_As illustrating the popular feeling in Bulgaria the following letter
from a peasant to Mr. Maringovich appeared in the official organ of
the Bulgarian Government, Echo de Bulgarie, published in French:_
Your Excellency: I am a plain peasant from the Danube country. While
born on the shores of the beautiful blue Lake of Ochrida, and really,
I cannot understand what is the meaning of your factum, (sic.) What
have you come to do among us? Nobody knows you any more in Sofia. You
are Servian and consequently a foreigner to us Bulgarians. There are
certain pains that nothing can alleviate, nor heal, and there are
wounds that nothing can cicatrize.
Since your entry in Ochrida, in my father's house, you, the Servian
Army, behaved like enemies. You profaned the church, that Bulgarian
church where I took my first communion. You have despoiled the
archives and burned our libraries; you ordered closed our national
school where I learned to mumble the alphabet of my mother tongue.
I have seen the epic struggle of my compatriots against Greeks and
Turks, and I took part with them in order to obtain these national
institutions. And did you come there in Ochrida, and everywhere in
Macedonia protected by our valiant army of Lulé Bourgas and Chataldja,
to perform the duty of allies--of Slav brethren?
You established yourselves as conquerors of the country, as vandals,
with the manifest purpose of extinguishing every vestige of our
national culture. You associated yourselves with the non-Slavs
(Rumanians and Greeks) against us, your allies, in order to reach your
end. Why, then, do you call us Slavs? We were called Tartars until
just before you arrived in Sofia.
You treated as villains our Bishops, whom the Turks and the Greeks
were forced to restore us after a struggle of seventy-five years. You
burned our Bulgarian books, and you forbade, under penalty of death,
our people from calling themselves Bulgars. You tortured my parents
with all the refinements of torture that you have invented.
Why, I beg of you? Because you were Servians? I will not go so far as
to injure you with the belief that the Servians are capable of crimes
against nature. Then, because we were Bulgarians; because those poor
people, taking you for their brethren, for Christians, for Slavs, at
least had the courage to say they were Bulgarians and to think
themselves such.
And this continues today with increased intensity. Ah, Mr.
Maringovich! You have committed there and you persist in committing a
crime against humanity that nothing will ever efface. You stabbed us
to the heart, with premeditation, and the wound is still bleeding; you
killed our faith in the Slav brotherhood. You morally assassinated us.
In the face of these crimes, Bregainitza and Slivnitza are pale
figures. These odious crimes will not be left unpunished. The day of
chastisement will come whether you look for it or not.
Your Excellency, I permit myself to repeat the question: What have you
come to do among us?
Really you must have a good cheek--permit me this undiplomatic
expression--and a Servian cheek, in order to have the audacity to come
here and tell us tales. It is not only this; but you make sport of our
sacredest and deepest sentiments, you reopen our wounds, and you
purely and simply abuse us. You ought to have thought of all this
before you set out for Sofia. Today there is an abyss dividing Serbs
and Bulgars. It is an open precipice which will serve for you as a
grave. You wish to fill it? To succeed you must employ other means
than words.
Sir: You are a foreigner to us; there is not an honest man in all
Bulgaria who can consider you a welcome guest. Nobody knows you. For
every Bulgar there is only one word and one gesture for you. We stake
our liberty in giving you the answer and in making the gesture.
Sir: You may take the train which brought you here from Nish. There is
the depot. Farewell! Kindly accept the assurance of my consideration
for your person, whom I had not the advantage to know.