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movements of respectable people, but does not prevent suspicious characters from going where they please. I do not suppose that the twenty-five Montenegrins who recently made a raid into Hotti took care to have their passports in order before they started. A regulation may be issued that people can only cross from Montenegro into Albania at certain points, but it would be a dead letter unless the whole frontier were carefully guarded, and how this is to be done is not clear.

I did not gather from Tewfik Bey that he had as yet placed any proposal of this sort officially before the Montenegrin Government. I have, &c.,

The Marquess of Salisbury.

WALTER BARING.

Mr. O'Conor to the Marquis of Salisbury.-(Received April 18.) Sophia, April 11, 1890.

MY LORD,

WITH reference to my despatch of the 24th ultimo, I have the honour to report that the Bulgarian Government has remitted the whole sum claimed by the Russian Government on account of the military occupation of Bulgaria; a receipt for the same on behalf of the Russian Government has been given in the form published by the " Bulgarie," copy of which I beg to inclose to your Lordship herewith. I have, &c.,

The Marquess of Salisbury.

N. R. O'CONOR.

(Inclosure.)—Extract from " La Bulgarie" of April 10, 1890.

FRAIS DE L'OCCUPATION RUSSE.-Quelques journaux étrangers, dont la malveillance à l'égard de la Bulgarie est incurable, se sont permis de prétendre que le Gouvernement Princier n'a pas encore pu payer les échéances des frais de l'occupation Russe. Pour couper court à ces raconteurs ridicules, nous publions ci-après le texte même de la quittance que le Représentant d'Allemagne à Sophia, agissant au nom de la Russie, a délivré, le Mars dernier, au Gouvernement de Son Altesse Royale le Prince. ment :

8

Voici ce docu

"Consulat-Général de l'Empire d'Allemagne en Bulgarie, "Sophia, le Mars, 1890.

20

"En vertu du pouvoir qui lui est délégué par le Gouvernement Impérial d'Allemagne sur la base de la note en date du 13 Février, 1890, du Gouvernement Impérial de Russie, d'encaisser pour le compte du Gouvernement Russe les annuités qui, conformément à la Convention du Juillet, 1883, pour le payement des frais d'occupa

tion de la Principauté par les troupes Russes, sont échues jusqu'au jourd'hui ;

"Le Soussigné, Gérant du Consulat-Général d'Allemagne, chargé de la protection des intérêts Russes en Bulgarie, déclare avoir reçu de la Banque Nationale Bulgare à Sophia, au nom et pour compte du Gouvernement de la Principauté de Bulgarie, la somme de 8,867,000 fr. en or, représentant la contre - valeur de 3,600,000 roubles, afférente au payement des annuités suivantes :—

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"Et par la présente donne quittance pour la dite somme aux fins qu'elle serve auprès de qui de droit.

"WANGENHEIM, Gérant du Consulat-Général d'Allemagne, chargé de la protection des intérêts Russes en Bulgarie."

Mr. O'Conor to the Marquess of Salisbury.—(Received April 18.) (Extract.) Sophia, April 14, 1899. As regards the position created for the Bulgarian Acting Agent at Belgrade in consequence of the incident of the Macedonian students, I have the honour to state that M. Stransky's choice for this post appears to be M. Dimitroff, the present Prefect of Philippopoli, and to have been dictated in the hope that the appointment of so well-known and experienced an official would be agreeable to the Servian Government, and tend to maintain the friendly relations with that country which the Bulgarian Government had so much at heart.

The Acting Servian Agent here, M. Petkovitch, as also I believe M. Minchovitch, are both absent for the moment from their posts. The Marquess of Salisbury. N. R. O'CONOR.

Mr. F. R. St. John to the Marquess of Salisbury.-(Received April 18.)

(Extract.)

Belgrade, April 13, 1890. My Turkish colleague has remonstrated with the Servian Government in consequence of a serious raid by about 200 Montenegrin immigrants, assisted by some Servian frontier Pandours, upon a Turkish village, all the cattle being driven off over the frontier while the Mussulmans were at mosque two Fridays ago. The Servian Government were apparently quite unaware of these facts, but Mahmoud Nédim Bey was yesterday informed by the Servian Government that the reported circumstances had since been inquired into and confirmed, with the result that all the ringleaders are now imprisoned and awaiting trial before the District Court of Prokouplia.

I must mention an incident on the occasion of this raid, namely, the slaughtering of a number of cattle at the place of capture, as corroborative of the reported famished state of the raiders. The Marquess of Salisbury.

F. R. ST. JOHN.

Mr. F. R. St. John to the Marquess of Salisbury.-(Received

(Extract.)

April 28.)

Belgrade, April 20, 1890. I YESTERDAY spoke again with the Minister and the SecretaryGeneral for Foreign Affairs on the subject of terminating the present tension in the relations with Bulgaria by reciprocal and simultaneous appointments of titular Agents, and I urged the advisability of a good understanding between two kindred and neighbouring peoples whose community of interests had been singularly exemplified by an identity of views at the recent International Railway Conference of Vienna, as well as by the arrangement entered into between them some months previously with eminent success for cheap rates for carriage of Bulgarian wheat northwards through Servia, in consequence of the inordinate charges maintained on the Turkish railways for such carriage southwards.

I also drew the attention of both gentlemen to the readiness evinced by the Bulgarian Government to appoint a titular Agent if a similar course were adopted here.

General Gruitch professed as usual much concern for the maintenance of friendly relations with all neighbours; but his Excellency was reticent, and apparently doubtful, as to the precise manuer in which so desirable au end could be attained in the present instance, while his subordinate only repeated to me the plea put forward by his chief some time ago, that there was no one at the disposal of the Government just now fit to be intrusted with so delicate a mission.

To this I observed that, provided the person selected were generally unobjectionable, his special suitability was a minor point, as he might afterwards be changed at any moment; but what I thought of paramount importance at the present juncture was the principle involved, by promptly filling up the vacant posts. The Marquess of Salisbury.

F. R. ST. JOHN.

Consul-General Blunt to Sir W. White.-(Received at the Foreign Office, April 29.)

SIR,

Salonica, April 21, 1890. I HAVE the honour to report to your Excellency that the Bulgarian Bishop Theodosius has been recently dispatched to Uscup by the Bulgarian Exarch to reside in that town, and exercise spiritual jurisdiction over the Bulgarians in the Vilayet of Cossova.

He was the bearer of an order of the Porte directing the Vali of Cossova to recognize and support his episcopal authority, and I hear that he has been installed in his office with the customary ceremonies.

The small Greco-Vlach community, and the Greek Archbishop of Uscup, at the instigation of the Greek and Servian Consuls, tried to get up an agitation against Bishop Theodosius, but met with no encouragement from the Turkish authorities.

Sir W. White.

I have, &c.,

J. E. BLUNT.

Sir W. White to the Marquess of Salisbury.—(Received May 2.) (Extract.)

Constantinople, April 19, 1890.

I HAVE to report to your Lordship a circumstance which has lately occurred in connection with the old grievance of the Bulgarian Church in relation with its dioceses in Macedonia.

Your Lordship will possibly bear in mind that the Bulgarian Exarch repeatedly claims, but without success, the re-establishment of Bulgarian Sees in that province. His Beatitude rests his claim on the Imperial Firman constituting the Bulgarian Church, and the Exarch as its ecclesiastical chief in Turkey, and I believe that two Sees had actually Bulgarian Bishops up to the breaking out of the late Russian war, but the Porte has persistently resisted allowing Bulgarian Bishops in Macedonia ever since, and has received an unofficial support in that resistance from some foreign Embassies, and an open one from the Ecumenical Patriarch, who, as well as the Greeks, looks upon the Bulgarian Church as schismatical, while

the pressure exercised by Russia up to 1885 in favour of these Bishoprics proved itself inefficient to overcome this resistance.

A few weeks ago I heard privately that the Grand Vizier, moved by the repeated representations of the Exarch, had given his consent to allow his Beatitude to send a Bishop to Uscup in Macedonia on a visit, so as to consecrate different Bulgarian churches lately constructed, and administer those ecclesiastical ritual functions which can only be performed by a Bishop in the Eastern Churches, of which the Bulgarian is one.

The absence of any Bishop for so many years is a constant matter of complaint to members of that Church in Macedonia, and I admit that personally I consider this decision of the Grand Vizier to have been in the right direction, and both in the spirit and in the letter in conformity with the Treaty of Berlin, which, in Article LXII, specially provides "that no hindrance should be offered either to the hierarchical organization of the various communities, or to their relations with their spiritual chiefs."

The Bulgarian Church, in the Ottoman dominions, is a community organized by Imperial Decree, and its chief, the Exarch, resides at Constantinople, and is a Turkish subject.

I have recently heard that the Porte have since regretted this decision, and that the Vali at Uscup is throwing obstacles in the way of the visiting Bishop to prevent him from carrying out his episcopal functions.

I am, however, unable to say what truth there may be in this allegation.

The Marquess of Salisbury.

W. A. WHITE.

Sir W. White to the Marquess of Salisbury.—(Received May 2.) (Extract.) Constantinople, April 19, 1890. WITH reference to the subject of the Bulgarian Church in Macedonia, mentioned in my preceding despatch of this day, it may be as well for me to mention that agitators in Bulgaria are trying to persuade the people that it is owing to the illegal character of the present Government at Sophia, and to the want of Russian support, in consequence, at Constantinople, that the religious privations of their co-religionists in Macedonia are to be entirely ascribed.

The Marquess of Salisbury.

W. A. WHITE.

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