Ibrahim Pasha

“ The fiercest of animals, the lion, must be conquered not by force, but by cleverness; by the food which his master gives it and by the influence of habit. Its guardian should carry a stick to intimidate it, and should be the only one to feed it. The lion is the prince. The Emperor Charles is a lion. I, Ibrahim Pasha, control my master, the Sultan of the Turks, with the stick of truth and justice. Charles’ ambassador should also control him in the same way.
From this he went on to expatiate on his own power:
The mighty Sultan of the Turks has given to me, Ibrahim, all power and authority. ”

“ A brilliant career for thirteen years, even though followed by sudden disgrace and death, is a fate that might be envied by many. The abruptness of Ibrahim’s fall is paralleled many times in Turkish history, which is full of sensational rises and falls. In the history of his life alone, we have seen Ahmed Pasha of Egypt and Iskender Chelebi rise to great heights and quickly descend to disgrace and death. It was the almost limitless possibility of rising, and the ever present danger of falling that constituted the fascination of Turkish public life. ”

“ They grumble enough, and if our first blow succeeds they will doubtless join us; but they are much afraid of Ibrahim Pasha. How is he affected in this matter?”
“We must not tell it him beforehand,” replied Osman Bey; “for with all his cruelty he is a craven at heart and might betray us, not from the love but the fear that he has for Mohammed Ali. Let us put the Old Lion out of the way, 411and I will answer for managing Ibrahim afterwards. He will not be very angry, depend upon it.” ”

“ He is also and more commonly called his son. He was born in his father’s native town, Kavala in Thrace. During his father’s struggle to establish himself in Egypt, Ibrahim, then sixteen years of age, was sent as a hostage to the Ottoman capitan pasha (admiral) , but when Mehemet Ali was recognized as pasha, and had defeated the English expedition under General A. M. Fraser, he was allowed to return to Egypt. When Mehemet Ali went to Arabia to prosecute the war against the Wahhabis in 1813, Ibrahim was left in command in Upper Egypt. ”

“ This was not mere personal vanity; under the pretext of the community of good which should exist between father and son he cloaked the Sultan’s usurpation of Hungary, and the fraternity of Ferdinand and Ibrahim served to disguise the humiliation of the former, who was placed in the same rank as a vizir.134 But in the long speech that Ibrahim Pasha made to the ambassadors, he revealed his personal pride. We quote from the speech: “It is I who govern this vast empire. What I do is done; I have all the power, all offices, all the rule. What I wish to give is given and cannot be taken away ”

“ The ambitious views of Ibrahim Pasha must experience a signal defeat; and as he is too powerful to be personally injured by us, we must torture his soul by crushing his relations—we must punish him through the medium of his sister and his aunt. This evening I had a long discourse with Dr. Duras, who is devoted to my interests, and over whom I wield a wondrous power of persuasion. He has undertaken to induce his brother, Angelo Duras, to abandon the cause of the Francatellis; and the inquisition will, therefore, deal with them as it lists. ”

“ In the depth of winter, which was very severe in the mountains, he collected a force of fifteen hundred irregular cavalry, whom he declared to be ‘as ruffianly a lot of cut-throats as ever a Christian gentleman had command of,’ with which he watched Ibrahim Pasha, the leader of the Egyptians, who had opened hostilities with the Turks, so closely that Ibrahim retreated through the desert east and south of Palestine instead of occupying Jerusalem and ravaging the settled country round about as he had intended ”

“ Then a trumpet sounded to parley, and a messenger rode forward to communicate with the Arab chief.
"To the Emir Kara-al Zariel," said the soldier, "thus saith the great Lord Ibrahim, pasha of Alla-hissar. Whereas, though thou hast been often a rebel against his highness's lawful authority, yet will he pardon thee all past misdeeds on condition that thou shalt give up the Frankish men and the Greek woman, who are accused of the secret murder of his late highness, Moley Pasha. Refuse this, and no mercy will be shown to thee or to thy tribe. ”

“ The wrath of Ibrahim Pasha was very great, and he caused his men to harass their men, and their beasts were no longer safe. Now the Shaykh knew not which among his people were the offenders, but after a year had gone by there came certain of the tribe to him and said, "Behold these camels and mules, are they not those which were stolen from Ibrahim Pasha? We pray thee restore them that we may no longer live in fear of having ours stolen." Thus it was, that on this same day the Shaykh had ridden out with his men, driving these animals, and had delivered them back to the Pasha at Viran-shahir. ”

“ Another evil existed in the Turkish army, and was caused, first, by the negligence of the sultan (who, to tell the truth, is not of such ability as the greatness of the empire demands) , 52 and secondly, by the actions of Ibrahim Pasha, who by the same means as those used to raise and maintain himself—namely, to degrade, and even to kill, all whose ability aroused his suspicion—deprived the state of men of good council and the army of good captains. ”

“ Suleiman in his letter gives Ibrahim credit for the taking of Peterwardein and Illok. As to Mohacz he says:165
“The accursed king (Lewis) accompanied by the soldiers of perdition fell before the army of Roumelie, which was commanded by the Beylerbey of Roumelie, my grand vizir, Ibrahim Pasha (May Allah glorify him eternally!) . It was then that the hero displayed all his innate valor.” ”

“ On the ninth day, the eve of that on which the bride would be brought from the palace, Ayas Pasha and the other vizirs, and the defterdar, and the agha of the janissaries sought the bridegroom and led him through the streets of Stamboul in gorgeous procession. From the Bab‐i‐Huma40youn (The Sublime Porte) to the Hippodrome the streets “were full of pleasure from end to end,” all hung with silks of Broussa and velvets of Damascus, through which passed the ranks of the janissaries and the vizir who thus honored Ibrahim Pasha. ”

“ But our only chance of understanding it is to banish from our minds western conceptions and accept as facts what seem like wild imaginings. Ibrahim Pasha was not of the Turkish race, a fact which accounts for some of the paradoxes of his career, but his life was passed in a Turkish environment, one of whose notable characteristics is that it has always at once included and modified so many alien elements. In any consideration of the Turkish people, the most important thing to hold in mind is that the Turks are neither Aryan nor Semitic, being unrelated to Persians, Arabs, Greeks, or Hebrews. ”

“ No sooner was the army of Ibrahim Pasha withdrawn than the old spirit rehabilitated the fallen empire with the old time strength of fanaticism. The army of the Pashas could not govern or even occupy the vast territories they had overrun. Within a few years Turki the son of the late Amir was proclaimed Sultan of Nejd, recovered all and more than his father’s territories, and by the judicious payment of a small tribute and yet smaller honor to the Egyptian Khedive retained the throne until he was murdered in 1831. ”

“ In 1848, this great satrap, then verging on his eightieth year, was attacked by a mental malady, induced, as it was said, by a potion administered in mistaken kindness by one of his own daughters, and the government was taken over by his adopted son, Ibrahim Pasha, the hero of Koniah and Nezib. He lingered till August 1849, but Ibrahim had already pre-deceased him; and Abbas, a son of the latter, succeeded to the viceregal throne. Though born and bred in Egypt, Abbas was a Turk of the worst type--ignorant, cowardly, sensual, fanatic, and opposed to reforms of every sort. ”

“ In 1522 Ibrahim became Ibrahim Pasha, Grand Vizir, and Beylerbey of Roumelie. Turkey has always been divided into Turkey in Europe, or Roumelie or Roum,49 and 35Turkey in Asia, or Anatolia. These two divisions of the empire during Suleiman’s reign were each ruled by a governor, or beylerbey, who had general charge of the sandjakbeys over each sandjak50 or province. The beylerbeys of Roumelie generally resided at Monastir or Sofia, but here again Ibrahim seems to have been an exception to the general rule and to have resided at Constantinople. ”

“ Ibrahim Pasha is, however, a man of some force of character, and has a mind more fit, it is said, for the department of a soldier than that of a statesman. He has for many years led the armies of his father Mohammed Ali, and, in many contested fields, he has won laurels which do [89] not fall on the head of every general. The regions of Upper Egypt, the plains of Arabia, the land of Palestine, the interior of Asia Minor, not to mention Greece and the Isles, have felt the desolation caused by his troops. ”

“ ABBAS I. (1813–1854) , pasha of Egypt, was a son of Tusun Pasha and grandson of Mehemet Ali, founder of the reigning dynasty. As a young man he fought in Syria under Ibrahim Pasha (q.v.) , his real or supposed uncle. The death of Ibrahim in November 1848 made Abbas regent of Egypt, and in August following, on the death of Mehemet Ali—who had been deposed in July 1848 on account of mental weakness,—Abbas succeeded to the pashalik. He has been generally described as a mere voluptuary, but Nubar Pasha spoke of him as a true Turkish gentleman of the old school. ”

“ In 1838 the Porte felt strong enough to renew the struggle, and war broke out once more. Ibrahim won his last victory for his father at Nezib on the 24th of June 1839. But Great Britain and Austria intervened to preserve the integrity of Turkey. Their squadrons cut his communications by sea with Egypt, a general revolt isolated him in Syria, and he was finally compelled to evacuate the country in February 1841. Ibrahim spent the rest of his life in peace, but his health was ruined. ”

“ The insurrection of these people had been more formidable than any other that Ibrahim Pasha had to contend with. He was only able to crush them at last by the assistance of a fellow renowned for his resources in the way of stratagem and cunning, as well as for his knowledge of the country. This personage was no other than Aboo Goosh (“the father of lies” [39] ) , who was taken out of prison for the purpose. The “father of lies” enabled Ibrahim to hem in the insurrection and extinguish it. He was rewarded with the Governorship of Jerusalem, which he held when I was there. ”

“ Ibrahim’s rapid rise began to alarm him. The inconstancy of fortune, as exampled by the fate of many of the great men of the Ottoman court, created in him an apprehension of the great peril which attached to those favorites who enjoyed the high dignities of the court, and served as a bridle to restrain his desires. He besought Suleiman not to advance him so high that his fall would be his ruin. He showed him that a modest prosperity was safer than the greatness wherewith he would honor him ”

“ We had passed to our right, at some considerable distance, a cluster of buildings on the top of a hill, called the tomb of the Maccabees. It looked like a fort, or place of defence, and was, as I am told, not long since, the residence of Aboo Goosh, who used to make free with the property of other people; in other words, was a notorious robber. But Ibrahim Pasha has taught such gentry a good lesson. He has nearly, if not wholly, put a stop to such practices; he has taken the matter into his own hands. What people have to spare, [112] he himself takes, or has taken from them ”

“ And Ibrahim said: “Go in peace; let it not be known that I have spoken with you this day.” Then she rose, and went her way to her village, trusting in the promise of the Pasha. After three days, her husband, and son, and brother returned unto her, saying: “We are free from service by order of the Pasha, but this matter is a mystery to us.” And all the neighbors marvelled greatly. But the woman held her peace, and this story did not become known until Ibrahim’s departure from Akka, after the overthrow of the Egyptian goverment in Syria, in 1840. ”

“ He could, however, catch little that they said, for they spoke in low tones, the Sheikh-el-beled talking seldom, but listening closely.
The crowd around the cafe grew. Occasionally an Arab would throw back his head and cry: “Allahu Akbar!” Another drew a sword and waved it in the air. Some one in front of him whispered one startling word to a camel-driver.
Dicky had got his cue. To him that whisper was as loud and clear as the “La ilaha illa-llah!” called from the top of a mosque. He understood Ibrahim the Orderly now; he guessed all—rebellion, anarchy, massacre. ”

“ Ibrahim’s importance in Turkish history lies partly in the great diplomatic changes and the conquests which he achieved together with Suleiman, and partly in the fact that he was the first grand vizir taken from the people who exercised much power, and that with him began the rule of vizirs and favorites which became a very important fact in later Turkish history. ”

“ Ibrahim, we recall, was born a Christian, and probably accepted Islam only formally and not from conviction. Now and then in his career his Christian predilections appear and always injure his reputation. One instance of this was the case of the infidel Cabyz, towards whom Ibrahim was accused of being overlenient. Another illustration of lack of consideration for Moslem prejudices was when he brought home from Buda three statues taken from the royal palace and set them up in the Hippodrome. ”