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[Illustration: Cover: Under the Red Crescent 1877-78]




UNDER THE RED CRESCENT.




[Illustration: Charles Ryan Walker & Boutall, Ph. Sc.]




UNDER THE RED CRESCENT:


ADVENTURES OF AN ENGLISH SURGEON
WITH THE TURKISH ARMY AT
PLEVNA AND ERZEROUM,
1877-1878.


RELATED BY
CHARLES S. RYAN, M.B., C.M. EDIN.,
IN ASSOCIATION WITH HIS FRIEND
JOHN SANDES, B. A. OXON.


WITH PORTRAIT AND MAPS.


NEW YORK:
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS,
153-157, FIFTH AVENUE.
1897.




DEDICATION.

    THIS RECORD
    OF
    THE STIRRING ADVENTURES OF MY EARLY YEARS
    I DEDICATE TO MY SON
    RUPERT.

    C. S. R.




PREFACE.

In submitting to the popular verdict this book, which aims at being a
plain, straightforward account of the experiences of a young Australian
in the last great battles which have been fought in Europe, I feel that
a few words of explanation are necessary.

In the first place, it may be asked why I have allowed twenty years to
elapse before giving these reminiscences to the world. I must answer
that, as a hard-working surgeon leading a very busy life, I had but
little "learned leisure" at my disposal; and I must also admit that I
did not feel myself equal to the literary labour of writing a book.
Indeed it might never have been written if my friend Mr. Sandes had not
agreed to my suggestion that he should reproduce in a literary and
publishable form the language of the armchair and the fireside, and so
enable me to relate to the world at large some of the incidents which my
own immediate friends, when listening over the cigars to my
recollections, have been good enough to call interesting. So much for
the matter of the book, and also for its manner.

In the second place, military critics as well as the general public may
be inclined to wonder how it was that a young army surgeon, a mere lad
in fact, should have been allowed to play such an independent part in
the field operations at Plevna as is disclosed in the following pages,
and should have been permitted to move about the battle-field and engage
in active service, with the apparent concurrence of the general staff
and of the officers commanding the different regiments. In reply, I have
to explain that the Ottoman army was not guided by the hard-and-fast
regulations which no doubt would render it impossible for a junior
surgeon in any other European army to act on his own volition and carry
on his work as he might think best himself. Furthermore, I may mention
that through my close friendship with Prince Czetwertinski, who was the
captain of Osman Pasha's bodyguard, I was always kept in touch with the
progress of the military operations; and I am also proud to say that I
enjoyed the confidence of Osman Pasha himself, and was on terms of the
closest intimacy with that gallant and true-hearted soldier Tewfik Bey,
who won the rank of pasha for his magnificent courage when he led the
assault that drove Skobeleff from the Krishin redoubts.

These facts may explain many of the adventures narrated in this book
which would be inexplicable to critics accustomed to the rigid
discipline under which medical officers do their work in other European
armies.

It is only right to say, in conclusion, that I consider myself
singularly fortunate in my coadjutor, who, while he has brightened this
narrative of my early adventures with all the resources of the practised
writer, has nevertheless left the truth of every single incident
absolutely unimpaired. At a time when the Eastern Question looms like a
huge shadow over Europe, and when the very existence of the Turkish
Empire is once more threatened, may I hope that this story of the
military virtues of the Ottoman troops may not be found without real
interest?

    CHARLES S. RYAN.
    Melbourne, _July_, 1897.




    CONTENTS.

    CHAPTER I. PAGE
    FROM MELBOURNE TO SOFIA.

    Autobiographical--My Wanderjahr--First Glimpse of
    Servians--Rome--A Prospective Mother-in-law--Sad Result of
    eating Chops--A Spanish Poet--The Chance of a Lifetime--How I
    seized it--Garcia's Gold Watch--The Via del Poppo--Off to
    London--Engaged by the Turkish Government--Vienna
    revisited--Stamboul--Origin of the Crescent--Misserie's
    Hotel--The Turkish Character--A Splendid Belvedere--View from
    the Seraskierat Tower--Scutari and Florence
    Nightingale--Stamboul by Day and Night--Scene in a
    Bazaar--Three Sundays a Week--A Trip to Sweet Waters--Veiled
    Beauties--I am gazetted to a Regiment--An Official Dinner--Off
    to the Front--A Compulsory Shave--My Charger--The March to
    Sofia--My First Patient--Prescription for a Malingerer--Mehemet
    Ali--My Soldier Servant--Diagnosing my Cases--Bulgarians at
    Home--At Sofia--MacGahan the War Correspondent--Learning
    Turkish--A Dinner in Camp--Leniency to Bulgarians--A Lady
    Patient--So near and yet