TURKS AND CHRISTIANS.
[To THE EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR:1
SIR,—As one who can claim intimate acquaintance with Turkey, the Turks, and the Turkish language, I beg leave to comment on your remarks made in answer to the Hon. Secretary, London All-India Moslem League, of December 21st, 191/ You state in your reply that "the history of the Ottoman Turk in Europe shows him utterly incapable of successfully governing European and Christian races." Reference to history may be adduced to prove this statement to be a fact up to the present day, but on what grounds does it hold good as a fact for the future P What nation is there in the world besides Turkey which, while honestly doing its best to govern its own subjects, sees all its efforts annulled
and made vain owing to the propaganda, covert and overt, (see the work of the "Christian? Bands ") carried out with the direct connivance of foreign Powers ? That the Balkan States worked for and directly brought about the situation leading to the present war can be denied by no one who has access to the facts. Reforms in Macedonia would havo been the death-blow to the work of the Komitadjis. That Europe always has been, and still is, ignorant of and pre- judiced against the Turks I yield to no one in asserting, or else why is it that when, according to Consular Reports and other equally reliable information, Macedonia is running in blood, the blood of Moslems butchered by Christians(?), yet we see no word or scarcely any mention in the press, whereas, should one Christian he massacred by Moslems the European press rings with the news ? Can it be wondered that Moslems say, "Is this Christianity ? Is this civilization ? " Trusting that you may see your way to insert this letter, which is animated solely by the love of fair play, I am, Sir, &es W. H. DEEDES (60th Rifles),
Captain, Imperial Ottoman Gendarmerie.
Smyrna, Turkey in Asia.
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