Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846

In the cleanliness of their persons and houses, they present a favourable contrast to most of the other Slavic populations; and their personal appearance is also advantageous. "They are a remarkably tall and robust race of men; in form and feature they bespeak strength of body and energy of mind; but one seldom sees that thoroughbred look, so frequently found in the poorest peasants of Italy and Greece. The women I think very pretty. They are not so well-shaped as the Greeks; but their complexions are fine, their hair generally black and glossy, and their head-dress particularly graceful; and not being addicted to the bath, like other eastern women, they prolong their beauty beyond the average period." The spirit of nationality, and zeal for national improvement, which pervades the population almost as one man, is strongly marked by many incidents related in Mr Paton's pages, and one is so remarkable that we cannot forbear quoting it. An idiot boy, to whom he had given a glass of slivovitza, "taking off his greasy fez, said, 'I drink to our prince Kara-Georgovich, and the progress and enlightenment of the nation.' He was too stupid to entertain these sentiments himself; but if the determination to rise were not in the minds of the people, it would not be on the lips of an oaf in an insignificant hamlet." Nor is the progress of intellectual development behind this patriotic zeal for national independence in the march of regeneration. "In the whole range of the Slavic family, no nation possesses so extensive a collection of excellent popular poetry," with which the British public has been in some measure made acquainted by the translations of Dr Bowring. "The romantic beauty of their country – the relics of a wild mythology, which has some resemblance to that of Greece and Scandinavia – the adventurous character of the population – the vicissitudes of guerilla warfare – are all given in a dialect which for musical sweetness is to other Slavonic tongues what the Italian is to the languages of Western Europe." The Servian Anthology has been collected by Dr Wuk Stephanovich, the author of several works on national topics; and there are several living poets, among whom, Milutinovich, already mentioned, is reputed facile princeps. The only newspaper now printed at Belgrade is the State Gazette, which prudently avoids all remarks on Austrian or Russian policy; and the only annual is the Golubitza, (Dove,) a miscellany in prose and verse, neatly got up in imitation of the German Taschenbücher, and edited by M. Hadschitch, the framer of the code of laws. In the Lyceum, lectures on law are delivered by M. Simonovich, bred an Hungarian advocate, and formerly editor of the Courier, a newspaper now discontinued; but the study of law, as well as its practitioners, is said to be unpopular in Servia at present; and Professor John Shafarik is an able and popular lecturer on Slavic history, literature, and antiquities; of the latter, there is a collection in the museum of the institution, as well as a rich mineralogical cabinet collected by Baron Herder, and including specimens of silver, lead, and copper ore, as well as marble, white as that of Carrara. A Literary Society has also been formed for the encouragement of popular literature, and the formation of a complete dictionary of the language – the seal of which represents an uncultivated field, with the rising sun shining on a monument bearing the arms of Servia.

The administrative senate consists of twenty-one members, named by the Prince for life; four of whom are ministers. Stojan Simitch, who has been before mentioned, the present vice-president (the presidency being an imaginary office,) is a Servian of the old school, in whom talent and shrewdness have supplied the place of education; but the most remarkable member of the cabinet is M. Petronevich, now minister for foreign affairs. He was at one time in a commercial house at Trieste, and subsequently for nine years a hostage for Servia at Constantinople – "he is astute by nature and education, but has a good heart and a capacious intellect; and, in the course of a very tortuous political career, has kept the advancement of Servia constantly in view. He is one of the very few public men in Servia, in whom the Christian and Western love of community has triumphed over the Oriental allegiance to self; and this disinterestedness, in spite of his defects, is the secret of his popularity." His partner in exile, M. Wuczicz, is now commander of the military force and minister of the interior, in which latter office he succeeded Garashanin; the standing army is a mere skeleton force; but every Servian is a soldier, and bound to provide himself with arms, thus forming a national militia, of which the effective strength is estimated at little less than 100,000 men. The military command of each of the seventeen provinces is vested in the Natchalnik, under whom are the captains of the several cantons, usually three in each province; these officers superintend the police, and report to the minister at war. As minister of the interior, he is charged also with the superintendence of ecclesiastical affairs, the spiritual head of which, the Archbishop of Belgrade, though acknowledging the supremacy of the Greek Patriarch, is virtually independent within the province; his salary, as well as that of the three bishops and the inferior clergy, is paid by the state, that of the primate being about £800 a-year, and of his suffragans half as much. The administration of justice (as settled by the Sultan's hatti shereef of 1838, which may be regarded as the Servian constitution) is vested in local courts in each province, consisting of a president and three members, from which an appeal lies to the supreme courts of Belgrade and Posharevatz; but reference is always made in the first instance, in minor cases, to the Courts of Peace (as they are called,) consisting of the village magnates, with whose patriarchal arbitration the litigants are usually satisfied, law and lawyers not being held in high estimation. "The courts of law have something of the promptitude of Oriental justice, without its flagrant venality;" but the salaries of the judges are small, that of the president of the appeal court at Belgrade not exceeding £300 a-year. But it is the financial department that presents the most striking contrast to other European states, in the unheard-of phenomenon of a national debt due not from but to the government; the revenue so much exceeding the expenditure, that a sum of a hundred thousand ducats has been lent to the people at six per cent, and forms an item on the credit side of the budget! The total annual outlay, according to the financial returns, including the tribute to the Porte and the civil list of the Prince, (the latter equivalent to about £20,000 English,) is 830,000 dollars; while the income reaches 887,000, principally derived from the poresa, or capitation-tax paid by heads of families, a separate tax being levied on bachelors. Such is at present the flourishing state of the principality of Servia, "the youngest member of the European family," the views of Russia on which, somewhat prematurely developed by the famous "Servian question," will be more clearly understood by a preliminary sketch of its previous history.

The political existence of modern Servia may be considered to date from 1804, in February of which year a general rising took place of the Christian population against the Moslems, provoked by the massacres and atrocities committed by the spahis, who held lands in the province by military tenure, and whose chiefs had thrown off the authority of the Pasha of Belgrade, and embraced the party of the famous Paswan-Oghlu, Pasha of Widdin, who was then in open revolt against Selim III., as the champion of the janissaries and the ancien regime, against the civil and military reforms which the Sultan was striving to introduce. The principal leaders of the Servians were Slavatz, (or as Mr Paton calls him, if the same person is intended, Glavash,) and George Petrovich, surnamed Kara or Czerni, (black,) the son of a peasant in the district of Kragejewatz, who afterwards migrated to Topola, which has therefore been held by the Servians as the place whence sprung their liberator,5 and where an annual festival is held in his honour. He was in his youth a Hayduk or klepht; and having been forced to fly from Servia for taking part in an unsuccessful insurrection, had served several years in the Austrian army. His successes were at first viewed with satisfaction by the Porte; and the obnoxious chiefs, driven to take refuge in Belgrade, were there seized and put to death by the Pasha; but it soon became evident that the Servians, once in arms and victorious, would not be satisfied without complete independence. Semendria and other fortresses fell into their hands; and Kara George, by the unanimous voice of his countrymen, was declared hospodar or prince. The Porte now directed an invasion of Servia by a mingled force of forty thousand Turks and Bosniaks; but the Moslem army was totally overthrown near Shabatz, Aug. 8, 1806, by seven thousand foot and two thousand horse under Kara George, and driven across the Drina with the loss of their commander and many other chiefs. It was now apparent that Servia was not to be reduced by force of arms; and conferences were opened, by which the Sultan engaged to grant them a local and national government, with free exercise of their religion. But the negotiation failed, from the demands of the Porte that they should surrender their arms, and leave the fortresses in the hands of the Turks; and while it was yet pending, Kara George carried Belgrade with great slaughter, by a coup-de-main, on the night of Dec. 13, 1806, thus completing the expulsion of the Turks from Servia, with the exception of Szoko, (Mr Paton's Sokol,) and a few other strongholds which still remained in their hands.

The war which broke out in the following year between Russia and the Porte, secured Servia against any further attacks from the Turks; and Kara George, thus freed from apprehensions of invasion, endeavoured to introduce some degree of order and civil organization into the country. A sort of federal senate, to which each of the twelve districts into which the principality was then divided sent a member, met annually at Belgrade to regulate the finances and internal affairs of the country; and though the freedom of their deliberations was impeded by the presence of the wayvodes or military governors, at the head of their armed retainers, whom even the authority of Kara George was unable to coerce, the success of their efforts to establish schools and promote the interests of civilization, indicated a degree of enlightened policy little to have been expected from a people but half emancipated from Turkish bondage. Kara George, meanwhile, who had received from the Emperor Alexander the rank of lieutenant-general, did good service to his Russian allies; and though signally defeated in an invasion of Bosnia, repulsed with triumphant success every attempt of the Turks to enter Servia. But his energies were paralysed by the disaffection of the subordinate chiefs; and when Russia, pressed by the advance of Napoleon, concluded in 1812 the peace of Bukarest, there was only a nugatory stipulation, in the eighth clause of the treaty, that the internal administration should be left with the Servians, "as to the subjects of the Sublime Porte in the islands of the Archipelago;" the fortresses to remain in the hands of the Turks. But no sooner was the Porte relieved from the presence of the enemy, than an overwhelming force was poured into Servia; and Kara George, unable to resist, fled into Hungary, and afterwards took refuge in Russia.

The character of this remarkable man is well portrayed in a despatch, quoted by Mr Paton, of the afterwards well-known Diebitsch, who was the confidential agent of Russia in Servia, in 1810-11: – "His countenance shows a greatness of mind not to be mistaken; and when we consider times and circumstances, and his want of education, we must admit that his mind is of a masculine and commanding order. The imputation of cruelty appears to be unjust. When the country was without the shadow of a constitution, and when he commanded an unorganized and uncultivated nation, he was compelled to be severe; he dared not relax his discipline; but now that there are courts of law and legal forms, he hands every thing over to the tribunals. He has very little to say for himself, and is rude in his manners; but his judgments in civil affairs are promptly and soundly formed, and to great talents he joins unwearied industry. As a soldier, there is but one opinion of his talents, bravery, and enduring firmness." The portrait prefixed to the present volume, from a painting in the possession of the reigning Prince, the duplicate of one executed for the Emperor Alexander, bears out the character thus given of the Servian hero: – "The countenance expressed not only intelligence, but a certain refinement, which one would scarcely expect in a warrior peasant; but all his contemporaries agree in representing him to have possessed an inherent superiority and nobility of nature, which, in any station, would have raised him above his equals."

At this juncture, when Servia lay at the mercy of the Turks, Milosh Obrenovich appeared on the scene. He had originally been a swineherd, and afterwards an officer of Kara George; but he now sided with the Turks, to whom he rendered efficient aid in cutting off the other popular leaders who still continued in arms. But the execution of Slavatz, and other chiefs who had also made their submission, by order of Soliman Pasha of Belgrade, showed him that his own fate was only deferred; and, escaping into his native district of Rudnik, he once more raised the standard of freedom. The peasantry rose en masse, and the campaign was generally to the advantage of Milosh, who displayed great bravery and military skill; but Soliman Pasha was at length recalled, and an accommodation effected, by which Milosh became hospodar, under the suzerainté of the Sultan, Belgrade and a few fortresses only remaining in the hands of the Turks. As the resident Turkish population had almost wholly disappeared during the war, Milosh was now absolute master of the country, and was delivered from all fears of a rival, by the death of Kara George, who, in 1817, misled by false representations, had returned from Petersburg to Servia; but was betrayed by Milosh, and put to death by the Turks.6 Though unable to read or write, his rule was marked by ability and vigour. He repressed robberies and offences against property with merciless severity, frequently causing malefactors to be hung to the next tree, without form of trial; – and improved the internal communications by the formation of an excellent road through the forests, from the Turkish frontier at Nissa to Belgrade. In his political relations with Russia and the Porte, he steered a middle course with consummate dexterity, constantly maintaining a good understanding with the cabinet of St Petersburg; while, in 1830, he succeeded in obtaining from the Sultan a firman, by which the dignity of prince was declared hereditary in his family; and it was further provided, that such Turks as still retained land in Servia should dispose of their estates within a limited period, and quit the province. Another firman, in 1833, released the Servians from the payment of kharaj (the capitation tax paid by rayahs) and all other dues and imposts, in consideration of an annual tribute of 2,300,000 piastres (£23,000) to be paid to the Porte; the right of levying taxes was conceded to the Servian government, and all fortresses erected by the Turks, since the commencement of the war in 1804, were to be rased.7 These concessions, which rendered the dependence of Servia on the Porte little more than nominal, were doubtless granted through the secret influence of Russia, whose obvious interest it was to weaken the connexion between her destined prey and its titular suzerain; but the despotic power thus placed in the hands of Milosh, was exercised with a degree of arrogance and contempt of vested rights, which soon rendered him highly unpopular. No carriage but his was allowed to appear in the streets of Belgrade; and, while all political rights were withheld from the people, he amassed immense wealth by arbitrary confiscations, by levying heavy taxes and import duties, and by establishing oppressive monopolies of articles of necessary consumption, particularly salt, veins of which, discovered by Baron Herder near the Kopaunik mountain, he forbade to be worked under severe penalties, in order to keep in his own hands the importation from Walachia. The discontent of the national party, headed by the primates (as they are called) of the municipalities, at length broke out into flame – fomented (as it was then believed) by Russia, who was jealous of the influence acquired over Milosh by Colonel Hodges, appointed in 1836 consul-general for England, and with whom he was on the point of concluding a commercial treaty. A hatti-shereef at this juncture (December 1838) arrived from the Porte, obtained (as it is said) through the advice of Colonel Hodges, and containing a form of constitution for Servia, regulating the legal tribunals, the functions of the ministry, &c., and ordaining the formation of a legislative council of seventeen members, as a check on the despotism of the Prince. But the crisis had already arrived. The senate took the initiative, by charging Milosh with embezzlement of the public property, and calling him to account; and, after a vain attempt to make a stand against the popular indignation, he fled with his treasures into Hungary. An attempt to recover his power having proved ineffectual, he at length abdicated in favour of his son, Milan; who, dying soon after, was succeeded by his brother, Michael, under the guardianship of his mother, Liubitza. But the same system still continued; and all efforts to procure any redress of grievances proving fruitless, a general outbreak took place in September 1842, the prime movers in which were Wucicz and Petronevich, who for several years had been the recognised heads of the popular party. As it was found that the few troops round the Prince were not to be depended upon, he quitted Belgrade, accompanied by his mother and the French and English consuls, and repaired to Semlin; and after some fruitless negotiation, the sovereignty was declared vacant by the representatives of the nation, with the concurrence of the Turkish governor, Kiamil Pasha.

As it was well known that the Obrenovich family had been for some time in bad odour at Petersburg, this movement was at first universally attributed to Russian influence; but it soon became apparent that its only motive was the spontaneous assertion by the Servians of the rights and liberties withheld from them; and the steps for a fresh election, in pursuance of the provisions of the hatti-shereefs were taken with perfect order and unanimity. A firman was issued by the Sultan, in right of his suzerainté; and the unanimous and enthusiastic choice of the nation fell on Alexander, son of the well-remembered Kara George, who was forthwith inaugurated in the cathedral of Belgrade, by the Archbishop, and received from the Porte the berat or patent, necessary for his confirmation in his new dignity. His accession was officially notified by the Ottoman ministers, to the Russian envoy at Constantinople but this evidence of good understanding and unity of interest between the Porte and her vassal, was a formidable and unexpected obstacle to the sinister designs of Russia which was to be counteracted at all hazards; and the course adopted for this purpose, unparalleled perhaps in the annals of diplomacy, cannot be better understood than from the able and lucid statement of Lord Beaumont in his place in parliament, on the 5th of May following. [It must first be well remembered that neither in the treaty of Bukarest, nor in any subsequent convention, was a shadow of a right of veto, or interference in any way in the election of a prince of Servia, conveyed to Russia, (as in the joint nomination with the Porte of the hospodars of the Trans-Danubian principalities,) and the only ground on which such interference could rest, was that enunciated by Baron Lieven, with somewhat remarkable frankness in a Russ diplomatist, to Mr Paton, that "Servia owed her political existence solely to Russia, which gave the latter a moral right of intervention over and above the stipulations of treaties, to which no other power could pretend" – a statement false both in fact and inference, since it was by their own good swords, unaided by Russia or any other European power with either men or money,8 that the Servians won their freedom; and the nugatory stipulation in the treaty of Bukarest, had been all along left a dead letter.] "Russia, neglecting all international law, sent an agent of her own into Servia, to investigate the internal proceedings of an independent state, and, on receiving his report, directed that agent to state his complaints, without consulting any other power, to the Divan. Now, he would venture to say, that a greater or more direct insult than this, was never offered to an independent state, and he could not conceive any act that could be a more gross and positive violation of the treaties of Bukarest, Akerman, and Adrianople, under which alone she could set up a right to be informed of what passed in Servia. Though Georgevich was elected by the people, according to the constitution of the province, and though the validity of his election was acknowledged by the Divan, and confirmed by the Porte, Russia demanded that the election should be set aside; and this demand was made by that power in such an overbearing manner, as to show to the world that Turkey was under the control of Russia, and must act in conformity with the dictates of the Czar."

In this extremity, the Porte appealed for support to Great Britain and Austria, two of the powers who were parties to the quintuple treaty signed at London, July 15, 1840, for the express object of ensuring the integrity and independence of the Ottoman Empire; and the appeal was backed by strong representations from Sir Stratford Canning, the British ambassador at Constantinople, to his home government. But the British government was (as Lord Palmerston observed, with much sarcastic truth, in the House of Commons on August 15) "in the same condition in which they had too often of late been found in foreign affairs, without any opinion of their own on the subject, (hear;) and determined to act with Austria, thereby risking the sacrifice of our own interests for a remote Austrian interest in which we had no concern. Austria at first determined to support Servia; but there came an urgent appeal from Russia; and Austria recommended Servia to yield." The nature of this "urgent appeal" will be well understood by those who are aware of the morbid fear entertained by Austria of Russian extension among the Slavic populations in Hungary; and of which Russia availing herself, (as remarked by Mr Paget,) "by exerting the influence which similarity of language, and, in some parts, of religion, gives her over them, has hitherto frightened Austria into doing almost any thing she likes." "The Sultan" (continued Lord Palmerston) "was now forced to submit. He annulled the election of Prince Georgevich; he consented to a popular election; he recalled the two popular leaders, Wucicz and Petronevich, to Constantinople; and even appointed a Russian general, Baron Lieven, his commissioner, in conjunction with a Turkish officer, to go into Servia to see his orders carried into execution."

So far Lord Palmerston; and the accuracy of the information possessed by the British Cabinet to combat these strong facts, may be estimated, from Sir Robert Peel's calling Prince Alexander, a man of thirty-five, and the worthy inheritor of his father's great qualities, "an infatuated youth" – on the authority (it is said) of a letter from Mr Fonblanque! But we must return from the English debates to the progress of the drama in Servia, where the commissioners found the Servians, in defiance of the great powers, and in spite of the hopelessness of aid from Constantinople, preparing for national resistance. The Prince refused to abdicate, alleging that the firman by which he had been appointed had never been revoked, and that universal anarchy would result from his resigning the reins of government, since no kaimakams, or regents pro tempore, had been named by the Porte – an omission which is supposed not to have been altogether unintentional; and the whole nation rose in commotion at the bare mention of the recall of Wucicz and Petronevich; the crowd exclaiming, when Wucicz told them that 'the Servian forests would not be less green were two old trees cut down, "No! a thousand times no!" and rushing with arms in their hands to the presence of Hafiz-Pasha, (who had been appointed on Kiamil's recall on the mandate of Russia for his share in the revolution,) announced their determination to maintain their prince and his counsellors; to which Hafiz assented, no doubt, with secret gratification. While the proceedings were thus stayed by the unexpected resolution shown by the Servians, Russian emissaries were traversing the country in all directions, striving in vain to stir up a revolt in favour of the Obrenovich family, whose former partisans, it was found, were now their strongest opponents; and inciting the Christians in Bosnia and Bulgaria to rise against the Moslems, by the hope of obtaining independent governments under hospodars of their own, like the other principalities. On the other hand, the Servian population was ready to rise en masse in defence of its liberties, and was further cheered by the report that thirty thousand of the Slavic races under Austrian dominion were ready to join them in the struggle for national freedom; while the Porte, roused to unexpected energy by the accumulation of wrong heaped upon it, reinforced the garrison of Belgrade with three thousand fresh troops, and formed encampments to the amount of near one hundred thousand men at Constantinople and Adrianople, for the ostensible purpose of overawing the spirit of revolt among the Bulgarians. The National Assembly, which had in the mean time met at Belgrade, declared the election of Prince Alexander legal and valid, and refused to abrogate it; and as the agents of Russia found that their original object could only be effected by an invasion, an act which (even had the season left time to march an army to the Danube) might have exceeded even the long-suffering of the other powers who were parties to the treaty of 1840, it was resolved, for the sake of appearances, to repair the false step as far as possible by a show of moderation. It was accordingly announced that the principal objections of Russia to the late election arose from the informality with which the proceedings had been conducted; that Prince Alexander would be admitted as a candidate, (a concession very distasteful to Austria, who apprehended that the talent and popularity of the prince might attract her own Slavic subjects under his rule;) and that the late prince, Michael, should be excluded from competition. This could only lead to one result; and Alexander, having pro formâ resigned his authority, a hatti-shereef was sent from the Porte, and he was again elected with even greater enthusiasm than before.