46 



officials and persons interested, and obtained some very interesting notes. 

 Through Dr. Maclean I was invited out to Mr. Thompson's estate at 

 Bostondjok, on the Asia Minor side, and saw the Turks pruning and 

 grafting their vines, and digging the vineyards with great two-pronged forks. 

 At one time there was quite a large wine industry here ; but the massacres 

 of the Armenians and the subsequent damage by earthquake to the property 

 of the remaining merchants, who were the chief consumers of wine, has so 

 reduced the sale that nearly all the vignerons have given up making wine 

 and grow table grapes instead. They have a very fine thin-skinned variety 

 which always brings a good price. Phylloxera swept all over this country 

 many years ago, and a great number of the orchards died out. Mr. Thomp- 

 son's has been replanted with blight-resistant stocks, but very few of the 

 Turkish growers have changed their methods, and still graft on the wild 

 grape. Curious little watch towers are built up in all the vineyards, where 

 a man sits and guards the field while the grapes are ripening. 



With a letter from the Consul, I called at the Dette Publique Ottomane 

 and met M. Raymond, one of the Inspectors in the department, who 

 furnished me with a great deal of information regarding the agricultural 

 industries of Turkey. He endorsed the opinion of Mr. Thompson that the 

 wine industry had been destroyed, but said it was mainly due to the ravages 

 of phylloxera. The Smyrna raisin industry is an important source of 

 revenue ; the bunches of grapes are dipped in a mixture of oil and potash 

 and then placed on the ground to dry. Where the growers are too poor to 

 buy potash, they make a lye from the ashes of the burnt vine cuttings. The 

 raisin grape vines are cultivated somewhat differently from the table and 

 wine grapes, being planted 2J metres apart in rich black soil, and allowed to 

 spread all over the ground until the grapes are formed, when they are tied 

 up to small stakes so that the bunches which grow along the canes hang clear 

 above the ground. Fungus diseases are very prevalent in all the vineyards; 

 and they say that a very bad form of mildew, that was practically unknown 

 in Turkey until a few years ago, has done more damage, and is more difficult 

 to treat, than all the other pests put together. The silk industry is also in 

 the hands of the Dette Publique Ottomane, and is fostered in all ways by 

 this department. They examine all the eggs, and supply cuttings and young 

 mulberry plants free to all the growers that apply, and most of the silk 

 grown in Turkey is reeled and manufactured in the country. Last year the 

 quantity cf cocoons grown in Turkey in Europe reached to 3,623,145 kilos, a 

 kilo being equal to 2 Ib. 8 oz. 



This department encourages orchard work, and collects all the revenue 

 from the silk, wine raisin industries, forestry, licenses, fisheries ; and has also 

 the monopoly of the salt industry. The chief fish in the markets is a large 

 flat fish commonly known as a "turbot," and a small, slender, silvery green 

 fish known as the "mackerel"; the latter are caught in immense numbers 

 in the Bosphorus. They are gutted, soaked in salt water for two or three 

 days, and then hung over strings and dried in the sun, and are an important 

 item in the food supply of the poorer classes. I paid several visits to the 

 fruit markets, where an immense number of oranges are sold, coming in from 

 all parts of the Mediterranean ; most of the other fruits are poor, and very 

 few bananas appear to come into Constantinople. Apples are not grown in 

 any quantity in Turkey, and at this season of the year are very poor, both in 

 quality and size. The best apples come from the neighbourhood of the town 

 of Amasia, on the Asiatic side. The market for dried fruits is very extensive, 

 find all kinds of curious dried fruits,. beans, pulse, and grains of all kinds can 

 be found upon the market stalls. 



