The Washington herald., 1915-12-19
years. they carried the bounds
OF Macedonia to the Indus.
The Procession of Empires.

The Procession OF Empires.
For $50 years the Macedonians re-
manned a proud and imperial race. But
while they were Hellenizing the
Orient. they themselves were oriental
by the Nile and the Euphrates. Greece
and Macedonia sank lower and lower
beneath the despotism they had de-
vised for others.
Meanwhile the republic of Rome
waXed vigorous in the freedom OF the
wild west, and soon its republican le-
gions swept the Macedonian plain. But
there they caught the contaglon of
Imperialism. and there Rome really es-
tablished herself in the fatal business
of empire. For it was in Macedonia
that Augustus vanquished Cassius and
Brutus. and one of the old gates of
Salonica still bears his name in mem
ory of a day 1000 years ago when he
entered the town in triumph after
overwhelming his republican adver-
saries at Philiippi.
Slowly. steadily the springs of Ro-
man power and greatness were drain
ed dry in the struggle to hold the
world in subjection. After the Empire
of Rome had fallen apart and the east
ern half had set up its throne at Con-
stantinople. stalwart races, nurtured
I'm the liberty of the savage north.
crowded in between the two empires.
1t was then that the Serbs and Bull
gars planted themselves in the Balk-
ans and began that long quarrel over
the possession of the Macedonian plain
which in our day has plunged the
Twice in the Middle Ages Bulgar-
ian empire rose and fell. and Ser
bian empire came to the same end.
Next the Turkish empire rose. and the
long Turkish night lay upon the troy
bled scene for 400 years.
On the Altar of Politics.
Serbia and Greece were the first to
struggle to the light, and Bulgaria
and Roumania were the next to emerge
from the eclipse. But Macedonia, like
an escaped slave. was driven back into
the darkness by the great powers at
the Congress of Berlin in 1878. and,
although Russia had broken her fet-
ters in the Russo-Turkish war. the rule
of the Turk was fastened upon her
anew
Yet it was really the Macedonian
cry of agony that had thrilled the
plying heart of the world and given
The horrible cruelties of the Bashi
Bazouks were spoken of as the Bull
garian atrocities" it is true. but only
Bulgars living in Macedonia. Bull
garia and the rest of the Balkans
were far enough away to escape the
heaviest blows. but poor Macedonia lay
Ted sntsn Nevertheess ers the one that
had suffered most Jared worst in the
grab game of the Berlin Congress,
which followed Russia's successful war
of deliverance.
In the Treaty of San Stefano. the
Russian victor had exacted and re-
ceived Macedonia from the Turk and
added most of 1t to Bulgaria. But Eng
pected that the little Balkan nations
would become only the outposts of
the Gar. and they feared that the
bear would freely stalk across them
to slake his thirst for warm water.
Macedonia. therefore. with her coast
the eager arms of the Bashi Bazouks.
Suspicion and fear ever are the
binding weaknesses Of imperialism. 1t
is always suspecting and fearing. that
earth. And what a congress Of the
blind was that at Berlin. Today Eng
land and Russia are in alliance against
the Sultan, and Bulgaria is the ally of
Germany. Austria and the Turk!
Where and How the War Started.
And this is only another war for Mace
donia, For the unsettled question Of her
wrongs has had no pity for the repose OF
nations in the thirty-seven years since
the POWERS rendered her back to Abdul
The jealous politicians at Berlin took
care to shut In the Balkans from the
sea and they gave Turkey q new lease
Of all the coast provinces, which included
Iiot only Macedonia, but also Ihrace on
Turk thus was left standing between
Greece and the Continent and blocking
the path OF Serbia and Bulgaria to the
shore.
mine for another war; but they could
not have known how great war.
Nowhere than down On the mountain