Works of E F Benson

by E. F. Benson

  CHAPTER VII: THE GRIP OP THE OCTOPUS

  It will not be sufficient for the fulfilment of the Allies’ aims as regards Turkey to free from her barbarous control the subject peoples dwelling within her borders, for Turkey herself has to be delivered from a domination not less barbaric than her own, which, if allowed to continue, would soon again be a menace to the peace of the world. We have seen in a previous chapter how deeply set in her are Germany’s nippers, how closely the octopus-embrace envelops her, and we now have to consider how those tentacles must be unloosed from their grip, and what will be the condition of the victim, already bled white, when that has been done. In the beginning, as we have seen, Germany obtained her hold by professing a touchingly beautiful and philanthropic desire to help Turkey to realise her national ideals, and her Pecksniffs, Tekin Alp and Herr Ernst Marré, were bidden to write parallel histories, the one describing the aims of the Nationalist party, the other the benevolent interest which Germany took in them. Occasionally Herr Ernst Marré could not but remember that he was a German, and permitted us to see the claws of the cat, without quite letting it out of the bag, but then he pulled the strings tight again, and only loud comfortable purrings could be heard, the Prussian musings over the ‘liberation’ of Turkey which she was helping to accomplish. But nowadays, so it seems to me, the strings have been loosened, and the claws and teeth are clearly visible. It is not so long since Dr. Schnee, Governor of German East Africa, sent a very illuminating document to Berlin from which I extract the following: —

  ‘Do you consider it possible to make a regulation prohibiting Islam altogether? The encouragement of pig-breeding among natives is recommended by experts as an effective means of stopping the spread of Islam....’

  That seems clear enough, and I can imagine Talaat Bey, with his sword of honour in his hand, exclaiming with the Oysters in Alice in Wonderland:— ‘After such kindness that would be A dismal thing to do.’

  But I am afraid that Germany is contemplating (as indeed she has always done) a quantity of dismal things to do, and is now, like the Walrus and the Carpenter, beginning to let them appear. She has taken the Turkish oysters out for a nice long walk, and when the war is over she proposes to sit down and eat them. And did she not also interfere in the affair of Jewish massacres and declare that ‘Pan-Turkish ideals have no sort of meaning in Palestine’? That must have been almost an unfriendly act from Turkey’s point of view, for it cannot be stated too clearly that part of the price which Germany paid for Turkey’s entry on her side into the war, was the liberty, as far as Germany was concerned, of managing her internal affairs, massacres and the rest, as best suited the damnable doctrines of Ottomanisation. The other Powers could not interfere, for they failed to force the Dardanelles, and Germany promised not to. That promise, of course, was binding on Germany for just so long as it suited her to keep it, and it suited her to keep it, on the whole, during the Armenian massacres. And in that matter her refusal to interfere is, among all her crimes, the very flower and felicity of her vileness.

  Signs are not wanting that Turkey is beginning to realise the position in which she has placed herself, namely, that of a bankrupt dependant at the mercy of a nation to whom that quality is a mere derision. Lately a quantity of small incidents have occurred, such as disputes over the ownership of properties financed by Germany and the really melodramatic depreciation in the German coinage, which unmistakably show the swift ebb of Turkey’s misplaced confidence. More significant perhaps than any is a transaction that took place in May 1917, when Talaat Bey and Enver Pasha took the whole of their private fortunes out of the Deutsche Bank in Constantinople, and invested them in two Swiss banks, namely, the Banque Nationale de Suisse, and the Banque Fédérale: they drew out also the whole funds of the Committee of Union and Progress, and similarly transferred them. This operation was not effected without loss, for in return for the Turkish £1 they received only thirteen francs. But it is significant that they preferred to lose over fifty per cent. of their capital, and have the moiety secure in Switzerland to leaving it in Constantinople.[] It is certain therefore that at both ends of the scale a distrust of German management has begun. A starving population has wrecked trains loaded with food-stuffs going to Germany, and at the other end the men with the swords of honour and dishonour deem it wise to put their money out of reach of the great Prussian cat. That the Germans themselves are not quite at their ease concerning the security of their hold may also be conjectured, for they are, as far as possible, removing Turkish troops from Constantinople, and replacing them with their own regiments. An instance of this occurred in June 1917, when, owing to the discontent in the capital, it was found necessary to guard bridges, residences of Ministers, and Government offices. But instead of recalling Turkish troops from Galicia to do this, they kept them there in the manner of hostages, mixed up in German regiments, and sent picked bodies of German troops to Constantinople. Fresh corps of secret police have also been formed to suppress popular manifestations. They are allowed to ‘remove’ suspects by any means they choose, quite in the old style of bag and Bosporus, but the organisation of them is German. And well may the German Government distrust those signs of popular discontent in a starving population: already the people have awoke to the fact that the German paper money does not represent its face-value, and, despite assurances to the contrary, it is at a discount scarcely credible. Three German £1 notes are held even in Constantinople to be the equivalent of a gold £1, while in the provinces upwards of five are asked for, and given, in exchange for one gold pound. It is in vain that German manifestoes are put forth declaring that all Government offices will take the notes as an equivalent for gold, for what the people want is not a traffic with Government offices, but the cash to buy food. Even more serious is the fact that Austrian and Hungarian directors of banks will no longer accept these scraps of paper. In vain, too, is it that the hungry folk see the walls of the ‘House of Friendship’ rise higher and higher in Constantinople, for every day they see with starving eyes the trains loaded with sugar from Konia, and the harvests raised in Anatolia with German artificial manures guarded by German troops and rolling westwards to Berlin. According to present estimates the harvest this year is so vastly more abundant than that of previous years, that no comparison, as the Minister of Agriculture tells his gratified Government, is possible. But the poorer classes get no more than the leavings of it when the armies, which include the German army, have had their wants supplied. The governing classes, whom it is necessary to feed, are not yet suffering, for the Germans grant them enough, issuing rations to such families as are proved adherents of the German-Turkish combination, and until the pinch of want attacks them we should be foolishly optimistic if we thought that a starving peasantry would cause the collapse or the defection of Germany’s newest and most valuable colony. There is enough discontent to make Germany uneasy, but that is all.[] Long ago she proved the efficiency of her control, and the successful pulling of her puppet-strings, and no instance of that is more complete than the brief story of Yakub Jemil and the extinction of him and his party, which, though it happened a full year ago, has only lately been completely transmitted. Yakub Jemil was an influential commander of a frontier guard near the Black Sea coast. In July 1916 he went to Constantinople, accompanied by his staff (which included the informant from whom this account is derived), and, being cordially received by Enver and Talaat, discussed the situation with them. He pointed out the demoralising effect of the Armenian massacres, and the danger of Jemal the Great’s attitude towards the Arabs in Syria, realising, and seeking to make them realise, the stupendous folly of making enemies of the subject peoples, and urging the re-establishment of cordial relations between the Turks and them. That, considering that Enver and Talaat were responsible (under the Germans) for the Armenian massacres, was a brave outspeaking. He went on to say that Turkey was at war not on behalf of herself, but on behalf of Germany, and that it would be wise of the Government to consider the possibi
lity of a separate peace with the Powers of the Entente. He was heard with interest, and took his leave. He remained in Constantinople, and his views obtained him many adherents, not only among Turkish officers whose sympathies were already alienated from Germany, but among members of the Committee of Union and Progress. But before long his adherents began to disappear, and he asked for another interview with Talaat. He was received, as the informant states, ‘with open arms,’ for Talaat seized and held him, called for the guard, and he was searched, and on him were found certain documents which proved him to hold the views he had already expressed. That now, was enough. He was ‘interrogated’ for two days (interrogation is otherwise called torture), and was then hanged. Subsequently 111 officers and men in the army also disappeared. Some were marched into the Khiat Khana Valley, opposite Pera, and were stabbed: others were sent under escort to the provinces and murdered. No courts-martial of any kind were held.

  Similarly, in October of this year, a new Turkish law was passed, prohibiting the acquisition of Turkish land by foreign settlers. This is aimed point-blank at Germany, and has naturally annoyed Berlin very much.

  The army rations have lately been reduced, each Turkish soldier receiving daily an oke of bread and a dried mackerel.

  And should anybody doubt the efficiency of German control in Turkey, and be disposed to be optimistic about the imminence of Turkey’s detachment, he might do well to ponder that story.

  Meantime the efficacy of our naval blockade is largely discounted by Germany’s new source of supply. Possibly in the ensuing winter of 1917-18 conditions may get unbearable, but if the Turkish Government only two years ago massacred more than a million of its subjects, it would be absurd to expect that the starving of a million more would produce much effect on the Ministers of the Turkish God of Love.[] The people are, of course, told, with suitable statistics, how famine is decimating England and France, and how the total starvation of those unfortunate countries is imminent. Indeed, of all the signs of want of confidence in their German overlords, by far the most promising are the facts that Talaat and Enver have sent their money out of the country, and that Jemal the Great has a swelled head. On these facts there is a certain justifiable optimism to be based. It will do no good to consider them academically in London; but are there not practical channels to reach the instincts of the Turkish triumvirate that might be navigated?

  The following list of prices in Constantinople is of interest:-;

  July 1914. July 1917.

  Rice, per lb. 2-1/4 d. 3s. 4d.

  Milk, per quart 5d. 2s.

  Flour, per lb. 3d. 2s. 6d.

  Petroleum, per lb. 1d. 4s.6d.

  Pair of boots £1 £8.

  We need not trouble ourselves with considering what the Allies will have to do with the Turkish army when once the end of the war comes, for the collapse of the military party in Turkey, which owes its whole vitality to Germany, will be perfect and complete. But the economical future of Turkey is not so plain: at the present moment its bankruptcy is total. Early in the war Germany drained it of such bullion as it had, and has since then advanced it about £150,000,000, which, as far as I can trace, is entirely in German paper, and must be redeemed in gold at some period (chiefly two years) after the end of the war. That is wonderful finance, and one marvels that Turkey could have been so far blinded as to accept it. But I expect that the swallowing of the first loan was sweetened by a spoonful of jam of this kind. Germany pointed out that, though England was quite certainly going to lose the war, she had issued an immense paper coinage which had all the purchasing power of gold. Germany, on the other hand, with her dear Ally to help her, was just as certainly going to win the war. How, then, could there be the slightest risk of the German paper money depreciating a single piastre in value? That sounded very good sense to Turkey, who was equally convinced that she would be on the victorious side (else she would not have joined it), and down went the loan with a pleasant sensation of sweetness. A second loan was easily induced by the failure of the Dardanelles expedition, and about then the ‘ignorant’ Turkish peasant began to wonder whether the paper was quite as valuable as gold, and to prefer gold or even the ordinary silver piastre to its German equivalent. To counteract that, as we have seen, a law was passed making it criminal to hoard gold, and, to complete the ruin, the silver piastre was called in, and a nickel token was substituted.... We can but bow our heads in reverence of the thoroughness of German swindling.

  Now Turkey is completely bankrupt, and we must ask ourselves why Germany ever bargained for the repayment in gold, after the war, of the millions she had lent the Turks in paper, if she knew that Turkey could never repay her. True, the loans had only cost her the paper the notes were printed on, so that in no case could she prove a loser, but how could she be a gainer? The answer to that question shouts at us from every acre of Turkish soil. The immense undeveloped riches of Turkey supply the answer. Some indeed are already being developed, and the labour and most of the materials have been paid for by the German paper notes. There are the irrigation works at Adana, there is the beet-sugar industry at Konia, the irrigation works in the Makischelin Valley, the mineral concessions of the Bagdad Railway, the Haidar Pasha Harbour concessions, the afforestation scheme near Constantinople, the cotton industry in Anatolia — there is no end to them. Turkey may not be able to pay in cash, but over all these concessions already working, and over a hundred more, of which the concessions have been granted, Germany has a complete hold, and her victim will pay in minerals and cotton and sugar and corn. She will pay over and over and over again, as none who have the smallest knowledge of Kultur-finance can possibly doubt. She is bled white already, and for the rest of time bloodless and white will she remain. Only one event can possibly avert her fate, and that is the victory of the Allies.

  We have been so bold as to assume that this is not an impossible contingency, and on that assumption there is a brighter future for Turkey than the Prussian domination could ever bring her. Bankrupt she is, but, as Germany saw, she is rich in possibilities even with regard to the restricted territory to which she will surely find herself limited, and it is a pleasant chance for her that Germany has already been so busy in developing the resources of Anatolia. For Germany may safely bet her last piece of paper money that she will not lay a finger on them.

  The Turkey of the future is to be for the Turks; not for the persecuted Armenians, nor for the Arabs, nor for the Greeks, and assuredly it is not to be for the Prussians. While the war lasts, Germany may draw supplies from the fields her artificial manures have enriched, and from the acres that her paper money has planted, but after that no more. Her Ottomanising work will be over. Such development (and it is far from negligible) as she has done in Syria will be continued under French protection for the Arabs, such as she has done in Mesopotamia under English protection, and such as she has done in Anatolia will be continued by the Turks to drag them out of the utter insolvency that she has brought them to. Never before has a country so justly and so richly deserved the repudiation of a debt incurred by the confidence trick. Not a civilised Government in the world would dream of enforcing payment, any more than a magistrate would enforce a payment to some thimble-rigger returning from a race-meeting.

  The roar of battle still renders inaudible all voices save its own, but already the dusk begins to gather over the halls where sit the War-lord and those who, for the realisation of their monstrous dreams, loosed hell upon the world, and in the growing dusk there begin to steal upon the wall the letters of pale flame that to them portend the doom, and to us give promise of dawn. Faintly they can see the legend Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin....

  THE END

  CHARLOTTE BRONTË

  CONTENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  CHAPTER I

  CHAPTER II

  CHAPTER III

  CHAPTER IV

  CHAPTER V

  CHAPTER VI

  CHAPTER VII

  CHAPTER VIII

  CHA
PTER IX

  CHAPTER X

  CHAPTER XI

  CHAPTER XII

  CHAPTER XIII

  CHAPTER XIV

  CHAPTER XV

  CHAPTER XVI

  CHAPTER XVII

  CHAPTER XVIII

  CHAPTER XIX

  Charlotte Brontë, 1850

  INTRODUCTION

  ‘And what was he like when he wasn’t writing books?’ asked the small boy to whom I had just been reading a chapter out of Treasure Island. ‘He wasn’t really grown up, was he?’

  Such were the two questions which came from those unsophisticated lips, and surely it was a very laudable curiosity that inspired them. This chapter of Treasure Island had been entrancing: it was proper to want to know something about the man who held so thrilling a pen. I sympathise with that desire and uphold it, in spite of those austere purists who tell us that a book must be judged on its merits and on them alone. The reading of it has kindled in us an excitement or has awakened a perception of beauty: for these (the purists say) the book alone is responsible, and the emotions which the reading of it has aroused are concerned only with what lies between its covers. The merchant of pearls (they argue) does not want to ascertain the conditions under which this valuable bivalve lived: it is enough for him that a thing of beauty and of great price lies in his hand. So why, if we read a book or look at a picture that kindles our imagination, should we want to know about the circumstances which helped or handicapped the author or the artist who produced it? They are irrelevant.

  The answer is that the book has kindled our imagination, and this very fact makes us demand to know the intimate and personal history of it. We want to see it not on the flat page only, but in the round, and to be curious about the author and the circumstances in which he wrote it is by no means an irrelevant inquisitiveness. We legitimately wish to know how and why he wrote like that: we find it humanly impossible not to desire to learn about him as well as to enjoy his work.