"Austria will probably be added to the German Empire, together with Hungary, Russian Poland, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Each would have the present system of the German confederation, by which every State has a certain autonomy but only one Emperor, one administration, and one army. It will be the largest Empire ever seen since Napoleon, but we are certain, with our organising capabilities, to be able to make it last a long time.
"Take Turkey! She is certainly the most practical nation in Europe; she has seen that it was no use trying to resist us, and she has accepted our quiet superiority. We are the brains, and she is the hands, and you can be certain that it will be all the better for her to have taken this step in time."
"And what will happen afterwards to Constantinople?"
"Oh! we shall always be friends with the Turks. They know our superiority, and they respect us. It is really of no importance for us to have Constantinople as long as we know that Russia will never be able to have it."
While my companion is telling me the modest German aspirations and the future plans for the wholesale Germanisation of the world, we have walked slowly across the Perchembe-Bazaar (Thursday's market). It is market day, but the business is next to nothing. Most of the merchants have not come at all, others are sitting philosophically amongst mountains of carpets, embroideries, and potteries, waiting for the customer who does not come.
The Turkish commerce has such deep roots that it did not stop even three years ago, when the Allied troops were a few miles from the town. Now it is completely paralysed.
Perhaps even the Turks begin to feel that the crisis is, this time, bigger than ever before.
Always chatting, we reach St. Peter's Church, and my attention is attracted by a white marble tablet, on which I read: "André Chénier naquit dans cette maison le 30 Octobre, 1762." Under it, on the brown painted wall, one of his verses is written with chalk by a hand evidently used to German characters:—
"Ces Anglais,
Nation tout à vendre à qui peut la payer."