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i io THE BALKAN WAR, 1912 [chap. ix.
could resume the cultivation of good and even intimate
relations between the two countries.
The new Russian Minister wrote and acted on these
lines, and was successful. During this same year,
H.I.M. the Emperor sent the Grand Duke Nicolas
Mikhailovitch (brother officer and intimate friend of
M. Schebeko’s) to King Charles of Rumania to present
to him the baton of Russian Field-Marshal. The old
King was much flattered by this high distinction, which
carried him back to the glorious days when he was in
command at the siege of Plevna and made the celebrated
Osman Pasha prisoner.
This whole episode proves that in our country we
were quite capable of smoothing away difficulties and
avoiding causes for discord based on exaggerated
nationalism, when we wished to. When we did not do so,
it was because we did not care to.
At the beginning of 1913, when the Rumanian claims
with regard to Bulgaria were taking shape, M. Sazonoff
thought it opportune not to contest fundamentally
the Rumanian point of view, but, on the contrary, to
support it up to a point, and then, taking the question
into our own hands, to solve it in a way which, while not
wronging Bulgaria too much, would procure some
compensations for Rumania. Consequently, I received
instructions to obtain the Bulgarians’ consent to the
action which the Rumanians were bringing against
them being examined in St. Petersburg by the
Ambassadors of the Powers, presided over by M. Sazonoff.
This was no easy task for me; the Bulgarians not
unreasonably retorted that no litigation existed between
them and the Rumanians; that Rumania, merely
profiting by the fact that the whole Bulgarian Army was in
Thrace, was claiming without any justification the
cession of a portion of the Bulgarian territory. Gueshov
alleged among other reasons the constitutional
impossibility for the Government—without the authorisation
of the Chamber, which was not sitting at the time—to
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