make perfect martyrs of the people, some of whom were even killed by his
agents. Exasperated beyond endurance, the people of Possavina rose en
masse, and although the movement was put down without difficulty, it
doubtless paved the way for the discord and rebellion which has been
attended with such calamitous results. This is precisely one of those
cases which has brought such odium on the Turkish government, and which
may so easily be avoided for the future, always providing that the Porte
be sincere in its oft-repeated protestations of a desire for genuine
reform. Ali Pacha was at Mostar in the beginning of 1858, when the
movement began, but was afraid to venture into the revolted districts to
collect his tithes. The Governor, therefore, made him Commandant of the
Herzegovinian irregulars, in which post he vindicated the character
which he had obtained for cruelty and despotism. Subsequently he was
appointed Kaimakan of Trebigné, but the European Consuls interfered, and
he has now decamped, owing a large sum to government, the remnant of his
contract for the tithes.

The sides of some of the mountains are covered, as I have before said,
with dense forests of great value. There the oak, ash, elm, beech,
walnut, red and white pine, and the red and yellow maple, grow in rich
profusion, awaiting only the hand of man to shape them into 'the tall
mast' and the 'stately ship.' But man, in these benighted lands, is
blind to the sources of wealth with which his country teems, and to
nature it is left in the lapse of years to 'consume the offspring she
has herself produced.' The difficulty of transporting the timber to a
market has been always alleged by the natives as their reason for
neglecting to turn the forests to account; but this is a paltry excuse,
for with abundance of rivers to float it to the coast, and a neighbour
so anxious to monopolise the trade of the country as Austria has shown
herself, little doubt can be entertained of the possibility of its