1941-03-24 — Page 7

Bulgaria Goes

The armics of Reichsfuchrer; Hitler are again on the march. The German move initially may not extend beyond the Bulgarian frontier, although Herr Hitler's eventual objective is obviously dominution of all the Balkans. Completion of the occupation of smali Bulgaria offered no parti- cular obstacle to the Nazi troops, although the terrain is mountain-

By Hanson W. Baldwin

ous, roads and railroads are rela

and at this

season

tively poor snow and mud handicap trans- portation.

The main route of the "Orient Express" TS

Belgrade from through Sofle, then south of the Balkan Mountains through Plovdiv and across the Turkish border to Adrianople and Istanbul. A branch line runs southward from Sofla down the Struma toward Salonika.

Bulgaria is virtually cut in two The by the Balkan Mountains. southern and western parts of the country. along the Greek and Yugoslav frontiers are moun tainous; the Maritsa River system with its valleys and basins runs to the south-east and levels out into the Black Sea plain. There at the border of Turkey, the Tunja River offers a good barrier to invasion in front of Turkish Adrianople.

The Rhodope Mountains on the south are a natural border be tween Greece and Bulgaria the pierced by several passes, most important of them being the Struma River gap, north-east o strategically important Greel othe There are two Salonika. principal passes - north of Gree) Kavala and north of Dede Agach Roads are bad and there are only seven across the Bulgarian-Greel

It would be extremely interest-frontier, all but one of them littl ing to know what proportion of better than mountain trails. Oxford's London immigrants ar- riving since last September have taken the slightest trouble to find out anything about Oxford except the whereabouts of cinemas and shops.

be may

The Rhodope Mountain passe lead into the Greek pan that handle have been fortified by th Greeks with field works and th Turks also have established fiel fortifications along their frontier Bulgaria, chiefly agricultural

of some would be

importance, the German brea chiefly importan

British Reaction Awaited

Now it is perfectly legi- timate for contrary opin- ions to exist about the probability of an invasion. A good case can be made for the view that Hitler with his threats is seeking to bluff us. He has turn- ed his attention to the Mediterranean. He has to rescue Mussolini. He is looking covetously to- wards the Balkans and beyond. An invasion of Britain must certainly be a most hazardous military undertaking. If it failed a deadly blow would have been dealt against Hitler's prestige. And in the long run might there not be some attraction for him in holding his empire, rounding out its periphery

This kind of crowding will pass, and defying the world to

Places of entertainment idle shops.

longer of but Oxford and Cambridge will take his gains from him?

can only be stormed by early and dreaming

enclaves of scholar never again be just It is a plausible argu- tense preparation, Even put gipsies vagrant on the neighbour-scholarship, the homes of a clois- perhaps, to

ing hills. What was left of the tered and

It basket, but is fugitive learning, ment. Yet even so no one ting Ibsen in the stage is no cer-

tai prophylactic against box-old magic has been dissipated. can be well argued that univer- strategically, for it is there tha must refuse to believe in office stampedes. I found "Hedda The colleges themselves seem now sities should be planted among the two traditional routes of con one throug the possibility of an in- Gabler as effectively packing the to be the intruders, and one feels the universal interests and that quest from Asia into Europe, an

Oxford Playhouse as if that lady that the people who push you scholars should rub shoulders vice versa, meet -

Black Sea vasion.

were called "The Girl With a into the gutter are extremely dis- daily with the men of business Russia north of the

the other across the Dardanelle Gun" ("gat" or "rod") and the gusted at the presence of all this and affairs. This, it Nothing can alter the part was being rendered on cel-ancient clutter of stone. What thought, will broaden the minds into Asiatic Turkey. Bulgaria i business has a mere Bodleian to of each and mitigate both the in a sense the strategic key to th fact that the only quick luloid by Miss Bette Davis.

The war has put a further and take up

so much space which | priggishness of the bookworm Balkans; hence its importance i way in which Hitler can colossal kick into that treading might have gone to the housing and the crudity of the exclusive-the German strategy.

Alms or of ninepenny ly commercial mind. None the win the war is by the sub-down of academic Oxford which of new

the Morris Dance of Industry had bazaars? Brasenose' and All Soufs less, I would support the idea of a jugation of England. By so powerfully started. The joke indeed! Why not Rialto, Palas- somewhat separate city for the Oxford being the Latin seum, Alcazar, and Trash Stores, academic life, because its separ- next winter America's aid about

Quarter of Cowley had begun to

ateness now

What the 'British reaction is t can never be com- to us will be considerable. be true enough. But now, thanks

Admittedly there was much plete. Cheap and swift transport the German occupation is not, ye the Aegean Even if by that time Hitler to evacuation from London, New wrong with the Oxford of thirty makes total isolation impossible, clear. We control

College might be called the Cul- had succeeded in march-ture Barrow

years ago. A walk past its shop and, in any case, there are several and under the Montreux Conven of the

New Cut, windows did rather suggest that and prolonged vacations in which tion apparently have the right t Balliol rears the mock- ing eastward and resus- while

the city was specially designed the student is sufficiently reminded send ships through baronial turrets of its front quad,

danelles into the Black Sea if de citating Mussolini

the sale of had wine and of the market-plate. (a like the Highland mansion of al

In defence of the good riding boots, together with

enclaves I sired, though the utility of suc formidable restoration) Cockney profiteer, over a myriad the costlier ties and tobaccos and would plead that the beginning a move is questionable.

jostling engrants from Crickle- the more elegant shirtings, to of adult life in a place at once Salonika is the natural poin he would not have coun- wood and Camberwell. The new-

young fools with, too much poc- | beautiful and dedicated to the for a British landing in force, bu ter-balanced the forfeit of comers appear to be of all kinds, ket-money and a flair for spend- fing issues of life must have a Salónika might be made a sham

from pale, exhausted mothers time, the chief commodity (the

more than that. Had precious influence for at least a bles by German ing even large majority) to some

one been a "Scout" in those days, fraction of the undergraduates; the other hand, quick and inten which we need to solder fairly sturdy, brutish, and prog- doomed week after week and some of whom must have some sive bombing of German troo

nthous males. Elbowed into the

To movements in the bottlenecks the Anglo-American al- gutter by some of the more for year after year to clear up the sensibility in these matters.

mess made

by drunken little be faced with this fact of age the Rhodope and Balkan moun liance. He would have midable of these and reflecting on Etonians and their flashy hangers-long dedication to immaterial tain passes might materially slov

their possible origin and the

Communism would things, to live in buildings that the German advance. spent his own machines

cause of their enforced leisure by have been a natural state of mind. have grown upward and outward But whether we have enoug and allowed us to accu- the Isis, I decided that the true The idea of Oxford and Cam- with their own expanding pur-

of these days is a mulate ours. Britain's university

bridge as Academies, cities of pose (and that purpose no pur-planes to attempt such bombard enough troops t beauty and learning, walled suit of profit), must be good for ment, or even

the extension of Her tight little island is the There was a time when it was about so that the devotees of the the soul, if spark of soul there be prevent

Hitler's conquests beyond will the enclave aspiring mind should have isola- Furthermore, biggest prize. If it sinks, fashionable

"gown" to meet in conflict, pre-

tion and tranquility for their have its close countryside which Bulgarian frontiers, is unknown. half the globe must slip ferably into Hitler's hands, and battle began with hilarity add slow-paced and reverent pursuit the great city will not. Academe banter and ended sometimes with of truth, may have kindled some must have its Arcady. Both Ox-

bachelor affections, but it was ford and Cambridge have always tión making its art with all th the other half would be less amiable exchanges of taunt

the Middlebeen something more than the enthusiasm, but also with the in left without arms to face

however foolish, was

Do we look fo evenly scholar became the bear-garden have been market towns, and at happy amateur? his tireless ambition.

matched. But nowadays "gown"

stated seasons the fairgrounds of learning democratically sprea would be so utterly outnumbered of young Sir Midas.

End Road the Cotswold Now that the Mile The hour may come at that it would be absurd to take and Maida Vale are treading in Anglian flats.

East about our mills and factories 0 fringe and And so, one hopes, delicately cabined by its rive Or the field or street. A lonely the footsteps of the Bullingdon they will remain, long after they banks of green any time in darkness

and under 1 light when the church and an insanely audacious Gen-club there is no drastic desecra- have ceased to be the cisterns for pinnacles of stone-cut poetry

tile might as well start a pogrom tion or essential change. The poor London's wartime overflow,

The ideals are not in essence cor bells ring orice more. If in West Hampstead that is, beare doing very much what the "There will always be the two tradictory. We can always man each man

fore West Hampstead had overrun rich did before them (and with far contrasted ideas of virtue the age, as they say, with a bit and woman the suburbs of Oxford. No, it is less excuse) namely, parading holiness of the recluse, pensive in both. But just at present the knows and plays his part

England's most beautiful streets some exquisite retreat, and the is nothing of the enclave lef without the faintest idea that they saintliness of they will be bells of vic-

the busy slum- Carfax has assumed the roar an are beautiful. "Blacked-out" Ox- parson whose workshop is the multitudes of Charing Cross, an under a full moon has a world's. In the arts the same dis- a new Martyrs' Memorial wi ford

end to have to be erected to Oxonia; loveliness not revealed to recent pute arises. Is It the generations who broke that silver achieve the perfection of profes- trodden down to dusty death splendour with their street lamps sional work in music and drama the Invasive Londoners and never knew that they were or to have the people play and they strove to buy a pound

or to secure a interrupting a perfection of eye-sing, albeit without much skill or sausages music, as it were Mozart in stone. even competence? Do we look to anoonful of their aboriginal But how many are aware of It? one superb executant or to a na- puissant marmalade.

Collection of Bookies.

for "town" and

on November 5, The

Ltd.?

for

on, a sour

the Dar

bombers. O

th

and missile, At least the contest, never a fact after

Ages. The Academe of the poor kraals of ancient culture. They eviably limited efficiency, of th

tory as much as bells of to break the body of any warning. They will be a trespassers on its soil, to sign that Hitler has chal- hurl them back so hard lenged in their own home as to break the hearts of the toughest nation in the the maniacs who sent world, one that has sworn them.

whi