Catoctin clarion. [volume] (Mechanicstown, Md.) 1871-1940, 1920-10-07
ADR|AN0PLE IS
BEAUTIFUL CITY
Airman Describes Romantic
Charm of Mosques and
Gardened Homes.
DECADENCE OF CITY GOES ON
Strangers Treated Kindly In an At.
mosphere Of Friendship-city En-
dures Its Shabby Gentility
With Pride and Calm.

Adrianople, Thrace.-The decadence
economic disintegration, wars with
out end, and an uncertain future. have
been unable to destroy the ineffable
charm the TURKS originally gave to
this city of eighty-odd thousand souls.
Adrianople is still a holy city in faith
and in appearance. Romance still
abides here.
"The Orient Is the only place left
to Europe where cities seen at, close
range are beautiful" remarked Jules
Scbotin. French aviator, while WIS.,
iting the most beautiful of all mosques,
Sinnn's masterpiece here, the mosque
Of thousand windows but one. erect
ed at the order Of Sultan Selim H., in
the sixteenth century.
The first impression Of the city has
been one Of infinite beauty. Arriving
from across the lofty Balkans in an
airplane, the city had been seen wIrn
rush. place of spires. and slate
dOmes and red roofs, planted at the
intersection of three rivers. 1t had
been q welcome sight. 1t had come at
the end of q fOur-hours' ride and 1t
was the journeys end to tired avia-
tor.
Charming AIoft or Afoot.
Seen from aloft, the city, surround
ed by popars at its outer rim, its
house gardens within the city showing
green vines and flowers, Its outlying
fields bare. aroused memories of Mar
din on mountains; Diarbekr by the
Tigris and hosts of other Turkish
cities, always sleeping in beauty,
whether visited by sunshine or moon
light.
The longer the stay in Adrianople
the more the charm of its beauty
grows a~tharm that Is as great afoot
as alOft.
Adrlanople Is city That has the
tone of country friendship about it,
not unlike a county seat Of the South.
The center Of the agricultural exchange
business of Eastern and Western
Thrace, 1t is frcquented by peasants
and traders of Turkish Greek, Bull
SuI JcN IFii uIll
alities. There Is record Of but one
American ever having done business in
the city, and he came here from Paris
and bought up all the brooms.
While no day knows what the next
day may bring forth in the way of
political strife and crime, today the
city preserves this tone of friendship
and order Strangers as they go along
the streets or visit the shops are
treated with kindly concern. The
Turkish officers salute cOurteOusly
and there is no CLINT Of hostility in
the eyes of the Turkish soldiers car
rying their new rifles, recently dis
tributed to them by Col. Defer Tayar
Bey.
The decadence Of Adrianople goes
at dignified pace. There is little or
none of the seething squalor and dirt
and noise and poverty of CONSTANT
nople. There is none of the clamor
of Constantinople's street cars and
automobiles.
Pride In Shabby GentiIity,
There are few ragged beggar
children who besiege the stranger, but
for the most payt Adrianople endures
its shabby gentility with pride and
calm. Here there are none of the
fallen houses and dusty streets which
characterize the majority of the cities
of Asia Minor.
Prayers are called from the NINA
rets as of old; also the old and new
baZaars do slender business in sell
ing American and European calicoes
and homespun cloths and Turkish
silver mounted pipes and cigarette
holders, rugs, junk, to passing peasant
customers; or else when these are
lacking they swap with each other, af-
ter the happy manner Of all the ORR
ent.
Decadence seems to have heightened
the beauty of the majestic old mosque
Of Sultan Bayzid. The windows are
broken in, the locks are rusted in the
doors, the grass is growing up between
the flagstones, the fountain In the
court no longer splashes Its water in
the sunshine, and the interior of the
mosque itself is slowly deteriorat-
ing.
Few worshlpers come here, but on
the drowsy Friday afternoons, the
Mussulman's day of worship, come a
devoted band of musicians and sing
ers. The avitor stumbled upon this
group and one of the red-fezed band
saluted with the simplicity of the Turk
and said. "Allah esmarladik. INLAY
God abide with you"