The Boise citizen. (Boise, Idaho) 1906-1910, 1909-04-23
THE UNSPEAKABLE TURK
THE AWAKENING IN The FAR EAST IS
MARVEL OF The AGE


look upon the Turks as a decrepit peo
pie, verging toward extinction, regard:
with incredulous wonder the resurgence
of modern political ideas on the banks
of the Bosphorous, says the Oregonian
That the subjects of the Sultan should
aspire TO liberty seems almost as strange
to US as that some tribe of the lower
animals should suddenly develop no
tions of domestic life The truth is
that the character of the Turks is not
well understood in the West They
are not degenerate people. The mar
tial vigor which they possessed at the
beginning of their history they have
never lost Addicted to vicious courses
sometimes, and indulgent of their
grosser passions, on the field of battle
they have always played the man. Nor
is there any ground for the belief that
they are by nature an unprogressive
race. Their early rulers were notable
for spirit of innovation. Many mill
tary and civil practices were introduced
by them to the advantage of the Orienta
world, and for the age in which they
lived their rule was famous for its even
handed justice. Many of the wretched
subjects of the Greek Emporers, in Con-
stantinople, took refuge in the course
of the 18th century, to escape the ex-
tortions of the tax gatherer, among the
subjects of the Turk in Asia Minor.
Where and when the Turkish people
originated, nobody knows. We hear
of them as early as the 9th century,
after Christ, playing something of a
part among the nomadic hordes which
raided and conquered in the vast re-
gions of Central Asia, where so much
history has had its source and so much
misery for mankind has been plotted.
In the var 1900, the period of the
amazing conquests of Jenghiz Khan,
the Seljuk branch of the Turks oc-
cupied the territory now comprised in
Asia Minor, which they had wrested
little by little from the feeble Greek
Emporers of Constantinople The
troops of Jenghiz Khan, wandering UP
and down the earth, devastating and
slaughtering, came face to face with the
army of the Seljuks, at the City of
Angora, sometime near the year 1850,
and for hours the battle between them
ragged with even fortune; but suddenly
a band of 400 horsemen, under gallant
leader, whom none of the combatants
had ever seen before rushed to the aid
of the Seljuks and, casting themselves
upon the Tartars of Jenghiz, decided. the
day. The leader was Ertogruhl, son of
Suleiman, the founder of the power of
the Ottoman Empire and the father OF
an unbroken line of more than thirty
Kings He had come from far Khora-
san, whence he had been driven years
before by the power of Jenghiz, and
wandering westward toward the Aegean
coast and the secure mountains OF An
atolia he had fingered for time on the
banks of the Euphrates, then resumed
his journey and arrived at Angora in
the nick of time to avenge his past
wrongs and retrieve the day for his
relatives, the Seljuks. They rewarded
him with little piece of territory, not
far from the famous city of Nice, where
in an earlier and happier time the tur-
bulent bishops of the orthodox church
had elaborated the great creed which we
all still confess and some of US still
believe
A place to stand on was all that
Ertogruhl needed Little by little his
power increased, sometimes by we'd
ding, sometimes by victory. In 1858
his son, Othman, or Osman, was born,
from whom the title of the Ottoman
Empire is derived His son Orkhan,
was born in 1888 and achieved, in 1926.
the first great triumph of the Turks
over the Greeks by capturing the popu
Ious City of Brusa, near the Ionian |
Coast Orkhan was a diligent innova-
tor and wise statesman as well as a
captain He it was who in
vented the organization of the Janis
saries, that famous body of Turkish
-roops to whose disciplined intrepidity
50 many of their conquests were due.
Each year he required from his Chris
ian subjects thousand well-grown
BOYS of tender age; whom he caused to
oe nurtured up in the true faith of
and drilled in the art of
lighting. Innred to valor by inces-
SAINT discipline, fearless Of death be-
,ause they knew that the joys of Para
iise awaited them the moment they
ell, eager for victory because the Sultan
'laced no rein upon their passions, they
Composed one o fthe finest bodies Of