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Show MM WWW WMMIWW J - PERSIA'S OLD CAPITAL TEHERAN A CITY THAT HAS SEEN MANY VICISSITUDES Now the Center of Warring Interetts That Threatan Its Very ExlJteneo Not an Especially Healthy Place In Summer Months. The capital of a small btiflcr state between threo clashing enijiirca, tho RiiRllsh, Uuoalnn and Ottoman emplro, i'choran in recent years, nnd more especially es-pecially sluco tho outbreak of tho great war, has had un Importance thrust upon It of a most embnrrasalng kind, begins n wnr primer of the National Na-tional Oeographle society, (lecgraph-lcally (lecgraph-lcally or greater Interest to each ot tho groups of contending powers than any other noutrul capital, Perslnn Teheran la experiencing Insupornblu difficulties In keeping Its destiny clour of ttosc ot tho warring giants nround It. Teheran, according .to (hcPerBiuii, Is very beautiful, but tho praise of his country's capital la soldou supported sup-ported unreservedly by tho westerner, western-er, Tor ho duds the i-orslan city ot Slilraz far moro beautiful 'and Isfahan Is-fahan tho poor of tho residence Tlio capital lies 79 miles south of the Caspian sen, on a plateau of coarsu sand and gravel, vhlch Is fruijod by low, distant hills, and, to tho north, by sonic hlghur mountains. Mount Damavand Is tho koy te tho city's setting, towering In tho northeast to n magnificent crest of 10,400 feet high. To tho southward stretch lovol lands, which lose themsolvoa In wnnto and desort. Tho Kast nnd West moot and mlnglo us oil nnd wator In tho shah's metropolis. metropo-lis. Teheran Is, ot course, n purely Oriental city, but, Ilka nil eastern centers cen-ters of Importance It has suffered such encroachments from tho Wet as street enrs, telegraphs, gns llghtlnc and soveroly dyed und tailored clothos for men. It Is backward In its development nnd unovt-n In its Improvement. Im-provement. Its Uoulovnrd dos Ambas-sadeura Ambas-sadeura Is moro or loss of a splendid thoroughfaro nnd It is lined with a European Eu-ropean typo of chops, two good hotels and a number of Hue natlvo palaces. It has ono of tho largest military parado grounds in tho world C50 by 350 yard; roughly .paved with strewn cobido stones. Tho modern city Is not bo very old, nu It camo Into oxlstonco less than 700 years ago, about tho tlma that nnclcnt Ilagha, tho crumbling Buhurb to tho south, began to sink Into oh llvlon. llnghu known In tho tlmo ol Aloxandor tho Great as Hopiar was tho birthplace of Horun nt-ltafSftKiTcrr ntpnoUjnn tlm , s'-mi-Trff;'nacy it-TCAB as vain and rich and shcuvy as Btoricd Hamndan, tho prldo of earliest Porsln, tho city of soven walls In seven colors, with palacn wrought In gold nnd silver nnd frescoed with precious stones. Modern Toheran Is tho Inheritor In-heritor of tho traditions and tho prldn of Hogae and of Hamndan and of the nnclent honors of Pasargudno and Per sepolls. With tho rlso of Teheran, Media regained tho placo that It lost to Persia In tho tlmo of Cyrus. Anarchy has ruled within tho cnpl-tal cnpl-tal In a way moro or less pronounced during the last sovcral years, and tho pcoplo of tho city novo accom- pnsaeu uitio toward Its modernlxa-Hon modernlxa-Hon and development of Its Impor-tnnco Impor-tnnco ns a placo of comraorco nnd manufacture. Thcro Is un Important caravan trado, which passes through Teheran toward tho Russian borders, , and a cortnln manufacture of cotton, cot-ton, linen, corpctB, shoes and Iron producta. Its business is enough tc i u,,,,ort t0 n Population of about . 'C0.O0O, In which aro Included about COO Europeans, Tho cllmato of Teheran is not a ravorahlo ond and especially aro tho summers unhealthy, when all of tho 1 IT,1, m w,! T Ket nwy w to tho foothills In tho north. Writing in I03C, a Persian gives a pathetic summary of n Tehoran summer. Ho Bays that tho air was too hot and ovon , smelly, that tho water was heavy nnd uiiwholesomo and, In short. ovorythlnK fiwnv 1 ,hBt. U,U A,,Kcl of " rn , rjJ,V ?UI l "U1, t,,e"' h author wrote shortly nfter n fcarrul cholera Plaguo bnd passed over tho city Tko nearby contrast or tho cool summer Bunions in tho foothills, hkoly has conspired to glvo tho Teheran summer bad standing. |