CHAPTER XVI.

A RETURN AND A SECOND FLIGHT.

Christian Ambassadors accredited to England by the Sultan--I am strongly urged to return--A question of money and health--I consent and go back to Constantinople--At the palace of Yildiz--A 'private salary' and an appointment--A suggestion of espionage work--A warning--Broken promises move me to try and escape again--My plan--I sign on before the mast at the British Consulate--On a paraffin boat without luggage--I reach Liverpool in safety.

ABOUT twenty days passed, and then I was again asked to go to the Embassy. Rustem Pasha told me that it was the desire of his Majesty that I should return and give a practical proof that I was not implicated in any plot against the person of the Sultan, and that in that case I should certainly be highly rewarded. He, moreover, assured me that I should be allowed to come to Europe again whenever I wished to do so. This offer was in reality an appeal to my vanity, for, humble individual though I was, I was now led to suppose seriously that I was becoming a more important person than I had suspected. The aged diplomatist was very emphatic in impressing me with the necessity of accepting the invitation. I asked him what guarantee I could have that I should be allowed to remain unmolested on entering Turkey, and to return to Europe when I wanted to do so. He gave me a distinct promise that my requests would be granted. The Pasha was one of the Ottomanised Europeans, was Catholic by religion, and was known to be a gentleman; if he had been a native Christian of the Levant I should most decidedly not have put faith in his words.

In this connection I should like to remark that for a good many years past the Ottoman Ambassadors to the British Court have been appointed from among the Christian subjects of Turkey. It is reported by the _entourage_ of the Sultan that the reason for this was the objection of the British Government to the appointment of Mussulman Ambassadors. This report must have been purposely spread with a view to represent Englishmen to Moslems as hostile to Islam. The real reason must, I think, be, that as there are some bigoted politicians and publicists in this country who always cry out for the appointment of Christian officials at the head of all affairs in the Ottoman empire, the Sultan wishes to show them that he employs Christians even in important diplomatic posts. As a matter of fact, in days gone by there have been Mussulman Ambassadors accredited to the Court of St James's.[10]

After my second interview with Rustem Pasha another fortnight elapsed, during which I considered anxiously what might happen to me if I returned; and what I should do if I remained in London. Meanwhile I was feeling very unwell, my money was rapidly decreasing, and there was not the slightest prospect of my finding suitable employment, and no possibility of my communicating with my people at home to ask for help, so I decided to return; I thought I now had a chance. As the Sultan knew me, I could get my money from the Government and come back to England. But I was sadly mistaken in my conjectures. It would have been impossible for any man who was not endowed by nature with that particular cunning so necessary for getting on in life to play such a rôle. I discovered my error to my sorrow when I arrived at Constantinople. A past master of the art of deception such as Abd-ul-Hamid was not easily to be outwitted. When I went to the Embassy for the third time I said I would return, so the officials telegraphed to Constantinople, and in three days a money order came. The sum was about seventy-five pounds, and I was urged to start at once by the _Orient Express_.

About the beginning of August 1894 I left England, stopping for two weeks on my journey in Paris, and a few days in Buda-Pesth, the capital of the people between whom and the Turks there is a community of origin, and whom we fought and subjugated for generations. On arriving at Constantinople the police officials sternly asked my name, whence I came, and where I was going to put up. I told them I was going direct to the imperial palace, whereupon they saluted me and I got out of the station with some feeling of relief. It was a foolhardy game I was attempting to play. I was now at the mercy of an autocrat who deals with his Osmanli subjects in his own well known fashion, and I was one of the few who was enlightened enough to see his true characteristics, and in consequence to detest his rule at heart In the Yildiz Palace I was really shivering with anxiety, knowing that here thousands of people who were denounced as 'Young-Turks' were imprisoned, examined, and tortured, and then sent into exile. While awaiting my fate in the palace, a certain Faik Bey, one of the Sultan's trusted courtiers, a man of no good repute, came to me with a very kind message from his Majesty. He was glad that I had obeyed him, and come back from the country which "is nursing hostility to Turkey, and plotting against the cause of the Caliphate." I am not certain whether these were the words of the Sultan, or whether his courtier made them up. The Sultan sent me twenty pounds as pocket-money and wished me to go home and rest. Well, this apparently kind treatment was consoling, but, however foolhardy, I had sense enough to see that it was not a good omen for the future. Just as I was leaving the palace I was ordered by the courtier not to mix with people much, and to live as quietly as possible. He also asked me to come and see him after two days. From the palace I went to Pera and engaged apartments. I was now afraid of going to see my relations and friends. I met some of them later on while going about in Constantinople, and we had to pass each other with a mere salute, as they were also afraid of being reported by the spies for talking to me, since they knew all about my escaping to England It is a very depressing and lonely condition to be in, to have to avoid one's friends and relations because a tyrant has issued a warning to that effect.

In compliance with the order, I went to the Palace again and saw the same chamberlain. He handed me over another twenty pounds as a mark of imperial benevolence, and said he would pay me the same amount every month as 'private salary.' And then he said in a low voice, coming nearer to me, "His Majesty, our benevolent master, commands me to ask you to write a report if you hear anything important on the political situation." My heart froze on hearing this contemptible proposal. By a monthly salary of twenty pounds the Sultan wanted to make me a Palace spy! A downright refusal would bring ruin on me, so I told the courtier that as I had been ordered not to come into intimate contact with other people, I could not hear anything of importance. He said there would be no harm in my meeting Europeans. I did not understand the significance of this last remark at the moment Proceeding in his talk, the courtier said that as I had graduated in law, the Minister of Justice would be ordered to make me a deputy prosecutor-general in the central criminal courts of Constantinople. I carefully avoided alluding to the promise of the Sultan made to me by his representative in London, that the income of my property would be given to me, and that I should be allowed to go to Europe. Nor did I express any desire to go to Europe again. I was made a deputy prosecutor-general in a few days by a special _iradé_. Before I went to England they would never have given me a post even inferior to this had I applied for it again and again for months. There are about a dozen deputy or assistant prosecutors like myself in these central courts, and each of them gets a salary of nearly £180 a year. As a rule, they are not very busy people. As my superiors could not urge me to attend the office, imagining I was highly in favour at the Sultan's palace, I did not care much about going to the court, and making one of the idle scamps there. I was hard at work devising a new plan of escaping once more from the hands of the Sultan.

At this time, when his Majesty appeared to be going to honour me so magnanimously with a Government appointment, as well as with that attractive 'private salary' in order to tempt me to acts of espionage, his spies kept an eye on my movements constantly. Every day I was watched, talked to, and even entertained by two or three of these creatures. I informed my old English friend of all that had happened to me of late. He reproached me for being so imprudent as to return to Turkey, and not going to Egypt if I had to leave England. However, what was done was done, and it was no good regretting it What I wanted now was to escape out of the country again as soon as I could get an opportunity. My friend seemed very sceptical as to my chances of success in running away a second time, as he thought, and rightly too, that the watch on my movements would be far stricter now than it was before.

While things were in this condition, I was one morning hurriedly summoned to the palace by a mounted messenger. Of course I had to go at once and saw the same courtier who had so suavely informed me of the imperial benevolence on the two former occasions. This time his manner seemed grave and cool, and so soon as I was seated he said that he was surprised that I should abuse the generous kindness of our august benefactor. On my anxiously asking him the nature of my fault, he said he had received a report (an espionage report, of course) that I was revealing confidential matters of State among the Europeans of Pera. He showed me the report, carefully hiding, however, the signature beneath it with his thumb. I at once discovered the author of the shameless document from the handwriting. The man, who never perhaps supposed that the report would have been shown to me, had hospitably invited me to dinner two days previously. The courtier gave me a sharp warning to avoid spreading the confidential matters of the Sultan's Government among foreigners. Although my safety seemed to be hanging on a thread at that time, I nevertheless collected my faculties and ventured on a bold stroke. I said that as he was the only court official I had had the honour of seeing, I asked him whether he would be good enough to tell me what were those secret matters which he had confided to me, and which I was accused of spreading among the Europeans. He appeared somewhat embarrassed by this, and his evident perplexity was a relief to me. We parted in a friendly manner, and as I was leaving he said, "Remember your private salary will be due in ten days." This was the monthly twenty pounds which he was going to pay me privately if I stained my honour by doing the dirty work of espionage.

On returning home in a great state of worry I had a tiny cup of Turkish coffee, which I used to find a great relief in times of trouble, and counted my fortune, which amounted to less than fifty pounds. This was, however, amply sufficient to carry me to England. The first difficulty before me was to find another English captain to take me, and then to succeed in getting on board his ship. All the boatmen in the harbour had been threatened with punishment if they carried suspicious persons to any foreign ships other than those passenger boats which are watched by the police. As a prelude to my plan of escaping, I thought it would be wise to take a boat and go for a row on the sea every day. I told everyone I met, including those Palace detectives who were always at my heels, that I had been advised by my doctor to get as much sea air as possible, and therefore was going for a row every day. On the next day after deciding to begin boating I went down to one of the many landing-places of the Golden Horn, where several boatmen are always in waiting to pick up passengers. I hailed one of these boatmen, and told him to take me for a row up the Bosphorus. After some time the boatman wanted to know where I wished to go. I told him curtly to go straight ahead, and he did so. When he stopped to light a cigarette I asked him how much he earned in a day, and he said that his profits fluctuated between seven and ten piastres. If a Turkish boatman gains ten piastres (about 1s. 8d.) a day he may consider himself lucky. I told him the same story of my medical prescription of sea air, and offered him fifteen piastres a day if he would take no other customers, but place himself at my disposal every day. As I expected, he readily agreed to this arrangement. My boating trips lasted a week. I went on the sea sometimes in the morning and sometimes in the afternoon. Sometimes I occupied myself with fishing, and sometimes with reading in the boat; occasionally, too, I approached and boarded the sailing crafts in the harbour, and watched them lading and unlading their cargoes. Besides his wages I used to give the boatman tobacco, which pleased him well. He did whatever I wanted him to do, and went wherever I ordered. I do not know if I was ever followed by the spies on the sea; anyhow, nothing occurred to rouse my suspicions.

After thus arranging the first part of my plan of flight, which was to find a boatman who would, consciously or unconsciously, take me to the prohibited foreign ships, I now came to the arrangement of the more important part, namely, finding a ship bound at once for England. By myself I could not have done this, so I took the liberty of again approaching that Englishman who was interested in shipping traffic, and who had helped me on my first voyage to this country. The excellent fellow said a steamer was due from Batoum on the Black Sea that very day, but she was to start on the same afternoon. I said I was quite ready to start; but he could only send me away on two conditions. One was, that this time I must see about conveying my luggage myself to the boat, because the Government supervision over the movements of English ships had become stricter, and so he would not compromise himself. I did not mind this at all But the second condition he laid down was alarming. He said that as the captain of this ship was not allowed to take any passengers, I must go to the British Consulate and sign my name in the captain's book as a seaman. Of course there was no harm in my doing this, as in reality I should not be expected to do a sailor's work; but an Ottoman subject, who has just become known to the Palace authorities, is not well advised to go to the British Consulate, for it is known to be watched by the spies, and he is certain to be seen. However, I ran the risk, went to the Consulate, and put down my name as a seaman. The captain directed me to the exact spot where his boat was anchored, and told me that in about three hours' time she was to start I did not go to my rooms where I had left all my belongings. The house in which I was living belonged to some Germans, who afterwards, without the slightest justification, refused to deliver up my property to the people who applied on my behalf for it until I had paid a considerable sum of money. Well, it is perhaps the policy of the Teutonic invaders of Turkey to rob the Turks as much as possible, as the price of their friendship to the precious person of the Sultan.

Immediately after getting out of the British Consulate I called a cab, and ordered the cabman to proceed to the palace of Yildiz as fast as he could. My object in going to the Palace in this critical moment was that I thought that if my entrance to the Consulate had been seen, the spies would imagine that I was in charge of an official message, and moreover they would not follow a man whose destination was the Palace, and who might in all probability turn out to be one of the Sultan's creatures like themselves. I reached the Yildiz Kiosk, and went up to the office of my friend the courtier. He was out, and his absence at that moment suited my purpose capitally, as the excuse which I should have had to concoct for this uncalled for visit would have been but weak. From Yildiz I took another cab and went down to the shore. My boatman was yawning, being tired of waiting inactive. I jumped into the boat and told him the direction in which he was to row, which was of course towards the steamer, though he did not know that I had determined to sail for England in it When we got near the steamer I observed to my boatman it seemed a peculiar vessel, having its funnel rather far back, and not in the middle of the deck as is usual. The boatman knew that it was an oil boat and that its engine was therefore constructed at the back. I pretended to be curious to see the ship, and the simple-minded boatman readily rowed to its side. I got on board with great relief.

I was now practically on British territory.[11] After seeing the captain I went to the side and shouted down to the boatman that as I talked the language of the people of the ship they had asked me to stay a little while on board and have tea with them. I told him he need not wait in the strong current of water, as I could hail any passing boatman when I wanted to go ashore, and I threw him down his day's wage. He went away, and we started not long after. I should not have played all these tricks if the Sultan had kept his promise and treated me honourably.

This second departure from Constantinople took place on the 8th of November 1894, and the oil ship reached Liverpool eighteen days after, without stopping anywhere on the way. As I had not been able to take any extra clothes I suffered much from cold, and also from the rough sea all the way. The men on board the ship were rough sailors, and the captain himself was an extremely stingy person. He supplied us with abominably bad food. However, I arrived in England safely, and ever since that time have made this country my home, and during my periodical trips abroad I have never entered the territories of my own country, over which the tyranny of Abd-ul-Hamid still prevails.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Writing to England from Adrianople on April 1, 1717, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu says:--

"A propos of distempers, I am going to tell you a thing that I am sure will make you wish yourself here. The smallpox, so fatal and so general amongst us, is here entirely harmless by the invention of ingrafting, which is the term they give it. There is a set of old women who make it their business to perform the operation every autumn, in the month of September, when the great heat is abated. People send to one another to know if any of their family has a mind to have the smallpox; they make parties for this purpose, and when they are met (commonly fifteen or sixteen together) the old woman comes with a nutshell full of the matter of the best sort of smallpox and asks what veins you please to have opened. She immediately rips open that you offer to her with a large needle (which gives you no more pain than a common scratch), and puts into the vein as much venom as can lie upon the head of her needle, and after binds up the little wound with a hollow bit of shell, and in this manner opens four or five veins.... The children or young patients play together all the rest of the day, and are in perfect health until the eighth. Then the fever begins to seize them, and they keep their beds two days, or seldom three. They have rarely above twenty or thirty in their faces, which never mark; and in right days' time they are as well as before their illness.... There is no example of anyone that has died in it; and you may well believe I am very well satisfied of the safety of the experiment, since I intend to try it on my little son.

"I am patriot enough to take pains to bring this useful invention into fashion in England."

[2] If the detractors of Islam would take the trouble to find out what is the exact position of women under Mohammedan law, they might feel ashamed of their contention that she is treated like a slave. Laws protecting the rights of women were promulgated under Islam when no such laws existed in Europe. As far back as five hundred years ago women in Turkey had begun to dispute men's superiority openly. As proof of this I will quote a few lines of the poetess Mihri, who lived in the last half of the fifteenth century:--

"Since they cry that woman lacketh wit alway, Need must they excuse whatever word she say. Better far one female, if she worthy be, Than a thousand males, if all unworthy they."

[3] The ancient Church of Sergius and Bacchus.

[4] In his book Civilisation des Arabes (p. 642), Dr Gustave le Bon, the eminent French savant, says: "Le paysan et l'ouvrier Turcs sont sobres, infatigables au travail, fort dévoués à leur famille.... Soldat, le Turc meurt à son poste sans reculer jamais. De solde, cependant, il n'en touche pas.... Ce que je viens de dire s'applique uniquement d'ailleurs aux Turcs proprement dits et non assurément à toutes les populations des provinces Asiatiques administrées par la Turquie. On y rencontre le plus souvent surtout dans les villes un melange de races diverses, résidu abâtardi de tous les envahisseurs qui depuis tant de siècles ont traverse ces contrées. Dans ce melange inferieur certaines quality subsistent encore, mais le niveau de la morality et de courage est descendu fort bas."

[5] Under the title "International Fetters," Lord Milner gives a condensed account in his book England in Egypt of the working of these capitulation privileges, and the disgraceful abuse made of them by foreigners.

[6] Many of the Sultan's highly placed officials and spies are of Armenian nationality. It is worthy of note that the Armenian revolutionaries directed their attacks against private individual Turks only; none of the Sultan's right-hand officials were hurt by them. The reason of this was that they wanted to provoke bloodshed, and by this means invite outside intervention. Moreover, it was manifestly to their advantage that the maladministration of the Sultan and his responsible officials should continue, as under it they were much more likely to find a favourable opportunity for this movement, to say nothing of being sure of external support.

[7] In this connection an anecdote is related in Turkey which, whether true or not, I will quote here. A Turkish diplomatist of the past generation paid a visit to the Pope of his time. During the interview die Pope said, "I am aware of the good points of your people, yet you are so unpopular in Christendom. In every international dispute Europe always regards you as in the wrong. Do you understand the reason of this universal hostility?" The diplomatist replied, "Because we are not Christians." "Exactly," said the Pontiff. "Then why do you not embrace Christianity?" Upon this the diplomatist made the following undiplomatic remark, "The Christians believe in Trinity, and we believe in Unity. Some of us are growing tired of worshipping even one God. How, then, could you expect us to worship three?"

[8] No European musical instrument is so much appreciated by Orientals as the bagpipe; it takes a long time to make the average Oriental understand and admire the masterpieces of the great musicians of the West played on any ordinary European instrument. But he takes to the bagpipes on the first hearing, and it is seldom that he gets tired of them. Of course there is much similarity both in the sound and in the manner of playing between bagpipes and a certain popular Oriental instrument which is played mostly by Turks, Arabs, Kurds, and Armenians. Although the tone and the style of playing this Oriental instrument resemble those of the bagpipes so much, there is considerable difference in the form and make. The bag of this instrument, which is called 'tooloom,' is made from a sheep's skin; besides the small mouthpiece there is only one large reedpipe from which the notes are obtained, and which thus replaces the chanter and the three drones of its Highland counterpart. The player, placing the blown-up sheepskin against his chest, and supporting it by the upper part of his left arm, moves his fingers up and down over the holes in the larger pipe. As a matter of fact, the sound of this instrument, like much other Oriental music, appears to European listeners dull and discordant, but it pleases the uncultivated taste of the ordinary Orientals. At the popular fêtes it is a very common thing to see many people, middle-aged as well as young, dancing together in a circle, while pipe and drum fill the air with ceaseless clamour. It is difficult to trace the original home of this instrument. It may be conjectured that it was brought from the West by the persons who went to the East with the Crusaders, or it may have been copied from them, with certain modifications in form, by the Eastern peoples.

[9] Most people who have travelled in the Levant are enthusiastic in their praises of the Turkish coffee which they drank out there. There is no reason why coffee prepared in the Turkish style should not become popular here. There is no difficulty about making it That the coffee may have the delicious flavour it has in the Levant, the beans must be freshly roasted and ground very fine. The water must be boiled in a tin or copper coffee-pot To supply, say, four or five persons with coffee in tiny cups, two or three teaspoonfuls of the powder should be put into the pot while the water is actually boiling therein. Some people do not like sugar in their coffee, but if sugar is required it should be put into the boiling water and allowed to melt before the coffee is added. Great sweetness is not appreciated by connoisseurs in coffee drinking. When the ground coffee is added to the boiling water, the pot should be taken off the fire and the coffee stirred up in the water with a teaspoon. Then it should be put on the fire again until the froth rises up. It is then poured into the cups. It is better to pour out the coffee slowly, placing the pot on the fire at short intervals, and thus getting more froth for pouring out into the cups, as the taste of the coffee is supposed to be better with the yellowish froth on the surface. It is on account of this idea that greedy people in Turkey choose those cups that have the most froth when coffee is handed round on a tray, leaving those with less to the others who are waiting their turn to be served.

[10] The first Turkish Ambassador in London was Agah Effendi, a Mussulman, who came over to this country in 1793. The following paragraph is translated from his memoirs:--

"We proceeded to the village of Chelsea, which is about an hour's distance from London. The King's Master of Ceremony came and felicitated us on our arrival, and conveyed the compliments of the King. The ceremony of our reception having been fixed for the following day, I sent on the presents. Next day the state carriages came. I entered one that was drawn by four horses; with me were a nobleman and the Master of the Ceremony. My suite were in the other carriages along with some court officials.

"When we were passing along the road called Piccadilly there were collected to see us so many people that never in my life had I seen so great a crowd; indeed I afterwards heard that several persons had been injured through the pressing of the crowd trying to get a glimpse of us. Our dress and our turbans must, I think, have appeared very curious to them. We arrived at St James's Palace, and after I had presented my credentials we were invited to dinner. What most impressed me was the charming manners and appearance of the ladies. Some young ladies belonging to the King's family bound round their heads the embroidered silk handkerchiefs I had offered on behalf of my sovereign, and said laughingly and with infinite grace, 'Now we belong to the harem of his Majesty the Sultan!'"

[11] It may be said that vessels other than men-of-war could not, in international law, be exactly considered parts of the territory of the State to which they belong when they are in foreign ports. But owing to the privileged state of foreign ships in the Ottoman empire, the Sultan could not now, under any circumstances, have taken me back from this paraffin-oil ship, had he been informed of my taking refuge there.

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