BOOKS.

NAPOLEON AND ALI OF YANINA.*

Ant Penis OF YANINA, the turbulent clansman who, like his countryman, Mehemet Ali, braved the power of the Sultan and carved out a kingdom for himself, has enjoyed a degree of posthumous fame in excess of that generally accorded to those masterful adventurers of whom the East has been eo prolific. The numerous stirring episodes of his chequered career, his daring, ferocity, and dissimulation, have formed the subject of countless tales and popular ballads. There is probably no Epirote or Corfiote child whose young imagination has not been excited by the pathetic story, told in • L'Albssis .5 Nspoldon: I757-1.714. Par A. Hoppe. Parts, Libralrie Hachette it Cis. DLL tom.]

tuneful verse by Aristoteles Valsoriti, of " The Lady Phrosine," who paid with her life the lore she bore to Ali's son. The heroism of the Suliotes and the infamy of the traitor Botzaris, who handed over the rock, heretofore deemed impregnable, to "the man of war and woes," as Byron called Ali, have been recounted in endless lays and odes.

We know much of the personal appearance and general behaviour of this remarkable men. He was visited by Byron and Hobhouse—the two " soi-disants mylords" of the French report quoted by M. Boppe. Hothouse recorded that " Ali's liveliness and euae gave us a very favourable impression of his natural capacity." The comment made by Dr. (subsequently Sir Henry) Holland, who was probably a more observant physiognomist than Hothouse, shows greater penetration. He visited Yanina in 1814, and noted in his journal that the expression of Ali was like " the fire of a stove burning fiercely under a smooth and polished surface." The cruelty for which Ile has gained an unenviable notoriety in Epirote annals was partly inherited and partly due to the circumstances in which he was placed. His savage and masterful mother, Khamco, trained him to be a brigand. " Remember," she said to him when he was a child, "that the property of others only belongs to them by the right of, the stronger ; why then should it not be yours ?" She left as a dying legacy to Ali and his sister the task of avenging on some neighbouring tribesmen the indignities which she had suffered at their hands. Her behests were all too faithfully executed. In due time, when Ali had risen to power, the wretched Gardikiotes were slaughtered; and Ali's implacable sister, Chainitza, who was denounced by a courageous Sheikh as a "daughter of Belial, the encourager of Ali's crimes," caused their wives to be driven to the mountains, where they died of hunger and exposure, and made a cushion of the hair of their beads. Testimony to the drastic methods by which All thought he could alone maintain his authority over the turbulent Albanians is borne by M. Pouqueville, the very intelligent French Consul who was sent by Napoleon to Yanina and who played so important a part in Albanian affairs, " Whenever," M. Pouqueville wrote, "I have followed any of the roads previously travelled by All Pasha, I have never failed to observe some ditch recently filled up, or wretches hanging on the trees. His footsteps were everywhere imprinted in blood; and it was upon these occasions that, to display the extent of his power, he ordered executions as terrible as they were unexpected."

An English Life of Ali, published in 1823, deals incidentally with the relations between Napoleon and the robber chieftain of Albania. M. Boppe, the Councillor of the French Embassy at Constantinople, is, however, to be congratulated on having again drawn attention to this little-known page of history. In a work which affords evidence of careful research, and which is singularly free from patriotic bias, M. Boppe gives a very full, lucid, and, it cannot be doubted, accurate account of the leading events which occurred during the seventeen years of the French connexion with Epirus and the Ionian Islands.

There is a monotonous sameness about the history of the events which occurred whenthe East was firstbrought into close contact with modern Europe. Everywhere the same features are revealed. First come aggression on the part of the European and truculence, born of an exaggerated belief in his own strength, on the part of the Oriental. Secondly, the European holds out glittering hopes which are not destined to be fulfilled, or takes pledges which be eventually finds it inconvenient to execute, whilst the Oriental, gradually awakening to the fact that he is in the presence of a power which he cannot resist, falls back on intrigue,

flattery, and dissimulation to enable Lim to hold his own. Thirdly, the subtle Eastern becomes alive to the fact that these Europeans, who are all alike uncongenial to him and in

whose friendship he sees almost au great a menace as in their enmity, are by no means a happy family, and that by playing on their mutual fears and jealousies he can hope to obtain something to his own advantage. All passed through all these successive stages. But throughout the numerous shifts

and windings of his tortuous diplomacy be never had the least doubt as to the object which he sought to attain. He wished to pose as a modern Pyrrhus, and if, as Miss Durham has told us, that name is derived from an Albanian word meaning " valiant," he certainly possessed one of the qualities

attributed to his ancient prototype. The main object of his ambition was to establish himself firmly on the coast of Epirus and, if possible, to acquire possession of the Ionian Islands, at all events of Corfu and Santa Mauna. As a matter of fact, be succeeded in gaining possession of Prevesa and Butrinto—that dreary snipe marsh which legend relates was the birthplace of Judas Iscariot, and which, by a poetical licence, Virgil (den. III. 20) has described as a " lofty city" (celsom Buthroti urban). But what he most coveted, and what the people concerned most resented, was the possession of the little citadel of Parga, which has been celebrated in Byron's ode. "o‘ae 1411, ITchryav I Witco "iv Ild'fyav I" was his never-ending cry to the French Consul. His wish was at last realized, but not by his personal exertions. As to the Ionian Islands, it was reserved for a statesman of a type very different from the Albanian robber chieftain to effect their political union with the mainland. Nearly half a century after All had fallen beneath the dagger of a hired assassin, Mr. Gladstone arranged that the islands should be ceded to Greece.

Al.'s first relations with the French were not commenced under good auspices. Napoleon thought that it would be in the interests of the French Republic to encourage the develop- ment of his power. The wily diplomatist who then presided over French foreign affairs made a more accurate forecast of the future. " Quelque desir," Talleyrand wrote in March, 1798, " que ce Pasha art d'affermir et d'etendre as puissance, it est trop clairvoyant pour ne pas apercevoir que l'esprit republicain, introduit avec nos guerriers dans le pays qu'il gouverne et aux environnants, renverserait son autorite et qu'il serait la victims de ea propre ambition. D'ailleurs, ii ne faut pas se fier trop leghrement A ces sortes de gene." Talleyrand's prediction was soon fulfilled. Whilst Napoleon was in Egypt, All attacked and defeated a small French force which garrisoned Prevesa. Nothing could exceed the brutality with which he treated his prisoners. After an interval, however, Napoleon's military prowess led to a complete change in Ales views. Moreover, under the Treaty of Pressburg, Dalmatia became French. It would have been unwise to affront so powerful a neighbour. Moved by these impulses, Ali said to a French agent : " Qu'il a toujours eu les entrailles fraucaises . . . sue la tete de ses enfants it jure qu'il n'a jamais regards In France qua comme son amie; ii est reconnaissant a In France de cette amitie dont it est plus que personae &RA il est prat h tout pour la reconquerir."

Napoleon found it convenient to forget the disaster of Prevesa. A political honeymoon then ensued. Nothing was in Alee eyes too good for the French. He sent Napoleon the sword of the Grand Khan of the Crimea, whose defeat at the bands of the Russians " avait ate si bien venge h Austerlitz." " Je n'ai d'autre appui que mon Empereur Napoleon et d'amis gue les Francais" were the words he used in pressing the French Consul's hands. "La scene," the latter reported, "est devenue extremement touchante. J'ai vu des larmes dana les yeux du Vizir." A curious popular ballad, which must have been composed at about this period, relates how All held out to the Greeks, whom he at times slaughtered and at times sought to conciliate, hopes that he would accord to them a liberty similar to that enjoyed by the French, whom, he alleged, they much resembled:—

11)4.i Nombr, rd 84atopev ovrxeopf. perbow,

'EXeutleplan lv vestry, dos tkayar oi PciAS.0‘,

temi cL yirm vOr rpeoSm arm carte TEN N.V.,

Napoleon met these advances in a spirit of reciprocity. The French Consul at Yanina was authorized to say that if Corfu fell into French hands it would be handed over to AIL This state of things did not last long. Under the arrange- ment made at Tilsit, Corfu was to pass into Russian possession. Ales dearest hopes were thus frustrated. He veered round to the English and became bitterly hostile to the French. On the other hand, Napoleon, indignant at Ali's frequent acts of piracy, which had the effect of stopping supplies for the Corfu garrison, ordered his local officials to do whatever was possible to sweep "ce brigand" off the face of the earth.

Ales subsequent attempts to run with the French hare and to bunt with the English hounds are fully and clearly set forth in AL Boppe's pages. Here it must be sufficient to state Viol he made strenuous efforts to aide with those whose star be thought for the time being was in the ascendant. With the entry of tiie French into Madrid Ids Gallophile tendencies

increased. The impression made upon him by their entry into Moscow was still more profound. Eventually, although he was always careful not to move too far in an English direction, he came to the conclusion, on hearing of Napoleon's later disasters, that " desormais la France n'etait plus en etat de s'opposer a ses projets." Accordingly French friendship, being no longer profitable, was cast to the winds.

Apart from the disasters which exercised so strong an influence on this opportunist Pasha, there could be but one end to Napoleon's Albanian and Ionian policy. At the battle of Aboukir the French Mediterranean fleet was destroyed, and without the command of the sea it was hopeless to expect that France could hold the Ionian Islands permanently. Parga, the apple of Ali's eye, after being occupied for a short time by the English, was banded over to AR, much to the dismay of its terror-stricken inhabitants, one of whom had warned his fellow-townsmen of the risk involved in applying for English help on the following singular ground, which may be quoted ae illustrative of the Albanian view of party govern- ment. "The King of England," he said, "has not that sword of justice in his hand, that he can, like Napoleon, Alexander, or the Sultan, decapitate the misgoverning Pashas of his distant provinces. On the contrary, his justice ie feeble ; because, being surrounded by contending parties, he is com- pelled to lean for support upon one party to.day, and to- morrow upon another, and yet to pay regard to all; while each party, in its turn, conceals as much as it can ; defends, and often praises, the blunders of its partisans; so that a governor may treat you as slaves, and yet be fearless of punishment."

English names frequently constitute a stumbling-block to French writers. It requires some thought to discover the name of General Airey under the cryptic description of "Major-General Marquis d'Ayret." Should IL Boppe's very interesting work reach a second edition it would be as well to

rectify this venial slip of the pen. C.