ignorant Parliamentary electors, who maintained that under the Constitution no taxes could be demanded of them) it may be impolitic to make any increase in the direct taxation of the country. The people, however, should be compelled to pay such direct taxes as are now in force until some better system has been devised, and the persons— and they are numerous-who by exercise of undue influence or otherwise have succeeded in avoiding the payment of their taxes should be forced to contribute like the others.

It is held, however, that whereas the direct taxes should be left as they are, reforms being made in the method of collection, several new sources of revenue could be tapped in the way of indirect taxation. In the first place, all the existing methods of raising indirect taxation should be maintained in their integrity, while the revenue derived from them should be largely increased by administrative reforms. For example, it has been calculated that the reorganisation of the Turkish Customs under the advice of the English expert, Mr. Crawford, will increase the revenue derived from the Customs by twenty-five per cent. Thinking men in Turkey recommend, not only the maintenance of the existing Customs tariff and other methods of indirect taxation, but also the imposition of still heavier taxation of this description until Turkey has been extricated from her present financial difficulties; and they also

favour the creation of several new monopolies, to be preceded, naturally, by an amelioration in the conditions of the existing tobacco, salt, and other monopolies.

The very mention of monopolies is shocking to most economists, but political economy is not an exact science, and there are many exceptions even to the most widely accepted of its rules. Turkey must have money. The foreign capital necessary to develop her resources hesitates to come in, waiting to see its security. A monopoly affords that security and tempts capital as nothing else will. The English business men to whom I spoke in Turkey regarded the granting of monopolies for comparatively short terms as expedient under the present conditions in Turkey; for not only does this fostering of large industries provide employment for many people, but-what is of the utmost importance to Turkey at the present moment-it will also bring to the Turkish Government, without any expenditure on its part, an immediate and considerable revenue.

As the time for the Parliamentary elections drew near the Committee of Union and Progress published its political programme, and to this all candidates who were nominees of the Committee were bound to adhere. The following were among the more important of the Committee's demands: -that the Cabinet should be responsible to the Chamber of Deputies; that Turkish should

remain the official language of the Empire; that the different races should have equal rights; that non-Moslems should be liable to military service; that the term of military service should be reduced; that peasants who had no land should be assisted to procure land, but not at the expense of the present landowners; that education should be free and compulsory.

It was deeply interesting to be in Turkey during the elections, to watch the Young Turks zealously conducting their campaign to serve what they considered to be their country's interests, and the people themselves puzzling out the meaning of this new Western innovation, the Constitution, and balancing the arguments of rival canvassers. The representatives of the Committee of Union and Progress were prepared to discuss patiently the intentions of the party with any group of electors that came to consult them, and while promising concessions to just demands, they did not attempt to catch votes by making wild promises which could never be fulfilled. Thus, when the Armenians-who have proved their loyalty to the Constitution and have not harassed the Government with unjustifiable grievances-asked that the lands which had been taken from the Armenians by the Kurds should be returned to the rightful owners, the Committee, realising that in practical politics there must be a law of prescription even for the raider, and not

wishing to have a Kurd question added to the numerous other difficulties which were confronting Turkey, suggested that it would be wiser to leave the turbulent Kurds in possession of what they seized some time ago and to compensate the Armenians by giving them at least equally good lands in the once productive tracts which have long been lying fallow and deserted. On the other hand, the Committee could not assent to the proposal of the Arabians that the use of the Arab tongue should be permitted in the debates of the Chamber of Deputies. To Christians of all sects it promised that there would be no interference with their churches, language, education, and laws of marriage and inheritance; but refused to consider the question of complete administrative decentralisation, or of autonomy, for any portion of the Empire.

On the other hand, the agents of the reactionary party-the party of those who had fattened under the old régime of plunder and were loth to see the profitable abuses swept away-worked hard to influence the electors, but apparently with little effect in European Turkey and Asia Minor. Certain foolish agitators who were infected with some of the socialistic doctrines of Western Europe unwittingly helped the cause of the reactionaries by raising the election cry of "No more taxes for the people" and "Down with all monopolies." I have explained that the more

ignorant people thought that with the suppression of the late régime there would be an end of all authority. When they were enlightened on this matter by the Young Turks, and discovered that they would be compelled to pay their taxes as heretofore they felt some disappointment, and this afforded an opportunity to the reactionaries to point out to them that they would be no better off under the Constitution than they had been before, and that, at any rate, Turkey, under the old régime, had been a Mussulman State, whereas under the new order of things the government would be in the hands of bad Mohammedans, Christians and Jews.

In Arabia and in other parts of Asia the efforts of the friends of the old régime, as might be expected, were attended with some success. The fanatical Arabs, who have never been reconciled to the Turkish rule, were impressed by the preachings of those who in the mosques denounced the Constitution, and declared that the Turks, who had ever been indifferent Mussulmans, had now abandoned the essential doctrines of Islam and were worse than the Christians and Jews with whom they associated.

But with the other races of the Empire it was still-in those early days of liberty-harmony, fraternisation and enthusiasm; the racial and religious differences appeared to be forgotten for awhile; one read of elections in which Christians