Those public boards and organised bodies, by which the civil concerns of other nations.are administered, are scarcely known, and the system 4 government of course takes its complexion entirely from the per sonal character of the chief Questions not of a cri minal nature, however, between subject and subject, are decided by the mullah or judge, whose jurisaie tion extends over both Turks and Christians. In the tribunals of these functionaries, bribery is almost open and avowed ; and false witnesses form some thing like a regular profession. The gainer of a suit pays the whole expellees. The Turks them selves, aware of the notorious corruption of the courts, rather submit to injustice than seek legal redress. The Greeks and Jews generally submit all differ ences amongst themselves to their patriarchs and rabbins, in the way of arbitration • and the decisions of these persons, though not in right, are, in fact, without appeal; because they are enforced by ana themes which inspire such terror that they have sometimes caused to be deserted by their wives, and fathers by their daughters. Avanies, ar vexatious prosecutions instituted against •Christians, for the purpose of compelling them to pay a sum of money as the price of abandoning the suit, are regular source of revenue to the Turkish inha bitants of towns. The police of the Turks is as rude as their judicial system. An officer accompa nied by soldiers traverses the markets in the great towns, and if he detects any person selling with false weights, the defaulter receives the bastinado for the first offence, is nailed by the ear to the door of his own shop for the second, and hanged for the third. Their attempts to correct -evils often pro duce others of much worse description. If a com plaint is made by some person of consequence, of a robbery committed, an enormous fine is levied on the district where it happened ; or, what is still worse, a party of soldiers is sent out, who, under the pretext of searching for the robbery, .oppress and plunder the peasants without mercy. An offi cer named Dervendgipacha, charged with the in spection of the roads and bridges, makes an annual tour through the country, accompanied by a party of soldieri ; but his inspection serves no other pur pose than to extract money, under the name of fines from the people, to fill his own pockets, while th; roads and bridges are utterly neglected. Indeed, all classes of public officers practise extortion, and Turks, Greeks, and Jews, are almost equally suites era. Public offices are regularly sold to the highest bidder, and those who buy them of course reim burse themselves by one means or.another. As the appointments are annual, the price is paid over again every year ; and the only method of redress which is open to a city or district that is oppressed, is to offer a greater sum for the removal of its go vernor than he gives to obtain the renewal of his office. Very often, after an age has amassed great riches, the porte allures him into some large town, by the bait of a -splendid employment, and there snips him of his wealth, and perhaps awards him bowstring. The pashas live surrounded with a degree of pomp and splendour, which contrasts strangely with the squalid wretchedness of the -people they govern. They are approached with prostration, like eastern monarchs. Their places of residence are vast buildings—forts without, and pa laces within, capable of containing a thousand or twelve hundred •men. Besides a strong body of soldiers, they are filled with an immense retinue of servants, including menials, tradesmen, and artists ; such as coffeernakers, sherbetmakers, confectioners, bathers, tailors, barbers, dwarf pages, black slaves, -buffoons, musicians, puppet-show-men, wrestlers, conjurors, dancers, an imam (or priest), and, lastly, the executioner, the pacha's confidential servant, without whom he never stirs abroad, and who is the only person privileged to sit in his presence. In addition to all this, the harem, or women's apart ments, forms a separate establishment, with its own train of servants. A pacha of Salonica, not pecu liarly profuse in his habits, has been known to ex pend L. 24,000 per annum on his domestic establish •nent. The mousselims, agas, and bays, support the • same state in proportion to their circumstances. Wars are as common among •these petty rulers as among the old feudal barons, and as destruc tive in their effects. The porte, by a miserable policy, foments their quarrels, to weaken them individually, and increase their dependance on itself. The people, ruined by exactions; or the -ravages of the military, abandon their homes, and Ay to the mountains and forests, where they com mence robbers. In some places the rural inhabit -ants live in 'houses which are built like small forts -with draw bridges and battlements. •In addition to all the evils common to them with the Turks, the -Greeks have many peculiar to themselves. They are made to feel their degradation by the most opprobri ous distinctions. They are marked out by a pecu liar costume ; and are not allowed to weancertain articles of dress,—or clothes or slippers of a light colour ; or to paint their houses of those colours which the Turks use. It is death -for a Greek to marry a Turkish woman, or to strike a Mahometan even in self-defence. One of the lowest Turks will dismount from his horse, force a Greek from his -shop, load him with his baggage, and compel him to follow him, without the poor Greek daring to utter a complaint The wealthiest individuals of this na tion are exposed to the most galling insults in their own houses. Dr Holland mentions, that while he was sitting with the Archbishop of Larissa, the most considerable Greek in Thessaly, a Turk of a surly and forbidding aspect, -and evidently of the lowest class, entered the room, seated himself unceremoni ously on the sofa, filled his pipe, and took coffee from the attendants. The Archbishop was evidently em barrassed, but made no comment. After a short in terval, he took a coin from his purse, and put it si lently into the hand of the Turk, who immediately disappeared. In general, the inhabitants of the dis tricts which are appanages of the great officers of state,—of the tinsarr or fiefs held under the sultan,— and of the lands belonging to the church, are less oppressed than the others. The islands of the Ar chipelago, where Turkish governors do not reside, are also less disturbed; and mountainous districts, such as Maim, which are capable of being defended, are sometimes nearly in a state of independenoe. Local differences, indeed, in the political condition of the people, are numerous in Greece. Where the Christian inhabitants have wrested certain privileges from the Turks, they generally enjoy them undis turbed, from the mechanical adherence of the latter to habits once formed. Very often the degree of freedom and security which the Greeks enjoy de pends on their numbers. In towns where they form a large part of the population, as in Athens, their numbers and union give them consequence, and their superior knowledge and address enables them suc-, .cessfully to elude or oppose the sluggish tyranny of the Turks. In Albania, the severe government of Ali has repressed the insolence of the Turks, but without raising the condition of the Greeks. He has, however, reduced the numerous bands of rob bers who infested, or rather occupied the country ; he has built bridges, made roads, given security to merchants, and, upon the whole, greatly improved the condition of the people. • The Turkish government being purely military, the privilege of carrying arms is considered a •mimic of distinction, and is reserved entirely to the Turks. Nearly the whole of this part of the population be longs either -to the Toprakli (feudal militia) or-to•the corps of janizaries. A Mahometan, unconnected with any military corps, is equally with Christians liable to capitation-tax and other imposts • and this law, though not rigorously enforced, induces most of the Turks -to -enrol their children in their infancy. Hence in the cities every Turk is a janizary. But only a very small number of these are embodied ; the whole corps of janizaries in actual pay in the empire being only about forty thousand, according to Mr Thornton. They serve in garrisons, and ge nerally follow some trade. Their pay was original ly about one shilling a-day, and though still nomi nally the same, is now, from the depreciation of the coin, reduced to a fourth part of this sum. Small companies of lopgis, or artillerymen, are also placed in the garrisons, but they are totally ignorant of gunnery; and very often the guns are without car =gem. The gammas or unembodied janistarim, and spahis, serve merely to fill vacancies in stand ing corps, and furnish extraordinary levies in time -of war. These levies are made at the rate of one man out of ten persons of the families attached to -the military bodies. When called upon for active service, they march without uniforms, armed with fowling-pieces, pistols, lances, or such weapons as they can find. The Albanians, from greater practice in war, are better organized, though destitute of what would be considered discipline in regular armies. Many of the pachas, indeed, now keep in their ser vice a corps of Albanians, who have become the principal, and far the most efficient part of the Turk ish military in Greece. We do not find any accu rate account of the amount of the military force ac tually kept on foot in Greece, or of the contingent furnished by it for the general service of the empire. But the pachaliks of Salonica, with the mousselimhic of Larissa, which have a population of 500,000 souls, Greeks, Jews, and Turks, supply, in time df foreign war, 15,000 men ; and as the proportion of Mahometans is much greater in these districts than anywhere else, perhaps the contingent for the whole country, including Albania, will not exceed three times this number. But so inefficient is the military administration, that generally not • more than one half of the individuals called upon actually join the army. The Pacha of Tripolitza has in his service a body of five or six thousand Albanians, which may be considered as the standing military force of the Morea. The Pacha of Albania, the most formidable military power in Greece, has seldom more than 8000 men in pay, according to Mr Hobhouse. But Dr Holland, who wrote at a later period, when Al's dominions were much more extended, estimates his standing army at 15,000 ; and thinks he could, for a short time, maintain 30,000 men in arms. As nearly one half of the Peninsula of Greece was, at the latter period, subject to Ali, containing a popu lation of 1,200,000, or 1,800,000 souls, the estimate seems exceedingly moderate ; and the whole military force of the country applicable to any emergency, calculated on the same scale, would be 60,000 men, or one tenth of the males able to bear arms. The pay of Ali's troops is said to be twelve piastres, or fifteen shillings a-month, besides provisions, which are furnished to them by the villages where they are quartered. The Albanians of all classes possess arms. Those in active service use a sabre in addi tion to the gun, pistols, and poinard which the pea santry carry. Pouqueville speaks of them as being formed into chiliads or bodies of a thousand men each, which are subdivided into companies ; but these companies do not consist of a fixed number. They have few cavalry ; and their infantry is with out tactics, discipline, or regular order. Ali has made some attempts to introduce the European discipline, but found the habits of his subjects totally averse to it. The men, however, have the military virtues in a de gree not surpassed by any nation in Europe ; and their impetuous courage has often snatched victory from an enemy superior in numbers and technical skill. They are strong, hardy, active, and enterpris ing ; they delight in combats,—are daring in ac tion, even to rashness, and firm in the midst of dan gers.* The public revenues of Greece, like those of other rude countries, consist of a number of imposts, rais ed on a very simple plan, and often so much the more oppressive for this simplicity. The expedients adopted in other states to lighten and equalize the pressure of taxes, and to mitigate their injurious ef forts on industry, are totally unknown in Turkey. Most of the taxes were imposed in rude times by men skilled in nothing but the use of the sword ; and the paramount authority of custom, which in Turkey controls equally subject and sovereign, will not allow of any material alteration. There are, however, local variations, both in the amount of the taxes, and in the mode of their imposition. 1. The first of the Turkish taxes is the miri or land-tax, which affects equally Turks and Greeks, and con sists of one-tenth of the gross produce of the soil. Beaujour estimates its actual amount at one-twelfth. Vineyards and gardens, with ground under cotton, madder, and mulberries, generally pay a composi tion. 2. A tax on moveables, that is, shops, houses, furniture, &c. affecting all other classes but Turks : it is assessed in a very arbitrary manner ; varying much in different towns ; and is estimated by the Greeks to absorb a fourth part of their gains. 3. A
tax on consumable commodities, cattle, provisions, firewood, liquors, &c. levied at the gates of towns, at rates probably not uniform. Sheep and goats pay one pare, an ox one piastre, wine two, and brandy four •pares the oke ; compositions are accepted for other articles. 4. The karatch, or capitation tax, imposed on all males, not Mahometans, who are above twelve years of age, according to some, above five, or eight, according to others. The rate varies from two to ten piastres, according to the supposed wealth of the person, and may vary to a still greater extent, as it is levied on the basis of an ancient roll or census, and, when the population of a district di minishes, the rate is raised in order to afford the same annual amount. The officers judge of a child's age by putting a cord round its head. The person paying receives a ticket, which he is obliged to pro duce at the gates of towns, and if he fails, he is com pelled to pay anew, perhaps with the addition of the bastinado. 5. A duty on exports and imports, a mounting, generally, to 8 per cent. when the mer chant is a foreigner, and 5 or 6 per cent. when he is a native subject. 6. The property of all public of dicers at their death, and of all persons who die with out heirs, devolves to the pacha, on behalf of the Grand Seignior. By a composition, however, the heirs of a public officer are sometimes allowed to re tain his property. 7. Each pacha has generally a number of farms and villages attached to his place, of which he draws the rents. All is reported to be the proprietor of 100 villages, which yield him L. 200,000 per annum. Mr Hughes thinks that one third of the whole cultivated territory belongs to him. 8. The arbitrary requisitions made of horses, forage, and provisions, for the public service, are a productive source of revenue. 9. Large sums are drawn from the sale of public offices, including those of the dignitaries of the Greek church. The inferior clergy are also compelled to pay a sum at their instal lation. 10. In some provinces, perhaps in all, there is a duty on legal proceedings, amounting to one-tenth of the value of the disputed property. 11. Jeanie:, or vex atious prosecutions ; and fines levied on districts for crimes committed within their bounds, on the ground that they might have prevented them. This last prac tice is made a pretext for many grievous acts of extor tion and cruelty, the inhabitants being subjected to military execution when they are unable to pay. 12. Sums are wrung from the tributary classes, as a composition for working at the highways and fortifi cations; but the money passes wholly into the pock ets of the public officers. 13. A considerable re venue is derived from escheats, forfeitures, and con fiscations; and a trifling amount from the produce of the mines, all mines being regarded as the Grand Seignior's property. Lastly, the Istira, or regula tion by which the cultivators are compelled to fur nish corn for the supply of the capital, at one-fourth. or one-fifth of its market value, operates as a tax on the husbandman, though it bring little into the trea sury of the prince. Many of these taxes are farmed ; but certain districts, as Mains, and certain bodies of men, as the Jews of Salonica, are allowed to make a composition with the government, under which they assess and collect their taxes (wholly or in part) them selves. Were we to judge of these taxes by the amount paid in to the government, we should pro nounce them extremely light. But the unequal and often arbitrary mode of apportioning and collecting them, are sufficient to render the lightest impost op pressive, and the numberless fraudulent demands for which they afford a cover on the part of the revenue officers greatly aggravate their pressure. From iso lated facts stated by various writers, we are warrant ed to believe, that the gross revenue, or the money drawn from the people, is generally double, some times triple, of what is paid even to the provincial governments.° We have no account, on which the smallest re liance can be placed, of the whole produce of the taxes of Greece; the statements with regard to those of particuar districts tre too contradictory to be received without suspicion. Mr Hobhouse heard the revenues of All estimated at six millions of pi astres, exclusive of casual levies (a very compre hensive head). Attica has been said to remit annu ally to Constantinople 700 or 750 purses (of 500 piastres each). According to Pouqueville, two mil lions of piastres are raised in the Mores, of which only one-half is paid in to the pasha. There is very little consistency in these statements. If we take the first as a basis, and assume that Ali's territories comprehended one-third of Greece at the period al luded to, the revenue of the whole peninsula might be estimated at eighteen millions of piastres, or L.1,100,000 Sterling, exclusive of what are called casual levies. But, from the vigour of Ali's govern ment, his revenue is probably greater in proportional amount, and collected at a less expence, than that of any other provincial ruler. A different mode of cal culation woulcl conduct us to a similar result. In the least adVanced countries of Europe, such as Spain, Portugal, Austria, Russia Sweden (see ar ticle EUROPE, Supplement), the public revenue, com pared with the population, is generally at a rate vary ing from 8s. to 15s. Sterling per annum for each in habitant ; and as Greece is certainly near the bot tom of the scale in point of productive industry, her revenue can scarcely exceed the lowest of these rates. Calculating on this principle, and supposing the po pulation to be two millions and a half, the net re venue would be L. 1,000,000 Sterling, and this sum doubled may represent the gross amount extracted• from the pockets of the people. t It is not true, as has sometimes been stated, that the taxes in Turkey have been immemorially the same. The tax on consumable commodities was first im posed during the reign of Abdul Achmet, late in the last century, and probably several others of those enumerated are of modern date. But the govern ment certainly has not the same ready access to the pockets of its subjects as those governments which are supported by Parliaments or States General. The Turks, who are the slaves of custom, would think themselves degraded if they submitted to exac tions unknown to their ancestors, and the Grand Signior must respect their prejudices. But no such motives operate to protect the rajas, or tributary classes, from new impositions ; and indirect schemes of taxation may reach the Turks also.
Municipal, and other local charges, are defrayed by the three classes of Turks, Greeks, and Jews, who are organized for this purpose into a sort of corporate bodies. In Salonica, the Turks are governed by a council of six Ayans, who are generally powerful Beys ; the Greeks by their Proesti, or Primates, as every where else; and the Jews by a council of Robbins, whose head, called Kakam, usually places himself under the protection of some Christian pow er. These persons ought to be a check on the public officers, and they are sometimes the channel through which remonstrances are made, and justice obtained ; but more generally they are accomplices in the extortion and oppression practised on their respective communities. (Beaujour, Let. i.), Of the various estimates given of the population of Greece, that of Beaujour has been most gene rally followed. This writer assigns a population of 700,000 souls to Macedonia, 300,000 to Thessaly, 400,000 to Epirus, 200,000 to Etoiia, Phocis, and Boeotia, 300,000 to the Mores., and 20,000 to At tica, making a total of 1,920,000. In two 'Haden. Jars, this statement seems to require correction. The population of the Morea, since the desultory war of 1770, appears to have been gradually increasing. Scrofani, on whose statement Beanjour probably grounds his own, estimates the number of inhabit ants in that district at 250,000; but Pouqueville, who wrote at a later period, and had good means of in formation, estimates them at 400,000 Greeks, 15,000 Turks, and 4000 Jews. Again, Beaujour appears not to have included under the name of Epirus the district watered by the Drino, or even northern Al bania; and the researches of Mr Hobhouse and Dr Holland have shown, that the parts of this country he did include are more populous than he imagined. An addition ought therefore to be made to Beau. jour's enumeration on these grounds. Dr Holland, on the other hand, appears to have greatly over rated the population of part of the country. Ali's territories, circumscribed by the boundaries which the Doctor has traced, embrace an area of about 26,000 square English miles. Pouqueville estimated the population at a million and a half; and Dr Hol land thinks it must be nearly two millions, which is equal to seventy-seven persons to each square mile. But Spain, a country resembling Albania in its phy .iical features, with a larger proportion of arable soil, and a greater internal tranquillity, has, on an average, only fifty-five or sixty inhabitants to a square mile ; and it is certainly extremely improbable that Albania should have more, or even so many. Considering the circumstances of the country, fifty persons to a square mile may be thought a high estimate. This would give 1,300,000 inhabitants for the whole of Alfa dominions. If we add to this, 420,000 for the Mo res, 100,000 for Attica, Eubcea, and the eastern part of Bceotia, 600,000 for Macedonia (exclusive of the part in Ali's possession), 200,000 for the pachalic of Scutari, and 80,000 for the Cyclades, we shall have 2,700,000 for the entire population of Greece. Perhaps the number of inhabitants was not greater in Strabo's time, if we may judge from the account he gives of the deserted state of the country (Lib. vii. p. SU); and the government of the Tarim, with all its train of abuses, is probably' not more destruetive to Greece than that of the }Io nians was. This population is very unequally dia. tributed. It is densest in the southern parts of Ma cedonia, in the eastern parts of Thesesly, and in the central and northern districts of Albania. Acanta nia is almost a desert ; lEtolia is thinly peopled; Attica, including the city, has not more than twen. ty-five or thirty inhabitants to the square mile. The plains of Argos, and the hilly region of Mains, are the most populous parts of the Mores. As might be expeeted from the insecure state .a the country, single cottages or scattered hamlets are scarcely anywhere to be seen. The inhabitants are always collected into villages or cities ; and those who are engaged in husbandry waste a great part of their time and labour in travelling to and from their lands. Hence in the agricultural districts, the pro portion of the inhabitants who live in towns seems unusually large, considering the small resources that trade and manufactures afford. Of 500,000 persons inhabiting the pachalic of Salonica, and the Mous. selimlik of Larissa, one-third, according to Beau jour, live in the large towns. The most fertile dis tricts are not uniformly the most populous. A bar ren soil in mountainous parts, which afford the means of defence, is often laboriously cultivated, while the rich plains below are neglected. • It would be interesting to compare the modern with the ancient population of Greece In point of numbers. But inquiries with regard to the latter seem to lead into a labyrinth of difficulties, partly from the want of sufficient data, partly from the multitude of errors that have crept into the nu merical expressions in the text of ancient author*, and partly from the civil distinctions of citizens, slaves, and strangers, which render the applica tion of particular statements uncertain. It would baffle human sagacity to build any satisfactory con clusion on the mass of discordant details collected by Hume. We shall proceed more securely if we Found our reasonings on some single statement that is pretty well established. From a variety of cir cumstances which elucidate and fortify each other, Hume deduces that Athens contained at one period 284,000 inhabitants.t Let us suppose this to in clude, also, the rural population. Attica was com paratively a barren district ; and, exclusive of Elea aim, Megara, and Salamis, did not occupy more than one-sixtieth part of the countries to which our state ments apply in this article. Its commerce and col°. nies, however, more than compensated for the inferi. ority of its soil. Now, if we suppose the other and more fertile, but less improved parts of Greece, to have been peopled only to one-fourth of the density of Attica, this would give a population of eight mil lions and a half for the whole country. Without re lying much on this calculation, we may observe, that, if one amidst a multitude of small states had such a Anass of population, her neighbours and rivals must have possessed something like a proportionate strength to preserve their independence. And, con sidering the strong feeling of emulation which per iraded these small republics, we may be certain that, before the arts of industry could be so far advanced in Attica as to enable such a mass of people to sub sist on so small a surface, the neighbouring states must have been considerably improved.