The Turk and his lost provinces

by William Eleroy Curtis

Each of the European Powers, even Holland and Belgium, has a handsome residence and legation building. The German embassy is one of the finest edifices in Constantinople. None but the palaces of the Sultan exceed it in dimensions or pretensions. It stands in a conspicuous place and may be seen from all parts of the city. The Russian embassy is an enormous building, surrounded by a high wall, and has a hospital connected with it. The British embassy is also a fine building. Our minister usually has to live in a hotel because it is always difficult and often impossible to rent a suitable residence. At present only one house in Constantinople fit for the purpose can be secured. It belongs to an Italian nobleman who has returned to his former home in Italy, and stands in one of the most convenient and desirable sections of the city, but the cellar is full of water and cannot be kept dry. The walls are saturated with moisture, and hence the prospect of leasing it is not good. Usually the United States minister rents a residence at Therepia, a suburban town a few miles up the Bosphorus, where several of the European governments have legations for the use of their representatives during the hot season, when the heat and the filth make it impossible for them to live in the city. On the first of July the entire diplomatic corps moves en masse from Constantinople to Therepia and remains there until the first of November, when it is again safe to return. The ambassadors or their secretaries come to town nearly every day for the transaction of necessary business and to communicate with the officials of the government, and are provided with yachts for the journey. Our government is the only one of importance which does not have a yacht for the use of its minister lying at anchor near the custom-house. During the summer months he is permitted to lease a little steam launch, but at the close of the season it is sent back to its owner.

These yachts have, however, a purpose which is much more important, but it is not often mentioned. The condition of affairs in Turkey is similar to that in China, and the members of the diplomatic corps are exposed at all times to the same dangers that imperiled the legations at Peking two years ago. When a mob of Moslems, whose religion teaches them that it is their duty to kill Christians, takes possession of the city of Constantinople, it does not distinguish between foreigners. All persons who do not profess the Moslem faith are infidels and must die, no matter whether they are Armenians or English or Austrians, and the police and other officials have no means of controlling or directing the ignorant and fanatical Turks. It is considered necessary, therefore, that the members of the different embassies and legations should have means of escape always at hand, and hence the long line of steam yachts anchored at a convenient situation near the foreign quarter of the city. Germany, Russia, England, France, Austria and Italy always have gunboats anchored in the Bosphorus as an additional protection. The Turkish government requires them to be small. As a rule it will not permit a foreign man-of-war to pass the Dardanelles, but these guard-boats, as they are called, are admitted to be necessary by the police themselves, and by special treaty provision are allowed to anchor off the city.

Public confidence in the government is so small that nearly all the European nations have their own mail service. The British, German, French, Austrians and Russians have distinct and separate postoffices, because the subjects of those nations residing in Turkey cannot trust the Turkish mails. This is done with the consent of the Sultan, and is regulated by treaty stipulations. The postoffices are open to the public and can be used by anyone. The mail is put into bags, sealed and shipped by railroad to the nearest convenient point within the territory of the nation interested. The British mail goes to London, the French mail to Marseilles, the Austrian to Budapest and the Russian to Odessa. The seals are broken at those places, and the contents of the bags are turned over to the regular postal officials. At the British postoffice British stamps are sold, surcharged with the value in Turkish money. The same is true of all the other postoffices.

Tourists can no longer visit the great “Cistern of the 1,001 Pillars,” which was formerly one of the most interesting objects in Constantinople. It was built in the time of Constantine for the purpose of storing water, is one hundred and ninety-five feet long, one hundred and sixty-seven feet wide and twenty-seven feet deep. The roof is sustained by a vast forest of columns, and it is the popular notion that they number one more than a thousand. It is estimated that the cistern formerly held enough water to supply the population of Stamboul for ten days, but it has not been used since 1850 for that purpose. Constantinople has an excellent water system carried in aqueducts running to various quarters of the city. For many years this and several other great cisterns, having been pumped out, were used for storage of government supplies, but of late they have been practically abandoned, and certain Armenian manufacturers of rope, carpets and other articles which required more room than light, have been using them rent free, because of their large size and other advantages. During the massacre of 1896, however, the Turkish mob surprised the Armenians at work in this cistern and killed between sixty and seventy in cold blood. Their bodies were allowed to remain in the cistern unburied and are there still. Hence it is not an agreeable place to visit.

Two thousand children, orphans of people who lost their lives in that massacre, are employed in a carpet factory in the suburbs of Constantinople.

PART II
Bulgaria

PART II
BULGARIA

IX
RECENT HISTORY AND POLITICS

In the early days, at the time of that great soldier, Philip of Macedon, the name of Thrace was applied to the whole district south of the Danube. It was inhabited by a savage race, which Philip and his successor, Alexander, brought under subjection and incorporated into their empire. Early in the Christian era the Emperor Vespasian conquered the country, and it became a Roman province, and remained such until the horde of eastern barbarians swept up the valley of the Danube about the beginning of the third century. Among them were the Bulgari, an Asiatic clan, who remained in possession of the Balkan Mountain region and gave it their name. During subsequent centuries they founded the great Bulgarian Empire, which attained the zenith of its power during the reign of the Czar Simeon (893-927 A.D.), but fell under Byzantine rule in the eleventh century.

The first appearance of Russia in the affairs of Bulgaria was a most important event, for it has affected the politics of the country until this very day. One August morning in the year 967 A.D. 10,000 men landed from a Russian fleet at the mouth of the Danube. They were led by a valiant and hardy warrior named Sviatoslav, whose food was horseflesh and whose bed was a bearskin laid upon the ground. Since then the Russians, by reason of racial and religious relationship, have claimed the right to interfere in the affairs of the country, and no nation has shown greater sympathy with the unhappy people who have suffered so much from Turkish oppression.