In addition to these oppressions, whenever the army was put in motion the inhabitants were obliged to furnish animals to transport baggage and provisions, and were paid two-thirds less than the common wages of the country. If horses or mules were wanted for the government, they were seized without any respect to persons, and paid for at whatever price the authorities thought proper to give. Vessels for the transport of provisions and government stores were seized in like manner, and the owners paid about a third of the freight they could have gained in trade.
Tampering with the currency was a source of dishonest gain to the Pacha: taxes were ordered to be paid in certain coins, Mehemet Ali fixing the value always below its standard; in short, there was a system of legal pillage established from one end of the country to the other.
These oppressions were nevertheless borne with, for they are common in Eastern governments; and, had not their new ruler commenced the disarmament of the people, and the forced levies, they probably would never have endeavoured to shake off his yoke. But his measures, odious in themselves, were rendered quite intolerable by the mode in which they were executed. According to Mr. Farren, the conscription in Syria amounted to 11 per cent. on the male population; the classes who were exempt from the conscription were obliged to find substitutes either by fine or purchase, and many who had been seized and drafted into regiments more than once, and obtained their discharge by purchase, were again seized, and their remonstrances wholly disregarded.
“The periods,” says Mr. Farren, in his excellent letter to Lord Lindsay[[2]], “of the forced levies are kept secret, and generally commence on a Friday, when the mosques are resorted to. At the hour of prayer numerous parties of soldiers are distributed through the quarters of the cities, and intelligence is conveyed to them by the firing of a gun of the moment to commence. They then rush on all the citizens who may be in the streets, and drive or drag them struggling along to the great square of the Serai, when, having left them in its inclosure, they return to make fresh captives of all upon their routes. A short time suffices to spread a thrill of fear and despair throughout the city. Women may be seen rushing wildly through the streets, followed by their children, to seek the husband, son, or father, who but a few hours before had left them to provide for their daily wants, and now are separated, perhaps for ever, from their families without a parting benediction.
“Within the inclosure, which files of armed troops surround, the wretched victims are crowded together, bowed down with despair, while, pressing upon every avenue, their wives and daughters and aged mothers may be seen, wildly darting their frenzied glances through the captives in search of a missing relative, or bursting into paroxysms of despair on beholding the lost objects of their fears; and, all around, the air is rent by the cries of these unfortunates, cursing, as I have heard them, the very name of their prophet, and invoking the Deity himself to avenge the cause of the poor and the oppressed. The wretched conscripts are taken immediately before the medical men of the army, and, unless physically disqualified, are sent off to the Castle, confined there, dressed as soldiers, and in a week or fortnight, marched out of the place and drafted into the regiments. This is no exaggerated picture, and many travellers in England—and one especially, Sir Edwin Pearson, who was lately with me at Damascus during one of these scenes,—can verify this statement, and attest the general wretchedness of the people. In the dead of the night the quarters of the city have been entered by armed soldiers, the houses forcibly opened, and their male inmates dragged from them. At these times the shops are closed for days, and all business is suspended. Considerable loss is consequently sustained by all classes, and as the debts that may be due by those who are seized are seldom or never recovered, large sums are lost in that manner to the citizens.
“The soldiers avail themselves of the general panic to get money from the aged or maimed,—and even by entering houses and seizing children in them, who are liberated by their frightened mothers at any immediate sacrifice.”
It is not surprising that people, thus driven to despair, should revolt. In the year 1834 the insurrections began in the Haouran, and spread afterwards to the country of the Druses and Naplousians. These insurrections, however, Mehemet Ali managed with his usual energy to put down, and established more security to the people from being plundered by anybody but himself; that, and a greater facility and safety in travelling through the country, appear to have been the only merits of Mehemet Ali’s government in Syria. Thus things proceeded for a while, the Pacha exerting himself to fortify the passes of Taurus, and building barracks at Antioch and other places, particularly at St. Jean d’Acre, while Ibrahim and his officers laboured to introduce new cultures, as of the sugar-cane, the indigo plant, &c., and with some success; but this could not reconcile the Syrians to the grinding monopolies and vexatious burdens of their ruler, and very strong measures were required to keep up the Egyptian authority.
In the year 1838 Mehemet Ali first began to talk of independence, and announced to the Consuls his intention, at no distant period, of declaring himself. Shortly after this he set out on an expedition to the mines of Sennaar, and was absent some considerable time.
The Sultan, as might have been expected, had never ceased to form plans for the recovery of Syria to his rule, and as early as the year 1834 he had committed the charge of several of the pachalics of the eastern part of Asia Minor to a Circassian soldier, named Hafiz Pacha, in order that he might there raise an army for that purpose. Hafiz laboured with great zeal in the cause, and from the remoteness of the districts, his progress was unnoticed by the European Powers. At length, in the beginning of 1839 the Porte more openly made preparations for war; and on the 12th of February of that year, Count Molé for the first time brought the affairs of the East under the consideration of Lord Granville, the British Ambassador[[3]]; and Lord Palmerston repeatedly wrote to Lord Ponsonby to discourage, by every possible means, the Porte from again embroiling themselves in war with Mehemet Ali; declaring, at the same time, that if the Porte was attacked, assistance would be given; but, if on the other hand they became the aggressors, it might change the whole face of affairs.
Notwithstanding the advice given to the Porte by the Allied Ministers at Constantinople, the Sultan, relying on the reports of the efficiency of his army in Asia Minor, communicated to him by his General, gave directions for the advance of the Turkish army, and they actually marched beyond Bir, which is only sixty miles distant from Aleppo. Mehemet Ali determined, however, not to be the aggressor, and directed Ibrahim to refrain from making any movement in advance.