n which England and Russia recognized the right of the Greeks to
claim from the Porte a recognition of their freedom. At about the same
time our Government had sent Mr. Stratford Canning, afterwards Lord
Stratford de Redclyffe, as ambassador to Constantinople, with special
instructions to use every endeavour to bring about a cessation of the
war which should be favourable to Greece; and on the 24th of April the
National Assembly at Epidaurus had authorized him to treat with Turkey
on its behalf, agreeing, if no more favourable terms could be obtained,
to a recognition of the Sultan's supremacy and the payment of tribute to
him, on condition that Greece should be independent in all its internal
government. Those terms, however, were rejected by the Porte; and after
a delay of a year and a half it was forced by the Great Powers, slowly
awakening from their long lethargy, to accede to arrangements far more
favourable to Greece.

These negotiations, however, proceeded very slowly, and before the dawn
of Greek independence there was a time of almost utter darkness, the
darkest time of all being the few months following Lord Cochrane's
arrival. "Vanquished Greece," says her historian, "lay writhing in
convulsive throes. In herself there was neither hope nor help, and the
question to be solved was merely whether the Mahometans would have time
to subdue her before the mediating powers made up their minds to use
force. That the former, if not checked from abroad, must speedily
overrun the country did not admit of the least doubt. But it was equally
certain that they could not pacify it; for, while the rich and timid
prepared to emigrate, the poorer and hardier portion of the insurgents
formed themselves into bands of robbers and pirates, which would have
long infested the mountains and the Levant seas, deriding the efforts of
the Porte to suppress them. The only branch of the Hellenic confederacy
that still presented a menacing aspect was the navy under Lord Cochrane.
Every other department was a heap of confusion. No government existed,
since it would be idle to dignify with that name the three puppets set
up by the Congress of Damala. None ever thought of obeying them, and
they sealed their own degradation by carrying on an infamous traffic in
selling letters of marque to freebooters. There was no army, because
there was no revenue. After the fall of Athens, Roumelia was entirely
lost, and the captains either renewed their act