The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1922-11-08
BULGARS TRY
 GOVERNMENT
 EXPERIMENT EMSGa &ARAsAA4ah
B ul g aria n s Experiment With Senni-Comnunistic Government.
By CLARA MOLD, International News Service Staff

Correspondents. 5oItsA, Nov. 8-Compu1sory labor, conf1scation of lands, rationing of liv- ing quarters-that is what living in Bulgaria means today. Under its ernment the Bulgarian is rapidly learning that his is an experimental country.
 One of the first things a foreigner learns in Bulgaria is that he must not agree, even for the sake of friendli- ness, with the Bulgar who criticizes his own country.
 He may tell you that his country is going to the dogs. But nod your head ever so little and he will bounce upon you and finally point with pride to the programme of the peasant govern ment he has just denounced.
 Bulgaria" said Professor Stepha- move, the Macedonian who represented Bulgaria in London in 1915, when the Bulgarian Government attempted to get Great Britain to recognize certain claims Bulgaria made to Macedonia as a preliminary to entering the war with the Allies, 'is a compact race fectively. We have shown this in our programme of compulsory labor, ap- piled with the greatest effectiveness.
 Mainly Agricultural.
 tfWe are an agricultural people, and as such it was difficult to interest our people in road repairs, in repairs to our public buildings.
 MT. Stamboliskf and his Govern uent conceived the idea of an army of workers instead of an army of fighters. They called on every man between the ages of eighteen and thirty and every woman over eighteen and not married to give six nlonths of labor to the country. In addition they were to give ten days of labor every year after giving six months. Men from eighteen to fifty years Of age must give ten days of labor each year. and all school children over seven years give one week.
 ho. roh TiCjey against this plan, but we have better roads than we had before the war. Our school buildings are kept clean, and our young people grow up with an idea of doing something for the state.
 Those who are taken away from other work for this service recefve their wages just the same the burden falling upon the employer"
 Land ConfiScated.
 It was Professor Stephanove who also discussed land conf1scation. From the large landholders has been taken what was needed for the peasants The landholder is left with about 1OO a"res. The peasant is given anywhere ] m twenty to fifty acres-enough to make a good living.
 Naturally the controversy over this part of the agrarian programme is most bitter, but the peasant popula tion of Bulgaria is 90 per cent.
 It was shortly after my arrival in Sofia that I called upon the wife of wealthy merchant of Bulgaria. found in her drawing-room, besides the usual furniture, a bed. "My brothers bed" she explained.
 "In Bulgaria. she continued, t'we are so crowded for living quarters that each municipality dictates the number of rooms you may live in.''
 Professors Suffer.
 As in Germany and Austria and Russia, the class that suffers the most in Bulgaria these days is not the ordinary laboring class but the pro- fessors. The professors of the Univer- sity at Sofia receive 2,0O0 leva a month-a little more than twelve dol lars. The poorest paid stenographer of the Preparations Committee in Bull garia receives three times that amount
 As a matter of fact, there is little poverty on the surface of things in Bulgaria, largely because the country almost never sees beggars.
 Bulgaria encourages private owner ship-but private ownership for every one. If you are a peasant you must own your land
 Bulgaria is not allowed a standing army of fighters any more, and only a few tn housand volunteer troops guard the borders. She has, however a standing army of workers. It was this army of peasant workers that de- feated communism in Sofia and Bul garia in 1919.
 If war steps over the border Of Bulgaria from Jugo-S1avia or from Hungary-then, say the Communists the revolution will be on its way again.