was considerably stronger on the part of the dignitaries in Macedonia than of those in Constantinople, the former fully realizing that their acknowledgment of the commission meant an end to their robbery for all time. They wisely and very cleverly appealed to the Sultan's pride. and honor, and convinced him that the loss of the financial control of Macedonia meant the first step to the loss of the entire province, as had been proven in the case of eastern Rou melia. They stated that Macedonia constituted the pearl of his empire, and that its loss was equivalent to the end of Turkish rule in Europe.

In order to prove their absolute unity on this question, the six powers decided to take an unusual step. The six ambassadors in Constantinople had requested a joint audience, in the course of which they desired clearly to state the ideas of their sovereigns, and particularly to prove the entirely friendly purposes toward Turkey on which their propositions were based. The Sultan replied to this unusual step by taking one even more exceptional. He simply refused to receive the ambassadors. In this manner a situation had suddenly been created which made a purely diplomatic settlement quite impossible. The necessity for immediate action brought about the decision to enter upon a joint naval demonstration of all the powers concerned, which should primarily result in the seizure of certain custom-houses, and in its eventual course in a blockade of the Turkish coast. Merely the passing of this resolution, one had every reason to suppose, would prove to the Sultan the uselessness of further resistance.

The Padishah, however, remained immovably. obstinate. The motives prompting his resistance are not difficult to surmise. The events in Russia could naturally not remain unnoticed in Constantinople. The military humiliation of that empire on land and on water perchance betokened to the Sublime Porte that Russia was no longer a dangerous opponent even for Turkey. That Austria-Hungary was loath to enter upon any military action at that time was also well known. Moreover, the Sultan felt perfectly secure in the possession of the frequently emphasized friendship of Germany, in fact, felt encouraged thereby to continue his resistance. When it finally became known that Germany did not intend to participate in the joint naval demonstration, this was interpreted as a direct summons to stand firm and unyielding. This, however, was a fatal error. I believe that my information regarding Germany's attitude in this matter is as reliable as it is authentic. That the entire incident was unwelcome to Ger

many is certain. The personal sympathy of

William II. for the Sultan, as well as the special commercial position which Germany secured for herself during the past ten years in European and Asiatic Turkey, would naturally influence his course of action. In the question of Macedonian finance reform, however, he is in complete accord with the other great powers. This is proved by the fact that his commissioner is jointly at work with the others. Moreover, the German Government has defined its point of view in an official notice in the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, as follows:

The attitude of the Turkish Government in the question of the Macedonian financial control will call forth the sincerest regret. The refusal to grant the desired joint audience sought by the ambassadors of the nations concerned, purposing a last appeal to the wisdom of the Sultan, has unfortunately proved that influences have gained prevalence at the Golden Horn which have turned a deaf ear to sane and pertinent judgment of the situation. The course of events up to the present time should have aroused the conviction that there can remain no doubt as to the unity in the purpose of the powers to carry out this feature of the Muerzsteg programme.

Moreover, the German ambassador in Constantinople, Freiherr von Marschall, again emphasized in a special audience accorded to him by the Sultan, whose particular favor he enjoys, the advisability of granting the desired concessions, stating that Germany shared, without reserve, the opinion of the other powers as to the necessity of the reforms in question. The failure to participate in the naval demonstration is attributable solely to practical considerations, inasmuch as there was no German man-of-war in the Mediterranean at the time, and, in the limited time for action, its dispatch would not have proved feasible.

Be this as it may, the Porte remained unrelenting even when the sailing orders had been issued to the united fleet, the chief command of which had been unanimously intrusted to the Austrian admiral, Ripper. The purpose of this action was to acknowledge the particular interests of Austria-Hungary in the Balkan peninsula, as well as to emphasize the more important fact that the monarchy demanded the execution of the Muerzsteg programme irrespective of any selfish interests whatsoever, merely purposing the preservation of the Sultan's sovereign rights.

The international fleet had already assembled in the Piræus when the Sublime Porte finally deigned to send a reply to the powers, and again a purely negative one. The attitude taken by the Turkish authorities was substantially this:

They held the commission of finance to be in direct opposition to the sovereign rights of the Sultan, and claimed that it would result in a loss of his prestige and would debase him in the eyes of his subjects. Refer

ence is also made to the Muerzsteg programme, which insured complete independence and integrity to Turkey. The appointment of the delegation of finance, however, was in complete contravention of this agreement. Finally, should the ambassadors persist in carrying out their purpose of bringing greater pressure to bear, the Porte declined to assume any responsibility for all events which might result, as well as for the consequences of the discontent in Ottoman public opinion following upon the infringement on the rights of the empire.

This unveiled threat of revolt and massacre of Christians was about the most unwise decision at which the council in Constantinople could have arrived. It is a matter of common knowledge that not only is the expression of popular opinion in Turkey not tolerated, but it is cruelly suppressed. The breaking out of hostilities, which, of course, did not occur, could therefore have resulted only at the direct instigation of the Turkish Government.

The most important feature of this message was an appeal to the signatories of the treaty of Berlin with particular reference to the fact that Turkey had conscientiously performed all the obligations which it imposed, whereas as much could not be said of the other high contracting parties. As it may be of importance, in consid ering the future development of events in Turkey and in the Balkans, to test the justification of this accusation, a short summary of the arti eles in question in the treaty of Berlin may not be out of place. Beyond a doubt it must be acknowledged that partially, at least, the reproaches of Turkey are based upon fact. Articles XIII. to XXII. of the treaty of Berlin contain a guarantee for the establishment of the sovereign province of East Roumelia, subject to the military authority of the Sultan and independent of Bulgaria. This guarantee was annulled by the revolt of Philippopolis in 1885 and the ensuing union of East Roumelia and Bulgaria. Similarly all the guarantees failed of performance by which Bulgaria was obligated to pay tribute to Turkey, Servia, Montenegro, and, furthermore, to assume a portion of the Turkish national debt.—all of which resulted in the loss of great financial advantages to Turkey.

On the other hand, it cannot be said that Turkey more conscientiously performed the obligations resting upon her. The duties with regard Crete which she assumed in Article XXIII. remained unperformed until enforced by the powers after the war with Greece. Further more, by reason of the same paragraph, special provision was to have been made for all European possessions, and this by means of special commissions. with the assistance of the native element. Had this actually been carried out,

the Macedonian question would no longer exist, and Turkey would have been spared this last humiliation. Finally, bearing in mind the contents of Article LXI., which minutely speci. fies the reforms for the Armenian provinces, and on the other hand remembering the outrages which the Porte visited upon these same Armenians, thereby losing the sympathies of all civilized nations, her present reference to her conscientious performance of treaties must be stigmatized as quite as unfortunate as her threats of new massacres. The international fleet went to sea and occupied the customhouses of Mytilene and Tenedos. In the interim, to be sure, there were days of inaction, by reason of the fact that the powers had agreed to continue to treat the Sultan with the utmost consideration. To be perfectly frank, it must be admitted that the powers were in dread of the moment which would necessitate the decision for a determined step, a step which neces sarily exceeded the conception of a peaceable blockade. The opposition of Turkey had developed to such an extent that the military honor of six powers appeared to be involved.

Once more the Padishah resorted to the wellknown artifices. He declared his approval of the "finance control," provided it was exercised only by Austria Hungary and Russia, a propo sition promptly declined by the latter powers.

Eventually an agreement was reached,―obstreperous Turkey had to bow entirely. To pass judgment on the real importance of these concessions would be useless. A common-sense view can but approve of them. The Macedonians will now attain their rights. Had any one of the powers actually intended to carry out the destruction of the Ottoman Empire at the present time, more energetic measures would have been adopted.

As it is, the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire is taking a most unusual course. Paradox.. ical as it may sound, Turkey will be ruined by reforms which are being forced upon her by degrees. These reforms cannot be obstructed, as they will progress automatically, one from the other. The incidents of the last few weeks are surely not the last of their kind. The Armenians will follow the Macedonians. On the present occasion the various small powers of the Balkans were given to understand in a trite communication that the antagonistic attitude toward Turkey was not to be deemed an encouragement to them. It may be stated, however, that the future of Turkey will not be decided in Constantinople, but will be dependent upon the outcome of the present chaotic conditions in Russia,

CAP

APTAIN ROALD AMUNDSEN and his seven comrades have made the Northwest Passage in one of the smallest vessels that ever undertook exploration in the archipelago north of us. The sloop Gjöa, of forty-seven tons, with little spread of sail and weak motive power,— for she is driven by a small petroleum engine, has accomplished a task that the big, strong ships sent out by England failed to achieve. It is a curious fact that two of the smallest vessels sent into those waters have done some of the most memorable work. A Norwegian single-stick vessel is the first to make the Northwest Passage, and it was the steam yacht Fox that carried to Europe the first definite information of the fate of the Franklin expedition.

Our map shows the great islands and some of the myriad small ones that England added to the charts of the Arctic Ocean north of us between 1818 and 1859. It shows by a black line the tortuous route of the Gjöa. She entered Lancaster Sound from Baffin Bay in the summer of 1903. She threaded her way up this noble channel, which, though sometimes choked with ice, is one of the finest of arctic waterways when it is open. This is the route that Parry took in 1819 when he pushed his way to Melville Island, almost on the western verge of the great archipelago, a voyage of education as well as of brilliant discovery, for not one of the sailors on his two ships could read or write when they left home and all of them had mastered these accomplishments when they returned.

The map shows that when Amundsen reached Peel Sound he turned southward through that sound and Franklin Strait. Here he reached the field of the scientific research for which he had gone to the Arctic. He remained for many months to relocate the position of the north magnetic pole if he found that it had changed its place since James C. Ross located it on the west coast of Boothia in 1831. His mission also included a magnetic survey of the entire region around the magnetic pole. His camp was on King William Land, in a harbor where the Gjöa was perfectly protected from ice pressure.

Amundsen has made this survey, and his magnetic work covers an important area. It includes the west coast of Boothia, with the adjoining waters, and extends as far south as King William Land and as far west as Victoria Land, where

two or three of his men were at work a few months before he started on the journey westward.

He accumulated a large amount of data relating to the behavior in those regions of magnetic variation, inclination, and intensity, the three elements of terrestrial magnetism; but as yet he has spoken only in general terms, and therefore his work in this field cannot be profitably discussed at this time. He sent his results to Nansen in a soldered metal tube, and the conclusions to be deduced from his extensive observations are not likely to be announced for some time to come. He is reported to have relocated the north magnetic pole in King William Land, but in the absence of a definite statement our map indicates the pole where Ross fixed it.

The magnetic work completed, the Gjöa hoisted anchor and steamed down Victoria Strait till she came almost or quite within sight of the American mainland; and here Amundsen saw the long, narrow channels leading westward between the islands and the mainland, and he knew that this was the Northwest Passage, the only feasible route for a vessel to pass to the north of our continent between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

Amundsen knew this because he had studied all the history of exploration among these islands. He knew what explorers on the American coast and in small boats in these narrow waterways had revealed. He said before he left home that he was coming back, if he could push his way, through the Northwest Passage that the Franklin expedition had discovered.

This was the pathos in the fate that overtook the Franklin party. It was sent from England to find the Northwest Passage; and as the poor fellows staggered to the southern islands and the mainland, dropping in their tracks from weakness and starvation, they knew that they had found it. They had traced the only way that a ship might travel from the Atlantic to reach this open summer highway. They knew that Dease and Simpson, and their lamented commander, too, who had died before them, had traveled overland to this north coast, had seen these channels for hundreds of miles, and had floated on their waters. If only the narrow stretch of ice that kept their two ships from the coastal waters might have been broken through before

their food-supplies were exhausted, the Erebus and the Terror would have passed over the road that the Gjöa has traveled, and the Franklin party would have been acclaimed, some fiftyeight years ago, as the discoverers of the Northwest Passage. The world gives them the credit now, but it was many years after the last man had perished before it was known what they had done.

This Northwest Passage may be briefly explained. The long coasts of the mainland are not clogged, like many other polar shores, with icebergs or glaciers or thick sea ice. The coast is low, the tundra behind it is only a little higher than the sea, and conditions are not favorable for the formation and flow of glaciers. Icebergs, therefore, are not found, because in the Arctic they are merely the broken-off ends of glaciers.

But from thirty to forty miles north of Point Barrow, the most northern point of the continent, stretches the great barrier of sea ice, with hummocks and ridges thrust, by pressure, from twenty to fifty feet above the general level, so that when McClure's Investigator got into the heavy floe the ice sometimes rose around her as high as the yardarms. As no islands intervene for hundreds of miles east of Bering Strait to protect the coast from the polar pack, why is it that this heavy ice is not forced down upon the 'shores?

It is because the coastal waters are comparatively shallow and the sea ice grounds miles away and farther east the coasts of the mainland are protected from the sea ice, not only by shallow water, but also by the islands that extend almost continuously from Banks Land to the Atlantic end of Hudson Strait.

So the ice along the coast is of the winter's formation, and in summer it disappears entirely or is so narrowed by melting as to leave channels of greater or less width that are navigable for two or three months. The fact is, as Lieutenant Wheeler, of our revenue cutter service, recently said, this Northwest Passage has been made time and time again by the overlapping of the tracks of vessels between the Atlantic and the Pacific. San Francisco whalers have already pushed far eastward beyond the Mackenzie delta and the mouth of the Coppermine River. Collinson, during the Franklin search, took his vessel castward through these channels almost to the very waters from which the Gjöa started last summer, and a short sledge journey farther east brought him within sight of King William Land, but he little dreamed that the bodies of many of the men he was seeking were scattered along its shores.

In time this route may be of some importance. Mineral resources have been found along the northern edge of Canada, and some day they will be developed.. This water route is by no means ideal, but, to some extent, it will facilitate the operations of miners and whalers.

Nine years ago. Lieutenant Jarvis, of the revenue cutter service, worked out the details of a plan for making the very journey that Amundsen has nearly completed, but in the opposite direction. His ambitious scheme was to start from Herschel Island, skirt the coast to King William Land, and then up through the channels to Baffin Bay and Disco, Greenland. Thence he proposed to cross the Atlantic to North Cape and make the Northeast Passage which Nordenskjöld accomplished in the Vega in 1878-79. Many of our revenue and naval officers volunteered for the expedition. But at that time only one of our revenue cutters was fit for ice work, and as she could not be spared for two or more seasons, the plan has not been carried out.

Our map shows the position of Herschel Island, west of the Mackenzie delta, where Amundsen began his sledge journey southward to Eagle, one of our Alaska mining towns. At Kay Point, near Herschel Island, the Gjöa is in safe winter quarters. She is now in well-known waters visited by whalers every season, and as soon as navigation opens next summer the little vessel will be able, in a few days, to reach the Pacific.

The broken line on the map from Bering Strait to Baffin Bay shows another Northwest Passage which was made by the British explorer McClure in 1850-53, a wonderful journey that secured for him and his men the prize of fifty thousand dollars offered by their government to the first crew that should make the long-sought passage. We see the route following the coast channels along Alaska as far east as Franklin Bay, where it turns north to Banks Land, on whose northeastern shores McClure's ship, the Investigator, was fast in the ice for two years and was finally abandoned. The journey was then continued, chiefly by sledge, but partly by ship, to Baffin Bay, at the mouth of Lancaster

Sound.

The crew, amid terrible difficulties and suffering, had made the Northwest Passage. But not as Amundsen's handful of men have made it, through navigable waters and with only one ship. McClure's achievement was hailed as a great discovery, but the world heard later of the more feasible route which the Franklin expedition had proved to be attainable from the Atlantic Ocean.