ABDUL KABUL'S SHODDY.

Auckland Star, Volume XL, Issue 271, 13 November 1909, Page 17

ABDUL KABUL'S SHODDY.

"VULGARITY" AND "BAD TASTE" OF PALACE FTJBNITTJBB. The legendary luxury and splendour of Yildiz Kiosk, the palace of the ex-Sultan of Turkey, Adbul Hauila, are declared by a Constantinople correspondent of the •'Cabinet Maker," to have been grossly exaggerated. Through the part he took in organising a gala at Tildlz, on behalf of the Adana Fund, the correspondent had, remarkable opportunities for exploring the palace. "The whole place looked mean," he states. "The passages are small. Cupboards seam to be a mania. With a very few exceptions, the private apartments contain nothing of value. The general Idea of the furniture ■was that it was not only poor but in exceedingly bad taste." The ex-Sultan's apartments were exactly as they were left on the night he was taken ac a prisoner to Salon'ca. "The Sultan was at the time evidently trying to get some rest onca couch. His papers were still on the floor — the "Serbrsti," his favourite newspaper, on the table. The editor has since been hanged. "The room adjoining contained another couch, on which was sleeping Abdul Rahani, one of his sons. The quilts and slippers— the quilts thrown back and partly on the floor — show the hurried way he left his couch. On the table ore two bottles, pne a cordial and the other some 'heart and nerve tonic , the Sultan used to take. The Sultan's bathroom is quite a small apartment. Some of the cabinets look as though they had come from n barber's shop. His study was one mass of desks and cupboards. "Tie windows Ere not properly pnlnted. One of the carpets has a large hole in It. His quarters were not only small and mean, but so stuffy and hot we were glad to get out. his bathroom is another small room in which he woiked as a carpenter. Inlay of various coloured woods, nlso pearl, end some five or six panels In his study are said to be his work. They look like it. The drawing te bad and the mixture of coloured woods quite vulgar. The workmanship, however, Iβ neat and accurate." The ex-Sultan's "shirt room" Is described as lined with "shelves all round covered with plush. He has a few hundred plush boxes of shirts and vests of all kinds. Some two thousand waistcoats show his mania for new things, which he never wore. Perhaps the most Interesting articles are the bulletproof watotcoate. He had three of them."