Show 00 KC 7 zb 0 ON 4 al k 4 v ze h m 4 j q avin h y bulgarian cul Lul ganan garian village lads carrying water prepared by the national geographic society washington D C bulgaria where democracy ties lias ad 0 an extent that the peasant premier is reported to have publicly discussed I the advisability of declaring a republic and electing the young king president lias has developed so rapidly since turkish rulers were ousted little more than a generation ago that this suggested world record in peaceably de hips hardly seems an impossibility bulgaria might be termed most balluta ot of the balkan countries both geographically and characteristically the country bulks large in balkan history in one generation of 0 freedom she has made incredible progress and crowned her achievements with exceeding prowess in the first balkan war from this growing pinnacle a hideous mistake brought her to a sad repute in ia no wise due to the qualities of her people but rather to one headstrong and chauvinistic statesman whose fateful counsel undid in a single month nil all that the founders of the balkan alliance had worked for two years to accomplish and whose mad folly destroyed tor for the majority of the world an impression of bulgarian wi wisdom eadom and capacity which had been built lip up from such meager beginnings A second error entail entailing Ln even greater disaster ats was made when the bulgar king cast the lot ot of ills his people with the teutonic allies in the world war the history ot of bulgaria differs little littie from that of her sister balkan aft etalea ites the successive chapters ire anre written in blood herodotus the father of history was the first to notice the wild thracian and illyrian Illyria a tribes who inhabited that portion of the peninsula and what he said of them centuries ago has a poignant emphasis in these last sad days of bulgarian experience peri ence if they were only ruled by one man and could only agree among liem bem selves they would be the great it of 6 all nations modern bulgart are slavs these ancient bulgara Bul gars however ere doubtless of another strain than those who now claim the name and who are purely slay slav more character p so BO than the russians even f just when the slav first set his markla this region Is to say but the re he has been for more than a thousand years spreading out from the parent center in a brood which at length has covered much of the territory from roni the to the Adil atle ile he early embraced christianity and from the first boris down to the last religion has highly colored the politics of bulgaria gibbon in a famous passage has remarked that the glory of the dul bul garlans was confined to a narrow scope both 0 fetnie and place and true it Is whether one speaks of that remoter remoler era when the emperor simeon gave to the bulgara their gulden golden nee age or to the present day when less than 40 years sufficed to mark the passage of tile the country from a state of awful ser etude to a place of power and ALA now DOW tell leu years after aft t tic triumphal conclusion of the first balkan war it ts Is agabi a shorn shora awl nd shattered nation y reason of their closer proximity to the on marthina forces of the prophet the alie bulgarians Bulga rians fell earlier captive to the turk than the other christian jiin peoples of tile the Bal balsams kams and the 0 Surk arkis Lili it supremacy in bulgaria chich aegan in the fifteenth century and asted well into the nineteenth Is the gloomiest gloo epoch in the national an uala there as ever where the turkish foot had trod in triumph freedom van belled jelled learn las lag languished and the zue memories morlea rt past glories all but als appeared even the character of the people seemed to change and had it not been tor for the priests and the brigands brigande bri gands it is probable that the thread of bulgarian national life would havil have been definitely sundered but in their woun mountain tain fastnesses fast nesses this strange combination of the monk and the marauder kept alive the national feeling like robin hood they are always rep resented as the protectors of the poor pool and the weak and in addition as the friend of all christians and the ruthless scourge of the ottoman oppressor thousands of legends and songs have g grown rown out of their exploits and had they made war against the coal common non foe only instead as they too often did among themselves their fame would rest upon a far firmer foundation nevertheless among all the agen cles which contributed in the end to the winning of bulgarian independence the brigands brigande bri gands were by far the most continuously active and the long centuries of turkish misrule were constantly broken by a series of abort abortive fre revolts which were suppressed with Inc increasing cruelty until the brutal massacre in inspired mr gladstone to the famous midlothian Mid lothian campaign gave to the czar a con convenient eilent handle against the sultan and brought brought on the russo turl ish m war a r their rapid development that war was ended by the treaty of san St stefano efann ate fano which essayed to establish a big bulgaria but thanks to fraeli Dra eli british influence brought about tile congress of berlin and it was a little bulgaria which finally secured a place at the worlds council table A lowly place it was but with splendid courage the bulgarians Bulga rians set out to make it better and the story of bulgarian development in a single generation finds few parallels among modern nations except for the humiliating war with her onetime one time allies in the balkans Bal lenns and her subsequent suicidal espo iKa of pan bul barlas advance has been constant and remarkable the country possesses great wheat fields 3 extensive forests rich mines all of which have been made to re spond spend to that patient industry for which the bulgarian peasant Is ille lie e M model odel tor for till nil ills his balkan net ghiors A unique product and the most profit able is the attar of roses the worlds of which comes f from rom southern bulgaria and aich which has enriched the landed peasants of that bi be yond their wildest dreams nation of farmers agriculture has always held first firs place in the life nf fit the bulgarians Bulga rians turkish domination for halt half a millennium made fannins tannins still more general among the hie bulgara Bu Bul lears gars for practically no other calling was left open to them by weeding out the upper classes too the turks made bulgarian agriculture more diore and more inore a peasant pou sait and now by legislation the bulgarians Bulga rians themselves are emphasizing farming on a small scale A national law limits the estate that an individual may hold to a maximum ol of about 74 acres anil and most ot of the hold ancs are much smaller another la av jitni to abolish a leisure class by requiring all adults between certain ages to work there Is 19 a temptation to con consides sidel bulgaria touching greece its as it doe a southern country but its latitude Is 19 approximately that of iowa its area incidentally Is some square miles less th llian an that of lowa iowa the principal port varna on the black blach sea pea Is farther north than boston and its harbor is often frozen drw en in whiter the southern portion ot of the country however becomes very hot bot la in urr ncr |