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    LIFE AND POLITICS IN SYKIA . Syria and f / te Syrians ; or , Turkey in the Dependencies . By Gregory M . Wortabet 2 vols . - Madden * When the Turks were powerful , they were universally hated ; now that they are feeble , they are universally despised . Wherever the Telics of their authority remain , scorn and detestation invariably exist together in the mind of the subject race . The evidence against them is not reducible to Greek conceit or Armenian jealousy * ; to Syrian prejudice or' Maionite bigotry . Whether by the Mahomedan sectaries , or by the Christians of the East , their rule is equally identified with rapacity , tyranny , and all the evils resulting from a feeble and insolent despotism . Their co-religionists in Egypt dislike them ; they are distrusted by the Circassians ; by the Maronites and Druses they are abhorred ; the Greeks regard them with a scarcely human rancour .

    Any peddling smoker of cigarettes , surnamed Leonidas or Pericles , will tell you glowingly , how , during the war of independence , the Greeks took a ship crowded with Turks , and dragged every man on board to the bulwarks , where they cut his throat , and flung him into the sea . Such is the spirit of the people , though they might not all approve the ruthless illustration . But it tells irresistibly against the Ottoman system , that from one limit to another of their enormous empire , they have never , during the four hundred years of their dominion , conciliated one population submitted to their sway . A large proportion of the charges preferred against them by the Greeks are affirmed by sentimentalists in England to be libellous j but , if so , what ? The Epanocastron of Smyrna has witnessed some scenes that might embitter the blood of a less vindictive race ; and what can that government be , which , all classes of its subjects , composed of

    distinct and jealous nationalities , conspire to libel ? Moreover , since the putbreak of the war , when exact descriptions of Turkish morals , politics , and manners passed for calumnies , what Englishman has visited the East and not returned disgusted ]? The correspondents of the press , of all shades of Opinion and feeling , have concurrently declared the governing class of Turkey to be corrupt , ignorant * helplessy destitute of public spirit , as well as of the " administrative faculty , and in frade ; industry , and general inteUigence 3 utterly eclipsed by the Christian nationalities . The author of The Thistie and the Cedar of the Lebanon , who may he suspected , however , of carrying the dark lantern of Russia , presented in his picturesque and original volume a strong plea against the Government of tn . e Porte . Mr . Gregory Wortabet > who , though

    arrogant and superficial , appears to possess national sympathies , confirms this view , and testifies to the malignant reputation of the Turks , among Maronites , Prtises , and Christians . He is a native of . Beyrout h and in that city his affections centre . There , he saysj the commercial spirit of Phoenicia survives j all that is trusted to private enterprise prospers ; but there is no lighthouse , no harbour , a tottering quay . Here , it might be supposed , the Syrian writes , in the bitterness of his heart , against the Turks , his conqueror , master , oppressor . But no . Though a Beyroutian , who talks exultirigly of " the Syrian mind , " the Syrian girls of more than Georgian beauty , the flowery lustre of the suburbs , and all the thousand and one enchantments that belong to the place and people , he has one serious admission to make : —

    The people , generally speaking , ' are honest , and will pay if time is given them . It is said that the MaTiomedan is more trustworthy thtuo . the Christian ; tJiis fact is true ; and is thus accounted for on the same principle as the Christian of the interior is more honeBt than he of Beyroot , so is the Mahomedan of Beyrowt honester than his Christian neighbour . The spirit of duplicity which , characterises the Christians of Beyroot , they have learnt from their intercourse with foreigners . IsTot so the Mahomedan ; he is reserved , and has no interchange of habits and customs with the European population of the place , hence his honest predilections remain , intact , and consequently are noticed to the disadvantage of the Christian . Take the Christian before Eiiropeanism visited Beyroot , and he was as scrupulous and as honest as the Mahomedan . So is the ChriBtidta . of the interior now . This is one of the evils which , foreign , influence has wrought upon the land .

    Probably the tricks and evasions of trade are indigenous in . Syria as elsewhere ; but Mr . Wortabet ' s patriotism travels in search of an apology , and finds it in the West , whence the Javans say they derived their profligacy , the Negroes their drunkenness , the Red Indians their small-pox , the South Sea Islanders their hypocrisy . The West may take the imputation , and pass it on , for in Western sea-ports , knavery and vice accumulate more profusely than in " the interior , " and they " who come down in ships " bring moral Contagions . The reason is as palpable as the reason why cathedrals are generally surrounded by a vicious neighbourhood , a monument of the sanctuary laws .

    Syria is divided into five puchaliks , or governments , of which Beyrout is one , the other four being Aleppo , Damascus , Acre , und Jerusalem . Each pachalik , as the name implies , is ruled by a Pacha , whose authority is almost as absolute as that of the Sultan , and more effective . He governs with the assistance of two divans , or Curts , besides the local tribunals j his revenue consists of the land rent farmed by the collectors , and of the polltax levied on all the population , and , until lately , with extra severity upon Christians . Events will tthow whether the abolition of this odious tribute is to be a reality , or an . official deception . Mr . Wortabet remarks : — I should liko to wait and see tho now laws pass into ofFoot—the Christian , a

    aoldior and an officer in the Turkish army , holding civil xunk , his words reBpeofcod all over the Turkish empire , his testimony in tho interior as good as the Mahome . dan ' s—ere I give them to tho world i \ b bona fide facts . Laws can bo easily framed ; but it is not such an easy thing with Turkey to oarx-y them out ; Bbo has a fierce Islamism to contend with . And hero I will nay , tUot Turkey and Mahonaodauisna are daily becoming two distinat thinga . I doubt not that Sultan Abd-ul-Mejid and tho bettor part of Ida cabinet mean well to their subjjeota ; but what hotwoon tho meanness of pacliaa who are easily bribed—ft corrupt court which will not rcdresa tho wronp ;—a weak government which cannot promise tho traveller safety in ite dominiono , and Mnhomedan funatioiam—tho moot difficult

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    before the age of twenty-five , a widow , with a good fortune , and a house on Ernond-hill . About four years afterwards , in the ripeness of womanhood , she b ^ me acquainted with the Prince of Wales , then a boy-a very foolish and Slant boy-of twenty-three . Her soft and white skin , her large clear eves her rich and abounding curls , her lovely figure , her winning and gracefulways , subdued the imagination of the booby Prmce , who came repeatedly to Richmond , admiring and soliciting . Had she been a girl , the result might have been what the result usually is when royalty asks and commonalty is bashful . But Mrs . Fitzherbert was twenty-nine , with a battalion ot Jesuits in her rear , and she « ' fought off" the fat Hanoverian . He , too , had his body cuard , Kent , Onslow , Southampton , and Bouverie , ^ who bled lnm to produce a romantic pallour , and probably gave him that sate stab which reconciled the " lass of Richmond Hill" to visit an unmarried gentleman at his own house . The Duchess of Devonshire played propriety , and the first mockery of marriage was performed between the fainting Prince of Wales and Marv Anne Fitzherbert . This , however , secured her no to immolate

    the convenient marriage . But , to argue that the act was justifiable because the Church sanctioned it , it is to ignore the thousand scandals legitimatised at Rome—Court divorces , tortures , assassinations , adulteries , and other violations of human and national law .

    " position , " she believed that George had actually attempted himself , though her friends suspected he had taken a lesson from the shepherd of Cervantes , who placedawine skin full of bull ' s blood under his arm and stabbed it in presence of his faithless bride . However , that was not her object . She fled to Aix-la-Chapelle , to Holland , though never bey on d reach of her royal Satyr , who followed her thick and fast with protests and passionate letters—one of which was seven and thirty pages long—full of mendacity and extravagance . Lord Holland says , that " Mrs . Fox , then Mrs . Armistead , had repeatedly assured him , that the Prince came down more than once to converse with , her and Mr . Fox on the subject ; that he cried by the hour ; that he testified the sincerity and violence of his passion and despair by extravagant expressions and actions—rolling on the floor , striking his forehead , tearing Ms hair , falling into hysterics , and swearing tkat he would abandon the country , forego the Crown , &c . "

    At last came the offer of marriage . The Catholic lady returned from the Continent , and , in her own drawing-room , in the presence of witnesses , was married by a Protestant clergyman to the Protestant Prince . The documentary evidence of this transaction remains at Coutts ' s Bank . Lord Stourton says : — The first signal interruption to this ill-fated engagement arose from the pecuniary difficulties of his Royal Highness , when , on the question of the payment of his debts , Mr . Fox thought himself justified by some verbal or written -permission of the Prince , to declare to the House of Commons that no religious ceremony had united the parties . This public -degradation of Mrs . Fitzherbert so compromised

    her character and her religion , and irritated her feelings , that she determined to break off all connexion with , the Prince , and she was only induced to receive him again unto her confidence , by repeated assurances that Mr . Fox had never been authorised to make the declaration ; and . the Mends of Mrs . Fitzherbert assured her , that , in this decrepaucy as to the assertion of Mi * . Fox and the Prince , she was bound to accept the word of her husband . She informed me , that the public supported her by their conduct on this occasion ; for , at no period of her life were their visits so numerous at her house as on the day which : followed Mr . Fox ' s memorable speech ; and , to use her own expi-ession , the knocker of lier door was never still during the whole day .

    George desired to be reconciled with Fox , whom he had duped , though , with characteristic turpitude , he afterwards denied tne part he had taken . WhenhenaarriedCarolinehepursuedhisMary Ann as he had done whenshe was Queen of Richmond Hill ; and she resented bis legal marriage , as she was ¦ wont to resent the shameless excesses of his youth ; --ran away , stood afar Off } coyly corresponded with her Jesuit friends , and with much compunction " and swearing she would ne ' er consent—consented "—to live with a notorious profligate who recognised Caroline of Brunswick only as his official wife : The next eight yeara were , she said , the happiest of her connexion with the Piince .

    She used to say that they were extremely poor , but as merry as crickets ; and as a proof of their poverty , she told me that once , on their returning to Brighton from London , they mustered their common means , and could not raise £ 5 between them . Upon this , or some such occasion , she related to me , that an old and faithful servant endeavoured to force them to accept . £ 60 , which he said lie had accumulated in the service of the best of masters and mistresses . She added , however , that even this period , the happiest of their lives , was mucli embittered by the numerous political difficulties which , frequently surrounded the Prince , and sh . 0 particularly alluded to what has "been termed " the delicate investigation , " in which Queen Caroline and his Royal Highness had been concerned .

    At last he cast her off for Lady Hertford ; at the death of Caroline he married once more , and Mrs , Fitzherbert , finding herself eclipsed at Court , accepted the conditions of her ill-chcsen life , and , though ever hovering about the palace , especially after the accession of William the Fourth , never met ** George P . " again . Her last degradation was on the occasion of a royal dinner , when she was told by lier " husband , " " You know , madam , you have no place . " Having come to this resolution , she was obliged , on the very evening , or on that ¦ which followed the royal dinner , to attend an assembly at Devonshire House , which was the last evening she saw the Prince previously to their final separation . The Duchess of Devonshire , taking her by the arm , said to her , " You must come and see the Duke in his own room , as ho is suffering from a fit of the gout , but he will bo glad to boo sin old friend . " In passing through tho rooms , sho saw the Prinoe and Lady Hertford in a tGto-a-tGte conversation , and nearly fainted under all the impressions which then rushed upon her mind , but , taking a glass of water , she x'ooovevod and passed on .

    Whatever Mrs . Fitzherbert was , she was not the legal wife of tho Prince of Wales . It is idle to say that , under the penal laws against Catholics , all unions contracted by th em were disavowed by the law , unless a Protestant clergyman officiated to insult their faith . It was not in this sense that tho alliance was null and void , because a Protestant clergyman was present ; the Royal Marriage Act , which was known to Mrs . Fitzherbert as well as to the Prince , rendered it a seduction on his part , and a fatal mistake on hcra . If her position satisfied her , it matters little whether the Papal Church approved the moans by which she attained it . " Wo are , of course , bound to believe that tho document which came from Rome , did contain tho Pope ' s assent j but why did she , "in n momentary panic , " destroy this hol y testimonial , so important to her character and of her co-religionists ? The lion Mr . Langdale , however , shows , clearly enough , tliat lna Church would not have annulled

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    March 29 , 1856 . ] T H S . LEA D E B . 305

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), March 29, 1856, page 305, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2134/page/17/