ENGLISH CONSULS IN TURKEY.
[TO T. EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.")
Sm,—A few years ago, I travelled in Syria, and had introductions to English residents well acquainted with that country. Among other things, they told me that the official reports from our consuls and other agents of the British Government are rarely to be implicitly depended on. Two reasons were given for this statement, which is of considerable interest at the present time. One was, that the Foreign Office expects its agents to " minimise " all things unfavourable to the Turks, and to credit them with as many virtues as possible ; and that the consuls are well aware that, unless they do this, they have no chance of promotion. The other reason was that not a few members of the consular service are Levantines by birth, or at least by education and marriage, and that long custom has blunted the natural feelings of indigna- tion with which Englishmen direct from home see acts of cruelty and oppression. It is true, this was in the good old times of Lord Palmerston and the Turkish loans, but the tradition seems to linger about the Foreign Office, if we may judge from the remark- able difference between the tone of the reports presented to Parliament and that of those furnished to the newspapers by their- correspondents in Turkey. I may add, that though I have since travelled in Spain and Sicily, I have never seen anything like the evidences of misgovernment which prevail in the Ottoman Empire. —I am, Sir, &c.,
Abbots Norton Vicarage, Evesham. N. G. BArr.
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