796 The National Geographic Magazine 



Photo from "Through Savage Europe," 

 by H. De Windt CLippincott) 



THE MACEDONIAN 



terious Cabiri. It is circular, the dome 

 unsupported by columns. The whole of 

 the interior is richly decorated with 

 mosaics which seem to have belonged to 

 the original temple, as nothing about 

 them divulges adjustment at Christian 

 hands. 



Between the Rotunda and the sea is 

 the site of the Hippodrome, where Theo- 



dosius, the last of the Emperors who 

 were sole masters of the whole Roman 

 Empire, caused to be committed one of 

 the bloodiest of massacres for which 

 Saloniki is famous. Although a zealous 

 follower of Christianity, and commended 

 by ancient writers as a prince blessed 

 with every virtue, his moderation and 

 clemency failed signally on this occasion. 

 In order to chastise the people for a 

 movement in favor of a charioteer very 

 popular among them, and who had been 

 arrested at his order, the inhabitants 

 were assembled at the Hippodrome under 

 the pretext of witnessing the races, and 

 then barbarously massacred, without dis- 

 tinction of age or sex, to the number of 

 seven thousand. 



ALBANIA, THOUGH ALMOST IN SIGHT OE 



ITALY, IS THE LEAST KNOWN 



REGION OE EUROPE* 



Albania is the most romantic country 

 in Europe, probably in all the world. It 

 is a lawless land where might makes 

 right, and parts of it are as forbidding 

 to the foreigner as darkest Africa. In 

 some sections of the country the homes 

 of men are strongholds built of stone, 

 with no windows on the ground floors, 

 and those above mere loopholes. At the 

 corners of a village or estate are kulers, 

 towers of defense, from which the enemy 

 can be seen far down the road. 



The first law of the land is the law 

 of the gun, as it was in the wild west. 

 But the country is more thickly popu- 

 lated than was the American border in 

 the old days, and men have banded to- 

 gether in clans for offensive and defen- 

 sive purposes. 



There is no education in Albania — 

 the Turks have kept the country illiter- 

 ate — and promises have come to be 

 bonds. It is because the Albanians keep 

 their word that the Sultan at Constanti- 

 nople has chosen them as his body-guard. 

 But the Albanian has no regard for the 

 man he has not sworn to, and, though 

 the petty thief is despised, it is considered 

 brave work to kill a man for his money. 



Albanian customs are dangerous to 

 break, and are handed down the genera- 



* Abstracted from "The Balkan Trail." 



