The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-09-14 00:00:00

IVIIIRDER OF MEHEMET ALL

CONSTANTINOPLE, Sept. S.
The Porte hazS received telegrams confirming the
intelligence that 11,ichemet All Pasha and suite, to-
gether with some soldiers, have been massacred at
Jakovo by the Albanians. The cause alleged is that
he refused to put himself at the head of a movement
for opposing the Austrians.

On the subject the Vienna Correspondent of The
Times writes :
" Yesterday we received news tending to show that violence
had been offered to the life of Mehemet Ali Pasha, Extra-
ordinary Commissioner of the Porte in Albania. It appears
that on his arrival in Jakova the house occupied by him
was surrounded by a band of over a hundred armed men,
and it was only with the greatest difficulty that he
succeeded in prevailing on the threatening mob to leave
the spot without their having recourse to violence.
In front of the house, however, they began to fire off
their guns. From Scutaria at the same time great popular
excitement is announced, which is said to have extended to
Prisrend and provoked resistance on all sidts. In view of
this state of things, the Porte had given up all hope of a
successful issue to Mehemet Alt's mission, and now the news
comes in that he has been murdered.
LATER.
I have just learnt from a trustworthy source that, accord-
ing to official intimation from Constantinople, Mehemet All
Pasha has been murdered in his dwelling at Ipek, along
Wilt' 20 soldiers of his escort and one officer. The house in
which he was living was then fired with petroleum. At the
same time the Mutessarif of Ipek, Abdullah Pasha, along
with 10 superior officials, are reported to have been

massacred. -
In Albania there is said to reign the most complete
anarchy, which excites apprebensions a further atrocities.
-

The Paris Correspondent of The Times writes :—"lt is
thought by many here that Mehemet Al's assassination is
not due to Albanians alone, but that the jealousies ho had
excited may have had something to do with this strange end
of a strange life. His presence as Second Plenipotentiary at
the Berlin Congress brought into still greater prominence
his striking features and the singular mixture in him
of European good nature and subtlety with Turkish stolidity
• and fatalism. Mehemet All, as is well known, sprang
from a Huguenot family, which on the Revocation
of the Edict of Nantes migrated from France to Ger-
many. liej oined a German merchantman as cabin boy,
escaped at the age of eleven to constantinople, and
entered:the hoUsehold of AR Pasha, who epeedll3, struck by
his intelligenc.e, gave him military ihstruhtion and•tnade him
enter the tamp, in which he eventually gained the high
position he held at the outbreak of the late war. His notni-
nationftinenipotentiary was not so strange as appeared at
alit He wits aWn.dtte'd with the Etetsfaui, opolte

German and French fluently, had a more supple mind than
most of the eligible Turks, and bad much more culture and
aptitude than could have been found elsewhere. Nothing
in his physiognomy could have made him be mis-
taken for a 'lurk; and when he happened tE) doff
his fez he showed the purest conceivable German type.
His accent, whatever language le uted. was also German;
but he had a livelir est of disposition rather reoalling his
French extraction, and in -France he would have been
familiarly described as d on enfant. At Berlin be had to
display prodigies of skill to maintain a position essentially
false; but he ultimately won a certain popularity among
the members of the Corgress He amused them by the
originality of situation and character. He one evening
delayed the whole Frontier Delimitation Commission by
reciting a poem he had written in German, full of senti-
ment and delicacy, entitled "The Rose of Jericho." Prince
Bismarok one day said of him :
"It would really much amuse one to chat with Mehemet
All, who must be a very shrewd man to have reached his
present position; but I cannot do so. I must not be unmind•
fill of the dignity of the Emperor whom I represent, and who
must have have been hurt at the selection of him as Pleni-
potentiary. I can understand his escaping when eleven years
old from a German vessel; I should, perhaps, have done the
same ; but to think that, being French and German, he made
himself Turkish, and that, being a Turk, and having made his
way as he has done, he should agree to come here and parade
before his countrymen his new creed and defend its interests
against the representatives of Christian Europe—l cannot
help feeling I was justified in adopting towards him the
attitude I shall retain all through."

The Prince, in fact, never for a moment deviated from an
attitude of which Mehemet All was conscious, and even
complained privately, but which he was careful not to notice
publicly Contrary to usage, there was no exchange of de-
corations between the Powers represented at the Congress,
each remaining free to give or withhold them. At Berlin it
was affirmed that Germany wished thereby to avoid the
obligation of bestowing a Grand Cross on Mehemet Ali, who,
it was added, only desired to go to the Congress for the sake
of obtaining it. The consciousness of this position, however,
did not affect his good humour. He was one of the merriest
guests at the diplomatic dinners, and if he drank pure water,
it was to drink wine without diluting it. When in an
amiable mood he was the first to condemn the abuses and
red-tapeism of Turkey, and he once related to me in a graphic
way the troubles of a Turkish peasant who started from Nuvi
Bazar with wheat for the Ottoman Commissariat, and was
forced to stop three days and secure 22 signatures before he
could draw a Turkish pound to meet his expenses during
that time. I may add that one evening, in a fit of frankness,
he confessed that the Porte had not ventured to hope to
leave the Congress with such advantageous conditions as
had been conceded to it. Apart from these candid
moments, he was extremely discreet, and no effort could
succeed in extracting from what he meant to conceal. He
did not speak much at the Congress, but in accepting his
mission he refused to pursue an obstructive policy; and
when he declared he had no instructions, this was really the
fact, for it was he who induced his two colleagues to sign
the Treaty including the Greek clause; their instruc-
tions did not authorize their doing so. At fashionable
gatherings he was amiable and playful with men and
very gallant with women. He was not, perhaps, the
most polished of diplomatists, but he had a vivacity
and liveliness which made him welcome. He cer-
tainly rendered great services to Turkey. He said
what he wanted to say laughingly, but he said it. He
was natural and unembarrassed with everybody. Bismarck
alone awed him, and he jocosely remarked, That devil
of a man: When he looks at me he has always the air
of saying, 'Ab, if you were still a German, I would lead
you a pretty dance.'" He was fond of Germany and France,
and had an idea of coming to Paris to see to the end of the
Exhibition. It was very interesting to listen to him on
military subjects, and he mixed spicy anecdotes with his
account of the campaign on the Lom. He admitted the
necessity of reforms, of popularizing education, and checking
the finances; but it was difficult to tell whether he did this
to win over his listeners to the side of Turkey or whether he
spoke from conviction. He certainly made people believe
in the possibility of a reformed and regenerated Turkey.
His death is a loss for that country, if not for humanity,
and if he does not leave the deep impression among
those who knew him which is created by really
superior minds, he leaves at least that of a man who felt
what he owed to his adopted country, and served it with a
sincere but not unselfish devotion characteristic of all who
serve-Turkey; for he too, though not born a Mu.ssulman,
was convinced that the Fatherland is neither in Europe, nor
in Asia, nor in Africa, but wherever the standard of the
Prophet is unfurled.