TURKEY'S TIME OF CRISIS.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 7912, 28 July 1917, Page 4 (Supplement)

TURKEY'S TIME OF CRISIS.

LIFE IN CONSTANTINOPLE TO=DAY. (The following article represents the expressed views of a foreign official w'i'j has had recent opportunity of personally investigating the everyday conditions of life in Turkey. We have every confidence in the writer.) ‘ —“Daily News.”

mHE Turkish Empire has often been in very difficult circumstances in tho past, but never, in the opinion both of the Turks ■anal the members of the Diplomatic Corps) at Constantinople, has its situation ever been as critical and precarious as at present. No one knew exactly why Enver Pasha hurried off to Berlin >and iVenna early in the year, but at the Turkish Foreign Office the officiate, at the time, when the subject cropped up, looked very grave, and talked vaguely about a. serious situation having arisen. When Enver came back some weeks -ago he told the public, through the newspapers, that the mission had succeeded beyond* all anticipation, whereas r.t the Club de Constantinople,l once practically a British institution, of which the Grand Yir.ier .te the present president, he told (as r happen to know), one of :.iis closest friends, that liis reception at Berlin was cordial, but that evervone “ wa,;.i too flurried and upset to pay much attention to his proposals.”

when the thousands of wounded poured into Constantinople from tile Dardanelles. The sight of their dying menfolk caused several hundred women to march to the War Office to call on tbe Government to give them back their husbands and their souk.

In Turkey, uj in Oliver belligerent Countries, tile war lias opened up new avenues of employment to women. The Greeks and Armenians formerly employed -at the post and telephone offices have been dismissed and their places, taken by Turkish women and giris. The war has hastened rather than checked the emancipation of Turkish women. All the young w omen wear veils of the flimsiest description, and in the tramcars they always draw them up from their faces. An incident which illustrates the strength or the “new’ woman' movement in Turkey occurred quite recently. The following notice was issued by the police department:

Tho adoption of new forms of apparel has become a public scandal 111 Constantinople. All Moil am median women are given two days in which to lengthen their skirts, discard cornets, and substitute thick for flimsy i oils. Two days passed, and the following notice appeared.: We regret that through the interference of certain old women a subordinate of the police department has attempted to regulate the costumes which Mohammednn women wear. The police department regrets tliis blunder and cancels the previous order. -he “police subordinate” who blundered w as l an invention of the department, anxioiwj to find an excuse to capitulate to the storm which the original ordfer provoked. The wives of Turkish aristocrats, Ministers and high Government officials, threatened to hold up the Red Orescent nursing work "in Turkey, the telephone girls threatened to strike, the post-office girls to leave the past-office, unless the offending order was cancelled ; and before two days had passed Turkish women, determined l to be Westernised, had won. The incident provoked an outburst of indignation on the part of the women against the Gprint in authorities in Turkey, who were accused, probably wrongJiv, with wanting to kee > Turkish women in a backward condition.

THE GAZA BATTLE. The fall of Bagdad and the steady progress of the British troops in Palestine has considerably undermined Enver’* authority. When Bagdad fell, members of the Diplomatic Corps in Constantinople expressed the view that the Turkish Empire would collapse in six weeks. The advance on Gaza increased the alarm among the general population, and depression among the ruling classes, and it is possible that L-.d the British Leon entirely successful in the Gaza battle Turkey would have packed off to Berlin its German masters gild have openly .petition* l .;] for peace. As it turned out, however, the British check at Gaza was exploited by the Germans .as a tremendous victory, ond the popular agitation! liafc been temporarily quietened. Significant evidence of the German reading of the present situation is that the womenfolk and children of the German officers and officials who were sent to Berlin after tho fia.ll of Bagdad have not returned 1 to Constantinople. The general feeling in diplomatic circles at Constantinople is that if the British succeed! in pushing rapidV: to Jerusalem, Damascus, and Beirut the Turks will throw up the sponge. A SEPARATE PEACE?

There is a great deal of talk now at Constantinople about the possibilities of a separate peace. Prominent Turks, ill discussing this question generally, express the belief that neither Engiand nor France will consent to any peace which stops short of the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire For the first time since their inception there is a general disposition in Turkey to condemn and regret the Armenian massacres—not on humanitarian grounds, but tfimply oeca-use (in the belief of the Turks) the memory of these massacre.} constituted an insuperable obstacle against any understanding between Turkey and the Entente Powers. Naturally enough, Germany carefully fosters this belief. A great deal of hohs'enso is talked from time to time, outside Turke.v, about the revival of the; Old Turk Party, the uprise of a pro-British Party, or the alarm which Enver Pasha feels at Iris dwindling power. As a matter of fact the utmost political stagnation prevails at Constantinople; and if the truth were known Enver probably wants ay quickly as possible to get out of the mess into which he has landed himself and liis country. Probably 99 per cent, of tbe Turks lament the policy which has harnessed their country to Germany, deplore the humiliation it is daily undergoing, and pra.v fervently for peace; but in their phlegmatic, fatalistic wav they let tilings run their course, hoping the while that Allah will aver the final catastrophe. THE VERGE OF STARVATION. Tho reports which reach the outer world from time to time about conditions in Turkey invariably understate the facts. The vast mass of the Turkish population is now subsisting on the verge of starvation. The misery which prevails at Constantinople among the middle and working classes is heartbreaking; while conditions inland, owing to the epidemics which prevail, are even worse. There is no cholera at Coiuitantinop.le, and the admirable sanitary measures imposed on the city by the Germans have succeeded in keeping te'phue within close limits. The Germans tried to make the tramway company daily disinfect their vehicles, but, m 1:811a 1, they acted in the matter without tact, and, the company refusing, no European now travels in the tramcar.s. Pitiful incidents, indicating the misery of the people, can be witnessed daily at any street corner. The faces you seo are haggard, .pinched, and worn, the eyes haunted, the frames feeble. Ido not know whether people die of sta; cation in Constantinople, but J. have frequentliv seen old men and women collapse —I suppose from hunger—in the streets. Poor people will pay enormous sums for worm-edten figs with which one would not attempt to poison a mad clog. In the old far-off days of peace the average humble clasts Turk would make apiece of bread and cheese, some olives, and some Turkish delight form his principal meal. To-day such •a moaf would probably cost him (in English money) about os.

THE TASK-MASTERS. It may be mentioned l that some illusions are entertained outside Turkey regarding the powers possessed by the German authorities) in Turkey. The Germans are certainly the masters of the Turks in the sense that they control the Turkish Government, but tho influence of the German officials over tho civilian popmli.ition is very small. The German police in Constantinople are strictly forbidden to interfere with tho population, and even in the army xurkish fjaldiers are not compelled l to bo .subservient towards their German officers. Besides bolding them respon-

sible for the misery land miMfprtuno which have befallen their country, the Turks dislike tbe Germans personally. On the other hand, the German naval and military officers make no secret of their contempt for what they regard a ; the laziness and slackness of their Turkish charges. Admiral von Souchon, the German Admiral at Constantinople, is never tired of declaiing to other Europeans at the Constantinople Club that the Turks, as fighting men, are hopelessly inefficient The Gooben and the Breslau have been anchored in vStenia Bay for over a year, and although it is impossible for a foreigner to inspect them, it is probably true that they are in a terribly battered and useless condition. WAR LOANS WHILE YJU WAIT. Tho principal preoccupation of the Turkish Parliament is the deplorable financial condition of the country. Gold, nickel, and copper have long since vanished from circulation, and the country is flooded with notes and stamps—the latter worth about 2.p1. each—of all kinds. At the backs of the noto in one of these categories is a design of Kut, and an inscription, rather amusing in the light of recent events, to tho ('fleet that, thanks to the bravery of the Turkish troop® and their Gorman allies, the town will remain in Turkish hands until the end of time. Turkish finances are run on the simplest lines. Every time that the Turkish Government is hard up it asks Berlin lor a “loan.” The “loan.” consists in permission by the German Government for tihe Turkish authorities to ’issue p per money for the amount required. Jhe German Government Las promised to redeem, out of the indemnities exacted from its enemies, all the paper mcney issued in Turkey during the war. The mark levs dropped extremely low late’i" in value in Turkey. THE BRITISH COLONY. Most of the members of the British colony at Constantinople left at the outbreak of the war, and those who remain—numbering from 100 to 150 — have won the admiration of friends and enemies alike by their courage and dignity in very difficult circumstances. The British business houses in Constantinople are open as usual, .and, generally speaking, the members of the present British colony are unmolested. About 3 / members of the colony have undergone periods of internment inland in “reprisals” by the Turkish Government for alleged bombardment? of undefended towns by British and French aviators. All British subjects in Constantinople must be .at home before nine o’clock in tho evenings. About half a dozen members of tho colony are at present ‘interned’ in a house in Constantinople. Their imprisonment also described as a “reprisal,” is a formal one, and they suffer 110 privations. The American Embassy at Constantinople looks after the interests of the British colony very thoroughly. The American Amlia *‘- I ;idor b on excellent terms with the Turkish authorities, and lib tactful intervention often prevents internments.

SUGAR 2id. A LUMP! Prices have risen steadily since tho oeginning of the war, and in English terms are now something like the following: Butter, 10s the lb.; cheese, 14s the lb.; olives, 3s the lb :; sugar JOs the II).; rice, 4y tho lb.; Turkish delight, 8s the lb. The veritable famine in sugar which now’ prevails in Constantinople is a- great blow to the sweets-lov-ing Turk. Lumps of sugar at 2Jd. each lump are hawked about the streets. Austria lots recently promi-Vd to send Turkey 2,000 wagons of sugar, at the rate of 200 wagons a month:, but owing to the grout scarcity of rolling stock none of the Turks treat this promiso very .soriousSjv. In : pita of the hunge 1 ’ and abject misery everywhere prevailing, the Turk manifests no desire to revolt. Food riots are unnkown at Constantinople, land the shops are never looted. Tin- shortage of broad is great cause 1 •or complaint among the women. The Turkish Government, at the instigation cf the Germans, early in th l present year introduced a rationing system, but the wealthy Turk- declined to submit to it, and the elaborate org intent ion set up speedily collapsed. The apathy of the Turks angers tho foreign observer. Only once have tlujv been roused from their apathy, and tlfc.it was

Quite recently the Turks, at the instigation of the Germ 11s. decided to intern, inland the British Nonconformist •minister —the most pooular European in Constantinople. The liiinhter was seized, conveyed a-crass the Bosnhoriis, raid was on hi way to an Asia Minor concentration camp when the American Ambassador hoard, of the dnse. Instead of protesting indignantly, file Ambassador quietly expressed regret that the authorities should treat a. man harslily who bad devoted a large

part of hi* life to the good of th' 1 ish population. Kuwr I’a-lm realis'd the lore m tL. Aink^ view; and a courier dispute' l haste instructed the guards to to Con-tantinoplv with the - 3 formist minister. Tile mental xtriin which the * undergo at Coiistaiitinap’o fc great; and men who two years were hale and strong imw creep tho streets men* shadows.