The morning star and Catholic messenger., 1877-09-16
Il H1R OF HORRORS.


war Infamous even among the wars of sheer
barbarism. Something infinitely worse
than the devastation of the Thirty Years
War is taking place under the eyes of Eu-
rope in the rineteenth century, and every
probability unites to indicate that the more
the struggle is prolonged the more fearful
will it's character become. The dire story
of Russo Bulgarian provocation and Bashi-
Bazouk retaliation keeps adding new chap
ters of blood and last, and meantime the
| Cnristan nations look on at the hatef0l
rivalry as if it were a mere stage tragedy,
and not the most rea! agony of millions of
| innocent people, Christian aud Musnlman.
| 1t matters little whether Turks or BulgaTi
aus commit the majority of the nassacres.
The greater or less extent seems to depend
on little bat opportunity. As soon as ever
| the RussiaLs crossed at Sistova the work OF
pillage and murder began in the Musnlman
quarter, and but for the has;y flight Of the
larger portion of the Mosiem inhabitants
along with the Turkish troops, a terrible
carnage would have resulted. AS the Lon
don Times correspondent has noted, the
preparations fer massacre went 30 far that
the houses of the Christians were carefully
marked with a cross to prevent mistakes,
while all the houses unprotected by the
Christian emblem became the prey of the
mob. As the Russians advanced the same
scenes were repeated. Nothing but flight
saved large number OF the peaceful Mos
| treating columDs of old men, women, and
children, were skillfully cut of by the pur-
suing Cossacks and driven back upon the
m urderous hordes of Bulgarian fanatics.
When General Gourko made his surprising
dash across the Balkans, it was evidently
fancled in the Russian camps that the hour
| for the final destruction of the Turkish
Empire had already struck, and thence
forth no restraint was set upon the Pan
slavst Propagandists in their agitation
to rouse the Bulgariane to rebellion.
| The fertile valleys on the southern
! side of the Bakans became for few
| days the theatre of the most frightful
0utrages on every body and everything
| Turkish. The roads to Adrlanople
and Constantinople became crowded
with miserable fugitives, who spread all
! along their T0ate the awful tidings of the
| Slaughter and ruin worked d by the "BulEa
rian Legion" in every place to which he
| Russ ana had come. The determination of
| the Mussulmau population was believed
even by themselves to be a mere question
of time. correspondent Of the Times
describes the awful character of the tor
tu1es 10 ficted upon the Turkish inhs bitants
who did not succeed in making their es-
cape. "The Balgarians," he writes, "cut
of the breasts of sucking Turkish moth
eTs and applied the babies in Inockery to
the mutisted part" 1t really seemed for
some days that under the combined influ-
created by the Bulgarian murderers the
entire edifce of Ottoman domination was
crumbliDg to the ground. The Turks
began to feel that if they resisted their
fate was to be moved down by the Musco-
vlte regulars, and if they suhmitted that a
b worse IEiDE was in stove Tor them at the
hands "f the Is l'glr'ats
S1dueDly the tiGe turned. Suleiman
Pasta was released from the Montenegiin
camFaign in time to pour his troops into
Rounena at the very moment when all
seemed lost in that region. The twenty
thousand Rassiaus Of Gourko fOuud them :
selves opposed by double their number of
TUX Lkish troops, while at the same time
the disaster of Pievna efTectualiy prevent
ed the dispatch of Russian reiuforcements
from Bulgaria. TIE consequence was
inevitable steadily the Turkish bsttalions,
flushed with recent victory, and infuriated
T by the massacre of their CO religionists,
drove the troops of General Gourko back
into the Balkan Passes, and perhaps
beyond them. The wide stretches of ter
3 ritory which had burst out into the most
. savage of instructions under the iustiga
ton of Muscovite victory were again re-
9 duced under the sway of the dominant
race. The short eaturnalis of bloody and
/ lustful revolt was over. The hour of Mus-
sulman vengeance was come.
9 We have not yet heard the full details
3 nor anything like the full details, of what
, followed the return of the Musulman vii.
layers to their devastated homes, and tC
q the uuburied corpses of their outraged and
] murdered kindred; but everything goes tc
8 show that the devilries of Bulgarian insur
! rection have been terribly exceeded by the
deviries of Mobammedan revenge. II
the towns and hamlets in which bot few
: days previously the Bulgarian legions q
3 the orthodox Car were hacking aud hew-
/ Jog the sick aud helpless of the Turkist
f population, were subjecting to every name
less infamy the matrous and maids of the
f Turkish faith and race, there were now lei
: loose another band of demons with the
, mission To intllct upon the Bulgariaus all
: aud worse it possible than all, that haC
been perpetrated against the Mussulmans
: Every male Bulgarian who could not salts
j, factoriiy account for his conduct during
= the Russian occupation-and few, We MAJ