TURKEY
By T. L. Jarman
This book (Arrowsmith, 8s. 6d.) is No. 8 of the Modern States Series. After dismissing the history of Turkey before Abdul Hamid's time in forty pages, the author spends twice this amount on the period between that Sultan's accession and the present day. He does better in this second innings. So far as space allows the book gives a sound, if somewhat banal, account of the history of one of the most lurid of countries. Its author has-been at pains to construct a competent narrative, but a certain lack of local colour suggests that at any rate he has not been to those eastern districts where, so he affirms, the traveller " is not allowed to penetrate," Apparently " news from these parts is difficult to obtain ; and so dangerous are conditions in some plat es that it is said that officials dare not go out after dark for fear of violence." The bibliography is useful, though it fails to include de la Jonquiere ; the two ingenuous maps have not even succeeded in keeping pace with railway development in post-War Turkey.
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