IN a previous article we have spoken

of RUSSIA, PAST AND PRESENT. We have traced the rise and growth of that vast empire, and spoken of the relations which it has sustained to other nations, particularly to the Turks on the one hand (including their co-religionists and kinsmen-if we may so call them-the Mongolians and Crim-Tartars), and the Poles on the other. We have shown the origin of the deadly hatred that has for ages subsisted between the Russians and these races, which, like themselves, are Asiatic in their character and manners, and the last-named, a branch also of the great Sclavonic family of nations. We proceed now to speak of RUSSIA, PRESENT AND FUTURE.

And here, at the outset, we will enter without further remark, upon the consideration of the present war between Russia and Turkey, which has already involved France and England, and may involve, before it is ended, all the great powers of Europe. The history of its origin and progress is in the highest degree interesting. To understand the real, though latent, causes which have led to this war, we must look back into the middle ages for a moment.

Those of our readers who are familiar with history need not be told that the successors of Mohammed, at an early day, commenced the struggle between the Crescent and the Cross, which has lasted, with various fortunes, for nearly twelve centuries. From the nature of the case, the Eastern or Greek Empire was the first portion of Christendom that felt the scymitar of the Impostor of Arabia. That empire embraced, in the seventh century, nearly all the countries of Western Asia which had belonged to the Roman Empire in its palmiest day. It included, also, a portion of Northern Africa, the southern part of Italy, and the islands in the Levant. As might be expected, Palestine, or the "Holy Land," the birth-place of Christianity, was one of the first of the pro

* Putnam's Monthly for October, pages 422-433.

vinces of that empire, to fall under Mohammedan dominion. This occasioned deepest grief throughout the Christian world. The tomb of the Saviour was in the hands of the Infidels! Many were the insults and sufferings which Christian pilgrims suffered at those hands for three centuries. At length the Crusades commenced, and from the end of the eleventh to the end of the thirteenth centuries, those astonishing movements by which Western Europe precipitated masses of men, who professed to be followers of Christ, on Western Asia -for the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre. It was emphatically a Roman Catholic movement-the Greek Church taking but little heartfelt interest in it. The intense hatred between the Greek or Eastern Church, and the Latin or Western Church, from the year A. D. 860, accounts for this fact. The Crusaders held Jerusalem from 1099 till 1187, when Saladin, the Caliph of Egypt, took it.

In the succeeding century, the Crusades ceased; but the cause which had led to their being undertaken, did not cease to be felt. In the century following, Palestine, as well as almost the entire of the Greek Empire, fell beneath the victorious arms of the Turks. In one century more, Constantinople fell, and the Greek Empire was no more!

When that event occurred, the Christians in the East were left for two or three centuries without the protection of any Christian prince or government. At length France, who had taken the lead in the Crusades, began to advocate their cause by making treaties with the Sublime Porte, in which there were stipulations in favor of Christians residing in, or visiting, the Holy Land. But these treaties contemplated mainly, or rather only, the rights, privileges, and protection of Christians of the Latin or Western Church. France cared little for the millions of the "schismatical" Greek Church. She has for eleven centuries

considered herself as at the head of the Roman Catholic nations, and the protector, as well as champion, of the Roman Catholic or Latin Church. As to the members of the Greek Church, and the five other Oriental Churches-the Armenian, Nestorian, Syrian, Coptic, and Abyssinian-inasmuch as they acknowledged not the Bishop of Rome, but looked up to their own Patriarchs, they were left by France, the Emperor of Germany, and the other Roman Catholic governments, to the tender mercies of the Sultan of Turkey and his confederates. Centuries of oppression, cruel injustice, and persecution in one form and another, passed away.

But at length God raised up an Avenger in the Czars of Russia. That great country, as we have stated in our former article, received its Christianity and its civilization from Byzantium, or Constantinople, as it has been called since the fourth century. It was to missionaries from the Greek Church, that she was indebted for the Scriptures, and the institutions of the Gospel. The most intimate relations sprung up between the Churches of Russia and those of the Greek or Eastern Empire. The Greek Patriarch of Constantinople was the acknowledged head of the Russo-Greek Church. This state of things lasted more than a thousand years. Even the conquest of the entire southern part of Russia by the Tartars and Poles (the former Mohammedans, the latter Roman Catholics, and both bitter enemies of the Greek Church), did not destroy the sympathy of the Russian Church for that of the Greek Empire-although it rendered much intercourse between them impossible. And when Constantinople fell under the dominion of the Turks, four centuries ago, and with it the whole of the Eastern Empire, the official connection between the churches of the two countries ceased, but not their sympathy. About that time, one of the Patriarchs of Constantinople (of the Greek Church) fled to Moscow. Thus the Patriarchate of that city commenced,* and with it the independent existence of the RussoGreek Church. At this period, and for several centuries afterwards, the Czars of Russia were too weak to do anything whatever in behalf of the oppressed people of the Greek Church in the

Turkish dominions. But in process of time, the scale turned the other way. The progress of civilization and the arts, -a progress for which Russia is indebted to Christianity-gradually raised up that great country from the feeble condition in which it had so long been, during which, it was a prey to the Mongols, the Tartars, the Poles, Livonians, the Lithuanians, and even the Swedes. In the year 1672, the Russians, for the first time, began to measure swords with the Turks, of whom they had lived in dread for two centuries. In a little more than a century after that, the Tartars were entirely conquered, and the Turks were driven to the southwest-almost to the frontier of the empire. In 1812, Russia extended her boundary to the Pruth, and even to the Danube, from the mouth of the Pruth to the Black Sea. Even before the treaty of that year, the Russian czars had begun to demand protection for their "brethren" of the Greek Church in the Turkish dominions. Nor has the present emperor been indifferent to this subject; on the contrary, he has gone farther than any of his predecessors. It is not easy for us to conceive the intense interest with which all the Christians in the Turkish Empire, excepting the Roman Catholics, have watched the growing power of Russia for the last century or two. From that quarter they began to hope for deliverance. There has been abundant proof, since the commencement of the present war, of the strong sympathy which subsists between the Christians of the Greek Church in Turkey and the kingdom of Greece, and the people of Russia. Not only has Russia demanded protection for the Greek Church in Turkey, which is the chief church in that country, and embraces twelve millions of souls (this is the estimate of the Emperor Nicholas); she has also interfered for the protection of the residents and pilgrims of the Greek faith in the Holy Land. On this subject we must say a few words, inasmuch as it is in some degree connected with the origin of the present war.

There are in Palestine certain buildings and places which are called the "Holy Places," and sometimes, but not very accurately, especially by the French diplomatists who have figured in the

present contest, the "Sacred Shrines." We believe there are eight or ten of such places. One of them (the site of the temple and the localities connected with it), the Mohammedan governments which have ruled that country for almost twelve centuries have never allowed Christians to visit. Sometimes even the Christian pilgrims have not been allowed to go down to the river of Jordan, and bathe in its sacred water. It has often been dangerous for them to visit the "Mount of Transfiguration," in the northern part of the country. But they have had access, more or less unrestricted, for a long time, to the two places which are, probably, the most sacred in the thoughts and feelings of those who have desired to make pilgrimages to the land where the Saviour lived, which was trodden by his blessed feet, and bedewed by his tears and his blood. One of these is the "Church of the Nativity," at Bethlehem. According to tradition, it stands on the very spot where the stable stood in which the Saviour was born. A silver star, suspended by a cord from the ceiling, hangs over the spot where the "manger" stood, in which the "Infant Christ" was laid by his blessed mother. The other is the "Church of the Holy Sepulchre," at Jerusalem, which is built over the supposed Tomb of of our Lord. The tomb is a small building in the centre of the church.

Every year these churches are visited by all the pilgrims who flock to the Holy Land, and by other Christians who may be in the country. It is difficult to say whether the Roman Catholics, or the Greek, and other oriental Christians take the deeper interest in, and attach the greater importance to, these "Sacred Shrines." It would seem as if they were, for the most part, about equally influenced by an ignorant and debasing superstition, which had its origin in the wants and the demands of an unenlightened heart, and a smitten and oppressed conscience. The epochs of greatest concourse are Easter and Christmas. the testimony of every traveller who visits Palestine at these seasons, that the churches in question are crowded at those times by pilgrims, most of whom belong to the Latin and Greek communities. As the hatred of these churches is reciprocal and intense, scenes of shock

It is

ing disorder and violence often occur, even within their sacred walls. To such lengths do matters often go, that the soldiers of Islam have to be called in to make the "Christian dogs," as they contemptuously call them, cease from their strife. The cause of the quarrel has often been: Who shall have the precedence, the Latin or the Greek Christians, on these occasions? For a long time the Latins bore off the palm. They were allowed to have the keys of the churches; and, of course, they did very much as they pleased. Often the Greeks could scarcely gain admittance at all, without many and most violent efforts.

For three hundred years* France has stood up for the Latin, or Roman Catholic, Christians, and maintained by treaty their claims, not only to protection, but also to precedence. For a long time she had the field to herself. There was no nation which professed the Greek faith that was strong enough to say a word in behalf of the claims of the Greek Church. The Protestant nations took little or no interest in the matter, as may well be supposed. They regarded with pity, if not contempt, the miserable superstition of both the corrupted and degenerated churches which were prominent in the dispute.

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But Russia at length appeared on the scene, and began to make her influence felt in behalf of the Greeks, as France had made hers felt in behalf of the Latins. She, too, made the question a subject of diplomacy at the court of the Sultan. Nor did she toil in vain. gained, a few years ago, some advantages which were deemed important for the followers of the Greek faith. This provoked the jealousy of France, and Louis Philippe (in 1847) directed his embassador to negotiate with the Sublime Porte. Certainly the annals of diplomacy do not furnish the names of many men who were less fit for such a delicate and difficult mission, than M. de Lavalette, who was the French embassador at Constantinople at that time. This gentleman-long known in the salons of Paris as an accomplished and fashionable man, and at length as the husband of the widow of an eminent American bankert-who had had no diplomatic experience excepting what he had acquired as the French consul general in Egypt, betrayed an impetuosity

of temper, and a degree of imprudence even, which came well-nigh occasioning the most serious trouble. Arriving at Constantinople the second time, in a 90 gun steamship (contrary to the treaties of the Porte with foreign powers), he demanded certain things in behalf of the Latin Christians who visit the "Holy Places." The affrighted government of Turkey yielded. Instantly Russia intervened, and made new demands for the Greek Christians; and Turkey yielded in turn to her; for she did not dare to refuse. This led France to reiterate her demands, to the astounded and, we may add, confounded Porte. Reschid Pasha, the Grand Vizier, knew not which way to turn. He had made engagements to France and Russia which were utterly irreconcilable. Fortunately the Emperor of France recalled M. de Lavalette, and sent M. de la Cour, a man of prudence and moderation, who pursued a conciliatory course, and effected an arrangement of the difficulty. In this affair Russia, on the whole, came off victorious. Much credit is due to Louis Napoleon, who had succeeded Louis Philippe, as ruler of France. It is probable also, that the influence of England was not without avail in the case, through her excellent embassador, Sir Stafford Canning*. We know not upon what principle the difficulty respecting the "Holy Places' was arranged in all cases, but we suppose that it was mainly on that of equal occupancy, but at different hours of the days, and probably also on that of alternation.

But however that may be, the affair was settled peacefully, happily, to the joy of all good men; for many fears had been entertained lest war between Russia and Turkey, involving France, if not other countries, might grow out of it.

Το

This was the state of things at the commencement of last year. Alas, the prospect soon became overcast by clouds of doubt and fear. Difficulty sprang up suddenly, -from another and distinct cause. the surprise of all the world, the Emperor of Russia sent down to Constantinople Prince Menschicoff, one of his ministers, with a large suite, or staff rather, of officers civil and military, in a war steamer. The high position which this extraordinary embassador occupied in the government of Russia shows the estimation in which the mission was held

Now Lord Stratford de Redcliffe.

by the emperor. Prince Menschicoff.

arrived at Constantinople on the 28th of February, 1853, and on the 16th of March he presented to the Porte his first communication, in which the ministers of the Sultan are charged with having violated the firmans issued in favor of the Greeks, of having wounded the religious convictions of the emperor, and of having been wanting in respect to his person. It concluded with asking an effectual redress of these grievances, and an arrangement which would put an end to the dissatisfaction of the Greek subjects of the Sultan, and give them sure guarantees for the future. The Porte was alarmed by this note, and Col. Rose, the English Chargé d'Affaires (in the absence of Lord Stratford) summoned the British fleet in the Mediterranean to approach the waters of the Dardanelles. On the 19th of April, Prince Menschicoff addressed a note to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, in which he stated in rather arrogant and unusual terms, that he was instructed to demand: "1. A firman concerning the key of the Church of Bethlehem, the Silver Star, and the possession of certain Sanctuaries; 2. An order for the repair of the Dome and other parts of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre; and 3. A Sened, or convention, guaranteeing the strict status quo of the privileges of the Catholic Greco-Russian Faith of the Eastern Church, and of the sanctuaries which are in the possession of that Faith, exclusively or in participation with other sects at Jerusalem."

These demands were substantially granted, through the influence of Lord Stratford and M. de la Cour, the embassadors of England and France, who had returned to Constantinople some days before. The firmans were delivered to Prince Menschicoff on the 5th of May; and though the convention referred to in the latter part of the prince's note had not been conceded or even discussed, it was hoped that there would be no difficulty in arranging everything amicably. This was the state of the case on the morning of the day just named. But that evening, Prince Menschicoff sent another note to the minister of Foreign Affairs, which was of the nature of an ultimatum. It demanded the immediate conclusion of a Sened,-or convention, having the force of a treaty. A draft of such a convention accompanied