THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE 1821 TO 1833 BY W.ALISON PHILLIPS 1897

314 THE WAR OF GREEK INDEPENDENCE
impotent for good.
against wiles.' 1
It is
only a combination of wiles
In Greece itself the publication of the protocol
was received with an outburst of indignation not
inferior to that which had greeted the protocol of the
16th of November.
To the Greeks it seemed that, all
through the long and tortuous processes of the diplomatic
negotiations, which had now reached another
stage,
they themselves had been regarded merely as
pawns in the game of statecraft, to be moved hither
and thither as the players pleased, and without regard
to their own desires or aspirations. After all that
they had done and endured, they were to be cheated
of the freedom for which alone they had fought and
suffered I For what was this ' autonomy ' worth that
year by year had to acknowledge a degrading dependence;
which merely substituted for the blood tax
which the rayah had paid to the Ottoman, a lump sum
paid yearly for the right of the nation to exist? The
Hydriots and Spezziots had been ' autonomous ' before
the war. Had they fought and bled for eight
years merely to be ' autonomous ' at the end? The
wild hillsmen of the Maina declared loudly that they
would only pay tribute, as from time immemorial they
had paid it, at the point of their swords. What, too,
* Mendelssohn, ii. 124.