The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1875-09-03
THE TURKISH REBELLION.
The Causes that Have Produced the Out
break which Threatens the Peace of
Europe.

The Causes that Have Produced the Out
break which Threatens the Peace of
Europe.
Iron the ST. Louis Republican,
Until the outbreak of the rebellion
which now promises TO give the Turkish
government considerable trouble before
it is permanently suppressed, compare
lively few persons had ever heard OF
Herzegovina. Nor is this popular igno-
rance at all surprising. A small territory
hidden away among the mountains,
sparsely settled by poor population,
lying entirely out of the route of ordinary
travel, it has hardly succeeded III attract
ing the attention of the compilers OF
Biographies and cyclopedias, and very
little information concerning 1t is attain
able from any source. All that is known
can be summed up very briefly.
Herzegovina is the name of province
belonging to European Turkey, situated
between Croatia, Bosnia Proper, Monte
negro, and Dalmatia. 1t was originally
one OF the possessions OF Venice, and
was then called the dukedOm of st. Saba,.
and at later period the county OF
Chulm. In 1926 it was again made
dukedom by the Emperor Frederick Ill.
About one hundred and fifty years after
ward-in 1466-it was conquered by the
Turks, and for the next two centuries
was the chosen battle-ground where
Cross and Crescent struggled for SUI
premacy. But by the treaty of Carlo
WITT, in 1897, it was formally coded to
the Ottoman empire, with the exception
Of the town of Castelnovo and It's envi-
rons, which still owe allegiance to Aus
tria. In the earlier history of Hungary,
Herzegovina is frequently mentioned; it
then being, in connection with Bosnia
and Bulgaria, for some time under the
dominion of the Hungarian Kings.
The people ere decidedly mixed, being
| Turks, Jews, Christians and Gypsies
but all save the former, who constitute
the minority, are bitterly opposed to the
rule of the Sultan.
The chief cause of the rebellion is the
outrageous expressions OF the ''agas, or
government tax-gatherers. The London
Spectator thus describes the operations
of these petty tyrants:
From village to village, and from
far N to farm the agas extend their sinis-
ter march, assessing the imposts by
calculation of the taxpayers resources
under pressure, and enforcing then pay
ment on the spot. When the cultivator
is unable or unwilling to meet the ext
gencies of the aga, he is sllmmarily
bound to post and beaten until he finds
some means of appeasing the justice or
cupidity of the aga. If he continues TO
prove recalcitrant, his harvest is cut
down and carted away, or his cattle driv-
en- off by the zaptiehs. This time the
tax collection was both more difficult and
more burdensome than on recent occa-
sions, in consequence of the agas en-
deavoring to make the remaining inhab-
itants pay up the contributions alleged
to be due by the 1900 Christian families
who, ever since the sanguinary outbreak
of Moslem fanaticism last year, have been
refugees in Montenegro, Servia, and the
Austro-H Hungarian border-lands "
What renders the burden still harder
to bear is the fact that the harvests lately
have fallen far below the average, and
the cattle-plague has ragged fearfully the
past season, decimating the herds and
thus reducing the scanty wealth of the
people until they can barely find means
to support their families. Rendered
desperate by misfortune, aggravated by
tyranny of the meanest and most vindic-
tive kind, the peasants of Herzegovina
have risen in revolt; and they certainly
deserve the sympathy of the world in
their unequal struggle against over
whelming odds.