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Updated: June 15, 2025
King Ferdinand and M. Venezelos are generally credited with the inception and realisation of the League, though it was so secretly and skilfully concerted that it is not yet possible correctly to apportion praise for the remarkable achievement.
In August 1912 an inquiry concerning this danger was met with a smile: 'Oh, yes, it was so, said the gendarme, 'but since then Venezelos has come. He amnestied every one "out" for minor offences, and then caught the "really bad ones", so there are no outlaws in Akarnania now. And he spoke the truth. You could wander all about the forests and mountains without molestation.
Results speak for themselves, and the remainder of this pamphlet will be little more than a record of his statesmanship; but before we pass on to review his deeds, we must say a word about the character to which they are due. In March 1912 the time came for the first general election since Venezelos had taken office.
Her history during the succeeding generation was a struggle between the parties of the Present and the Future, and the unceasing discomfiture of the former is typified in the tragedy of Trikoupis, the greatest modern Greek statesman before the advent of Venezelos.
Every request, without being even examined thoroughly, was immediately justified by history, statistics, ethnography. In any discussion he took care to solliciter doucement les textes as often the learned with few scruples do. I have met few men in my career who united to an exalted patriotism such a profound ability as Venezelos.
We learnt to know Levantine and Egyptian mentality better than ever. So at Alexandria, every pedlar was the one honest follower of his craft. Yet its population is more European than Egyptian. The shops were full of the picture post cards of Italy and France, and portraits of Venezelos were to be seen everywhere, adorned with the pale blue and white national colours of Greece.
The award of the powers roused great indignation in Greece, but Venezelos was strong enough to secure that it should scrupulously be respected; and the 'correct attitude' which he inflexibly maintained has finally won its reward. As soon as the decision of the powers was announced, the Epirots determined to help themselves.
Upon the royal invitation Venezelos exchanged Kretan for Greek citizenship, and took in hand the 'Military League'. After short negotiations, he persuaded it to dissolve in favour of a national convention, which was able to meet in March 1910. Thus Greece became a constitutional country once more, and Venezelos the first premier of the new era.
Greece was represented by M. Venezelos, Servia by M. Pashitch, Roumania by M. Jonescu, Montenegro by M. Melanovitch, and Bulgaria chiefly by General Fitcheff, who had opposed the surprise attack upon the Servians.
Greece has been fortunate indeed in finding the right man at the crucial hour. In the winter of 1911-12 and the succeeding summer, the foreign traveller met innumerable results of Venezelos' activity in every part of the country, and all gave evidence of the same thing: a sane judgement and its inflexible execution.
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