106      EGYPT,    CYPRUS,    AND   ASIATIC  TURKEY.
Such  is  the  unhappy  condition  of  the  people
of  Asiatic  Turkey, — Mussulmans  as  well  as
Christians — the  whole  administration,  in  fact,
being  so  arranged  that  the  entire  agricultural
population  is  a  prey  to  the  usurer,  the  tax-farmer,
and  the  Turkish  officials.  Thus  it  will  be  seen
how  difficult  is  the  task  undertaken  by  our
Government.  No  reforms  are  possible,  if  their
execution  be  left  exclusively  in  the  hands  of  the
Turks;  and  without  the  direct  supervision  of
British  administrators,  all  attempts  at  reform
will  prove  futile.  To  create  order  out  of  this
chaos,  to  establish  the  reign  of  justice  where
hitherto  it  has  not  existed,  to  give  liberty —
civil  and  religious— to  a  down-trodden  people,
is  a  noble  ambition ;  but  it  will  be  a  Hercu-
lean labour.  The  British  statesman,  however,
who  succeeds  in  its  accomplishment,  will  earn
the  gratitude  of  millions  of  human  beings,  and
make  for  himseK  a  name  in  history  that  will
last  as  long  as  the  Pyramids.
CHAPTER  XI.
RESOURCES   OF   ASIATIC   TURKEY.
