TURCO-RUSSIAN WAR--TREATY OF BERLIN
Liberalism had received a check. In this outburst of severity, used to
repress the free instincts of a once great nation, the temper of the
Russian people had undergone a change. The warmth and ardor were
chilled. The Emperor's grasp tightened. Some even thought that
Finland ought to be Russianized precisely as Poland had been; but
convinced of its loyalty, the Grand Principality was spared, and the
privileges so graciously bestowed by Alexander the First were confirmed.
While the political reforms had been checked by the Polish
insurrection, there was an enormous advance in everything making for
material prosperity. Railways and telegraph-wires, and an improved
postal service, connected all the great cities in the empire, so that
there was rapid and regular communication with each other and all the
world. Factories were springing up, mines were working, and trade and
production and arts and literature were all throbbing with a new life.
In 1871, at the conclusion of the Franco-Prussian War, the Emperor
Alexander saw his uncle William the First crowned Emperor of a United
Germany at Paris. The approval and the friendship of Russia at this
crisis were essential to the new German Empire as well as to France.
Gortchakof, the Russian Chancellor, saw his opportunity. He intimated
to the Powers the intention of Russia to resume its privileges in the
Black Sea, and after a brief diplomatic correspondence the Powers
formally abrogated the neutralization of those waters; and Russia
commenced to rebuild her ruined forts and to re-establish her naval
power in the South.
There had commenced to exist those close ties between the Russian and
other reigning families which have made European diplomacy seem almost
like a family affair--although in reality exercising very little
influence upon it. Alexander himself was the son of one of these
alliances, and had married a German Princess of the house of Hesse. In
1866 his son Alexander married Princess Dagmar, daughter of Christian
IX., King of Denmark, and in 1874 he gave his daughter Marie in
marriage to Queen Victoria's second son Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh. It
was in the following year (1875) that Lord Beaconsfield took advantage
of a financial crisis in Turkey, and a financial stringency in Egypt,
to purchase of the Khedive his half-interest in the Suez Canal for the
sum of $20,000,000, which gave to England the ownership of nearly
nine-tenths of that important link in the waterway leading direct to
her empire in India.
During all the years since 1856, there was one subject which had been
constantly upper-most in the mind of England; and that one subject was
the one above all others which her Prime Minister tried to make people
forget. It was perfectly well known when one after another of the
Balkan states revolted against the Turk--first Herzegovina, then
Montenegro, then Bosnia--that they were suffering the cruelest
oppression, and that not one of the Sultan's promises made to the
Powers in 1856 had been kept. But in 1876 no one could any longer
feign ignorance. An insignificant outbreak in Bulgaria took place. In
answer to a telegram sent to Constantinople a body of improvised
militia, called Bashi-Bazuks, was sent to manage the affair after its
own fashion. The burning of seventy villages; the massacre of fifteen
thousand--some say forty thousand--people, chiefly women and children,
with attendant details too revolting to narrate; the subsequent
exposure of Bulgarian maidens for sale at Philippopolis--all this at
last secured attention. Pamphlets, newspaper articles, speeches, gave
voice to the horror of the English people. Lord Stratford de
Redcliffe, Gladstone, John Bright, Carlyle, Freeman, made powerful
arraignments of the government which was the supporter and made England
the accomplice of Turkey in this crime.
However much we may suspect the sincerity of Russia's solicitude
regarding her co-religionists in the East, it must be admitted that the
preservation of her Faith has always been treated--long before the
existence of the Eastern Question--as the most vital in her policy. In
every alliance, every negotiation, every treaty, it was the one thing
that never was compromised; and Greek Christianity certainly holds a
closer and more mystic relation to the government of Russia than the
Catholic or Protestant faiths do to those of other lands.
Russia girded herself to do what the best sentiment in England had in
vain demanded. She declared war against Turkey in support of the
oppressed provinces of Servia, Herzegovina, and Montenegro. In the
month of April, 1877, the Russian army crossed the frontier. Then came
the capture of Nikopolis, the repulse at Plevna, the battle of Shipka
Pass, another and successful battle of Plevna, the storming of Kars,
and then, the Balkans passed,--an advance upon Constantinople. On the
29th of January the last shot was fired. The Ottoman Empire had been
shaken into submission, and was absolutely at the mercy of the Tsar,
who dictated the following terms: The erection of Bulgaria into an
autonomous tributary principality, with a native Christian government;
the independence of Montenegro, Roumania, and Servia; a partial
autonomy in Bosnia and Herzegovina, besides a strip of territory upon
the Danube and a large war indemnity for Russia. Such were the terms
of the Treaty of San Stefano, signed in March, 1878. To the
undiplomatic mind this seems a happy conclusion of a vexed question.
The Balkan states were independent--or partially so; and the Ottoman
Empire, although so shorn and shaken as to be innocuous, still remained
as a dismantled wreck to block the passage to the East.
But to Beaconsfield and Bismarck and Andrassy, and the other
plenipotentiaries who hastened to Berlin in June for conference, it was
a very indiscreet proceeding, and must all be done over. Gortchakof
was compelled to relinquish the advantages gained by Russia. Bulgaria
was cut into three pieces, one of which was handed to the Sultan,
another made tributary to him, the third to be autonomous under certain
restrictions. Montenegro and Servia were recognized as independent,
Bosnia and Herzegovina were given to Austria; Bessarabia, lost by the
results of the Crimean War, was now returned to Russia, together with
territory about and adjacent to Kars. Most important of all--the
Turkish Empire was revitalized and restored to a position of stability
and independence by the friendly Powers!
So by the Treaty of Berlin England had acquired the island of Cyprus,
and had compelled Russia, after immense sacrifice of blood and
treasure, to relinquish her own gains and to subscribe to the line of
policy which she desired. A costly and victorious war had been
nullified by a single diplomatic battle at Berlin.
The pride of Russia was deeply wounded. It was openly said that the
Congress was an outrage upon Russian sensibilities--that "Russian
diplomacy was more destructive than Nihilism."
Emperor Alexander had reached the meridian of his popularity in those
days of promised reforms, before the Polish insurrection came to chill
the currents of his soul. For a long time the people would not believe
he really intended to disappoint their hope; but when one reform after
another was recalled, when one severe measure after another was
enacted, and when he surrounded himself with conservative advisers and
influences, it was at last recognized that the single beneficent act
history would have to record in this reign would be that one act of
1861. And now his prestige was dimmed and his popularity still more
diminished by such a signal diplomatic defeat at Berlin.