AN
                                ACCOUNT
                                   OF
                          _THE PRINCIPALITIES_
                                   OF
                        WALLACHIA AND MOLDAVIA:
                                  WITH
                     VARIOUS POLITICAL OBSERVATIONS
                           RELATING TO THEM.

                        BY WILLIAM WILKINSON, ESQ.

                LATE BRITISH CONSUL RESIDENT AT BUKOREST.

 Dobbiamo considerare queste due provincie, Wallachia e Moldavia a guisa
      di due nave in un mar’ tempestoso, dove-rare volte si gode la
   tranquilita e la calma.       DELCHIARO—_Revoluxione di Wallachia_.

                                _LONDON_:
            PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN,
                             PATERNOSTER-ROW.
                                  1820.

                  Printed by Strahan and Spottiswoode,
                        Printers-Street, London.

                                PREFACE.

Amongst the nations of Europe most given to letters, none have so
largely contributed to the general list of publications, relating to the
condition and progress of the different countries of the world, as the
English; and no travellers possess to the same degree as they do the
love of describing them, however numerous the accounts that have
preceded the period of their own experimental observations. Their
journals, nevertheless, hardly ever fail to create interest, and the
least share of novelty in form or matter induces the less travelling
class of their countrymen to read them with pleasure.

Turkey and Egypt in particular have long been favourite themes; and
indeed the Ottoman empire in every point of view, whether topographical,
historical, administrative, religious, moral, political, military, or
commercial, offers an inexhaustible subject for investigation, and an
endless excitement to curiosity. No regular and minute description has,
however, yet been undertaken of two of its most important and curious
provinces, those which divide the principal part of the ancient kingdom
of Dacia, under the modern denomination of Wallachia and Moldavia,
although in the renewed existence of Greek governments exercising most
of the prerogatives of independency, in the struggles of two nations
between a strong remnant of Dacian barbarism and the influence of modern
civilisation, and in a country comprehending within its own boundaries
all the productive resources which fall but separately to the share of
other countries, sufficient matter may be found to render them a subject
by no means unworthy of notice.

These considerations have encouraged me to write the following pages
with the view of laying them before the public. An official residence of
some years in the principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, afforded me
the most ample opportunities of observation on every thing they contain
most interesting, and I have endeavoured to make an accurate and
satisfactory description of them. With regard to their history, I have
only dwelt upon the most remarkable events, and have merely given it
that extent to which its degree of importance seems entitled. I was
apprehensive that longer and more minute details might be found tedious
and unnecessary.

I regret, however, that at the time I wrote this account, I was not
sufficiently prepared to enter into further particulars with respect to
the minerals with which those countries abound; I intend, if I return to
them, to bestow as much attention as possible to that particular object,
and to make it the subject of a future separate treatise.

I am aware that my present undertaking is deserving of an abler pen; but
as the character of nations can only be properly understood after some
length of residence among them, I trust that the circumstances which
place it to my lot, will make the apology of my intrusion, and become a
motive of indulgence to its deficiencies in literary merit.

As Wallachia was the country of my fixed residence, I naturally chose it
for the principal scene of my observations; and indeed the history of
the two principalities is throughout so intimately connected, the form
of their respective governments, the language, manners, and customs of
the inhabitants, have ever been so much alike, that a description of the
one renders a distinct account of the other superfluous.

The political importance to which these two provinces have risen since
the reign of the ambitious Catherine, has given them a place of no small
consequence in the general balance of Europe. Most of the European
cabinets keep an eye upon them from the same motives, though with
different views; but politics alone have hitherto brought them into
notice, and philosophically or philanthropically speaking, it must be
confessed that a share of attention, directed by common justice and
humanity, was equally due to their definitive fate.

I have taken an opportunity of introducing into my appendix, a very
curious account of the military system of the Ottoman empire, translated
from a Turkish manuscript by an English gentleman, who possesses a
perfect knowledge of that language, and who has favoured me with it. I
have added to it some explanatory notes, rendered necessary by the
metaphorical, and in many parts, obscure style of the original writing,
and which my friend has purposely translated in a literal sense, in
order not to divest it of that originality of narration which
constitutes a great share of its interest.

The work was written in 1804, by order of the then reigning Sultan,
Selim III., with the view of explaining the important advantages of the
new military institution, called Nizam-y-Gedid, by which the Ottoman
armies were trained into a regular form of discipline.

This institution, however necessary, and although strongly supported by
all the higher classes, was so violently opposed by the clamorous
janissaries, that at length it became impossible to continue it, and
since the year 1805, the former regulations, or rather irregularities,
have again been prevalent in the Ottoman armies. The same disorders
which the Turkish author so faithfully describes as having existed
before the introduction of the Nizam-y-Gedid, have necessarily followed
its abolishment, and Turkey will no longer trust to her own means for
salvation in future war. Her last one with Russia has made her feel but
too sensibly how far the present form of discipline of her armies may
prove fatal to her existence, if ever she is abandoned to herself for
defence.

                               CONTENTS.

                               CHAPTER I.

 Geographical position and extent of Wallachia and
   Moldavia—historical remarks from the decline of the Dacians to
   the last century                                               Page 1

                               CHAPTER II.

 Inauguration of the Hospodars.—Present form of government.—Local
   laws.—Tribunals of justice.—Members of the divan, and other
   public functionaries.—Districts.—Caïmacam of
   Crayova.—Ispravniks.                                               46

                              CHAPTER III.

 Population.—Tribute and taxes.—Other branches of
   revenue.—Metropolitan dignity.—Monasteries.                        60

                               CHAPTER IV.

 Gold and silver mines.—Productions.—Restrictions on their
   exportations.—Navigation of the Danube.—Trade of importation.      72

                               CHAPTER V.

 Bukorest and Tirgovist, the capitals of Wallachia.—Yassi, the
   capital of Moldavia.—A description of them.—Mode of
   travelling.—Breed of horses.       Page                            86

                               CHAPTER VI.

 Observations on the Greeks in general.—Their introduction to the
   government of the principalities.—Their political
   system.—Causes of the declaration of war between England and
   Russia, and Turkey in 1806.—Those which occasioned the failure
   of the English expedition to Constantinople.—Subsequent change
   of policy of the Ottoman government.—Peace with England.—Peace
   with Russia, and circumstances which mostly contributed to
   it.—Hospodars, Callimacki and Caradja.—Prince Demetrius
   Mourousi’s death.—Caradja’s flight from Wallachia.—Reflections
   on the conduct of the Porte relative to the two
   principalities.                                                    95

                              CHAPTER VII.

 Climate—its influence.—Education of the
   Boyars.—Schools.—Wallachian tongue.—Modern Greek.—National
   dress, music, and dance.—Amusements.—Holidays.—Manners of
   society.—Marriages.—Divorces.—Religion and
   superstition.—Authority of the church—its independence of the
   patriarchal church of Constantinople.                             126

                              CHAPTER VIII.

 Peasants.—their manners and mode of
   living.—Emigrations.—Agriculture.—General aspect of the
   country.—An account of the Gypsies        Page                    155

                               CHAPTER IX.

 Intercourse of foreigners.—Foreign consuls.—How far the natives
   are benefited by their intercourse with foreign residents.        177

 ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

 GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE POLITICAL POSITIONS OF THE
   PRINCIPALITIES                                                    187

 APPENDIX                                                            199

                               AN ACCOUNT

                                   OF

                          _THE PRINCIPALITIES_

                                   OF

                        WALLACHIA AND MOLDAVIA.

                               CHAPTER I.
 GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION AND EXTENT OF WALLACHIA AND MOLDAVIA—HISTORICAL
      REMARKS FROM THE DECLINE OF THE DACIANS TO THE LAST CENTURY.

The principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, situated between 43° 40′
and 48° 50′ north latitude, 23° and 29° 30′ east longitude, occupying a
space of 350 miles in length, and 160 in breadth, are separated from the
Austrian provinces of Temesvar, Transylvania, and Boukovina, by the
Carpathian mountains; from Russia, by the river Pruth; and from Bulgaria
(the ancient Mœsia), by the Danube.

It is sufficiently ascertained that these two provinces, joined to those
of Transylvania and Temesvar, composed the kingdom of Dacia, finally
conquered by the Romans.

The Dacians were originally a Scythian or Sarmatian tribe, resembling,
in language and manners, the Thracians; the Greeks, indeed, considered
them as a part of the Thracian nation.

They were a sober and vigorous people, capable of enduring any hardships
and privations in war: they did not fear exposing themselves to the
greatest dangers, because they looked upon death as the beginning of a
much happier life; and this doctrine, according to Strabo, they held
from a philosopher named Zamolxis, who was held in high repute by them.

The progress of the Roman arms, which, under the reign of Augustus, were
carried to the banks of the Danube, brought them into contact with the
Dacians, who were at that time governed by a warlike prince named
Bærebestes, who boldly set the Roman conquerors at defiance. After his
death, they were divided into four or five different principalities, and
their strength was a good deal broken by the Romans; but their last king
Decebalus, one of the ablest and most enterprising warriors of his time,
re-united them into one body towards the 87th year of the Christian æra.

The first irruption of the Dacians into the territory of the empire,
took place during the latter part of Augustus’s reign; and, at times
repulsed, at other times successful, they continued to annoy the Romans
without any decisive advantage taking place on either side. At last the
Emperor Domitian, determined to put a stop to their depredations,
marched in person against them.

The particulars of the war which ensued are sufficiently detailed in the
Roman history. The result of it having been such as to compel Domitian
to sue for peace; he consented to pay to Decebalus an annual sum in the
shape of a pension, but which, in fact, was nothing less than a tribute.
It was regularly paid by the Romans until the year 102, when the Emperor
Trajan declared his resolution to discontinue it; and the Dacians
thereby considering themselves no longer bound to observe the treaty of
peace, crossed the Danube, and laid waste the Roman territory. Upon
these acts of hostility, Trajan put himself at the head of a numerous
army, and marching against them, forced them to retire, passed the
Danube in pursuit, engaged and defeated their successive forces, and
finally compelled Decebalus to acknowledge himself his vassal. Trajan
then returned to Rome, where he received the honour of a triumph, and
the title of _Dacicus_.

But not long after, Decebalus, eager to shake off the Roman yoke,
invaded and plundered the territory of his neighbours the Iazygæ, who
were also tributary to the empire, on their refusal to join him against
the Romans. Trajan again took the field at the head of a vast army,
determined to chastise and subdue the Dacians. He reached the banks of
the Danube in Autumn, and he thought it prudent to wait there the return
of the fine season, that he might carry on military operations with more
facility and success. It was during this interval, that he caused his
famous bridge to be built over the Danube, under the direction of the
architect Apollodorus of Damascus; and its present remains are
sufficiently visible to verify the ancient accounts of this stupendous
work. When the water is very low, some of the piles stand two or three
feet above it, and render that part of the river difficult of
navigation; they are looked upon as rocks by the natives of each side.

At the return of the Spring, when the bridge was completed, the Roman
army marched over it, and commenced hostilities. The war was long and
difficult, but it terminated in the complete subjugation of the Dacians,
and in the death of their king, Decebalus, who, finding it impossible to
avoid being made prisoner, killed himself that he might not fall alive
into the conquerors’ hands.

Dacia was thus converted into a Roman province, and Trajan shortly after
sent colonies to increase its population. New cities were built, and
pavements were constructed on the high roads, for the greater facility
of communication.[1] It was governed by a Roman pro-prætor until the
year 274.

Under the reign of Gallienus, when the empire was already declining,
various parts of Dacia were seized by the Goths, and other barbarous
nations.

A few Roman legions yet remained in the country, under the reign of the
Emperor Aurelian, who, returning from Gaul, came down to Illyria, and
finding a great part of Dacia in the hands of the barbarians, foresaw
the impossibility of maintaining any possessions in the midst of them,
and he withdrew a good number of the Roman inhabitants to the other side
of the Danube, and settled them in Mæsia.

During the space of a hundred years from that period, those of the
natives who had remained behind, and their descendants, were incessantly
exposed to the rapacities of a variety of barbarous tribes, who came
into the country for plunder.

Towards the year 361, the Goths, more powerful than the rest, seemed to
have been left in exclusive possession of the province, and were
inclined to make a permanent stay in it. They embraced the Christian
religion, and established it in Dacia; since when, to the present
moment, it has never ceased to be predominant amongst its inhabitants.

In 376, the Hunns, having over-run the countries possessed by the Goths,
forced Athanaric, King of the Vizigoths, to retire with all his forces
to that part of Dacia, situated between the rivers Dniester and Danube,
now called Moldavia. He raised a wall between the latter river and the
Pruth, by which he thought himself sufficiently protected against the
attacks of his enemies. The Hunns, however, were not stopped by it; and
their approach spread such consternation among the Goths of the
interior, that those who had the means of escaping, to the number of
some hundred thousand, fled for refuge into the Roman territory, and
were permitted by the Emperor Valens, to settle in Thrace, upon
condition that they should live peaceably there, and serve, when
required, in the Roman armies.

The Hunns having penetrated into Dacia, were left masters of it until
the year 453, when Ardaric, King of the Gepidæ, a people previously
conquered by Attila and the Hunns, revolted against them, in consequence
of Attila’s death. His son and successor, Ellach, marched against them,
but being defeated and slain, the Hunns were driven back into Scythia,
and the Gepidæ remained masters of all Dacia. They entered into a sort
of alliance with the Romans, who agreed to pay them a pension. In 550,
their first quarrels with their neighbours, the Lombards, took place;
and being sometimes assisted by the Emperor Justinian, they carried on
frequent hostilities against them, for the space of eight years, at the
end of which both nations resolved to decide the fate of the war by one
great battle. The Lombards, under their King Alboin, had previously
formed an alliance with the Avars, a people of Scythian extraction; and,
assisted by them, they marched to action. Both sides fought with equal
valor; but at last victory declared in favour of the Lombards, who,
pursuing the Gepidæ, made a great slaughter among them. The Gepidæ,
either destroyed, dispersed, or subdued, never after had a king of their
own, and ceased to be a nation.

Alboin’s achievements in Dacia attracted the notice of Narses, sent by
Justinian to conquer Italy: he made offers to him, and finally engaged
him to join the expedition with all his forces. The Lombards thus
abandoned their possessions in Dacia and Pannonia to their friends and
neighbours the Avars. These, also known by the name of White-Hunns,
remained in them until their own destruction by the Franks and
Bulgarians. In the 7th century, being joined by other barbarous tribes,
they pushed their incursions as far as the gates of Constantinople,
where they were so completely defeated by the Emperor Heraclius, that
they could not recover the blow: it was the original cause of their
rapid decline.

Towards the close of the same century, a nation, known under the names
of Slaves and Bulgarians, came from the interior of Russia to that part
of Mæsia, which has since been called Bulgaria. Soon after a great
number of Slaves, headed by their chief Krumo, crossed the Danube, and
settled in Dacia, where they have since been known under the name of
_Wallachs_. Opinion varies with respect to the origin of this name. Some
historians pretend that the Slaves distinguished by it the Romans of
Mæsia; whilst others maintain that they meant by it a people who led a
pastoral life, and had given it to the inhabitants of Mæsia, most of
whom were shepherds; and that a great number of these, having joined the
Slaves in Dacia, the name by degrees became a general one amongst its
inhabitants. The modern Wallachians, however, exclude it altogether from
their language, and call themselves “Rumunn” or Romans, giving to their
country the name of Roman-land, “Tsara-Rumaneska.”

Some former inhabitants of Dacia, joined by a number of Slaves and
Bulgarians, separated from the new settlers, and went to the lower part
of Dacia lying between the rivers Olt and Danube, where they fixed their
habitations. They formed themselves into a nation, and chose for their
chief one _Bessarabba_, to whom they gave the Slavonic title of _Bann_
or regent. The country within his jurisdiction was called _Bannat_; and
it retains to this day the name of Bannat of Crayova, the latter being
that of its present capital. Several other petty independent states
arose at the same time in various parts of Dacia; but they were
frequently annexed to the same sceptre, at other periods dismembered,
according to the warlike ardour or indolence and incapacity of their
various chiefs. Their general system, however, consisted in making war
against the Romans of the lower empire, in which they were seconded by
the Slaves and Bulgarians of Mæsia, whom they looked upon as their
natural allies. This state of things continued to the close of the 9th
century, at which period the Slaves having fallen into decline, various
hordes, originally Scythians, successively undertook the conquest of
Dacia, driving each other out of it, according to the momentary
superiority of the one over the other. The most remarkable of these were
the Hazars, the Patzinaces, the Moangoures, the Ouzes, the Koumans, and
other Tartars.

The natives were treated as slaves by all these hordes of barbarian
intruders, and great numbers of them were continually retiring to the
other side of the Carpathians; where they settled under their own
chiefs, sometimes independent, at others tributary to the kings of
Hungary. The most conspicuous and thriving of these colonies were those
of Fagarash and Maramosh.

The devastations continued in the plains finally drove out all the
natives, and in the 11th century the Tartars retired, leaving the
country a complete desert. It remained in this state until the year
1241, when the inhabitants of Fagarash, conducted by their chief Raddo
Negro (Rodolphus the Black), crossed the mountains, and took possession
of that tract of country, which is now called Upper Wallachia. Nearly at
the same time, the inhabitants of Maramosh under their chief Bogdan,
came and settled in that part which is by some called Moldavia, from the
name of the river Moldau, which crosses it to fall into the Danube, and
by the natives and Turks, Bogdania. Raddo Negro and his followers halted
at the foot of the mountains, where they laid the foundation of a city,
to which they gave the name of Kimpolung. At present it is reduced to an
indifferent village; but its original extent is marked by old walls in
ruin; and some inscriptions in its cathedral church attest it to have
been Raddo’s capital. His successors transferred their residence to
Tirgovist, more pleasantly situated in the plains.

Some Wallachian, Transylvanian, and Hungarian authors differ in opinion
with respect to the exact period of Raddo’s and Bogdan’s establishment
in Wallachia and in Moldavia, and fix it at a different year of the
early part of the 13th century; but as they give no satisfactory
explanation on the subject, I am disposed to differ from them all, in
placing that event in the year 1241, on the strength of the following
considerations:—1st. It does not appear probable that the kings of
Hungary, who, at the commencement of the 13th century were very
powerful, and who looked upon Fagarash and Maramosh as dependencies of
their crown, would have suffered their inhabitants to desert them, in
order to settle in foreign countries: 2dly, It would seem strange that
Raddo, Bogdan, and their followers should have quitted their homes in a
prosperous country, and come to inhabit a desert, without some
extraordinary event had necessitated so remarkable an emigration: and
3dly, the best Hungarian historians place in the year 1240 the invasion
of Battou-Han in the northern countries; and add, that having crossed
Russia and Poland at the head of 500,000 men, he entered Hungary in the
year 1241, where he staid three years, during which he put every thing
to fire and sword, and finally retired because nothing more was left to
satisfy his thirst of blood.[2] It appears, then, extremely probable
that the ravages of Battou-Han, and the terror he spread in the adjacent
provinces, were the only causes of this emigration, which no historian
has yet otherwise accounted for.

Bogdan and Raddo assumed the Slavonic title of Voïvode, equivalent to
that of commanding prince. When tranquillity was restored in Hungary,
they acknowledged the supremacy of the Hungarian king; but it does not
appear that the formalities of the recognition had been such as to bind
their successors; for, at the early part of the principalities, some
Voïvodes disputed it with success; and from the commencement of the 14th
century, their independency was acknowledged by Hungary.

The Bannat of Crayova had been little molested during the great
incursions of the barbarians: in the 9th century it had become tributary
to the kings of Hungary, who afterwards held it as a sort of refuge for
the knights going to, and coming from, the Holy Land; but soon after
Raddo’s arrival, the Bann submitted to him the supreme sovereignty of
the Bannat, and it has since then been annexed to the principality of
Wallachia.

During the latter part of his life, Raddo raised another city, distant
about thirty miles south-west of Kimpolung, on the borders of the river
Argis: he gave it the name of Courté d’Argis, and resided in it
occasionally. He also built a church here, which, two hundred years
after, one of the Voïvodes beautified in a very conspicuous manner. The
whole of the exterior work is entirely of carved marble, something in
the style of the steeple of St. Stephen’s church at Vienna, but far more
elegant. The whole produces a very striking effect; and, as it has
perfectly preserved its original beauty, it is certainly a monument that
the Wallachians may boast of in any part of Europe.

The Voïvodate was not made hereditary; and although it devolved
sometimes from father to son, the successor was obliged to go through
the formality of being elected by the chiefs of the nation.

Several successors of Raddo strengthened the government, the population
increased, and a great number of small towns and villages were built in
the country. Frequent hostilities against the Hungarians, arising from
the claims of sovereignty of the latter, accustomed the Wallachians to
war; and in 1391 the Voïvoide Mirtza collected a numerous force, and
attacked the neighbouring possessions of the Turks with the view of
rescuing them from their hands. The Sultan Bajazet being at that moment
employed in Asia in a troublesome war with the Prince of Castomona, had
left his conquests near the Danube without the means of defence. But
when the news of their invasion reached him, he suspended his operations
in Asia, and returned to Adrianople, from whence he sent a numerous army
to Wallachia. The Voïvode marched to meet the Turks; and, after a bloody
battle, he was defeated, and compelled to become tributary to the
Sultan. The annual amount of the tribute was fixed at three thousand
piasters.[3]

Wallachia continued to pay it until the year 1444; when Ladislas King of
Hungary, preparing to make war against the Turks, engaged the Voïvode
Dracula to form an alliance with him. The Hungarian troops marched
through the principality and were joined by four thousand Wallachians
under the command of Dracula’s son.[4]

The Hungarians being defeated at the celebrated battle of Varna,
Hunniades their general, and regent of the kingdom during Ladislas’s
minority, returned in haste to make new preparations for carrying on the
war. But the Voïvode, fearful of the Sultan’s vengeance, arrested and
kept him prisoner during a year, pretending thereby to show to the Turks
that he treated him as an enemy. The moment Hunniades reached Hungary,
he assembled an army and placed himself at the head of it, returned to
Wallachia, attacked and defeated the Voïvode, and caused him to be
beheaded in his presence; after which he raised to the Voïvodate one of
the primates of the country, of the name of _Dan_.

The Wallachians under this Voïvode joined again the Hungarians in 1448,
and made war on Turkey; but being totally defeated at the battle of
Cossova, in Bulgaria, and finding it no longer possible to make any
stand against the Turks, they submitted again to the annual tribute,
which they paid until the year 1460, when the Sultan Mahomet II. being
occupied in completing the conquest of the islands in the Archipelago,
afforded them a new opportunity of shaking off the yoke. Their Voïvode,
also named Dracula[5], did not remain satisfied with mere prudent
measures of defence: with an army he crossed the Danube and attacked the
few Turkish troops that were stationed in his neighbourhood; but this
attempt, like those of his predecessors, was only attended with
momentary success. Mahomet having turned his arms against him, drove him
back to Wallachia, whither he pursued and defeated him. The Voïvode
escaped into Hungary, and the Sultan caused his brother Bladus to be
named in his place. He made a treaty with Bladus, by which he bound the
Wallachians to perpetual tribute; and laid the foundations of that
slavery, from which no efforts have yet had the power of extricating
them with any lasting efficacy. The following is the substance of the
treaty:—

1. “The Sultan consents and engages for himself and his successors, to
give protection to Wallachia, and to defend it against all enemies,
assuming nothing more than a supremacy over the sovereignty of that
principality, the Voïvodes of which shall be bound to pay to the Sublime
Porte an annual tribute of ten thousand piasters.”

2. “The Sublime Porte shall never interfere in the local administration
of the said principality, nor shall any Turk be ever permitted to come
into Wallachia without an ostensible reason.”

3. “Every year an officer of the Porte shall come to Wallachia to
receive the tribute, and on his return shall be accompanied by an
officer of the Voïvode as far as Giurgevo on the Danube, where the money
shall be counted over again, a second receipt given for it, and when it
has been carried in safety to the other side of that river, Wallachia
shall no longer be responsible for any accident that may befall it.”[6]

4. “The Voïvodes shall continue to be elected by the archbishop,
metropolitan, bishops, and boyars[7], and the election shall be
acknowledged by the Porte.”

5. “The Wallachian nation shall continue to enjoy the free exercise of
their own laws; and the Voïvodes shall have the right of life and death
over their own subjects, as well as that of making war and peace,
without having to account for any such proceedings to the Sublime
Porte.”

6. “All Christians who, having once embraced the Mahometan faith, should
come into Wallachia and resume the Christian religion, shall not be
claimed by any Ottoman authorities.”

7. “Wallachian subjects who may have occasion to go into any part of the
Ottoman dominions, shall not be there called upon for the haratsh or
capitation tax paid by other _Rayahs_.”[8]

8. “If any Turk have a lawsuit in Wallachia with a subject of the
country, his cause shall be heard and decided by the Wallachian divan,
conformably to the local laws.”

9. “All Turkish merchants coming to buy and sell goods in the
principality, shall, on their arrival, have to give notice to the local
authorities of the time necessary for their stay, and shall depart when
that time is expired.”

10. “No Turk is authorised to take away one or more servants of either
sex, natives of Wallachia; and no Turkish mosque shall ever exist on any
part of the Wallachian territory.”

11. “The Sublime Porte promises never to grant a Ferman[9] at the
request of a Wallachian subject for his affairs in Wallachia, of
whatever nature they may be; and never to assume the right of calling to
Constantinople, or to any other part of the Turkish dominions, a
Wallachian subject on any pretence whatever.”

This treaty in many respects advantageous to Wallachia, still forms the
basis of its constitution. The first, third, fourth, and latter part of
the fifth articles only, have since undergone alterations, which have
proved in no small degree detrimental to the liberties of that country.
The remainder have been, and are to this day, punctually observed.

The qualification of a mere tributary prince did not, however, appear to
the Sultan Mahomet as implying sufficient submission; and, in order to
place the person of the Voïvode under a more immediate dependence, he
gave him the rank and title of a Turkish Pashah; a dignity, which has
ever since been inseparable from that of Voïvode or Hospodar.

The principality remained in a peaceable state several years after its
war with Mahomet, and the weakness and incapacity of several of its
princes afforded to the Ottoman court the means of ruling over it with
increasing power. In 1544 portions of territory bordering on the Danube
were ceded to the Turks; the fortresses of Ibraïl, Giurgevo, and Tourno,
which have much figured in all the subsequent European wars of Turkey,
were raised upon them, and were garrisoned by Turkish soldiers. Having
gained so strong a footing in the country, the conduct of the Turks
became more and more overbearing: its rights and privileges were no
longer respected; and the Porte countenanced, or connived at, every sort
of depredation committed by the soldiers of the garrisons beyond the
boundaries of the fortresses; and soon treated the principality and its
inhabitants as on the same footing with all its other Christian
conquests.

This state of things continued to the year 1593, when an individual of
the name of Michael was elected to the Voïvodate. He no sooner held the
reins of government than he determined to deliver his country from the
Turkish yoke, and restore it to independency. Circumstances soon
afforded him an opportunity of putting this plan into execution. The
Prince Sigismund of Transylvania, also tributary to the Turks, revolted
against them towards this period, at the instigations of the Pope and of
the Emperor Rodolphus. With him and with the Voïvode Aaron of Moldavia,
Michael formed a league against the enemies of Christianity. But in
order to give a greater appearance of justice to their proceedings, the
allies sent a long list of grievances to the Porte, demanded redress,
and insisted that some satisfactory guarantee were given of a change of
system for the future. These representations not only remained
unanswered, but, shortly after they were made, a troop of three thousand
Janissaries came into Wallachia, and went about the country, levying
contributions on the villagers, and committing all sorts of outrages. A
Wallachian force was at last sent against them, and they were all put to
the sword; after which, Michael, at the head of an army composed of his
own troops and those of his allies, marched against Giurgevo, and
compelled its garrison to retire to the other side of the Danube.

The threatening attitude of Michael and his allies induced the Sultan
Amurat to desist from further provocation, and to wait for a more
favourable moment of imposing again his yoke on the principalities; but
he died suddenly in 1595, and his successor, Mahomet III., no sooner
ascended the throne than he resolved to carry that plan into execution
by the means of an overpowering army. Forty thousand Turks and twenty
thousand Tartars, under the orders of the Grand Vezier, invaded the
Wallachian and Moldavian provinces nearly at the same time, and a long
war ensued. The invaders suffered a series of defeats: for five years
they renewed the campaign with no better success; and the Sultan was
finally compelled to relinquish his claims.

In 1600, after the abdication of Sigismund of Transylvania, that
principality became tributary to the Emperor Rodolphus; and as the
Voïvode Michael, whom the emperor had engaged into his interests, had
assisted him in defeating the schemes of Cardinal Battori, pretender to
the Transylvanian sovereignty, Rodolphus, to reward him, left him the
government of Transylvania. The Voïvode fixed his residence in that
province, and appointed a lieutenant in Wallachia. But in the following
year the Transylvanians, not satisfied with his administration,
revolted, and sent invitations to their former Prince, Sigismund, who
was living as a private individual at Clausenburg, to come and resume
the supreme authority. An Austrian army, under the command of General
Baste, was hastily dispatched to stop the progress of the rebellion; and
Michael, who had repaired to Wallachia, returned with some troops, and
joined the imperial general. They marched together against the rebels,
who had formed an army of equal strength, and an obstinate battle took
place, which terminated in the entire defeat of the insurgents, and in
the subjection of the whole province. When events had determined the
fate of Transylvania, the two allied commanders quarrelled in a
discussion concerning the ulterior measures of administration; and
Baste, resolved by some means or other to get rid of Michael, whose
pretensions appeared to him to have become of a dangerous tendency,
caused him to be assassinated. The Wallachian troops were sent back to
their country, and they carried away with them the head of the Voïvode
Michael, which was buried in the monastery of _Dialloluy_, near the town
of Tirgovist, where the monument that was placed over it at the time,
with an inscription alluding to the principal events of his life, and to
the circumstances of his death, engraved in Slavonian characters, still
exists.

The death of Michael, which took place in 1602, spread great
consternation and confusion in Wallachia. The Primates[10] lost time in
deliberations on the measures that were to be pursued; and the Turkish
Pashahs of the neighbourhood sent a strong body of troops, which,
crossing the Danube at different places, occupied the greatest part of
the principality, and put it out of the power of the Wallachians to make
any effectual resistance. The sultan’s orders for the election of a
Voïvode of his own choice were soon obeyed, and the principality resumed
its tributary character; the treaty of Mahomet II. was renewed, but the
amount of the tribute was fixed at a much higher sum. From this period
forward, Wallachia remained under the power of the Ottoman Sultans; and
although its inhabitants, in the course of the 17th century, made
frequent efforts to throw off the yoke, the success of such attempts
always proved momentary, and consequently more injurious than beneficial
to them in the sequel.

With regard to Moldavia, the first act of its submission to the Turks
was not the effect of conquest, but a voluntary measure of precaution
and security.[11] It was only in 1536 that this principality consented
to become tributary to the Sultan, and the event is thus explained by
all the Moldavian historians.

In 1529 the Voïvode Stephen, being on his death-bed, called to him his
son Bogdan, who was likely to succeed him, and his principal nobles: he
addressed them at length on the political situation of the country,
representing the probability of its being soon attacked by the Turks,
and the insufficiency of its means to make any effectual resistance
against their power. He dwelt on the ferocious character of the reigning
Sultan Suleÿman I., and recommended to them in the strongest manner,
rather to seek his clemency by the voluntary offer of a tribute, than
expose themselves to his vengeance in resisting his attempts to obtain
it.

After Stephen’s death, Bogdan neglected some years his father’s advice,
till at last he saw the necessity of following it; and he sent, in 1536,
ambassadors to Constantinople to offer the tribute. The Sultan then
entered into written engagements with him, by which the same privileges
as those of Wallachia were granted to Moldavia; but in which the tribute
was merely called a _Peshkicsh_, or present.

Moldavia was governed on the same plan as the sister province, and
frequently shared the same fate in war; sometimes ravaged by the Turks,
at other times successful in resisting them. Towards the close of the
16th century, after its successful co-operation with Wallachia,
Sigismund of Transylvania seized it, deposed the Voïvode Aaron, his
friend and ally, and appointed a man of his own choice, whom he bound to
pay him tribute. But in 1597, a Polish army invaded the province, and
rescued it from the hands of Sigismund. In 1602 the Poles restored it to
the Turks, against whose power the Moldavians never after struggled with
any permanent success. Their frequent and fruitless efforts to regain
independency, exhausted their means and patriotic ardour; and by degrees
they became accustomed to the Turkish yoke. The appointment of the
Voïvodes was left to the pleasure of the Sultans, although the formality
of the election continued to take place a long time after; but the
tribute was no longer called a present, and its amount was increased at
almost every new appointment.

As far, however, as the end of the 17th century, intervening political
motives still induced the Porte to show some deference to the privileges
of the two principalities; but at the early part of the 18th century,
the Ottoman Court became less constrained in its policy, and in assuming
the right of punishing by death the Wallachian princes, laid the
foundations of that system by which both have been governed to the
present moment. The event which proved so fatal to the respective
constitutions of those states, will show at the same time how far their
public spirit must have been subdued, and how rapid appears to have been
its decline.

During the reign of Sultan Ahmet, the Porte had, in 1695, declared war
against the Emperor; and the Voïvode Constantine Brancovano Bessarabba
of Wallachia was directed to form an army, and to march into the
Austrian states, in order to second the operations of the Grand Vizier
who was to commence hostilities from the frontiers of Servia. The
Voïvode partly obeyed; but, either from a secret hatred to the Turks, or
from being bribed into the Emperor’s cause, probably from both these
motives, he abstained from taking any active part in the campaign, and
by that circumstance alone, favoured the operations of the Austrians. At
the conclusion of the peace of Carlowitz, the Emperor Leopold rewarded
the Voïvode’s services by conferring on him the title of Prince of the
Roman Empire, together with the gift of some landed estates in
Transylvania. These circumstances could not remain hidden from the
knowledge of the Ottoman court, who, however, found it necessary to use
dissimulation; and some years elapsed without any notice being taken of
them.

In 1710, Bessarabba was drawn into a secret correspondence with the Czar
Peter the great, the object of which was to obtain his co-operation in
that sovereign’s projected war against the Turks. The Voïvode promised a
contingent of thirty thousand men, and an ample supply of provisions and
other necessaries for the Russian army.

The purport of this correspondence became known to the Porte, and the
death of Bessarabba was immediately determined upon; but at the same
time it was deemed adviseable to use stratagem instead of open force,
and it was resolved that he should be drawn into a snare by the Prince
of Moldavia. Nicholas Marrocordato then governed that province, but he
was thought unfit for the execution of the plan; the Porte therefore
recalled him, and appointed to the principality Demetrius Cantimir,
whose fidelity had been frequently tried both in peace and war. Cantimir
set out from Constantinople for Moldavia, having instructions and
positive orders to seize Bessarabba under the colour of friendship,
alliance, or any pretence which he might think proper, and send him
alive or dead to Constantinople.[12]

But Cantimir, who, it seems, had neither the ambition nor the desire of
being made Voïvode of Moldavia, having twice before procured that
principality to his younger brother Antiochus, accepted it with the
express condition that he should not be called upon to pay any tribute,
or to make any of the presents customary at the new nominations. But
when he reached Moldavia the Grand Vezier wrote to him by the Sultan’s
order, not only to send immediately the usual tribute and presents, but
also to prepare provisions for a numerous Turkish army, to throw a
bridge over the Danube for their passage, and to join the Turks in
person with Moldavian troops, besides other intolerable burthens.[13]
Cantimir says, that perceiving now how little faith was to be expected
from the infidels, and esteeming it far better to suffer for the
Christian cause, he resolved to detach himself from the Turkish
interest, and sent a faithful messenger to the Czar, with an offer of
his services and principality.

With these favourable prospects in Wallachia and in Moldavia, the Czar
advanced towards the Ottoman frontiers. In 1711, he arrived with all his
forces at Yassi, where he remained some days in expectation of the
contingent and provisions promised by the Voïvode of Wallachia. But it
seems that Bessarabba, as the rupture between the Sultan and the Czar
drew near, alarmed at the great preparations of the Turks, and the
approach of their army, composed of two hundred and twenty thousand men,
thought it prudent to take no part in the war, and the subsequent
disasters of the Russians are in a great measure attributed to the
failure of his former promises to the Czar, who had placed too great a
reliance in them. The events of this war are too well known to need any
further explanation here. When peace was restored, and the Voïvodate of
Moldavia had remained vacant by Cantimir’s defection, Nicholas
Marrocordato was again appointed to it. Bessarabba remained unmolested,
but not without the fear of early vengeance. Eager to regain the favour
of the Ottoman government, and to obtain the assurance of oblivion on
the past, he sent large supplies of money, and considerable presents to
the Turkish ministers, and to the public treasures; he repeated them so
often, as to convince the court that he possessed immense wealth, and
the Grand Vezier, Ally-Pashah, who was his personal enemy, obtained from
the Sultan a formal order for his recall, and for the seizure of his
treasures. The Vezier then formed the plan of enforcing this order, and
it was carried into execution in the following manner:—

In 1714, at the beginning of April, being the week of the Passion, when
the attention of the Wallachians and their occupations were entirely
devoted to the long ceremonies of the Greek church, a Capigee-Bashi[14],
of the Sultan, arrived at Bukorest with a suite of a hundred men; he
sent word to the Voïvode that he was on his way to Hotim upon very
pressing business of the state, and that he should only have time to pay
him a visit on the next morning, after which he intended to take his
departure. Accordingly, he went the next day to the palace, and, on
entering the closet of the Voïvode, who stood up to receive him, he
placed a black handkerchief on his shoulder, conformably to the then
usual method of announcing depositions to persons high in office in
Turkey. The Voïvode was confounded by the unexpected compliment, but the
moment he recovered from his first emotions, he burst into a long strain
of invectives against the Sultan and the Turks, for treating him with so
much ingratitude after the many services he had rendered to the Porte.
The Capigee, however, placed a guard about his person, and proceeded to
the divan chamber, where he read a _Ferman_, which contained the decree
of Bessarabba’s deposition, declared him a traitor, and ordered him to
Constantinople with all his family. After the _Ferman_ had been
published, the Capigee secured the public treasure, and all the
Voïvode’s private property. The frightened inhabitants of Bukorest
remained tranquil spectators of all these acts of violence, and made no
effort to release the Voïvode from his imprisonment. With a nation more
awakened to its own dignity, and to the value of independence, an event
of this nature would not, perhaps, have taken place without the support
of an army, and the shedding of blood; and, indeed, the circumstances of
this very occurrence would hardly appear credible, if they were not
almost fresh in the memory of the present generation.

Two days after Bessarabba’s deposition, one Stephen Cantacuzene, of
Greek origin, and calling himself a descendant of the imperial family of
that name[15], was, by the Sultan’s order, raised to the Voïvodate.

On the 14th April, the Capigee-Bashi left Bukorest with Bessarabba, his
wife, four sons, three daughters, and grandson, and escorted by the
Turkish guard. They soon reached Constantinople, and the Voïvode, with
all his family, was immediately confined in the state prison of the
Seven Towers. His treasures not being found so considerable as had been
expected, his sons were put to the torture for three successive days,
that they might confess where their father had hidden the rest; or that
the latter, being a witness to his children’s torments, might come
forward and make that confession himself. But as these cruelties did not
produce the intended effect, the Sultan, exasperated at the apparent
obstinacy of the sufferers, ordered them to be executed in his presence.
The prisoners were conducted to a square, under the windows of the
seraglio, and a long list of accusations was read to them; it alluded
particularly to the treachery of Bessarabba in the Austrian war, and to
the indignant expressions he had made use of against the person of the
Sultan, when his recall had been signified to him. The four sons were
first beheaded, one after the other, and the execution of the father
closed this scene of butchery. When the Sultan withdrew, the five heads
were put upon pikes, and carried about the streets of Constantinople.
The bodies were thrown into the sea, but they were picked up by some
Christian boatmen, and conveyed to a Greek monastery in the little
island of Halcky, in the Propontis, where they received burial.

As to the unfortunate princess and the remainder of her family, they
were shortly after exiled to Cuttaya, in Asia Minor, but three years
after they were permitted to return to Wallachia.[16]

The Voïvode Cantacuzene only remained in office two years, and he was
the last Wallachian prince, whose nomination was effected through the
formality of election. This important prerogative of the inhabitants had
been abolished some years before in Moldavia. The Porte found it
unnecessary to suffer it any longer in Wallachia, and indeed it had,
since more than a century, become merely nominal.

Nicholas Marrocordato was transferred from the government of Moldavia to
that of Wallachia, and proclaimed by a Turkish Capigee-Bashi in 1716. At
this time the Porte was preparing to carry on a defensive war against
Austria; and had the primates of Wallachia felt the courage to protest
against so manifest a violation of their privileges, they would, most
probably, have succeeded in securing a better observance of them.

Since the commencement of the decline of the Turkish power, the Ottoman
court has made it an invariable policy to infringe little by little on
the privileges allowed to foreign nations by treaty; and to conduct, by
systematic stratagem, an administration which has been constantly
falling in vigour and energy. If any infraction is left unnoticed by the
party it concerns, and the article of a treaty, in its modified state,
is once applied with success to any case to which it may relate, it
becomes a precedent which the Porte will obstinately refer to at any
other time that the strict interpretation of the article is insisted
upon.

Thus, without assigning any satisfactory reason, and without repealing,
in a plausible manner, the Wallachian law of election, the Sultan took
to himself the exclusive right of appointing to the two Voïvodates. The
measure was not opposed, and its repetition became habitual; and if, at
the present moment, the inhabitants of the two Principalities were to
recall their right to memory, and claim the enforcement of it, the Porte
would consider and treat the proceeding as open rebellion on their part.

No prince of Wallachian or Moldavian birth or origin, was ever appointed
after the recall of Bessarabba, and the Porte would have been willing to
govern the principalities through the means of Turkish Pashahs; but the
intrigues of the state-interpreter, Alexander Marrocordato, who was then
endeavouring to secure either of the Voïvodates to his son Nicholas,
induced at the time the Ottoman government to introduce another system,
which subsequent motives have contributed to support to the present day.
The Porte selected the new princes from the Greeks of Constantinople,
whose long habit of obedience and servile degradation, appeared to
render them suitable tools for the new policy adopted, relative to the
government of the principalities. From that moment the princes have been
appointed by _Beratt_, an imperial diploma, in which the Sultan, in
proclaiming the nominations, commands the Wallachian and Moldavian
nations to acknowledge and obey the bearers of it, as sole depositories
of the sovereign authority.[17]

They were instructed to pursue the plan, of administration of the
Voïvodes, and thus they were suffered to hold a court, to confer
dignities and titles of nobility, and to keep up a show of sovereign
splendour, circumstances which were most flattering to the vanity of the
Greeks, and proved useful to the interested views of the Porte. But they
were most strictly forbidden to maintain troops, or to collect any,
under any pretence whatever. This precaution was indispensable, as it
prevented the princes from acquiring military power, and the natives
from aspiring to independency.

In the course of the last century, a variety of Greek princes succeeded
to each other in the government of the principalities. One alone,
Constantine Marrocordato, appointed in 1735 to Wallachia, devoted
himself with zeal to the welfare of the country. Some wise institutions,
to which we shall have occasion to advert in the sequel, attest the
liberality of his views, and a generosity of character which is not to
be traced in any of his successors. But he was twice recalled, because
he refused to comply with demands of the Ottoman government, which
appeared to him incompatible with duties he owed to the Wallachians. The
other princes, less scrupulous, and more careful of their own interests,
marked their administration by the most violent acts of extortion, and
an invariable system of spoliation. Few of them died of natural death,
and the Turkish scymetar was, perhaps, frequently employed with justice
among them. In a political point of view, the short reigns of most of
these princes offer nothing of sufficient importance or interest to
deserve a place in history.

                              CHAPTER II.
     INAUGURATION OF THE HOSPODARS—PRESENT FORM OF GOVERNMENT—LOCAL
    LAWS—TRIBUNALS OF JUSTICE—MEMBERS OF THE DIVAN AND OTHER PUBLIC
        FUNCTIONARIES—DISTRICTS—CAÏMACAM OF CRAYOVA—ISPRAVNIKS.

The princes of Wallachia and Moldavia, since the choice of them falls on
the Greeks, receive their investiture at the Porte, with the pomp and
ceremonies usually observed on creating _Pashahs_ and _Veziers_. The
_Kukka_, or military crest, is put on their heads by the _Muzhur Aga_,
and the robe of honour is put on them by the Vezier himself. They are
honoured with the standards and military music, and make their oaths of
allegiance in the presence of the Sultan, to whom they are introduced
with the ceremonies usual at a public audience. From the seraglio, they
go in solemn and ostentatious procession to the patriarchal church,
where prayers and ceremonies are performed similar to those which were
formerly observed at the inauguration of the Greek Emperors. They are
accompanied to their principalities by the Turkish officers appointed to
install them. They make their public entry into the capital of their new
sovereignty with a great display of magnificence, attended by the
metropolitan and dignified ecclesiastics, the members of the divan, and
the chief Boyars. They assume, from the ceremonies which are practised,
the title of “God’s Anointed.”[18]

The general form of government in both principalities has undergone
little alteration since the exclusion of the native Voïvodes. The prince
is invested with absolute authority, and, till lately, was only
controllable in his financial operations, by the divan, representing the
senate; still, in levying extraordinary contributions, and in fixing the
mode of raising them, the signatures of a majority of members are
required as a mere formality; and, although the want of these would
render such acts illegal, they would not thereby be put with less vigour
into execution.

The executive administration is divided into various regular
departments. The divan, composed of twelve members, is the supreme
council, and is presided by the Prince, who appoints to it new members
every year, with the exception of the metropolitan, whose ecclesiastical
dignity entitles him to a permanent seat. It is convened at least twice
a week, to receive, examine, and decide upon appeals in judiciary
matters.

A Voïvode of the name of Mathew Bessarabba, who governed Wallachia from
1633 to 1644, instituted laws which he drew from Justinian’s code, and
modified by the customs of the country. His example was soon after
followed in Moldavia. Several princes made alterations in the original
codes, and the late princes, Caradja of Wallachia, and Callimacki of
Moldavia, have made them undergo a new revision, and have published them
under their own names.[19] It is in conformity to these laws that all
suits are said to be judged, and the sentences framed; but the prince
interprets them in his own way, and his will, in fact, is the only
predominating law.

The princes’ decisions are without appeal for the natives of the
country; and, however irregular or unjust they may be, they cannot be
revoked by their successors.

In any case of moment, where the opinion of the members of the divan
happens to be unanimous against that of the prince, or contrary to his
wishes, the decision of the question is postponed, and the members are
privately desired to pronounce according to the views of the prince. As
they are aware that non-compliance would be attended with dismissal and
disgrace, it is common enough, on similar occasions, that at the next
sessions they all declare an opinion directly opposite to the one they
had last given.

At Bukorest, and at Yassi, where the princes reside, there are two
particular tribunals appropriated to the revision of commercial and
other differences existing between the natives and foreign subjects.
They are called the Foreign Departments, and are each directed by a
Boyar, who has the title of chancellor of foreign affairs, and two other
judges. The business that comes before them is examined and discussed in
the presence of an officer attached to the consulate, by which the
foreign party concerned is protected. The decisions are, conformably to
the general sense of the treaties existing between the Porte and foreign
powers, made according to the local laws; but they are not valid without
the prince’s confirmation, which can be withheld, and a timely appeal
made either to the Grand Vezier’s tribunal at Constantinople, or to the
prince’s own judgement, should the nature of the department’s decision
bear the appearance of partiality or injustice against the foreign
party. Cases of this nature are so common, that the consuls are
frequently obliged to act the part of attorneys in defending the rights
of the individuals who are entitled to their protection.

There are also separate departments for the police, the treasury, and
criminal cases, as well as a variety of petty offices for the different
business, most of which report directly to the prince, and receive his
instructions.

The following is an exact list of the chief dignitaries, and the other
officers of state, according to their respective ranks and precedence,
beginning with the twelve members of the divan.

_The Metropolitan_, or archbishop.

_The Banno_, a title taken from the former Banns of Crayova.

_Vornik de Tsara de Suss_, or judge of the upper country.

_Vornik de Tsara de Joss_, or judge of the lower country.

_Logothett_, or chancellor and keeper of the great seal.

       _3d Vornik_,                  Common judges at the divan.
       _4th Vornik_,

_Logothett de Obichëy_; his particular business consists in assembling
the divan.

_Vornik de Couttee_, or treasurer for the pensions of the widows of poor
Boyars.

_Vornik de Polittia_, or collector of the capitation tax within the city
of Bukorest.

_Clutshiar_, or keeper of the code of laws.

_Clutshiar d’Aria_; although he has a seat, he is not allowed to vote.
He is a kind of sergeant-at-arms.

According to old custom, an individual, who is not born or naturalised a
Wallachian or Moldavian, cannot be admitted member of the divan.

_The first Postelnik_ is principal minister and master of the ceremonies
at court. His office is of the most confidential nature, and only given
to Greeks, near relations, or intimate friends of the prince.

_The Spathar_; his office formerly corresponded to that of minister at
war. At present he is director-general of the police throughout the
principality. In Moldavia he is more properly called _Hetman_.

_The Vestiar_, or treasurer of the principality: he must be a native.

_The Hetman_; in Wallachia his business consists in carrying into
execution the prince’s sentences in matters of judicature. He takes 10
_per cent._ on the value of the objects to which they relate.

_Camarash_, or first chamberlain; the prince’s private treasurer, and
judge over the Jews. He levies a duty upon all merchandise sold by
retail for his own profit.

_Armash_, or judge of criminal causes relating to the lower orders; he
has the superintendency of the public prisons, and collects the tribute
paid by the gypsies to government.

_Agga_, or chief of the police within the city of Bukorest.

_Portar-Bashi_; he directs the correspondence with the neighbouring
Turkish Pashahs, and other governors. He also attends upon all the Turks
of distinction who visit Bukorest.

All the preceding offices give the rank of Boyars of the First Class to
the persons who are appointed to them, and as such they wear their
beards; they are all removed every year; but as they retain the titles
until promotion, those in activity are distinguished from them by the
additional one of “_great_,”—“_maray_,”—such as _Logothett-maray_, the
Great Chancellor, &c.

The Boyars of the Second Class are as follows:—

_Caminar_, or collector of duties upon wine, brandy, tobacco, and snuff,
brought to Bukorest for sale.

_Paharnik_, or cup-bearer. At state dinners he stands behind the
prince’s chair, and offers him to drink.

_Comisso_, or master of the horse.

_Stolnik_, chief steward at court.

_Sardar_, chief or colonel of the guards.

Third Class:—

_Medelnitsher_; he receives the petitions addressed to the Hospodars,
and reads all the papers at the divan.

_Pittar_, superintendent of the prince’s equipages.

_Sludgier_; he was formerly commissary to the regiment of body-guards:
it is now an empty title.

_Shatrar_, keeper of the prince’s tents.

 2d Logothett                        All these are public clerks
 2d Postelnik                          attached to the offices from
 2d Vestiar                            which they derive their titles.
 3d Logothett
 3d Postelnik
 3d Vestiar

The renewal of public officers every year naturally creates great
confusion in the transaction of public business. The custom arises from
the circumstance that the Boyars, whose number in Wallachia amounts to
nearly thirty thousand, claim public employment, at least, for a time,
as a right to which they are each entitled. The first families, in
particular, consider it as their birthright; but as their chief object
is gain, they scramble for places with the most indecorous avidity, and
never regard their want of capacity for any branch of public service.

As every Boyar has some title or other, he is never addressed by his
name in common intercourse, but by his title preceded by the ancient
Greek one of “ἄρχον,” such as “Archon-Banno, Archon-Shatrar,” &c.

A certain ceremony is practised at court upon all promotions and
nominations. It takes place once or twice every month, when the prince,
seated on an elevated throne, verbally notifies to the candidate, who is
introduced by the First Postelnik, the rank or office to which he raises
him. A robe of honour is then placed on his shoulders, and he advances
in the most respectful attitude, and kisses the prince’s hand. He is
then conveyed home in one of the state-carriages, or on one of the
prince’s horses (according to his new rank) and accompanied by a great
number of Chiohadars, or livery-servants of the court, to whom he pays a
considerable fee.

The Boyars of the First Class look upon their titles as corresponding to
those of Count and Baron in Germany, and their rank to that of
Major-general in Russia. It is true that the Empress Catherine, at the
period of her first war with Turkey, issued an Ukase to that effect; but
her successors have set it aside. Although most of the principal
families indulge the idea that none in Europe can boast of more genuine
nobility, there are very few who can trace their origin any farther than
a century back.[20] The present descendants of Bessarabba and
Cantacuzene are amongst this number. A family in Wallachia bear the name
of Paleologos, and confidently assert being descended from the race of
the last Constantine. It would not be very material to attempt to refute
such pretensions; few could be imposed upon by them. They appear,
however, the more absurd, as the persons who make them cannot in any
manner explain upon what grounds they are assumed.

Wallachia is divided into seventeen districts, including the Bannat of
Crayova composed of five. They are called _Rimnik_, _Buzéo_, _Sakoyéni_,
_Prahova_, _Yallomitza_, _Ilfov_, _Dimbovitza_, _Vlaska_, _Telly-Orman_,
_Mousstzello_, _Argis_, _Olt_, _Romanatz_, _Vultza_, _Doltz_, _Gorge_,
_Méhédintz_. Each of them is governed by two _Ispravniks_ or deputies,
whose appointment is renewed every year by the prince. Their business
chiefly consists in collecting the tribute and other contributions,
which they send to the _Vestiary_, from which they are in a great
measure dependent. The _Ispravniks_ of the Bannat are under the
immediate orders of a lieutenant of the prince, who resides at Crayova,
under the title of _Caïmacam_. The Greek princes have substituted this
appointment to that of the _Banns_, taking the title from that of the
Turkish minister who fills the office of the Grand Vezier at
Constantinople during the latter’s absence.

The situation of _Caïmacam_ at Crayova is very lucrative, and generally
given to some of the Greeks who follow the princes into Wallachia with
the hope of enriching themselves.

The Ispravnicates are also given to persons of that description, jointly
with the sons of Boyars, who, at a very early age, commonly make their
_début_ in public career by those appointments. They receive a salary of
five hundred piasters per month, besides which they have perquisites,
which, in some of the richest districts, they extend as far as twenty
thousand piasters a year.

                              CHAPTER III.
 POPULATION.—TRIBUTE AND TAXES.—OTHER BRANCHES OF REVENUE.—METROPOLITAN
                         DIGNITY.—MONASTERIES.

The exact number of population in the two principalities has never been
properly ascertained; but the nearest calculation approaches to one
million of souls in Wallachia, and five hundred thousand in Moldavia,
since the last peace of Bukorest.

This population is, in each principality, divided into three distinct
classes; the Boyars, or nobles, of the different orders; the tradesmen
of all descriptions; and the peasants, with others, who are liable to
the common taxes and contributions.

All the male peasants are, by their birth, subject to the capitation
tax, from the age of sixteen; with the exception of some few who compose
a privileged body called _Sokotelniki_, they are divided into
associations called _Loods_, each of which is composed of a certain
number of individuals, from five to ten, according to their respective
means, and pays a fixed sum of six hundred piasters every year to the
prince. According to the registers of the Wallachian Vestiary in 1818,
the total of the _loods_ in the seventeen districts, amounted to
eighteen thousand, which, at the rate of six hundred piasters, gave an
annual income of 10,800,000 piasters.[21] This amount of revenue is
considered as becoming the property of the reigning prince, and not as
due by the inhabitants to the Ottoman government, as some writers have
represented.

The treaties made by Mahomet II. and Suleÿman I. in leaving to Wallachia
and to Moldavia the power of choosing their own princes, bound these
alone to pay an annual tribute; the amount of it was at different
periods increased; but it is now fixed at two millions of piasters for
Wallachia, and one million for Moldavia. The Porte has indeed broken its
original engagements by assuming the exclusive right of giving to those
countries Greek princes instead of their own; but in doing so, the
Ottoman court did not degrade the character of sovereignty inherent in
the native Voïvodes; and if the present princes did not bear that
character, their decisions would not be, as they are, without appeal for
the natives.

The policy of the Porte, and the precarious position of the Greek
Hospodars, have, however, for a long time rendered the fixed amount of
the tribute due to the Porte merely nominal; and it is perfectly
understood that the latter, on receiving their appointments, engage to
satisfy any calls of the Turkish government, of money and other
necessaries.

Besides the _loods_, there are in Wallachia about one hundred thousand
individuals, and a proportionable number in Moldavia, who do not belong
to the class of peasants, but who pay taxes at an equal rate. These are
the tradesmen, Ottoman Jews, and other Rayahs.

The privileged class called _Sokotelniki_ is composed of fifteen
thousand individuals taken from among the peasantry, and who were, till
lately, perfectly exempted from every kind of contribution levied by
government; but within a few years the greater number of them have been
made liable to an annual capitation tax of twenty piasters each.

Their institution dates its origin from a remarkable reform made by
Constantine Mavrocordato, in 1736, when he had the government of both
principalities at the same time.

Until that period, most of the peasants were slaves of the Boyars:
Mavrocordato abolished the system, and no attempt was ever made since to
renew it. In order, however, to indemnify in some measure the Boyars for
the loss of their slaves, he regulated that each should be allowed to
exact from a limited number of his peasants an annual tribute, in any
shape whatever; and that this class of peasants, to whom he gave the
name of Sokotelniki, should be entirely exempted from the burthen of
public imposts.

Every Boyar of the first rank is now entitled to eighty Sokotelniki,
each of whom pays him the annual sum of eighty piasters; some few,
instead of receiving money, employ their Sokotelniki in the cultivation
of their lands, and thus derive a much greater advantage from them.

The privilege, however, is not hereditary either with the possessors, or
the private tributary. Every rank had a fixed number; and by the
inattention and neglect of many princes, as well as by the unceasing
increase of titles of nobility, the Sokotelniki became so numerous, that
in 1814 the government in Wallachia determined to allow no longer to
private individuals a considerable amount of revenue which could be
appropriated to its own use. A new law was therefore made, which formed
into government-loods all Sokotelniki who were not attached to the first
class of Boyars. The institution of this law was warmly supported by the
members of the divan, who, with their equals, had no loss to apprehend;
but it created great discontent in all the other classes affected by it,
and particularly with the Boyars of Crayova, who being more given to
agricultural occupations than the other land-proprietors derived great
advantage from the employment of their Sokotelniki; and they unanimously
determined to oppose the new regulation, as far as it related to
themselves; they threatened to complain to the Porte through the channel
of the Pashah of Widdin, who appeared willing to second their
representations with all his influence. The ferocious Haffiz-Alli[22]
had at that time the government of Widdin; and as he was the prince’s
personal enemy, he would have profited with eagerness of any opportunity
to do him injury. The prince therefore modified the law relating to
Sokotelniki, and those of the Bannat of Crayova were excluded from it.
The following year he succeeded in compelling them to submit to a tax of
twenty piasters each.

Another privileged class exists in both principalities, and is called
_Poslujniki_; its number, however, is far inferior, and it is composed
of some of the foreign peasants who come from Bulgaria, Servia, and
Transylvania, to settle in the principalities.

The Poslujniki are given to the Greek Boyars, and to foreign residents
of distinction; a custom which has become habitual since upwards of
fifty years. They pay no money to the persons to whom they are attached;
but it is their business to supply them with provisions of wood, barley,
hay, poultry, eggs, butter, and game, in consideration of which they are
exempted from government imposts, and receive some protection from their
chiefs when they experience any vexations from the Ispravniks, or their
subalterns.

Constantine Mavrocordato did not include the gypsies in the abolition of
slavery; we shall place our remarks on this curious people in a more
appropriate chapter.

At the last peace concluded at Bukorest between Russia and the Porte, it
was stipulated that, in consideration of the two principalities having
borne all the weight of the war, they should not, during the first two
years after the day of their restitution, pay any tribute. The agreement
was in the sequel merely observed with regard to the lood-system,
through which it had been always customary before the war to collect the
imposts; and, under a variety of other forms and denominations,
contributions were paid to the Ottoman authorities of an amount
proportionable to the present rates.

The most important regular revenues of the princes, after the _loods_,
are derived from, the following branches:—

                                                               PIASTERS.

 In Wallachia, the salt mines, which annually give               600,000

 The Vamma, or Customs,                                          380,000

 The Port-Establishment                                          420,000

 The Vinaritt, or tax upon wine; Oyaritt, or tax upon sheep;   1,330,000
   Dismaritt, or tax upon swine and bees; and a tax upon
   cattle feeding upon heaths and commons without licence

                                                               —————————

                             Total                             2,730,000

                                                               —————————

 In Moldavia their annual amount is 1,400,000 piasters.

The administration of these branches of government is always sold to
private speculators; and the above-specified sums have been paid by them
in advance the last six years. Some merchants, and others possessed of
considerable fortunes in the country, have acquired their riches by
these speculations.

In Wallachia it has become customary that most of the public officers
give a share of their profits to the prince, who, according to the
estimate of their amount, receives it in anticipation; the whole
together, with the value of the presents made to him on conferring
titles of nobility, secure to him a private income of about two millions
of piasters.

The metropolitan dignity, and all other sees, are in his gift. The
former is usually granted for life, or for the time of the giver’s
reign. Its revenues amount to four hundred thousand piasters. They are
derived from landed property bequeathed to the metropoly by deceased
boyars and others, and from an annual capitation tax of fifteen piasters
levied on the priests of the lower order, whose number amounts to
fifteen thousand. The claims of the prince on this important revenue are
not so openly avowed as on the civil offices; but they are understood
with the person who is raised to the situation, or is confirmed in it by
the successor.

The bishops of Argis, Rimnik, and Buzéo, are the next ecclesiastical
dignitaries in rank, and the only qualified candidates for the metropoly
among their numerous colleagues. They reside at Bukorest, and they form
the supreme council of the church under the presidency of the
archbishop. This council is the most corrupted tribunal of any in the
country, and its acts and decisions, which proceed from any motives than
those of moral tendency, would seem calculated for no other purpose than
the encouragement of profligacy, and other disorders in the society. The
will of the metropolitan, or that of the prince, is the only rule by
which its concerns are conducted.

The constitution of Moldavia does not permit the prince to interfere
with the affairs of the ecclesiastical council, nor with the financial
concerns of the metropoly. The archbishop is elected by the nobility,
and must be a native. The bishop of Romano, next in rank, is usually
chosen to that dignity. The same regulations ought to exist in
Wallachia, but a series of abuses have there rendered many evils
irremediable.

Both principalities abound with monasteries originally established by
different Voïvodes, and it was a long time customary with the
inhabitants to consider as great acts of piety bequests of lands,
houses, shops, or sums of money, made to them, insomuch that hardly any
rich man died without having allotted a portion of his property to such
a purpose.

These voluntary gifts had so accumulated, and the value of land has so
increased, that some of the monasteries are now the richest
establishments in the country. The greater number are in the gift of the
reigning princes, who let them out for a space of time to the highest
bidders. Others, being dedicated to the patriarchs of Constantinople and
Jerusalem, are disposed of by them; but although the princes cannot
appropriate to their own profit any part of their revenues, as they have
the right of imposing taxes on them upon certain occasions, they
frequently put them under contribution.

Besides the various important branches of revenue hitherto specified,
the reigning princes possess many other means of raising money. The two
principalities are an inexhaustible source of riches to them, and their
proverbial appellation of ‘Peru of the Greeks’ is verified by
experience.

                              CHAPTER IV.
     GOLD AND SILVER MINES, &c.—PRODUCTIONS.—RESTRICTIONS ON THEIR
      EXPORTATION.—NAVIGATION OF THE DANUBE.—TRADE OF IMPORTATION.

The chain of Carpathian mountains which separates the two principalities
from the Austrian dominions, abounds in a variety of minerals. Gold,
silver, quicksilver, iron, copper, pitch, sulphur, and coals, are to be
traced in many places; but although there is strong reason to believe
they exist in abundance, no attempt is made to render them available,
and this neglect is attributed to various motives, some of which would
appear sufficiently justifiable.[23] The inhabitants maintain, that to
undertake a work of a similar magnitude, the employment of a
considerable capital and of a great number of men would be requisite,
and consequently the country would have to support many heavy burthens
long before it would begin to reap any advantage from their intended
object; and that even after consenting to any necessary sacrifices, as
the fruits of them would only serve to benefit the coffers of the Grand
Signior, it is thought prudent to abstain altogether from creating so
powerful an attraction to the leaders of the system of rapacity already
too prevalent in the country.

On another hand, it is supposed that the precarious position of the
Greek Hospodars, who live under the incessant apprehension of sudden
recall and disgrace, induces them to bestow their whole attention to
such resources only as are most immediately within their reach, and to
neglect any plan that merely offers a remote prospect of gain.

The Porte then seems to be the only party much interested in this
affair, as the only one capable of setting it properly on foot, and
reaping a lasting advantage. Yet the Turks evince the same indifference,
and political reasons are given in explanation, which, however, are by
no means satisfactory; for surely no such considerations could prevent
them from availing themselves of treasures which they have certainly
assumed in every way the right of calling their own.

From all these conjectures, however, this conclusion can be drawn,—that
as long as the principalities remain under Turkish influence, their
mineralogic riches will be buried in obscurity and oblivion. The rivers
Dimbovitza and Argis, taking their sources in the Carpathians, and
crossing Wallachia to fall into the Danube, carry along a considerable
quantity of grains of gold. The gypsies that belong to government are
employed in picking them out of the sand when the waters are low; and
they are allowed to pay their tribute partly from the fruits of this
labour.

The trade of Wallachia and Moldavia, notwithstanding that it labours
under a variety of restrictions and partial prohibitions, is one of
their most important sources of opulence. Its details are little known,
and less noticed beyond the neighbouring countries, although they are by
no means deserving of inattention.

Of the common productions of the soil, the most abundant is wheat, of
which the two principalities are supposed to give an annual return of
ten millions of killows,[24] although hardly one-sixth part of their
extensive and fertile plains is cultivated, and that a certain space of
this is sown by Indian corn, barley, and hemp.

The other productions, proportionably important in a commercial point of
view, are the bees-wax, honey, butter, cheese, hides, timber, staves,
and ship-masts of all sizes and descriptions; and an annual supply of
five hundred thousand hare-skins, six hundred thousand okes[25] of
yellow-berries, and forty thousand kintals[26] of sheep’s wool.

The three last-mentioned articles are alone perfectly free of
exportation; the remainder are kept at the disposal of the Turkish
government; and it is only in times of abundance, after the usual
supplies have been fixed upon for the granaries and arsenal of
Constantinople, that leave can be obtained to employ in foreign trade
any portion of them. The exportation of wheat alone is considered as
under a permanent prohibition; it is not in the power of the Hospodars
to suffer any of it to be taken out of the country on private
speculation; they must be authorised so to do by Ferman, a permit which
is never granted to Rayahs, and very seldom to other Europeans, as the
foreign ministers accredited at the Porte, aware of the difficulty of
obtaining it, and the value that the Ottoman government would set in the
gift of it, prefer abstaining altogether from applications on the
subject, more especially as their success would only be profitable to
some individuals, without being productive of any permanent good to the
trade at large.

The quality of the Wallachian wheat is inferior, but it is far from
being bad; that of Moldavia is better, and not differing much from the
Polish wheat. Their ordinary price stands between 2 and 2½ piasters per
killow. As an article of general trade, the charges upon it from the
Danube to Constantinople, would hardly amount to one piaster more. The
Turkish government send their own ships every year to transport their
share of it, which is each time fixed at 1,500,000 killows, as well as
the other articles necessary to their use, the quantity of which is not
fixed, though generally very considerable.

The Moldavian timber is far better than that of Wallachia; it is of the
finest oak, and perfectly well calculated for the construction of
vessels. A great number of ships in the Turkish fleet are built of it,
and fitted out with masts and ropes of Moldavian growth and origin. In
the two provinces, these articles are sold at the lowest possible
prices, and indeed the same thing may be said of all the prohibited
articles; which, restricted as they are, from the monopoly arrogated by
the Porte, have but little demand, except for the local consumption.

The hare-skins commonly stand at 35 paras[27] each, in large purchases,
and the yellow-berries may be had at 40 or 45 paras per oke. The usual
method of securing any quantity of these two articles at the lowest
prices, is by bespeaking them at the different villages, and paying
something in advance; the villagers engaged in such contracts never fail
to fulfil them in proper time.

The hare-skins are of the first quality, but the yellow-berries are
inferior to those of Smyrna, and only demanded when the crops in Asia
Minor have proved deficient.

The sheep’s wool is considered to be very good: cleaned and washed, it
is sold at about 60 paras per oke, or 66 piasters per kintal, when in
its original state, it is offered at 35 to 40 paras.

The principalities abound also in cattle and poultry of all
descriptions. Every year they supply Constantinople with 250,000 sheep,
and 3000 horses. They send, besides, a great number of these, and oxen,
into the surrounding provinces, where they are usually sold at great
profit.

All the productions and commodities that are employed for the exigencies
of the Ottoman capital, are bought by the local government for about
one-fourth of the prices current in the market, and one-sixth of their
value in Turkey. They are paid for by a deduction from the common
tribute, and, sometimes, by an extraordinary imposition of an amount
equal to their cost.

Before we proceed to any remarks on the import trade, it is necessary we
should say a few words on the town and harbour of Galatz, which may be
called the seaport of the two principalities.

Galatz is in Moldavia, but nearly touches the frontier of Wallachia: it
is situated at the beginning of the broadest and deepest part of the
Danube, distant sixty miles from the Black Sea, sixty-five from Yassi,
and seventy-two from Bukorest. The river is so far very navigable for
ships not exceeding three hundred tons burthen. Its principal entrance
from the sea is not very easy to make, owing to the islands which divide
it into three great channels, two of which are very shallow and
dangerous. But ships bound hither take pilots on board, and with this
precaution, very few accidents take place, particularly in the fine
season.

The navigation of the Danube closes in the month of November; and in the
severest winters, even this part of the river is completely frozen over
for the space of five or six weeks. In the month of March, ships begin
to make their appearance again, and as they have not the inconveniency
of a tide against them, they are enabled to come up close to the wharfs,
and to remain there until their business is finished.

Galatz is the great market for the produce of the two principalities,
and the only landing-place for some principal articles of importation.
Having all the resources of a seaport, it is apparently a very
flourishing town. Its market is always well stocked with the productions
of the interior. The timber, masts, and staves are conveyed to it along
the small rivers, that come from various parts of the country, and fall
into the Danube nearest to it. There are public granaries for the wheat,
and a great number of large warehouses, belonging to private merchants,
for all articles. It is chiefly inhabited by commercial men, who,
notwithstanding the rigour of the prohibitive measures, often find the
means of exporting some quantity of wheat, and other contraband
articles; but their principal trade is that of importation. The town and
its dependencies are governed by two deputies of the Prince of Moldavia,
called _Percalabi_. The number of the fixed inhabitants does not exceed
seven thousand, but the great concourse of people occasioned every year
by commercial pursuits, gives it the appearance of being very populous,
and all the bustle of a place of great trade. The presence, in
particular, of a great number of commercial vessels, increases
considerably that appearance.

Although Galatz is the general _depôt_ for many goods of importation, it
is not the principal market for them: they are conveyed to those of
Bukorest and Yassi. Coffee, sugar, pepper, rum, lemons, oranges, and
foreign wines, are the principal articles of this description. The local
consumption of the first, in both provinces, is calculated at 800,000
okes every year; of the second, 900,000 okes; and of the third 35,000
okes; that of the others is merely eventual. Their importation, however,
surpasses this quantity, and might be still carried to a greater extent,
as the provinces of Galicia, Boukovina, Transylvania, Temesvar, and
Servia are partly supplied with those articles by the markets of
Bukorest, Yassi, and Galatz.

The general system of this import trade is ill contrived, and it is
subject to many inconveniencies. The purchasers have recourse to the
markets of Smyrna and Constantinople, where, of course, they buy at high
prices. The goods, which have already paid custom-house duty in Turkey,
are taxed with a new duty of the same kind, of three per cent., on being
landed or brought into the principalities, as well as with other charges
of an arbitrary nature, which amount to as much more. The latter are
not, indeed, established by the local governments, but merely exacted by
their officers, and as they are tolerated, they become unavoidable,
unless the proprietors of the goods happen to be subjects of European
courts, and as such, receive protection and assistance from the consuls
residing in the country.

Wallachia and Moldavia are at present supplied by Germany with all kinds
of cotton and woollen manufactures and hardware, either by land or by
the Danube.

The plain and printed calicoes, the chintz, glass and earthenware,
brought to their markets, are, without exception, German; but they are
called English, and as such sold at higher prices than they would fetch
were their origin made known.

The consumption of the woollen cloths is very extensive; that of the
superfine qualities alone is valued at 200,000_l._ sterling every year.
Some French cloths are brought into the country, but as their prices are
considerably higher than those of Germany, they do not meet with much
demand. French cambrics and English muslins are always profitable
articles to speculators, and never remain long on hand.

As furs of all kinds form a part of the national costume, and are,
besides necessary, owing to the natural rigour of the climate, they are
an article of vast importation. Russia supplies the principalities with
it, and takes in return brandy and wine, and imperial ducats.

Most of the merchants carrying on trade in these countries, are natives,
or Greeks. Some have been naturalised in Russia or in Austria, and
receive protection from those powers; an advantage which is of no small
consequence to their affairs. Of late years, some natives of the Ionian
islands have began to trade in the principalities, and the English flag,
borne by their vessels, is now frequently displayed on the Danube.

Some overland expeditions of goods coming from Smyrna, are now and then
made by way of Enos and Adrianople; but they are attended with risk and
difficulty; besides which, the amount of charges surpasses by eight per
cent. those incurred by way of Galatz.

The natural richness, and the various resources of Wallachia and
Moldavia, are such, that if those countries could enjoy the important
advantages of a regular government and a wise administration, under
which industry and agriculture should receive their due encouragement,
the trade of exports laid open, the commercial intercourse with foreign
nations set upon a proper footing, and finally, the mines explored, they
would in a short time become the most populous and most flourishing
provinces of Europe. The harbour of Galatz would soon stand in rivalship
with all the ports of the Black Sea, not excepting Odessa.

The fertility of the soil is such as to procure nourishment for ten
times the number of the present population, and leave wherewith to
supply other countries besides; the common return of cultivation being
sixteen-fold, and in more favourable seasons, twenty-five.

Nature has furnished them with every possible means of becoming
prosperous; men have ever proved themselves the determined enemies of
their prosperity.

                               CHAPTER V.
BUKOREST AND TIRGOVIST, THE CAPITALS OF WALLACHIA.—YASSI, THE CAPITAL OF
 MOLDAVIA.—A DESCRIPTION OF THEM.—MODE OF TRAVELLING.—BREED OF HORSES.

Bukorest, the present capital of Wallachia, is an extensive dirty town,
situated on a low and marshy ground, and containing eighty thousand
inhabitants, three hundred and sixty-six churches, twenty monasteries,
and thirty large _hanns_ or caravanserays.

About four hundred years back it was but a small village, belonging to a
person called _Bukor_, from whom it derived its name, and retains it to
the present day. By degrees it became a town, and it continued
increasing, until it surpassed the former capital, Tirgovist, in size.
The Voïvode, Constantine Bessarabba, made it in 1698, the permanent seat
of government; abandoning with all his nobles the city of Tirgovist,
most delightfully situated further in the interior, having on one side a
beautiful range of hills, and the other a very fine and extensive plain.

The Greek princes having continued to reside at Bukorest, probably on
account of its being nearer to the Turks, Tirgovist was by degrees
deserted by the remaining part of its inhabitants, and it is now reduced
to a mere village. It contains many ruins of ancient edifices, amongst
which those of the Voïvodes’ palace are the most conspicuous. The river
Dimbovitza runs alongside of it.

Yassi,the capital of Moldavia, is a smaller but better-built town,
containing many elegant houses built in the most modern style of
European architecture, forty thousand inhabitants, and seventy churches.
One part of it stands upon a fine hill, and the other is situated in a
valley. The prince’s palace is the most extensive edifice in the whole
town, and is surrounded by gardens and yards. It is furnished in a style
which is half Oriental and half European, and has room enough to lodge
conveniently more than a thousand people.

The palace of Bukorest was formerly a large building, standing on an
eminence at one extremity of the town, and commanding a full view of it.
In 1813 it was accidentally burnt down, and it has not been rebuilt. The
late prince had, since that time, resided in two private houses joined
into one.

Both capitals occupy a great extent of ground, the houses being separate
from each other, and surrounded by yards or gardens, and trees. All the
buildings are made of brick, and their walls, outside as well as within,
are plastered and whitewashed. Tiles are seldom used, and the roofs are
generally covered with wood.

The streets of the two capitals, and indeed of all the provincial towns,
are, without exception, paved with thick pieces of timber, thrown
across, and made tight to each other. In some, the surface is made
smooth and even, whilst in others, the logs of wood are almost left in
their natural state. In the rainy seasons they are constantly covered
over with a deep liquid mud, and in the summer, with a thick black dust,
which the least wind renders excessively injurious to the eyes and
lungs; besides these great inconveniences, a complete renewal, at least
once in every six years, is absolutely necessary.

At Bukorest, under the wooden pavements, to which the natives give the
more appropriate name of _bridges_, there are large kennels, which
receive the filth of the houses, and are meant to convey it to the river
Dimbovitza, which runs through the town. Hardly any care is taken to
keep the different passages open, and the accumulation of dirty
substances frequently stops them up; in this state they sometimes remain
for months in the hot season, during which they produce the most noxious
exhalations, and occasion fevers of a putrid and malignant
nature,—diseases to which the natural position of the town must alone
dispose a great part of the inhabitants.

It has been long supposed, and it is still considered impossible to pave
the streets with stone, not so much on account of the scarcity of the
material, as owing to the ground being of a soft clay, which offers no
hold to it. This idea, very prevalent among the natives, is certainly
erroneous, and there cannot exist a more convincing proof of it, than
the stone pavements constructed by Trajan and the Romans, which have so
firmly withstood the destructive hand of time.

From a certain distance, and on elevated ground, the city of Bukorest
offers itself to the view with great advantage; the mixture of the
houses and trees give it a peculiar beauty; but it is like the fine
scenery of a theatre which charms the distant eye, and on being
approached is found to be a coarse daub.

As late as thirty years back, the Boyars were in the habit of visiting
each other, and going to court on horseback, and the women of the most
opulent only, went in coaches. Within that period, the fashion of riding
in coaches has so increased, and it is now so universal, that no person
of either sex, who has claims to respectability, can pass the gates of
his house otherwise than in a coach, even in the finest weather. The
Boyars consider it derogatory to their dignity to make use of their
legs, and leave to the mob the vulgar practice of walking. The
consequence is, that the streets, about seven or eight yards wide, are
always full of carriages, and frequent accidents happen to the
unfortunate pedestrians.

The kind of carriage most in use, is the German calèche; and the Boyars
have introduced the fashion of having theirs ornamented in the most
gaudy manner; but as they do not so much regard the beauty of the horses
and harness, nor the dress of the coachman, it is very common to meet in
the streets a carriage glittering with gold, drawn by a pair of
miserable hacks, and driven by a gypsy in rags.

There are many coachmakers, both at Bukorest and at Yassi; but the
carriages sent from Vienna are preferred to theirs, and much higher
prices are paid for them. The Boyars are indifferent as to their
solidity, and buy any old vehicle that is made up to deceive the eye,
and is offered as new; fine ornaments being the only quality in
estimation, every twelve or eighteen months they are obliged to purchase
a new carriage. On another hand, their own inattention, and the lazy,
slovenly, and careless habits of their coachmen, render this annual
expense indispensable.

No coaches of any kind are to be hired, so that travellers, and other
non-residents, must submit to the necessity of going on foot. Private
lodgings are also seldom to be had, and it was but very lately that a
public hotel was set up at Bukorest, which, being well furnished, and
provided with every requisite commodity, has become very useful to
travellers. A German is the proprietor and director of it.

The mode of travelling in the two principalities is so expeditious, that
in this respect it is not equalled in any other country. Their post
establishments are well organized; there are post-houses in all
directions, and they are abundantly provided with horses. Every idea of
comfort must, however, be set aside by those who are willing to conform
themselves to the common method of riding post. A kind of a vehicle is
given, which is not unlike a very small crate for earthenware, fastened
to four small wheels, by the means of wooden pegs, and altogether not
higher than a common wheel-barrow. It is filled with straw, and the
traveller sits in the middle of it, keeping the upper part of his body
in an erect posture, and finding great difficulty to cram his legs
within. Four horses are attached to it by cords, which form the whole
harness; and, driven by one postilion on horseback, they set off at full
speed, and neither stop nor slacken their pace, until they reach the
next post-house. Within the distance of half a mile from it, the
postilion gives warning of his approach by a repeated and great cracking
of his whip, so that, by the time of arrival, another cart is got ready
to receive the traveller.

The Boyars, and other people of respectability in the country, travel in
their own carriages, and at their own pace. In winter, as the snow lies
about two months on the ground, sledges are generally used, as well in
town as in the country.

The Wallachian breed of horses is of a peculiar kind. Their stature is
very small, and they have no spirit; but they are strong, active, and
capable of enduring great fatigue. Those of Moldavia differ only in
being a little larger in size. Some of the richest people have their
horses sent them from Russia and Hungary; but they are merely meant for
their coaches, as, from an aversion to every exercise that occasions the
least fatigue, hardly any of them ride on horseback. Handsome
saddle-horses, consequently, are seldom seen in the country; the prince
is the only person who keeps any; but they are chiefly used by his
Albanians, or body-guard.

                              CHAPTER VI.
    OBSERVATIONS ON THE GREEKS IN GENERAL.—THEIR INTRODUCTION TO THE
PRINCIPALITIES.—THEIR POLITICAL SYSTEM.—CAUSE OF THE DECLARATION OF WAR
BETWEEN TURKEY, RUSSIA, AND ENGLAND IN 1806.—THOSE WHICH OCCASIONED THE
FAILURE OF THE ENGLISH EXPEDITION TO CONSTANTINOPLE.—SUBSEQUENT CHANGES
  OF POLICY OF THE OTTOMAN GOVERNMENT.—PEACE WITH ENGLAND.—PEACE WITH
  RUSSIA, AND CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH MOSTLY CONTRIBUTED TO IT.—HOSPODARS
  CALLIMACKI AND CARADJA.—PRINCE DEMETRIUS MOUROUSI’S DEATH.—CARADJA’S
FLIGHT FROM WALLACHIA.—REFLECTIONS ON THE CONDUCT OF THE PORTE RELATIVE
                       TO THE TWO PRINCIPALITIES.

None of the events that had influenced the political existence, and
undermined the public spirit of the Wallachian and Moldavian nations,
proved more ruinous to them than the system of policy introduced by the
Greeks of the Fannar[28], when they were placed at the head of the
principalities.

Humiliated, degraded, and oppressed as the Greeks were, since they had
ceased to be a nation, civilisation degenerated among them, in
proportion to the weight and barbarism of the yoke that had been imposed
on them, and they had insensibly contracted those habits of corruption,
and servile obedience, which must be inseparable from a state of slavery
similar to theirs. Dissimulation and falsehood became the most prominent
features of their character; and, in short, the force of the causes
which acted upon them incessantly, familiarised them, by degrees, to
every thing that could be degrading and humiliating to man.

The ambition of certain Greeks, leading an obscure life at
Constantinople, was, however roused, when the office of
state-interpreter at the Porte, assumed an important appearance under
the direction of their countryman, Alexander Mavrocordato, who, from a
petty merchant at the island of Scio, rose by degrees to that station,
and was sent in the quality of Ottoman plenipotentiary to the congress
of Carlowitz, where he distinguished himself as an able negotiator. He
caused his son Nicholas to be raised to the governments of Moldavia and
Wallachia, and he suggested to the Porte a new mode of appointment to
those principalities, after the elective right had been entirely set
aside. The Ottoman court thenceforward appropriated those two dignities
to individuals who had once served in the quality of state-interpreter
to its satisfaction, not so much as a reward for their services, as on
account of the knowledge obtained of their personal character and extent
of abilities.

On another hand, the repeated demonstrations of servitude on the part of
the Greeks, and the apparent impossibility of their ever becoming a
nation again, seemed to render them the fittest tools of the Porte’s new
system of government in the principalities; for, although it could not
trample upon the whole of their privileges at once, yet, in giving them
princes who should be entirely devoted to its interests, and slaves to
its will, the existence of those privileges was rendered nugatory.

No sooner was the possibility of sharing in the public administration
manifested to the Greeks, than such as were versed in the Turkish and
European languages, abandoning all other pursuits, formed themselves
into a distinct class, which assumed the title of nobility, and the
exclusive right of being called to the service of the state.

In a short time, however, the number of competitors increased
considerably; all equally eager and impatient to reach the same objects,
they introduced a system of intrigue and bribery, which gave rise to
continual changes in the government of the principalities, and
accustomed the Porte to look upon these as farms which were to be let
out to the highest bidders; the farmer-princes were therefore deposed
and recalled, whenever the offers and promises of others of their
countrymen appeared more advantageous.

From the period at which this system was introduced, to the beginning of
the present century, being a space of ninety years, Wallachia alone has
passed through the hands of forty different princes, independently of
the time it was occupied by the Russians, from 1770 to 1774; by the
Austrians and Russians, from 1789 to 1792, and by the Russians again,
from 1806 to 1812.

The evils which naturally arose from such a state of things, weighed so
heavily upon the two nations, that the court of Russia, already
authorised by the treaty of Kaïnargik[29], to interfere in their behalf,
insisted at the peace of Yassi in 1792, that the Porte should engage to
maintain the princes of Moldavia and Wallachia in their respective
stations, for the space of seven years, and not to molest them in any
manner previous to the expiration of that term. This agreement was then
legally entered into by the Ottoman plenipotentiaries, but in the sequel
it was not regularly observed by the Porte, whose frequent infractions
of it became the subject of continual remonstrance on the part of the
court of Russia. In 1802, however, Prince Ipsilanti was appointed to the
government of Wallachia, and Prince Alexander Mourousi to that of
Moldavia, with the express condition which was obtained through the
negotiations of the Russian minister at the Porte, that neither of them
should be removed from office previous to the term stipulated in the
treaty, if they were not proved guilty of an offence that the Russian
minister should allow to be of a nature which justified their
deposition.[30]

In 1805, the intrigues of Buonaparte, who sought to involve Turkey in
his continental system, prevailed upon the Porte to adopt a line of
conduct which Russia could not otherwise interpret, than as a systematic
violation of its existing engagements, and an approaching alliance with
France, notwithstanding that a public audience of the Sultan was given
to the Russian envoy, Mr. d’Italinsky, in which a formal exchange of
ratifications took place of a late treaty of defensive alliance
concluded between the two powers.

The Hospodars, Ipsilanti and Mourousi, were suddenly recalled, without
the participation of the Russian embassy; the latter was replaced by
Charles Callimacki, and the former by Alexander Sutzo, a man who was
looked upon as a partisan of Buonaparte, and who had always been
obnoxious to the interests of Russia.

Previous to this circumstance, a certain degree of coolness already
existed between the courts of St. Petersburgh and Constantinople; it
originated in the Porte’s sudden resolution of suppressing foreign
protections, in abolishing all letters-patent, until then granted to
individuals, natives of Turkey, who were authorised by such letters to
place themselves under the protection of foreign courts, although
residing and trading in the Ottoman dominions. More particularly in
carrying that resolution into effect, by forcibly and publicly
compelling all such individuals, protected by Russia, to give up their
titles, without paying the least regard to the representations of the
Russian embassy.

Ipsilanti’s and Mourousi’s deposition brought things to a crisis. A
Russian army was immediately sent to the frontiers to enforce the
treaties, and having occupied the fortresses of Bender and Hotim, the
Porte looked upon the measure as a declaration of war, and the Mufti
issued his _Fetvaa_[31], which declared it legal to repel force by
force.

The rupture was soon followed by another with England, who had joined
Russia to oppose the increasing influence of Buonaparte over the Porte.
When, in 1805, the English ambassador, Mr. Charles Arbuthnot, arrived at
Constantinople, the Porte expressed a wish of renewing the treaty of
accession made in 1799, the term of which (eight years) was drawing to
its end. That treaty, framed upon the wisest principles, completed the
triple alliance between England, Russia, and Turkey, from which so many
important advantages have accrued to the common cause.

Mr. Arbuthnot not being invested with full powers for that particular
object, wrote home for instructions, and received them a short time
after; and when on their arrival an offer was made to the Turkish
ministers to commence the work, they very unexpectedly began to draw
back, and an actual recantation took place, which naturally created the
greatest surprise.

The intrigues of the French ambassador, and Buonaparte’s progressive
encroachments in Europe, had made on the minds of the Sultan and his
ministers such an impression, that no remonstrance, no threat could now
induce them to perform what they themselves had shown so much wish for
before.

On the other hand, the British embassy could not remain indifferent to
the recall of the Hospodars, and to the manner in which the foreign
protections had been suppressed.

From an impulse of official regard to the complaints and interests of
those individuals who were patentees under the English protection, and
in consequence of the Russian envoy’s solicitations that their efforts
might be joined for the purpose of resisting the violent measures
pursued by the Turkish government, the British ambassador made many
representations to the Porte against its proceedings, and although
impartial in principle as to the practice of granting protection to
natives of the country, he, at all events, recommended moderation, and a
less offensive mode of carrying the new system into execution. But
having soon discovered and ascertained beyond a doubt, that all
interference was of no avail, that the resolution of the Turkish cabinet
was such as to hazard all, sooner than withdraw from the adopted plan,
he deemed it expedient to advise the British patentees to proceed, as if
from their own accord, and give up their titles to the Porte, and in the
mean time recommended in a private manner, the property and personal
safety of such individuals, who, by this means, not only avoided the
resentment of the Turkish government, but were all well treated, and
some taken into favour.

The British ambassador, however, showed less disposition to compliance
with regard to the other proceedings of the Porte, and having insisted
with Russia on the immediate reinstatement of the Hospodars Ipsilanti
and Mourousi, the subject was discussed at the divan, where the general
opinion inclined to a firm resistance of those pretensions; but the
Sultan finally declared, that however humiliating might be the
alternative of ceding to them, he was resolved to recur to it rather
than break with England.

This decision was at the time carried into execution, to the extreme
disappointment of the French ambassador, Sebastiani, whose great object
was to kindle the fire he had raised. But very soon after, advices being
received that the Russian troops had already entered the Moldavian
territory, affairs underwent a total change; the Russian envoy was
dismissed, and the Grand Vezier took the field.

To represent these events in a more proper point of view, it is
necessary to observe, that it was neither the intention of England, nor
the wish of Russia, to engage in a serious war with Turkey. Their object
was to bring the Porte to a sense of its true interests, in diverting it
from a line of conduct which bore every appearance of a change in its
political system, and was every way calculated to confirm the suspicion
that the Sultan was contracting an alliance with Buonaparte.

In order to separate the Porte from the French party, and induce it to
return to the connexions which had formerly existed with the allies of
Turkey, a plan of coercive measures had been found necessary; and, to
give them a greater weight, it had been determined that Russia should
send an army from the north, and England a fleet from the south.

When the English fleet appeared before Constantinople, it naturally
occasioned the greatest confusion and alarm. The Sultan lost no time in
sending on board to offer terms of peace, and negotiations were
commenced with Mr. Arbuthnot, who was in the flag-ship, the Royal
Sovereign. But they were carried on with much less vigour than it was
necessary to give them, and left time to the French intrigues to gain
the advantage. Buonaparte’s active agents, General Sebastiani and
Franchini[32], were the more anxious to counteract the operations of the
English plenipotentiary, as they were aware that the first result of his
success would have been the expulsion of the French embassy from
Constantinople. They employed for that purpose every means in their
power, and they succeeded by the following stratagem.

The chief of the Janissaries, Pehlivan-Aga, had formerly been colonel of
a regiment, which had acted once as guard of honour, given to a French
embassy at the Porte. Having remained some time in that station, he had
contracted a lasting connexion with the French, to whose party, since
that period, he devoted himself. When General Sebastiani saw that peace
with England was on the point of being concluded, he sent Franchini to
him to suggest a plan which the Turkish officer carried into immediate
execution. He went to the seraglio[33], as if in great haste, and having
obtained audience of the Sultan, he thus addressed his imperial chief:—

“May God preserve your sacred person and the Ottoman empire from every
possible evil. A pure sense of duty brings me before your Royal Person,
to represent that so strong and general a fermentation has arisen
amongst my Janissaries since the appearance of the infidel’s fleet
before your royal palace: they express so great a discontent at the
measures pursued by your ministers in negotiating with the English, from
a shameful fear that the appearance of that fleet has thrown them into;
that a general insurrection is on the point of breaking out, unless the
negotiations be laid aside, and all offers of peace be rejected with
scorn. They declare that it is beneath the dignity and fame of the
Ottoman empire, to submit to such an act of humiliation, as to sign a
treaty, because a few ships have come to bully its capital, and dictate
their own terms to the Ottoman sovereign. Your brave Janissaries will
not suffer so disgraceful a stain to tarnish the splendour of the
Ottoman arms. They are all ready to sacrifice themselves in defence of
your residence, and in vindication of the honour and faith of the
Ottoman nation. But they can never consent to stand tacit witnesses of a
submission so ignominious to the Turkish name.”

Sultan Selim, a prince naturally timid and credulous, no sooner heard a
message of this sort delivered in the name of the Janissaries, then in
good understanding with the chiefs of government, and apparently united
with the troops of the Nisam-y-gedid[34], than he ordered all
communications with the English fleet to be suspended, and immediate
preparations of defence to be made, in the event of its commencing
hostilities.

This manœuvre, unknown at the time, and with which very few persons are
yet acquainted, was the true cause of the failure of the negotiations
which, at the commencement, bore so sure a prospect of success.

The fleet returned without even having made a show of hostile
intentions, and left to the triumphant French party the most decided
influence in the Seraglio.

Before we enter into further observations on the events which followed,
it may not be amiss to make a few remarks on the character of those who
were then at the head of the Turkish administration, as it is to them
that the whole change of system of the Porte is to be attributed.

Haffiz-Ismaïl Pashah, Grand Vezier, appointed early in 1805, was a
low-bred, ignorant man, so poor and thirsty after money, that the moment
he was elevated to his station, he formed the plan of operating a change
in the principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia, although the time
prescribed by the treaties was not yet near, with a view of getting a
subsidy, and securing to himself an income which the candidates, who
took no small advantage of the Vezier’s inexperience and selfish views,
had promised to allow him when the appointment should have taken place.

Ibraïm-Aga, Kiaya-Béÿ, or minister of the interior, a man of little
experience and great ambition, under the idea of ingratiating himself
with his master, and rendering, as he thought, a signal service to the
state, undertook the affair of protections which he treated in a manner
so insulting and provoking, that it was impossible for any foreign
power, jealous of its own dignity, to suffer it to remain unnoticed.

The Mufti, Sheriff-Zaadé-Attaa-Effendi, and the chief of the
Janissaries, Pehlivan-Mehmet Aga, were entirely devoted to the French
party. They willingly seconded the adoption of any measures which tended
to alienate the Porte from England and Russia, and appeared calculated
to promote Buonaparte’s scheme of overthrowing the triple alliance.

Galib Reïs-Effendi, minister of foreign affairs, and Yussuf-Aga,
Validay-Kiayassi or chancellor to the Emperor’s mother, were the only
two men in power friendly to the common cause. They disapproved of the
measures pursued, but their opinion was over-ruled, and they both
thought it prudent to retire from business, in order to screen
themselves from responsibility with respect to the consequences they
foresaw.

The military operations on the Danube be between the Russians and the
Turks, which followed the first acts of hostility, were not more
successful with regard to the object that brought them on, than the
threats of the English fleet.

The peace of Tilsit took place; and the Porte, which had reason to
expect an effective interference on the part of Buonaparte in behalf of
its differences with Russia, gained no other advantage than the
conclusion of a long armistice, the first condition of which was the
retreat of the Russian armies from the principalities, whence, however,
they did not remove. Negotiations for peace were, notwithstanding, set
on foot; and the great revolutions, which overthrew the Sultan Selim,
and consigned him to death, finally established a new order of things at
Constantinople, and operated a complete change in the political system
of the Turkish cabinet. The Porte remained no longer blind to the
equivocal conduct of Buonaparte since his reconciliation with Russia,
and began to look upon its state of hostility with England not only as
useless, but even injurious to the interests of the country.

In 1808, an English[35]plenipotentiary had been for the second time[36]
sent to treat at the Dardanelles, and peace was definitively signed in
the month of December of the same year.

At the same time the Turkish plenipotentiaries, sent to Bukorest during
the armistice, were endeavouring to adjust the differences with Russia;
but the interview of the Emperor Alexander with Buonaparte took place at
Erfurth, and the failure of their joint proposals to the court of
London[37] was followed by instructions to Prince Prosoroffsky,
commander-in-chief of the Russian armies in Moldavia and Wallachia, to
signify to the Ottoman plenipotentiaries that, as the Emperor Alexander
had acceded to the Continental System, the chief object of which was a
continual state of warfare with England, he could no longer enter upon
terms of peace with Turkey, unless the English ambassador, lately
admitted at Constantinople, were sent out of the Ottoman dominions.

The Turkish ministers expressed astonishment at the versatility of the
court of Russia, which, having made the first overtures for a
negotiation, had not then in any manner alluded to England; they
demanded time, however, for the arrival of instructions which were
necessary to regulate their official reply to a communication so
unexpected. They dispatched a messenger to Constantinople for that
purpose, and he was accompanied by an aide-de-camp of Prince
Prosoroffsky, Colonel Bock, who, on his arrival, signified to the Porte
the Emperor’s ultimatum, through the channel of the French minister
Latour Maubourg.

The Ottoman government, without much hesitation, recalled the Turkish
plenipotentiaries from the congress of Bukorest, and hostilities were
renewed.

A plan of partition had been formed at Erfurth between the emperors
Alexander and Napoleon, by which the Turkish provinces were to fall to
the share of Russia, and Spain to that of France. It was after this
understanding between the two sovereigns that overtures were made to
England. The English negotiation took time, and before it came to a
decided issue, Buonaparte declared to his senate that the principalities
of Wallachia and Moldavia were annexed to the dominions of his friend
and ally the Emperor Alexander. When, however, Buonaparte found England
determined to treat upon no basis which did not expressly admit of the
evacuation of Spain, and that by entering into such terms he left a
decided advantage to Russia with respect to Turkey, without reaping any
benefit to himself from the political bargain made at Erfurth, he
changed his views. The continental system, which he endeavoured to
justify in attributing the general calamities of Europe to a tyrannical
perseverance in war on the part of England, furnished him with a
sufficient pretext for engaging Russia to continue her war against
Turkey, who had just entered into terms of friendship with England. On
the other hand, he prevailed upon the Turkish government to insist on
the restitution of the principalities occupied by the Russian armies,
and to continue hostilities so long as the Russian court should withhold
its consent to that measure. His desire of keeping these two powers at
variance with each other could not but increase when he had subsequently
formed the plan of invading Russia, who, molested on one side by the
Turks, and on the other by the Persians, was thus forced to employ
considerable armies on distant frontiers.

The exhausted state of Turkey, the mediation of England, and the
impatience of Russia, who was pressed by the hostile preparations of
France, evidently intended against her, hastened the conclusion of peace
in 1812 between the Mussulman powers and the Russians; but, critical as
the circumstances were, the Court of St. Petersburgh signed a most
advantageous treaty with both.

Galib Effendi, who, since the great changes of government at
Constantinople, had resumed the functions of minister of foreign
affairs, was chief plenipotentiary at the congress of Bukorest in 1811
and 1812; but the Greek prince Demetrius Mourousi, who, in his quality
of state-interpreter, was present at the negotiations, conducted the
greatest part of them, and was indeed intrusted with extensive power. He
had, with his two brothers, been invariably attached to the Russian
party since the beginning of his public career, and his hopes of being
appointed to one of the principalities, the greatest objects of his
ambition, after the restoration of peace, appeared grounded upon the
best foundation. His office, his services at the congress, and the
support of the court of Russia, were, in fact, considerations which
appeared to render his nomination certain.

The cession of Wallachia and Moldavia could not, therefore, by any
means, suit his views, and he combated it with energy and success; but,
in rendering so important a service to the Porte, some proof of
attachment to Russia was also necessary on his part; and although by
insisting on the entire restitution of the principalities, no doubt but
the Russian plenipotentiaries, who were instructed to hasten the
conclusion of peace upon any terms not beyond that restitution, would
have consented without hesitation, Mourousi, who was aware of it,
finally settled the conditions by ceding to Russia the finest part of
Moldavia, that which is situated between the rivers Dniester and Pruth,
thus fixing the future line of demarcation of the Russian frontiers by
the direction of the latter river.

The vigilant agents of Buonaparte at Constantinople did not suffer the
conduct of Mourousi to remain unnoticed. When, after the signing of the
treaty, they saw themselves frustrated in the hope of inducing the Porte
to continue the war, they sought to bring the Mourousi family into
disgrace, that they might, at least, prevail upon the Ottoman government
to place at the head of the principalities persons of their own
choosing. They represented the Prince Demetrius as a traitor who had
been bribed by the Russians to serve their interests, at a time when it
was in his power to obtain the most advantageous terms of peace.

Meanwhile hostilities commenced between France and Russia, and the Porte
having evinced a resolution of remaining neutral, unwilling to give
umbrage to either of the contending powers in the choice of the new
Hospodars, resolved to fix upon two individuals whose political
principles had never been connected with foreign parties. A great number
of candidates offered their services, but none of them being qualified
for the appointments, their claims were rejected. Halett-Effendi,
intimate counsellor of the sultan, was instructed to make a choice, and
he fixed it on the prince Charles Callimacki[38] for Moldavia, and Yanco
Caradja for Wallachia. Halett-Effendi had been several years before
Turkish secretary to Callimacki’s father, whilst at the head of the
Moldavian government, and on terms of intimate friendship with Caradja,
who had also a subaltern employment under the same prince. Being
perfectly acquainted with the personal character of both, he recommended
them to the sultan as the fittest persons in those circumstances, and
they were appointed in August 1812.

Demetrius Mourousi, who, with Galib Effendi, had not yet departed from
Wallachia, received the news of the nominations at a time that he
expected with confidence that of his own. He was at the same time
secretly informed that his return to Constantinople would expose him to
the greatest dangers, and advised to retire into a Christian country.