The daily gazette., 1877-10-02
The Camp Followers Of Sulei.
/ man. .Paeha. D. ..t

Shfpka Pass Correspondence of the Lon
don Times. ,..t trlsr ,,,.r q. ..t..r,,,
The valor of the Turkish troops needs
no further eulogium. but there all praise
begins and ends. W hile these five thous-
and or six Thousand men of the regular
army are losing their lives on the hills,
the smoke from all the villages at the
base is going up in great cloud and the
Gireassians aud Bashi-Bazouks are plum
dering and numbering. If was not an
eyewitness to this could not possibly
believe it. I am seated in the plain just
out Of the range of the shell from the
Russian batteries. Z In front of me are
the Headquarters of Suleiman Pacha, pro-
tected from the fire of the Russians by an
old Roman tumulus, of which there are
hundreds in the Valley of the Tundja.
Between this tumulus and the entrance
to the pass stood yesterday morning one
of the most hourishing villages in Tur-
key, with upward of seven thousand or
eight thousand inhabitants. Now 1t is
vast heap of smoking ruins. and strings
of robbers are passing away in the direc-
ton of Eski SaghrA and Yeni Saghra,
with carts, horses, mules, and donkeys,
laden with the household stuffs of all the
Inhabitants indiscriminately. u. '...
| Let us now consider who and what
these robbers are. They have gathered
together from the remotest parts of the
Turkish Empire, Arnauts from Albania,
Greek renegades from Thesslly, the
scum of Smyrna and Alexandria, cut
throats from Lebanon, Bedouins from
Palmyra, Zeibeks from Aidin, and last,
and yet first in bloodthirstiness and insa-
tiatable love of rapine, the Circassians
and Georgians. And rarely pictures
que gang of robbers each group presents
as they jog along on their wiry little
Arabs with their infinite variety of cos-
tune, their arms at their waists and the
great bales of plunder slung at their sad
dlesHereand there set of bucolic robbers
may break the long line of ordinary
thieves, and cattle and sheep stream past
on their way to Adrianople or Philippol-
is. ..... ..- -
| l defy parallel to be produced for
such state OF affairs. An army of men
of all races, totally and completely or
ganized, armed by government suppos-
ed to be responsible, is allowed to hang
about the rear and flank of the regular
army operating in its own country. This
!, supplementary army on no single occa-
| SiOA pOIlOILlb OuS oluEiO luhSoiOh Va ohJ
; kind of troop, regular or irregular, that
ever existed in history or fiction. These
irregulars are distinctly here to rob and
murder, to devastate the land, trample
the crops, slaughter the old, ravish the
young and defile the churches in the
most ostentatious and revolving manner.
. Their enormities render them unfit to
, live, and they have soWn seed ofhatred
among the people, who, after all, though
, numbers may be massacred, must come
again to occupy the land. which will bear
bitter fruit to remote generations.
In this village there were few inhabit-
s, ants left alive after the first operations of
, those people, but the few are now gone
to Join the others. An old man of sixty
j. and an old woman whom l suppose
/ to be his wife, as she is lying near him,
t are the last victims-he with his head
battered to pieces, she with her hands
l clasped, and so shot dead. How could
3 these poor old creatures be supposed to
be dangerous rebels? But must not be
understood to say that seven or eIgh.
f thousand people were massacred here,
: for l believe that the whole number is
: about forty or fifty. These two may be
fairly considered as reprisals, for the
: Bulgarlans also massacred some Turks
! when first the Russians arrived. The
! bodies of these Turks, some thirty in all,
d are lying in ravine not far off-a hor-
rid charnel house, though only too com
n mon in this unfortunate Valley Of the
n Tundja. ...