The Waterbury Democrat., 1935-11-29


 through Djibouti from over the an- cient slave routes, the news is sent of in code to the capitals of Europe. The spies are scooping the journalists.
 Polylinguists, who know Arabic, Eomaliland dialects, Gallas, Am harmic and the guttural tongues of the desert tracts, are in demand. They glean from the caravan driv- CTS, from the borderland shepherds, what is happening miles away. The palm-tree wireless is working over- time.
 Rumor combatS rumor. The ba2aars, cafes and mud-hutS buzz with them. Few of them are true, they hvae purpose. To ineite, to provoke, or to calm, to subdue.
 Have Widest Appeal
 They are deep-rooted in motive and natiOnalism. They appeal to the white race, they appeal to the black race. They appeal to one re- ligion, they appeal to another. Dji- bout is the capital of rumorS, no idle purposeless reports, but ru- mors that are tenacious and libelous They could never be printed in Europe or America( but in French Somaliland, where there are no newspapers and news is coreulated only by word of mouth, the great battle of master propagandists is being fought every day and every night.
 These mysterious forces of spies and propagandists are working for many countries and recruited from still more. Many of them knew the capitals of Europe before 1914 and follow in the ways of Old World diplomacy. Others are young and newly drilled in the art of filching military secrets. But they all keep under cover and succeed in carry ing out their wellpaid work far from the actual battlefields. But the sinister espionage work does not keep Djibouti, once a slumbering port of native huts and few colonial buildings, from be- ing the Whoopee Capital of the Red Sea.
 Like Gold Rush Days AS jouralists, adventurers, mis- sionaries and lecturers jam the gateway to Ethiopia, the capital of French Somaliland is building up like a mushroom mining camp in the gold-rush days of pioneer America.
 Two open-air cabarets have sprung up in a palm studded oasis a few miles outside the city. A jazz band of Greek and Armenian musi- clans has been formed. And the first cinema in French Somaliland has been opened with ancient talkies. The four hotels of the town, filled to over-fiowing, are organiz- ing dansants, cocktail parties and soireeS.
 Even the mud-hut village is un- dergoing progressive change. The thatched novels where Arabian stomach-dancers and naked So- maitland girls performed their chants and dances are beign clean ed and redecorated.
 Amusement Boats for Rent
 There are the amusement boats that take out picnic parties to neighboring beaches where there are palm-tree groves and swim? ming holes.
 On the cafe terraces, where a few colonial Frenchmen and a scattering of Arab merchants and Ethiopian traders once sat quietly chatting over Turkish coffee or mugs of beer; there is the tinkle of iced drinks dnthe babel of for- eign voices Whisky soda," is heard in a score of foreign accents. The click of dice as the new French arrivals play backgammon competes with the postmortem bridge discussions of Americans and English.
 It is estimated that the white population of Djibouti, placed at only some 600 a year ago, today is between 5000 and 4,000. Many of this number are French soldiers and officers sent here for any emergency that may arise. Others are soldiers of fortune. adventufers, newspaper correspondents and business men.