Explore "Crescent and Iron Cross" by E.F. Benson on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
In the year 1908 a military group in Constantinople, styling itself the 'Young Turk' party, seized and deposed Abdul Hamid, and shut him up at Salonika, there to spend the remainder of his infamous days. They put forth a Liberal programme of reformation, one that earned them at the moment the sympathy of civilised Europe (including Germany), and the Balance of Power very mistakenly and prematurely heaved a sigh of relief. For upwards of a century it had maintained in Constantinople the corrupt and bloody autocracy of the Sultans, fearing the European quarrels that would attend the dismemberment of that charnel-house of decay known as the Ottoman Empire, and now (just for the moment) it seemed as if a sudden rally had come to the Sick Man, and he showed signs of returning animation and wholesome vitality. The policy of the Powers, after a century of failure, looked as if it was justifying itself, and they were full of congratulations towards Turkey and each other.
But never, in the whole century of their pusillanimous cacklings, had they made a greater mistake.