ew, and assuming
that there will not be either a conclusive peace favourable to Prussian
interests, or even an inconclusive peace, but one in which the Allies
will be able to dictate and enforce their own terms, the magnitude of
the problems that will await their decision may well appal the most
ingenious of their statesmen. And of all those problems none, it is safe
to prophesy, will be found more difficult of solution than that which
will deal with the future of the corrupt and barbarous Government which
has for centuries made hell of the Ottoman Empire. We know more or less
what will happen to Alsace and Lorraine, to Belgium, to the Trentino,
because in those cases the claims of one or other of our Allies to
demand a particular settlement are quite certain to be agreed to by
those not so immediately and vitally concerned. But in the Balkans these
problems will be more complicated because of conflicting interests, and
most complicated of all will they be in Turkey. One thing, however, is
certain, that there can be no going back to the conditions that existed
there before the war.

Ever since the Osmanlis came out of remoter Asia into the Nearer East
and into Europe, the government of their Empire has gone from bad to
worse. In the early days, as we have seen, their policy was to absorb
the strength of their subject peoples by incorporating the youth of them
into the Turkish army, by giving them Turkish wives, and by converting
them to Mohammedanism. Such was the foundation of the Empire and such
its growth. But having absorbed their strength, the Sultan's Government
neglected them until they milked them again. They were allowed to
prosper if they could: all that was demanded of them was a toll of their
strength. They were cattle, and for the right to graze on Turkish lands
they paid back a pail of their milk of manhood. But an empire founded on
such principles contains within it active and prolific seeds of decay,
and, as we have seen, more stringent measures had to be resorted to in
order to preserve the supremacy of the ruling people. Instead of
absorbing their strength, Abdul Hamid hit upon the new method of killing
them, so that the Turks should still maintain their domination. And the
policy set on foot by him was developed but a few years ago into a
scheme of slaughter, which in atrocity has far surpassed the killings of
Attila, of whom the Nationalist poet sings, or even the designs of the
deposed Sultan. The A