THE MYSTERY OF ADRIANOPLE.

Wanganui Chronicle, Issue 12878, 27 March 1913, Page 8

THE MYSTERY OF ADRIANOPLE.

J3ELEAGUFREU CITY AND ITS

WELL-KEPT SECRET.

(By ALAN OSTLER, "Express" Special Correspondent.)

CONSTANTINOPLE, Feb. 6

The typewritten, sheets of the Agence Ottomane are daily pinned up on the green baize notice boards of the European Club of Constantinople. Every day streams of members, shedding wraps and overcoats and goloshes in the ball, pass those sheets, with a brief glance at the masterly vagueness of their contents; and always, on the subject most important to all people here, they find tho same bland, uninstructive statement: —

" Lo bombardement d'Adrinpple continue."

There are fifty theories about the state of Adrianople, but no sure knowledge. Never was a siege more rigorously conducted, for since the beginning of the war no single scrap of reliable in formation cowjerning the invested city has been allowed to leak out into the waiting worjd. Not a fugitive from within has made his way through Bulgarian cordo/i. So far as is known, no one from without has ever made his way in. It ;s said that wireless communication is maintained with the' beleaguered garr'son; but a. good many people disbelieve this.

T do rot doubt that there have been attempts to communicate with Adria-. nople by wireless, because I have seen the opera-tore busily at work in the wireless station ait Hadem-keui But ifc is very doubtful whether any answer has been received. It was said before the first defeat of the Ottoman army that tho wireless apparatus m AdriaTiople was defective^ and that, once cut off from the world, the city would have no means of communicating. Of course, the pretence that messages are daily received is bravely kept up; but it ie at teast probable that this is only a pretence. At any rat©, if the headquarters staff and one or two Ministers really do know the actual state of affairs in Adrianople, they have contrived to keep that knowledge to themselves with a degree of secrecy unheard nf in Turkey. IMPREGNABLE OR DOOMED? Of Emc/p&afts lets, even among the I oldest ana bas\ informed residents, there are hardly co be found two. whose opinions as to how long the town can hold out agree. Some know, with a very positive knowledge, that Adria.rople was tho one spot in Turkey on which military funds were properly expended. They declare that, however unsound the army may be, the defences of AdrLinople are worthy of the strongest military Power in Europe; that the town is amply supplied with stores and , ammunition, and can hold out for months-

.Others are equally certain that the garrison is inadequate and must- have been on short rations ever since the be-, ginning of December,, and that it can-( not possibly have enough ammunition to feed the big guns on the forts, which i;re the key to the defences.

The importance of Adrianople dwarfs al! else here. We have almost ceased to expect an. attack on the Tchataldja lines. Turkish scouts reconnoitring the positions held by the Bulgars at the time of the signing of the armistice report that the enemy having burnt tzzedin-keui and, one or two villages which they formerly occupied, have withdrawn even further north. Evir dently they are concentrating their whole force against Adrianople. As for such fighting as may take place in the Gallipoli peninsula, no one considers it likely tr> affect the ultimate issue. It is upon Adrianople that everything defends. .

Europeans here are wondering, rather t'neasily, how the Constantinople populace will take tlie' news of the-fall of, Adiii'iaiiople. .whesn tk?it news ,arrrvfeJ3. Hitherto- the apathy of the people -or" this town has b^en astonishing. ,/No one could possibly infer from the conduct of the people in the streets that their country is at war, that their politicians iiro fighting among themselves, and that the enemy is less than thirty-miles' from the city.

TURJQSH INDIFFERENCE. Interest in the affairs of the nation seems to be confined exclusively to the governing classes, and to Eurorjean residents. This is nofc simply due to the ignorance of the masses. There must }-.aye been in England at the +kme of th© comjng of the Armada as great a proportion of illiterate people as there «ire in Constantinople to-day. Yet, miItss our historians have lied wonderfully, well, Drake's exploits rang through England; the coming of the Spanish galleons wias discussed in every alehouse and hedgo tavern ; iand tho tmlcttered mob were ac keenly alive to the menace to the nation as was Queen I.'ess herself.

The means of disseminating news in Elizabethan England -we're infinitely scantier than they are in modern Stamboul; for. though the bulk of the people may ba unable to read for themselves, thero is.no lack of Turkish, Greek, and Armenion newspapers, which are read aloud in the cafes by the one or two educated persoss who, in the East, aro always to be found in any g-atherins.

No, it is not ignorance which prevents the Turkish people from manitesting any interest in the fate of their country. The desert, Arab is jusfc els uiterate as the average Turkish peasant. \ ot, barely a year ago, in TriI>oh, I saw an army of men whom patriotic enthusiasm had sent ..against tho.ltalians from oven- corner of North Tho Italian war was discussed by hooded desert statesmen from tho Western Sahara to tho Yemen. Cam^ldnvers, shepherds, caravan riders from a» far away as Darfur and Wadai were a* keenly interested in tJie fate of Tripoli as though it lay three hours' ride fiom their tents, instead of throe months march away HOPE OF LIBERTY. Hero are the Turks of Stamboul apparently as little concerned about the threatened effaoement of tkeir whole empire as they might be expected to bo about a South American revolution Is :-, stupidity, or indifference, or hopelessness.' I> 0 (they .-realise that any change from Turkish rule could onfv benefit tho lurkish people? That may bo so, for, as ]. think I have said in previous despatches, I have been told nioro than once by fugitives, that- they hope to go to Egypt, and there settle *n peace under the rule of the English. *•/ i JL? tho cx Pla^aWon of the at|titudeof the people, they may be *xIfcted to W el Co?l e rather than regret the fall of Adrianople. In any case, they can be counted on, if left to tfiem«elves, to accept the last defeat as they aocopted the first. The only dange? lies m the possibility of the present rulers of Turkey staking their j£b to row on the fanaticism of the army und particularly of its non-Turkish efei n.ents Among the Arabs and the Laz and Kurds are large bodies of vohin-• teers who flocked to the war, even : bnngmg their own horses, solely in hope of gam. These are more human ! creatures of prey—hawk-like, predatory free-lances, to whom war means what it meant to tile first Turkish invaders of Europe—loot, new lands, captive women, and vengeance on their "enemies If Adrianople should fall, and these v..en are requested to return to their own places no richer than they came tiiey will surely find eomo outlet for

tfceir disappointment. By what means, will .the Government^ which has no money wherewith to bribe them, try to pacify the malcontents P