Of the methods of the propaganda in Macedonia we learn a good deal from the published letters of Major Niazi Bey, the officer who first raised the standard of revolt. He explains how, gradually, the young officers, hitherto estranged from one another by the mutual suspicions engendered by the system of _espionage_, were emboldened by the patriotic hopes held up before them, and through the possession of a common secret became as a band of brothers, mutual confidence and affection increasing daily; and how even those who had not been made members of the secret Society, and knew not its mysteries, were convinced by their affiliated comrades that the Committee was powerful and just, and was working in the sacred name of liberty for the integrity of the fatherland; and so sympathised heart and soul with the movement, and were in readiness to co-operate with the revolutionaries. In the meanwhile the Committee was steadily undermining the entire civil as well as military administration of the Empire. It acted, as a member of the association put it to me, like a well-ordered but secret Government. It kept books in which were inscribed the names of all the higher Government officials, with particulars as to their careers and habits—their _dossiers_, in short. Some of the enlightened and right-minded of these officials had been gained over to the cause; the others were closely watched, and whether they were _Valis_, Inspectors General, or Governors of districts, or what not, their moral influence was destroyed, and their authority was made impotent by the fact that their subordinates, on whom they had to rely for the execution of their wishes, had almost without exception become adherents of the Committee. CHAPTER IX _HOW THE REVOLUTION BEGAN_ It had been calculated by the Young Turks that the time would not be ripe for their great _coup_ until the autumn of 1909, but the menace of further foreign intervention in Macedonia and an active campaign against the Committee, which was opened by the Palace at the beginning of 1908, precipitated the revolt. The propaganda had been spreading rapidly, the movement had been prospering, when suddenly the prospect darkened, and there were happenings that threatened even to break up the Society and shatter the hopes of the reformers.