FOREWORD
Because of their pivotal positions, politically and geographically; because of their tempting adaptation to colonization; because of their vast proven and hidden resources; because of their divers other advantages, too numerous to mention, the Balkan States have been, are and will continue to be, as once a certain writer so aptly put it, the “Powder Box of Europe.”
Constant conflict, however, has stunted their progress, and it has only been within the past few years that these lands—conspicuously lacking in the arts of peace, but overcrowded with types and replete with wonderful scenery, their histories sated with war and romance—have begun to be disclosed to the travelling world. Only within the past few years their outlying districts have been connected with their business centres by telegraphic communication; only within the past few years railroads have been constructed, steamship lines inaugurated and hotel accommodations perfected. Yesterday their peoples were almost barbaric; to-day they are more highly civilized and more finely cultured than perhaps we are inclined to admit; to-morrow they may be famous. They have been makers of history for our forebears and us; they will be makers of history for posterity and its children.
It is to assist the reader to frame a more just opinion of that southeastern corner of Europe, “The Lands of the Tamed Turk,” and those who people it, that this volume of personal observations and experiences of travel, interspersed with brief bits of history, is offered.
The author begs to tender his appreciation to Mr. Nox McCain for the use of several unusual photographs published herewith; also to the editors of The Metropolitan Magazine, New York, Travel Magazine, New York, and The National Geographic Magazine, Washington, with whose kind permission are herein reprinted, verbatim, certain parts of special articles on the Balkan States by the author, and some of the illustrations accompanying them, which appeared in the periodicals mentioned above.