THE GATES TO THE BLACK SEA 



459 



and so to a degree are Servia and Hun- 

 gary, who have access to the Black Sea 

 through the Danube. Even the Turks 

 deserve to have a voice in the matter. 



What the AlHes are now seeking to 

 teach them is that a double freak of na- 

 ture does not necessarily fit them to be 

 masters of the fate of other nations, and 

 that in the eyes of the rest of mankind 

 the defenses of one city are less impor- 

 tant than free access to wheat and oil 



fields among the greatest in the world. 

 But if the Turks shall learn that some- 

 what bitter lesson they will still remain 

 neighbors to the Black Sea and the Sea 

 of Marmora, and concerned in their fu- 

 ture accordingly. 



The question is so great, it involves so 

 many interests, the industry of such vast 

 territories, the destiny of so many million 

 people, that it should have no petty or 

 partial answer. 



CONSTANTINOPLE AND SANCTA SOPHIA 



By Edwin A. Grosvenor 



The follozving article is abstracted from "Constantinople," tivo volumes, by 

 Dr. Bdwin A. Grosvenor, of Amherst College, published and copyrighted by 

 Roberts Brothers and Little, Brozvn & Company some years ago, but nozv out of 

 print. 



IN THE word "Constantinople" there 

 is the blended magic of mythologic 

 romance, history, and poetry. It is 

 the synonym of the fusion of races and 

 the clash of creeds. More than any other 

 capital of mankind it is cosmopolitan in 

 its present and its past. From the nat- 

 ural advantages of its site it is the queen 

 city of the earth, seated upon a throne. 



After the treaty of Tilsit, Napoleon 

 bade his secretary, M. de Meneval, bring 

 him the largest possible map of Europe. 

 In anxious and protracted interviews the 

 Emperor Alexander had insisted upon 

 the absolute necessity to Russia of the 

 possession of Constantinople. There was 

 no price so great, no condition so hard, 

 that it would not have been gratefully 

 accorded by the Russian czar for the 

 city's acquisition. Napoleon gazed in 

 silence earnestly and long at the map 

 wherein that continent was outlined, of 

 which he, then at the zenith of his power, 

 was the autocratic arbiter. At last he ex- 

 claimed with earnestness, "Constantino- 

 ple ! Constantinople ! Never ! It is the 

 empire of the world!" 



the; i;arth's gre;at-city be;i,t 



The dome of Sancta Sophia is 41'' 

 north of the equator and 28° 59' east of 

 Greenwich. It is remarkable that so 

 many cities of first importance are situ- 

 ated on the same great parallel. That 



narrow belt, hardly more than 90 miles 

 in breadth, which encircles the globe be- 

 tween 40° 20' and 41° 50' in north lati- 

 tude, includes Constantinople, Rome the 

 Eternal City, Madrid, the political and 

 literary capital of Spain, and on this side 

 the ocean the two metropolises, unrivaled 

 in the Western Hemisphere, New York 

 and Chicago. A person proceeding di- 

 rectly east from the Court-house Square 

 in Chicago would ascend the slopes of 

 the Palatine Hill in Rome. One travel- 

 ing directly east from New York City 

 Hall for a distance of 5,622 miles would 

 pass through the southern suburbs of 

 Constantinople. 



AI.Iv RACES ARE REPRESENTED HERE 



The resident population today can be 

 but little less than one million. Like the 

 audience that listened to St. Peter on the 

 day of Pentecost, they are "out of every 

 nation under heaven." 



To say that there are 450,000 ]\Iussul- 

 mans, 225,000 Greeks, 165,000 Arme- 

 nians, 50,000 Jews, and 60,000 members 

 of less numerous subjects of foreign na- 

 tionalities is to give only an approximate 

 and faint idea of the motley host who 

 sleep each night in the capital of the Sul- 

 tan. The endless variety of facial type, 

 of personal attire, and of individual de- 

 meanor, and the jargon of languages in 

 some gesticulating- crowd afford more 



