If you stand, soon after daybreak, looking at the white facade of
Sofia's enormous, Russian-built cathedral, you will perceive that
whether accidentally or by some architectural _tour de force_, the
upper part is a majestic face, the face of some old god, benevolent
and quite implacable. The Bulgars never would deny that Russia
liberated them and showered on them every kind of gift. But woe be it
to them if in return they did not forward Russia's purposes. Hundreds
of young Bulgars were received in Russia and gratuitously educated;
the Church books which the Bulgars used, their ecclesiastical
vestments and sacred utensils had usually come to them as gifts from
Russia; both before and after the political emancipation Russia's
literature was most assiduously studied. And a pious care was taken of
the places around Plevna that were memorable for a feat of Russian
arms; the people down to this day speak about "The Holy Places." All
was well until the death of Alexander II. No, all was not well--for
the Russians had, in their design to make the Bulgars their devoted
Balkan agents, given them by the Treaty of San Stefano a vast
territory which in gratitude they were expected to administer for
Russia's greater glory. Yes, it may be said, but Russia was using the
best available maps, and these indicated that Macedonia was
Bulgarian.... Perhaps we have already shown sufficiently that the
Macedonian Slavs are devoid of an innate national sense, but that
they have Bulgar or Serb sentiments which are, for the most part,
imported, thrust upon them or created by the propagandists. Very
rapidly the Macedonian Slavs transform themselves into Serbs or
Bulgars; according to circumstances they will or will not be faithful
to the nationality which they have chosen. And in their wavering they
have thousands of precedents--towards 1400, for example, a Slav
chieftain called Bogoja attacked the town of Arta, and in order to
gain an easier victory announced, the chroniclers tell us, that he was
of Serb, Albanian, Bulgar and Greek descent. One must therefore be a
little dubious of maps which ascribe the Macedonian Slavs to any
particular nationality. Much more than the rival maps, it was
Kiepert's that was used by the Russians and others for determining the
Bulgaria of San Stefano. "It is the best map that we know of," said
Bismarck, and Kiepert's ethnographical statements were completely
adopted by British scientists and diplomats at the time of the Berlin
Congress. No doubt a well-equipped foreigner could obtain more exact
ethnographical results in Macedonia than equally gifted Serb or Bulgar
observers. But not one of the travellers whose observations Kiepert
used for his map was acquainted with the Serb or the Bulgar language,
nor had any one of them travelled for purposes of research; hence it
is not surprising that none of them perceived that the Macedonian
Slavs have no sense of nationality and that "Bulgar" is not used there
as a national term. In former as well as in recent times the
Macedonian Slavs have readily abandoned one name for the other, the
temporary predominance of either depending solely on the conquests,
political circumstances and various events, internal and external,
which give rise to certain sentiments and instincts among this people,
easily transforming them into Serb or Bulgar aspirations. It seems
clear that Serbia's existence as an independent State for a good many
decades before Bulgaria was freed would render the name of Serb more
disagreeable to the Turk; it is therefore not astonishing that in
Macedonia under the Turks one discarded the Serb name in favour of the
Bulgar. Without dwelling upon the more or less valuable remarks which
were made by priests and monks and Turkish geographers and French
explorers and German doctors from the sixteenth to the eighteenth
centuries and from which we can at least deduce that the Slav
inhabitants of southern Macedonia were not fanatically constant to the
Bulgar name, it would appear that in the nineteenth century the
earlier deliverance of Serbia and, above all, the foundation of the
Exarchate caused the Bulgar name to become the more popular. The Serbs
were looked upon by Turkey as a revolutionary element, while the
Bulgars aimed at an independent Slav Church within the limits of the
Turkish boundaries. It is unnecessary to add that after Bulgaria's
deliverance and her annexation of Eastern Roumelia, and especially
after the rebellious movements in Macedonia, which had the moral if
not the official encouragement of the Principality, there was less
eagerness on the part of the Slavs to let their Turkish masters think
that they were Bulgars. But in the period preceding the publication of
Kiepert's map the Bulgar name was the more fashionable with Macedonian
peasants. And by giving practical effect to this map in the Treaty of
San Stefano the Russians did a huge disservice to the Bulgars. In the
first place, they aroused in this young people such an exhilaration
that the subsequent annulling of the Treaty at the hands of the Great
Powers would naturally leave a rankling disappointment. Also the
relations between Serbs and Bulgars were not rendered easier by the
chief Slav nation coming down so heavily upon the Bulgar side in what
necessitated a most delicate and scientific handling. Three Russian
ethnographical maps on Macedonia were issued by the Petrograd
_Slavyansko Ob[vs]t[vc]estvo_, which worked for Pan-Slavism and
assisted Slav students. These maps--one of them is described by
Kntchev, the chauvinistic Bulgar, as "giving the Bulgars somewhat more
territory than they in reality occupy"--were lamentably superficial.
While remaining unnoticed in the rest of Europe they exercised an
unfortunate influence on the Balkan educated classes, who believed
that, according to tradition, the potent "elder brother" would be
anxious to decide righteously the disputes between the small Balkan
nations. These maps were, no doubt wrongly, looked upon as the plans
of Russian policy, and on this account the Bulgars became still more
unapproachable for an understanding or for united work; it appeared
to the Macedonian _intelligentsia_, whose hope was to see their
country set free, that Bulgaria was the land which fortune and the
Russians favoured. Except the foundation of the Bulgarian Exarchate in
Macedonia and the creation of Bulgaria at San Stefano, perhaps nothing
contributed so much to the estrangement of the Balkan nations as these
maps; for it was long before one could be persuaded that this Slav
society had produced the maps through ignorance and false information,
so that, as Professor Cviji['c] remarks,[55] "the educated classes in
Serbia were as culpable for the pernicious effects of these maps as
were the Russian authors themselves." And Serbs and Bulgars had good
reason to complain of the manner in which Russia treated them.