A Tour Up the Straits, from Gibraltar to Constantinople: With the Leading Events in the Present War Between the Austrians, Russians, and the Turks, to the Commencement of the Year 1789Sutherland, David, Captain
History
A Tour Up the Straits, from Gibraltar to Constantinople: With the Leading Events in the Present War Between the Austrians, Russians, and the Turks, to the Commencement of the Year 1789
Sutherland, David, Captain
Mediterranean Region -- Description and travel; Russo-Turkish War, 1787-1792
Would the Empress be equally moderate, if in possession of this fertile
region? Believe me she would not. As several of our manufactures could
not be carried on without her productions, she would only give them on
her own terms. Perhaps only in her own bottoms. All her politics would
be directed to increase her trade and shipping, and consequently her
naval force; and, thus inclined, with such a country, she would soon
rise to a maritime power much beyond what the world has ever
experienced. We have only to look to Tyre, to Rhodes, and many other
places scarce bigger than specks on the map of Turkey, to conceive what
a force might arise from this immense, this all producing Empire.
In its present state, Turkey, as I have already hinted, may be compared
to a rich mine, to which the industrious from every nation have free
access. In the hands of the Empress it would be like the barred treasure
of an ambitious Lord, never to be opened but to be increased.
In this I do not mean to reflect on her Imperial Majesty, since, I
fancy, every European power, in a similar situation, would act the same
part. I only desire to evince that England will never derive such
advantages from Turkey, as whilst it remains in the hands of the
Ottomans, and consequently that it is our interest, as well as that of
every other nation that does not expect a share in the partition of the
Turkish Empire, to break the confederacy between the Empress of Russia
and the Emperor of Germany, and check the progress of the two Imperial
Courts. I mention the Emperor, because, though he has not yet declared
war, it is very well known that he is bound, both by treaty and
inclination, to assist the Russians.
The French Court very wisely, in the last war, supported the Porte; but
from the indifference with which she now beholds the threatened ruin of
a power with whom she trades to so much advantage, a rumour gains ground
that she has been brought over to the ambitious views of the Imperial
Courts, by the promise, that should their designs succeed, Egypt and the
Island of Candia shall be given to France.
Should this ever happen, England may bid adieu to the trade of the
Levant, and, in a short time, by the easy communication the French will
establish with the East-Indies, by the way of the Isthmus of Suez, they
will give a fatal blow to our India trade also.
To prevent these schemes from succeeding, our first object is to
countenance the Spaniards in opposing the entrance of the Russian fleet
into the Mediterranean; since, if the Turks can bring their whole force
to act towards the north, I do not think, now that their fleet has such
a decided superiority on the Black Sea, that they have much to fear in
the present state of Europe. The King of Sweden, were he countenanced,
is well disposed to take an open part in their favour; and this
countenance the King of Prussia will undoubtedly afford him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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