No. 326.
Mr. Maynard to Mr. Evarts.
Constantinople, June 9, 1877. (Received July 17.)
Sir: Since the beginning of the present war between Turkey and Russia, the attitude of Hungary has been observed with some interest. In this connection certain recent occurrences deserve mention as indicatory of the sentiments of the Hungarians toward the Ottoman Government, and at the same time illustrating the force of traditionary popular gratitude.
When the cause of the Hungarian patriots failed in 1849, Kossuth and his associates, numbering several thousand, took refuge in Turkey, where they found an asylum, and were protected against the attempts of both Austria and Russia. (See Mr. Brown’s dispatch No. 5, September 1, 1849; Mr. Marsh’s No. 2, November 9, 1849; Mr. Brown’s No. 12, [Page 592] February 18,1850; Mr. Marsh’s No. 3, March 14,1850, and No. 4, March 25, 1850.) Many of them ultimately went from Turkey to America under the auspices of our government.
Last winter, during the session of the conference, a deputation of Hungarian students from the University of Pesth came to Constantinople, bearing the present of a sword to his excellency Abdul-Kerim Pasha, the serdar ekrem or generalissimo of the Ottoman forces, who had recently finished a successful campaign in Servia. They were received with great distinction by the imperial government, lodged and entertained at the public expense during their stay of some ten days, and loaded with favors on their departure. Plenipotentiaries could hot have been more enthusiastically fêted than were these young men who represented no one but themselves and their fellow-students, and nothing but the sympathies and gratitude of their countrymen.
As a sequel to this transaction, a reciprocal deputation of softas, the higher-class students of theology and law, was sent early in April to Buda-Pesth, bearing with them, by authority of the Sultan, certain of the so-called Corvinian manuscripts. The history of these literary treasures is briefly this: Corvinus, the Hungarian monarch, added to the splendor of his reign by collecting what was for that day an immense library, principally of illustrated manuscripts. When Soleiman the Magnificent overran Hungary, in 1526, he carried away from Pesth to Constantinople, with other immense booty, what the historian Jouannim calls “La belle bibliothêque de Matthias Corvin.” The proud Hungarians have again and again attempted to recover these precious relics of their period of happiest memory, but without success. During the three and a half centuries subsequent, the library would unavoidably suffer great detriment, even if preserved more carefully than it has been by the Turks. Though kept at the seraglio, in the same building with the sacred banner, the prophet’s sword, and other similar objects of Mussulman veneration, the books had no religious character, and their value in the estimation of Europeans was not appreciated. At the same time they were so withdrawn from the public eye that few non-Mussulmans ever saw them. What their present number or condition may be none but the faithful have the means of knowing.
The softa deputation carried, in all, thirty-five manuscripts, containing, besides the Holy Bible, works of Aristotle, Plutarch, Cicero, Caesar, Dante, and other great writers of antiquity. The bearers of this present, so peculiarly dear to the Hungarians, seem, from the published accounts, to have met at Buda-Pesth attentions even more distinguished than had been accorded to the student delegation in Constantinople. And on their return in the middle of May, after an absence of a month, their welcome home by their associates was almost an ovation.
Whether these sentiments exhale in manifestations of enthusiasm, or assume a more effective style, will depend very much, probably, upon the turn of events.
I have, &c.,