FERDINAND THE MARTYR
The Treaty of Bucarest was followed in Bulgaria by what Ferdinand, in
an interview with a British newspaper correspondent, pathetically
described as a “schemozzle.” You may remember that among his many
accomplishments a facile use of Yiddish speech takes high rank.
And really, considering how furiously the Bulgarians had fought, and
how freely they shed their blood, it is not surprising that they were
angry with him. All their neighbours had got something substantial,
even Rumania, which had not taken up arms against the Turks. And
Bulgaria was the poorer by a substantial slice of territory extorted
from Ferdinand by his Rumanian neighbours. The Turks had regained
possession of Macedonia, including the city of Adrianople. The Greeks
had the coveted ports of Salonica and Kavalla on the Ægean. The
Serbians, though they had not found their way out to the Adriatic, had
Thrace, and a long railway line from Belgrade through Uskub, with an
outlet through Greek territory to Salonica.
Each of the ten Bulgarian political parties blamed one of the leaders
of another party, but all united in giving chief part of the blame to
Ferdinand himself. And in this, there can be no doubt, they were quite
right.
Ferdinand himself was indeed in a bad way. He had offended Russia
beyond all chance of recovery in her good graces. He had lost every
trick in the game, and his dreams of being crowned in Constantinople
had melted into thin air. In his extremity he turned to his Austrian
friends for sympathy. It was characteristic of him that he should go
off to Vienna disguised as the Count of Murany. He went for advice and
sympathy to his friend Franz Ferdinand. But this astute person refused
to see him. Moreover, the semi-official Press of Vienna came out with a
demand that Ferdinand should be required to leave the Austrian capital.
He was, they said, a dangerous and undesirable visitor. So Ferdinand
went quietly back to Sofia, taking with him a sheaf of Press cuttings
to prove, at any rate, that the Austrians were no friends of his.
There were no national dances to welcome him home. Instead a crowd
assembled under the Palace windows and moaned, “Down with the Balkan
Nero.” And the students had got a pot of tar and a big brush and
scrawled on the Palace walls, in letters two feet long, “TO LET.”
The students had reason to be angry with him. He had never really liked
the students of Sofia, and when the attack on his Allies was made, he
had arranged that a regiment, mainly composed of students and other
advanced thinkers, young men of position in Bulgaria, should be placed
in a position without support where they were sure to be badly cut up.
This had leaked out, and Ferdinand was more unpopular than ever with
the youth and intellect of Sofia. “Down with the Balkan Nero,” they
cried; and Ferdinand shuddered to hear them.
Then it was announced that the King was about to abdicate in favour of
Prince Boris. The latter had borne himself gallantly in the war, and
was popular, compared to his father. The rumour of his impending
resignation made things easier for Ferdinand, and he did not deny that
rumour. He posed as a martyr and a victim of Russian intrigue. And the
curious part of it is that he got people to believe him, and especially
English people.
Ferdinand has always been very polite to foreign journalists, and in
his hour of need this facile courtesy served him well. By this time few
people in this country knew what all the fighting was about, or whether
Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria or Rumania was in the wrong about the second
Balkan war. What they did know was that the Bulgarians had administered
the principal trouncings to the Turk, and had come out of the struggle
worse off than when they entered.
On broad principles it was considered that Ferdinand had been most
unfairly treated. The theory that the Balkan States should be limited
by racial conditions has also prevailed in this country, among such
people as were interested enough to give the matter a single thought.
It is an excellent theory but for the fact that the average Macedonian
peasant prefers to belong to the race which has the strongest band of
murderers in the neighbourhood.
In any case, Ferdinand, who had a keen nose for sympathy, saw that his
treachery could be covered by a sufficient amount of brazen complaining
and posing. If he ever had any thought of abdicating he quickly laid it
aside. He was quick to recognize that the worst that could possibly
happen to him had already happened, and that the Great Powers would see
that Bulgaria was shorn of no more territory. He set diligently to work
to obscure the real facts of the second Balkan war; he has been
obscuring them ever since.
At home he fomented disputes among the party politicians, and managed
to switch them on to a discussion about which the Bulgarians have
written whole libraries of books. He did not care who or what they
blamed; let them only keep on arguing and their fury would spend itself
in words. He was right; they continued to argue about the events of
June, 1913, until they had something more cogent to engage their
attention.
Meanwhile Ferdinand returned to the simple life. He found in his old
hobbies of botany and ornithology a new charm; they took him much into
the country and out of the cries of the enraged students. He added a
new hobby, and interested himself much in animals. Soon an interested
world was informed that he was spending his leisure in taming elephants.
The pro-German party in Bulgaria wished him to strive with his Austrian
and German friends for a revision of the Treaty of Bucarest. Our own
authorities on Balkan questions openly proclaimed that unless that were
done, there was nothing that could save his crown for Ferdinand. The
Sofiote Press began to publish stories of Prince Boris, showing what a
hero he was, and how well fitted to rule in place of his unworthy
father.
But if Ferdinand knows nothing else, he knows how to wait. He had
waited many years for the chance of a Principality. He waited ages to
bring about the downfall of Stambuloff. He waited even longer for the
recognition by the Powers of Europe of his claim to be considered
Prince of Bulgaria; and he waited nearly a quarter of a century to
declare himself Czar of Bulgaria and independent of Turkey. None knows
better than he the virtue of masterly inaction.
From the haven of Euxinograd—“My Sandringham,” as he used to call it
when speaking to British visitors—he followed with interest the storm
that was raging in Sofia. He cultivated sedulously every influence that
was opposed to his old friends and supporters, and threw all his weight
into the growing friendship arising between Bulgaria and Turkey, the
two sufferers from the Balkan wars. His plans were simple enough; he
wished to promote revolutionary outbreaks in Serbian Thrace, and to
foster the Austrian influence in Sofia.
But he acted throughout by means of agents. Ostensibly he was living
the simple life, and posing as an injured and misunderstood monarch.
The fierce winds of controversy in Sofia in which he was made a target
by all the controversialists did not blow upon him. He could see the
storm-clouds thickening in the Balkans, and spent more and more time on
his throne seat on the seashore, looking out to Constantinople.
And while he was living the simple home life at Euxinograd, the storm
at Sofia actually did blow itself out; and the great European storm
burst and carried away all the fastenings of civilization.
But first it will be amusing and instructive to take a peep at him as
the simple farmer and flower-lover, living the family life far away
from the cares of State and the troubles which afflict a monarch who
means to be crowned in the cathedral of St. Sophia at Constantinople.
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FERDINAND IN RETIREMENT
“_His disappearances correspond to the most secret depths of his
soul._”—ALEXANDRE HEPP.
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