ing is that he should have got influential politicians
to take him seriously. While assuring the French deputy, M. Joseph
Reinach, of his attachment to France and signing himself the European,
he was writing to Professor Walter of Budapest offering "all the
sympathies of the Bulgarian nation" to Hungary.[57] I have read
ecstatic communications of his penned in hours of exaltation, when
visions of Constantine's city, the mosque of Aya Sofia towering aloft,
warmed his fancy and the sheen of Byzantine brocades and the quaint
paraphernalia of bygone days inspired his apocalyptic words. His
language in those telegrams and letters was highfaluting and
bombastic. And I read other communications of his--mostly abject
appeals for help--devoid of dignity and manliness, when the gloom of
dissipated illusions was made unbearable by fear of dethronement and
death. And the figure cut by the Tsarlet, who addressed those humble
prayers--mostly to influential ladies--was despicable.

[57] In September 1914. See _Morning Post_, September 4,
1914.

Ferdinand was swayed by ingrained hatred of Russia which was almost as
potent as his contempt for the Bulgars. And he never made a secret of
either. For the Turkish pasha who was responsible for the Bulgarian
atrocities, which aroused Gladstone's indignation, Ferdinand's
professed admiration took the form of a subscription.[58] But high
above all motives that turned upon his feelings towards others were
those that centred entirely in himself.

[58] The Batak massacre of Bulgarians by order of Abdul Kerim
Pasha had called forth Gladstone's pamphlet: _Bulgarian
Atrocities_, and aroused the horror of civilized men. But the
Hungarian aristocracy sympathized with the mass murderer, and
presented him with a golden hilted sabre. The list of
subscribers for this mark of aversion to the Bulgarian people
can still be viewed in the Museum at Budapest. The third name
on that list--Princess Clementine--is followed immediately by
that of her son Prince Ferdinand of Coburg, who gave one
hundred florins as a token of his admiration for the
exterminator of his future subjects! It need hardly be added
that he was not yet Prince of Bulgaria.

And he had cogent personal motives for cultivating cordial relations
with the country of his birth. From the Austrian Government he
expected to be saved from the necessity of abdicating and expiating
his unwisdom.