For nearly six months not a Russian merchant ship had passed through the straits. All the commerce of Rumania and Bulgaria, which had normally found its way to Europe across this inland sea, had long since disappeared. The ultimate significance of all this desolation was that Russia was blockaded and completely isolated from her allies. How much that one fact has meant in the history of the world for the last three years! And now England and France were seeking to overcome this disadvantage; to link up their own military resources with those of their great eastern ally, and to restore to the Dardanelles and the Marmora the thousands of ships that meant Russia’s existence as a military and economic, and even, as subsequent events have shown, as a political, Power. We were approaching the scene of one of the great crises of the war. Would England and her allies succeed in this enterprise? Would their ships at the Dardanelles smash the fortifications, break through, and again make Russia a permanent force in the war? That was the main subject which Enver and I discussed, as for nearly three hours we walked up and down the deck. Enver again referred to the “silly panic” that had seized nearly all classes in the capital. “Even though Bulgaria and Greece both turn against us,” he said, “we shall defend Constantinople to the end. We have plenty of guns, plenty of ammunition, and we have these on terra-firma, whereas the English and French batteries are floating ones. And the natural advantages of the straits are so great that the warships can make little progress against them. I do not care what other people may think. I have studied this problem more thoroughly than any of them, and I feel that I am right. As long as I am at the head of the War Department we shall not give up. Indeed, I do not know just what these English and French battleships are driving at. Suppose that they rush the Dardanelles, get here into the Marmora, and reach Constantinople, what good will that do them? They can bombard and destroy the city, I admit, but they cannot capture it, as they have no troops to land. Unless they do bring a large army, they will really be caught in a trap. They can perhaps stay here for two or three weeks, until their food and supplies are all exhausted, and then they will have to go back--rush the straits again, and again run the risk of annihilation. In the meantime we would have repaired the forts, brought in troops, and made ourselves ready for them. It seems to me to be a very foolish enterprise.” I have already told how Enver had taken Napoleon as his model, and in this Dardanelles expedition he now apparently saw a Napoleonic opportunity. As we were pacing the deck he stopped a moment, looked at me earnestly, and said: