THE PROBLEM OF TURKEY 217 



places around the city — splendid ones — and if the Turks were an 

 energetic people they would turn the whole region into fine farms." 



The second reply emphasized another point: "It is because the 

 Turks don't know how to do things wisely. They keep sheep up 

 there on the plateau. You can see them any day close to the city, 

 eating away, and cleaning up the grass so that the ground is 

 smooth as a floor. The Turks ought to give that up and take 

 to farming." 



The third answer carried the matter still farther : "The trouble 

 is that it is not safe outside the city. [All this, of course, was 

 before the war.] It is dangerous to go out alone there on the 

 hills ; all over the plateau the shepherds are unfriendly. Soldiers 

 from the city go out there and insult or rob respectable citizens. 

 So people do not live there. The government is to blame." 



All these answers are true, but not the whole truth. Lack of 

 energy, lack of knowledge, and lack of good government all seem 

 to be largely the result of unfavorable physical environment act- 

 ing either through economic conditions or through health. Con- 

 sider the economic side of the matter. The plateau west of the 

 Bosphorus does not blossom with gardens partly because it is too 

 dry. In the spring it is beautifully green, and in exceptional years 

 it remains verdant well toward autumn. Usually, however, it dries 

 up at the beginning of summer. Even early crops such as winter 

 wheat and barley often fail. The gardens to which two of 

 my friends referred are all artificially irrigated, or else lie in valley 

 bottoms enjoying natural, that is, underground irrigation. 

 Under present conditions water for irrigation cannot be brought 

 to the plateau, which therefore is left to semi-nomadic shepherds. 

 Across the Bosphorus where the mountains are higher, the rainfall 

 is greater and there is more chance for irrigation. Hence the 

 more abundant villages. 



On the European side the sparsity of population due to the dry- 

 ness allows the plateau to become the haunt of miscreants from the 

 great city. If agriculture were profitable thousands of poor 



