172 CHRISTIAN GREECE AND LIVING GREEK. About 18 18 the Hetairia commenced to prepare the Greeks for a change of their condition to be expected in the near future. Greece was ready for liberty. All her population were but waiting the moment to shake the chains from their limbs. The apostles of the brotherhood had everywhere good ground. When the war broke out there was a want of organization either military or political, the means were insufficient, and there was no al- liance and no hope of help from any foreign nation. On the side of the Osmanli there were power and strength; the struggle was to be a desperate one. Hellas in fighting for many years against her gigantic oppressor received no quarter, her population became much more than decimated, in the field, by massacres, by epi- demics. Turkish savagery spared nothing. The towns were destroyed. The country was laid waste. When all the bloodshed, the horrors of was were over, only a little fraction of the Hellenic race obtained independence. Three hundred thousand Hellenes gave up their lives in order that six hundred thousand might be free. This independence could be won only sword in hand in order to wash out the stains of slavery. Some people thought the Greeks, instead of
