What Kiamil, Great Turkish Leader, Told A Tourist.

New York Times 100 years ago today, March 30, 1913:
Statesman Who Recently Was Exiled to Egypt Gave a Cordial Reception to an American Who Visited Him When He Was in Power, and Spoke Frankly About Turkish Affairs.By Grant Hugh Browne.
    For more than forty years the world expected a Balkan conflagration. Then, at last, the Balkan allies declared war against Turkey and the status quo promised by English Premiers since Disraeli became nil.
    I was anxious to see the stage setting of what might be the greatest tragedy Europe had ever seen. So early last November I decided to get over there and secure a good seat, as it were. No sooner thought of than I proceeded to put the plan into execution.
    I arrived shortly afterward in London, and was told by the American Embassy that no regular passports were being issued for Turkey. But, fortunately for me, the same staff of clerks and assistants are in charge at the Embassy that were there during the American-Spanish war, when they were all kept busy by myself and others purchasing transports, colliers, and munitions of war for the use of Uncle Sam.
    To me it was like an old reunion. I remembered the days and nights of activity under Ambassador John Hay and Naval Attache William S. Sims, when we were all kept on the jump at fever heat, and I soon found that these same men were willing and anxious to recognize my enthusiasm for my trip. They immediately proceeded to do everything in their power to expedite and make possible the securing of a passport, and they did it to such good effect that the next day I was starting from Charing Cross Station with an emergency passport in my pocket viséd by both the Turkish and Rumanian Consuls.
    Traveling on the Orient Express via Vienna, Budapest, and Bucharest, I reached Kontenje, where I embarked on the Black Sea, this being the only approach to Constantinople that was open. The front door through the Dardanelles was, of course, closed, and the railway through Servia and Bulgaria in the bands of the allies. I soon discovered that I was making fine headway in getting into Turkey, but what about getting out? The nearer I got to the city of mosques the more I heard about cholera. Was I to be quarantined? This bridge, however, I decided to cross when I came to it.
    My friend Emil Hecht, a merchant of Constantinople, who had volunteered to come all the way to Budapest to meet me, and I were practically the only passengers on the Black Sea steamer outside of twenty-five or thirty Red Cross nurses, all from Holland excepting two Japanese, all of whom were on their way to care for the wounded in the trenches at Tchatalja. These nurses were only an advance guard of a great stream of Red Cross workers — Japanese, Hollanders, Germans, Swiss, French, and English — on their way to care for wounded Mohammedans of an Oriental army, in an Oriental country, in Oriental trenches. These brave women talked earnestly of the work awaiting them. No one flinched at the thought of contact with the dreaded cholera; they feared seasickness far more. They walked the deck, impatient to reach those unfortunates who so sorely needed them.
    After a stormy night on the turbulent Black Sea we arrived the next day at 2 o'clock in the Bosphorus.
    No longer are there seven wonders of the world to me. There is but one. Who can ever forget the passage through the Bosphorus, with those marvelous palaces and gardens on either side, through the most wonderful stretch of water of its kind in the world, to the anchorage in the Golden Horn alongside the Galata Bridge? I thought to myself, "Who would not be a Pasha and live all his days in the Orient?"
    We landed on the Galata side of the Golden Horn and, securing a carriage, commenced the long climb up the hill to Pera and the Pera Palace Hotel. This part of Constantinople is almost like a portion of some French city — shops all French, prices in francs, owners French or German.
    The morning after my arrival I told my friend that I should go immediately to the Sublime Porte and present my letter to that Turkish patriarch, the Grand Vizier Kiamil Pasha. I was told that it would be impossible to see Kiamil on the same day, that it would take several days to arrange for an audience. I had no wish for delays, and the greater the number of obstacles presented to me the more anxious was I to see this wonderful old man. In all Turkish history of the last two generations no one name stands out like that of Kiamil Pasha, the man to whom, throughout the reign of Abdul Hamid, the powers of Europe looked for the maintenance of peace and the controlling of the turbulent leaders of the Orient.
    We crossed the Stamboul Bridge and climbed the hills to the Government House, known as the Sublime Porte. I bore with me a letter to Kiamil from Sir Hamilton Lang, who for thirty-eight years represented the English Government in the Orient, and who passed many of these years working out, with the aid of Kiamil Pasha, those difficult problems that always arise where Western civilization is continuously bumping into Orientalism.
    Sir Hamilton had graciously referred to me in his letter as an American, "therefore a man of the world." It was probably this description that proved my "open sesame," for I was ushered immediately into the audience room, overawed by that mystery that always hovers about the Westerner in the East.
    Kiamil Pasha came in — an old man with a kindly face set on narrow shoulders.
    "Your Excellency," I said, "I have come 7,000 miles to shake the hand of the greatest diplomat in Europe."
    He pulled me down on a seat alongside of him and said: "I am so pleased you came."
    I was anxious to get all that I could from the Turkish magnate about the future of Turkey and its people, its progress under the constitution of 1908, the outlook of the war, the possibility of its early cessation, and so forth. Before I was able to ask him any questions, he very quietly began to interrogate me:
    "On what ship did you come from America, Mr. Browne?"
    "The Kronprinz Wilhelm."
    "How many days were you on the ocean?"
    "Six."
    "Only six?" he said, surprised. I suggested that he visit America, but he shook his head.
    "No, I am too old," he objected, and then:
    "How big is New York City?"
    "Greater New York has 5,000,000 of people."
    "How you Americans have grown!"
    Then the old man sat quietly a long while with his eyes closed, and I knew that his mind was again dwelling on his own cares and worries.
    "Will your Excellency," I ventured, "tell me the cause of the war?"
    "The powers did not maintain the status quo which we have always been promised since the Crimean war. England was always by our side, but now whatever policy they have in England seems to be to aid the Muscovite." "Did you know of the secret alliance of the four Kings — the Balkan League?"
    "Yes, our Government knew, although I was not in power at the time. I am told that the Turkish Government protested to the powers that there was a secret alliance of the Balkan States, that they were arming and getting ready to attack us and bringing ordnance and ammunition into the Balkans as early as last March. The reply of the powers was that we should not be alarmed, that the status quo would be maintained. The Balkan States were impatient concerning our acceding to their demands. We thought we were doing very well in modernizing our institutions, with our constitutional form of Government barely three years old. Our constitution granted equal rights to all religions, political equality to all races, no discrimination in Government office, no discrimination in military service. And yet they wanted these reforms to work out perfectly in so short a time.
    "I understand that the Ministers in charge at that time applied for funds with which to arm ourselves to meet the threatened invasion, but our requests were refused. It is probable that our Government did not pursue the matter very earnestly, relying upon the implied promise of the powers that no armed campaign would be tolerated.
    "We now have before the representatives of the powers, as we have had for some time, a request to increase our import duties from 11 per cent. to 15 per cent. This would give us almost 40 per cent. more revenue, but up to the present the powers have not granted us permission so to do."
    "But why ask the powers?" I asked.
    "Don't you know, Mr. Browne, that Turkey is the only Government in Europe that cannot spend its own money?" answered the old man. "Every piastre of its revenue is only collected by permission of the powers."
    "And why would they not permit you to raise these duties to 15 per cent?"
    "Their reply always is: 'We do not know what you or your Pashas may do with the money.' Your American manufacturers and exporters are exporting to Turkey goods that come into this country at 11 per cent. duty, while they would be obliged to pay 40 per cent. or 45 per cent. in Greece and the other Balkan States. The different Ambassadors object to this or that suggestion on our part whenever they think it may possibly prohibit or curtail their own country's exports into Turkey. And it is very necessary for us always to maintain peace with the powers."
    "Does it not seem unfair," I said to him, "that our exports are assessed these very high tariffs in all these other countries, and only pay 11 per cent. into Turkey?"
    With a pause between each word, he replied:
    "You must remember we cannot object, Mr. Browne. Our religion is founded upon humanity and peace between all men, but your Christian religion sometimes seems different to me, or, rather, I would say, the people who strive for the Christian nations are better traders, or more successful in forcing upon us their financial conditions than we Mohammedans are in objecting to them."
    To appreciate the impressiveness of these words one must bear in mind the old man's slowness of speech, his careful weighing of words, his frequent long pauses. It was to him a solemn thing thus to unburden himself.
    I shortly afterward withdrew after he had told me he would gladly extend any courtesy within his power to make my visit in Constantinople a pleasant one.
    I spent the next few days sightseeing, interviewing, and trying to learn Constantinople. I purchased some books of English-Turkish conversational phrases. I thought perhaps I could do as I had done in other countries — learn enough of the language in a few days to ask my way about, or, at least, bargrain with a cabman. But I gave it up. I was obliged to fall back upon my friend, Mr. Hecht.
    The Bazaar of Stamboul is said to have 500 streets. After wandering about one whole afternoon, I thought that there were a million, all under one roof. You can buy camels and rugs from the East, cash registers, typewriters, and sewing machines from the West. The merchants sit in long rows, each man in a little niche or arch of his own, or on a small platform in front of his arch. No foreigner ever gets by them without being importuned to buy their wares.
    I was, however, surprised to see how little dickering there was. I tried to buy a gold chain. The old Turk, with a beard almost to his feet, weighed it and charged me about $16 an ounce. I offered him about $15 an ounce. With great dignity, he placed the chain back in its receptacle and crawled back into his niche without vouchsafing a reply.
    Every time I went back and forth from Stamboul to Galata or Galata to Stamboul it was necessary to go across the stone bridge. Probably more people cross this bridge in a day than any other bridge of its size in the world. The stream of Turks in carriages and on foot, soldiers, infantry and cavalry, black men, white men, yellow and brown, Nubians, Abyssinians, Afghanese, Beluchistanese, Persians, Assyrians, Kurds, Hindus, Tartars, Jews, and Christians, make up the most marvelous mass of humanity imaginable. Thousands of porters trudging with their great packs, pigmy horses and donkeys — it is an incessant stream from daylight to darkness.
    I stood there for hours watching. Why make this East West? Why change the Oriental Constantinople into a Western Constantinople? Will it be more attractive if its mosques and minarets are changed to churches, if you no longer hear the muezzin calling to prayers, nor the faithful bathing their feet at the fountains? Will it be better for the world to change all this into a Chicago, with the clang of the trolley car, with the taxicab — to make the bazaar give way to department stores?
    The native Turk is an industrious man. The laborers are not intelligent, neither do they take easily to modern methods of labor. But such work as they have known for generations, or to which they are born, they do as well at as any other race, and better than many.
    The mass of the people are not curious. This I especially noted in respect to the war. Notwithstanding the continuous procession of soldiers, the thousands of ox teams with covered wagons, in which the refugees from Thrace and Macedonia were trekking back to the lands of their fathers — Turkey in Asia — no one seemed to pay much attention. The people of Constantinople went on about their business or occupation very much as if there was no war.
    Fighting was going on continuously at the Tchatalja fortifications, some fifteen miles away, to which last line of defense the Bulgars had pushed the Turks. The wounded and sick were being brought in by trainloads every night and sent up Pera Hill to the hospitals, when these became full, the mosques were turned into temporary hospitals.
    I am certain the authorities did everything within their power to care for the sick and wounded. They did not foresee the cholera. But they quickly arose to the situation. Every newspaper in the city published a set of general rules of prevention and methods of caring for those stricken with this plague. Naturally all foreigners were careful as to food and exposure.
    The nights were doleful. The electric light company went out of commission, owing to lack of coal, so the city was practically in darkness, except a few flickering gas flames. At sundown most people locked themselves in for the night. But I was always a prowler if there was anything to be seen, and found myself night after night watching the long lines of soldiers going and coming.
    And now I come to my last day in Constantinople and my last audience with Kiamil Pasha. The armistice had been signed on Dec. 3, and envoys were being selected to go to London to the peace conference, so I thought London would be an interesting place for me. I quickly arranged for an early departure.
    I hurried over to the Sublime Porte on a Saturday morning about 10 o'clock and sent my card in, and was immediately ushered into the presence of Kiamil.
    "I am going home to-day," I said. Again he pulled me down alongside of him and for some minutes said nothing. Then, in his slow, almost voiceless voice:
    "I am sorry to see the friends of Turkey always going away. They have nearly all gone, and I seem so alone. I wish to send my greetings out from Turkey to two old friends — one, Sir Hamilton Lang in London and one Mr. Oscar Straus in New York."
    "Were you successful in securing your armistice?" I asked.
    "Yes, I appealed to the powers for an armistice, but fifteen days went by without reply. The Christian powers of Europe entirely ignored a request which I made to avoid further bloodshed. On the sixteenth day I appealed directly to Czar Ferdinand, and he immediately granted my request."
    "Do you think Turkey has irretrievably lost Thrace and Macedonia?"
    "I fear we have lost Monastir and Salonica. I think we can save Adrianople."
    He then bade me good-bye. I immediately went to my steamer to return across the Black Sea. I was fumigated, at Kontendji, escaped quarantine, and in a few days was back in London, where the Peace Commissioners were at work.
    This was in December. Kiamil was soon after exiled to Egypt, and Nazim Pasha, the Minister of War, assassinated.
    "When I told prominent men in England on my return from Turkey that I hoped they would secure to Turkey its individuality, and that my sympathies were with Turkey in her troubles, a British statesman said to me:
    "Browne, Kiamil hypnotized you."
    Perhaps he did.