FEAR: AN Impression of Constantinople

Maoriland Worker, Volume 12, Issue 303, 20 December 1922, Page 3

FEAR: AN Impression of Constantinople

Vj ;By FREDERICK KUH,

\ Special Correspondent, London V " Daily Herald^

•r'or a week Constantinople lias been la the clutch of fear. No one here has been inioiune from the subtle unjpasincss. i ¥ou see the frightened look on a questioning face that peers at you from a shadowy doorway. You feel it in the gestures and glances ol Jof women who pass.

Perhaps you shiver a little as you .notice the stare-of the fat man whose aeclc bulges beneath his fez, and who spants as he bustles -up to join the cluster of Greeks, Jews, Jiatl Armenians engager! in excited chatter.

A 'few.'steps, beyond, hundreds, of 'Greeks are standing in front.of their Consulate. They have been there since dawn. Each is confiding his doubts and suspicious to', a neighbour.

"They'll burn Pera when they

tome: ,.

"D'you think there'll * be a xnas-. eacre?" asks a naive girj.

They talk, talk 'incessantly. When i*he Consul's sentry permits two more applicants for passage to Greece to ient.ee the building, there is a stampede for the gate. An old man.'trying hard to maintain his bearded dignity, is flicked aside. The sentry's menacing [protests arc drowned in tue rush. Half a dozen struggling men arc Swept inside before the door is slammed.

Across (lie street two Armenian Students suddenly change tli-eir course Sand hurry into tho : narrow, dirty alley. A iHlle- child; with' a dirty, scarred face, runs off weeping.

On the street corner, citizens are scrambling (o buy the latest evening , gpaper. Unexpectedly, their hubbub Ss muffled. The silence is broken by Whirring sounds. AH faces are searching the heavens. The squadron of British aeroplanes appears, flying low; each plane emits a spurting, thin trail of translucent smoke. The wliirxing subside?, leaving an awed stillness around the newsvendor. "The- English" show his their force mow; they'll be showing us their heels aiext!" growls an embittered-Turk.' The Greek? are -rumoured to li&ye been slaughtering-• and violating in Thrace. And now, they say, the Turkish troops are coining to Constantinople. . At the l>a.zara-, where Greek aacl •Armenian, pedlars are ■ standing ..behind their counters, selling soap, Sace-s, olive?, silks, toothpaste, notebooks and patent medicines, you discover that several booths are desertie<3. Soon- you loam that they are all Selling out their wares, in order to jteave Constantinople to-morrow. There is a nervous tension about ihe cafes. Whenever a newcomer enters every guest glances towards Jloor, instinctively, as though expecting some terrible apparition. In Stamboul the Turks fear violence Jrom the Greeks and Armenians. .There is a steady procession to the Snosciiies. The'pilgrims pause to listen to the nasal chant ot a Mussulman abeg-gar alms in. the name of Allah. From somp, he receives a piastre; from others an ugly look.

' r A buglo sounds. There is the steady Toll of drums and marching feet, interspersed with the shrill whistle of fifes. Tlie fifes sound like wind Sweeping through a crack during a (thunderstorm. The noise swells in, its anonotony. Someone cries, in French. "They are coming!"

A 'battalion of tall, clean-cut Coldtetreamm Guards swings into view. iTliey pass in a twinkling. And for a ttaoment there is silence, broken only Iby the sing-song drone of the tattered jjbeggar, whose beard droops upon a roaked breast as he chants his eternal Sitany: "Alms, in the nalne of the ijpi-ophet, alms!"