CAPTIVES IN TURKEY

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2955, 19 December 1916, Page 6

CAPTIVES IN TURKEY

(WHERE THEY-ARE LIVING

'A! New Zealand officer who is held by the' Turks as a prisoner of war at Anon Kara Hissar, where most of the Now Zealanders held captive in Turkey are interned, has written the following interesting letter about the place tuid his life there.

"We get a lovely view from our win- •; 3ows of the plain, bounded by ridge L after ridge of mountains. We are' 3000 :; <feet above sea level.' The air is bracing, the'climate is ideal, and the at- .,; aiosphere wonderfully clear. The plain ; round hero is under cultivation, but Sttle got from the soil, the main • crop being; poppies for opium—hence '■ "Afion Opium." The town clutters at ' the foot of a range of hills winding about their base like an ei-onnous snake. From the centre rises a gigantic rock with precipitous sides, on whioh is perched the citadel with its , massive walls and turrets, vast water tanks carved in solid rock, which enabled it hundreds of years ago to ' resist a siege for six years. « "The streets in the town are fairly - wide, and paved with cobbles very ir- '.' regularly. The houses, except a few public buildings—mosques and baths— i are allmade of mud and wood, with -.. tiles laid on the roofs. The ws-ls are whitewashed, and the, ceilings are of wood. There is not a scrap of phint . anywhere inside or out. The windows are covered with wooden trellis work shutters, so that inmates can look out . without being seen. . . . Shopping in ,' the town is most amusing, being one perpetual haggle, in whioh a vocabulary ■ of only about 20 words is needed.