The St. Mary banner. (Franklin, Parish of St. Mary, La.) 1889-1931, 1913-01-04
ONE VIEW OF ADRlANOpLE

lOO want 10 get away lTOm IAo
world OF trusts and strikes and
monopolies. away from the clan
gor of car bells and the shrieks
of itinerant newsboys, and back
to time when, four times a day. the
long-pronounced walls Of a score Of
muezzeius sound from as many min
| arets; where competition Is unknown
and there are no labor unions, go by
rail across Macedonia to Adrianople,
the strategic point in every trans
Macedonian war!
Half an hour after midnight. pro-
verbal black Turkish night. with the
crickets singing and the boys peddling
water at the stations, the east-bound
all-Macedonian express deposited me
at station labeled Karaghatch-
somewhere this side of Constantine
ople, undoubtedly, but how far from
my destination, the old capital Of the
Ottoman empire. Adrianople, | had not
the faintest idea. There was light
baggage examination, for came here
from Salonika and there is always
baggage examination between pro-
vinces in Turkey, and then they went
for my teskeret, or internal passport.
Where l had come from, where had
told the Salonika police ! was bound
for, what country | hailed from, my
profession, general characteristics,
etc, all were copied in the feeble light
Of station lantern, while the crickets
sang on and the hours grew ever
wee'er and wee'er
Finally, after registering the names
OF the newspapers l represented, / was
turned loose to find my way. There
were two or three ramshackle cabs
standing about and l hired the one
whose driver seemed to have least Of
the bitterness of life written in his
face.
Over lone, dark fields and down a
pike. feebly lif-by gas lamps. over
bridge across the Martha, into which
my cicerone could have hurled the in
fldel passenger and no man been the
wiser, and up to the doors OF the Hotel
America (think Of IT'D, / was taken.
1t was one by the town clock when we
galloped thus into Adrianople
By means OF a narrow door we en-
tered courtyard. surrounded by low
veranda, onto which the guest rooms
opened. 1t took up another half hour
to wake the proprietor and then l was
given bed. l was again In America,
withal in the heart OF Turkey. at last!
Afraid to Walk Streets.
Waking early that next morning the
prospect was not reassuring. A maze
Of gray-brown roofs stretched of on
every hand. That was all. After an
experienced in Monastir where we had
been arrested for walking the streets,
under the plea that they mistook me
for a spy, dared not venture forth
In this city without authorized guide,
and that gentleman was not at leisure
until 11:15. l beguiled the time as
does every other stranger thus put to
it in Adrianople, with Myer, the Bae-
deker of the Balkans, attempting to
learn what we could Of the city beyond
the fact Of its containing branch Of
the Ottoman bank, and Austrian, as
well as Turkish, postoff1ces which is
always the fact thrust first on the
traveller.
This Adrianople, the old capital of
Turkey in Europe, lies at the junction
Of the Martha, the Arda and the
Tundsche rivers in most fertile val
ley Now the capital of the vilayet or
province of the same name, Adrian
ople, has fallen from its former glory,
and, as was already aware, was made
up Of narrow. crooked, badly-plastered
streets, dirty as is only Turkey in de-
cadence, withal that movement was
now on foot for widening the main
thoroughfare. The town is built al
most entirely of lightly constructed
shanties. with gardens and cobbling
walks until it takes on the appearance