Mosaics of Grecian History Part 51

The glorious hour's gone forth, And, worthy of such ties, Display who gave us birth.

Then manfully despising The Turkish tyrant's yoke, Let your country see you rising, And all her chains are broke.

Brave shades of chiefs and sages, Behold the coming strife!

h.e.l.lenes of past ages, Oh start again to life!

At the sound of my trumpet, breaking Your sleep, oh join with me!

And the seven-hilled city [Footnote: Constantinople] seeking, Fight, conquer, till we're free.

Sparta, Sparta, why in slumbers Lethargic dost thou lie?

Awake, and join thy numbers With Athens, old ally!

Leonidas recalling, That chief of ancient song, Who saved ye once from falling-- The terrible! the strong!

Who made that bold diversion In old Thermopylae, And warring with the Persian To keep his country free; With his three hundred waging The battle, long he stood, And, like a lion raging, Expired in seas of blood.

--Trans. by BYRON.

Another poet, POLYZOIS, writes in a similar vein:

Friends and countrymen, shall we Slaves of Moslems ever be, Of the old barbaric band, Tyrants o'er h.e.l.lenic land?

Draws the hour of vengeance nigh-- Vengeance! be our battle-cry.

It may be stated that Rhigas, having visited Vienna with the hope of rousing the wealthy Greek residents of that city to immediate action, was barbarously surrendered to the Turks by the Austrian government. On the way to execution he broke from his guards and killed two of them, but was overpowered and immediately beheaded.

v. THE GREEK REVOLUTION.

The various efforts made by the Greeks in behalf of freedom, or, as more comprehensively stated by a recent writer, "The constancy with which they clung to the Christian Church during four centuries of misery and political annihilation; their immovable faithfulness to their nationality under intolerable oppression; the intellectual superiority they never failed to exhibit over their tyrants; the love of humane letters which they never, in all their sorrows, lost; and the wise preparation they made for the struggle by means of schools, and by the circulation of editions of their own ancient authors, and translations of the most instructive works in modern literature"

--these were the influences which finally impelled the Greeks to seek their restoration in armed insurrection, that first broke out in the spring of 1821, and that ushered in the great Greek Revolution. On the 7th of March Alexander Ypsilanti, a Greek, who had been a major-general in the Russian army, proclaimed from Moldavia the independence of Greece, and a.s.sured his countrymen of the aid of Russia in the approaching contest. But the Russian emperor declined intervention; and the Porte took the most vigorous measures against the Greeks, calling upon all Mussulmen to arm against the rebels for the protection of Islamism.

The wildest fanaticism raged in Constantinople, where thousands of resident Greeks were remorselessly murdered; and in Moldavia the b.l.o.o.d.y struggle was terminated by the annihilation of the patriot army, and the flight of Ypsilanti to Trieste, where the Austrian government seized and imprisoned him.

In southern Greece, however, no cruelties could quench the fire of liberty; and sixteen days after the proclamation of Ypsilanti the revolution of the Morea began at Suda, a large village in the northern part of Acha'ia, and spread over Achaia and the islands of the aege'an. The ancient names were revived; and on the 6th of April the Messenian senate, a.s.sembled at Kalama'ta, proclaimed that Greece had shaken off the Turkish yoke to preserve the Christian faith and restore the ancient character of the country. A formal address was made by that body to the people of the United States, and was forwarded to this country. It declared that, "having deliberately resolved to live or die for freedom, the Greeks were drawn by an irresistible impulse to the people of the United States." In that early stage of the struggle, however, the address failed to excite that sympathy which, as we shall see farther on, the progress of events and a better understanding of the situation finally awakened.

During the summer months the Turks committed great depredations among the Greek towns on the coast of Asia Minor; the inhabitants of the Island of Candia, who had taken no part in the insurrection, were disarmed, and their archbishop and other prelates were murdered. The most barbarous atrocities were also committed at Rhodes and other islands of the Grecian Archipelago, where the villages were burned and the country desolated. But in August the Greeks captured the strong Turkish fortresses of Monembasi'a and Navar'no, and in October that of Tripolit'za, and took a terrible revenge upon their enemies. In Tripolitza alone eight thousand Turks were put to death. The excesses of the Turks showed to the Greeks that their struggle was one of life and death; and it is not surprising, therefore, that they often retaliated when the power was in their hands. In September of the same year the Greek general Ulysses defeated a large Turkish army near the Pa.s.s of Thermopylae; but, on the other hand, the peninsula of Ca.s.sandra, the ancient Pelle'ne, was taken by the Turks, and over three thousand Greeks were put to the sword. The Athenian Acropolis was seized and garrisoned by the Turks, and the people of Athens, as in olden time, fled to Sal'amis for safety; but in general, throughout all southern Greece, the close of the year saw the Turks driven from the country districts and shut up in the princ.i.p.al cities.

A PROPHETIC VISION OF THE STRUGGLE.

When the revolution of the Greeks broke out the English poet Sh.e.l.lEY was residing in Italy. It was during the first year of the war that Sh.e.l.ley, filled with enthusiasm for the Greek cause, wrote, from the scanty materials that were then accessible, his beautiful dramatic poem of h.e.l.las; and although he could at that time narrate but few events of the struggle, yet his prophecies of the final result came true in their general import. Forming his poem on the basis of the Persians of aeschylus, the scene opens with a chorus of Greek captive women, who thus sing of the course of Freedom, from the earliest ages until the light of her glory returns to rest upon and renovate their benighted land:

In the great morning of the world The Spirit of G.o.d with might unfurled The flag of Freedom over Chaos, And all its banded anarchs fled, Like vultures frightened from Ima'us, [Footnote: A Scythian mountain-range.]

Before an earthquake's tread,

So from Time's tempestuous dawn Freedom's splendor burst and shone: Thermopylae and Marathon Caught, like mountains beacon-lighted, The springing fire, The winged glory On Philippi half alighted [Footnote: The republican Romans, under Brutus and Ca.s.sius, were defeated here by Octavius and Mark Antony, 42 B.C.]

Like an eagle on a promontory.

Its unwearied wings could fan The quenchless ashes of Milan.

[Footnote: Milan was the center of the resistance of the Lombard league against the Austrian tyrant Frederic Barbarossa.

The latter, in 1162, burned the city to the ground; but liberty lived in its ashes, and it rose, like an exhalation, from its ruins.]

From age to age, from man to man It lived; and lit, from land to land, Florence, Albion, Switzerland.

[Footnote: Florence freed itself from the power of the Ghibelline n.o.bles, and became a free republic in 1250.

Albion--England: Magna Charta wrested from King John: the Commonwealth. Switzerland: the great victory of Mogarten, in 1315, led to the compact of the three cantons, thus forming the nucleus of the Swiss Confederation.]

Then night fell; and, as from night, Re-a.s.suring fiery flight From the West swift Freedom came, [Footnote: The American Revolution.]

Against the course of heaven and doom, A second sun, arrayed in flame, To burn, to kindle, to illume.

From far Atlantis its young beams [Footnote: The fabled Atlantis of Plato; here used for America.]

Chased the shadows and the dreams.

France, with all her sanguine streams, Hid, but quenched it not; again, [Footnote: Referring to the French Revolution.]

Through clouds, its shafts of glory rain From utmost Germany to Spain.

[Footnote: Referring to the revolutions that broke out about the year 1820.]

As an eagle, fed with morning, Scorns the embattled tempest's warning, When she seeks her aerie hanging In the mountain cedar's hair, And her brood expect the clanging Of her wings through the wild air, Sick with famine; Freedom, so, To what of Greece remaineth, now Returns; her h.o.a.ry ruins glow Like orient mountains lost in day; Beneath the safety of her wings Her renovated nurslings play, And in the naked lightnings Of truth they purge their dazzled eyes.

Let Freedom leave, where'er she flies, A desert, or a paradise; Let the beautiful and the brave Share her glory or a grave.

In the farther prosecution of his narrative, the poet represents the Turkish Sultan, Mahmoud, as being strongly moved by dreams of the threatened overthrow of his power; and he accordingly sends for Ahasuerus, an aged Jew, to interpret them. In the mean time the chorus of women sings the final triumph of the Cross over the crescent, and the fleeing away of the dark "powers of earth and air" before the advancing light of the "Star of Bethlehem:"

A power from the unknown G.o.d, A Promethean conqueror came; Like a triumphal path he trod The thorns of death and shame.

A mortal shape to him Was like the vapor dim Which the orient planet animates with light; h.e.l.l, sin, and slavery came, Like bloodhounds mild and tame, Nor preyed until their lord had taken flight.

The moon of Ma'homet Arose, and it shall set; While, blazoned as on heaven's immortal noon, The Cross leads generations on.

Swift as the radiant shapes of sleep, From one whose dreams are paradise, Fly, when the fond wretch wakes to weep, And day peers forth with her black eyes; So fleet, so faint, so fair, The powers of earth and air Fled from the rising Star of Bethlehem.

Apollo, Pan, and Love, And even Olympian Jove Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared on them.

Our hills, and seas, and streams, Dispeopled of their dreams-- Their waters turned to blood, their dew to tears-- Wailed for the golden years.

In the language of Ha.s.san, an attendant of Mahmoud, the poet then summarizes the events attending the opening of the struggle, giving a picture of the course of European politics--Egypt sending her armies and fleets to aid the Sultan against the rebel world; England, Queen of Ocean, upon her island throne, holding herself aloof from the contest; Russia, indifferent whether Greece or Turkey conquers, but watching to stoop upon the victor; and Austria, while hating freedom, yet fearing the success of freedom's enemies.

The poet could not foresee that change in English politics which subsequently permitted England, aided by France and Russia, to interfere in behalf of Greece. Ha.s.san says:

"The anarchies of Africa unleash Their tempest-winged cities of the sea, To speak in thunder to the rebel world.

Like sulphurous clouds, half shattered by the storm, They sweep the pale aegean, while the Queen Of Ocean, bound upon her island throne, Far in the West, sits mourning that her sons, Who frown on Freedom, spare a smile for thee: Russia still hovers, as an eagle might Within a cloud, near which a kite and crane Hang tangled in inextricable fight, To stoop upon the victor; for she fears The name of Freedom, even as she hates thine; But recreant Austria loves thee as the grave Loves pestilence; and her slow dogs of war, Fleshed with the chase, come up from Italy, And howl upon their limits; for they see The panther Freedom fled to her old cover Amid seas and mountains, and a mightier brood Crouch around."

Although Ha.s.san recounts the numbers of the Sultan's armies, and the strength of his forts and a.r.s.enals, yet the desponding Mahmoud, watching the declining moon, thus symbolizes it as the wan emblem of his fading power:

"Look, Ha.s.san, on yon crescent moon, emblazoned Upon that shattered flag of fiery cloud Which leads the rear of the departing day, Wan emblem of an empire fading now!

See how it trembles in the blood-red air, And, like a mighty lamp whose oil is spent, Shrinks on the horizon's edge--while, from above, One star, with insolent and victorious light Hovers above its fall, and with keen beams, Like arrows through a fainting antelope, Strikes its weak form to death."

As messenger after messenger approaches, and informs the Sultan of the revolutionary risings in different parts of his empire, he refuses to hear more, and takes refuge in that fatalistic philosophy which is an unfailing resource of the followers of the Prophet in all their reverses:

"I'll hear no more! too long We gaze on danger through the mist of fear, And multiply upon our shattered hopes The images of ruin. Come what will!

To-morrow and to-morrow are as lamps Set in our path to light us to the edge, Through rough and smooth; nor can we suffer aught Which He inflicts not, in whose hands we are."

When the Jew, Ahasuerus, at length arrives, he speaks in oracular terms, and calls up visions which increase the Sultan's fears; and when the latter hears shouts of transient victory over the Greeks, he regards it but as the expiring gleam which serves to make the coming darkness the more terrible. He thus soliloquizes:

"Weak lightning before darkness! poor faint smile Of dying Islam! Voice which art the response Of hollow weakness! Do I wake, and live, Were there such things? or may the unquiet brain, Vexed by the wise mad talk of the old Jew, Have shaped itself these shadows of its fear?

It matters not! for naught we see, or dream, Possess or lose, or grasp at, can be worth More than it gives or teaches. Come what may, The future must become the past, and I As they were, to whom once the present hour, This gloomy crag of time to which I cling, Seemed an Elysian isle of peace and joy Never to be attained."

Although the poet predicts series of disasters and periods of gloom for struggling Greece, yet, at the close of the poem, a brighter age than any she has known is represented as gleaming upon her "through the sunset of hope."

The year 1822 opened with the a.s.sembling of the first Greek congress at Epidau'rus, the proclaiming of a provisional const.i.tution on the 13th of January, and the issuing, on the 27th, of a declaration that announced the union of all Greece, with an independent federative government under the presidency of Alexander Mavrocorda'to. But the Greeks, unaccustomed to exercise the rights of freemen, were unable at once to establish a wise and firm government: they often quarreled among themselves; and those who had exercised an independent authority under the government of the Turks were with difficulty induced to submit to the control of the central government. The few men of intelligence and liberal views among them had a difficult task to perform; but the wretchedly undisciplined state of the Turkish armies aided its successful accomplishment. The princ.i.p.al military events of the year were the terrible ma.s.sacre of the inhabitants of the Island of Scio by the Turks in April; the defeat of the latter in the Morea, where more than twenty thousand of them were slain; the successes of the Greek fire-s.h.i.+ps, by which many Turkish vessels were destroyed; and the surrender to the Greeks of Nap'oli di Roma'nia, the ancient Nauplia, the port of Argos.

By the destruction of the Island of Scio a paradise was changed into a scene of desolation, and more than forty thousand persons were killed or sold into slavery. Soon after, one hundred and fifty villages in southern Macedonia experienced the fate of Scio; and the pasha of Saloni'ca boasted that he had destroyed, in one day, fifteen hundred women and children.