Eurotas

“ Christianity is professed throughout, except amongst the Jews, of whom there are about six millions, and in Turkey, where Mohammedanism claims about seven millions; of Catholics there are about 155 millions, of Protestants 85, and of the Greek Church 80. Amongst the 18 countries the form of government most prevailing is the hereditary monarchy, resting more and more on a wide representation of the people.
Eurotas, the classic name of the Iri, a river of Greece, which flows past Sparta and discharges into the Gulf of Laconia, 30 m. ”

“ From the central mass of the mountain system of the Peloponnesus in Arcadia, two chains, Taÿgetus and Parnon, detach themselves and extend southward, terminating in the two dangerous promontories of Tænarum and Malea. Between the two ridges the river Eurotas winds its way in a southeasterly course. In the undulating valley formed by the bed of the stream, and shut in by the mountain ranges, lay ancient Sparta. The country, by nature and climate, was such as to make men hardy and determined. Euripides styles it "a country rich in productions, but difficult to cultivate ”

“ To these arguments and demands the Greeks replied that, next to Krete; these are the two largest, most wealthy, and most populous Greek islands in the Aegean; that their inhabitants ardently desire union with the national kingdom; and that the Greek Government would hesitate to use them as a basis for economic coercion and nationalistic propaganda against Turkey, if only because the commerce of western Anatolia is almost exclusively in the hands of the Greek element on the Asiatic continent. ”

“ But a personal observation of the hatred of Turkey which exists in every Greek heart, and a glance at the map of Europe, lead an American mind towards one general idea or fancy—namely, that Capo d'Istria was merely in advance of his time, and that an alliance between Russia and Greece is now one of the probabilities of the near future. It is unexpected—at least, to the non-political observer—that Hellas should be left to turn for help and comfort to the Muscovites, a race to whom, probably, her ancient art and literature appeal less strongly than they do to any other European people. ”

“ Austria-Hungary and Russia, though for different reasons, were right in their attitude toward the matter of Greece's claim upon Kavalla. Greece would have done well had she been content to leave to Bulgaria a larger littoral on the Ægean Sea, and the port which is absolutely essential for the proper economic development of the hinterland attributed to her. By taking her pound of flesh, the Greeks only exposed themselves to future dangers. The laws of economics are inexorable. ”

“ From Malta to Athens, indeed, is not a long run; but when every moment you are tossed from side to side, at the mercy of all the winds in heaven, most things have a disagreeable look. As we approached the brown and arid coast of this historic peninsula, I thought how unjust it seems to have driven the Ottoman Greeks out of fertile Turkey to a fatherland that cannot feed them. You cannot obtain blood from a stone, nor fruitful crops from an unfertile soil. What is Greece to do for these poor people, who cannot all turn merchants or moneylenders? ”

“ In language and political sympathy their inhabitants are as completely Greek as all the other islanders of the Aegean, and if the Quadruple Entente has made the principle of nationality its own, Italy is morally bound, now that the Sporades are at her free disposal, to satisfy their national aspirations by consenting to their union with the kingdom of Greece. On the other hand, the prospective dissolution of the Ottoman Empire has increased Italy’s stake in this quarter. ”

“ Not only the Morea, but the parts of Greece north of the Gulf of Corinth up to the frontier of Thessaly, including Athens—then reduced to a squalid, third-rate town—and the islands of the archipelago, achieved a practical independence. A national government and a representative assembly were constituted. The outbreak in Greece roused the sympathies of great numbers of persons in Western Europe, especially in England and France. In spite of this, the Governments of these countries for long held aloof and discouraged the rebellion, not wishing to see Turkey weakened as against Russia. ”

“ Greece was the first, and was followed by Servia. Moldavia and Wallachia united into the principality of Rumania. Last of all came Bulgaria. After having gained autonomy, independence was only a matter of form. But in the central portion of the Balkan Peninsula, from the Black Sea to the Ægean, through Thrace, Macedonia, and Albania, the sovereignty of Turkey, restored by the Treaty of Berlin, was able to endure. For the people were mixed up, race living with race, and in no place could the Christians of any one race claim that the country was wholly theirs. ”

“ In that mood Turkey would have accepted—anything, but the one thing we imposed on her—the Greeks at Smyrna! That policy of sheer folly has transformed the veneration of her people into fear and distrust, if not hate.
Unjustly and unreasonably as we have behaved towards our old ally, we were not, indeed, alone in this mischievous exalting of Greek aggressions. Dare we not now own our mistake? We are great enough, and strong enough, to be generous, to mend our ways! ”

“ Serbia was, like Belgium, invaded and devastated; Bulgaria and Turkey allied to Germany and Austria; one half of Albania occupied by the Austrians and the other half by the Italians—the latter undesired neighbours of Greece—and German terrorist propaganda, which in Italy had failed so miserably, in Greece achieved the success of fear.34 “Should we throw ourselves into this conflict and run the risk of seeing our country invaded and devastated?” the Greeks asked themselves, and most of them came to the conclusion that it was better to remain neutral and to make money through war trade ”

“ In that ethnological pandemonium, which is called the Peninsula of the Balkans, of which so many nationalities dispute the possession, to the exclusion of the only possessors whose rights are consecrated by history, Greece seems to be the only nationality which, better than all the other races,—most of which lack historic traditions and a true national consciousness,—is capable of realizing the views of Europe for the fulfilment of which, on the initiative of England, the European Congress was convoked at Berlin. ”

“ The only countries at whose cost the Hellenic Kingdom could possibly compensate itself for these inevitable sacrifices were Turkey and Bulgaria; and those countries were Germany's allies. A moment's reflection raises a number of equally unanswerable questions: If the Greeks wanted to join Germany, why did they not do so when the Kaiser invited them at the very beginning of the War? Why did they not resist the landing of the Allies? ”

“ Thus she wins by statecraft and loses by politics. In thought, and in the spoken word, Greece is outmatched for instance by the Slavs; but in silent action and in administrative policy Greece more often excels her neighbours. You will always hear odious comparisons made in the Near East between Greek and Turk, to the disadvantage of the former. But it seems rather absurd. The Turk, at his best, is a child or a legendary hero—not one of ourselves—whereas the Greek is a serious European with a race-consciousness of civilization thousands of years old. ”

“ There is no question but our employees are the cleverer and the more capable, but there is a continual clash on psychological grounds. The Greeks make mistakes and the British are not ready to make allowances. The Englishman demands that his friend shall be a "sportsman"—the Turk is, the Greek is not. Therefore we cannot fit Greece into the jig-saw puzzle which we call the comity of nations. The question is, can Greece cut herself to fit—ought she to? ”

“ The city of Odessa was founded on the ceded territory. The merchants who raised it to its sudden prosperity were not Russians but Greeks; and in the course of a single generation many a Greek trading-house, which had hitherto deemed the sum of £3,000 to be a large capital, rose to an opulence little behind that of the great London firms. Profiting by the neutrality of Turkey or its alliance with England during a great part of the revolutionary war, the Greeks succeeded to much of the Mediterranean trade that was lost by France and its dependencies. ”

“ The burning question of national unity might break out at any moment into a blaze of war, and, in the probable case of disaster, involve the whole country and all interests connected with it in economic as well as political ruin. Western Europe would not commit itself to Greek mining enterprise, unless it felt confident that the statesman responsible for the government of Greece would and could restrain his country from its instinctive impulse towards political adventure. ”

“ The Greeks, who had found culture in western Europe, had come there for trade, and their commercial no less than their intellectual activity reacted in a penetrating way upon their countrymen at home. A mountain village like Ambelakia in Thessaly found a regular market for its dyed goods in Germany, and the commercial treaty of 1783 between Turkey and Russia encouraged communities which could make nothing of the land to turn their attention to the sea. ”

“ Just as the realization of the dreams of Hellenic irredentists would give Greece a narrow strip of coast line along European Turkey to Constantinople, with one or two of the larger inland commercial cities, while the Slavs would be cut off entirely from the sea, the realization of the dreams of Italian irredentists would give to Italy the ports and coast line of the northern end of the Adriatic, with no hinterland, and the Slavs, Hungarians, and Germans an enormous hinterland with no ports. ”

“ The Greeks—whose policy is the partition of Macedonia—were, like the Turks, against such a development of the reforms, because 294the establishment of an effectual European control would lead to a good government, which would gradually evolve the destiny of Macedonia towards an autonomy.
Therefore, the policy of Turkey, Greece, and Germany had a common interest, namely, to paralyse the reforms, and became a common enemy to the Macedonians, who, by their Bulgarian majority, were striving for autonomy. ”

“ The Greeks reckon the total of their nationals in the Balkan Peninsula at roughly eight millions, but I doubt whether they number more than five millions, for the Helenophils who have been making propaganda for years among the Slavs in Macedonia are much inclined to count in those converts, many of whose sons, by the way, have been won back by the Slavs and now call themselves Serbs or Bulgars, according to the nationality of their teachers. About two millions of these five make up the population of the Kingdom of Greece, the remainder are scattered about in the other Balkan States. ”

“ The Greeks have hated us since our occupation of Cyprus, and firmly believe that we mean to take Crete as well. The Servians have not forgotten how Russia, after instigating them to two disastrous wars, dealt with their claims at San Stefano; they cannot forgive Austria for her occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and every Servian peasant, as he pays his heavy taxes, or reluctantly gives a big price for some worthless imported article, feels the galling yoke of her fiscal and commercial tyranny. ”

“ Russia desires to possess, not to liberate Greece; and is contented to see the Turks, its natural enemies, and the Greeks, its intended slaves, enfeeble each other until one or both fall into its net. The wise and generous policy of England would have consisted in establishing the independence of Greece, and in maintaining it both against Russia and the Turk;—but when was the oppressor generous or just? ”

“ Before these supreme problems all other interests paled, for they were no will-o’-the-wisps of theoretical politics. It needs a long political education to appreciate abstract ideas, and the Greeks were still in their political infancy, but the realization of Greater Greece implied for them the satisfaction of all their concrete needs at once.
So long as the status quo endured, they were isolated from the rest of Europe by an unbroken band of Turkish territory, stretching from the Aegean to the Adriatic Sea. ”

“ The chief possessions of the Ottoman Empire are Asia Minor, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and Arabia.
Greece.—Greece is a rugged peninsula, no part of which is more than forty miles from the sea. The country is without resources in the way of coal, timber, or available capital. Its former commercial position, in ancient times, was due largely to the silver-mines near Ergasteria, and subsequently to the gold-mines of eastern Macedonia; these, however, are no longer productive.
There is but little land suitable for farming, and not far from one-half the bread-stuffs must be imported. ”

“ New Greece, with her hazardous northern frontier, needs to cultivate friendship, and will have to employ all her strategy to gain any. Her mainstay is, of course, England. For us Greece has the natural respect which a weak country pays to a strong friend, but she has also a curious covert regard for us as one nation of sailors for another, a petty maritime State for a great one. Her weakness is in asking material favours at the same time as she pays compliments. Greece is almost our ally in the Near East. French rivalry has bound British and Greeks together. In our employ are Greeks ”