Omaha daily bee., 1908-06-14

began a series OF American revival meet.
igs. The Turks and the correspondents,
growing weary. contented themseiv es with
watching the rooms In which the gold was
kept, leaving the rsnsoming committee
free to take daily walks about the town,
After many weeks the announcement was
made that It was impossible to pay the
ransom and that the money would so back
20 Constantinople. A heavy escort Of
mounted soldiers zane and took the same
two boxes. still weighing 200 pounds apiece,
back to the railway, and a guard OF in
fantry went with them aboard the train.
After the correspondents had also taken
their leave Miss Stone and Mrs. Tsilka, her
companion, appeared quietly one evening
-unsnnounced. They were met by the mis-
sionsries and taken back to salonika. OF
course the money had been paid gradually
in small installments, and to keep the boxes
full and heavy pellets OF lead, supplied
by the brigands, a been substituted for
the gold.
They are picturesque fellows. these Bull
garian insurgents who practise brigandagc
to obtain funds for their cause. l have
met hem individually disguised in Eu-
ropean clothes or native sheepskins. as
they 90 about Macedonia, moving secretly
under the very noses of the Turks. and l
have known many in Bulgaria, VIII ere they
pass openly.
on one occasion near the Rio monastery
l came, with a fellow correspondent, upon
a band of nearly fifty who had just re-
turned from Turkey and had hidden their
guns in the mountains. Among them was
an Amazon.
Excepting the woman, whose clothes were
neatly patched, they we're q ragged,
weather marked crew. No one could doubt
that they had seen mean service.
Several of them spoke French. W. had
been officer in the Bulgarian army, one
had been a lawyer and other school teach
ers. professors in the gymnasiums,
Few of this band were clad in khaki.
One stalwart fellow had on the uniform of
a Turkish zaptieh he had shot and swelled
his chest under the yellow braid that
crossed the Jacket; the ex-lieutenants wore
their army coats, now in tatters: some
were dressed In sheepskins, and Others had
native cloaks of goats hair. things Of
broad stripes OF black and white, used for
covering man or buffalo,
Their caps and leggings told their trade.
The latter, OF wool, came up to a point
high above the knees and were trimmed
with coarse black braid. Their caps were
mostly Of the English pattern, a job lot,
one of them said. which their chief had
bought in London; but some wore the
more usual lambskin bearing the motto of
the Committee, Liberty or Death" in a
brass design above a skull and crossbones.
The Amazon was the conspicuous man"
of the band. On her arm was a red cross,
but she carried only one kind of medicine
arsenic. The cross was only an orna-
ment, for she knew nothing of medicine,
having been a washerwOman in Sofia be-
fore she took to arms. The arsenic, she
said, was for the purpose of killing herself
In case Of capture by the Turks.
She appeared to be a true patriot, and
her conversation was neither boastful MOI
pretentiously modest. She told me tina
the Turks had killed her father and mother
and her brother in a single massacre, and
that she was now lending her aid to keey
up a conflict that would drive them ouI
OF Europe.
She saw nothing ~unrishteous in capturing
europeans and making diplomatic trouble
for the sultan. ! suggested that in Europe
II was considered savage to conduct wal
OF no quarter against Greeks as well as
Turks, to which the woman replied that 1,
was savage of the Greeks and fiendish OF
Europe to support the Turks.
The little description that the woman
gave of their life in the mountains had IT,
epic side. 1t Is generally with the band
she explained, to fight or not to fight. ant
the band chooses to attack only inferior
bodies of Turks.
In the daytime the Christian warrior,
rest at the summit of some lonely noun
tain which commands q length of roat
and a breadth Of valley. and from thes,
crows nests in the heights survey tn,
loWlands and watch for their enemy
Sometimes they swoop down upon town,
WEAKLY garrisoned, and they ambush small
patrols. The travel by night, guided
from district to district by local member,
of 'the Organization"
They are simple folk, the majority O.
them, not all so clever as this Amazon
When young Abbott. taken prisoner nea.
salonica some time ago, was about. I,
; leave his captors. one and all got dow,
/ on their knees and kissed his hand. tell
ing him that he had been the means O.
making happy twenty unfortunate fam
{ lilies.
1 There are two sorts of brigands in Euro
pean turkey. Christian brigands and Mo
hammedan brigands. The former are enc
t mics OF the government and often attael
u IlihhCl ulplOnldIli
trouble for Abdul Hamid. The latter, fl
spite Of their hatred and distrust of Euro
! peans, seldom attack them. but pre-,
chiefly upon the Christian subjects of tn,
sultan, who have no country to defent
them. Once in a while, however, a Mo
hammeaan band gets out Of baud, as II
the case last week in the attack by Al
banians on the Greek and Italian trader
: in the miserable Adriatic port of SAINT
> euaranto.
The punishment melted out to brigand
who make trouble for the sultan is Dor
. trayed in an accompanying photograph
y The sultan's soldiers never destroy a no
e %torious band without decapitatlng tn
v leaders and bringing their heads 10 tn
$ nearest town. A German photographer a
t Monastir has a collection of thirty o
, forty groups like that depicted.
( FREDERICK MOORE.
e THE LAST IS THE BES'
3 -