July 26, 1917 
LAND & WATER 
Sedes and its Marsh 
By H. Russell Wakefield 
iy 
Model Farm, Sedes 
SIX miles along the Salonika- Vasilika road, where the • 
\-iolet, "^hadowed and ever-cloudy mountains of Chal- 
idice run out to join tl)e long promontory of Kara 
Bumu, is a little oasis of trees from out of which a 
littlj group of buildings peeps. This is the Model Farm, 
Sedes, one of the very few examples of modern progress the 
Old Turks gave to Macedonia. There is a long barrack-like 
building where the budding agriculturists lived and worked, 
forming with some rudimentary barns and out-houses a Httle 
square, in the centre of which is an ancient fountain, which 
is shiwn in the photograph reproduced here. The trees, 
which hem in this little square on all sides, are a paradise for 
birds, and one of the most certain and profuse springs for 
many miles round ever 
bubbles forth to refresh 
the flower and vege- 
taiile gardens, and to 
irrigate the neighbour- 
in?; fields. 
To the north the 
foot-hills terrace up to 
the brow of Old 
Hortach, the king of 
that sector of the 
coastal range, famous 
for its charcoal. The 
arid rolling plain just 
reaches Sedes and then 
ends abruptly in vast 
desolate marshes, 
which run out to the 
tideless sea. It is a 
beautiful and lonely 
place and like all oases 
lias the added beauty of 
emphasised contrast. 
Quite near it the 
Serbian army landed 
last summer, so that 
it will have for evermore a place in the Sagas of that glorious 
race. It has too a tinv strategic importance, for in the event of a 
successful Bulgar invasion, should the Ime of the Lakes be 
lost, it- might bo held as a strong place, guarding and 
flanking as it docs the road to Salonika, though its 
garrison would inevitably end cither in Valhalla or Sofia. It 
was partly for that reason that the writer's unit was sent to 
train there in the spring of lyK). Though quite near the city.it 
was sp'.endidlv remote, and off the beaten track of Staff cars, 
lorries and dispatch riders and all the wheeled hierarchy .which 
in thi end remains the most abiding memory of active service, 
The Mound in the Marsh 
with the din and dust it stirs. There we remained cixweeks and it 
is some tribute to its vague but potent charm that to more than 
one of us it remains one of the happiest, most care-free expe- 
riences of their lives — -a quiet hour before the fiery suns, the 
choking dust, the thirst and strain, the burden and heat of 
the Struma valley. 
Before we left Salonika for Sedes, three of us bought guns, 
safe but uninspired weapons, for the marsh was kfiown to be 
thronged with water-birds. The occasional half-days,whcn we 
had no duty, I always spent there. I can recall every dyke 
and every stream, almost every yard of that entrancing 
place. The snipe began three hundred yards from our front 
■loor, big wild birds, which rose in screaming wisps, and hurried 
in huge circles, rising 
ever higher till quite 
suddenly they would 
■^woop in a " nose- 
dive " to the reeds. 
All along that part 
of the coast are curious 
and unexplained 
mounds, i bviously 
artificial, little editions 
of those on the Wilt- 
shire Downs. One rose 
out of the very maish 
itself, and the French 
sent a working party 
under an arcli£eologist 
to excavate it ; it is 
this party which ap- 
pears in the adjacent 
photograph. They 
found several fine 
vases, many skeletons 
and tutti quanti, an>l 
the floor of what 
seemed to have betn 
a tiny temple. Thv 
bee-eaters, surely the trimmest and most beautiful of bird' , 
came in flocks and burrowed out their resting holes when- 
the French had loosened the soil. ^ 
Ne^r this mound lived the wild geese, dignified and war\ 
birds, who timed their rise to perfection, and left but few o' 
their company to vary our dift. But snipe abounded 
especially the too confiding little jack, and only bad shootin,' 
or bad cartridge* and Salonika cartridges weie vile snlphiitir 
.swindles — could prevent one speedily getting half a dozen on 
any good day. (Jncc to my eternal shame and regret I shot 
one of tho'se rnrinus and aloof bird*, "^lie I.oon, a spc.iiiu'n of 
