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i9i3] NATURE OF THE TREATY 207
strictly conscientious prayer for the living and for the
dead.
The idea of profiting by events which had developed
in the Balkan Peninsula to stipulate for the independence
of Mt. Athos was consequently an essentially Russian
idea. It offered no direct political advantages, but it
constituted a striking recognition of the Russian
religious ideal, and should yield beneficial results of
a cultural and political order. From the time of Peter
the Great, and until the present day, Russian policy has
striven at every favourable opportunity to enhance and
glorify the name of the autocratic monarch, to strengthen
the naval and military power of the Empire, to further
the interests of commerce, and, finally, either to free the
Christian nationalities of a common origin of the
East or to ameliorate their lot. But it was the first
time that our diplomacy had thought of the defence and
the glorification of the Russian popular ideal, and had
recognised the importance of the work of simple men
of the people, who had brought the leaven of their faith
to the East, and had accomplished a real spiritual
conquest there.
When 1 received from St. Petersburg the account of
the stipulations of the Conference of London, I heartily
congratulated M. Sazonoff on his idea concerning Mt.
Athos.
The peace treaty of Bukharest presents quite a
different structure. It does not constitute a definite
settlement of the troubles of the Near East, but only
a settlement of the war of 1913 between the Christian
nationalities of the Balkan Peninsula. Bulgaria, as the
initiator of this fratricidal contest, was to undergo just
punishment, and her former allies had a right to
territorial gains at her expense, gains which would
have made them more powerful and less exposed to
Bulgarian greed and ambition. But, if this condition
could and should be admitted with regard to Serbia,
Greece, and even Rumania, it was in no way to the
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