The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-11-22

To say that the story of Abdu
Hamid reads like a romance is to do il
injustice. From his infancy he inspir
| ed fear and repulsion, says Harper :;
Weekly, and we are told that his father
gave orders that the child should never
be brought to him in the morning lest
he might east i'll luck over the whole
day.
He was, it is said, the son of an
Armenian slave girl who renowned
Christianity for Islam and danced hel
way into the favor of Abdul Mejid
That wise and liberal ruler was sue.
ceeded by the wild and tempestuous
Abdul Aziz, whose maniacal frenzies
forced his ministers to depose him. He
ended his life few days later by open
ing his veins with scissors.
Abdul Mejid, the liberal minded re
former, left an older son, Murad, OF
| legitimate birth and in many ways re-
sembling his father. Abdul Hamid had
spent his unloved boyhood in super.
stitious ignorance, consulting soothsay'
ers, who had promised him the throne
but had told him that his fate was link
ed with that of Murad and that his
death would follow close on his broth
er's death.
Murad V was raised to the throne
made vacant by the deposition of Abdul
Aziz at the end of May, 1876. Three
months later he himself was removed
from the throne, and a pail of mystery
| descended upon him which has never
| been raised.
Hundred tongued rumor declares that
| he still lives, the lawful sovereign OF
/ Turkey, commander of the faithful
caliph of Islam, in the marble dungeon
| of the Cheragan palace, and no Mo
hammedan boatman will willingly ap
preach the forbidden ground on which
the Cheragan stands, on a cliff above
| the Bosphorus.
| Whether Murad v lives is certainly
known only to Abdul Hamid, the young
| er brother, who holds his throne. But
this much is certain. Murad, soon after
the suicide of his maniac uncle, was
stricken with mental depression, per
! haps brain fever, and commission OF
doctors, with Abdul Hamid S physician
at its head, declared that he was hope
lessly insane.
The Sheik III Islam, the religious
head of the Moslem world, thereupOn
declared a regency, and it is as regent
| for his brother Murad that Abdul
Hamid still holds the throne. Murad S
/ life is spared only because the seers had
! told Abdul Hamid that he would not
4
The incarceration of the elder broth
er took place at the end of August
1876. At that very time a frightfuI
struggle was going on among the Bal
| kan mountains between the Christian
Slavs and the Moslem Turks. The
world rang with the tale of the "Bul
| garian atrocities which filled al
| Northern Turkey with a carnival OF
cruelty and destruction. Meanwhile
whispers were rife through CONSTANT
nople that Murad V. had completely re
covered his health and mind and thai
MS brother Abdul Hamid was guilty Of
the high crime of usurpation.
To strengthen himself, to disarm hi:
critics and enemies, Abdul Hamid de
termined to declare a constitution. HI
lmade lavish profession of modernism
and love of liberty. declared in 1876
"The welfare of the Turkish empirt
lies wholly in the full and sincere appli
cation of the constitution. A Turkisl
parliament met twice, in 1877 and 1873
for sessions of several months.
In it all creeds were equally repre-
sented-Moslem, Greek. Orthodox, Ro
man Catholics, Armenian Catholics
Protestants and Jews-a motley gather
ling of the score of races that make VI
the huge Turkish empire on three con
ltinents. The debates were intelligent
temperate. patriotic, and Turkey seem
led destined to take her place among tn
constitutional monarches of the world
But all this time Abdul Hamid wa
plotting. filed with dread that tn
throne he had so hardly gained w0ul
vanish as suddenly as it had appeared
Russia watched the turmoil in tn
Balkan peninsula with mixed feelings
On the one hand all that was noblest i
Russia desired to free the SOuther
Slavs from oppression and cruelty. o
the other hand there was an old amb
ton to seize COnstantin0ple.
The nobler side of Russian feeling lie
to a declaration of war against Turke
in the spring of 1877 and to the fna
and complete defeat of the armies o
Turkey. The obscurantist reaction,