CHAPTER IX

BULGARIA AND HER PAST

Progress of Bulgaria—Origin of her Peoples—The Bulgari—First Russian Invasion of Bulgaria—The Assenide Dynasty—Turkish Tyrannies—Emancipation of Bulgaria—Russia’s Intrigues against Prince Alexander—The Late Balkan Disturbances.

But now, for a moment, let us look at the serious side of this little warlike principality which has only recently wiggled from under the vassalage of Turkey, at the same time proclaiming her absolute independence, and which, to my mind, is the Bulwark of the Balkans.

Although having enjoyed but a short thirty-one years of partial independent existence, for it is the youngest of the Balkan States, the progress of Bulgaria during that thirty-one years has been little short of remarkable. A visitor to the country is at once impressed with the look of indomitable determination that characterizes the features of the Bulgars. That indomitable determination has convinced the outside world of their worthiness of the freedom as a state conferred upon them in 1877; it will continue in the future to convince the outside world of their worthiness of the indefinite prolongation of this freedom.

It is impossible to recognize in the proud, full-blown kingdom of to-day the down-trodden province of Turkey of three decades ago. In thirty years Bulgaria has built more than four thousand three hundred primary schools; she has established, and maintains, a standing army of one hundred and twenty thousand men and is capable of putting in the field in time of emergency two hundred and fifty thousand more; the value of her annual exports has reached the figure of $250,000,000; seventy per cent. of her total area has been rendered susceptible to the highest degree of cultivation; the agricultural and stock-raising adaptability of her peoples has opened the eyes of all Europe; while her ottar of rose industry, down in the little valley of Toundja, “The Rose Valley,” has become world-renowned.

But to fully appreciate and feel this miraculous development we must delve, briefly, into Bulgaria’s past.

The ancient Roman name of Thrace was the one generally applied to the entire territory lying between the Macedonian frontier and the Danube River, while the territory to the north of the Balkans was then called Moesia. Savage tribes, known as the Thraco-Dacians, the Thraco-Illyrians and the Thraco-Macedonians, held sway over the whole of the Balkan Peninsula until, historians tell us, Philip and his successor, Alexander, came upon and took the country. The date of the beginning of Roman conquests in Thrace is indefinite, but it remains an undisputed fact that Vespasian annexed the country and proclaimed it a Roman province in A. D. 75.

The Slavs, moving westward from their confines in Asia, and having waged successful warfare upon the Huns and the Goths, populated Bulgaria between the third and the seventh centuries. They introduced their customs and language throughout a large part of eastern and southeastern Europe, and their descendants, influenced, of course, by the later dominant races, constitute the present population of Bulgaria.

At this point of history we hear for the first time of the Bulgari, “a horde of Asiatics of Turkish strain,” who were also destined to be a prime factor in the general make-up of the present-day Bulgarians. They swarmed over the country in the seventh century and founded the first Bulgarian empire, which attained its height between the years 893 and 927 A. D. under the Tzar Simeon, only to fall ignominiously under Byzantine rule hardly a century later.

In the year 965, Greece endeavoured to subject Bulgaria to her power, and the Emperor Nikephoros Phakos sought aid in his undertakings from a tribe of Northmen (and we have every reason to believe that this tribe was composed of the antecedents of the Russians of to-day) under a leader named Sviatoslav. Sviatoslav condescended to become an ally of the Greeks, but the latter became so jealous of his many successful conquests in their behalf that they grew afraid of him and finally made a treaty with the Bulgarian Tzar, Boris II.

Upon the death of Nikephoros, Sviatoslav decided to make war on Bulgaria for his own aggrandizement, and in 969 he captured Boris, carrying him as far east as Philippopolis. Here the Greek Emperor, Zinisces, the successor of Nikephoros, with the help of the defeated Bulgarians themselves, drove the Northmen back. Sviatoslav was compelled to seek refuge in Silistria, where he sustained a siege of three months. After his final capture he was liberated and allowed to return to his native land, but, while on the march, he and his few surviving adherents were ruthlessly slain by a marauding band of hostile tribesmen.

This may be said to have been the first Russian invasion of Bulgaria, the direct result of which was the fusion of the Northern and the Southern Slavs. Bulgarian history proper begins, however, with the nation’s conversion to Christianity under the Tzar Boris, late in the ninth century. About the same time the Cyrillic alphabet—now adopted by all Slav peoples, including the Russians—was introduced by the great apostles, Cyril and Methodius.

Under Assen, Bulgaria, then belonging to Greece, revolted, conquered, and Assen I, the founder of the Assenide dynasty, was chosen Tzar. This dynasty reached its height under Assen II (1218-1241) and a century later the country fell under Servian rule; to its advantage, however, for King Dushan of Servia proved himself a wise and jealous protector.

After the death of King Dushan, the Northern provinces of the Balkan Peninsula commenced to feel the effects of Turkish invasions. For some years the Bulgarians defended their lives and their property heroically; but, finally, Tzar Shishman III, having been deserted by his allies, surrendered and acknowledged himself a subject of Sultan Murad I. Not, however, until after the bloody battle of Kossovo in 1389 was Bulgaria brought completely under Ottoman rule.

For the following five hundred years the Turks pillaged and sacked the country and outraged its inhabitants. Europe remained in ignorance of the atrocities, for her mind was distracted by her own sanguinary wars. The Ottoman domination and tyranny was social as well as political; it was felt keenly, not only in manners and morals, but in social liberty also. Nevertheless, it is a singular fact that no determined attempt to assimilate Bulgaria, as a whole, to Turkish customs and Mohammedanism was made during all these years. The only instances of religious coercion were prevalent in the cases of young Bulgarian girls who had been snatched from their very doorsteps and placed in the harem of some bigoted Pasha.

Even the Crimean War of 1854-56, which resulted in the liberation of Roumania from Ottoman rule, brought no relief to oppressed Bulgaria. The Turks seemed to persecute the Christians more terribly after it than before. In 1876 Gladstone’s vitriolic speeches, in the exposure of Turkish atrocities and demanding the emancipation of Bulgaria, were heeded, and the successful defence of Shipka Pass was not in vain. Bulgaria became a principality under Alexander; but, after a successful war with Servia as the aggressor, Russia instigated a conspiracy against him which led to his ultimate abdication.

With glowing promises of promotion, Russia’s agents, Bendereff and Greuff by name, were bribed to influence Bulgarian officers to turn traitors to the Prince. Parts of two regiments and the cadets of the military college at Sophia, all more or less under the influence of liquor, invaded the palace on the night of August 21st, 1886, and ordered Alexander, at the point of drawn revolvers, to sign an illegible document which he was told was his abdication paper. He was forthwith carried aboard his own private yacht, taken down the river and delivered to the Russian authorities at Reni, where, for a time, he was held prisoner.

Then Europe, indignant, lent a hand and secured his liberation. Re-entering Sophia on September 3, he assumed triumphant control, for his people, incensed beyond measure at such intrigue, awaited anxiously his home-coming. Bendereff and Greuff were tried and convicted by court-martial, but Russia, Germany and Austria demanded that they should be released.

Upon the final abdication of Alexander, the Bulgarian Sobranje, or Parliament, elected unanimously Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the present ruling “Tzar of the Bulgars,” as his newly acquired title reads.

As a part of the history of present-day Bulgaria, principally, and of the Near East, generally, it would be unwise to exclude from these pages a brief rehearsal of the late eruptions in that part of Europe, which have proven the futility of international treaties and, at the outset of the troubles, tended to shatter the pacific exertions of the Old World.

This time Bulgaria exploded the percussion-cap, and the primary cause of the resulting imbroglio was a strike of the employees of the Orient Railway, which threads its way through the country from west to east, but which is really Turkish property, for it is operated under a concession from the Porte that does not expire until January 1, 1958, although it thrives under the protection of Austria, and is capitalized largely by Germany.

Bulgarian troops occupied the railway line provisionally during the strike but, when an agreement was effected, refused to relinquish the road to the officers of the Oriental Railways Company.

While Bulgaria’s answer to a formal request by Turkey to surrender the railway still hung fire her people were aroused to fever heat by an untoward incident that took place in Constantinople: Their representative at the Porte failed to find his name included in the list of guests invited to be present at an international diplomatic banquet. Turkey’s apology for this slight came too late, for the then Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria had already repaired to the ancient capital, Tirnova, probably out of pure sentiment, and was solemnly crowned “Tzar of the Bulgars” on Monday, October 5th, 1908.

Thus did Bulgaria bring into play a lame excuse to break faith with the Powers of Europe, which, in a clause of the Treaty of Berlin, signed by them in 1878 (but not signed by Bulgaria, and therefore it can hardly be said that Bulgaria _broke_ the treaty), compelled Bulgaria to pay a yearly tribute to Turkey for certain concessions of territory, including the province of Eastern Roumelia.

Three days after Bulgaria’s proclamation, Austria, in direct violation of this same Treaty of Berlin, declared her intention (and later fulfilled the same) of usurping for her own the one-time Servian provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, over which she had been appointed guardian. This move provoked the Servians to clamour for war with Austria while Montenegro swore her allegiance to Servia. It looked for a time as if King Peter of Servia would be forced to abdicate in favour of his son George, the Crown Prince, or fulfil the demands of his super-patriotic subjects; and even king-killing is not a lost art in Belgrade.

To further the dismemberment of Turkey in Europe, the Island of Crete declared itself Grecian territory, and Albania, also inoculated with the serum of liberty, commenced to howl for independence and courted the sponsorship of Italy.

For several obvious reasons the convention of the original signatories of the Berlin Treaty for the promulgation of European peace was at that time impossible. Great Britain would not consent to such a convention unless all agreed that the original treaty should not be changed, but that the present issues alone should be discussed; Russia would not consent to such a convention unless the clause which barred the Dardanelles to the passage of Russian war vessels was struck in advance from the original treaty; Austria refused to be a part of such a convention unless her annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina was acknowledged in advance by the other Powers.

At a conference held in the interests of permanent peace, France, Russia and Great Britain submitted tentative plans, which were promptly adopted, for the re-distribution of authority in the Balkan provinces, the most important decision being that Bosnia and Herzegovina go permanently to Austria. The original stipulations of the Treaty of Berlin did not even have a hearing. France, of course, blamed Germany for instigating the troubles in order to humiliate Great Britain and force the “Young Turks’ Party,” which compelled the Sultan to acknowledge a new constitution and later dethroned him, to re-adopt the old régime, under which Germany is alleged to have benefited greatly by trade with Turkey. Germany, in turn, felt slighted at not having been invited to join Great Britain, France and Russia in the drawing up of their proposals. For a time the guy-ropes of the European peace-tent were stretched mighty taut. Had just one of them parted there would have been the liveliest scramble among the Powers for Balkan territory that Europe had seen in many a day.

Although Bulgaria complied with the demand of Turkey that the Roumelia tribute be capitalized, Turkey was loth—and is yet, for that matter—to acknowledge the independence of Bulgaria or the annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina by Austria; Antivari, Montenegro’s only seaport, enjoyed for a time a splendid view of an Austrian war fleet; Montenegro claimed, but failed to collect, indemnity from Austria for the detention by officials on Austrian territory of a special Montenegrin envoy to Servia; and the strained relations between Austria and Servia took on a ridiculous aspect by Austria’s refusal to allow war materials to be imported into Servia through her domain ... about the only way Servia would be able to obtain such materials.

Bulgaria said she had been preparing for a possible war with Turkey for ten years, and it is a known fact that, although barely one-fifth the size, in population, of the Ottoman Empire, she could have placed in the field fully as many men, some three hundred and seventy-five thousand, vastly better drilled and better versed in the tactics of war. The expenses of keeping the reserve forces with the colours during the recent disturbances and the “compensations” which she had to pay because of her prince’s assumption to the title of “Tzar” were met by increased taxes upon her peasantry, and upon the apathy or enthusiasm of this peasantry would have depended the defeat or victory of Bulgarian arms in a war with Turkey. In advent of hostilities, however, it is safe to say that the pugnacious Bulgarians, with Austria nagging them on, would have bade fair to sweep the Turk from the map of Europe.

Had the unsatisfied Servians, on the other hand, been foolish enough to force themselves into war with Austria, the continuance of Servia as a nation would have been doubtful indeed. It would be difficult to imagine an alliance between the Servians, including the Montenegrins, and the Turks, their life-long enemies, but under the conditions at that time such a thing was not out of the question.