The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE Published every Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday Morning. Saturday, September 21, 1889.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume III, Issue 354, 21 September 1889, Page 2

The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE Published every Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday Morning.

Saturday, September 21, 1889.

Be just and fear not; Let all the ends thou aim’st at be thy country's, Thy God's, and truth’s.

A message of more than ordinary importance in relation to foreign affairs was received this week, being the information that the Sultan had consented to the demand for a Christian Governor of Crete, and had agreed to allow the formulation of a more liberal system of government than at present exists. As will be well known, Crete is one of the largest of the Greek islands, and has a population of about 200,000 For seventy years the island has been reckoned as one of the chief of the possible elements of disturbance in the East of Europe. The population includes 40,000 Mussulmans, the descendants of men who became renegades on the subjugation of the island in 1669. To those men a certain amount of authority has been delegated by the Turks, but naturally the Christian majority clings to its Greek traditions, and has not hesitated, when there arose what was considered a good opportunity, to strive once more to become politically Greek. The Cretans took a leading part in the war of Greek Independence in 1821. The allied Powers in 1830 having handed them over to Mehemet Ali, for a while their condition was improved, but ten years later they again fell under the power of the Turks in Constantinople. In 1866 there came a long and desperate insurrection which nearly secured the independence of the Cretans, but the European Powers felt that to allow them to do so would be to create a grave danger. The result was a kind of Home Rule, which, however, fell far short of anticipations. Then came murmurings of discontent which the Turks could no longer ignore. The difficulty springs from the nature of things in a mixed Christian and Mussulman community. The Christian population is much more numerous and far wealthier than the Mussulman, but the latter is supported by the powers in Constantinople, which means the vesting in them of nearly all authority, to the mortification of the Christians, To attempt to repress the people by force might lead to a repetition of costly lessons which have already made a great impression. The outcome of the trouble indeed proves that even the Turkish mind is becoming susceptible of that desire for liberal measures which is one of the characteristics of the age. It would be easy, perhaps, to kill off thousands of Cretans, but the result of such rough treatment would bp to arouse Greece, to set Russia in motion, and the outcry caused in Great Britain would be sufficient to prevent that Government stepping in and granting aid to Turkey in her attempt to carry out her brutal policy with the sword. If the information be reliable that the Sultan intends to grant a liberal form of Government to the Cretans, the concession marks a great advance in the Turkish methods of dealing with a discontented people. A feeling is beginning to arise in Constantinople that the possession is not worth the keeping, but then there is the difficulty of disposing of it satisfactorily, and the Saltan now certainly appears to have adopted the best line of policy.