body of prisoners they made in the war of 1877, exceeding two hundred thousand in number. They treated them with great kindness, fed them far better than they were accustomed to in the Turkish army, and released them eventually warmly clad and well shod. A friend told me in illus. tration of this that his servant, a Turk, who had been in the war, told him that at its close he was discharged from the army penniless and half-starved, with scarcely a rag to cover him and with no shoes. "I was not so fortunate as my brother," he said; "he had the good luck to be taken prisoner, and the Russians gave him a good suit of clothing and a spare pair of boots, and he returned home in good health. If I am ever drawn for the army again, I shall take good care to be taken prisoner as soon as possible." Two hundred thousand men returning to their homes in Asia Minor have spread, it is believed, something of the same opinion among the Turkish peasantry. The danger to Turkey in this quarter, as also in what remains to it of its European provinces in Macedonia and Epirus, is the comparison between the condition of those who were freed in 1877 from the sultan's rule, and who have become selfgoverning, as in the case of the Bulgarians, or have gone under the rule of Austria, Russia, or Greece, with those who still remain the subjects of Turkish rule. When on one side of mere geographical lines, without any physical differences, the people are flourishing and content, improvements of all kinds in roads, railways, harbors, schools, etc., are going on, brigandage at an end, and the cultivation of the land extending, justice is equally administered, and security to life and property afforded by the authorities, and all these improvements date from the time when they ceased to be under Turkish rule; or when, on the other side of these lines, the conditions are the same as formerly, or even worse, and no improvement of any kind has taken place, the contrast must inevitably be such as to lead to fresh aspirations of the peasantry, to renewed political difficulties, to threats of intervention, and further schemes for disintegrating the empire at no distant date. The real defects of the Turkish govern ment appear to be the same as ever, namely, not so much the laws themselves as the administration of them, or the want of administration, the excessive centralization, the want of honest and capable governors, the corruption which infects all official classes, the want of money to sup ply the wants of the central government and the sultan, the consequent excessive taxation, the need of security for life and property. The governors of provinces, as in past times, still obtain their appointments by means of heavy backshish to officials at the palace. They hold them for no certain period, and are removable at any moment by intrigues in the same quarter as that where they obtained them. They must necessarily make hay while the sun shines, and they can do so only by exactions and backshish, similar in kind to that to which they have themselves been subjected. They are left at their posts so short a time that, as a rule, they have no opportunity to effect improvements, if that be their desire; but in fact no initiative for good is allowed them; everything has to be referred to the capital, and nothing is done which can be put off or avoided. It is alleged that there are capable and honest and patriotic men among the class from whom the governors are chosen, but they have a less chance of appointment than the worst, because they can less afford to bribe. If the sultan were to direct a part of his energies to breaking down this system of corruption and to selecting honest and capable men as governors in the provinces, some of the evils of his country might be cured and many dangers in the future avoided. Let us not, however, underrate the dif ficulties which the sultan labors under. Surrounded by men who have been brought up under and who live in this corrupt system; embarrassed by the rivalries of the great powers; limited in a hundred ways by foreign jurisdiction under the capitulations, and the concessions to the Greek and Armenian patriarchs in derogation of his sovereign rights, his position must be one more full of difficul ties and pitfalls than that of any arbitrary ruler. That he has shown skill of a certain kind in threading his way through these perils and difficulties cannot be denied. He showed political sagacity in assenting to the union of Bulgaria and eastern Roumelia, and in refusing to act on the advice of Russia to occupy the latter province for the purpose of preventing this union. He has followed up this policy by showing a friendly feeling to Bulgaria and by granting berats, or exequaturs, carrying with them important civil jurisdiction, to the Bulgarian bishops in parts of Macedonia. On the other hand, the last concession, which has been at the expense of the Greek bishops, has | tinople we cannot say; the precedent of caused the greatest jealousy on the part the Byzantine Empire shows that the of Greece, and the sultan has greatly in Turks themselves held Adrianople for creased this by taking the same opportu- ninety years before they succeeded in nity of curtailing the privileges enjoyed capturing the capital itself. It may well from time immemorial by the Greek bish- be that the Turks will long retain the ops in other parts of the Turkish Empire. Bosphorus and Stamboul after they have Generally, the policy of the Porte to lost substantial hold on their European Greece seems to be unnecessarily hostile. provinces. As they fall back on those The late prime minister of Greece, M. provinces where a great majority of the Tricoupis, complained to me that, with population are Moslems, they become poevery desire to keep on good terms with litically stronger, in the sense that they Turkey, his government found it impossi- raise fewer controversies founded on race ble to do so, as no concession of the and religion. smallest kind was ever made to them. Nothing but fear, he said, would induce the sultan to do or to settle anything. Looking at the present map of Turkey, it is obvious that the area in which Christian races now predominate is not large. Macedonia, Epirus, Crete, and the islands of the Ægean Sea, constitute the main points of difficulty. There are also the provinces of Van and Erzeroum, where the condition of the Armenians presents a most serious difficulty, all the greater because they are a minority of the popula. tion. The jealousies of Greece and Bulgaria are such that it would not seem to be a very difficult task for the Porte to play off one against the other, and to postpone awhile the claims of either to the inherit ance of Macedonia. Nor does it appear that the Russian government is at present anxious to precipitate events in the east of Asia Minor, or to use the Armenian question as a pretext for a further advance in this direction. If only decent government could be secured for these provinces in the direction of ordinary protection for life and property, the putting down of brigandage, and the lightening of the burthens of taxation, there might yet be a further period of rest and respite for Turkey before the Eastern question is reopened in an acute form. It is obvious to any one who visits Constantinople that the material and commercial interests of Austria and Germany are extending greatly in the Balkan Peninsula and in Asia Minor, and that those of England are rather on the decline. Immense efforts are made by German firms to obtain hold of the trade in Bulgaria and Serviâ, also in Asia Minor. Their agents thoroughly acquaint themselves with the languages and inform themselves as to the wants of the people - -a course which does not appear to be taken by English merchants. German capitalists have constructed the railways to Constantinople and Salonika, and have recently obtained a concession of great importance for a line from Ismid to Angora, which will tap the centre of Asia Minor. The granting of this concession was connected with what seems very like a confiscation of the interests of a British company in a line from Scutari to Ismid. German influences with the Porte for such purposes appear to be all-powerful. It is obvious, then, that the destiny of Constantinople, both from a commercial and political point of view, is becoming more and more a matter which primarily affects Austria and Germany. It is said to be a political axiom in Russia that the way to Constantinople is through Vienna. As regards England, it is certain that In the absence, however, of those con- its hands are free; not the slightest apditions, and for want of capable and proach has been made towards complying honest governors and officials, the condi- with the conditions of the Treaty of Bertion of these provinces, and the contrastlin or the Cyprus Convention with respect between them and those freed from Turkey in 1877, are such that neither the skill of diplomacy nor the jealousies of rival claimants will long be effective to keep the people from rising or to prevent a further disintegration of the empire. Whether this will necessarily involve the question of the destination of Constan3751 LIVING AGE. VOL. LXXIII. to general reforms and to the special treatment of the Armenians, and we are as far as ever from the realization of the object of Lord Stratford's policy, namely, "the constitution of a new Turkey a state worthy to be defended on moral as well as material grounds as a barrier against the encroachments of its enemies." G. SHAW LEFEVRE. From Blackwood's Magazine. THE DRUSES OF THE HOLY LAND. I. concerning the Druses, which has been handed down amongst the ignorant and bigoted Christian sects of the Lebanon for many centuries. This report accuses Of all the various tribes and races which the Druses of habitually marrying their at present inhabit the Holy Land, there own daughters, and of carrying on licenare none more distinctive and interesting tious orgies with promiscuous intercourse than the Druses. The interest attaching under the name of religious worship. As to them is due to several causes. In the far as I can discover, the first person who first place, they are one of the most exclu- promulgated this absurd idea was Benjasive races upon earth. They keep reli- min of Tudela, an inaccurate and untrustgiously and rigorously to themselves, worthy writer of the Crusading period; never intermarrying with outsiders, never and it is a curious evidence of the tenacity interfering with the religious opinions of with which ignorant fanaticism will cling others, and never allowing others to inter- to scandalous insinuations affecting other fere with theirs. It would be equally im- sects and religions, that such a ridicupossible to convert a Druse to any other lously false charge as this should have religion, as it would be to become a Druse survived against the Druses even to the one's self. They have one great saying present day, in the very country and diswith reference to their religion: "The tricts which they still inhabit. A striking door is shut; none can enter in, and none parallel to this is to be found in the popcan pass out." They would on no account ular belief amongst the Christian peasadmit a proselyte into the mysteries of antry of Hungary, Poland, and Roumania, their faith, nor accept a convert from any that the Jews sacrifice human lives and other religion. It is equally out of the drink human blood at certain of their reliquestion to attempt to pervert any of the gious ceremonies. A like accusation was Druses to another creed. It is true that commonly entertained against the early in many parts of the Lebanon, and espe- Christians, but we should scarcely have cially in the neighborhood of Beyrout, expected such fanatical ignorance to have many Druse children may be found in existed at the close of the nineteenth centhe missionary schools of the Roman tury. It is, however, to be in a great Catholics, Greeks, and Protestants. They measure accounted for by the jealous are allowed to be instructed in the cate- secrecy with which the Druses in Syria, chisms of the various schools where they like the Jews in the east of Europe, and may be placed; and, not unfrequently, the the early Christians in the Roman Emteachers and pastors of the missions have pire, guard the celebration of their relifondly imagined that they have secured gious rites; for secrecy always engenders promising lambs for their fold from among suspicion, and human nature is ever prone the children of Druses. But as soon as to conceive the worst idea of that which ever they arrive at the age for leaving school, when the girls are marriageable and the boys ready to assist their fathers in the labor of the field, they are taken back to their Druse village and home, and become as strict and exclusive in their religion as if they had never heard of any other. One could fearlessly challenge any missionary to produce a genuine case of a convert from Drusedom who had arrived at years of maturity. Another feature of interest in the case of the Druses is the mystery which, to most people, surrounds their history, creed, and principles. Books and treatises have been written, full of vague conjectures and theories as to their origin and history, and hinting at still wilder and more absurd beliefs as to the mysterious practices which are carried on at their secret gatherings for the celebration of their religious rites. Take, for example, one outrageous and utterly false report is concealed from its view. This very secrecy, whilst it has been fruitful in engendering idle and suspicious beliefs concerning them, has undoubtedly surrounded the Druse religion and race with a certain halo of attraction for those who have come into contact with them. There is a third feature of special interest for Englishmen in connection with the Druses. Should England ever find it necessary to attempt an armed occupation of Syria, the Druses are the only purely native tribe on whose fidelity and support the British forces could rely. Under these circumstances, some account of this remarkable race from one who has lived amongst them for several years, and has had unusual opportunities for observing their inner life, may be not without some amount of interest and instruction. The broad outlines of the origin of the name and religion of the Druses are tolerably familiar to those who take any interest in the races of the East. But | Duruzi, Hamzé fled from Egypt, and arriv their real ancestry has, up to the present, ing in Syria, he attempted to promulgate been veiled in mystery and doubt; and in the new religion. He asserted that order to make clear this interesting point, Hakim was not dead, but that he had it is necessary briefly to recapitulate what miraculously disappeared from amongst may be well known to many. his subjects, who had proved themselves unworthy of such a divine and holy being; that he was immortal, and that in the fulness of time he would come forth from his place of secret retirement in power and majesty, attended by a mighty army, and would victoriously assert his position as the incarnate of God. In the year 996 A.D., a certain Hakim, surnamed Biamrillah, ascended the throne of Egypt, at the early age of eleven years, as the third caliph of the Fatimite dy nasty. He reigned twenty-five years, and during that time he displayed such a wild mixture of vice and folly that grave doubts have existed as to his sanity. Amongst other acts he solemnly cursed the first caliph in the Mohammedan mosques of Cairo, and afterwards revoked the curse; he compelled his Jewish and Christian subjects to abjure their religions, and afterwards permitted them to resume them; he burnt the half of Cairo, and gave his soldiers free license to pillage the remaining half; he forbade the sacred pilgrimage of El Haj to Mecca, the fast of Ramadan, the five daily prayers, and all other Moslem rites; he ordered all shops to be kept open the whole night through; he uprooted all the vines in Upper Egypt; he forbade the manufac ture of shoes; he put the most rigid restraint upon women, forbidding any female above the age of thirteen to go out of doors at any time on any pretext whatever; he persecuted all his subjects of every rank, degree, and kind with every sort of annoyance that his ingenuity could suggest; in a word, he behaved in such an outrageous manner that his throne and life became endangered; and at last, as a happy thought, he tried to cover all his misdeeds and to impose upon his subjects, by giving himself out as an incarnation of the Deity. This absurd doctrine was taken up by a Persian named Mohamed Ibn Ismail Duruzi, who thought to gain the caliph's favor by pandering to his eccentricities. His endeavors to bolster up his royal master's pretensions were, however, futile amongst the Egyptians. Hakim's character was too well known to admit of any of his subjects being duped by his blasphemous claims to divinity, and both he and Mohamed Duruzi were murdered. Hakim fell under a conspiracy against his life, headed by his own sister; be was assassinated in the year 1021. Hamze met with no success in his missionary enterprise till he arrived at the western slopes of the Lebanon. There he found a remarkable race, living quite separate and distinct from all surrounding peoples, without any fixed code of religion of their own, and ready to embrace his doctrines. This race, who accept Hamzé as their great prophet, and regard Hakim as the divine Messiah, are to this day known as Druses, after Duruzi, Hamzé's tutor. And now comes this interesting and abstruse question: From whom were descended this separate and distinct race whom Hamzé found on the slopes of Lebanon? It is my object in this paper to answer this question. And here let me say, that it is not without careful investigation, a close examination into the doctrines and religious practices of the Druses, and much private conversation with some of the most learned and instructed of their priests, or khateebs, that I have arrived at the conclusions which I believe to be true. In one word, the Druses are, according to my researches, neither more nor less than the direct descendants of the subjects of Hiram, king of Tyre, who assisted Solomon in the building of the Temple. These subjects of Hiram were, of course, Phoenicians. But the Phoenicians were of two classes, the maritime traders of the seaboard, whose fame is so renowned, and the less-known mountaineers of the Lebanon district. The former, as the natural result of their mercantile life and their intimate intercourse with foreign nations, have long since lost their individuality and become merged in other races. The latter, who were really those that were principally employed in hewing Probably nothing more would have been down the cedar-trees of Lebanon, quarryheard of this insanely vicious monarching and fashioning the stones, and perand his pretensions, had it not been for a man named Hamzé Ibn Ahmed, who had been a disciple of Mohamed Ibn Ismail Duruzi. On the death of Hakim and forming other services in aid of the erection of the Temple, were, from the very nature of their homes and occupations, less liable to change their habits of life or to become intermingled with other tribes and nations. Thus, long after the recognition of the Phoenician race, as a race, was lost to Europeans, these people were still quietly occupying their same mountain settlements, preserving their integrity of blood, and keeping themselves distinct from surrounding influences. which contains the main essence of his teaching, is full of the most beautiful and lofty thoughts, mingled, it is true, with much that is false and absurd, and yet breathing, as a whole, a far different spirit from that which pervaded the life and pretensions of Hakim. The mere fact of Hamzé's creed being new and unique With the decline of Tyre, Sidon, and might not, perhaps, have proved sufficient the other Phoenician maritime ports, the of itself to induce his hearers to accept worship of Baal and Astarte had gradually his teaching, if they had not also been died out; and when Hamzé came amongst greatly influenced by his own personal this primitive race, occupying the secluded character and example. Be this as it slopes of Lebanon, he found them prac-may, the life of Hamzé amongst his distically without a religion; though they had ciples was, so far as one can gather, a life amongst them certain customs and traditions which, taken in connection with other circumstances which I shall presently point out, were in the highest degree significant of their connection with Sol omon, and which also indicate a close relation between their ancestry and the originators of the mystic rites cf Freemasonry. They were in the habit of holding|priate, though perhaps less euphonious, if secret assemblies, and they had pass words, signs, and degrees of initiation. The Druses then, according to my beBut as far as a definite religious creed was lief, are merely the modern representaconcerned, they do not appear to have tives of the illustrious Phoenicians of old, been in possession of any fixed code of genuine and lineal descendants of the belief, beyond their faith in the existence of a Deity. It is not difficult to see why Christianity and Mohammedanism had failed to attract them. That rigid exclusiveness, which is continually cropping up as the great distinctive feature of their race, had hindered them from embracing any religion which would have brought them into contact and communion with outside races. Their chief desideratum was a creed which they could enjoy to themselves alone, which had been adopted by no one else, and which none but themselves should be allowed to enter. So then Hamzé, on his arrival among them, found disciples ready at hand to listen to his teaching, unbiassed by preconceived beliefs, dissatisfied with their destitute religious condition, and in a word, as it were, "empty, swept, and garnished" for the reception of his doc trines. The very fact that these doctrines were new, and that they had hitherto been accepted by no other nations, was, in all probability, one of the most important factors in inducing this people to listen to them, and, finally, to adopt them as their own. Hamze was undoubtedly a very different character from either Hakim or Duruzi, whom he professed to follow. The "Book of Testimonies to the Mysteries of the Unity," which was composed by him, and of great self-sacrifice, humility, and purity; and it is an evidence of his self-abnegation that he bestowed on his new converts the name of his master, Duruzi, instead of his own. It is curious, indeed, that that name should be theirs, for the Druses regard Duruzi as the incarnation of all that is evil. It would have been far more appro they had been known as Hamzé-ites. subjects of Hiram, king of Tyre. To |