Great Britain would be first and most immediately menaced by this; for a strong military and naval power established on the Bosporus would hold in command the shortest way of communication with her possessions in India. The Czar would hold in control the route by way of the Suez canal: or at best Great Britain could keep it open only by maintaining a vastly superior fleet in the Mediterranean; and it would be difficult for her to maintain there a fleet which would not be practically overmatched by one which Russia could easily keep up in the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmora. The days are past when a Hood or a Nelson might safely risk a battle if the odds against him were much less than two to one. A British admiral must henceforth make his count upon meeting skill and seamanship equal to his own, and whatever advantage he gains must be gained by sheer preponderance of force.
If Great Britain is to retain her Indian empire, a collision there between her and Russia is a foregone conclusion. An empire which, under a succession of sovereigns of very different character, has steadily pressed its march of conquest through the deserts of Turkistan, will not be likely to look without longing eyes upon the fertile valley of the Indus; and here Russia would have a fearful advantage in position. The Suez route practically closed, as it would be in the event of a war, Britain could only reach India by the long voyage around the Cape of Good Hope, while Russia would have broad highways for the march of her troops to the banks of the Indus, whence she could menace the whole peninsula of Hindostan.
We indeed do not think that the possession of her Indian empire adds anything to the power of Great Britain. She has never derived any direct revenue from it. The Indian expenditures to-day exceed, and are likely in the future to exceed, the revenues. All the vast amounts of plunder and "loot" which individuals, the East India Company, or the Crown have gained, have cost to get them more than they were worth. Unlike Australia and the Dominion of Canada, India offers no field for colonization for men of British blood, where they or their children may build up a new Britain under strange stars. It has come to be an accepted fact that Englishmen cannot long retain health and vigor in India, and that their offspring, born there, rarely survive childhood unless sent "home" at an early age. Britain holds India purely and absolutely as a conquered and subjugated territory. Whether British rule in India is, upon the whole, a blessing or a curse to the natives, is a matter of grave doubt; that it is most unwillingly borne, is beyond all question. It is a despotism pure and unmixed, and a despotism of the most galling kind—a despotism exercised by a horde alien in race and religion, alien in habits and modes of thought, in life and manners, in customs and ideas. Macaulay, when in power in India, forty years ago, said of it the best that can be said: "India cannot have a free government; but she may have the next best thing—a firm and impartial despotism." To maintain this despotism, even against the feeble natives alone, imposes a heavy strain upon the British government. The British empire in India is only a thin crust overlying a bottomless quagmire, into which it is in peril of sinking at any moment by a force from above or an upheaval from below. How nearly this came to pass during the accidental Sepoy mutiny of twenty years ago, is known to all men. Had that mutiny chanced to have broken out three years before, during the Crimean war, it is safe to say that the course of the world's history would have taken a different turn. Since then Great Britain has apparently somewhat consolidated this crust, but it is yet thin, and the weight of Russia thrown upon it could scarcely fail to break it through.
The commercial value of India to Great Britain is, we think, vastly exaggerated. India, in proportion to her population, has always been, and is likely long to be, a very poor country. The trade of Great Britain with India—exports and imports—is not much greater than that with France, considerably less than that with Germany, and far less than that with the United States; and we see no reason to suppose that it is perceptibly increased by the subjugation of India to the British crown. India sells to Great Britain what she can, and buys from her what she wants and can pay for, and would continue to do so in any case. Still, we do not imagine that the British government or people will ever be brought to take our view of the value of India to them. It will be held to the last extremity of the national power, and will only be abandoned under stress of the direst necessity. And for her secure possession of India it is absolutely essential, for reasons which have been stated, that whoever else may have Constantinople in the future, Russia shall not have it. England's interest in the question is a purely selfish one. She is content to have the Turks there because for the time being they keep the Russians out. Whatever worth may formerly have been in the sentimental averment that it is the duty of the European family of nations to see to it that no weak member of it is gravely wronged by a stronger one is past and gone. It is from no love for the Turks that Great Britain desires that the Sultan should continue to hold at least nominal sovereignty over Turkey in Europe, and the actual custody of the keys of the Black Sea. An able English writer says:[H]
The position of the Turk at Constantinople is no choice of ours, nor any creation of our policy. We do not maintain him for any love of himself, nor because we rely on his strength to guard the post—though that is absurdly underrated. His corruption and weakness are at least as great an embarrassment to us as an injury to the nations of his empire. But the whole Eastern question hangs upon the fact that he is there, and has been there with a long prescriptive right which he is not likely to yield, or to have wrested from his grasp till after a frantic struggle of despair. Nor is any practical mode apparent by which he will be soon displaced, save that, after a convulsion which would involve all Europe, the Czar should be enthroned upon the Bosporus. To prevent that catastrophe, and to avert the horrors that must precede it, is our real Eastern policy.
Still more emphatic is the declaration of Lord Derby, the British Premier, when defending the action of the Government in sending the Mediterranean fleet, last May, to Besika Bay, at the mouth of the Dardanelles: "We have in that part of the world great interests which we must protect.... It is said that we sent the fleet to the Dardanelles to maintain the Turkish empire. I entirely deny it. We sent the fleet to maintain the interests of the British empire."
Let us now glance rapidly at Turkey in Europe, the coveted prize in this case. Nominally, and upon the maps, it comprises all except the southern apex of the great triangular peninsula bounded on the east by the Black Sea, the Sea of Marmora, and the Archipelago; on the west by the Adriatic; on the north, the broad base of the peninsula, it is bounded by Austria; on the south, the narrow apex, by Greece. Russia touches it only on the northeast corner. Its area is in round numbers 200,000 square miles, not differing materially from that of France or Germany, or about five-sixths of that of Austria. No other part of Europe, of anything like equal extent, combines so many natural advantages of geographical position, soil, and climate. The population is variously estimated at from 13,000,000 upward; we think that 17,000,000 is a tolerably close approximation. Of these, in round numbers, only about 2,000,000 are Turks, or, as they style themselves, Osmanlis; 11,500,000 are of various Sclavonic races; 1,500,000 are Albanians; 1,000,000 Greeks; the remainder Armenians, Jews, and Gipsies. In religion there, there are about 4,800,000 Mohammedans, nearly half of whom are not Osmanlis, the remainder being of Sclavonic descent, whose ancestors embraced Islam in order to save their estates; they are, however, quite as devoted Mussulmans as are the Osmanlis themselves. There are now about 12,000,000 Christians, of whom some 11,000,000 belong to the Greek Church, and nearly 1,000,000 are in communion with the Church of Rome. The name Ottomans is officially given to all the subjects of the empire, irrespective of race or religion; all except Mussulmans are specifically designated as Rayahs, "the flock." Nominally, at least, by the new Constitution promulgated in December, 1876, while Islam is the religion of the State, all subjects are equal before the law, and all, without distinction of race or creed, are alike eligible for civil and military positions.
But a very considerable part of this territory is not properly included in the Ottoman empire. The principality of Roumania, in the northeastern corner, made up of what was formerly known as Wallachia and Moldavia, with a population of about 4,500,000, is practically independent, under a prince of the house of Hohenzollern, elected in 1866. It merely acknowledges the suzerainty of the Sultan, to whom it pays an annual tribute of some $200,000. Servia, on the north, bordering upon Austria, with a population something less than 1,500,000, has for years been really independent, merely paying a tribute of less than $100,000.
Roumania and Servia are strongly under Russian influence. Besides these is the little State of Montenegro, on the Adriatic, with a population of less than 200,000, which disowns the suzerainty of the Sultan, and has for many months waged a fierce but desultory war against him.
Of what properly constitutes Turkey in Europe, with a population of some 11,000,000, the following are the principal divisions, designating them by their former names, by which they are still best known: south of Roumania, and between the Danube and the Balkhan mountains, is Bulgaria; south of Bulgaria is Roumelia, in which Constantinople is situated; in the northwest is Herzegovina; between which and Servia is Bosnia; on the west, along the Adriatic, is Albania. In estimating the defensive strength of the Ottoman empire we must take main account of Turkey in Asia, with a population of some 17,000,000, by far the larger portion of whom are Osmanlis, devoted to Islam, warlike by nature, and fully capable, as was shown in the Crimean war, of being moulded into excellent soldiers. But our present concern is with Turkey in Europe.