Halil thereupon arose, and turning towards the assembly thus addressed it:
"Mussulmans! faithful followers of the Prophet! If any one of you were to hear that his house was on fire, would he need lengthy explanations before hastening away to extinguish it? If ye were to hear that robbers had broken into your houses and were plundering your goods—if ye were to hear that ruffians were throttling your little children or your aged parents, or threatening the lives of your wives with drawn swords, would you wait for further confirmation or persuasion before doing anything, or would you not rather rush away of your own accord to slay these robbers and murderers? And lo! what is more than our houses, more than our property, more than our children, our parents, or our wives—our Fatherland, our faith is threatened with destruction by our enemy. And this enemy has all the will but not yet the power to accomplish what he threatens; and his design is never abandoned, but is handed down from father to son, for never will he make peace, he will ever slay and destroy till he himself is destroyed and slain—this enemy is the Muscovite. Our fathers heard very little of that name, our sons will hear more, and our grandsons will weep exceedingly because of it. Our religion bids us to be resigned to the decrees of fate, but only cowards will be content to sit with their hands in their laps because the predestined fate of the Ottoman Empire is written in Heaven. If the prophecy says that a time must come when the Ottoman Empire must fall to pieces because of the cowardice of the Ottoman nation, does it not depend upon us and our children whether the prophecy be accomplished, or whether its fulfilment be far removed from us? Of a truth the signification of that prophecy is this: We shall perish if we are cowards; let us not be cowards then, and never shall we perish. And if the foe whose sword shall one day deal the nations of Muhammad the most terrible wounds, and whose giant footsteps shall leave on Turkish soil the bloodiest and most shameful imprints—if I say this foe be already pointed out to us, why should we not anticipate him, why should we wait till he has grown big enough to swallow us up when we are now strong enough to destroy him? The opportunity is favourable. The Cossacks demand help from us against the Muscovite dominion. If we give them this help they will be our allies, if we withhold it they will become our adversaries. The Tartars, the Circassians, and Moldavians are the bulwarks of our Empire, let us join to them the Cossacks also, and not wait until they all become the bulwarks of our northern foe instead, and he will lead them all against us. When he built the fortress of Azov he showed us plainly what he meant by it. Let us also now show that we understood his intentions and raze that fortress to the ground."
With these words Halil resumed his place.
As pre-arranged Kaplan Giraj now stood up in his turn.
Halil fully expected that the Tartar Khan, who was to have played such an important part in his project, inasmuch as his dominions were directly in the way of an invading enemy, and therefore most nearly threatened, would warmly support his proposition. All the greater then was his amazement when Kaplan Giraj turned towards him with a contemptuous smile and replied in these words:
"It is a great calamity for an Empire when its leading counsellors are ignorant. I will not question your good intentions, Halil, but it strikes me as very comical that you should wish us, on the strength of the prophecy of a Turkish recluse, to declare war against one of our neighbours who is actually living at peace with us, is doing us no harm, and harbours no mischievous designs against us. You speak as if Europe was absolutely uninhabited by any but ourselves, as if there was no such thing as powerful nations on every side of us, jealous neighbours all of them who would incontinently fall upon us with their banded might in case of a war unjustly begun by us. All this comes from the simple fact that you do not understand the world, Halil. How could you, a mere petty huckster, be expected to do so? So pray leave in peace Imperial affairs, and whenever you think fit to occupy your time in reading poems and fairy-tales, don't fancy they are actual facts."
The representatives of the people regarded the Khan with amazement. Halil, with a bitter look, measured him from head to foot. He knew now that he had been betrayed. And he had been betrayed by the very man to whom he had assigned a hero's part!
With a smiling face he turned towards him. He had no thought now that he had fallen into a trap. He addressed the Khan as if they were both in the room together alone.
"Truly you spoke the truth, Kaplan Giraj, when you reproached me with the shame of ignorance. I never learnt anything but the Koran, I have never had the opportunity of reading those books which mock at the things which are written in the Koran; I only know that when the Prophet proclaimed war against the idolators he never inquired of the neighbouring nations, Shall I do this, or shall I not do it? and so he always triumphed. I know this, too, that since the Divan has taken to debating and negociating with its enemies, the Ottoman armies have been driven across the three rivers—the Danube, the Dnieper, and the Pruth—and melt away and perish in every direction. I am a rough and ignorant man I know, therefore do not be amazed at me if I would defend the faith of Mohammed with the sword when, perhaps, there may be other means of doing so with which I am unacquainted. I, on the other hand, will not be astonished that you, a scion of the princely Crimean family, should be afraid of war. You were born a ruler and know therefore that your life is precious. You embellish the deeds of your enemy that you may not be obliged to fight against him. You say 'tis a good neighbour, a peaceful neighbour, he does no harm, although you very well know that it was the Muscovite guns which drove our Timariots out of Kermanshan, and that the Persians were allowed to march through Russian territory in order to fall upon our general Abdullah Pasha from behind. But there is nothing hostile about all this in your eyes, you are perfectly contented with your fate. War might deprive you of your Khannish dignity, while in peaceful times you can peaceably retain it. It matters not to you whose servant you may be so long as you hold sway in your own domain, and you call him a blockhead who does not look after himself first of all. Yes, Kaplan Giraj, I am a blockhead no doubt, for I am not afraid to risk losing this wretched life, awaiting my reward in another world. I was not born in silks and purples but in the love of my country and the fear of God, while you are wise enough to be satisfied with the joys of this life. But, by way of reward for betraying your good friend, may Allah cause you, one day, to become the slave of your enemies, so that he who was wont to be called Kaplan[17] may henceforth be named Sichian."[18]
Even had nothing been preconcerted, Kaplan Giraj's sword must needs have leaped from its sheath at these mortally insulting words. Furiously he leaped from his seat with his flashing sword in his hand.