Bulgaria, The Peasant State 



769 



SCENE IN SOFIA. NOTE THE PARIS PARASOL 



Photo by F. J. Koch 



When Bulgaria became semi-independent in 1878, Sofia was a very dirty town, with streets 

 unpaved or paved with rough cobble stones, and with but one house of any pretensions, the 

 Turkish "konak." Today, besides a palace and a parliament building, there are a national 

 bank, a post-office, a military academy, several vast barracks, and many other government 

 buildings. There are parks and public gardens where bands play on summer evenings ; new 

 streets and avenues have been laid out, and some of the narrow ones of Turkish times have 

 been widened ; substantial shops and hotels mark the business quarter, and modern homes the 

 avenues. 



priests active in developing their own 

 educational institutions. It was not until 

 the American missionaries opened a 

 school for girls in their land that the 

 Bulgarians began to educate their 

 women. But that was many years ago, 

 before Bulgaria became a quasi-inde- 

 pendent state ; now the state schools af- 

 ford every advantage the Americans can 

 offer, except the American language. 



The freedom of religious opinion 

 granted throughout the little kingdom is 



described by Frederick Moore in "The 

 Balkan Trail:" 



"The Bulgarian government attempts 

 to administer justice to all denominations 

 and to maintain religious equality before 

 the law, and the government comes fairly 

 near to this aim. The Greeks complain 

 that Greek schools are not subsidized, 

 but Turkish schools are maintained by 

 the state. 



"It is due to the freedom of religious 

 opinion existing in Bulgaria that the mis- 



