Dictation--Signal of war--Civilization--Barbarism--Russian court--
Turkish Civilization--Duties of England--Extent of her empire--
Africa--Asia--India--Australia--English influence--Northern
powers--Free institutions--Turkish aspirations--Commercial views--
Mediterranean trade--Steam-boats--Dardanelles--Nullification--
Government measures--Nesselrode’s answer--Russian magnanimity--
Treaty of 1809--Strait of the Euxine--Russian advantages--Key of
Turkey.
It was comparatively an unimportant prerogative of the Sultan to hold
in his own hands the key of the Dardanelles. We acquiesced in his
exercise of that principle, because he was an old ally of ours, and not
possessed of any formidable power. But the same prerogative usurped
by the Emperor, becomes a privilege of a very different character. We
have not been consulted about the transfer. From weak hands it has been
grasped by those of a giant, with whom we shall, sooner or later, have
to contend for the liberties and the peace of Europe. If we had been
solicited to consent to such an arrangement, we should certainly have
opposed it; if insisted upon, we should have negotiated further only
by ordering our fleet to the Bosphorus. Are we to be constrained into
acquiescence by the force of a treaty concluded behind our back--a
treaty signed by the Sultan under duresse--a surreptitious, and in
every respect an illegal instrument?
♦ DICTATION ♦
Are we to acknowledge the Czar as the sovereign lord of Turkey,
dictating the law of the Dardanelles--the law of nations--to the whole
commercial world? Are we to endure the continuance of those relations
between Russia and the Porte, by the instrumentality of which, under
the mask of a treaty concluded between two powers, one independent of
the other, and upon a footing of equality with it only by diplomatic
fiction, a rule of warfare is enacted in a clandestine form, to be
carried into execution whenever it suits the convenience of the party
with whom it originated? These are questions in which not England only,
but all maritime Europe, the two Americas, and the Indies, are vitally
interested.
♦ SIGNAL OF WAR ♦
The view I have taken of the treaty of Unkiar Skelessi, must be founded
altogether upon mistaken notions as to the authority from which
international laws should emanate, and as to the sanctions by which
they are upheld, if that compact be not such an invasion of the rights
of all other countries as to compel them, in their own defence, to
nullify it by the most direct exercise of all the powers of resistance
within their control. That treaty must be rescinded, or we shall be
but a province of Russia. It is itself a manifest preparation for war.
It is the first trumpet sound of the camp gathering in the North, to
emulate the hordes which, in former ages, pressed upon the barriers
of the Roman empire until they swept them away, bearing down beneath
their hoofs, as they rushed tumultuously onward, every monument of art,
every creation of genius, every fair and beauteous and noble work of
a polished and generous people, that was conducive to convenience or
illumined by accumulated centuries of glory.
♦ CIVILIZATION ♦
Considered as a question of human civilization, I ask any man
conversant with the actual state of the Northern empire itself,
whether, setting apart the fraud perpetrated on the “Giant Mountains,”
and the injustice against all other nations with which that act is
pregnant, there is the most remote probability in the hypothesis
that Turkey would be really and permanently improved by becoming the
handmaid of Russia? We are told, from day to day, by foreign writers,
paid out of the imperial treasury, that the Ottoman sovereignty is
falling to ruin; that the Mussulmen are a voluptuous, indolent,
superstitious, slavish and barbarous race; that they have no schools,
no literature, no science, no architecture, no sculpture, no painting;
and that the time has arrived for expelling them for ever from Europe,
where after all they have been only encamped for a few centuries.
♦ BARBARISM ♦
I could feel the force of this sort of argument if put forth in
favour of England or France, or even of Southern Germany; but in the
mouth of a Russian it is unintelligible. If Turkey be in a state of
dilapidation, is it to be restored by the destroyer of Poland? If
the Turk be voluptuous, will the Oustliougan render him abstemious?
If the Turk be indolent, will the Cossack convert him to habits of
industry? If the Turk be superstitious, will the idolater of Mordua
win him to the paths of religion? If the Turk be slavish, will the
serf of Horodeck, or Kandalox, or Neomerskovolocki, kindle in his
breast the sentiment of freedom? If the Turk be barbarous, will the
forester of Boraevet, or the fisherman of Dwinka, teach him how to
dance? If the Turk have no schools, is he likely to obtain them from
the conqueror who shut up the university of Warsaw? If the Turk have
no literature, will he acquire it from the unrestricted, enlightened
presses of Moscow? If the Turk possess no science, who is there among
the Palatines of Hokia that will initiate him in Algebra? If the Turk
be not sufficiently conversant with the rudiments of architecture,
will the Calmuc create him a Michael Angelo? If the Turk be ignorant
of sculpture, will they who dwell on the Ulka or the Sloutka transform
him into a Phidias? If the Turk be no painter, will the hunters of
Sestanox, or those who drink of the Molascheck, render him the rival of
Titian?
♦ RUSSIAN COURT ♦
If the magnanimous autocrat feel desirous of assisting to civilize
mankind, let his Majesty shew what he can do by beginning at home.
Let him look to the very _élite_ of his own court, the very nobles
by whose presence his palaces are graced, and say whether they are
such as even he would wish them to be? That some few men of great
aptitude for diplomacy, of elegant manners, and general intelligence,
belong to that court, no one who knows any thing of the Lievens, the
Nesselrodes, the Di Borgos, the Pahlens, the Orloffs, will venture to
deny. But these are either foreigners, or the “rari nantes in gurgite
vasto.” What are they amongst fifty millions of boors, over whom the
imperial sceptre waves--men degraded even beneath the lines of ordinary
barbarism, and likely to be kept there for ages still to come, by the
essentially unchangeable principles of the government which holds them
in subjection?
Most of the agents of the Russian cabinet are adventurers from the
civilized nations, who seek to earn fortune, and perhaps fame, in the
service of a treasury, which, though very much straightened in its
resources, can always command enough of gold to establish a system of
corruption in every part of the world, where anti-liberal views are
to be carried into effect. I am willing to acknowledge the fact that
some native subjects of the emperor have displayed great intellectual
powers. One of these gentlemen, however, whom I met at Rome, who had
devoted himself to painting, and was considered as eminently successful
in his art, told me that he had no country but Italy. He had not the
most remote intention, he said, to return to a home where celebrity has
no lustre, genius no protection!
♦ TURKISH CIVILIZATION ♦
Turkey, it must be admitted on all hands, is not in a state of
civilization at this moment--unfortunately very far from it. But there
is no danger in asserting that it is much the superior of Russia
in that and every other respect; and if any such connection as the
relation of sovereign and subject were to be established between
the autocrat and the Ottoman people, it would blight every hope of
improvement, annihilate every chance of future prosperity, which they
now enjoy. To adopt avowed, systematic, and most rigorous measures for
the entire extermination of the Turks, would be a policy infinitely
more humane than any that would bare them to the scourge of the most
brutal soldiery on the face of the earth.
♦ DUTIES OF ENGLAND ♦
Again, putting aside the clandestine attempt at international
legislation by the two Powers, as well as the utter impossibility of
Turkey being civilized by Russian example, can I, as an individual of
the multitudes who compose our own empire, treat with indifference the
question, Who shall rule in the Mediterranean? Who shall shut or open,
when he pleases, the gates of the Dardanelles? Who shall command all
the shores of Marmora and the Euxine; subjugate Persia; penetrate,
in his steam-boats, to the capitals of Europe, by the Danube; to the
mountains of Nubia, by the Nile; and to India by the Euphrates?
Had we only in view the mere human ambition of directing the destinies
of the world, which under the EYE that never sleeps we hold at this
hour in our hands, even that were a noble motive of action, a glorious
impulse to renown. But he must tread to little purpose the earth
on which we are placed, who does not read in letters of light the
ordinance of the GREAT GOD, whereby he has announced it to be his will,
that from this island should be dispensed the knowledge of his law, and
the happiness with which it overflows, amongst all the families of men
still immersed in mental darkness and misery. All our important acts
upon the theatre of the world, our impregnable position on the seas,
which give us access to every tribe under the sun, the power we at this
moment exercise from the point where that sun rises to the point whence
it is to rise again, are the palpable tokens of a divine mission, for
the due execution of which, we, who live in discussion and action, and
our children’s children, shall be held responsible.
♦ EXTENT OF EMPIRE ♦
The Roman empire, when it reached the full extent of dominion which it
was destined to hold, stretched from the Atlantic to the Euphrates,
from Dacia to the tropic of Cancer, occupying a million and a half of
square miles, teeming with every fruit of earth, distinguished by every
shade of beauty, comprising all the tribes of men then fitted to lead
or to follow in the career of civilization. For what purpose was such
an empire constructed? From what actually occurred we are authorized to
say, that all these tribes were assembled under the eagles of Rome, for
the purpose of hearing the new law which was disclosed to them from the
Mount of Olives. That law, after the lapse of eighteen centuries, is
still the guide and the hope of their descendants.
No other empire has arisen since the dissolution of that of Rome worthy
of being compared with it, except that of Great Britain, which not only
exceeds it in territorial vastness, but beyond even its possessions
exercises a moral sway, almost commensurate with the planet of which
the island seat of her government forms so small a part. It was our
mission to convert the forests of North America into nations, to give
them our own language, our religion, and our free institutions. These
duties we have accomplished. It devolved on Spain to perform similar
offices for the southern tracts of that vast continent, so far as
religion and language were concerned; but to us they looked for the
institutions of liberty, and for emancipation from the thraldom in
which Spain had held them; from us accordingly they have received
independence, both at home and abroad.
♦ AFRICA ♦
The whole continent of Africa is waiting to bear further testimony to
our character. We are the only European nation that holds any portion
of that territory, from which light can eventually be shed over the
sable multitudes who occupy its central and northern districts. The
incursions of the barbarians who swarm on our frontiers in the south,
will compel us ultimately to extend those frontiers until they touch
the Nile. Men, actuated by extraordinary impulses, have gone forth from
amongst us at the hazard, and almost uniformly at the forfeiture of
their lives, to explore the rivers and lakes, and mountains and plains,
and to become acquainted with the tribes of those magnificent, though
as yet unhealthy, regions. They have already felt our power in the
south and in the west, and know that it is irresistible. They warred
with each other in order that they might make captives, and sell them
to less populous climes. We have already put an end to that unhallowed
trade, have extinguished their motives for perpetual hostilities
amongst themselves, and have attempted to shew them that there are
other kinds of commerce, which can only be fostered by peace, extended
by industry, protected by laws, blessed by religion, and capable of
forming a bond, which shall connect them by the ties of interest and
affection with all their brethren of the human race--a bond never to
be broken. The last shout of our people, speaking the living voice of
our God, was--“Break the chains of the negroes!” _it is done_. The next
will be--“Baptize them!” IT WILL BE DONE.
♦ BRITISH INFLUENCE ♦
Unroll the map of Asia, and behold the duties imposed on us throughout
the whole of that wondrous continent. But a few lustres ago--within
almost my own memory, although that does not extend as yet to forty
years--we had no more territory in Hindostan than we now possess in
China--a few feet of earth with a fort upon it, which we called a
factory. That factory is now an empire, extending from Ceylon to the
Himalayan mountains, from Ava to the Indus. We menace the dense regions
of China on one side, and almost control those of Persia on the other.
We have broken the crowns of the dissolute and sanguinary dynasties
raised up by the Tartar and the Turcoman, the Mogul and the Saracen,
the worshipper of block, and stone, and fire, and fused them all into
one dazzling jewel, which has been set in the diadem of England.
♦ IN ASIA ♦
Beneath our sceptre in that land there are more than a hundred millions
of human beings. They were, like the Africans, perpetually engaged in
wars with each other. We have already accustomed them to peace. The
men whom we have given them from time to time as their rulers have
exhibited matchless talents for empire, and taught them the solid glory
of Justice sitting by the side of Mercy. Laws firmly administered have
secured them property, life, and liberty; they have been lately called
to magisterial and judicial offices, and will soon be summoned to
legislative assemblies. Education has begun to prepare their children
for still nobler fortunes: for the resuscitation of the most brilliant
arts which had their primeval sources in oriental genius and taste;
for the cultivation of the most fertile territory on the globe; for a
commerce which is to enrich all nations; for the substitution of the
one English language in the room of the myriads of defective dialects
by which they are now encumbered; for the substitution of the one
Christian religion in place of the multifarious forms of idolatry by
which they are still degraded; and for the resolution of our empire
into several independent states, destined by peaceful rivalry in
industry, and literature, and science, to restore that Paradise which,
though overspread by the jungle and the marsh, and ravaged by the
elephant through long ages of degeneracy, has never been wholly effaced
from the world of the sun.
♦ INDIA ♦
Thus upon three distant continents of the globe, our exertions and our
influence have been called forth to a wonderful extent, and attended
with a degree of success quite miraculous. But scarcely were our
duties in those regions discharged, or put into a regular train of
performance, than we discovered a new continent in Australia, which
opened a vast field of enterprise for our own population, just at the
moment when the different classes of our community began to press upon
each other with such an overwhelming force of mere physical density, as
to threaten the most alarming consequences. Already great numbers of
our families have transferred themselves to that new world, where the
natural productions, the genial climate, the teeming soil, the abundant
rivers, and the surrounding seas, promise them health, opulence, and
peace. They have taken out freedom in their bosoms, to be brought forth
when the due season shall arrive. In less than a century they will be
independent, and another great nation shall arise, our brethren in
blood, in religion, in language, literature, and liberty--our generous
rivals in all those pursuits which are conducive to the happiness of
mankind.
♦ AUSTRALIA ♦
Whatever may be said to the contrary by persons who are of discontented
minds at home, it is impossible for those who found their knowledge of
the European continent upon actual inspection, not to perceive that the
_moral_ influence of England upon the civilized, as well as some of the
uncivilized nations of that portion of the globe, is very remarkable,
if not predominant. Books of any merit which emanate from our press,
are within a few weeks after reprinted at Paris, Brussels, Leipsic,
and in different parts of Germany, and provided only that they contain
no _politics_ which interfere with the principles of the three powers
who have organized a “High Police” in the North against the march of
English ideas, are translated into every language of Europe. Austria
has already its “Penny Magazine.”
♦ NORTHERN POWERS ♦
No power on earth is at this moment so frail as that which has been
established by the Northern League. Should the whole, or any of its
members have the temerity to go to war, the thrones of Prussia and
Austria will be its first victims; and the minor sovereignties of south
Germany will be compelled to concede to their people the most liberal
constitutions. England holds in her hand the match, not yet lighted, by
which the whole mind of Europe may be kindled into insurrection against
the bristling hosts of the “Holy Alliance,” whose bayonets might as
well fight with the stars, as with that public opinion which shines
and marches above their heads and through their very ranks, bidding
defiance to their impotent artillery.
♦ FREE INSTITUTIONS ♦
Our institutions have given to France, Spain, and Portugal, the models
of those charters which they now enjoy, and although I regret to say,
that constitutional liberty is as yet but in its earliest infancy
in France, and is very defectively comprehended in the Peninsula,
nevertheless the fire of free aspiration is certainly kindled in those
countries, and it will at no distant period fill with its light the
entire concave of their horizon. The Ionian Isles are prospering under
our authority. The Greeks sent a deputation to us to ask for their
ancient liberties, and they have not asked for them in vain from an
educated people, whose finest mental associations are linked by a
galaxy of immortal thoughts with their own.
The failing Mussulman now supplicates assistance at our hands:--no
more noble heart beats in any human breast than in his; he asks for
our civilization, not only as a great benefit to himself, but as a
safeguard against the degrading, anti-civilizing power of Russia--he
asks that his form of manly beauty may not be chained to the barren
earth, that his mind, dark though it be, may not remain for ever
under the eclipse every day becoming more frightful, as that vast
congregation of brute matter, now visible on his confines, threatens
in its course effectually to intercept the radiant and fertilizing
splendour he would otherwise have received from Western Europe. Is he
destined to petition us without success? Most assuredly not. We shall
give much more than he may now expect to receive from our inexhaustible
sources of improvement; we shall give it upon considerations perhaps of
self-interest, which is the most powerful, as it is the most practical
motive of action with a commercial nation: but the blessings he is to
welcome and enjoy will be to him of the same value, as if they had been
administered upon impulses of a more generous character.
♦ TURKISH ASPIRATIONS ♦
What then would be the state of our commerce in the Levant, and indeed
throughout the Mediterranean, if Russia domineered over Turkey and held
the Dardanelles? Our trade with the Russian ports of the Black Sea and
the Baltic is at this moment, I admit, considerable. But it is not in
the power of the Autocrat to terminate or even suspend it by a ukase.
His subjects want our manufactures and our colonial produce, and if
they cannot carry on their accustomed interchange with us under the
protection of law, they will carry it on in despite of the law. Our
commerce with Constantinople is, if I be rightly informed, doubling
every year; while at Smyrna it is steadily increasing, though not in
the same ratio. Thessalonica has lately demanded an English consul.
The inhabitants of the new kingdom of Greece have returned to those
agricultural pursuits, to which they are naturally much devoted, and
the Piræus, whose very name ceased to be remembered, except by the
classic student, in Europe, exhibits the bustle of a crowded and
industrious port. Napoli and Patras have been for some years actively
engaged in intercourse with England. Corfu is crowded with Greek
and English brigs. I reckoned above a hundred ships of all nations,
our own as usual conspicuous, in the harbour of Trieste. Venice is
recovering from her long lethargy. Ancona has some business, and Naples
an important trade with us. Civita Vecchia is by no means abandoned by
English merchantmen. Leghorn and Genoa are literally forested with our
masts.
♦ COMMERCIAL VIEWS ♦
Hardly a week passes that our merchant flags are not seen entering or
leaving Palermo. We visit Candia, and sweep the whole of the Syrian and
Barbary coasts; every new year trebles our engagements at Alexandria.
Marseilles, Toulon, Barcelona, Valencia, and Malaga, have for centuries
been accustomed to our merchandize.
♦ MEDITERRANEAN TRADE ♦
Before ten years elapse, the Mediterranean will be traversed in all
directions by steam-boats, and in no sea are they so much required on
account of the variable and often perplexing winds, and still more
provoking calms, by which it has been in all ages characterized. The
result must necessarily be, that that vast lake will become the centre
for commercial operations emanating from Persia through the Euxine,
from Western Asia, Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe, Egypt, and
the finest provinces of Africa--operations which, on account of the
impulse they are to receive from the employment of steam-communication,
will be multiplied to an extent of which it is impossible for us now to
conceive even an estimate.
If this system of active commerce demand the presence in the
Mediterranean of myriads of our merchant vessels, and if it be
admitted, as I apprehend it must be, that the Power who possesses the
Dardanelles under his control might rush out from his strong-hold,
whenever it should suit his convenience, capture great numbers of
those vessels, and run back again behind his gates with perfect
impunity; that would be a state of things not very consonant to the
well-understood interests or dignity of the British empire. The
Dardanelles must not become another Algiers.
♦ GOVERNMENT MEASURES ♦
The question, therefore, at which the discussion has now arrived is
this: By what process are we to rescind the treaty of Unkiar Skelessi,
to rescue Turkey from the power of Russia, and to constitute the
Ottoman empire an impregnable barrier against the further encroachment
of the northern hordes in that direction?
It is necessary here to observe, that as soon as our government
received authentic information as to the conclusion of the secret
treaty, they instructed Lord Ponsonby to remonstrate against it at
the Porte in the strongest terms. Lord Palmerston also addressed a
note to Count Nesselrode, intimating that the British Government
disapproved of that transaction, and would act as if it had never taken
place. A similar note was addressed to the same quarter by the French
minister for foreign affairs. Count Nesselrode’s answer to both these
communications was epigrammatic--Russia would act as if those notes
had never been written. Such an answer as this was not calculated to
soothe the irritation which the clandestine alliance had excited; and
the next step on our part was, to demand explanations as to the object
of the treaty, from the parties in whose names it had been executed.
The reply of the Porte was an evasive commentary on its own copy of
the treaty, which it attempted to interpret in a way to lead to a
conclusion that the instrument was in effect so much waste paper. Such
an interpretation as this naturally suggested the further inquiry,
“if your construction be right, then why did such a transaction take
place at all?”
“To please Russia, in whose power we were--to get away her fleets and
troops, as they were no longer required,” was the Reis Effendi’s reply,
given less in words than by a shrug of the shoulder, which was much
more sincere than any language could have been on his part under the
circumstances.
♦ NESSELRODE’S ANSWER ♦
The explanations of Count Nesselrode were administered in a more
diplomatic form, and even assumed the character of an argument. “You
are perfectly aware,” said he, “that it is an ancient regulation of
the Ottoman empire to prohibit ships of war from entering the straits
of the Dardanelles and the Black Sea in time of peace, and that all
the powers have acquiesced in considering that the Porte had a right
to make that regulation, inasmuch as the territory on either side of
those straits was her own. We have done no more in the treaty of Unkiar
Skelessi than acknowledge the justness of that regulation--it acts
against ourselves as well as against you--our ships are shut out as
well as yours--of what then have you to complain?”
♦ RUSSIAN MAGNANIMITY ♦
Such was the substance of an argument clothed in a vast mass of
eloquent phraseology, in which the magnanimity of the emperor in
quitting the Bosphorus at a moment when, if he were really actuated
by views of aggrandizement, he might have realised them without
the slightest difficulty, was put forth and extolled as the best
interpretation that could be given of the treaty, and indeed the only
interpretation worthy of his imperial dignity. Notwithstanding all
these subtle and pompous declamations, the discussion, I believe, is
still going on, but in what direction it tends at this moment I am
unable to say.[3]
[3] Lord Durham’s appointment to the Russian embassy, which has met
with universal approbation, will probably solve the leading
difficulties of this question.
♦ TREATY OF 1809 ♦
The reader, however, who will look carefully through the whole of
the treaty in question, and especially at the secret article, cannot
I apprehend materially differ from the view which I have taken of
that instrument. But in order that he shall have the point in dispute
placed before him in a still clearer light, I shall here transcribe the
eleventh article of the treaty of peace, concluded between Great
Britain and the Porte on the 5th of January 1809.
“As ships of war have at all times been prohibited from entering the
canal of Constantinople, viz. in the straits of the Dardanelles and of
the Black Sea, and as this ancient regulation of the Ottoman empire _is
in future to be observed by every Power_ in time of peace, the Court of
Great Britain promises on its part to conform to this principle.”
It will be observed that this article speaks of two straits--those not
only of the Dardanelles, but also of the Black Sea--and that the secret
article of Unkiar Skelessi limits itself to the Dardanelles. So far,
therefore, there is a most material difference between the two articles.
Suppose Russia to be at war with England, and both the Powers to be at
peace with Turkey, then the Dardanelles and Bosphorus would be shut
against both by one article, but the Dardanelles alone against Russia
by the article of Unkiar Skelessi. By this arrangement she obtains a
wider range than the Euxine for her ships--would be enabled to provision
them at Constantinople, to enter the Sea of Marmora, and convert the
Dardanelles into an outpost for the protection of her establishments in
the Euxine.
♦ RUSSIAN ADVANTAGES ♦
But this is a superficial view of the article, which must be taken in
connection with the whole treaty. Under that treaty, it is impossible
for Russia to be at war with England without Turkey becoming a party
to it on the side of the emperor. The stipulations entitle him,
whenever he thinks fit, to demand _secours matériels_ from the Porte,
not, however, for the purpose of obtaining _secours matériels_, but
something else, which it is already agreed shall be given in lieu of
them; and that “something else” is the closing of the Dardanelles, and
the prohibition to all foreign ships of war to enter them, “under any
pretext whatever.” Assuming for the sake of the argument that the word
“foreign” here is applicable to Russia as well as to England, even
still the advantage is all on the side of Russia, and to the prejudice
of England. The Russian ships would have no desire whatever to come out
and encounter ours in the Archipelago or the Mediterranean; but our
ships would have every possible motive, and, I fancy, no little desire
to go in, to attack the Russians in their own seas, and to destroy
their arsenals and naval establishments at Sebastopol.
♦ KEY OF TURKEY ♦
The whole of the remonstrances, however, which we are fairly entitled
to make against the transaction of Unkiar Skelessi resolve themselves
into this: that, by its effect, the Porte has ceased to be the
mistress of the Dardanelles--that they are liable to be closed at the
requisition, which means the command, of Russia; and that Russia,
therefore, and no longer Turkey, keeps in her hand the key of those
gates. Need I repeat, that that key is the token of something more
than the gold ornament we see dangling at the back of an imperial
chamberlain: that it is, in fact, the sceptre of the Ottoman dominions!