The Ottoman Empire begins with Othman, born 1258 A.D.; the dynasty is
usually counted from the time of his being given a local governorship
by the last of the Seljuk Sultans, in 1289. The tribe was simply one
small group of families when we first hear of it; Othman's father
Ertogrul entered the Seljuk dominion not many years before that
date with only four hundred tents, say two thousand people in all,
counting women and children. They had been driven from their homes
in Central Asia by the Mongols. The Seljuk Sultan Ala-ed-din III
made Othman governor of Karadja-hissar (Melangeia). Now Othman,
though a plundering marauder like other tribal chiefs, turbulent
and cruel, knew some things that better men never find out. He
knew that impartial justice is a greater strength to a state and a
greater lure to draw others to it than anything else; he made the
fair at Karadja-hissar a model of business equity for all races and
religions, it was thronged with traders, and other Turkish tribes
soon flocked to the banner of the man who never broke his promises
and dealt out even-handed justice. The lying Greeks never learned the
lesson in all their history. In a dozen years he was able to collect
an army of 5,000 soldiers, beat a Byzantine force sent against him,
overrun a large province of Asia Minor, and with the plunder greatly
increased his following. He realized too that education and thorough
practical training and moral discipline were the foundations of
success; most of us know that now, but few understood it then. But
the wild and barbarous Turks could not be educated and disciplined
as he wished,--would not stand it and were incapable of profiting
by it,--and so he or his son Orkhan developed the terrible system
which for centuries made the "Turks" irresistible, which made the
"Turks" seem to increase rapidly, and makes the "Turks" to-day
appear numerous while in fact not one drop in ten of the blood in
their veins is Turkish at all. This was to exact from the Christian
population--Greek or Armenian chiefly--a regular tribute of boys as
well as money. These were taken from their parents at about eight
years old, educated and trained in the household of the Ottoman Sultan
himself, of course drilled in the Mohammedan religion, and gradually
inducted into the highest posts, civil or military, if fit for them,
or made into a special body guard for the Sultan. These were called
"yeni cheri" (new soldiers), which is familiar to everybody in the
form "Janissaries." From that day to this, the Turkish system has
been built up by foreign blood, and outside of the Sultanate pretty
much entirely by foreign brains; it was the constant infusion of
fresh civilized Christian ability and moral character into it that
kept its inherent defects and vices from bringing it to an end long
ago. Finally the system partly rotted out and partly became impossible
to enforce for fear of revolution (Sultan Mahmoud ended it in 1826);
but never outside of this has a tribe of barbarians ever succeeded
so completely in impressing into its own service the powers of a
higher race. It is as though horses should have regularly broken and
driven teams of men for centuries; even more usefully to the Turks,
because intermarriage (largely by force on their part) has filled
their own veins with civilized Armenian and other blood. As soon as
this reinforcement stopped, the Turks began to decay.
I cannot enter even in outline into the political history of the
Armenians during the next few centuries. The country has been torn
into fragments, and each fragment has a history so separate that
there would be no unity between them. One section of what was once
Armenia would be governed by Persian officials; another occupied by
the savage Kurds; another mis-governed and oppressed by the Turks;
another under the rule of Russia; and so on. Persia, when she recovered
her national being, held and still holds a small part of the eastern
section, as I stated earlier in the book, Russia the north; but the
heart of old Armenia is in Turkish hands. The Sultans have succeeded
in mixing themselves with the natives and occupying their confiscated
lands till the Armenians are put in a minority in their own country.
I must correct here a notion fostered by historical writers, that
the Turks are very brave. They may have been once, though I doubt it
and there is no proof of it; but they certainly have gotten over it
now. In the last Turko-Russian war (1878), they ran by thousands to
Christian houses for protection. They are just like wild dogs: savage
and ferocious, but not brave. Nor are they wise: they have some low
cunning, but no practical sagacity--that too is a thing of the past. As
to industrial talents they have simply none whatever; they depend on
foreigners for everything: they will not learn and indeed cannot learn,
and never try to learn. They have never made a cannon or even a gun,
they never built a war vessel and very few if any other kinds, they
make neither powder nor shot; all come from Europe or America. Nor
have they even decent military talent, the very thing they pretend is
their special business: their best generals are Germans, their admiral
for a long time was the Englishman Hobart, I think the Englishman
Woods is so now. As to civil ability, their best administrators have
always been Armenians. Bezjian Amira was Sultan Mahmoud's adviser;
Haroun Dadian, another Armenian, is the chief adviser in foreign
affairs of the present Sultan. His personal treasurer is an Armenian,
Portucalian Pasha. Is this inconsistent with what I have said of his
hating the Armenians for their intelligence? Not in the least: he
employs them in spite of his hatred, because he can trust no others:
the Turks are too stupid and all others too unsafe.