Salt Lake Tribune | 1918-08-18 | Page 33 | Bagdad Being Given Thorough Cleaning

BAGDAD BEING GIVEN " THOROUGH 'CLEANING Ancient Center of Romance Is Rapidly Becoming Modernized. MANY CHANGES SEEN City Boasts Police Force, Fire Brigade and Electric Lights. By EARL C. REEVES, ; Universal Service Staff Correspondent. j LONDON, July 20. (By Mail) Eag-dag, Eag-dag, like the story which Will Rogers threatens to "tell next Monday," is being be-ing cleaned. That ancient center of romance and intrigue, which has been immortalized j for Broadway and the rest of America by Winter Garden - Follies and Montgomery Mont-gomery and Stone extravaganzas, Is in dire danger of becoming as new and modern as Akron, Ohio, or Gary, Ind. Even the smells are being controlled, Edmund Candler writes from Mesopotamia Meso-potamia to the Daily News. "The Turks have been dissipated on three fronts," he writes. As a pugilist serving in the ranks puts it, "We've bitten bit-ten off his left ear and his right, and broken his nose and knocked him over the ropes." In the meanwhile peace has reigned In the city of Bagdad, and the amenities ameni-ties of life have been multiplying for the army and the civil population. Coming to Life. The place was dead, to all appearances, or moribund, when we entered it on March 11 last year. Now it is a bustling hive of humanity. Thousands of workmen work-men pass through the streets early and late. The main thoroughfare, metalled and lighted, is a constant stream of traffic; traf-fic; the sleepiest old women who haunt! the bazaars have become adepts at dodg- ing the Ford van. . I A police force has been organized and j a fire brigade. The street lamps have ' given place to electric lights. The wa- i ter supply has been extended. - Mosques; have been repaired, roads metalled, ; schools opened, Including a survey school ' and a training school for teachers. Wa- ! ter carts ply in the streets, sanitary squads have penetrated the most hidden ' purlieus of the city; the smells are be- 1 coming centrifugaL Galled, injured, sick ; and starved animals are received into a I home until they are fit for. shaft or pack again. Prices Moderate. The markets are controlled, the grain supply has been taken in hand, and the prices are now moderate. The municipal- . lty pays its way, and the Tigris is crossed by two bridges. These are only some of the outward changes, and though most of them affect the Bagdadi and the British and Indian soldier alike, they are probably little noticed no-ticed by the army of" occupation. The soldier in the street if asked if he marked much change in the city would probably say that it looked cleaner, smelt less and seemed more alive. He might remark upon the good behavior and contented con-tented appearance of the citizens, but it is doubtful If he would associate these conditions with the work of the administration, adminis-tration, with the police, the revenue, or judicial department, the municipality, the reorganization of the courts, the provision provi-sion for agricultural and garden developments, develop-ments, and the control of grain and markets mar-kets in those lean months when we had to feed the civil population. . Rights Are Adjusted. I,east of all is the soldier In the streets ! likely to grasp the complicated nature j of the machinery we have been getting into gear, the complex relations of labor, , tenant, land-owner and state, the difficul- 1 ty of adjusting their rights and of as- j sessing property and taxes with no rev- i enue registers or land records to go upon. Yet all this is being done and a system j is being evolved based on what is sound I in existing organization. I We have adapted and modified these j to meet the new needs, preserving as far as possible local traditions and employing ' native agency. ! Bagdad, of course, occupies a very small space in the extended front we hold now. One may pass a year or more without with-out seeing it, but men who have the fortune for-tune to be - billeted there in the hot weather, or who yisit it or pass through on work or leave, will agree that It Is the perfect antithesis of the Bagdad of the old days.