88 RUINED CASTLES IN ASIA MINOR. 
FEBRUARY 1, 1887—THIRTY-SIXTH REGULAR MEETING. 
William G. Stevenson, M.D., president in the chair ; 
two hundred members and guests present. 
Rev. Edward Riggs, of Marsovan, Turkey, gave the 
following address entitled : 
‘S RUINED CASTLES IN ASIA MINOR.”’ 
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: Our subject 
this evening pertains to the fascinating region of the 
Orient, but where is the subtle line which divides *‘ the 
east’’ from ‘‘the west’?? The abstract scientist will 
readily answer that there can be no such line. But in 
defiance of this verdict the tourist has discovered the 
mystic boundary, and he reports that the line passes in 
a soméwhat irregular northeast and southwest direction 
just to the west of Constantinople. When the traveler 
leaves the Danube at Rustchuk and finds himself on a 
real Turkish railroad, creeping slowly towards Varna 
on the Black Sea, a constantly increasing multitude of 
queer, contradictory, characteristic points bring cumu- 
lative evidence of the fact that he is crossing that mys- 
terious line and entering the dreamy realm of the 
Orient. At the Black Sea port he finds himself in a 
babel of languages, and for some inexplicable reason, in 
getting on board the Lloyd steamer, he experiences more 
confusion, delay and petty annoyance than he has en- 
countered in his entire journey across Europe. A quick 
run of a dozen hours brings him to the entrance of the 
Bosphorus. As he enters the narrow strait which di- 
vides two continents, a beautiful landscape meets his 
eye. The heavy swell of the Black Sea changes abrupt- 
ly to the perfectly steady quiet of harbor water, while 
the dark blue waves still dance with a short and merry 
plash, under the influence of the deep, swift currents, 
that sweep on down through the channel. The eastern 
and western shores, constantly approaching nearer and 
