The news from Macedonia is alarming. The Revolutionary Committee at
Sofia have issued an Address to the Powers, in which they distinctly threaten that unless Macedonia is occupied by Christian troops they will, by rising in insurrec- tion, give their secular oppressors an excuse for a general massacre which will compel Europe to intervene. The threat is evidently believed at Constantinople, whence the Sultan is daily pushing troops into Macedonia, and in Vienna and St. Petersburg, where grave warnings appear threatening Bul- garia and Servia if they are not passive. As the Macedonians, though two millions in number, have no competent leader, are imperfectly armed, and are threatened by at least seventy thousand Turkish soldiers, it is hardly probable that the rising will come to much, unless the Turks commit a massacre so awful as to stir the blood of the Russian population. The Armenians were heretics, but. the Macsedonians are as orthodox as the Holy Synod. The Sultan ought by this time to understand that there are limits which he must not pass, but he has not complete control of his irregulars, and a great massacre in Salonica, besides shocking Europe, would affect considerable commercial interests. The great port, it must be remembered, does not lie, like Constantinople, in a gigantic dock with fortified gates, but is fairly exposed to Admiral Noel's shells. They will not, however, we fear, fall just yet.
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