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in alone to confer with the Committee and receive his instructions.

So soon as Niazi had read this letter he collected his men and made a forced march throughout the night, for all were eager to learn the nature of the duty which they were to be called upon to perform. Before dawn-July 20-the outskirts of Ochrida were reached, and Niazi, leaving his band, entered the town and went to the house of his brother, where the members of the Committee came to meet him. It was then explained to him that he and Eyoub Bey were to collect two thousand men from Ochrida and Resna, form them into two bands, and march on Monastir without delay. The detailed instructions as to what he was to do would be delivered to him before he reached that town.

As Niazi learnt later, the Committee of Union and Progress had decided that the time had arrived for it to make its great coup. The plan was simultaneously to proclaim the Constitution at Monastir and send an ultimatum to the Sultan, who would have to choose between constitutional government, abdication, and a bloody civil war. In the first place it was necessary for the Committee to secure the possession of Monastir, the headquarters of the Government's military strength in Macedonia, where General Osman Pasha, an able man who exercised a greater moral influence over his troops than did his

predecessor, Shemshi Pasha, was still in command. The bulk of the troops in Monastir were adherents of the Committee, but there were also many ready to obey the orders of the General. It was realised that if Osman Pasha could be got out of the way the supporters of the Government would be demoralised, and the Committee might then be able to establish its authority without bloodshed. The killing of each other by Turkey's Moslem soldiers was a calamity to be avoided. It was therefore decided to entrust to Niazi and Eyoub Beys the special duty of removing Osman Pasha from Monastir as suddenly and quietly as possible, so as to allow no time for the organisation of opposition.

To collect the necessary two thousand men was no difficult matter. In the first place it was decided to employ the very troops who had been the first to pursue Niazi and his band after the raising of the standard of revolt at Resna. This was a

battalion of redifs of the Ochrida district which had been disbanded after its fruitless chase of the revolutionary leader, because the authorities rightly suspected that most of the men were adherents of the Committee of Union and Progress. So messengers were sent to the neighbouring villages to summon these disbanded soldiers who had not yet given up their arms to the Government-to assemble at an appointed place outside Ochrida. Niazi with his band

marched into his own country to collect the men of Resna, Persepe and Labcha. Throughout the night of the 20th and throughout the following day he traversed the mountainous countryside, his band being ever increased by the accession of fresh volunteers who came to him generally in threes and fours, but occasionally in bodies of from forty to fifty men. Whenever the band passed through a village it was received with extraordinary enthusiasm, and the villagers brought presents of bread and cheese until each

was provided with two days' rations, the supply which Niazi deemed to be necessary.

In the morning of July 21 Eyoub Effendi, with his Ochrida band of disbanded redifs and others, a thousand men in all, joined Niazi's band at Labcha, and now the column formed by the two united bands set off in the direction of Monastir. After dark, as they were approaching their appointed night's halting place, an incident occurred which is interesting as illustrating the manners and customs of the wild Albanian hillmen. The stillness of the night was suddenly broken by the sound of rifle-fire on the mountainside above the road; so Niazi sent out scouts to ascertain what was happening. It turned out that the Faragas and the Quapris, between which two tribes there had existed for ages a deadly blood feud, had each sent a band of about one hundred men to join Eyoub Bey's battalion; these two

bands met in the mountain, and what happened may be best described in Niazi's own words : "It was indeed a sight worth witnessing-this meeting of the men of these two tribes, between whom there had been so intense an enmity; but who were now united, as with one heart, ready to die together for the sake of the same ideal. These tribesmen, who for two centuries had hated to see each other's faces or to hear each other's voices, and who had ever pursued each other with rifle shots, had now, on meeting on the hillside saluted each other with rifle-shots, and were eager, standing together as comrades, to use rifle-shots against the traitors and enemies of the fatherland."

The column passed the night in the village of Gauchar, where many volunteers from the surrounding country joined the battalions of Niazi and Eyoub, bringing the force up to the strength of over two thousand men. The people gathered from the countryside to crowd the village streets throughout the night to honour and entertain the fedais with simple refreshments. All these people were prepared to risk everything in the civil war, the immediate outbreak of which they considered as inevitable.

On the following morning, July 22, the column marched under a blazing sun by the steep zigzag tracks that cross the precipitous ranges of Mount Pelista. At ten o'clock a halt was made, and the

"National Battalion of Ochrida" under Eyoub Bey, and the "National Battalion of Resna under Niazi Bey, were arranged in their roll-call order. There were twenty companies or bands in all, under twenty commanders, who included among them one lieutenant-colonel, several majors and captains, one doctor of medicine, and leading Beys of the Macedonian and Albanian land-owning class. Up to that moment these National troops had not been informed of their destination or of the object of the expedition. So now, while Eyoub enlightened his battalion, Niazi addressed the men of his own command. He explained how, in order to serve the beneficent Committee which was working for the salvation of the country, the men of his band had cheerfully given up comfort, and their wives and families, and had been ready to sacrifice their lives. "" 'But now," he said, "these hardships and troubles will soon be a thing of the past, and they have achieved their purpose well. Relying upon the success which God gives and the inspiration of the Prophet, we are now on our way to the headquarters of the Villayet of Monastir to carry into execution a most important command of the Committee. Within a few hours, if we are successful, we shall have delivered our country from its afflictions. Without hurting a hair of his head we shall take the Mushir (Field Marshal) Osman Pasha from his residence so as to prevent him from carrying into effect the

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