Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1878-04-11

I VnnrIa
sion when Leander gazed upon her 70
the first time, might easily have beer
seen from the Opposite shore and will
a good glass-which, however, Lean
der would have been unable to procure
the features of Hero herself might
have been distinguished. The channel
at its narrowest point is considerably
less than mile, and, according to some
estimates, less than half mile across.
The distance has been variously nut
down at 500 PAGES, S75 PAGES, and about
a mile. Gibbons says 500" PAGES ~
meaning, apparently by space not
the ordinary modern pace Of two feet
| but the ancient Roman pace of five feet
A respectable French authority saws
S75 "paces," but without defining the
word "pace." If, as has been gener-
ally calculated, the distance across at
the narrowest part of the Dardanelles
is about equal to the distance across
at the narrowest part Of the Bosphorus
then 600 yards may be adopted as the
correct measurement. These are the
figures of the late General Chesnev in
regard to the latter channel. arrived at
after an actual survey A swim of 600
yards would not, and doubtless did not
fatigue Leander in dne weather for
each night he made the RETURN nas-
cage. He had, however 10 strive pr,
against powertrfpe and but for
| Hero's flaming tsvct which he rnust
have kept constantly "a view, he would
have landed, as Lord Byron did some
centuries later, few miles lower down
than the point for which he had been
making. Perhaps, however, in Lean
der's time this current did not exist
or his lifeless body would not one fatal
night have been washed ashore, not far
from the temple to which the now dis
tracted Hero was attached. Besides
the Princess Helle, and at a more re.
cent period Leander and the priestess
Hero. several sailors belonging to Ad-
miral Duchworth's expedition, in the
wear 1907, are known to have been
drowned in the Hellespont. Xerxes,
too. went over from Abydos to Sestos
and some of the accidents inevitable in
such cases must have happened to the
troops of Alexander the Great, when a
portion of the infantry and all the cav
alrv of his army passed from Sestos to
Abvdos. Nor can the Turks in crossing
the Sestos, when, in 1857, the crescent
was first planted on European soil, have
been exempt from such misfortunes as,
in the conveyance OF large bodies of
men over water, are sure to be caused
by leaky boats, badly constructed RATS
and kicking horses.
Darius crossed at the narrowest part,
not of the Heiiesposa, but Of the Ros-
phorus. connecting Asia with Europe,
as Xerxes previously had done between
Abydos and Sestos, by bridge OF boats.
Here was the scene Of Mohammed Ii. Is
activity, as Sestos, on the European
shore of the HellespOnt or Dardanelles,
had been that of SOlyman three-quar-
ters of century earlier. For the Turks,
as Lord Beaconsfield pointed out last
session in an admirable speech on the
subject of Russian progress towards
the Bosphorus, did not take CONSTANT
nople all at once. They began by es-
tablishing themselves in the for-the-
mOst-part Slavonian lands known at
the present as European Turkey and it
was not until more than two genera
tions had passed since the landing of the
| Turks in Europe that COnstantinople
was attacked with success.
THE GATE TO CoNsTANTINoPLE.
The vast Importance of the Bosphor-
us, as the gate or passage to Constan-
tinople from the Black Sea, and of the
Dardanelles as its gate from the Med
iterranean, had been fully recognized by
the Roman and Greek Emperors.
Gibbon tells us that the Emperor Con-
stantine built forts At the Euxine en-
trance TO the BOspb) - i g 3
stav the excursious o. pirates, VINO nao
| been in the habit OF ialllng through Ine
Bosphorus, the sea OF Marmora, and
the Hellespont to ravage the coasts OF
the Mediterranean thence In due time
to escape by the channel through which
they had come to their practically mac
cessible harbors in the Black Sea. In
modern times Europe has never, hith.
erto, been threatened from the Black
Sea, except by the Turks themselves
who, to prevent return expeditions, OF
expeditions of any kind from the West
against Constantinople, constructed the
forts, towers or castles, as they are var
iously called, off the Dardanelles. The
castles constructed by MOhammed IL
at the narrOwest part of the Dardanellet
were the advanced posts of the Otto
man Empire on the south European
side. The Venetians, however, disre
garded them to the point of approach
ing them very closely. Accordingly
Mohammed ", to keep the Venetian
galleys from sailing so far along tn
channel, built much nearer the moutl
the castles-one on the European tn
other on the Asiatic side-which ha
since been known as the "new y one
in cOntradistinction to the "old."
The story OF the Bosphorus is less in
teresting than that Of the cannot he be iiGs dis'
from which, however, times have bee,
sociated II must so,ne,1horus and no
suclaoeo aoeod 4hat - the Bosnnoof BS.sa Of Leander
9IpPos MdIssnont was tthsSnances, for on a rocl
opposite ScutssriS, acing the entrance t.
the Bosphorus, Stands a tower which i
often, without reason, called 1.-The Tow
er of Leander." The Turks call it tn
: Tower of the Virgin - and in it. ac
cording to a Turkish legend, was con
fined the lovely daughter of Moham
med-Sultan, Mehar-Schegid by name
OF whom it had been predicted by
mysterious gypsy that she would di
by the bite of a serpent Mehar-Sche
gld's reputation for beauty spread unit
it reached the ears of the Prince ofPeI
sia. who came to Constantinople deter
, mined by some means to gain admi:
sion to the tower. He coptrived. b
bribing her attendants, to get convene
to her bouquet of symbolical flower
EXPRESSING to her in a lan0ua eya she nel
/ fectly understands the passion wit
} which she had inspired him. But, lik
t CleOpatra's basket of fruit, MehaI