The more bishops, churches, and schools a nationality could show, the
stronger its claim on the reversion of Macedonia when the Turk should
be driven out of Europe! There was no doubt much juggling with
statistics. And though schools and churches were provided by Greeks,
Servians, and Bulgarians to satisfy the spiritual and intellectual
needs of their kinsmen in Macedonia, there was always the ulterior
(which was generally the dominant) object of staking out claims in the
domain soon to drop from the paralyzed hand of the Turk. The bishops
may have been good shepherds of their flocks, but the primary
qualification for the office was, I imagine, the gift of aggressive
political leadership. The Turkish government now favored one
nationality and now another as the interests of the moment seemed {85}
to suggest. With an impish delight in playing off Slav against Greek
and Servian against Bulgarian, its action on applications for
bishoprics was generally taken with a view to embarrassing the rival
Christian nationalities. And it could when necessary keep the
propagandists within severe limits. The Bulgarians grew bold after
securing so many bishoprics in the nineties and the bishop at Uskub
thought to open new schools and churches. But the Turkish
governor--the Vali--summoned him and delivered this warning: "O
Bulgarian, sit upon the eggs you have, and do not burst your belly by
trying to lay more."
How are we to determine the racial complexion of a country in which
race is certified by religion, in which religion is measured by the
number of bishops and churches and schools, in which bishops and
churches and schools are created and maintained by a propaganda
conducted by competing external powers, and in which the results of the
propaganda {86} are determined largely by money and men sent from
Sofia, Athens, and Belgrade, subject always to the caprice and
manipulation of the Sultan's government at Constantinople?
In Southern Macedonia from the Thessalian frontier as far north as the
parallel of Saloniki, the population is almost exclusively Greek, as is
also the whole of the Chalcidician Peninsula, while further east the
coast region between the Struma and the Mesta is also predominantly
Greek. Eastern Macedonia to the north of the line of Seres and Drama
and south of the Kingdom of Bulgaria is generally Bulgarian. On the
northwest from the city of Uskub up to the confines of Servia and
Bosnia, Macedonia is mixed Serb, Bulgarian, and Albanian, with the Serb
element preponderating as you travel northward and the Albanian
westward.
{87}