No internal improvements are dreamt of, and no motive left for speculation, and as there is no mutual confidence between the government and the people, the formation of corporate companies, which require united action, is out of the question, or, if attempted, they are sure to fall through by official exactions. Thus, a country teeming with mines and minerals, is left unexplored, and all other internal resources lie dormant.
Some attempts have of late been made by the government at internal improvements, such as the post-road from Trebizond to Erzuroum; but the over-exertions of those intrusted with the work soon exhausted the appropriations, and the road was but half completed.
The coal mines at Heraclea have shared a similar fate. Indeed, no undertaking can be prosperous in the lands of the officials—and if any such privilege be granted to private individuals, it is invariably under the patronage of some grandee.
A permission was obtained from government by an individual to light the streets of Pera. In the course of six months the lamps were demolished by the citizens, because they were heavily taxed to fill the pockets of the speculator, without any advantage to themselves—the streets for the most part, being as dark as before.
All innovations are, therefore, in disrepute, not that they are not appreciated, but because they invariably prove to be mere schemes for individual advantage, and never pro bono publico.
Hence it is also that the streets, even in the metropolis, are ill paved, filthy, and not lighted—each person carrying his own lantern, and getting along as best he can.
Public enterprise being at so low an ebb, a spirit of indifference pervades the country and if you once pass the aristocracy, the actual necessities of the community are but few. They have no idea therefore of bettering their condition. If you offer them any new invention, they admire its ingenuity, and dryly tell you they have no need of it—consequently there is no need of patent rights for new inventions.
This indifference is not to be construed into a love of inactivity—but is rather the result of selfishness—each man’s interests being circumscribed by the sphere in which he moves. In case of any emergency they are most indefatigable and persevering. It needs only to cite the fact that Pera, one of the suburbs of the city, has, in the course of twenty years, been destroyed by fire four times, and entirely rebuilt by native industry. Indeed, inactivity is against the spirit of the country, for there, there are no Rentiers—but every one must have a calling—even the sultan is traditionally supposed to belong to the tooth-pick trade!
Since the abolition of capital and summary punishments and the monopolies, by the promulgation of of the Tanzimat, which was an attempt at reformation, not without some beneficial results, a new impulse has been given to the activity of the population. In a word, give but the necessary impetus, and as much genuine go-a-headism may be found in Turkey, as in Yankee-land itself.
With such a population, and so many internal resources, it may be deemed a matter of wonder that this empire should be in so ruinous a condition.