Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-07-14
lily control the markets of central

The activity upon the docks indicates
that there must be large commerce on
the Caspian. The quays along the sea
shore in front of the city for mile on
more are occupied by steamers and sail
ing vessels discharGing and receiving car
goes which lie in great stacks upon the
WharyeS Long professions of carts dnd
wagons are constantly coming and gong
between the docks and the railway sta
tons. Nearly all the commerce or cen
trail Asia is handled here and II y
brought or carried away by the two rail
ways. one running to Batoum ana the
other to Odessa and MOSCOW.
Acquired by Conquest.
Baku is an ancient Persian city and
belongs to Russia by conquest major
ity of its Inhabitants are still Persians'
who furnish the manual labor. The next
largest racial division is composed OF
Armenians, who keep the small shops
and many of the larger ones, for that
matter, and constitute the mercantile
class And then come the Tartars, who
are third in number and here, as every
where else. are the disorderIy element.
The old city is a typical Persian town.
half surrounded by wall built in the
twelfth century, with monumental towers
and gates, several OF which have been
preserved. The followers of Zoroaster
came here in early times. attracted by
the burning springs OF naphtha. and built
temples for fire worship at Intervals
along the coast. The Parsecs of Bonn
BAY descendants of fire worshipers who
were driven from Persia by Mohamme-
dan mobs. formerly kept up perpetual
fire upon an altar near the city, but IT
was extinguished several years ago, and
an oil refinery now stands upon the
spot.
We had rather an exciting experience
trying to find enc of the old temples of
the fire worshipers. We hunted around
the old Persian town until we discovered
a man who knew where it was, and he
sent two small boys to show us the way.
Following them through a labyrinth of
narrow streets. we came TO small block
of land inclosed with high stone wall
and guarded by soldiers. who drove us
off. When we tried to look through the
cracks in the gates to get glimpse of
the building inside they pointed their
/, rifles at US and were dangerously demon
strative. We did not imagine that we
were doing anything wrong. Our mo-
tiyes were as innocent as those of a
sunday school teacher. but the guard
evidently suspected that we were up to
some kind of mischief, and finally threat
ened us with instant death unless we left
the place.
Friendly Citizen Explains.
At that critical moment a polite citi-
zen came along who demonstrated with
| the belligerent guard. He explained to
us that the ancient temple was now used
as a magazine for ammunition, and had
to be closely guarded because of the en-
ergy of anarchists and revolutionists in
the city.
There is a Byzantine fortress 500 years
old and an imposing tower $50 feet high
and eighty-four feet in diameter 1t is
circular in form. with oblong ex-
tension and built Of regular courses of
cut stone alternating out and in about
four inches. There are four doors at
the base, but they are all sealed up ex-
cept one They call 1t the kiskala which
in Persian means the tower of the vir-
GIN" Several romantic stories are told
about it's origin. but We finally discov-
cred that it was built for prison by
the early Persians and is now used by
the Russians for the storage of military
supplies.