Norwich bulletin., 1922-10-30


 from the Washington. D. C., hesdquar- ters of the National Geographic society. based on compuniation from sosita Solano.
 The devastating fires that have erer been working toward the dsauction of constautinople caused the city to be built anew every fifty years, until a law was passed prohibiting the construction of wooden houses on the site of burned ones; in fact. it vas provided that DO houses at all should be built until tue city government planned new streets.
 Nothing has been done about the planning, however. and the result is that one-fourn of Stamboul-more than a. 900 houses. burned during the past F years-st1 lies in ashes. Seutari. too. has vast ruined sections. So has Pers, on much smaller scale.
 - When a fire starts in gtamboui it nearly always assumes frightful propor- tions. h the fire of 1908, T 500 build ipgs were destroyed: in that of 1s11, 2-fs3 houses; the following day an en- tire Jewish quarter burned; in 1si3 an immense area between Ssncta Sophia and the Marmora was consumed. The fire of June, 1918, burned 5000 buildings. clearing a space from the-6eldeu Horn through the center of the city. Theee fires are enormously destructive because of the narrow streets, wooden houses: and volunteer thremen who go to answer the call on foot. carrying a punp on ] their shoulders
 ''rhe tiremen of \constartinople are worthy a story in theuseiyes Uupsid for their services. they reason like tb5s: Fe don't go to this fire. the oHn- CT will lose all his belongings If ye 70 and take some of them home with us and leave some to him. is he not better on than if we hadn't come at aiig We I give our services free of charre: the | owner must give us bakshish if he vsnfs i us to risk our lives for him
 We get to the fire as quickly ss He can run, and if the owner does not con- sent to give us money at once. 90 NC can get to work. the fire will gain beadvay 1; that is not our fault. but his l It was a cause for grief and acusa- | tions of injustice when the British in- stalled their own fire system in Pera- By the time the Turks come panting down 1 the street to bargain. the British have | the nre out and are driving away Il The walls that inclosed Byzantium | and saved civilization for a thousand years are still standing, and constitute, with the exception of Sancta Sophia, ths most interesting historical monument in | Turkey.
 The impression produced by these battered and lonely ruins is ineradica, ble. The lines of walls and towers still stretch out as far as the ere can see rising and falling. tinted from dars brown to ocher and gray, sometimes covered with vegetation. They are bar. barrie, threatening. mourufui. Modern Constantineple is forgotten as -one tries to imagine what these bar riers seemed like to the hordes of bar barians who came every few years looked at those miles of moated ant turreted walls. and then turned back.
 Nov gypsies and refugees live her, and there in the ruins that extend fo five miles across the isthmus, from fh, Sea of Narmera to the Golden Horn They rob the gardens which are cult l vated in the old meats. and watch wit
 astonishment the occasional sirplan ! that buzzes high over the v3iis . ) | Theodosfus IL
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