ruary
1870 a firman was issued establishing the Bulgarian exarchate, with
jurisdiction over fifteen dioceses, including Nish, Pirot and Veles; the
other dioceses in dispute were to be added to these in case two-thirds of
the Christian population so desired. The election of the first exarch was
delayed till February 1872, owing to the opposition of the patriarch, who
immediately afterwards excommunicated the new head of the Bulgarian church
and all his followers. The official recognition now acquired tended to
consolidate the Bulgarian nation and to prepare it for the political
developments which were soon to follow. A great educational activity at
once displayed itself in all the districts subjected to the new
ecclesiastical power.

_The Revolt of 1876._--Under the enlightened administration of Midhat Pasha
(1864-1868) Bulgaria enjoyed comparative prosperity, but that remarkable
man is not remembered with gratitude by the people owing to the severity
with which he repressed insurrectionary movements. In 1861, 12,000 Crimean
Tatars, and in 1864 a still larger number of Circassians from the Caucasus,
were settled by the Turkish government on lands taken without compensation
from the Bulgarian peasants. The Circassians, a lawless race of
mountaineers, proved a veritable scourge to the population in their
neighbourhood. In 1875 the insurrection in Bosnia and Herzegovina produced
immense excitement throughout the Peninsula. The fanaticism of the Moslems
was aroused, and the Bulgarians, fearing a general massacre of Christians,
endeavoured to anticipate the blow by organizing a general revolt. The
rising, which broke out prematurely at Koprivshtitza and Panagurishte in
May 1876, was mainly confined to the sanjak of Philippopolis. Bands of
bashi-bazouks were let loose throughout the district by the Turkish
authorities, the Pomaks, or Moslem Bulgarians, and the Circassian colonists
were called to arms, and a succession of horrors followed to which a
parallel can scarcely be found in the history of the middle ages. The
principal scenes of massacre were Panagurishte, Perushtitza, Bratzigovo and
Batak; at the last-named town, according to an official British report,
5000 men, women and children were put to the sword by the Pomaks under
Achmet Aga, who was decorated by the sultan for this exploit. Altogether
some 15,000 persons were massacred in the [v.04 p.0782] district of
Philippopolis, and fifty-eight villages and five monasteri