As for his character, he is neither capable nor determined. He takes up everything with great enthusiasm, but never accomplishes his work. The only deed of his mighty career was the ruin of Abdul Hamid; Europe looked at him as at a novel Brutus, and Enver made at once a world-wide fame and a fairly large fortune. From his gilded cage, the beautiful Villa Allatini, on the Bosphorus, in which he is kept prisoner, the former Sultan has written repeatedly to the man who has dethroned him and led his country to take the most foolish of steps, asking that neutrality should be observed as long as possible, and saying that only by keeping friends with the great Mediterranean Powers and Russia could the Sick Man of Europe obtain another lease of life. Enver took no notice of the advice of the old Sovereign, who is certainly one of the most Machiavellian and tactful politicians of modern times. If anything, Enver tried to rush by personal action the Turkish intervention. Here, in Constantinople, one imagines that he must have the gift of ubiquity. He is everywhere. He traced personally the route of a new railway line, which will connect directly the Arsenal with the main line; he fixed the place where the platforms for the new large guns from Germany were to be erected; he selected the houses which were to serve as temporary barracks, hospitals, and depôts; he was seen on one day at the two extreme points of the Dardanelles (a record considering the leisurely Turkish communication), arranging for special protective trenches to be constructed in defence of roads and railway lines exposed to the fire of the naval artilleries. And while doing all this material work he had all the diplomatic arrangements completely on his shoulders, and had to carry out, as though not pretending to do so, the orders from Berlin. A Diplomat who had many years of Turkish experience, having been connected with one of the Embassies in Constantinople for over ten years, tells me that, during the last month, and especially after his marriage with the Sultan's niece, Enver Pasha has affected a sort of private Court, and surrounded himself with truly Imperial luxuries. Audience with him was more difficult than with the Sultan. "Enver flatters himself to act independently," said my diplomatic friend. "He tries to play the great diplomat and the great captain, but really he is only a toy in the hands of Germany. He has reorganised the army and the navy with German officers, German arms, German money, and he seems to believe that he has been very clever and got very much for nothing. He does not realise that acting as he did has completely ruined his country, whatever the result of the war.