Ismail Pasha and his fellow-Commissioners returned to Constantinople, their efforts having had the effect of spreading the growth which they had been sent to root up. The Palace, which throughout this crisis exemplified the truth that whom the gods wish to destroy they first make demented, for it took every precaution too late and displayed a vacillation that ruined what chances it had, now decided to do what, if it had been done some months earlier, might have crushed the Young Turk movement and left Abdul Hamid the undisputed master of the Ottoman Empire. It was decided to despatch a large army from Asia to overpower the mutinous troops in Europe, and orders were given that no less than forty-eight battalions of Anatolian troops should be landed forthwith at Salonica. But before describing the failure of this last move on the part of the Despotism it will be necessary to go back a little to give an account of what had been happening in the interior of Macedonia since Niazi Bey had raised the standard of revolt at Resna on July 3, and of how everything was there being made ready for the general insurrection. CHAPTER X _THE STANDARD OF REVOLT_ The situation in Macedonia in July, 1908, when Niazi Bey took to the mountains, may be summed up thus: The Bulgarian, Greek, Servian, Wallach, and Albanian bands were murdering, robbing, outraging each other’s kin all over the country; the Committee of Union and Progress, having established its branches in Monastir, Ochrida, Resna, Persepe, and other places, was engaged in steadily spreading its propaganda through all the countryside, a large proportion of the young officers of the Macedonian army being initiates or sympathisers with the cause; and, lastly, the Palace had taken its precautions, and there was not a town or regiment without its secret Government agents ferreting out the secrets of the conspiracy and denouncing the suspects.