encounter hostile rage.
Hereditary bondsmen! know ye not
Who would be free themselves must strike the blow?
By their right arm the conquest must be wrought.
Will Gaul or Muscovite redress ye?--No!
True, they may lay your proud despoilers low,
But not for you will Freedom's altars flame."

The Greeks, all but a few genuine patriots, thought otherwise. They
sought deliverance at the hands of Gauls and Muscovites; and, as the
Muscovites had good reason for desiring the overthrow of Turkey, they
listened to their prayers, and other ties than that of community in
religion bound the persecuted Greeks to Russia. The Philike Hetaira,
or Friendly Society, chief representative of a very general movement,
was founded at Odessa in 1814. It was a secret society, which speedily
had ramifications among the Greek Christians in every part of Turkey,
encouraging them to prepare for insurrection as soon as the Czar
Alexander I. deemed it expedient to aid them by open invasion of
Turkey, or as soon as they themselves could take the initiative,
trusting to Russia to complete the work of revolution. The Friendly
Society increased its influence and multiplied its visionary schemes
during many years previous to 1821.

Its strength was augmented by the political condition of Turkey at the
time. The Sultan Mahmud--a true type of the Ottoman sovereign at
his worst--had attempted to perfect his power by a long train of
cruelties, of which murder was the lightest. Defeating his own purpose
thereby, he aroused the opposition of Mahometan as well as Christian
subjects, and induced the rebellious schemes of Ali Pasha of Joannina,
the boldest of his vassals. In Albania Ali ruled with a cruelty that
was hardly inferior to Mahmud's. Byron tells how his

"dread command
Is lawless law; for with a bloody hand
He sways a nation turbulent and told."

The cruelty could be tolerated; but not opposition to Mahmud's
will. Long and growing jealousy existed between the Sultan and his
tributary. At length, in 1820, there was an open rupture. Ali was
denounced as a traitor, and ordered to surrender his pashalik. Instead
of so doing, he organized his army for prompt rebellion, trusting for
success partly to the support of the Greeks. Most of the Greeks held
aloof; but the Suliots, a race of Christian marauders, the fiercest of
the fierce community of Albanians, sided with him, and for more than a
year rendered him valuable aid by reason of the