As the result of Nazim Bey’s alarming report, another Commission of inquiry was sent from Constantinople to Salonica. It was under the presidency of Ismail Mahir Pasha, General of Division and A.D.C. to the Sultan—who, it having been discovered by the Committee that he was the leader of a reactionary plot, was shot dead in the streets of Stamboul by an officer in December last—and it contained, among other notable men, Youssouf Pasha, Rejet Pasha, and Sadik Pasha. The ostensible object of the Commission was to inspect arsenals and military stores; but this the Commissioners never attempted to do. They took up their abode in the principal hotel in Salonica. A friend of mine, now editor of one of Turkey’s principal papers, who was told off by the Committee to live in the hotel and keep the Commissioners under observation, found that they rarely ventured out of doors, but sent for and proceeded to examine closely all manner of men.
The contre espionage conducted against them by the Committee to a large extent baffled their designs; even the people employed by the Commission to gather incriminating information were as often as not initiates of the secret Society. But though the Commission could not get at the heart of the conspiracy it displayed great activity, and the denunciations to the Palace were numerous; for, as with the other spy commissions, proofs of complicity in the plot were not necessary to condemnation, and to be known as an honest and patriotic Ottoman subject was sufficient ground for accusation. The Commission also had its branches in the interior of Macedonia. In Monastir, Persepe, and other garrison towns certain officers became its agents; but most of these were discovered by the Committee and had to flee, and some, including Sami Bey, Commissioner of Police in Monastir, were destroyed by the executioners of the Committee.
So thoroughly had all the machinery of official authority been destroyed in Macedonia that it was difficult for the Commissioners to secure the arrests of those who had been denounced, therefore treacherous methods were now employed to get the ring-leaders within the clutches of the Palace. The Sultan believed that every man had his price, and on previous occasions he had found bribery succeed where terrorism failed. The most flattering letters were sent to Enver Bey and other young staff-officers who had been forwarding the revolutionary cause in the interior of Macedonia with such marked success; they were invited to the Palace and were promised not only forgiveness but large pecuniary rewards and promotion to general rank. Many a good man from the time of Midhat Pasha had been tempted by the Palace to come out from some secure sanctuary to his destruction by such wiles as these. So Enver Bey and his comrades ignored this invitation, but at the same time, realising the danger of non-compliance, they fled to the mountains, organised bands, and as open insurgents precipitated the doom of the Despotism. At the same time other methods of conciliation were attempted by the Palace. A large sum of hastily borrowed money was sent to Salonica to discharge the arrears of pay due to the troops, and the authorities in Constantinople refrained from doing any injury to the thirty-eight young officers of the Macedonian army who had been imprisoned at the Ministry of War. To anticipate a little, these officers were pardoned and released on July 21 as the result of the Committee’s threat to kill all the general officers in Macedonia unless this was done.
Ismail Pasha and his fellow-Commissioners returned to Constantinople, their efforts having had the effect of spreading the growth which they had been sent to root up. The Palace, which throughout this crisis exemplified the truth that whom the gods wish to destroy they first make demented, for it took every precaution too late and displayed a vacillation that ruined what chances it had, now decided to do what, if it had been done some months earlier, might have crushed the Young Turk movement and left Abdul Hamid the undisputed master of the Ottoman Empire. It was decided to despatch a large army from Asia to overpower the mutinous troops in Europe, and orders were given that no less than forty-eight battalions of Anatolian troops should be landed forthwith at Salonica. But before describing the failure of this last move on the part of the Despotism it will be necessary to go back a little to give an account of what had been happening in the interior of Macedonia since Niazi Bey had raised the standard of revolt at Resna on July 3, and of how everything was there being made ready for the general insurrection.
THE situation in Macedonia in July, 1908, when Niazi Bey took to the mountains, may be summed up thus: The Bulgarian, Greek, Servian, Wallach, and Albanian bands were murdering, robbing, outraging each other’s kin all over the country; the Committee of Union and Progress, having established its branches in Monastir, Ochrida, Resna, Persepe, and other places, was engaged in steadily spreading its propaganda through all the countryside, a large proportion of the young officers of the Macedonian army being initiates or sympathisers with the cause; and, lastly, the Palace had taken its precautions, and there was not a town or regiment without its secret Government agents ferreting out the secrets of the conspiracy and denouncing the suspects.
Niazi Bey, the young officer who was the first to raise the standard of revolt, was a good example of the men who were forthcoming in numbers at this period of Turkey’s great danger, men who proved to the world the stubborn virtues of the old Ottoman stock, intensely patriotic, brooding over the sorrows of their country, seeking a plan for her deliverance, and, that plan once found, devoting themselves, with the passionate zeal of men obsessed by a fixed idea, to the carrying out of their high aim. They were not self-seeking; if they cherished ambition, it was for the martyr’s death; they were prepared to sacrifice their careers, their wives and families, and their property for the cause, and, as we shall see, when Niazi set out with his little band of followers on that wonderful forlorn hope of his, each took an oath not to return to his wife and family until Turkey was freed; before going they bade last farewells to those they loved; for them it was to be victory or death. With a Mussulman Turk, love of country is a part of his religion, and his single-minded devotion has the strength of fanaticism. When in an oppressed country there is a sufficiency of men of this stamp, the days of the tyranny are numbered.
This spirit breathes through the published letters and diary of Niazi Bey, wherein, telling us a good deal in very frank fashion about his thoughts, aspirations, and emotions, he provides us with a most interesting human document. That he thus writes so freely and often with poetical diction concerning his sentiments will surprise Englishmen, who have always heard that reserve is one of the characteristics of the Turk. The Turk is reserved in his relations with the Western European, who so little understands him. But the Turk, as all his literature proves, is sentimental and emotional with the sentiment and emotion that are the sources of strength and not of weakness. The Turk reveals his heart to his friend with a truthful simplicity that would seem lack of proper reticence to Englishmen, many of whom appear to be ashamed to let it be supposed that they have any affection for their wives or parents; but we ourselves, as the memoirs of the time show, did not take so much care to hide our emotions when Nelson was gaining victories on the seas. So Niazi, having no false shame, makes no secret of his brave deeds, his musings, and his affections, and one likes him the better for it. But Niazi, though devoted to high ideals, was no dreamer or unpractical and rash revolutionary. Like most of his countrymen he was endowed with plenty of cool common sense, and displayed the shrewdness and cunning of the Homeric Odysseus in the carrying through of his audacious adventure.
Niazi Bey is himself an Albanian, his family belonging to the Mussulman land-owning class. He was born in Resna, a little town between Monastir and Ochrida, in a region where fertile valleys studded with orchards and cornfields, grassy downs, forest-clad mountains, craggy Balkan peaks and gorges, and broad lakes combine to make as beautiful a scenery as can be found in Europe. Niazi had known this countryside from his childhood, and he had friends in all the villages, so when it was decided to make this the scene of the first outbreak of the insurrection it was recognised that he was the right man to come forward as leader. Niazi entered the army as a very young man and greatly distinguished himself in the Greek war. Then he was sent to his own country, and for the five years preceding the revolution he was employed with his battalion of chasseurs in pursuing the various brigand bands in the mountains. Again he gained distinction, temporarily crushed the power of the Bulgarian insurrectionary Committee in the Resna district, and became very popular with the Moslem section of the population, whose property and lives he zealously set himself to protect. The Committee of Union and Progress, exercising its powerful underground influence, obtained for him promotion to the rank of Major and his appointment to head-quarters at Resna, the place in which he could serve the cause best. For Niazi had been initiated into the secret Society by his brother officer, the now famous Enver Bey, and throughout his operations against the bands was acting as the instrument of the Committee rather than that of the despotic Government.
The story of Niazi’s work at this time throws an interesting light on the condition of Macedonia. When he was moved to Resna, Bulgarian and Albanian bands, acting in conjunction, were terrorising that district. It was his duty to seize the leaders of the non-Moslem bands and to scatter the bands themselves. He was successful in doing this, though his methods were not cruel or vindictive; for, as he tells us, he was sorry to be hunting down these men who, after all, were fighting against a despotism which was as detestable to himself as it was to them. So he used to call together the Christian notables, who had known him from his childhood and trusted him, and point out to them that their separatist dreams could never be realised, that it was better for them to repudiate those bringers of bloodshed, the agitators in Athens, Sophia, and Belgrade, and join in union and brotherhood with their Moslem fellow-countrymen, whose grievances against the Government were as heavy as their own. His words, recognised as sincere, produced a good effect.
At Niazi’s advice some Moslem inhabitants of the district formed themselves into a band which was under the direction of the Committee of Union and Progress. This band used to go about the country, protecting the villagers without any distinction of race or creed. Thus at one time it would be defending a village of Bulgarians against the attack of a Serb band, and at another time a Serb village against a Bulgarian band. This band was well disciplined, committed no excesses of any kind, and did not even requisition the necessaries of life in the villages; conduct so extraordinarily Quixotic for a Macedonian band that it gained for the Committee the good opinion of the Albanians, who began to come in numbers to Ochrida and Monastir to take the oath of allegiance to the revolutionary leaders.
But so fast as the labours of Niazi and the Committee helped on the pacification of the country, so fast did the evil policy of the Government, alternating between encouragement of lawlessness and cruel repression, undo all the good that had been effected. The corrupt tribunals could be bought. Thus, after the troops under Niazi had brought in some hundreds of people who had been found in the possession of bombs and arms, their trial resulted in the condemnation of twenty poor peasants and the acquittal of all the really dangerous rebels who happened to be rich townsmen, a miscarriage of justice which held Niazi and his brother officers up to ridicule and of course encouraged the Christian bands to redouble their mischievous activity. On the other hand, the Government sent to Persepe, to put down the insurgents, an officer of passionate temper who did not know the customs or languages of the people, and was unable to gain their confidence. He tortured and beat the peasantry and behaved with such inhumanity that the foreign Powers made representations to the Porte on the subject. Thus dictated to, the Government arrested and sent away this officer, again with the result that the Bulgarian bands were encouraged in their brigandage, as was always the case when foreign intervention humiliated Turkey. At this time, too, the Committee found an enemy in the Russian Consul for this district. He exerted his influence to procure the withdrawal of Niazi Bey from the scene of his successful labours. So Niazi was summoned to Salonica and was rebuked by the General in command, but he was not impeached and, fortunately for his country, he was allowed to return to his post at Resna. The Government of Russia was then arranging with that of England its joint intervention in Macedonia, and any improvement in the state of affairs of that region that might render such intervention unnecessary would no doubt have been regarded as a calamity by Russian statesmen.
At about this time Kermanle Metre, once a leader of a rebel band, who had been pardoned and had since done signal service as a Government officer, was tried and condemned to death unjustly, as the result of Russian intrigue. This cowardly betrayal of a valued servant by the Government aroused profound indignation throughout the Macedonian army, and was one of the most important of the factors that combined to effect the moral union between, not only the army, but also the Moslem civil population, with the Committee of Union and Progress; for the incident was a proof to the Mussulmans that the Government was an immoral one, “acting in defiance of the Sacred Law, the Moslem Religion, and Ottoman ideals.” Niazi Bey himself received orders to take Kermanle Metre to Monastir and he determined to save his prisoner’s life at the risk of his own. So, after arresting him, he connived at his flight, and the agents of the Committee restored the man to his home. This escape of their compatriot from the gallows with the assistance of the Committee of Union and Progress produced a great effect upon the Bulgarian peasants in the district, who said to themselves that a power that administered justice had at last risen in the land; and from this time the Bulgarian revolutionaries used to listen with an increasing respect and sympathy to Niazi when he argued that Mussulmans and Christians, being all brothers of one fatherland, should work in union to obtain a Government that would assure justice and equality for all.
While Bulgarians, Greeks, and Serbs in Macedonia by noise and violence had been urging their racial claims in anticipation of the break-up of the Turkish Empire, the Moslem Turks under the direction of the Committee of Union and Progress had been steadily and patiently working for the liberation of their country, employing methods so secret that the outer world knew nothing of the movement and was deceived into thinking that the Mussulman backbone of the population was regarding the progress of events with indifference. The European Powers had ignored the memorandum in which the Committee had protested against the intervention of England and Russia in Macedonia, and patriots recognised that the time had arrived to come out in the open and strike the blow for freedom before that intervention and the increasing activity of the Palace spies had made it too late to act with any chance of success. Towards the end of June it was realised that it needed but a spark to start a general rising, and it was decided that certain young officers, who were members of the Committee, should abandon the Government service, form bands in various places, take to the mountains and organise the insurrection of the united Mussulman and Christian populations.
Niazi Bey apparently was the first to conceive this idea. He had become the zealot whose mind is occupied by but one thought; he tells us that he did not sleep for three nights after learning the result of the Reval meeting. He formed his plan. The population of the Resna district was largely Moslem, and in both town and country the organisation of the Committee of Union and Progress was practically complete. In that mountainous and wooded region a Moslem band, helped by a sympathetic peasantry, could, if necessary, hold the Government troops for months and years. So he broached the matter to his friend Jemal Bey, president of the municipality of Resna; Tahir Effendi, the Police Commissioner; and other of the brethren; and it was arranged to hold a secret meeting of the adherents of the Committee in the house of one Haji Agha, on the evening of June 28.
About fifty men were present at this meeting. The following is a summary of the report of the proceedings as published by the Committee. Niazi Bey, after the usual salutations, thus addressed the brethren: “Fellow-countrymen and comrades. You have sworn by the Unity of God to obey the commands of the Committee, and to save the country, which is being destroyed by traitors, by working together in concord and giving your lives and property freely. Is it not so?” All cried, “Evet! evet!” (Yes! yes!). “The time has come,” continued Niazi, “to redeem that sacred vow. The country now needs our devotion. Our vile Government is regarding with indifference the compact which has been agreed upon at Reval between the Tsar of Russia and the King of England, which aims at the division of our fatherland and the delivery of it into the hands of our enemies. The cruel scheming of Europe can only be frustrated by the blood of the nation. It is the decision of the Committee that we should rise as a nation against the vile Turkish Government which is bowing its head before this humiliating compact. It was at Resna that the Bulgarians first revolted, and brought this calamity upon us. So, therefore, at Resna shall our first standard of revolt be raised—a general revolt, without distinction of creed or race, against the despotic Government. I have prepared everything. I can provide all that is needed to equip a band of two hundred men—money, arms, ammunition, cartridge-belts, sandals. I only need enthusiastic and devoted men; but I want in them a devotion that will sacrifice family, the comforts and sweets of life, all worldly relations, and the love of the world, for the salvation of the country. If the salvation of the fatherland cannot be gained, then those who follow me must look upon death with affection as the greatest boon. I ask your forgiveness for reminding you of what high-minded self-sacrifice is demanded of those who will advance in the van of the forces of liberty; for, knowing you as I do, I do not imagine that there is one among you who will shirk his duty. I will explain to you our purpose. You know that the intervention of Europe in our internal affairs was brought about by the complaints of the Christians, who suffered less than did we Moslems under the Despotism, and that the Government has opened a road for this intervention by its despicableness and cowardice, making Turkey a by-word among the nations for all that is bad. Now, in this revolution we have to make manifest to the world in a practical fashion that we love the Christians, as being our brethren under the same fatherland, that we hold them equal to ourselves, that we recognise the security of their honour as our honour, of their lives as our lives, of their property as our property. This revolt is not against individuals, but against the system of government, which has not only stirred up strife between the different creeds and races, but has also made us Moslems the enemies of each other. This is a revolt in the name of liberty, equality, and brotherhood. To bring justice to the people we will traverse the mountains until we have sacrificed our lives. I am sending to Monastir my wife (Niazi had been married but nine months and was very attached to his wife), and my sister with her fatherless children, for they have none but me to take care of them; and there my relatives wall protect them. I will bid an everlasting farewell to these dear ones, and I will shut up my house. Are there any among you who will follow me heart and soul?”
Then all those present with one voice replied: “We look to dying with you in honour and felicity. We are all ready.” The following Friday was fixed upon as the date of the rising of the people of Resna, and it was agreed that on that day, at the hour of morning prayer, the band of two hundred patriots should assemble near the barracks. Jemal Effendi was sent to Monastir to apprise the central Committee in that town of Niazi’s plan and to obtain permission to carry it out. Then the brethren, having embraced one another, with tears of joy and pride in their eyes, broke up the meeting, departing in twos and threes so as not to attract the notice of the spies.
Within two days Jemal returned from Monastir with the required permission from the central Committee, and Niazi made all preparations for the fateful Friday. As he was thus engaged, an incident occurred which, in his opinion, to no small extent favoured the fortunes of his adventure. There came to appeal to him, with lamentations and tears, the sister of the famous Bulgarian revolutionary leader, Christe. A Servian band, which had recently killed a member of her family, had now carried off into the mountains the child of this poor woman, and demanded impossible ransom. Niazi swore to the woman that he would rescue the child for her, and he decided to take into the mountains with him the Servian schoolmaster of Resna as a hostage. Niazi’s success in recovering the child shortly afterwards went a long way towards gaining the confidence of the Bulgarians and convincing them of the good intentions of those who served the Committee of Union and Progress.
The night that preceded the going forth of the band was spent by Niazi in writing various manifestos and letters, which it was his purpose to send out when he was clear of the town and out of the power of the agents of the Government. In a manifesto which he addressed to the Chief Secretary of the Imperial Palace; to Hilmi Pasha, the Inspector-General at Salonica (the present Grand Vizier); and to the Vali of Monastir, he explained that the Committee of Union and Progress represented the whole nation and was very powerful; that its aim was to obtain a just form of government, like that in civilised countries, and to preserve the integrity of the Empire. He stated that, in view of the number of spies who had been sent by the Government to Salonica to destroy those who were silently working for their country’s good, the Committee had taken measures to protect the patriots; that on that day two hundred fedais (devoted ones), armed with Mauser rifles, under three officers, were marching from Resna; that elsewhere other bands were being formed, representing all the elements of the population, and that these bands would inflict punishment on the traitorous spies who disgraced the army to which they belonged. The Committee demanded that the spying Pashas and their assistants should be at once sent back to Constantinople by special train. It also demanded that the Fundamental Law (the Constitution) should be restored immediately and that the Chamber of Deputies should assemble as soon as it was possible. If the Government refused to grant these requests, then the nation would obtain by force what it required, and the responsibility for the bloodshed would rest with the high dignitaries of the State.
Then he wrote letters to the commander of the regiment of gendarmes at Monastir, to the lieutenant of gendarmerie at Resna, and to certain other officers who had sold themselves to the Palace, and solemnly warned them, in the name of the two hundred fedais of the Committee of Union and Progress, that if they continued to disgrace their military uniform by acting as spies over their comrades, and by showing themselves the sycophants of the Government and the foreign officers, thereby betraying their fatherland which was agonising “like a sorely wounded lion;” and that if they did not at once reform their conduct and cease to be the active enemies of the National Union, death would be the punishment awarded to them by the Committee. Men had already discovered that the Committee never uttered idle threats, and the recipient of one of these letters was so terrified that he became insane.
The momentous day (July 3, 1908) dawned, and Niazi Bey was up betimes to complete his preparations. For his band to march out of Resna while the officers, who were not adherents of the cause, and the considerable garrison remained in it was, of course, out of the question, so he employed a ruse to empty the town of those who might oppose him. By pre-arrangement some members of the Committee came into Resna and reported that a Bulgarian band was moving up the road near Ismilova, that is, in a direction contrary to the one in which he intended to lead his own followers; and some rifles were fired in the hills to support the story. Thanks to this scheme, all the available troops were hurried off to attack this imaginary band, leaving but a few officers and men to guard the barracks, which are situated on a height overlooking the town and about a mile and a half distant from it.
Niazi then walked to the barracks in his uniform, while the members of his band in twos and threes collected in the neighbourhood. He passed through the gates of the barracks just after the Moslem officials and inhabitants of Resna had entered the mosques for the Friday midday prayer; he made the appointed signal with his sword, and his fedais, to the number of one hundred and fifty, poured into the barracks, arousing no suspicion among the soldiers on guard, who were led to understand that Major Niazi Bey was arming a party of Moslem civilians with the object of proceeding to the scene of action to co-operate with the troops.
Following Niazi Bey’s instructions, the fedais broke open the rifle and ammunition cases and armed themselves, many of the men taking two rifles each, so that those who joined the band later on might be provided with weapons. Niazi also opened the military chest and took all the money that was in it, amounting to about £500, making out a receipt for it in which he explained for what purpose he was about to use it. Then the band, in perfect order and full of enthusiasm, marched out of the barracks, and with it went nine private soldiers who, being still under the impression that Niazi was leading a detachment against the Bulgarians, had volunteered their services. After marching for two hours they came to cross-roads on the summit of a grassy down, where Niazi’s band was joined, as had been arranged, by Lieutenant Osman Effendi and his detachment of fedais from Persepe, consisting of a lieutenant, four soldiers, and thirty civilians.
Here a halt was called for rest and food, and before the march was resumed Niazi called the men around him and addressed them, explaining his aims and the strict rules of discipline which the Committee had enjoined him to enforce. He reminded them that they had sworn upon the Unity of God to devote their lives to the salvation of their fatherland. “The nation expects you,” he said, “to set a brilliant example of self-sacrifice and Ottoman chivalry worthy to be imitated. Are you prepared never to see your homes again until the salvation of the country has been secured, and willingly to die for her?” His followers cried out, “Yes, yes; it shall be death or salvation.” Then Niazi proceeded, “There may be some among you who have not the physical strength to live the hard life before us, to support the long marches on foot, thirst, hunger, nakedness, heat, and cold. If there be such I give them full permission to retire; let them go back to their villages and pray for us.” As there was no reply to this, he went on to speak of the very lofty sense of duty and the strict rules of conduct that should govern the fedais, who, having bid farewell to life, were now ready to sacrifice themselves for the fatherland. Their enemies were many, and would certainly slander them; but it behooved them so to act that none could look askance at them with good reason. It was for them to exemplify by the righteousness of their lives what was meant by “the exaltation of the glory of Islam and the Ottomans, through obedience to the Sacred Law of Mohammed which was the basis of the Constitution.” The Constitution was to bring equality and justice to all Ottomans without distinction of race and religion. They, as the apostles of the Constitution, must exemplify this equality and justice. It behooved them, while the band wandered over the country, to regard the honour of the inhabitants as their own honour, to be kindly in their dealings with them, to be guilty of no act of oppression, to thieve nothing, though urged by the pangs of hunger, and above all things to respect all the women of the country and to observe chastity. He explained that he would punish, without exception, any of his followers who in the above respects was a wrong-doer even in the slightest degree, and that the one penalty that he would inflict would be that of death; for the safety of the fatherland necessitated this severity. He told them that he had taken measures to provide for their immediate needs. He would give each man three Turkish pounds for the support of his family and two silver medjidiehs for his tobacco, and he undertook to procure food and clothes for them. “These are the stringent conditions of service,” he concluded. “Do you approve of them? If so, swear by the Unity of God that you accept them from your heart and soul.”
In reply the fedais raised an enthusiastic cry of “Wallahi, billahi” (in the name of God, yes!).
Of the nine private soldiers who had marched from Resna under the belief that they were being led against the Bulgarians, four now asked permission to return. Niazi took their arms and sent them back to the officer commanding the battalion of chasseurs at Resna, with a letter in which he explained that the men were in no wise to blame, as they had been deceived by himself. Of the civilians who had joined the band only one displayed timidity at this last moment, so Niazi allowed him to return to his home and entrusted the man with the letters and manifestos which he, Niazi, had written during the previous night, instructing him to deliver them to the mudir of the district; and to the mudir he sent a separate letter, ordering him, with threats, to forward these documents to the various people to whom they were addressed.
Then the bugle sounded and the little band of zealots marched on again through the beautiful Balkan countryside, in the glorious summer weather, to their unknown destiny—a band of sworn ascetics who harmed no men save the agents of the Despotism who stood in their way, and these they slew without pity; to all others they were as brothers, protecting the weak and oppressed of whatsoever race or creed, preaching the gospel of justice and equality.
The bands of the racial propaganda that had hitherto passed through the Balkans had terrorised the population with murder, robbery, and the violation of women, whereas this band gained the confidence of all and was welcomed in the villages. This was indeed as a company of knights-errant, but these were no visionaries tilting at wind-mills; the aim of the fedais was the overthrow of the reign of tyranny and corruption; Niazi’s bands and the other bands of the Committee of Union and Progress which followed its example actually succeeded, as we shall see, not only in winning over the entire Moslem population of this region to the cause, but in uniting the various races that had been cutting each other’s throats for years, so that the whole strength of the Macedonian peoples was brought together to oppose the Despotism.
WITHIN a few hours of the departure of Niazi Bey and his band from Resna, the officials of the Yildiz had been informed by telegraph of the outbreak of the insurrection. After a consultation of the Sultan’s advisers a telegram was sent to General Shemshi Pasha, then in command at Mitrovitza in the northern Vilayet—who was, as I have explained in a former chapter, a trusted officer, than whom none had greater experience in crushing revolt in Macedonia and Albania—recounting to him what had occurred, and ordering him with the least possible delay to move the necessary troops from Mitrovitza to Monastir, and to raise volunteers from among the people, “so as to surround and seize the ungrateful traitor, Niazi, together with the officers, officials, private soldiers, and civilians who are his companions.” The General was further informed that his Majesty expected him to prove his fidelity and loyalty by making these wicked men a telling example to other seditious persons, and relied upon him to cleanse that portion of the Empire of this mischief and to prevent its spread by measures of the severest nature.
The ill-fated Shemshi displayed his loyalty and zeal by working night and day to compass the destruction of Niazi and his band of fedais. On July 6 he arrived with two battalions at Monastir by special train; another battalion was closely following, and seven other battalions were marching into the disturbed districts. The usual trickery of which the creatures of the Palace were so fond was also employed to support the operations of the troops. Thus, in order to excite Moslem fanaticism and persuade men to serve as volunteers, it was assiduously rumoured that the Christians were rising to massacre the Mussulmans, a falsehood that produced but little effect; while delegates were sent through the villages to tell the people that the Constitution desired by the Committee of Union and Progress, and advocated by the bands under Niazi and others, was opposed to the religion of Islam, “its doctrines being as vile as that which permits women to go about unveiled.” The Palace also arranged with the local officials that attempts should be made to corrupt the members of Niazi’s band, rank and money being offered to any of these who would kill him.
In the telegrams in which he reported progress to the Palace, Shemshi stated that he was unable to obtain any reliable information concerning the rebels from either the military authorities or the Vali, and that no one could tell him where the Committee of Union and Progress was, or the names of its members. All that his spies had been able to discover was that the heads of the people in those parts were full of seditious ideas and that many men of importance were on the Committee; the movement was evidently spreading, and Staff-Major Enver Bey had abandoned his uniform and gone off to join the seditious Committee. Nevertheless he, Shemshi Pasha, assured his Majesty the Caliph that he would exert himself until he breathed his last breath (words the literal truth of which were soon to be proved) to root up this seditious growth. He, moreover, reported that he had sent messages to the Albanian notables, and that thousands of brave Albanians were prepared, in answer to his call, to pour into the disaffected districts and punish these people who were unfaithful to their religion and traitors to their sovereign. He also announced that two battalions would at once march in the direction of Resna, and that he was confident of his speedy success in stifling the conspiracy.
His confidence was misplaced, for of the Albanian chiefs upon whose help he relied the greater number had become adherents of the Committee of Union and Progress, while all the officers and non-commissioned officers of one of the two battalions which he was sending to surround Niazi had sworn the oath of fidelity to the Committee. But Shemshi had his doubts; for he confessed to the notables of Monastir that the Rumelian troops which he had brought with him were not of much account, and that he was anxiously awaiting the arrival of an entire division of Anatolian troops which the Government was sending to him from Asia Minor. Shemshi’s own brother-in-law, an officer of gendarmerie in Monastir, and a member of the Committee, while unable, of course, to take him into his confidence, attempted to prevent a useless shedding of Moslem blood and to save the General’s own life, by warning him that the troops of Resna and its neighbourhood would refuse to obey his orders if they were called upon to fire on Niazi’s band. In the meanwhile the Committee of Union and Progress had full knowledge of all the plans of the Government; for telegraph clerks and other officials who were secret adherents of the cause were able to betray the communications that passed between the Yildiz and the military authorities in Monastir.
The Committee was actively employed in frustrating the plans of the Government. In order to counteract the influence of the false reports that had been circulated by the agents of the Despotism it placarded the walls of Monastir with manifestos on the night before Shemshi’s arrival. These manifestos explained that the aim of the Committee was to free Turkey from her traitorous Government which had been corrupting the nation for thirty years and was now betraying her to foreigners. It called for the immediate removal of the spies who had been sent recently from Constantinople, and protested against the illegal carrying off of the people denounced by the spies, to the Inquisitions of the Yildiz and the Central Police in the capital.
The Committee also organised numerous bands in various parts of the country so as to confuse the Government, divide its forces, and prevent a concentrated attack on Niazi. It kept up constant communication with Niazi, keeping him well informed of the movements of his enemies. The Committee enjoined him to avoid coming into contact with the troops that had been sent against him, but if this became impossible, to force on a decisive action that would do the Government great damage. As the object of the Committee was to unite all the different elements of the Ottoman population, a civil war, at this juncture, especially if it took the form of a conflict between the Moslem soldiery and the Moslem peasantry, would obviously be a deplorable calamity. But there was to be no sparing of the Government spies; and the Committee gave orders that the Palace agents, who were wandering through the villages gaining information and poisoning the minds of the people against the Constitution, should be put to death.
And now to return to Niazi Bey and his wanderings. After his halt on the afternoon of his departure at the cross-roads, where his band, reinforced by Osman Effendi’s contingent of fedais from Persepe, had attained the strength which he considered to be the most suitable for his purpose, the march was continued to the Moslem village of Labcha, to most of whose inhabitants he and his followers were well known. The fedais entered the village shouting Allahu Akber, “God is very great,” and La ilaha illallah, “there is no God but God!” Then Niazi, through the Elective Council of the village, called in all the peasants who were working in the fields and addressed them. Here the ground had been well prepared. There were none among the inhabitants who did not desire the restoration of the Constitution. They fell upon the necks of Niazi and his men and embraced them, rejoicing to see that these saviours of the country were now openly working for the cause.
Here one of the elders of the village, an ex-sergeant of the army, begged to be allowed to join the band. “Do not deprive me of this happiness,” he said; “for even if we fail, true martyrdom can be gained on this expedition.” But Niazi replied, “My heart wants you with me, but you must stay here, for this village needs your presence. I intend to make Labcha my principal base and our place of refuge, so here you can help the cause more than by following me.” The sergeant therefore remained in Labcha, where his zeal, fidelity, and mother wit were of great service. An incident which occurred in this village some time later throws a curious light on the system of self-government which was introduced by the Committee of Union and Progress into the villages that had accepted the Committee as their virtual ruler. The sister of the above-mentioned sergeant had told her husband, a man of Resna, what she knew concerning the oath which the representatives of the Committee had administered to certain leading inhabitants of Labcha; and this foolish fellow had gone about boasting that he was in possession of the secret, mentioning the names of initiates. The sergeant, on hearing this, summoned the villagers to a meeting at which it was decided that, as a punishment for both these babblers, the man should immediately divorce his wife. The husband and wife came before this irregular tribunal, whose orders had to be obeyed more implicitly than those of the law courts of the State, and on begging for forgiveness obtained the revocation of the sentence that would have separated them. This event led to the creation of a female police or vigilance committee in this and some other villages, whose chief duty it apparently was to check indiscreet gossip concerning the Committee.
As in Labcha and the surrounding villages all the men were strong partisans of the Committee, there was no more work to be done here for Niazi’s band, and therefore, after purchasing provisions and refreshing themselves, the fedais set out again to march through the night.
In the following afternoon they came to the neighbourhood of the Albanian town of Ochrida, where there were many Palace spies and a considerable garrison, so that it was not possible for the band to enter it; but there was also here an important branch of the Committee of Union and Progress, and a large proportion of the inhabitants were at heart adherents of the cause. So Niazi, leaving his band encamped in a cherry orchard in the hills, walked into the town under cover of the night. Major Eyoub Effendi and other members of the Committee, who were old friends of his, had a meeting with him at the house of one of the faithful, and welcomed him heartily. They told him that two detachments of troops had left Resna to surround his band. They sent up to his camp leather water bottles and other necessaries of which his men were in want, and gave him great encouragement. Here he took the opportunity of sending a manifesto to the Albanian Committee, as it turned out later, with excellent result, for Niazi, whose birthplace was near the Albanian border, and who was himself of Albanian stock, had many friends among the Albanians, and was much respected by them. He also wrote a letter to his old foe Cherchis, the famous leader of Bulgarian bands. In this letter he explained his aim to Cherchis, and told him that he, Niazi, who had formerly pursued Cherchis’ band with such vigour, now extended to him the hand of friendship, and asked for an interview under any conditions that Cherchis might propose, in order that they might devise a scheme for concerted action against the Government, and he reminded him of the proverb which says, “the sheep who leaves the flock is torn by the wolf.” Niazi’s friends took him back to his camp by back lanes and paths, and the band, leaving this dangerous neighbourhood, made another long night march to the north, its objective being Dibra on the Black Drin, the centre of a district in which Niazi knew that he would find many adherents, and where the forests and rugged mountains afforded safe retreats and easily defensible positions.
And now Niazi’s work of preparing a general insurrection commenced in earnest. The story of his wanderings cannot be fully told here, but I will give some explanation of the methods he employed. It was his intention, in the first place, to carry on his operations in the Moslem villages and afterwards to bring in the other elements of the population. He worked with the greatest energy, often visiting and organising several villages in the same day. It was his custom to send a small advanced party of his followers under an officer to reassure the people, and, this done, he would enter the village with the rest of the band. In all save a very few Moslem villages thus visited the fedais were received with extraordinary enthusiasm, and Niazi’s task of making the inhabitants sworn adherents of the Committee was not difficult. He would call a meeting of the villagers, or, having attended prayers in the mosque with his band, he would there, after the prayers were over, address those present with stirring words, explaining to them the lofty aims of the movement whose soldier he now was. The leading men would be called up one by one to take the oath prescribed by the Committee of Union and Progress, and afterwards the other inhabitants would come up eagerly to be sworn in. Among those who thus became adherents of the Committee were many deserters from the army who had been hiding among their families.
Niazi used to impress it upon these newly made members that, as they were now united as brethren to serve the same high purpose, they must put away all differences among themselves, and forgive each other for wrongs inflicted. The cause demanded that their blood feuds should cease. Throughout this region, and especially in some of the Albanian districts, relentless blood feuds between families and individuals are very frequent, and to be murdered in a vendetta is regarded as the natural ending to a man’s life. But now was beheld the astonishing spectacle of a general reconciliation. Men whose families had been slaughtering each other for generations, embraced publicly, united by devotion to a common cause; and old men who had not dared to go outside their houses for years, because some ancient crime was yet unavenged, once more went forth freely and without fear.
The villagers, in the sincerity of their welcome to Niazi’s fedais, whom they regarded as the saviours of Turkey, often refused to accept payment for the food and other necessaries which they freely and gladly supplied to the band; but Niazi, when he did not pay in cash for these supplies, insisted on giving receipts for their value, and instructed the villagers to show their receipts to the authorities and deduct the amounts from the taxes which they paid to the Government. At the same time he used to send manifestos to the local mudirs and other officials warning them that death would be the penalty for the tax collector who refused to accept these receipts as part payment of taxes.
A village, after its inhabitants had been sworn in, was “organised” according to certain rules laid down by the Committee, and became a well-ordered centre of revolt. In the first place the authority of the Government and its officials was disclaimed, and tyrannical oppression was prevented by the united opposition of a population that had become as a band of brothers. A local form of government on constitutional lines was set up. The sources of the Government revenue were appropriated whenever it was possible to do this, and in some districts the villages refused to pay any taxes to the Government, offering a passive resistance that would have taken an active shape had the tax collectors ventured to push the matter.
For the purpose of mutual protection, relations were established between the various villages of a district; and a certain number of the inhabitants were secretly organised as a sort of militia. Niazi found that from one hundred to two hundred and fifty rifles were concealed in each village of the Dibra and other neighbouring districts, so arms were not wanting. These villages had suffered greatly from the raids of the Bulgarian bands, but from this time the organisation introduced by Niazi enabled them not only to hold their own against the largest bands, but to defy the attempts of the Government to coerce them. This general preparation for defence brought a peace to this region such as it had not known for years, and the Moslems themselves, obeying the orders of the Committee, refrained from any aggressive actions; all the Moslem bands that were in the hills were dissolved, the men who composed them returning to their villages. Niazi made it clear to all adherents of the Committee that it was above all things necessary for the success of the cause that the Moslems should carefully avoid any conflict, whether with Christian bands or Government troops, and that they should act strictly on the defensive until the Committee gave the word for the general insurrection.
Niazi thus succeeded, whithersoever he wandered over the Balkans, in winning over the Mussulman land-owners and peasantry, and many of the Government officials, to the revolutionary cause; and, in the meanwhile, by manifestos and letters he sought to gain the confidence and support of the Bulgarian element in the population. Notwithstanding the never-ceasing warfare between them in Macedonia, the Turks and the brave and manly Bulgarians were more in touch with each other than with any of the other races in the Balkan Peninsula. The Turks had often protected and were soon again to protect the Bulgarian exarchists against the fanatical persecutions of the Greeks. It was, therefore, natural that Niazi should seek the cooperation of the Bulgarians before approaching the other Christian peoples of European Turkey.
There are many Bulgarian villages scattered over the region in which Niazi was at work, and their inhabitants at first regarded with some anxiety the change that had come over the Moslem population, which for several years had appeared listless and devoid of hope, not having the separatist aspirations which buoyed up the spirits of the Christians, but now had suddenly become cheerful and alert, as if looking forward to some great and happy change. Suspicious at first, the Bulgarians at last came to realise that whatever sentiment was stirring the Moslems, it had nothing to do with anti-Christian feeling, and was not antagonistic to themselves.
On July 6 Niazi issued his important manifesto to the Bulgarians. He proclaimed to them that the time had come to strike a blow at the evils that had been destroying the fatherland for years, for the Despotism was ever becoming more intolerable. He put all the blame on the Government; but pointed out that the Christian Ottomans had taken a wrong road, while seeking a better state of things. They had heeded the false advice of the surrounding small states, Bulgaria, Servia, and Greece, which had promised to free Macedonia, but were really working for their own ends, their one aim being to seize the country and enslave its people. “These little Powers have sown hatred and dissension among us, and have deluged the fatherland with blood.” He assured them that “if these little Powers should work on thus for another thirty years they would not attain their purpose. The fatherland is, and ever shall be, ours.” He then went on to explain that the Ottoman Committee of Union and Progress, consisting of army officers, civil officials, townsmen, and peasants, all honourable men, had been formed with the object of establishing a system of government that would give liberty and justice, without distinction of creed or race, to all Ottomans, so that they might live in peace and happiness in their common fatherland. Then he spoke of his band of armed fedais, whose mission it was to propagate these principles in the towns and villages, and to bring about the co-operation of all elements of the population in putting a stop to the internal dissensions and civil warfare that were hastening the Empire to its ruin. He called upon the leaders to dissolve these mischievous bands, to join his own band, and work for Ottoman liberty and justice, instead of for Bulgaria and the other little Powers. Severe punishment would be dealt out to such bands as did not come in, and if any village gave encouragement to the bands after this warning, its head man would be executed. They were all Ottomans, and they must all co-operate to establish the Constitution which gave equality and liberty, and protected each creed and race and language.
This manifesto produced a wonderful effect. The Bulgarian inhabitants knew that Niazi Bey was not speaking idle words, and threatening to do things that he could not carry out. They realised that if it came to civil war the Committee of Union and Progress would have practically the entire Moslem population of Macedonia and Albania on its side. Moreover, they knew enough of Niazi to feel that he was quite sincere in his declarations and promises, and many of them had observed with amazed admiration the just and honourable conduct of his band of fedais. Here was the Turkish officer who, for five years, had been vigorously hunting down the Bulgarian bands, now speaking to them as fellow-countrymen and brethren! Hitherto, they argued, they had paid heavy taxes to a Government that had given no account of how the money was spent, and treated them as dogs; but now a new rule was asserting itself, under which they began to see justice and the prospect of being treated as human beings.
So within a few days of the issue of his manifesto, Niazi received intelligence to the effect that the Bulgarians of Resna, Ochrida, Persepe, and other districts had held meetings at which it had been decided that “it would be an honour to serve with their lives and property this band which had such high aims.” Cherchis himself, too, with his comrades, desired to effect a union with the Committee of Union and Progress.
On July 9 Niazi, thinking that the time was ripe, for the first time brought his band into a purely Bulgarian village. This was the large village of Velijon, containing three hundred and fifty houses. It is situated on a hillside, with a great forest behind it sloping up steeply to the wild and lofty ridges of the Balkan Range, and for its strategic advantages it had been selected as one of the most important supply bases for the Bulgarian bands. As Niazi’s vanguard entered the village the inhabitants took alarm, closed their shops, and shut themselves up within their houses; but after Niazi, coming in with the rest of his band, had summoned the Elective Council, and explained matters, the fears of the villagers disappeared; and friendly relations were soon established by the kindly and courteous officers and Moslem notables who composed the bulk of this remarkable band. The end of it was that the priest, the Elective Council, and all the other inhabitants of the village placed their hands upon the Holy Gospels and took the oath of fidelity to the Committee, undertaking to carry out all its orders and render armed assistance to the cause when called upon to do so. When the band marched out of the village in the cool of the evening the friendly Christians accompanied the fedais for some distance to put them on their way and then bade them God speed. Shortly after this Niazi was enabled to amnesty and arrange for the coming in of the bands that were in the hills round Dibra, which place was made an important centre of the insurrectionary movement.
It was about this time that Niazi received a letter from the Monastir Centre of the Committee which gave him great encouragement. It thanked him and “the heroic self-sacrificing men of Resna” for the splendid work they were doing, and informed Niazi that his friend, Major Enver Bey, the clever staff officer who had performed distinguished service in Macedonia, had thrown up his commission, and at the head of a band of fedais was actively preparing the population in the Tikosh district, while other officers had also organised bands, and taken to the mountains. The fortunes of the cause appeared very bright.
He also learnt from this letter that General Shemshi Pasha had been publicly assassinated in Monastir on July 7. The General, after reporting progress to the Palace, had left the telegraph office and was driving in his carriage to join the two battalions with which it was his intention to surround Niazi’s band, when he was shot dead by an officer in uniform. Fifteen hundred people were surrounding the carriage at the time, but not one attempted to, or had any wish to arrest this executioner of the Committee’s will, who strolled quietly off. The ill-fated Shemshi was an energetic commander, and had he lived there would undoubtedly have been some severe fighting between such troops as would have remained loyal to him and the Committee’s bands. Shemshi would probably have led his troops to disaster, for his boldness and confidence in himself amounted to rashness, and he despised his enemy. Ambushes had been prepared for him on the roads by which he would have had to march; and Niazi, operating in a difficult mountain country, with an armed population skilled in guerilla war to stand by him, was now in a position to hold his own for an indefinite time against any forces that the Government could send against him. There can be little doubt that the death of Shemshi prevented a civil war that would have done much injury to the cause of the Committee, for it would have divided public opinion, the unanimity of which it was of such importance to secure. From the date of Shemshi’s death the impotence of the Government and the disorganisation of the army made it difficult for the Palace to plunge the country into the horrors of internecine conflict.
THE preparations for the general rising now advanced very rapidly. Enver Bey, declining further treacherous offers, which included the promise of his promotion to General rank if he would return to Constantinople, led his band of fedais through the mountains, and won village after village to the revolutionary cause. The story of this young officer’s escape in disguise from Salonica, his adventures in the wilds, and the brave work he did for Turkey, is told throughout his country. He has become the popular hero, and is held in the highest estimation by his comrades; for the complete absence of any jealousy among the young officers who devoted themselves to the liberation of their fatherland is a pleasing feature of this patriotic movement. Niazi writes of Enver as follows: “He who in the time of sorrow and hopelessness encouraged and fortified us with his ardent words and serious ways, Enver Bey, whose like is seldom to be met.” Salah-ed-Din Bey, Hassan Bey, and other officers were also wandering over Macedonia and Albania with their bands, gaining thousands of adherents among the land-owners and the peasantry; and at the same time others were educating the rank and file of the army, with the result that a large proportion of the troops garrisoning this region were ready to fight, even against their own comrades, if called upon to do so.
Niazi Bey had practically won over the bulk of the Moslem inhabitants of Western Albania, a wonderful achievement indeed. For one who knows these fanatical Albanian tribesmen finds it difficult to understand how they could listen with sympathy and patience to the gospel of universal brotherhood, and the extension of equal rights to Christian and Mussulman. But Niazi, with his rough, strong eloquence, his obvious sincerity and single-mindedness, his magnetic personality, and his commanding presence—for, like many Albanians, he is a man of great stature and sturdy build—is evidently a born leader of men; and he was successful not only in gaining over the Albanians, but in holding back these eager warriors until their armed assistance should be called for, and in making them patch up their sanguinary tribal and family blood feuds, some of which had endured for centuries. Moreover, a large proportion of the young officers of the Third Army Corps were of Albanian stock, and of these several were able to influence their countrymen in the Committee’s favour.
Niazi and his band, during their memorable twenty days’ wandering in the hill-country, avoiding the main roads and threading in single file the difficult mountain tracks, ran many dangers and suffered considerable hardships. At times the pursuing Government troops were close at their heels; sometimes, but not often, the fedais came to a village whose inhabitants were hostile. Thus, on one occasion, when hungry, thirsty, and weary they approached a village in order to obtain the bread and cheese and water which seem to have composed their usual diet, the villagers, whose minds had been poisoned against the Committee by an emissary of the Palace, came out armed to the teeth, and dangerously excited, and threatened to fire upon the band. The position was an awkward one, for Niazi not only had the hostile village in front of him, but had in his rear, and not far off, a large detachment of troops under a Bosnian officer, which had been sent to cut him off. So the band, foodless and worn out with fatigue, had to take to the upper slopes of the mountain for safety. Niazi is an obstinate man. He was determined either to convert that village to the cause or to give it a severe lesson. A few days later he talked the villagers over to repentance of their error; they took the oath of allegiance to the Committee, and supplied the band with two days’ rations of bread and cheese, for which they refused to accept payment. Moreover, the Bosnian officer, on receiving the news of Shemshi Pasha’s execution at Monastir, abandoned his pursuit of Niazi and marched with his band to Ochrida to submit to the Committee.
On July 12 Niazi, having been summoned to Ochrida to confer with the Committee, marched boldly into that town with his band, none daring to interfere with him, so much had the authority of the Government been weakened by this time. Here the members of the Committee gave him information concerning the other bands, and instructed him to keep in touch with them, as the time was near when an important combined movement might be made. They told him that the Government had sent General Osman Pasha to Monastir as Commander Extraordinary of the Vilayet, in the place of the assassinated Shemshi Pasha, and that the Bulgarian Executive Committee had issued instructions to all the Bulgarian villages to the effect that the Moslem revolutionary bands should be treated hospitably and with consideration, but that, until further orders, armed assistance must not be given. Niazi was also informed of the shooting, by order of the Committee, of the imam, Mustapha Effendi, and other dangerous agents of the Palace.
The business completed, Niazi’s band marched out of the town, and followed the sandy shores of the great lake of Ochrida, where they were warmly welcomed in the villages of the Bulgarian fishing-folk. The objective of the band was Istarova, but on the way they carried out their mission in the villages, swearing in the people, overthrowing the authority of the Government, establishing elective administrative bodies, and expelling any tax-gatherers or other servants of the Government who had oppressed the people, or were known to be subservient to Palace influence. Threatened at one point by a pursuing detachment of four hundred men, Niazi divided his band into small parties and took up commanding positions on the rocky hills that bordered the main road. But it turned out that the detachment was under the command of Captain Ziya Bey, a young officer whose sympathies were with the revolutionaries. Ziya Bey and some other officers came up to Niazi’s camp, offered to join the band so soon as their services should be needed, and undertook to withdraw the detachment from the neighbourhood. There was another detachment, too, in pursuit of the band at that time, but it had purposely been sent off in a wrong direction.
It was Niazi’s intention to make Istarova, the centre of an important district, his head-quarters for a short while. His band made a triumphal progress through the district. The villagers were all eager to be sworn as adherents of the Committee. In one village Niazi ordered the execution of a particularly iniquitous tax-gatherer (who succeeded in effecting his escape) and the man’s rams were divided among the members of the band, who were thus enabled to enjoy a luxurious meal for a change. Before entering Istarova, Niazi sent a letter to the principal Government official in the place, the kaimakan (or administrator, of the Caza, or district of Istarova), an honourable young man who had exercised his authority with justice, and of whom the peasants in the district had spoken well to Niazi. It was a characteristic letter, in which Niazi, after explaining that all the inhabitants of the district, Moslem and Christian, had sworn to stand by the Committee, told him that though he entertained a great esteem for him as a just ruler of the people, at the same time he, Niazi, regretted that the kaimakan had shown negligence in one important particular; for in that large district there was not a single school. “The calamities of this nation,” he went on, “are mainly due to the ignorance of the people,” and he urged him to do his best to promote education.
On July 16 the band entered Istarova, where the men enjoyed a welcome and much-needed rest—the villagers supplying cigars and coffee to cheer them—and were able to sleep in unwonted security, surrounded by their friends; for in that district of a hundred villages, with a population of 30,000, all men were with the Committee of Union and Progress, while any troops that might have proved troublesome had been removed to a distance by arrangement with friendly officers. As for Niazi, he saw to the swearing in of the people of Istarova, and the election of the administrative body, and then he preached the gospel of the Constitution in the Mosque, and recommended the newly appointed administrative body to build schools, to educate the people, and to repair their mosques, and for this purpose, on behalf of his band, he subscribed the sum of two pounds. The kaimakan himself sought out Niazi in the night, and praised him to his face as a brave man and a bringer of justice to the people, declared his belief in the righteousness of the Committee’s aim, and placed himself under Niazi’s orders. Thus did Niazi influence all the men with whom he came into contact.
Throughout the following day Niazi remained in Istarova, which presented a very animated appearance, for there poured into the village thousands of peasants from all the surrounding countryside, eager to be sworn, together with a number of soldiers who had deserted to join Niazi, and had come in, bringing their rifles with them, from the neighbouring garrisons and posts. There was good reason for Niazi’s exultation in the success of the movement. Resna, Ochrida, Persepe, Dibra, Malisa, and now Istarova had all been brought within the revolutionary union by the efforts of the bands. He now knew that with a word, when the time came, he would be able to summon a large armed force to execute the Committee’s will.
And now to leave the mountains and the bands of brave fedais for a while, to return to the less wholesome atmosphere of the Yildiz Palace, and follow the last vain efforts of the Despotism to crush the life out of the revolutionary movement. The advisers of the Sultan were fully aware of the significance of the reports that came to them from Macedonia, though the newspapers, officially inspired, still spoke lightly of “unimportant manifestations of disaffection in a few garrisons.” There were high Government officials in the European Vilayets who ventured to inform the Palace of the exact state of affairs. Notable among these was the Vali of Monastir, who in the following despatch to the Grand Vizier (dated, I think, July 17) pointed out, as plainly as he dared, that the revolutionary movement was too strong for the Despotism, that further repressive measures must fail, and could only result in useless bloodshed, and that it would be well to submit to the will of the people and grant a Constitution. The last suggestion was, of course, put in an ambiguous way, for at that time no one had the courage to mention the word Constitution to the Sultan. The following is a translation—some repetitions and unimportant details being omitted—of the despatch in question.
“It has been ordered by an Imperial Iradé that Niazi Bey and his companions should be arrested. The existence of the powerful Committee of Union and Progress has been proved by the severity of the measures which it adopts. It stands not alone; for, as has already been intimated in official despatches, the officers of the army are united in a determination to support the demands of the Committee; and the population, likewise, is in league with the Committee. To leave aside the question of the pursuit of Niazi, I beg to state that none will now venture to undertake the duty of making investigations. The members of the commission which was formed under the presidency of Shukri Pasha to institute inquiries (the spy commission) have been obliged to abandon their work in consequence of the secret threats which were conveyed to them. The ulema who were sent by the Government to travel through the country and give advice to the villagers have been warned by the Committee of Union and Progress that they would be killed if they continued to do this, so they have returned. The lives of all officials, my own included, are in peril. It has been shown that the Committee has the power of executing its threats. Here, in Monastir, when General Osman Hidayet Pasha had gathered his officers around him to read to them the telegram which communicated the high Iradé of his Imperial Majesty the Caliph, he was shot by one of the officers, who fired three times at him in the presence of all these people, and yet this officer was not arrested, and it has been found impossible even to ascertain his name. The police and judiciary officials are meditating resignation from their posts in order to save their lives if pressure is brought upon them to make them carry out their duties. As for me, your servant, my ancestry having been faithful for four hundred years, and myself having served the Government in various capacities for the last forty-four years, I consider that for me to resign my post in this hour of trouble would be an act of ingratitude; and therefore, despite the perils to which I and my family are exposed, I am prepared to discharge my duty, that is, to devise means preventing the active co-operation of the people with the officers of the army, whose views and aims they undoubtedly share.
“At the same time I consider it a duty and a proof of my loyalty that I should submit to you in detail the true facts of the situation. I must inform you that the sentiments of which I am speaking are now acquiring a strong hold upon the private soldiers. The six battalions which were sent to Resna now remain there inactive, and their commanders confess their powerlessness. Should any attempt be made to pursue Niazi, the soldiers will refuse to fire upon him and his band. I may mention in proof of this that when General Shemshi Pasha was assassinated here, the men of his Albanian body-guard, the gendarmes, and the other soldiers present, when pursuing the criminal in accordance with the orders given to them, discharged their rifles in the air and allowed the assassin to escape. According to private information which I have received it is believed that the troops who are to be despatched from Anatolia will, on their arrival here, refuse to use their arms against their comrades. What I have stated concerning the condition of this region is applicable also, so I am informed, to the Vilayets of Salonica and Kosovo.