No. 127.
Mr. Bancroft to Mr. Fish.
Berlin, January 21, 1873. (Received February 15.)
Sir: I have endeavored to combine the relaxation which I enjoyed under the leave of absence you granted me with the duties that devolve on me as minister in Berlin.
Of questions that affect all Europe, the changes that are going forward in the East are of the greatest moment; England, France, Italy, Germany, Russia, and Greece, to say nothing of Servia, Roumania, and Egypt, taking almost equal interest in the result, To the end, therefore, that I might better understand the policy of this Court in all that relates to the Orient, I employed my holidays in a tour to Constantinople, Athens, and Egypt.
I left the Bosphorus and Greece with the conviction that, from the great multiplicity of nationalities in the Turkish Empire, the regeneration of the East could not depend on one nationality alone, yet that no one has distinguished itself so much by culture, capacity, and enterprise, and by actual progress, as the Greek.
Of the condition and prospects of Egypt I was able to form opinions from the frank and very extended communications of the Khedive himself, [Page 276] the most free and confidential intercourse with some of the most enlightened men in his viceroyalty, and from my own observations. All along on the Nile, at the principal towns, the Arab magistrates called to see so unusual a person as an American minister, but not much was to be learned from them. Their idea of courtesy seemed to be to make very long visits and to sit nearly in silence.
On the 22d of December I turned my face toward Berlin, having collected, as I hope, all that is necessary to enable me to judge correctly of the influence which the German government may desire to exercise on the Oriental question. It gives me pleasure to say that everywhere the name of the American nation stands among the very highest, and its greatness is acknowledged without jealousy or fear.
I began my return to Berlin on the 22d of December, but it was somewhat delayed by the difficulties of the sea and the winter season.
I remain, &c.,