The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1915-12-04
GATES TO BLACK SEA
IMPORTANT POINTS WHICH ARE
MAKING HISTORY TODAY.
May Again Determine the Future OF
Europe, as They Have Done in
Gigantic Conflicts of
the Past.

With the northwestern battle thea
ter of the Turks proclaimed by the war
prophets as that where the deciding
master strokes in this most titanllke
Of all struggles are to be delivered, a
sketch OF this remarkable regions past
prepared by Harry Griswold Dwight
for the National Geographic society is
of more than usual interest Here the
West won it's self-confidence, and this
confidence has borne fruits with SPLEEN
did richness for longer than 1000
years Here the course of civilization
has been changed and modified sew
eral times, and here again today the
attention of the world is fixed in the
belief that the future of Europe will
once more be determined by events
about to transpire. In the bulletin is
sued by the National Geographic So
ciety Mr.. Dwight tells about The Gates
to the Black Sea-
There is something alluring in
the very shape and position OF these
lakes-the Black sea and the Sea of
Marmora-separatin as they do the
two most historic continents of our
globe and communicating with each
other and with the outer seas by
openings that seem miraculous. And
those 1andlocked waters nave. been
from earliest times as they happen
again to be today, the theater of epic
events. For us of the West no
legends are older than those OF Zeus
and 10, of Phryxus and Helle, of the
Trojan war, of Jason and the Argo,
which commemorate the earliest voy~
ages into the Great Lakes of the Lee
want.
"Of the two, the Marmora-the Pro
points, if you prefer to be classical
is by far the smaller. Not much more
than 100 miles long and some 40 miles
across at it's broadcast part, it is about
the same size as Lake Champaign. The
Marmora has much of the softness Of
air, vividness of color and beauty of
scenery that we associate with the
Aegean and Ionian seas. Thread the
narrow slit of the Bosporus, however,
and you pass into an entirely different
world terner, barer, rocker, colder.
IF the Marmora may be compared
to Lake Champlain, the Black sea is
about four times the size Of our great
est lake Lake Superior is Az miles
long by 1877 wide, while the Black sea
has length of $50 miles and breadth
of 1856. That there is something dark
and unfriendly about it is more than
a legend.
cat the moment at which I write
the fleets of France and England are
hammering at the historic gateway.
Thus the question of the Black sea,
which is the ancient question of the
straits, is posed anew, more dramati-
cally than ever before. Is it for a
final solution? No solution can be
found the writer concludes, which
will give any one nation an absolute
right of control over the Bosporus
and the Dardanelles."
Zeppelin Bombs.
There are many different kinds of |
bombs dropped from Zeppelins and
aircraft. They are divided into two
main classes-explosive and incen-
diary bombs. The explosive ones are
divided again into those dropped with
no initial velocity, and those propelled
with high initial velocity in somewhat
the same way as bullet is propelled
from a gun. The first kind of explo-
sive bomb is more used than the Sec
ond, and explodes upon hitting the
ground. In an article on. the "zeppe-
lin Question" by Mr.. Prade, published |
in translation in the Scientific Ameri- |
can for April 8, 1915, it is stated that
nowhere have bombs been found |
more than 40 kilos Cos |
pounds. This was the weight, says
Mr.. Prade, "of the bomb found intact |
ut Yarmouth. 4. Large naval d.
rigibles which appeared over the Eng
fish coast certainly had not 1000 kilos
(2,204 pounds) of explosives ON board,
which is proved by the fact that they
did not throw that number, as they
would hardly have returned with any
From this Mr.. Prade
proves that the bombs do not weigh
more than so kilos at most, and that
each Zeppelin carried at the most 20
bombs.
Coal Tar Of Immense Value.