It is said that they are to be expelled from European Turkey. If this is the case, the unfortunate population of Asia Minor, both Mohammedan and Christian, among whom they will be quartered, are most deeply to be pitied, as well as the Government, whose duty it will be to re-establish and discipline these ruffians now rendered desperate and doubly hardened by the crimes and horrors of every description into which they have lately plunged with impunity.
The best and wisest plan would be to request Russia, if she really and earnestly desires the welfare of the Christians in Turkey, to take the Circassians back and reinstate them in their native land. Should this be impracticable, the Turkish Government would do well to send them to colonize some of the fertile but waste lands in the heart of Asia Minor, in the vicinity of half-savage tribes like themselves, in whom they might find their match, and cease to become a perpetual source of trouble and injury both to the Government and its peaceful subjects.
The migration of the Tatars into Turkey preceded that of the Circassians by half a century. When their country passed into the hands of Russia, the Tatars, unwilling to remain under her dominion, removed, at a great sacrifice of life and property, into Bessarabia, where, scarcely had they begun to feel settled and to forget their wrongs and sufferings, than the Muscovite eagle again clouded the horizon, and the emigrants, fluttering at its approach like a flock of frightened birds, collected their families and belongings, and took to flight. Weary and exhausted, they alighted on the Ottoman soil, and settled in the Dobrudcha. They were a quiet and industrious people, and before long, through toil and exertion, they made themselves homes, and peopled the Dobrudcha with their increasing numbers. Some of the Tatar princes migrated with their subjects, and took up their abode in the vicinity of Zaghra, where they retained their title of Sultanlar, or “the princes.” They became in time wealthy landowners, but, unlike their less exalted brethren, they were hard, unjust, and oppressive masters to the Bulgarian peasants, and by their cruel treatment of these people were among the causes of their being cited as rebels before the authorities.
A second emigration of Tatars took place after the Crimean War, when these unfortunate people, in a similar plight to the Circassians, came to join their kinsmen in the Dobrudcha and other parts of European Turkey. They were poor, and for the most part destitute of every requisite of life. The Turkish Government did its best to help them by giving grants of land, etc., but those who settled as agriculturists were unfortunate, for a series of bad seasons crushed their first efforts, and, unassisted by further relief, they remained in a stationary condition of poverty, notwithstanding many praiseworthy efforts to better their condition. Those who settled in towns fared better; all who were acquainted with some handicraft at once set to work and executed their different branches of industry with so much activity, neatness, and honesty that they soon reached prosperity and comfort.
Their religion is Mohammedan, but they are by no means strict or fanatical. Their women do not cover their faces when among their own community, but when abroad are veiled like the Turkish women. They are very thrifty in their habits, and some are pretty and sweet-looking, but as a rule they are the dirtiest subjects in the Sultan’s dominions. Their uncleanliness with regard to dress, dwellings, and food is so great as to shock and horrify the Turks, who certainly have that virtue which is said to come next to godliness.
The principal ingredient in their cookery seems to be tallow; as candle-makers they are greatly superior to the natives, and the preference given to this article of their manufacture has induced them to take the principal portion of this branch of industry into their hands.
When a colony settled in the town of A⸺, one of my friends took a great interest in the efforts made by these estimable artisans to earn a livelihood as shoe-makers, tailors, tallow-chandlers, etc. Some opened small shops for the sale of different articles, while those who had no distinct calling or possessed no capital became wood-cutters, or hawkers of vegetables, fruits, etc. In this business, however, they met with shrewd and knowing professionals—the Jews, who were far more able and practised hands at it, and at first gave very little chance to the poor Tatars. It became a race between Jew and Tatar who should get up earliest in the morning and go furthest to meet the peasants bringing their produce to market. In this the Tatar was most successful, as he was the better walker of the two, and less afraid than the Jew of venturing some distance from the town; but the latter contented himself with the reflection that there are many roads that lead to the same goal, and many ways of making profit which are not dreamt of in Tatar philosophy.
The Gypsies in Turkey, numbering about 200,000 souls, profess outwardly Mohammedanism, but keep so few of its tenets that the true believers, holding them in execration, deny their right to worship in the mosques or bury their dead in the same cemetery. Although not persecuted, the antipathy and disdain felt for them evinces itself in many ways, and appears to be founded upon a strange legend current in the country. This legend says that when the gypsy nation were driven out of their country and arrived at Mekran, they constructed a wonderful machine, to which a wheel was attached. Nobody appeared able to turn this wheel till, in the midst of their vain efforts, some evil spirit presented himself under the disguise of a sage and informed the chief (whose name was Chen) that the wheel would be made to turn only when he had married his sister Guin. The chief accepted the advice, the wheel turned round, and the name of the tribe after this incident became that of the combined names of the brother and sister, Chenguin, the appellation of all the gypsies of Turkey at the present day.
This unnatural marriage, coming to the knowledge of one of the Moslem saints, was forthwith, together with the whole tribe, soundly cursed; they were placed beyond the pale of mankind, and sent out of the country under the following malediction: “May you never more enter or belong to the seventy-seven and a half races that people the earth, but as outcasts be scattered to the four corners of the earth, homeless, wretched, and poor; ever wandering and toiling, never realizing wealth, enjoying the fruits of your labor, or acquiring the esteem of mankind!”[4]
I have related this legend because it represents in a very striking manner the condition of the gypsies of Turkey as well as the belief placed in it by people of all creeds, who not only put them beyond the pale of humankind, but also deny to them what would be granted to animals—their alms. Last year during the Ramazan, a popular Hodja, preaching on charity to a large congregation of Mohammedans, thus addressed them—“O true believers, open your purses every one of you, and give largely to the poor and needy! Refuse not charity either to Mohammedans or Christians, for they are separated from us only by the thickness of the skin of an onion, but give none to the Chenguins, lest part of the curse that rests upon their heads should fall upon yours!”