Saturday news. (Watertown, S.D.) 19??-19??, 1913-02-06
SEES THE
OLD SOD
Watertown Boy Writes an Inter-
esting Letter to His Parents
About Scenes in Old World.
ON BOARD BIG BATTLESHIP
Young Man Sees Many Strange
and Interesting Sights and
Writes About Them.

Howard Bronson, who was born and
raised in Watertown and is the son
of Mr.. and Mrs. Fred M. Bronson, OF
this city, writes very interesting let.
ter to his parents regarding the land
of Turkey. where he in now stationed
with the United States warship Ten
nessee." The big battleship is now
III Turkish waters looking after the
interests of American citizens in Tur
key during the Balkan war.
Smyrna Turkey, Jan. 13.-This *
getting very monotonous, lying at an
chor in this place. Christmas day, al
though in a heather land, l attended
Episcopal service. We were requested
to play the Christmas music and it
did seem good to listen to an Episco.
pal service in this far-away land. The
interior of the church is almost identi-
cal to the one at home, and the service
was exactly the same, making me
very homesick. Outside the English
portion the city did not know whether
it was Christmas day or Easter. One
afternoon | visited the remains of an
Great 1,1O0 years before Christ, The
castle stands upon a high hill back
Of the CITY, .,cemmansinsH:an an excellent
view of the surrounding country and
harbor. All that remains of the cas-.
tie is the walls and underground dun
geons. Just below the wall on the
slope of the hill stands the tomb of
one of the earliest martyrs of the
Christian faith, St. Polycoph. The
Greek Catholics observe this as holy
day. 1t was celebrated a short time
ago and the graves were still decorat-
ed.
Thousands of refugees flock into
this city every week. They are quar-
tered in army barracks and in public
buildings. The suffering caused by
the war is terrible. 1t is no wonder
the Turks are getting the worst of it,
mems of humanity that l ever saw
They look more like animals than men
They are forced to fight, so have no
interest in doing SO.
walked through the real Turkish
part of the city, where the houses
are built of stone and mortar, with
red tiled roofs. l passed several
groups of women who were heavily
veiled and guarded by black women
The ordinary Turk is allowed seven
wives. A high official may have any
number.
The needlework of the people is
marvellous. Turkish rugs are fine and
last a life time, made by hand with
needles. 1t takes long time to make
one Women get two piestres per day
that is about sixteen cents of our
money.
January 4, three hundred of us took
a special train and under the guidance
of the president of the American col
lege, took trip to the ruins of the
ancient city of Ephesus, which is
about the best known city in Biblical
history aside from Jerusalem. We left
the ship at 6 o'clock and after some
very interesting sight seeing from the
car windows arrived at the station
Ephesus The people Of Christs time
could have had no more primitive way
of tilling the soil than those of the
present day. Men and women work
side by side in the fields and as each
man has so many wives they work in
ing skirts, wear loose-fitting panta-
loon which is tight at the ankle, bag
gy in the leg, and tight again at the
hips, which makes very picturesque
dress. The fields are plowed with
wooden plows drawn by oxen, and the
soil in this manner is barely scratched.
Upon slighting from the train the
4 first thing that greets the eye is the
ruins of a huge fortress, which is
rapidly crumbling away in parts. On
o1IS eide it is as solid as it ever was
The remains of the city are a mills
and a half from the railway, and vi
to about ten years ago the city was
4 almost entirely untouched. The Brit
y ish museum and society from Vienna