The terms were almost identical with those which had been rejected by the Porte two years before, after the conference at Bucharest. In view of the fact that the Ottoman armies had been everywhere defeated during the war, and that the Russians had obtained actual possession of the Crimea, Wallachia, Moldavia, and Bessarabia in Europe, and of Georgia and Mingrelia in the Caucasus, the terms were distinctly moderate. The Empress must have been very desirous of peace. There was a serious rebellion of her southern provinces. Affairs in Poland were causing her great anxiety. Her losses in the war with Turkey had been very great, though her victories were many. It was all-important to her that her hands should be free. These were doubtless adequate reasons for moderation in her terms to Turkey.

Under this treaty Russia gave up nearly all the Turkish territory occupied by her armies. The Crimea was not, indeed, restored to the Turks. The independence of the Tartars there and in Bessarabia up to the frontier of Poland was recognized under a native prince, in whose election Russia and Turkey were forbidden to interfere. Neither Power was thenceforth to “intervene in the domestic, political, civil, and internal affairs of this new State.” There was, however, a grave reservation pregnant of future aggrandizement to Russia. She was to retain the fortresses of Kertch, Yenikale, and the cities of Azoff and Kilburn. These would necessarily give access to and virtual command over the Crimea to Russia at any future time. For the present, however, the Crimea, though lost to the Turks, was not acquired by Russia. It is probable that the ulemas would not have assented to the transfer of a Moslem province to a Christian Power, and that the war would have been continued if Russia had insisted on this. Oczakoff, on the opposite side of the Dnieper to Kilburn, was retained by the Porte. But the two Karbartas on the shores of the Euxine, though inhabited by Moslems, were retained by Russia. With these exceptions, all the Ottoman territories in the hands of Russia as a result of the war—Wallachia, Moldavia, Bessarabia, Georgia, and Mingrelia—were restored to the Sultan. In the case of Wallachia and Moldavia, this retrocession was subject to the condition that free exercise of the Christian religion was to be secured to their population, and that there was to be humane and generous government there for the future. The right of remonstrance in these respects was secured to the ministers of Russia at Constantinople on behalf of these provinces.

Another most important clause, full of danger for the future to the Ottoman Empire, related to its Christian subjects. “The Sublime Porte,” it ran, “promises to protect constantly the Christian religion and churches and allow the ministers of Russia at Constantinople to make representation on their behalf.”

This most important provision gave to Russia a preferential right of protection of the Christian rayas not conceded to any other Christian Power. Provision also was made for the full access of Russian subjects to the holy city of Jerusalem. Free navigation was provided for Russian ships on the Black Sea and the Mediterranean, but nothing was said as to a right of access through the Dardanelles and Bosphorus. There was no mention of Poland in the treaty, though it had been the original cause of the war. Two secret clauses provided for the payment by the Porte of four millions of roubles within three years and for the withdrawal of the Russian fleet from the Archipelago.

The importance of this treaty, moderate though it was in many of its terms, has always been recognized by historians as the starting-point for further and greater dismemberments of the Turkish Empire. The treaty of Carlowitz had secured the deliverance of the Christian population of Hungary from Ottoman rule. But this treaty now, for the first time, tore from the Empire a Moslem province and gave to Russia a right of intervention on behalf of all the Christian population—an immense innovation, humiliating to the Turks, and fraught with the gravest peril to their Empire in the future.

There can be no doubt that the Grand Vizier was fully authorized by the Porte to agree to the terms of this treaty. He was, however, recalled and deposed immediately after its signature, and he died from the effects of poison on his way to Constantinople. It was probably thought by the ministers of the Sultan that Mouhsinzade, if called to account for concluding so humiliating a treaty, would be able to show their full responsibility for it. It remains only to state that the Russian plenipotentiaries at Kainardji delayed the signature of the treaty for four days in order that it might synchronize with the anniversary of the treaty of the Pruth, which had been the cause of so much humiliation to Russia.

XVII
TO THE TREATY OF JASSY
1774-92

Eighteen years elapsed between the peace of Kainardji, 1774, and the treaty of Jassy, 1792, the next conspicuous event in the downward course of the Ottoman Empire. The first thirteen of these years were a period of external peace to the Empire under the rule of Abdul Hamid I. The country had been completely exhausted by the late war with Russia, and the Sultan—or, rather, his ministers, for he appears to have been little competent himself to carry on the government—were strongly in favour of maintaining peace, and did so in spite of great provocation from the Empress Catherine. That able and unscrupulous woman pursued her designs for the complete subjection of the Crimea with relentless resolution and activity. It was an essential condition of the peace of Kainardji that the Crimea was to be an independent State under the rule of a native Tartar prince. The breach of it, by the assumption of sovereignty, direct or indirect, on the part of Russia, would undoubtedly be a just cause of war to the Turks. The Porte, however, was not in a position to take up a challenge of the Empress. The knowledge of this was doubtless the main motive for her proceedings during the next few years.