SYRIA, AND THE FRENCH OCCUPATION.
Tire French Army has now been nearly five months in Syria. When the Emperor Napoleon determined to plant a military force there, none of the Powers were in a position to say him nay. Public feeling was excited by the flaming reports of atrocities, and the Emperor, who had offended his Roman Catholic subjects by his Italian policy, eagerly seized the opportunity of doing an act which he knew would tell on the credit side of the account. By the time the French arrived, the Turks under Fuad Pasha had practically crushed the rebellion, and had executed justice upon the assassins of Damascus. Nevertheless, the French went ; landed, made a promenade militaire in the Lebanon, but did not go to Damascus ; and settled down to the work of protecting Maronites, while the Turks hunted the Druses, and rebuilding villages, while their former inhabitants hung on their skirts, and assailed any stray Druse they could find. But although the Powers and the Sultan could not prevent the French display in a country which remembers Acre and Sir Sidney Smith, they could and did impose conditions. One was, that the force should reembark at the expiration of a fixed period—six months. That period terminates on the 5th of March. Will General d'Haut- poul and the " legions " who have earned the marked approval of their Emperor, go when their license to stay has expired ? For some time, it has been obscurely hinted that an extension of the license would be demanded. From Syria, we have all heard cries of alarm, real or simulated, at the prospect of the departure of the French troops. If the French go, the cry of "Dheen ! Dheen !" will be heard again, and the massacres will be renewed, is the exclamation of the timid, who see nothing in the occupa- tion but the protection of those soi-disant Christians, the Maron- ites, a people industrious it is true, but not more so than the
Druses ; timid and servile, which the Druses are not; and as cruel and bloodthirsty as the Druses themselves.
There are not wanting indications that the French will not go. A French paper, reputed to have access to official information, " has reason to believe that the French Government, claiming an extension of leave, is already assured of the consent of several of the Powers." We doubt it very much. What power can look upon the presence of the French there with the eyes of affection ? Russia may feel that the fatal influence of the French occupation upon Turkey tempers her pain at the sight of the eagles in the Lebanon. But she cannot like it. Prussia may regard the force under General d'Hautpoul as so many men removed from the neighbourhood of the Rhine. But the display of military vi- vacity cannot please•her. Austria must have similar sensations. England feels a lively interest in the subject, and the presence of the French neither accords with her views of what is expedient for Syria, nor what is best for herself. The Sultan must regard the red-trousered folk pretty much as a host would regard an uninvited guest. Yet everything tends to show that the French desire to prolong their stay. Why has M. Moequard, private secretary to the Emperor, written and caused to be acted in Paris a drama, entitled "Les Massacres de Syrie," unless it be to tickle the vanity and stimulate the passions of the Parisians ? Why does the Emperor tell General d'Hautpoul, in this very month, that cruel fanaticism still threatens " a whole people ;" when the fact is that the cruel fanaticism of that " whole people," the Maronites, those clients of the Jesuits, not only threatens the Druses, but, under cover of French arms, puts its threats into execution ? Lord Dufferin, to his honour, has stood between the Druses and their enemies—Turk, Frenchman, and Maronite. The Druses have now suffered as much as their rivals. They have been "hunted down and despoiled on all hands ;" are now threatened with the horrors of famine on the one side, and extermination from the Maronites on the other. French policy and Turkish policy would extirpate these gallant people, if they could ; but we have no in- terest in seeing the only really vital race in the Lebanon done to death for the glory of France. Whatever their offences, remem- ber they acted upon provocation, they repelled actual attack, and did to the Maronites what the Maronites would, if they could, have done to them. If any general policy of crushing severity be carried out against the Druses, it will only bring them once more and not them only, into the battle-field, and France will have what she appears to want, a pretext for keeping a considerable force, easily increased, as near as possible to the Isthmus of Suez and the valley of the Euphrates, and actually having sous main those custom-houses whose receipts have been mortgaged to the respectable firm of Mires and Co. Unless he is powerfully sup- ported from home, Lord Dufferin will be unable to keep up the strain of the potent influence he has exercised to repress the com- bined tendency of Turkish and French policy. We read of a plan of settlement said to have been devised by the, commissioners of the Five Powers. Syria is to be politically sequestrated ; put out to nurse. A Governor-General, Fuact Pasha, or perhaps Abd-el-Kader, is to rule over the land. In the Lebanon there is to be a Christian Pasha, General Kmety's name is mentioned, and he would be a good man. The nomination of the Governor-General, and of all the Pashas and Governors under him, is to be subject to the approval of the Five Powers—a de- lightful source of intrigue, dissension, and trouble. There is to be a Syrian army, and a police, and the revenue, that is, what M. Mires leaves in the treasury, is to be expended in the country. Then, to watch over this delicate machine, there are to be five gentlemen, deputed by the Powers, whose seat will be in Beyrout. It is not easy to see how a scheme, which requires the frequent assent of so many diverse interests, would work ; but it is easy to see that the man who would have the least power in Syria would be the Sultan, and that such a plan would probably prove the eu- thanasia of the authority of the Sublime Porte. The question is, are "the eagles" to be its executors, and sole or residuary lega- tees? The occupation of Syria, if prolonged, will give colour to the speculations of those who are wicked enough to differ from Mr. Bright, and imagine that Napoleon would not unwillingly get a cheval of the British highways to India.
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