Evening journal., 1915-01-25
BY HENRY WOOD.

CONSTANTINOPLE (Via Rome to
New York;, Dec. 22.-The thoughts
OF all COnstantinople. if not all OF |
Turkey. have suddenly. as If by ma
gic, become centcred upon ono sin |
gle man.
BY strange oddity. too. this man
is not the one who for tho moment
is most in the public eye. Envcr
Pasha, with his 80 years OF age, his
imperial alliance. his ministry Of war.
and his grand ambition TO put the old
Turkish empire back on the map.
awakons no especial interest i'm the
Turkish mind
Enver is a daredevil boy, they
say. who has secured for himself the
chance to have his fling and they are
quite willing that he have it. If hN|
makes good. all very we'll They are
quite filling that he have all the
credit and reward for It too But it,
he doesn't make good-well. that is
how all Turkey has suddenly begun
thinking about another man. and
who by the way of strange contrast.
is the one who at the present moment
is farthest from the public eye.
Abdul Hamid the old Sultan. the
man whom the boy Enver put down
I and out, and by whom he is now kept
shut up in a little white prison pal
ace over on the opposite shores Of
{ the Bosphorus-ths is the man of
mystery, the man of hypothecal pos
sibilities about whom Turkey has
suddenly set itself a thinking.
What is passing at this precise
moment, what schemes arc forming
in the mind OF that foxy old man
that man who was the shrewdest.
the cruelcst. the cunningest. the in
hUmanest the cleverest old lara
Turk, every inch of him-who. ever
sat on the Turkish throne? These
are the questions all Turkey is today
asking itself, and there is hardly a
member of the whole male population
who would not give at least three if
not all of the four wives accorded
him by the Koran to be able to peep
in and solve the riddle.
Abdul Hamid is now 70 years OF
age. From the night in 1909 when
Enver and his band of Young Turks
deposed him, shutting him up first in
the green high walled villa Allatainl
at SalOnika. but later for safety's
sakc-theirs. not his-taking him ia
his present prison palace at Con-
stantinople, the Turkish public has
known very little about him. Al
periodic intervals the word is passed
around that he is insane. But nc
one believes this. In the first place
they figure that Abdul's master mind
which for a quarter of a century kept
the minds a-bobbing Of most of tho
/ nf oil. 81
kind to get cracked. In the second
place, they know just how much Il
is TO the interest of the people keep,
ing him shut up to have 1t believed
that he is insane.
And then too, despite the tomb lik,
seclusion in. which he is kept apar
from the world, there creeps from
time TO time to the ears of the Tur
kish, words which the old Sultan is
declared to have uttered and which
far from creating the impression tina
he is insane, give vent TO the idea tina
he is very, very much in his righ
mind, that he is very, very much il
touch with everything that take
place IN the Turkish world without
and that he is waiting very, very fox
ily-just as foxily as he ever did be
fore-for the moment when his pris
oners may have hung themselves, 8,
step out and rule again.
And it is only recently-very re
cently-in fact since Enver draine
all Turkey of its last man, its las
"piastre.' its last animal. its las
= mouthful of food. to carry out hi
. ambitious projects. that the Turkis
ear has heard a few phrases. repute
! TO have come from the inside of tn
little white prison palace that leave
no doubt that the Sultan knows wha
all the rest of Turkey outside tn
prison walls knows-namely, afte
Enver the deluge
For to the average Turkish mint
there now remains no doubt tina
Turkey is today playing its last care
IT Enver, with the help Of German
and Austria, is victorious in his plan
to retake Egypt then the die is wor
But If bnver fails. there is no on
who does not realize that the las
resource of Turkey will have bee
spent. This will mean also tina
Enver and the Young Turks must 2,
and then-will the old Sultan com
back?
This is the great Turkish questio
of today, and the great bulk of tn
Turkish public is most favorably in
clined to accept its answer in th
affirmative. Time after time sine
Abdul Hamid's Imprisonment plot
I have developed to liberate him an
| replace him on the throne. Oster
4 sibly these plots have all develope
Z from without. Those who profess 4
/ know however. are quite certain tina