The Cordova daily times., 1920-03-22


 fleets of British control, is it's geographical situation. MOSul is the meeting point of roads and caravan routes from everywhere. They wind in through the mountain passes and over the rocky highland from Diar- bekr and Bitlis, across the great des- ert from Aleppo and over the sands from Persia and Bagdad. Its very name, indeed, from the Arabic AL Mousil, "the place of connection" tells It's story. And as with roads and car avan routes, so it will be, some time again in the future in the matter of railways, when the famous Bagdad line is completed, says the Christian Science Monitor. At present Ger many's great effort falls short of Mo- sul by many miles in the west and In the south, and the "ramshackle city," as it has been irreverently called, still depends for it's communi- &ations on the road and the caravan route as it has done through the ages.
 Of all the cities in the Turkish en- plre, as one writer has well said of it, perhaps Mosul is the one that has been least touched by western civili- ZatiOn. Built on ground that once was a suburb of Nineveh, it stands on the western bank of the Tigris, looking across at the mounds which are ali that remain of the glories of the cap- tai of ancient Assyria. Nineveh has a history that stretches throughout period nearly two thousand years long, ending with the fall of the en- pire of Sennacherib about the year 600 B. c. From that time until Lay ard unveiled the palaces of Ashur- banipal and Sennacherib, and un- earthed the literary chamber contain ing the famous deluge tablet the ru- ins of Nineveh for 2,50O long years have slept undisturbed. AS for Mosul itself, it is particularly mentioned in all history since the Arab conquest and it is checkered history indeed f1r it suffered pillage at the hands of Tamerlane, was besieged by Nadir Shah, and endured a host of other vi- cissitudes.
 V MosuPs Many storks.
 The old town, with it's strangely narrow streets, even for the east is surrounded by half.ruined wall, built in modern times as protection against the Shammar Arabs. Every one remarks on the narrow streets of Mosul, on its white, crumbling houses, on the gypsum dust which falls con- stantly from the walls over everything, and upon the stOrks. Indeed the storks of Mosul are apparently it's most remarkable feature.
 Discussing the matter one authority tells how, in the cool of the evening, the citizens of Mosul share their hOusetOps with innumerable stOrks, who build their ragged nests on the highest places 'in utter disregard of the laws of gravity" Four great, pre- pOsterous specimens of the species stood, in the early morning, on a wall beside the room where he was, he con- tinues, and he dimly realized that Ney were performing their morning toilet. They took no notice of him. BYt loud noise like someone rattling a stick in a wooden bucket attracted his attention. Then somebody else with another bucket made a similar noise in a different key, and he won- dered what in the world could they be doing to the buckets. Then it dawned upon him that half the population of Mosul must be rattling buckets, for the sound came from far and near, faint or loud according to distance, and in hundred different keys. Then came a loud rattle close beside him. ''Within nine feet of him." he says, ''stood a solemn stork, the toilet over, his attitude of graceful balance on one