PROGRESS IN PALESTINE.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 26, Issue 63, 3 August 1915, Page 8

PROGRESS IN PALESTINE.

The march m modern progress in Asiatic as well as European Turkey is remarkable. To-day ancient Damascus, a city more typically Eastern than Beirut or Constantinople has its electric street car system. The local council of elders, wind seems to be an amazingly modem spirited body of men, has made provision out of the city treasury tc light the public streets with. K.-00 art lamps. Even the grand mesque is now lit by electricity. The nali.ef have taken very kindly to electricity, and it is owing to their appreciation of its benefits that electric companies have been granted concessions to supply Beirut. Aleppo, and Smyrna Jerusalem has just obtained a ne\i town clock and a new fire engine. Fires are of rare occurrence, owing to the solid construction of the houses and the absence of timber. A chamber of commerce has also been established in the Holy City. A concession for a railway from a point near Jaffa to historic Gaza and thence to the Egyptian frontier has been applied for by an Italian capitalist. Other lines contemplated are from Haifa to Jaffa along, the coast, and from Jerusalem to Bs Salt and the Hedjaz line. This would be of great importance in affording access to the sea to districts as yet almost devoid of means of communication. A great triumph has just been achieved in Constantinople itself Under Abdul Hamid’s regime thi telephone was rigidly excluded from Turkish dominions on political grounds. The new Government has just accepted a scheme submitted b| an American-Britlsh-Prench group for the establishment of a telephone service in the Turkish capital.—Londea Letter,