CHAPTER XX
MUSTAPHA KEMAL PASHA—THE MAN WHO IS MASTER OF HIS FATE
My eye fell on the portrait of a handsome Turkish lady, which was hanging over the Pasha’s writing-desk.
“What a lovely face!” I exclaimed.
“My mother,” said the Pasha, with obvious pride.
“Would it be very indiscreet,” said I, “to ask if I might have the great pleasure of seeing her?”
“She is very ill. The doctors are with her day and night. Alas, I fear she can never recover.”
We afterwards went up the staircase to the invalid’s apartments. To my surprise, we found her seated on a wide divan, supported by cushions. It was difficult at first to believe that she was so near the end.
“Alas!” said Mustapha Kemal, “her suffering has come through me. She is paying back now the tears and anguish she spent for me in exile.” There was sorrow in his voice, too heart-broken for many words.
“Now you can take part in his victory,” I said. “How proud you must be of your son. His is a wonderful story. I am proud only to have spoken with him and seen his work.”
She thanked me with great feeling, and said she believed “God had sent her this son to save the Fatherland—but my son is always kind to me.”
Whilst giving me a beautiful silk handkerchief, scented with her favourite perfume, she asked whether she had not seen me before, ten years ago, in Constantinople.
“She has a marvellous memory,” the Pasha murmured.
In a few days there were to be no more opportunities for any of us to see this dear lady!
When, later, in Constantinople, I ventured upon some allusion to the great devotion he always evinced to his mother, a Turk said: “That is only natural—Oriental, if you will. The man whose hands are steeped in blood, whose soul is black with crime, yet bows in respect to his mother. You might as well be surprised that the sun shines.”
The story of M. Kemal’s youth and of his brilliant career is, of course, well known in Anatolia. He was born in Salonica in 1880, and there are legends that many who saw the boy, “fair as the corn,” at his games, would say: “Look well at that little fellow. He will one day be the saviour of his country.”
St. Jeanne d’Arc’s “Life,” you remember, begins with a description of the countryside on the night of her birth—“all the animals seemed strangely excited. There was a chorus of approval from the chickens, the geese, and the pigs.” “Very possibly,” as a friend once commented on this passage, “it all happened again on the night each of us was born, but no one noticed it.”
So I will speak only of facts. A year ago, how few had even heard his name! How often the Unknown Personality has appeared, just when hope seemed dead, to save his country!
M. Kemal’s father died when he was quite a child, though already attending the school of Chemsi Effendi. Then, for a few years, his mother took him to stay with an uncle in the country, and life became one glorious game in the sunny fields, shooting at rooks, stealing Nature’s secrets, and flourishing on all the delights of being naughty with no one to interfere.
Although his mother seems to have felt, however, that young minds cannot safely be left long undisciplined, and, therefore, brought him back to school at Salonica, the experiment did not prove a success. Like other unusual boys, he was always in hot water and, in the end, was allowed to come home and play at soldiers.
It was Edison’s unsympathetic schoolmistress who told his mother: “This boy’s brain is addled, we can do nothing with him.” He had given one of his companions a seidlitz powder to find out whether the gas would lift up his patient into the air! Mrs. Edison was wise enough to take the boy’s education into her own hands, proving herself “the loveliest and most wonderful teacher on God’s earth,” as he afterwards declared.
As the Pasha’s mother did not approve of soldiering, the boy simply took himself off to a military college, passed the examinations with distinction, and then proudly confronted her with all his certificates! He was both hard-working and intelligent, devoted to French and mathematics.
But even as a schoolboy his country’s suffering must have eaten into his ardent imagination. I was told that he would spend hours of recreation in making speeches and organising a committee, to protest against the tyranny of Abdul Hamid. Already he felt that an army was not enough to save his country, and persuaded some of his schoolfellows to study politics, sowing the seed of all he has since given to the world.
From the beginning he determined, above all, to make himself master of every detail concerning the French Revolution; to understand, by understanding “the people,” why it happened and how it happened, what mistakes were made, the real ideals that inspired its passion of sacrifice, and the permanent gains it brought to France and to mankind.
Long after all his companions were fast asleep, the young Mustapha dived into every possible book he could lay hands on, to clear up this fascinating subject. Next morning he would hold forth to all and sundry upon his discoveries, and finally issued a paper with exemplary regularity, which was widely circulated in manuscript.
Meanwhile military studies had not been neglected; He was promoted Staff Captain, and—through under-hand channels—“recommended” to the notice of Abdul Hamid, who promptly exiled him to Syria.
In Damascus, Beyrout, and Jaffa, his more revolutionary plans matured. At last the Constitution was proclaimed, and he was able to join his mother in Salonica!—not yet, however, for the quiet of a restored home life.
At the time when the troops marched to deliver Constantinople from the reactionaries, he was appointed Chief of Staff to Mahmoud Chefket Pasha. During the Tripolitain War he was first at Syrenaique, and afterwards at Benghazi.
When the Great War broke out, he was military attaché at Sofia, but was immediately despatched to the command of a Division in the Dardanelles, and, when this had been formed and organised, marched to Gallipoli. It was he who defeated the English forces, not only in Gallipoli, but at Anafarta.
After we had been driven out of the Dardanelles, he went to the Caucasus in command of the 15th Army Corps, and recovered Bitlis and Mouche from the Russians. For a time he led the 6th Army Corps, under the German General Falkenhayn; but nothing could reconcile him to his chief’s methods and the reckless loss of life they involved. He therefore resigned and went back to Constantinople.
After accompanying the present Khalif on a visit to Hindenberg and Ludendorff, he tells me that, when he thus first clearly saw into the real issue of the war; he also saw, even more clearly, the need for making his own plans in Turkey.
He was in Syria when the Armistice was signed; and returning with high hopes to Constantinople, sank broken-hearted before the treachery of Mudros! But not for long.
Never the man to nurse despair, he quickly rose again to his country’s call. Offered the post of Inspector of the East (that is, High Functionary of the Eastern Villayets), he accepted at once, and hurried into Anatolia to prepare for resistance.
From the moment he stepped out at Samsoun, the movement began.
What shall we say of the “Man at the Helm—the Hero and the Genius?” Were his “Destinies,” indeed, “written on the tablets of heaven”; or may he not rather claim:
“I am Master of my Fate
I am Captain of my Soul”
Every detail of the work had to be built up, as it were, stone by stone, entirely afresh—an army to be found anywhere and everywhere from nothing. Yet it was trained and organised to become, what Colonel Mougin tells me, is “the best-disciplined and best-officered army in the world.”
Perhaps the Battle of the Sakharia, lasting fifteen days without interruption, may be quoted as the Great Victory. It was certainly one of the battles of this century. When one of the majors asked for instructions about “the line provided for retreat,” he was told: “There will be no retreat. Advance, or die in your trenches!”
On the anniversary of the Battle of the In-Enus, Ismet Pasha told me a little about his victory, and what it meant. What victory must mean when you have nothing with which to conquer.
Already the military experts have written pages about the advance and the victory. One day, we hope, “The Pasha” will give us his own version.
How, again, shall we tell the endurance of the people, suffering through long years in silence and alone? To us who could but look on them, pitying and admiring from a distance, it seemed as if someone must get through somehow to offer the hand of friendship and give, at least, heartfelt sympathy. I tried, but it could not be done. Even now, I cannot say all it has cost me to reach Angora!
Mustapha Kemal must put on record “The Birth of a Nation”; and from Halidé Hanoum we want the thousand and one pictures of the agony of simple folk—desolate village homes, women who weep and work, the little ones crying, “What is it, mother?”; all that war means to men, all that men can endure for liberty and the right.
“What does it matter,” she has written, “though the world call us pariah? We will die with honour. What does it matter if food be denied us by all our neighbours? Our own soil will keep us alive, sheltered in sackcloth!”
At Lausanne the patriot-passion is taunted for its arrogance. It is forgotten that self-made nations, like men, if made with honour, have certain rights and duties, which the most illustrious and ancient lineage cannot bestow. Moreover, we carry with ease what has come down to us through the centuries; what we have suffered and fought for, we grasp, crying maybe somewhat loudly: “Hands off!” To be in Turkey, and to learn of the heroism of her people, is to understand her moderation.
I was naturally keenly interested in the Pasha’s views on women; I have been still more interested to hear that, since I was at Angora, he has put his theories into practice.
I have never spoken in England or the United States without having to answer the most absurd questions on life in a harem. This time, in London, the old nonsense was trotted out, and my replies either invented or distorted.
I was interviewed during our own Suffrage agitation, and expressed my conviction that “women must either have full liberty to earn their livelihoods in any profession, or be sheltered and protected as Turkish women are sheltered and protected.” Next morning a large poster appeared with the legend, under my portrait, “English writer urges polygamy!”
The paper inserted my prompt denial, but, of course, that never was read by thousands who had swallowed the poster. A Glasgow paper, indeed, was considerate enough to remark that, “knowing my people were Presbyterians, the kindest interpretation was—insanity!”
American pressmen were particularly furious with me for asserting that polygamy does not exist in Turkey, and that no Turkish women would put up with the European system of “establishments.” When they persisted that “Turks had more than one wife,” I asked, “why many men, who lacked the means or courage to ever marry, yet supposed the men of the East could each have four?”
In my judgment, “Progress for Women” has begun on far sounder lines in Turkey than elsewhere. The occasion has come to help them, and I believe they are ready to meet it. There is to-day so much to be done for their country that few, surely, will hesitate to come forward and stand beside the men in the great work. Temptations to rivalry or competition scarcely exist.
Ten years ago, that eloquent and graceful speaker, Hamdoullah Soubhi, was urging the women to freedom, bidding them cast off their veils and help to govern the country. To-day it is Mustapha Kemal himself who, in season and out of season, is calling on them to break for ever with the harem, and learn to be helpmates to their husbands.
I have said and written, over and over again, that women should not, and need not, compete with men. That is not the real road to freedom. Liberty dwelleth among comrades, and shuns a rival.
“This time next year,” said Mustapha Kemal, “woman must be free. She must uncover her face and mix with men.”
“How will the men like it?” I asked.
“It matters little what they like or dislike. Freedom must come.”
He has no more patience with tradition in men’s dress. “When summer comes and our kalpaks are too hot, we shall wear hats with ‘brims,’ to protect us from the sun. The time is past for ‘dress’ to reveal the ‘race’. We should dress for comfort.”
Hamid Bey and other delegates at Lausanne are of the same opinion. They say the old conventional way of dressing “stamps the Turk in Europe as a member of an inferior race.”
Taking my courage in both hands, I ventured to mention the fear his friends had expressed to me, of his marrying a princess.
“That will never happen,” he replied. “I have already chosen an educated woman of my own people, with character enough to be ‘equal partner’ in all my work. There can be no happiness in union for only half one’s character and one’s life. But I stand for democracy, and was never attracted by rank.”
Everyone now is talking of Mustapha Kemal’s future wife. The ring was bought for him at Lausanne by the delegates, who were as excited about the business as any school-children. His neighbours, sweet little Mme. Ruchène Echref and her talented husband are beside themselves with delighted anticipation of having so charming a châtelaine at Tchan-Kaya.
Mme. Ruchène told me that the Pasha was staying with his future father-in-law during the Moudania Conference, and that Latifée Hanoum proved herself most helpful over all his despatches, as she speaks and writes excellent English and French.
The wife to be could have no better sponsor than Mme. Echref! She and her husband, like Adnan Bey and Halidé Hanoum, gave up everything to follow the Pasha. They would not, however, allow me ever to speak of their sacrifices, or tell the tale of their many tragic sufferings in all parts of Turkey. Now, indeed, their dear little two-roomed cabin, so tastefully furnished with its beautiful pictures, may well stand for “love in a cottage.” She does a great deal of Red Crescent work among the women who are still so active in helping the refugees of Anatolia.
One only wishes that the other social reforms, splendidly started in Constantinople, had not been so long interrupted. But like education, and all other real progress, they cannot survive long wars. What criminal waste that means for mankind!
I have talked with many Turkish brides, received many confidences, and the whole question of marriage in Turkey has always interested me immensely.
The first Turkish bride I ever met, long years ago, had never seen her husband before marriage, and detested him from the first. “There is nothing the matter with him,” she admitted, “except that I don’t like him.” Ultimately she managed to escape, married a man of her own choice, and was twenty times more unhappy.
Another bride told me that, as a great favour, she was allowed to see her future husband, and has regretted it ever since. “The dreadful imprudence seems to have robbed life of all its romance!”
Yet one more confession! “I peeped through the lattice-window to look at him as he walked past. Quite an uninteresting little man, but he was ‘my fate’ and I might have ‘been given’ something worse.” But, at her wedding, I found a tall and handsome bridegroom. “What does this mean?” I asked. “What has happened?” And she answered quite calmly: “I must have looked out at the wrong man.”
Tewfik Rushdi Bey declares that it is “easy divorce” in Turkey which makes their marriages so happy and lasting. I gladly pass on the paradox to all English advocates for “marriage reform”; only bidding them remember that Turkish husbands accept big risks at the start. They never hesitate about trusting their mothers to “pick a winner in life’s handicap”; and, since young Western people, one and all, prefer their own way to their parents’, all the “wisdom of the East” may leave them cold.
European bridegrooms must always experience a sense of being “outsiders” at their own weddings; but at least we expect them to be there! In Turkey, the signatures of bride and bridegroom are not affixed to the contract in each other’s presence, and often not even on the same day. It is scarcely necessary to add that the guests belong to the bride’s party, and are entertained at her house. To us it certainly is strange to hear the solemn questions addressed to the bride by the Imam that pledge her life to an “absentee” partner, whom she has never set eyes on. I can still remember a beautiful wedding-dress of white satin brocade, embroidered with silver stars, over which sparkled a large diadem of diamonds. All brides, too, wear a shower of silver threads round the neck, from which they pull out threads to give their friends for “good luck.”
“Good luck” at a wedding naturally means a good husband, and from the number of threads I have received, there should be at least fifty “eligible partners” somewhere in waiting for me.
We, in our turn, wish happiness to the bride on her bridal throne, as we pass before her in solemn procession. Last of all comes the feast, for women only, after which the happy couple are, at last, “introduced.”
At this charming and strange ceremony I also witnessed a fine example of true democracy as practised in the East. Among the guests in their elaborate ball-dresses, trimmed with orange blossom, I noticed the Grand Vizier’s wife; and then, catching sight of a very differently attired group of women, wearing faded and worn tcharchaffs and feradjés, I realised that the “bath-women” of the family had come uninvited to the feast! And the door of the harem was wide open, that all might enter in to see the presents, admire the dresses, and all the other delightful feminine intimacies of such an occasion.
As a matter of fact, I was told by Zeyneb, any woman can go to a Turkish wedding without having been invited. “You, in England, only ask your intimate friends, and yet you have to employ detectives to watch the presents.”
When my attendant, Cadem Haïr (whose colour led me to call her Miss Chocolate) became engaged to a coffee-coloured railway official, she was treated like one of the family by the Pasha’s household. Fatma and I bought her trousseau, we arranged for her to be photographed, and secured a Kara Kheuz (or Punch and Judy show) for the wedding festivities.
So many confidences, so many romances and love-stories inside the Imperial harem, and outside! They would fill a volume.
I have never met an “old maid” in Turkey, and I doubt whether one could be found. I well remember the distress and anxieties of a certain matron whose daughter was still unmarried at twenty-eight. The girl had resolutely refused all offers, and her poor mother could only suppose she had been bewitched. Then one day he appeared, and that story had a happy ending.
Whether the reforms Mustapha Kemal is so determined to promote will substantially diminish the number of early marriages, one cannot, of course, foresee. At present, fortunately, the most brilliant, practical, and advanced Turkish women have found their own sphere, and do not enter into open competition with men. If they are tempted to follow our Western feminists, to steal, not only men’s prestige, but their bread and butter, domestic chaos and anarchy may spread to the East.
For the moment, one does not expect advance beyond “The Pasha’s” own striking example. He has not only chosen his own bride, but dispensed with the Imam—a parallel to the first Englishman who dared to marry in a registry office!
I always said this man would scatter many coupés d’état, once peace was signed; but he has not waited for the signature!
The originality of his gifts to the bride recalls the Prophet of Islam. Mahomet gave his daughter a Koran, a prayer-carpet, and a coffee-mill; Mustapha Kemal has given his wife-to-be General Trécoupis’ revolver and an Arab horse! She is an excellent rider, sitting astride, with the veil only confining her hair.
I much regret that I was never able to find an opportunity of meeting this lady, partly because she was educated at Chislehurst, almost next door to my own school—Rochester.
Inevitably the Pasha’s liberal attitude towards marriage has been criticised, and described as “in direct opposition to the principles of Islam.” He, however, will not admit the charge.
It is true that, at the very door of Europe, women have been content to live through the centuries in a comfortable material security, that means being cut out of all the realities of life, and all the serious joys or sorrows of existence. It is not unnatural that isolation should have kept them down so long.
But the harem was not invented by the Turks, and has nothing in common with the nomad existence of the Great Preacher of the Deserts. Polygamy and the harem were first introduced when the Turks entered Byzantium as conquerors. They served, in those troublous times, as the best means available for the protection of women, and proved a fine school of instruction for Georgian Circassian slaves.
It is false to say that Eastern women have blamed their religion for the evils, so many now recognise, of seclusion. The most ignorant are quite familiar with the great names of women who have been the glory of Islam. Mahomet’s own daughter, the “Lady of Paradise,” spoke to large audiences of dusky-skinned Arabs, her face unveiled. Neither did Zeyneb, the famous and beautiful professor at the University of Bagdad, wear the veil. Khadidja sang in public, her own beautiful songs, still known and admired all over the East. Rhadyah, one of the first great travellers among these lands, was also an eloquent lecturer, applauded by the most learned men of Islam.
Therefore are not the women themselves to blame for their prolonged isolation? or was it the régime of Abdul Hamed?
Mustapha Kemal has not only offered his wife the privileges Mahomet accorded to his daughter, but he has swept from the path of Islam the retrograde heresies that Byzantium grafted on to the Faith.