The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-10-14
WITH FIRE
AND SWORD
Lycurgus Talks on
Barbarism of
Bulgarians.
Helpless Women and
Children Put to Death
by the Sword.
Villages Burned and DesoIatsd,
Crowds of Ref,,oees Throno-
Villages Burned and DesoIated,
Crowds Of Refugees Throns-
ing to Larger Cities.

+
George Lycurgus, who has not long
since returned from the starting point
of the Balkan troubles, has strong
sympathies with the Turkish side of
the story. He has been in close touch
with tales of rapine and ensuing des-
titution among Greek and Turkish
women and children and describes in
vivid language the cruelties practiced
by the revolving Bulgarians in Mace
donia and elsewhere.
Soon after Lycurgus' arrival here
the Advertiser secured an interview on
the initial outbreak in which he I'M
reservedly placed the initiative blame
upon the Bulgarians. He was resident
in Salonica when the first bombs were
thrown destroying bank and the
railroad depot. No acclaimed cause
for this action was made by the Bull
garians at the time and it was the
general opinion in Salonica that the
bomb throwersN were in the pay OF
Russia or Austria.
Mrs. Lycurgus. bride of the restau-
rateur, is a niece of a Minister OF the
Interior at Athens and through the
latter many narrowing details of the
fight of destitute men, women and
children from interior villages to the
larger towns, have been received.
Lycurgus has subscribed to a fund
started for the relief of these des-
titute people, who have lost fathers,
mothers, husbands, wives, children
and property, escaping only after
dreadful sufferings and toilsome jour-
neys through a country but slightly
traversed by railroads.
1.-THE Bulgarians," says Lycurgus,
'are barbarians. They do not indulge
in warfare but massacre. Living like
mountain goats in their native passes,
they congregate in small bands of fif-
ty to a hundred and swoop down on
helpless villages principally inhabited
by Turks or Greeks, the Bulgarian
population being only some fifteen
per cent. of Macedonia and other
districts wher, the massacre is now
raging.
I'm these defenceless villages they
run riot with murder, lust and loot.
But a few escape to endure perils as
great as those of the first night. Fire
and the sword devastate the township
and mothers and babes are murdered
with a mingled jest and an oath.
1.-The Bulgarian is a peculiar char
acter He is a cutthroat in appear
ance and disposition. The nature of
the country he lives in shuts him off
from civilizati ton and its influences and
he makes no attempt to seek them
He is of type similar to the Russian
Croat, pitiless and cruel, a type of
barbarian. Living in scattered bands,
supplied in some mysterious way, I'M
less one looks to Russia or Austria for
the solution, with ammunition, he is
more able to defy any attempts to
suppress him than the Filipino the
American, or the Boer the English.
Massacre of helpless men, women and
children is pastime that comes nat
urally to him.
Turkey should either be left alone
in her efforts to quell this butchery
or the Powers should in the name of
civilization assist in stopping these ter
rible outrages. The war between
Greece and Turkey, that was war, as
was the combat between the Beers and
England. There was an outcry to stop
the latter, surely this Bulgarian bar
barism should be put an end to for
the sake of common humanity. 1t is
not war, it is massacre"