Ward A.W. The Cambridge History of British Foreign Policy. 1783-1919. Volume 3
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GLADSTONE'S "BAG AND
BAGGAGE
'
CRUSADE
105
race have deserved well
of
their
country,"
and
added
that
the Govern-
ment
"did
much to
encourage
this
idea
by
dealing
out
with a liberal
hand
decorations and rewards to such miscreants
as
Achmed
Aga
1
."
Nevertheless,
by
the
end
of
September
no
attempt
had
been made
to
punish
the
criminals,
though
2000
Bulgarians
had been
arrested
for
alleged
complicity
in
the
incipient
revolt.
Elliot
completely
endorsed
Baring's
report.
The
Bulgarian
Atrocities
gave
to
Mr
Gladstone
an
unexampled
opportunity
for
one of those
impassioned
appeals
to
the moral
sense
of
the
community
into
which
he was wont
to
put
the
full force
of a
highly
emotional nature. The
Queen
had been
indignant
with the
stories which had
slowly
filtered
through
from
Bulgaria
and had
urged
her
Prime-Minister to throw
more warmth
into his
condemna-
tion of
the
brutalities.
Lord
Beaconsfield,
however,
had
compromised
himself
by
his too
flippant
scepticism.
After
having
deprecated
the
stories as
evil
exaggerations,
on the
strength
of official
information,
it
was
difficult for him to
go
back
upon
his words in
public,
whatever
he
might
do in
private;
what
he
had
said
he
had
said, and,
the credit
of his
Government
being
at
stake,
he left
the
subject
alone.
So
it
came
to
pass
that
the
political
advantage
of a
great
moral move-
ment
rested with his
rival. In
September
Gladstone
published
his
famous
"Bulgarian
Horrors"
pamphlet,
which contained
a
damning
and
unanswerable indictment of
Turkish
misrule,
and
pointed
to the
ejection
of the Turk
from
Bulgaria,
"bag
and
baggage,"
as the
only
possible
remedy
2
.
The
pamphlet
had
an immediate and
unexampled
effect
;
but
the
agitation
reached its
climax
when
the
resting
Achilles left
his tent
early
in
December and
threw
himself
into the
open fray.
The old
British
enthusiasm
for the
cause
of
"oppressed
nationalities"
broke
out
like a
storm
and
swept
the
country
from south
to
north
;
and con-
stituencies
which,
more
than a
century
before,
had
rung
with the
cry
1
Someone
took care
that
the Blue
Book
containing
the
report
on
the Atrocities
was
translated for
the
Sultan's edification.
2
Gladstone
proposed
to
apply
this
"bag
and
baggage"
ejection
to the
province,
and
not
(as
Lord
Beaconsfield
among
others
represented)
to
European
Turkey
as a
whole,
as Sir
Stratford
Canning
had
suggested
in
1821.
The
famous
passage
runs:
"Let the
Turks now
carry away
their abuses
in the
only
possible
manner,
namely
by
carrying
off themselves. Their
Zaptiehs
and their
Mudirs,
their
Bimbashis
and
their
Yuzbashis,
their
Kaimakams and
their
Pashas,
one
and
all,
bag
and
baggage, shall,
I
hope,
clear out of the
province
they
have desolated
and
profaned"
(The
Bulgarian
Horrors
and the
Question
of
the
East).
"
Lord Gran-
ville
thought
the
passage
too
strong
and
wanted
it out
of
the
pamphlet"
(Lord
Morley's
Life
of
Gladstone,
11.
550).
106 FORWARD
POLICY
AND
REACTION,
1874-1885
"Wilkes
and
liberty!"
now echoed to
"
Gladstone and
emancipa-
tion!"
The
agitation
may
have been
overdone;
but the
impulses
underlying
it were
real
and
generous,
and
for a
time
British life was
lifted out
of
the
atmosphere
of dull
routine and
mere material
pre-
occupations
1
.
Only
London seemed to be
little affected
by
the moral
outburst,
while the
greatest
enthusiasm was
shown in
the
reserved,
yet
highly
emotional,
North.
After the rebellion
in
Bulgaria
had been
crushed and
Turkey
was
able to
give
undivided attention
to
the
prosecution
of
the
War,
the
Servian
rising
had no
longer
even the remotest chance of success.
Not for
the
first
or last time
in
their
history,
the Serbs had to
confess,
in
the words of their
Prime-Minister, Ristich,
the
spokesman
of
the
Greater
Servian movement
,
*
Nous
avonsfait
une
grande
illusion .
' '
For
months,
armistice
and
peace
negotiations
were carried on between
Turkey
and the
Powers,
of whom Great Britain acted as an informal
mandatory.
The Porte
sought
to
impose
severe
conditions;
but to
these not even Lord Beaconsfield
would
listen,
holding
that
the
"atrocities" created
a
justification
for
pressing
the Porte to
a
degree
beyond
what
had
hitherto been
contemplated.
Conscious, however,
of
the
difficulty
of
holding
the balance between Russia and Austria-
Hungary,
neither
of whom
he
trusted,
he
contemplated,
in
October,
a
treaty
with
Germany
for a bon
accord,
which was
to be
something
less
than
an
alliance,
with a view to
maintaining
the territorial
status
in
the
Balkans,
in
the belief that
it would secure Great
Britain
against
Russia and
Germany against
France.
But
the idea failed
to
find
favour
with the
Cabinet.
Finally,
Great
Britain
put
forward as
reasonable bases
for
the
conclusion
of an
armistice,
which
it was
hoped
would
prove
the
precursor
of
a
settled
peace,
the restoration of the
status
quo
ante
helium
in
Servia
and
Montenegro, autonomy
for Bosnia and Herze-
govina,
and
guarantees against
future
administrative
abuses in Bul-
garia.
Austria's
agreement
to
these
proposals
was
only
obtained
after
the idea
of
autonomy
had
been
so diluted
that
it
had
dwindled
into
a mere
reform of
local administration.
Still
the Porte held
out,
though
Elliot
had
urged
the Sultan
to
place
himself
unreservedly
in
the
hands of the
mediating
Powers,
since
Her
Majesty's
Government
1
In
the
Public
Record
Office are
preserved
six
large
volumes of
resolutions
of
protest
against
the
Bulgarian
Atrocities
addressed
to the
Foreign
Secretary
from
September
onward.
They
came from
political
meetings,
representing
all
parties,
town
and
village meetings,
municipal
and other
local
government
councils,
labour
organisations,
meetings
of
agricultural labourers,
and
religious
bodies of
all
kinds.
THE
CONSTANTINOPLE
CONFERENCE
107
would
then be "able
to
exercise
a
salutary
influence
in
the
decisions
to be
come
to
1
."
It
was
only
after
Lord
Derby
had warned
Turkey
that,
if
she
rejected
the
terms
proposed,
others
more onerous
would
be
pressed
on her
by
force,
and
had instructed
Elliot
to leave
Con-
stantinople
failing
her
compliance,
and after
Russia
had
demanded
an
unconditional armistice on
pain
of
immediate
declaration
of
war,
that
the
Porte
yielded.
C. The
Constantinople Conference
,
1876
Just
before
the
suspension
of
hostilities,
the
British Government
had
decided to invite the
Treaty
Powers to
meet in conference
at
Constantinople
with a
view to
discovering
conditions
for a
general
settlement of the Balkan troubles.
Gladstone
called the
decision
"the best
thing
the Government
have
yet
done
in
the Eastern
Question."
Lord
Derby
had been
eager
to
anticipate
action in
Petro-
grad, fearing
that
if
Russia took the initiative
she would
wish
to
lay
down the basis of
discussion,
with the result
that
Austria,
whose
cooperation
in
resistance
to
any
attempt upon
the
integrity
of
the
Turkish
empire
was
so
important,
might
decline
to take
part.
All
the Powers
accepted
the
invitation.
The British
Ambassador at
Constantinople
had
discouraged
the
idea of a
conference at that
stage,
convinced
that
it would wish
to
probe
inconvenient
subjects.
A conference
might
have to
come
after
peace
had
been
established; but,
even
so,
he
urged
that
it should
be
limited to
the
question
of the
revolted
districts
2
.
By
that
time,
how-
ever,
Lord
Derby
had
emancipated
himself
from the
influence
of an
adviser
whose
persistent pro-Turkish
sympathies
seemed
altogether
to
incapacitate
him from
taking
a
European
view
of what
was
a
European
problem
and was
becoming
more so
every
day.
Elliot
had
done his
best,
it
is
true,
to
speed up
Turkey
in the matter
of the
reforms,
and had
failed.
Considering
how
strongly
the
Porte believed
that it
had a
permanent
lien
on British
sympathy
and
support,
his
failure
was
perhaps
inevitable,
and was not
discreditable
to
him.
He
laid
himself
open
to
just
criticism, however,
in
that,
with little
or
no
reason
for
confidence in
Turkey's
willingness
to
act,
he had
nevertheless
based
all
his
recommendations on the
assumption
that she
would
act,
and
had
succeeded in
persuading
the
Government
to orientate
their
attitude from
the
same fallacious
point
of
view.
His
policy
of
I
1
Letter of
September 14th, 1876.
2
Letter to Lord
Derby,
September 4th,
1876.
108
FORWARD
POLICY
AND
REACTION,
1874-1885
non-intervention
and
leaving Turkey
to reform
herself as
and how
she
would had broken
down, and,
excepting
himself,
no one had
any
longer
a word
to
say
for
it. When in
September
Musurus
Pasha,
on behalf
of his
Government,
protested
to
Lord
Derby against
diplomatic
interposition
in
the
affairs of Bosnia and
Herzegovina
as
an
infringe-
ment of the
Sultan's
rights,
the
Foreign
Secretary
answered
that the
Powers had never abandoned their
right
to
urge
upon
the
Sultan
the
proper
treatment of his Christian
subjects,
and that recent events
had
shown the exercise
of this
right
to be
more
necessary
than
ever
before.
The attitude of Russia
was
changing
from one
of
impatience
and
irritation into one of a frank
disposition
to war. Whether
the
world
believed
him
or
not,
the
Tsar had hitherto
consistently
professed
pacific
intentions;
now,
a
distinctly
warlike
spirit
came over
him.
Convinced that he
was called
upon
to
play
the
role of Protector of
the Christian
populations,
and that envious rivals
were
attempting
to frustrate
his
mission,
he listened more
readily
than before
to the
suggestions
of
Ignatieff
and the Moscow Pan-Slavist
party.
That he
was
honestly
concerned
to remove
British
suspicions
of
his ultimate
aims,
which he
somewhat
bitterly
resented,
cannot
be doubted.
To
Lord
Augustus
Loftus he
said
at Livadia
(November
5th):
"
Avant
tout,
imprimez-vous
trots
points.
Le
testament
de Pierre le
Grand
n'existe
pas;
je
ne
ferai
jamais
des
conquetes
aux
Indes;
je
n^irai
jamais
a
Constantinople."
Even,
he
said,
if
necessity
should
oblige
him to
occupy
a
portion
of
Bulgaria,
"it
would
only
be
provisionally
and
until
peace
and the
safety
of
the Christian
population
were secured."
All such
assurances
failed
to convince Lord
Beaconsfield.
Speaking
at the
Lord
Mayor's banquet
on November
9th,
1876,
he uttered
a
boastful
challenge
of which the
application
could not be
mistaken.
"If,"
he
said,
"England
were to
go
to war
in a
righteous
cause,
her
resources would
prove
inexhaustible.
She
is not a
country
that,
when
she
enters into a
campaign,
has to ask herself
whether
she can
support
a second or a
third
campaign.
If
she enters
a
campaign
she will not
terminate
it until
right
is
done." On
the
following
day,
without
knowledge
of this
threat,
the
Tsar
declared,
in the
presence
of
notables
of
Moscow,
that
unless
Turkey
ceased
to make war
upon
her
own
subjects
and
agreed
to
accept
reforms
at
the
bidding
of
the
Powers
collectively,
he would
intervene alone
and
compel
her
by
force
of
arms.
There
was a certain
justification
for
Russia's
disposition
to take
matters into her own
hands,
and it consisted
in
the
fact that
she was
BRITISH
POLICY DEFINED
109
negotiating
on
unequal
conditions. She knew
that
in
dealing
with
Turkey
she
was
dealing
with two Powers
at
once,
since
behind the
Porte
in
counsel,
influence,
and
interest stood
Great
Britain.
The Conference
met from
December 12th to
January
20th,
1877.
Lord
Salisbury
had
been
chosen
as the British
Plenipotentiary,
with
Sir
Henry
Elliot
as
prompter
and
adjoint.
Than Lord
Salisbury
no
better
choice
could have been made.
He was
neither
a
pro-Turk
nor
an
anti-Russian,
but
simply
an
unemotional,
unbiassed,
clear-
and
just-minded
British
statesman,
who
was
concerned to draw from
an
honest
sifting
of the facts of a difficult
problem
honest
conclusions,
and to
act
upon
them.
The
apparent hopelessness
of Ottoman
rule
had
convinced
him that
nothing
could be done for the Christian
races
without
the
application
to the Porte of
strong
pressure
perfectly
definite
in its
purpose
;
and,
though
he
was as
yet
quite
as much
opposed
as
was
the Prime-Minister
himself to the dissolution of the Turkish
empire,
he
was free from
preconceived
views
as to how far interference
with its internal
organisation
should
go.
To
decide
that
question
was
the
main
object
of
the Conference.
Lord
Beaconsfield
took accurate measure of the Conference when
he wrote to
the British
Plenipotentiary:
"It will consist of a
meeting
between
you
and
Ignatieff.
It
is
possible
that the
meeting may
have
results." Before
it
assembled,
the
Foreign Secretary
submitted
to the
participating
Governments
a
series
of
propositions,
by way
of
defining
the
scope
and
purpose
of
its
deliberations.
They
included
(1)
the
independence
and
the territorial
integrity
of the
Ottoman
empire;
(2)
a
declaration
that
the Powers would not seek for
any
selfish
terri-
torial
advantage,
exclusive
influence,
or commercial
concessions
1
;
(3)
as
the bases of
pacification,
the
general
observance
of
the
status
quo
in
Servia and
Montenegro,
and an
undertaking by
the Porte
to
grant
to
Bosnia and
Herzegovina
a
system
of
local institutions
giving
to
the
population
some
control
over their
affairs
and
guarantees against
the
exercise
of
arbitrary authority,
with
no
question,
however,
of the
actual
establishment of a
tributary
State
;
guarantees
of
a similar
kind
to
be
provided
against
maladministration in
Bulgaria;
the
reforms
already agreed
to
by
the Porte to be
included in the
administrative
arrangements
for
Bosnia
and
Herzegovina,
and,
so
far as
they
might
be
applicable,
in
those
for
Bulgaria.
These
propositions
found
general
1
A
similar declaration had
been made on
September
17th,
1840,
in the
Protocol
for
the
Pacification of
the
Levant,
and
again
on
August
3rd,
i860,
in
connexion
with
the
Pacification
of
Syria,
greatly
to the
regret
of
France.
no FORWARD
POLICY
AND
REACTION,
1874-1885
acceptance,
and,
together
with the
Andrassy
Note,
they
governed
the
proceedings
of
the
Conference
throughout.
On the
suggestion
of
the Prince of
Wales,
Lord
Salisbury
travelled
to
Constantinople by way
of
Paris,
Berlin,
Vienna and
Rome,
for
the
purpose
of
conferring
with the
leading
statesmen in
these
capitals,
a wise
precaution
discouraged by
the
Foreign
Office.
The Prime-
Minister, however,
had
urged
his
representative
to trust
his
own
intuitions
rather than the
promptings
of
"
Tenterdenism
1
"
;
and this
preliminary
round of
visits
unquestionably strengthened
his
position
and made
clearer to
him
both
the
problems
with which he
had
to
deal
and the difficulties
in
the
way
of
their
practical
solution. He
found
Bismarck even more
doubtful
of
success than
Beaconsfield
;
his dis-
trust of
Andrassy
was
increased;
and
the
suspicion
which he had
already
formed,
that
the
principal
obstacle to a
satisfactory
settlement
would
be
Turkey
and
not
Russia,
was
strongly
confirmed
2
.
The
Plenipotentiaries
met
for
preliminary
deliberation from
December
12th
to
22nd,
and
on the
23rd
the Porte's
representatives
were invited to confer
upon
the
proposals
which had been
drawn
up,
Safvet
Pasha,
the
Foreign
Minister,
now
acting
as
President
of
the
Conference.
Perhaps
no
important
joint
deliberation of the
Great
Powers has been
characterised,
on the
whole,
by
a
readier
spirit
of
accommodation than was
shown
by
the
Constantinople
Conference.
The secret of the
harmony
which
prevailed
throughout
its
proceedings
lay
in
the
fact
that the
assembly
was
singularly
well
balanced,
and
that its
members were
honestly
determined
to seek
and find
a
practical
basis
of
agreement promising
success to
the
purpose
which all
the
Powers had in view.
At the
outset,
Lord
Salisbury
gave,
both to the
Conference
and
to the
Porte,
a full
assurance
that,
while his
Government would not
join
in
any
measure of
active
coercion
against
Turkey,
they
would in
no
way
protect
her from
the
consequences
of
resistance to the reforms
which
might
be
proposed.
Ignatieff
began
by
countering
the British
propositions
with a
scheme
for the
reorganisation
of a
Greater
Bulgaria
as
an autonomous
territory,
still under Turkish
suzerainty,
but administered
by
Christian
Governors,
to
be
nominated
by
the
Porte
subject
to the assent
of
the
Powers. Turkish
troops
were
to
continue
in
the
province,
but
in
cantonments,
and
the
importation
1
Lord
Tenterden
was
the,
somewhat
pragmatical,
Permanent
Secretary
of the
Foreign
Office at the
time.
See
Life
of Salisbury,
11.
95.
2
Letters to
Lord
Derby,
November
9th
and
26th. Ibid. 11.
92
and
102.
TURKISH
CONSTITUTION
PROCLAIMED
in
of
Circassians
was to cease
1
.
The execution
of
these
reforms was
to
be
supervised
by
an
International
Commission,
supported by
forces
—
Belgian
or
Italian
—
sufficient
to
impose
its
decisions
and
to
preserve
tranquillity.
Although
this scheme failed to meet
with much
favour,
some
of
its
proposals
were embodied
in the
programme
of reforms
which
was submitted to
the Porte when
the full
Conference
began
its
sessions.
This
programme
underwent
much modification in
the course
of
the
ensuing
negotiations
;
and in its final form it
proposed
a
rectifica-
tion
of frontiers
for
Montenegro,
to be decided
by
an
International
Commission,
and the
recognition
of the status
quo
ante helium
in
Servia,
subject
to the settlement of
frontier difficulties
on
the Bosnian
side
by
a Commission.
With reference
to
Bosnia,
Herzegovina
and
Bulgaria,
governors-general
(valis)
were to be
appointed
for the first
five
years
by
the Porte
after
prior agreement
with the
Powers
;
with
redivision of
the
provinces
for
administrative
purposes
and the creation
of
provincial
and
local
bodies,
taxation
reforms,
including
the abolition of tax-
farming,
the
reorganisation
of the
judicial system,
and the
appointment
by
the Powers
of two Commissions of
Control,
to watch
over the
execution of
the
regulations
and
to assist the
local
authorities.
On the
day
of
Turkey's
entrance into the Conference
(December
23rd)
a
Constitution was
proclaimed
for
the
empire
(Midhat
Pasha,
the
Young
Turk
leader,
had
just
become Grand-
Vizier).
Laudable
though
this
step
was,
there
was
no
mistaking
its
real
purpose,
which
was to
justify
the Porte in
rejecting
the reforms
upon
which the
Powers
were
agreed
and,
in
other
words,
in
scouting
the
Conference
as
superfluous.
For a
month,
the
Plenipotentiaries
of the
Powers,
Lord
Salisbury
(who
did not
share Elliot's trust in
Midhat)
among
the
most earnest and
urgent
of
them,
endeavoured to
persuade
the Porte
to
accept
the
joint programme
of
reforms,
but in
vain. That the
British
Plenipotentiary
was
severely
handicapped by
the lukewarm-
ness of Sir
Henry
Elliot,
the
"
friend of
Turkey,"
who
applied
the
brake
whenever
possible,
is certain
2
.
Sir
William
White,
who was
1
See letters from Sir H.
Elliot
to
Lord
Derby
as to
the
Circassians,
e.g.
: "After
the
great
Circassian
immigration, many
of
that
lawless
people
were
very impru-
dently
established in
colonies
close
to
the Serbian
frontier"
(September
21st,
1875)
;
and
"
Circassian
villages
are
simply depots
of
plunder
in which the local
authorities,
even
if
they
have
the
will,
have
not the
power
to make
any
effectual
search"
(December
3rd, 1875).
1
In
reporting
to Lord Beaconsfield
on
January
15th
his
intention
to leave
Constantinople
if
the
final
terms were
not
accepted by
the
Porte,
Lord
Salisbury
complained
that
Elliot
refused to
promise
to leave at the same time.
"This,"
he
ii2 FORWARD
POLICY
AND
REACTION,
1874-1885
diplomatically
engaged
in
Constantinople
at
the
time,
suggests
that the
British
Embassy
staff,
immoderately
pro-Turkish
in
sympathies,
like-
wise
did
its utmost
to
defeat
Salisbury's
statesmanlike
endeavours
1
.
In addition
to these
auxiliaries,
however,
the Porte had at
its
disposal
still more effectual
weapons
of
obstruction of its own.
Every
sort
of
prevarication,
subterfuge,
and
chicane was
employed by
the
shiftiest
minds in
Constantinople
in
the
attempt,
first
to
delay,
and
then
to
wreck,
the
work of the
Conference.
Proposals
accepted
one
day
were
rejected
the next
;
an
assent
which
when
given
had
seemed
clear and
unambiguous
was soon
explained
to mean
something quite
different,
and in
fact to be no assent at all. Even
though
at
one
time
the Porte announced
its
acceptance
of
the
proposals
in
principle,
when
it came to
the discussion
of details
objection
was
offered to
the
entire scheme.
All
sorts
of
counter-proposals
were
produced;
but
they
simply
amounted to
turning
the
positive
measures
of
the Powers
into
flat
negations.
When
Salisbury
warned the Grand-
Vizier
in
grave
language
of the "extreme
danger
"
which he was
running,
that
Turkey
stood
absolutely
alone,
and
that if war
broke out
she
might
find
herself
exposed
to
aggressive
action from
other
States,
Midhat
only
replied
that
if it
were the will of God
that
the
empire
should fall
he would
be
resigned
to that
fate
;
but
he would not
capitulate
upon
the
question
of
reform.
All
through
the stubborn contest of wits
and
diplomatic
strategy,
the
Turkish Ministers
were
imploring
Lord
Salisbury,
in
the
name
of
traditional
friendship,
to
detach himself from his
colleagues;
and,
when these
attempts
failed
in
Constantinople,
Musurus Pasha and
a
Special Envoy,
in
the
person
of Odian
Effendi,
tried in
London to
influence, first,
Lord
Derby
and
then,
behind
his
back,
the Prime-
Minister
—
in
each case with
the same result. In
the
plainest
and
firmest
language
possible,
Lord
Derby
refused
to deviate from the
policy agreed
upon
by
the
Powers
and warned
the
Envoy
that,
if
Turkey
found
herself
at
war with
Russia,
Great
Britain would not
raise
a
finger
to
help
her.
Odian
Effendi
replied
that
Turkey
had
said,
"will make
our success
much more
unlikely.
It will
be
treated as
justifying
the rumours
that he
represents
a
different
policy
from the
Conference,
and
that
the
British Government will not
support
me."
It
appears
that at
Salisbury's
request
an Instruction
was sent that the
two
Delegates
should leave
together.
See also
letters
from the
German Ambassador in
Paris
to Prince Bismarck
(January
6th,
1877),
an<*
from the
German Ambassador in
Constantinople
to
the
Foreign
Office in Berlin
(January 14th,
1877)
in
Die
Grosse Politik der
europaischen
Kabinette,
1871-1914,
11.
121,
123-5.
1
For
evidence
on this
head see
Life
of
Salisbury,
11. 1
17,
120-3
;
also
Sir William
White,
his
Life
and
Correspondence,
by
H. S.
Edwards,
pp.
1
16-18.
FAILURE
OF THE
CONFERENCE
113
600,000
men
under arms and
did not fear
a
struggle
with Russia.
Somehow and
somewhere,
the
Sultan's advisers
at
that time found
encouragement
sufficient
to
convince
them that
the
British
Govern-
ment
were
"
bluffing"
and
playing
fast and
loose with the
other
Powers,
and
would at
the critical moment turn round
and
desert
them
1
.
The
last
word
of
the
Plenipotentiaries
was
spoken
on
January 15th,
and the
Porte
was
given
until the
17th
to make
up
its mind. On
the
preceding
day,
a
meeting
of the
Grand
Council,
consisting chiefly
of
State
dignitaries
and
officials,
met
to
pass
judgment
upon
the Powers'
proposals.
According
to
Lord
Salisbury,
the Sultan was
now
won
over.
The
Grand-Vizier, however,
was
opposed
to the
reforms,
and
he so
represented
them to the Council
as
to
secure an
emphatic
re-
pudiation.
Such a
decision was at least a relief
to the
Plenipotentiaries,
since
they
now
knew where
they
stood
and
were
at
liberty
to
return
home.
The Porte's
final
attempt
at
compromise
was a
plea
for
just
one
year
more,
in which to
convert the Ottoman deserts into
smiling
places.
It
ignored
the fact
that
it had had
fifty years' grace
already,
and
had
abused
instead
of
using
it. Lord
Salisbury crystallised
the
result of
the
four
weeks of futile
negotiations
in the words
:
"
The
Porte
only
proposes
to
execute its
former
promises;
it
refuses
to
promise
anything
new or
to
give
any
guarantee
for
the
future,"
while the
Italian
Plenipotentiary's
comment was:
"They
put
us
off
with
good
intentions
where we think it
necessary
to have realities."
On
January
22nd Lord
Salisbury
had to
make
to Lord
Derby
the
sorrowful
confession: "The
principal object
of
my
mission,
the
con-
clusion of a
peace
between Russia and
Turkey,
has not been
attained."
So
far did
the
Porte's
defiance
go
that
its
Representatives
ostentatiously
absented
themselves from
the
general
meeting
of
the Conference on
the
previous
day.
The
fact,
however,
that
peace
was not assured
meant
that
war
must almost
inevitably
ensue.
As
Lord
Beaconsfield had
predicted,
two
men
had dominated
the
Conference,
Lord
Salisbury
and
Ignatieff
—
yet
not
as
antagonists
or
1
A
telegram
sent
by
Lord
Salisbury
to Lord
Derby
on
January
8th,
1877,
several
days
after
the
reception
of
the
Special Envoy
in
London,
shows
that
he was
mystified
by
what was
taking place,
for
the Grand-Vizier had
just
told
him that he
believed
that he
could
"count
upon
the assistance of Lord
Derby
and
Lord
Beaconsfield."
Lord
Derby replied (January 9th)
that he had warned
Musurus
Pasha
in a
contrary
sense,
adding:
"
It is not
in
my power
to
speak
more
plainly
than
I
have
done
on
this
subject,
and
I feel
satisfied
that
no
language
different
to
this
is
being
held
by
any person
connected with Her
Majesty's
Government." See
also
Life
of
Salisbury,
11.
112 and
127.
W.&g.iii
8
n
4
FORWARD
POLICY
AND
REACTION,
1874-1885
even
rivals,
but
as
reasonable
coadjutors
emulating
each
other
in the
furtherance
of
a
great
task of civilisation
1
. If
the
repute
of Great
Britain
as
the
friend
of
"oppressed
nationalities" had been
com-
promised
by
her cool
reception
of the Berlin
Memorandum,
it
was
abundantly
redeemed
by
the bold and consistent
attitude
of her
Plenipotentiary
at
Constantinople.
While Lord
Beaconsfield
approached
the
Eastern
Question
from
the
purely
political
standpoint,
as one
of
power
and
prestige,
and
gave
to British
interests,
real or
imaginary,
almost
exclusive
consideration,
Lord
Salisbury
saw
in addition the
moral and humanitarian
issues which were
involved,
and
viewed
the
question
in
its
larger
European
relations.
Undeterred
by
the
know-
ledge
that the Prime-Minister
unfairly
suspected
him of
pressing
the
Porte
unduly
2
,
he
persisted
in this
attitude to the
end,
fully
justi-
fying
Gladstone's
judgment
of
him
as a statesman who
u
has no
Disraelite
prejudices,
keeps
a
conscience,
and has
plenty
of
manhood
and
character
3
."
As
the head of a
Cabinet,
Lord Beaconsfield
was
a
hard
taskmaster,
and
when he was in
a
fault-finding
mood
his
tongue
had the
edge
of
a
file. The other
and
more
generous
side of
his character
was shown
by
his
chivalrous
greeting
when
his
Envoy
returned
to
England,
disappointed
and
disillusioned
4
.
Though
the Conference
had
resulted
in
a
deadlock,
it had had
the result
of
strengthening
Russia's
position just
in
proportion
as
1
On
January
19th,
1877,
Lord
Salisbury
wrote to
Lord Carnarvon that the
failure
of
the Conference
had been
due,
in
the first
instance,
to
the
Turkish
Govern-
ment's
belief in
Russia's
weakness,
and,
in
the
second,
to
the
impression
conveyed
in the
same
quarter,
that his views
were
not
really
those
of
the
British Government.
{Life,
11.
123.)
2
"Salisbury
seems most
prejudiced
and
not to
be aware that
his
principal
object
in
being
sent
to
Constantinople
is to
keep
the Russians
out of
Turkey,
not
to
create an ideal existence for
Turkish
Christians"
(Letter
of Lord
Beaconsfield
to
Lord
Derby,
December
28th,
1876).
Lord Beaconsfield's
judgments
were
notoriously very
impetuous
and
in
consequence
erratic.
In
the
same
letter
he
wrote of Lord
Salisbury:
"He
is more
Russian than
Ignatieff:
plus
Arabe
que
VArable. While
Russia,
I
believe,
is
meditating
and
preparing compromise,
and
the
Porte not disinclined
to
that,
Salisbury
sees
only
obduracy
and
war."
Yet
within
fourteen
days
he
wrote,
in
another
temperamental
letter
(January
8th,
1877)
;
"
Salisbury
succeeded in
moderating
the
Russians,
and I have done
my
best to
moderate
the Turks." The
truth was
that someone
had
conveyed
to the
Porte the
suggestion
that Russia
really
disliked
the
prospect
of
war,
which
was a
fact,
and
would
bear
a
good
deal of
squeezing.
The
moderation
was
on
her
side,
not
on
that
of the
Turks.
3
Letter
of
December,
1876,
quoted
in Lord
Morley's Life
of
Gladstone,
II.
560.
4
"
I
hope
you
will not
permit
the immediate result
of the Conference
unduly
to
oppress
you.
Trust
me,
before
very long you
will bless the
day
which
permitted
you
to obtain
such
a
mastery
of
men
and
things,
and
especially
as connected
with
the
East,
as this
momentous
enterprise
has afforded
to
you."
(Letter
of
February
6th,
1877,
Life of
Beaconsfield,
vi.
114.)