those large branches of revenue otherwise productive, the system of farming them, though most vexatious, generally continues.

The Hati Humayoun of 1856 proclaimed an equality of civil rights and justice for all subjects, as far as compatible with the fundamental laws and institutions of the empire left subsisting. Courts in which ulama judges preside, from the cadhi-el-asker's at the capital to the mekemane of the rural cadhi, have always the exclusive jurisdiction in causes relating to real property and many others. These courts are universally corrupt, every case of importance being decided by personal bias or bribery. Even when that is not the case, such is the strictness of the letter and forms of the law, that it is almost indispensable to establish even the right by false witnesses, by which process wrong is done habitually without scruple. The code in force being that of the Koran, which rejects all evidence against Muslims save of those of their own faith, and the judge being always inclined to favour that side in suits between them and other parties, it is in such cases almost impossible for raya to get justice. The Tigaret or commercial, and the criminal courts, profess to observe some rules of European law and equity, and to admit every sort of evidence without distinction of parties or creed. But all those tribunals are more or less tainted with the same vices as the rest. The members acting as assessors not being paid, do not always choose to lose their time for the public, unless they are members of a ruling clique, and find it their interest to attend, especially at the Tigaret. Delegates from the Christian communities are members of the criminal courts, but from timidity and venality they are generally found obsequious to the dictum of their Muslim colleagues and presidents. However defective the application of the law, still an immense step was gained in the interests of humanity and equity by the recognition of the validity of Christian testimony for the conviction of Muslim criminals. This was at first confined to the police court at the capital, but it was afterwards introduced into several of the provincial courts through the influence of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, the British ambassador.

The great merit of the Hati Humayoun of 1856, is the declaration of entire liberty of conscience, which has been so fully observed, that some Musulmans, converted to the Protestant doctrines of Christianity, enjoy unmolested, as Ottoman subjects, the exercise of their adopted faith at the capital and on their journeys beyond it. No other social benefit has yet emanated from an ordinance to which great political interest was attached, and which was viewed as the installation of a new era in the Sultan's dominions. No diminution of the multiplicity of administrative abuses has yet ensued. Already the Hati Sherif of Ghulhando has cut down the arbitrary power of the pashas, and abolished their wonted vexatious exactions for their maintenance when travelling, relieving also the raya peasantry from the corvee or forced labour for the State or powerful Turkish proprietors, to which they were previously subjected. The same edict re-established the municipal councils (medigisses) in the provinces, admitting deputies from the Greek and Armenian communities as joint members. Besides taking cognisance of all local matters of public importance, these assemblies are also courts of justice, for the primary hearing on appeals of almost every variety of causes, being guided in points of law by the ulama judge. As all petitions must be addressed to the pasha, he retains a large discretionary power in the course he may pursue in any suit, and may reject or refer it in the first instance, or partly accomplished, or decline letting the case proceed to judgment. Thus, much will always depend on the personal character of the pasha, whether he is inclined to be equable or oppressive. Amongst other changes of late years, is the formation into a separate community, by imperial charter, of the Protestant subjects of the Porte, chiefly seceders from the Armenian Church, and partly from the Greek and other sects. The protestants of American Presbyterian missionaries have their own recognised elders and places of public worship.

Whilst raya subjects of the Porte labour under the distinctive disabilities described, the Hati Humayoun of 1856, treating their emancipation as complete, rendered them liable to military conscription for the first time. In commutation a tax was imposed on them called "asker bedde," army contribution. Under another name it restores the ancient haratch or capitulation tax of 15 to 80 piastres, 2s. 6d. to 13s. for each person, according to the class, which had been abolished, and is now usually doubled or trebled in amount.

Such is the actual position of the sultan's subjects, Musulman and Raya; nor is it to be assumed that the former may not have their wrongs to complain of as well as the latter. All amelioration of the country depends in substance on the sincerity and capacity of its chief rulers and on the selection of provincial governors. Reform to be effectual in Turkey must begin at the highest seat and source of power; and it might be too much to affirm that they are not men qualified to undertake and perform the task, had they the necessary power, and therein lies the difficulty. By the reference of the Ministry of Paris to the Hati Humayoun then recently issued, the Porte gave a virtual pledge to the five powers and to the world, that its military provisions and spirit should be carried out; and although all fear of interference between the sultan and his subjects was rightly excluded, in order not again to afford a dangerous handle to Russia, this cannot supersede friendly counsel and warning on emergency.

The Osmanlis are all Mohammedans, and Islam is the religion of Religion the state; but all other religions are freely tolerated, and with and laws their professors the Osmanlis live in the utmost harmony. Both the law and the religion being founded on the same common basis, the Koran, the clergy and the lawyers form but a single order. Turkey divided however into two classes, the ministers of religion and the ministers of justice; for the prayers and ablutions prescribed by the Koran are so numerous and so frequent, that the ministers of religion could never find leisure to execute the office of a judge; they form therefore a separate class, leaving the administration of justice to the cadis. Every Osmanli is entitled to become a member of this body, but he must first receive a suitable education. After a few years' study, and an examination of his capabilities, the candidate may be admitted to the service of a mosque; but having once become an Imam, his career is closed, unless on a new examination he is found eligible for the judicial order. Those who aspire to higher honours continue their studies for a longer time, and, after several examinations, obtain the rank of mudaris, which entitles them to hold the office of deputy to a cadı or judge. If their ambition urges them still farther, and they wish to obtain the degree of mudaris or doctor, their novitiate must be continued seven years longer, and they undergo a final examination in presence of the mufti. The title of mudaris being once conferred, the first dignities of the magistracy lie open to their hopes. The classification, however, does not end here; the mudaris of Constantinople are divided into ten classes or degrees, from the first of which only are chosen the judges who inaugurate the state. This exact organization gives to the clerical body a firm cohesion, which makes it the most solid part of the Ottoman institutions. Its unity is secured by the controlling authority of its head, the grand mufti, or sheikh-ul-Islam, from whom depend all the appointments to its various ranks and offices, while the members have all a common interest in maintaining its privileges. Of all the offices in the state, that of grand mufti, or sheikh-ul-Islam (chief judge of the Muslim faith), is alone held for life. He is the oracle of the law, and the representative of the khalif or sultan in his spiritual capacity; and as all new laws, and even the question of peace and war, must await his sanction, he thus participates in the legislative power of the sovereign, and interferes with all the movements of the government. The privileges common to all the members are exemptions from taxes and arbitrary imposts, arbitrary confiscation, and the punishment of death. They are sufficiently enlightened to understand their interests; the prerogatives on which they depend are of the most solid and important nature; their chiefs are bound to them by the strongest ties, or are proved by long novitiate or repeated trials; they unite the firmness of an aristocracy to the spirit of a profession; in fine, their influence has naturally such a good foundation, and is so artfully fortified, that it would be extremely difficult to overturn it. All the advantages which result from their combination are exclusively their own; they cannot resist the arbitrary violence of the sultan, but they can impede the alterations of the law. Their power is founded on the false principles which would arrest the progress of civilization, and they are the natural supporters of the present state of things. In the Ottoman empire there is nothing of a solid construction, except this bulwark against innovation. It is difficult to reform law and religion, even when taken separately; but when united, they offer an inert, or even an active resistance, sufficient to baffled the strongest efforts of the best-intentioned despot. The whole body is termed the Ulama.

To give, however, a precise idea of this important body, we should begin with the students, who are called sofias. There are schools or colleges, named medreses, established in all the imperial mosques in Constantinople, Adrianople, and Brusa. The pupils first study grammar, and then Arabic and Persian poetry, and rhetoric; and, when considerably advanced in the Arabic language, they apply themselves to the reading of the Koran, the commentaries upon it, and the books which treat of the civil law. Finally, they study logic, metaphysics, philosophy, and metaphysics, in old Arabic works. Totally neglecting mathematics, they also study judicial astrology, as the most sublime branch of human knowledge. Such is the sum of information possessed by the sofias. They are chiefly from Syria and Asia Minor, very few being from European Turkey. They are the most savage, the most factious, the most turbulent, and the worst subjects among the Turks. Their number also is so considerable, that Constantinople alone contains about 4000 of them. They perform, in their clerical quality, the services of the mosques; their daily sustenance is regularly furnished out of the revenues of these temples; and they are lodged in the numerous cells annexed to them. But as most of them are poor and unprotected, it is very seldom, and only when at an advanced age, that any of them attain the chief clerical dignities. The student who has neither patronage nor distinguished talent to carry him through the ten degrees of mudaris or doctorship, which lead to the higher dignities of the law, aspires only to inferior offices; and the greater number of them reach only the rank of simple cadis or judges of Naib, or subdelegates of the judges in the towns and villages. Riches, birth, and patronage, the powerful instruments of worldly advancement, exercise their usual influence in this body. The first step of promotion is, when, after Statistics, many previous trials, the student is inscribed in the list of those who aspire to legal offices, and as such, under the mufti's verbal intimations, called iddet alayi (the high wink), obtains a written document from the supreme judge, denominating it tesdideye gopadi (the writing of reversal). Next, if the mudaris acquire himself well in the prescribed trials, he obtains a medres of the lowest income, and afterwards advances, by regular gradation, to the highest rank of the medreses, that of the suleimanlyeh; and then the eldest among them are promoted to the rank of mahrejmedla, or superior judges. These posts of mahrejmedla are eight in number, namely, those of Galata and Eyoub, suburbs of Constantinople, Scutari, Smyrna, Salonica, Larissa, Haifa, and Jerusalem. Their function however lasts only a lunar year, when they are succeeded by others. The next step of promotion by seniority is to the four superior mollahships of Adrianople, Brusa, Damascus, and Cairo; the next step to the two titular mollahships of Mecca and Medina; and one is further promoted to the rank of Istanbul-effendi, or master of the police of Constantinople. The next step from this rank is to that of kadi-asker of Ama-doli; and then to that of kadi-asker of Rumul-ili or European Turkey, and finally to the supreme rank of grand mufti. The grand mufti and the two kadi-askers always reside in Constantinople. Another of the members of the ulama is the nakib-ul-esha, or chief of the eunuchs. There are also four whose function is within the sultan's palace.

Before a simple sofia can arrive at the high dignities of kadi-asker and grand mufti, a period of twenty-five years may elapse; but the great ulama, vizir, and other officers, abusing their power and influence, procure for their children from an early age the honorary title of mudaris, and afterwards of the other degrees of office, without their ever filling them.

Besides the chain of the ulama, there is yet another class of personages who have a certain religious character, they are the sheikhs, or superiors of tekkehs (dervish monasteries), and subject to the authority of the sheikh-ul-Islam. Those are distinct from the sheikhs called sefat, as preachers in the imperial mosques, and who have, like the chain of the ulama, an actual course of advancement according to the ranks of their respective mosques. There are at present seventeen mosques in Constantinople which bear the title of Kusayyapin (imperial). The late Sultan Mahmoud was desirous of building a new imperial mosque, but could not, as not being in accordance with law, which required that it should be out of his own funds, and in some quarter where requisite, neither of whom conditions could be fulfilled.

The whole system of internal administration in Turkey was directed to the accumulation of money. Before November 1839, every office was sold; corruption pervaded every department of the state, civil, legal, and ecclesiastical; and under its baneful influence the provinces have been made deserts, and the empire brought to the verge of ruin. The late Sultan Mahmoud, indeed, made many vigorous efforts to reform abuses; and his successor Abdul Medjid (servant of the mosque) issued a hatt-i-sharif, published 30 November 1839, promising to seek, by new institutions, to procure for the provinces of the empire the benefits of a good administration. These institutions relate principally to three objects—first, guarantees for the security of honour and property; second, a regular mode of fixing and levying taxes; third, a regular mode of levying soldiers, and fixing the duration of their service. This edict has been pompously called the Magna Charta of Turkey; but such deep-seated corruption and abuses as we have described are not to be cured by edicts.

The mode of collecting the revenues of the state has undergone various radical changes. In the simple institutions transmitted to the Turks by the Arabs, direct taxation was an essential element. With the exception of the haratch or capitation tax levied on the rayas (now Musulman subjects), the whole regular revenue of the state used to be derived from the miri, a sort of property-tax, of which, the aggregate for each large district being fixed, the assessments for each town, village, and separate community were regulated among the inhabitants themselves, as apportioned by the municipal council of the principal district town. When, however, Mohammed II. introduced the system of farming the revenue, he subverted the functions of those municipal councillors, who, as members of the provincial diet, says D'Ohsom, could interpose their influence in the distribution, but no longer with the same weight, when the pashas had purchased their places and the revenues attached to them. Some of these municipal notables continue to retain the title of ayan with considerable local influence, but they are not recognised under that name in the actual municipal system, which is otherwise precisely on the old model, revived and enlarged.

Indirect taxes had long been introduced of the nature of our excise, as well as the customs on exports and imports, which are still levied, and extended to home trade. By the separation of Statistics. Greece, some loss of revenue has been sustained; the tribute from the Danubian principalities and Servia is small but certain; that from Egypt—an acquisition since it was reduced to submission in 1841, as, for some years before, Mohammed Ali paid nothing. Systematic taxation, with a greater degree of order in the empire, has also been extended to various portions of it in Asia and Europe, and to Arabia, which were before unproductive. On the other hand, the regular expenditure of the army and navy, and of the civil service, has increased many fold, besides the burden left by the late Russian war, and the excessive cost of the sultan's personal establishment. The revenue for 1859 is as follows:

| Property tax | 276,000,000 | |--------------|-------------| | Tithes | 351,000,000 | | Customs | 201,000,000 | | Tribute from dependant provinces | 47,000,000 |

Metallic piastres: 875,000,000

At the rate of 124 piastres per pound sterling, = L7,000,000

Other miscellaneous duties and taxes on tobacco, silk, &c., piastres 210,000,000

Surplus over expenditure from vakouf or mosque, and other religious and charitable endowments: 50,000,000

Paper money piastres 265,000,000

At mean exchange of 160 piastres per L1 sterling, = L1,650,000

Total in sterling: L8,720,000

Of this the interest on loans to the amount of twelve millions made in England absorbs about L7,290,000, leaving a balance of eight millions sterling, but vastly curtailed by the exorbitant cost of advances upon it made by moneyed parties at the capital, to meet the pressing exigencies for the day of the imperial treasury.

The budget of 1859 is—

| Piastres | |----------| | For the Army | 312,000,000 | | Artillery, warlike stores and fortifications | 80,000,000 | | Navy | 60,000,000 | | Internal administration | 134,000,000 | | Public instruction and schools | 31,000,000 | | Tribunals | 5,000,000 | | Police and guards | 95,000,000 | | Civil list | 144,000,000 |

Total: 861,000,000

Equivalent to L5,200,000

The civil list does not represent the sultan's real expenditure, which has no limit but the imperial will, and the means of supplying its exigencies.

The debts of the palace, including those of the harem, amount to above L4,000,000 sterling. On account of the insatiable drain on the revenue under these two heads, with the enormous salaries drawn by personages of the highest rank, whilst the pay of the armies is inconsiderable, that of the officers of the lowest grades is miserably scant, great discontent prevails, of which the late conspiracy was a dangerous symptom. So vast an amount has accumulated by the actual ministerial war, that his receipts from the public treasury are reckoned at 350,000 piastres, about L2,200 a month. There are a vast number more of mushirs receiving L500 to L1,500 a month, besides plunder and peculation on a large scale always going forward. It is not surprising, therefore, that the advances raised on the current revenues at any sacrifice should have cost 250 millions of piastres, L1,700,000, in a year and a half; and that the finances of Turkey should have become involved in the deepest disorder and embarrassment, such as to threaten a collapse. But this does not necessarily follow. The late Sultan Mahmoud paid off a war indemnity to Russia of ten millions of ducats, nearly five millions sterling, without imposing any new taxes. But a survey is going forward at Brusa of all real property in the district, which is progressively taxed at the rate of two-fifths per cent. on the value, and 4 per cent. more per annum on all incomes derived from it, whilst all other incomes, down to that of the common labourer, are assessed at 3 per cent. This has doubled and trebled the previous amount of those contributions, without, save rarely, causing any hardship. As the system comes to be extended to other parts of the empire, a great increase of revenue must ensue, which might suffice to free the treasury from embarrassment, and meet all necessary expenditure. But without thrift and economy, any amount of money flowing into it would be of little avail; a grand reform needful in Turkey is, therefore, to cut down the exorbitant salaries of the great, increase the lower, and reduce the imperial expenses to what is requisite and adequate to support the dignity. Indeed it is difficult to see how the present order of things in these respects can possibly long continue.

There is one great defect in the financial, as it is also in the social and political system of Turkey, arising from the principle of centralization, which Reshid Pasha borrowed and introduced from the institutions of France. On framing the edict of Ghulamh in 1839, or Tashkum, as it is otherwise called, and that he re-established the municipal councils, he swept away the funds belonging to each municipality applicable to local purposes of utility, at the cost of roads and repair of causeways, bridges, &c., and included the whole of the special dues hitherto levied for such uses in the general contributions payable to the government. Petitions must therefore be addressed to it, and long delays occur in obtaining grants for these local exigencies which are very sparingly doled out, and often neglected or refused. The consequence is, that great thoroughfares in the neighbourhood even of large towns are in a wretched state, and almost impassable in heavy weather in winter, or after heavy rains; and the country has fallen greatly behind within twenty years in this respect. Some provision is made in the new system of taxes initiated at Brusa for municipal purposes, but on a small scale.

The effective of the Turkish army in the present year (1859) Army with 150,000 men on the rolls, is 112,000 to 115,000 infantry, cavalry, and artillery, besides 210,000 trained redif, liable to serve as soldiers when called upon, 85,000 more redif, forming the retired reserve after twenty years' service; and 69,000 zables and soymen, armed irregulars, who act as guards and policemen throughout the empire. The effective regular force is divided into five armies or corps,—that of Constantinople (Darsanides), of Roumel, stationed at Monaster, of Anadoli at Erzeroom, of Arabistan at Damascus, and of Irak at Bagdad. Each of those armies is commanded by a mushir or marshal. The grand vizir has still the power, even if a civilian, to place himself at the head of the army in time of war, but no longer does so; his title would then be Sirdar Ekrem. The monthly pay of the officers is as follows:—

Mushir, 75,000 piastres. = L470 0 0 Furik (lieut.-general), 15,000 piastres. = 940 0 0 Levi (brigadier-general), 7500 piastres. = 470 0 0 Miratul (colonel), 3000 piastres. = 190 0 0 Binbash (major), 1500 piastres. = 910 0 0 Your Bash (captain), 400 piastres. = 210 0 0 Mulazim (lieutenant), 250 piastres. = 180 0 0

There are besides rations, which, for the mushirs, may amount to two-thirds of their pay; for inferior pashas and other officers, much less in proportion.

The Osmanli have never been a maritme people, nor paid any attention to the art of navigation. Their military navy, after its triumphs in the fifteenth century, was long neglected; but at last, into this department, as into every other, the Sultan Mahmoud infused his energy, and succeeded in creating a very respectable fleet.

The Ottoman navy at the same period (1859), consists of 3 screw and 5 sailing ships of the line; 2 screw, 5 paddle-steam, and 2 sailing frigates; 6 steam corvettes, and 20 war steamers of smaller class; 3 sailing corvettes, 6 sailing brigs, 12 sailing cutters, and 4 new steam gun-boats for the Black Sea service. These vessels are all manned, and in an effective state for sea. There are building, and recently laid on the stocks, 1 screw ship of the line at Constantinople, and 2 screw frigates of very large dimensions, one at Nicaea, and the other at Ghio (Ghemek). The fleet, or any division of it, is so seldom sent out to cruise, that the crews have little practice as seamen. Their discipline has, however, been much improved of late years; and the men under the training of a captain (halare) of the Black navy attained great excellence in gunnery, both for quickness and precision of fire. The port-admiral at Constantinople, with the title of Pasha, is now Sir Adolphus Sturdy, K.C.B., a captain in the British navy.

There is no nation more passionately attached to literature than the Osmanli; and from the earliest periods of their history they have devoted themselves to its cultivation. Their dialect is the most polished of all the Turkish idioms; rich, dignified, and melodious. In delicacy and nicety of expression it is not perhaps surpassed by any language; and in grandeur, beauty, and elegance, it is almost unequalled. In poetry they display great genius and taste; all classes are its ardent admirers; and to so great a degree has the love of poetic composition been carried, that there is no class of society which has not contributed towards it. The ladies, the sultan, his ministers, doctors, soldiers, all have devoted themselves to the cultivation of poetry; and the divans, or poetical collections of above 600 authors, are existing evidences of the taste of the Osmanli for the productions of the Muse. In the kindred In philosophy they have all the speculative knowledge of which the Greeks and Arabs were masters. In moral philosophy, and in the science of government and political economy, they are said to excel; which is more surprising, as our ideas of the Turks and their policy would lead us to a very different conclusion. In history they possess several good works, particularly those of the early periods of the empire. There has been also a regular series of imperial historiographers; but, generally speaking, of all the branches of knowledge, history and geography are the most neglected by the Osmanli. From the earliest periods, they possessed the best masters of astronomy; and they have a multitude of astronomical works, many of which display great science. In many of the mosques of Constantinople are to be found solar quadrants, fitted for taking observations; and astrolabes, telescopes, and other instruments of their own manufacture, some of them extremely well constructed, are in frequent use. Geometry, algebra, and arithmetic are considered among the necessary acquirements of a man of education; and a course of these sciences forms a portion of the studies of their schools. In the science of numbers their proficiency is very great, and the facility with which their calculations are performed has been frequently observed. On these subjects they possess many excellent works. Their philosophical productions are very numerous, but their speculative and metaphysical writings are almost all those which issued from the schools of Europe during the reigns of the Aristotelian philosophy; and it must be admitted, the philosophy of Bacon and Newton has not yet shed its light over the Ottoman empire. Their moral philosophy is, however, a science on which they seem to have bestowed their best energies; it is the subject of many excellent and valuable treatises. Their mode of conveying the principles of morals, by means of imaginative discourses and apologies, adds great force and beauty to the sentiments; and strewing the path of knowledge with flowers, renders the acquisition of it at once agreeable and impressive. The foreign languages which they most study are the Persian and the Arabic, and many Turks are authors of Persian and Arabic works. Only two centuries ago the literature of Turkey surpassed that of Europe; and it was from a Turk that d'Alembert took the idea of the Encyclopédie; but unfortunately the want of the press has kept them stationary, while, by its aid, Europe has been making rapid strides in both literature and science. A Turkish printing-press was for the first time established at Constantinople in 1729; in the course of fourteen years it published twenty-three volumes, and then ceased. After an interval of more than forty years, the experiment was repeated. During the reign of Selim III., printing became a part of the new order of things, and the establishment was fixed in the barracks of the new troops at Scutari; but when the revolution of 1807 broke out, the whole was reduced to ashes, and few of those connected with it escaped the fury of the janissaries. During this second period of its existence, not more than forty volumes issued from the press. It was, however, a third time restored by Sultan Mahmood, and established at Constantinople itself, and continues to issue a number of important works. It is, however, still a government undertaking, and no private individual or company seems ever to have thought of introducing this useful art as a branch of trade for the extension of general literature, although there are various private presses for the printing of newspapers, occasional pamphlets, circulars, official or commercial, and the like. The government publishes a state gazette in Turkish, under the title of Javiz Fakaye (Record of Events), which contains new ordinances, or other official papers, and gives an account of official appointments, and court or other public ceremonials. There are besides the Gérald Herald, in Turkish, a paper giving general news; French, the daily journal, the Constantinople, now bought up by the Porte; in English, the London Herald, of recent origin; three Greek newspapers, printed in the Greek character, but one in the Turkish language; two Armenian newspapers, one of them in the Turkish language; one Arabic; one Bulgarian paper, in Slavonic and the Cyrillic characters; and one Jewish, in the Hebrew character. A French paper, called La Presse d'Orient, was suppressed by the Porte for an offensive article relative to the object of the late conspiracy. The government follows the French imperial system of censorship, or warning to the press on the like occasions; and every new paper projected must have a special permission from the Turkish authority before it can appear.

Owing to the multitude of offices connected with the law and religion which can be filled only by those who have been qualified by a regular course of study, the number of those who possess the requisite elementary acquirements is very great, and the means of education are most abundant. The schools divide themselves naturally into those for children, or A, B, C schools (medrese); the general instruction given at the mosques (ders-i-omur); and in the colleges (medrese). In the children's schools, which abound in every corner of the city, the master (kébap) teaches spelling, reading, and the principles of grammar and religion. In the mosques, again, the pupils receive general, usually intelligible, and popular instruction upon philology and religion, as is indicated by their title of ders-i-omur, which means general lecture. The lecturers are not kékhas, but medresi (doctors or professors) of a medrese or college. Lastly, in the colleges, the students receive instruction in the higher and more difficult branches of knowledge. These colleges, usually founded beside mosques, libraries, monuments, and sometimes unexpectedly, are presided over by a professor (medresi), which, however, may be better translated rector, master, or head of the college, because he superintends not only the course of instruction, but likewise the conduct of the students who dwell in the medresse, as scholars upon the foundation. Out of about 350 such medresses existing throughout the empire, Constantinople alone possesses 240. The most celebrated are those founded by the conqueror Mohammed II., and by Soliman the Great, in connection with their respective mosques. As in Islam all instruction is founded upon religion, and jurists are at once theologians and lawyers, it is natural that mosques should always have been the central points round which scientific institutions are grouped. Thus in the Constantinopolitan mosques are found united the learned institutions, not only of general lectures and of the medresses, but also of libraries; and, other, other three establishments for education, unconnected with the medresses, and specifically founded. These are the school of medicine, founded by Suleyman's mosque, and the lecture-rooms of the Koran and of tradition. Sultan Mahmood reformed the medical school, and founded a university of physicians and a school of surgery, from which the military hospitals now established at Constantinople are supplied. He enlarged the school of engineers founded by Sultan Selim, and connected with it a school of architecture. He also instituted a naval college; several other educational institutions were also established in his reign, both by himself and by private persons. In the mathematical sciences, and especially in those branches most immediately applicable to the art of war, more was done under Mahmood's reign than had been accomplished under all his predecessors. Under his son educational institutions have been augmented in number, well maintained, and the branches of knowledge they embrace enlarged. The existing public schools are the polytechnic (marif aliye), the military (harbiye), naval (bahriye), the school of arts, and the medical school.

At Constantinople there are a great number of public libraries. D'Ohsson estimates them at 35, there are now 47; but no works are arranged on the shelves, or included in the catalogues, but such as are written in the languages of Islam, namely, Turkish, Arabic, and Persian. All others are thrown aside as lumber, left to decay. There is no good reason for supposing that the library of the sérail was destroyed by the Ottoman conquerors. Mohammed II. was an accomplished prince, the patron of letters, and versed, it is said, in the seven languages. On the conquest of Constantinople, he immediately took possession of the imperial palace; why, then, should he destroy the library? Yet it is now affirmed by the most accomplished of the Turks in European literature, that no ancient manuscripts of any value exist in the stores or vaults of the sérail.

Turkey is not a manufacturing country. It has but a very scanty population to furnish hands for such labour, and could not pretends, tend to compete with the science and capital of other European countries. But the rich products of its territory enable the inhabitants to obtain, in exchange, all the commodities they require from foreign countries, a mode found to be the cheapest and most suitable. They never could attain to the art of making woollen cloth, to which their nearest approach is a coarse felt, called abba, always in great use for soldiers' great coats, and the rough wear of the common people. Angora was long famous for its camlets, called shallice. Constantinople, Brusa, Damascus, and Aleppo, with some other places, produced stuffs of silk, and of silk and cotton, as likewise interwoven with gold and silver thread, which were of considerable merit, and extensive sale in the country. All those fabrics dwindled away many years since on account of the introduction of cheaper British manufactures. In latter years, however, a futile attempt was made to set up factories for the production of cloth and various silk and cotton tissues; fine glass and porcelain, to supersede the importation of those articles from other countries. It was a sort of mania originated by a powerful minister of the day; and no pasha or other personage of high rank was popular in the sérail who had not his factory of some sort or other. In the natural course of things all this soon fell to the ground, to the serious loss of the projectors. There survive only some factories of the sultan's at Nicomedea, in most unhealthy sites, where, under the direction of European foremen, some fine cloth and silk stuffs are languidly produced for the use of the sérail, costing over twenty times their worth, owing to the great capital and expenses wasted on those establishments. Turkey furnishes no manufactured article for exportation worth notice except the carpets of Ushak, near to Smyrna, still in repute in this country from the solidity of their texture, and the durability and vivacity of the colours, whilst usually of grotesque patterns. The large quantities of cotton yarn imported from England, are chiefly made up into coarse stuffs, woven by the women for household use among the peasantry, and partly into hand and bath towels; these last, however, are perfectly imitated and rivalled latterly in England. Still dresses and other stuffs of silk, or silk and cotton, are made on a very limited scale, unless in Syria and at Diarbekir, where they seem to be gaining ground,—the superior solidity of their texture being found more economical than British manufactures, with the local sale of which they are interfering. The Porte, however, takes the most effectual means which fiscal policy can devise to thwart and discourage home manufactures, rendering them, in common with other native products, liable to upwards of 13 per cent. of customs, on their transport by sea from one place to another for internal consumption. From this is exempted, because belonging to government, the most important manufacture which Turkey possesses, that of the red cap, called fez, worn by the officers of the army and members of the navy, and the adoptive national costume of the sultan and officials of every grade and order in the public service, whence, save amongst the Ulama, it has passed to the general population to become a distinctive part of the dress of Ottoman subjects.

The most valuable export from Turkey is raw silk, with the addition latterly of cocoons, chiefly raised in the Brusa district, where the silk is now nearly all reeled in filatures moved by steam according to the French and Italian method. The product there is worth a million to a million and a half sterling, according to the season, besides the silks of Adrianople, Amasra, and Syria. The other chief exports are wheat and maize, when in demand and the crops abundant; opium, and various other drugs and gums, dried raisins, currants and figs, wines, olive-oil, vanilla, madder, gallnuts, carpets, wool, goat's wool, especially that of Angora, to a great and vastly increased amount, almost entirely for England; tobacco from Yenigö in Thrace, sent largely to France, for use in the state monopoly there of cigars; morschaum clay from Eski Sheir and Angora, for making the famed German pipes, emery, and sponges, besides a number of articles, as wax, honey, &c., of minor note. Turkey remains in exchange colonial produce and manufactured stuffs, almost everything else, glass, pottery, arms, paper, cutlery, bar-iron, steel, amber (for Turkish pipes), &c.; and frequently corn from the Russian ports in the Black Sea, for the supply of Constantinople in especial.

Commercial relations between England and Turkey date so long back as the reign of Elizabeth; but the capitulations or treaties from that of Charles II. Till 1826, there existed in England a chartered Turkey company, in which was vested the exclusive privilege of trading with Turkey, and which named and paid the consuls from dues levied on goods. It was rightly abolished as an antiquated anomaly. The trade conducted by the members individually had dwindled away in their hands, save for colonials during the blockade in the latter part of the great continental war ended in 1814–15. Malta had then become a depot for our trade in the Mediterranean; and, after the peace between Great Britain and Turkey in 1809, the Greeks, ever on the alert in discovering and developing new sources of trade, began making purchases of British manufactures at Malta. These were chiefly sent to Smyrna, and thence distributed to the capital and other parts of Turkey. Only two or three vessels annually with assorted cargoes, of which cotton goods formed but a small portion, went from England to Constantinople till 1812. In that year an English merchant (Mr. Black) established a house there, and for several years had the whole trade of direct trade. Thenceforward, Constantinople became a rival mart with Smyrna, which it soon entirely eclipsed in the supply of British manufactures. The Greeks next engaged in the direct trade, which went on increasing with great rapidity, and has been generally prosperous. In addition to the English there are now a number of Greek houses which trade with England from Constantinople; besides a number of Armenians and other Ottoman subjects, and most of the French, Italian, and German merchants. Those of various nations at Smyrna, in like manner, share considerably in the trade; others at Salonica, and a greater number at Beyrouth, Damascus, and Aleppo,—the Syrian branch having become most important, from part of the goods for Persia taking that route. English merchants and manufacturers still share in the business with Turkey; while the Greek houses in London have increased to 45, inclusive of 5 Greco-frank firms, having 12 branches at Manchester, and 16 at Liverpool. There is also one Armenian house in London, further 26 solo Greek establishments at Manchester, and 5 at Liverpool, and 6 Armenian at Manchester, making in all 111 Levant firms in England, enjoying respectable, and several first-rate, credit as capitalists. The purchases made in Britain being for the real wants of their destined market, and not merely speculative, the trade is rendered the static more steady and safe. Constantinople, besides being in the direct course for Persia, offers the advantage of an intermediate market for goods going there. They are partly taken by steamers straight to Trebizond; and partly trans-shipped at Constantinople for that port, whence they are forwarded inland by way of Erzeroum. Till lately, this was the sole line of transit; but Russia now affords facilities for landing the goods at Poti, and their expedition through Mingrelia; and, in vain, has the Porte been urged by England to arrest this rivalry by opening a good carriage road across the rude mountain track from Trebizond to Erzeroum.

Previously to our commerce convention of 1838, with Turkey, the regular duties thereon imports and exports were three per cent. But British goods were subjected to a variety of vexatious impositions, based on their subsequent circulation in the country; its productions even were subjected to variable internal duties, arbitrary prohibitions and monopolies, all which were by the treaty abolished. It established free trade in all native products without exception, on payment of nine per cent. customs on arrival of the goods at the place of shipment, and three per cent. more on their embarkation for exportation. It fixed the customs on imported goods at three per cent. on landing, and two per cent. more on their sale or removal to any other place,—after payment of which, five per cent. In all, the goods may be sold and resold without further duty or impediment. This treaty did an immense deal of good both to British trade in rendering transactions certain and more easy, and to Turkey by giving our merchants right of access to deal with the native producers at first hand.

The productive resources and scope for trade in Turkey will always be limited by its scanty dispersed population; but these are undoubtedly susceptible of far greater development than they have attained. Its rich copper mines, mixed with the more precious metals, extending for hundreds of miles about Tokat, remain unworked, save in a feeble clumsy manner. It has at Hemıcała, and at Kudıv beyond, close to the Asiatic shores of the Black Sea, such veins of excellent coal, the shafts and galleries for working which, opened by British engineers during the Russian war, have been doomed to neglect, and have been flooded with water, and splendid forests of naval and other timber, on the Bithynian Olympus, the hills of Nišapıra, and along the south shore of the Black Sea, are suffered for the most part to waste their treasures.

The experiment is being made of a railroad from Smyrna to Aldın; another more promising is in course of formation from Rasova on the Danube to Kustendıgı on the Black Sea coast. Railway progress in the interior of Turkey will much depend on the success of the first essay. But the necessity is palpable for opening some practicable carriage roads through the country, the want of which condemns the cultivator to accept of a third or one-half the price for his corn at a distance from the coast which it is there worth. The same cause which thus paralyses agriculture cramps also the circulation of imports, and trade of every description. For ages the currency of Turkey has been in a disordered declining state, its piastre, originally equivalent to the Spanish dollar, fell in 1859 to less than 1½d. It has a gold coin, the medjidi, of twenty-two carats, worth about eighteen shillings, first issued at 100 piastres, but from a want of bullion, its value has fluctuated from 170 piastres to 130 in course of five months. There have been various projects, within a few years, of reforming and fixing the currency with the aid of a bank; but up to this date, they have been unsuccessful.

The interest of money on account of its scarcity even in a feeble paper currency, has become enormous in Turkey. Loans at eighteen to twenty-four per cent. for a year are common, and in provincial towns even as high as four to five per cent. is paid by the first merchant for the use of sums for fifteen to twenty days on emergency.

The total number of vessels that entered the port of Constantinople in 1856 was 17,868; tonnage (excluding that of 109 Russian vessels), 3,702,469; the number of those that cleared was 18,406, and the tonnage (with the same exclusion), 3,676,302.

The following were the principal nations to which they belonged:

| Countries | Entered | Cleared | |--------------|---------|---------| | | Ships | Tons | Ships | Tons | | Great Britain| 2504 | 828,753 | 2837 | 864,454 | | Greece | 3447 | 553,819 | 3523 | 517,301 | | Turkey | 6204 | 693,583 | 6204 | 693,583 | | Austria | 1898 | 643,350 | 1933 | 660,221 | | France | 905 | 263,884 | 905 | 263,884 |

In the following year the navigation of the port of Constantinople with the principal nations was as follows: At the port of Salonica, in 1854, there entered all 117 vessels, with a tonnage of 42,905; and there cleared 112, tonnage 41,865. At Smyrna, in 1856, there entered 1772 ships, tonnage 442,953; and cleared 1750, tonnage 493,975. At Rhodes, in 1857, there entered 626, tonnage 158,182; and cleared 627, tonnage 158,407. At Suez, in the same year, there entered 55 steamers, tonnage 71,650; and cleared 56, tonnage 72,850. At Galatia, there entered and cleared 623 vessels, tonnage 99,785. The trade of the various parts of the Ottoman empire with Great Britain, in the year 1858, is exhibited in the following table:

| Countries | Imports | Exports | |--------------------|---------|---------| | Turkey Proper | 4,676,488 | 2,640,806 | | Wallachia and Moldavia | 216,293 | 1,213,316 | | Syria and Palestine | 774,416 | 150,150 | | Egypt | 2,141,675 | 6,023,191 | | Tripoli and Tunis | 11,295 | 5520 | | Total | 7,819,637 | 10,035,783 |

Besides this trade with Great Britain, the Turkish empire has also an extensive commerce with France, Austria, and Russia; and an important commercial intercourse is carried on between its different parts.

(D.S.—D.N.)