Famed Bristol

What is it to be famous? If not one American in a hundred could pick out Rear Admiral Mark Lambert Bristol from among all the U. S. Rear Admirals, active and retired, standing in a row--surely then Rear Admiral Mark Lambert Bristol is not famous.

Last week he returned from seven years in the service of his country overseas. There was no mention of the fact in Detroit, in Kansas City, in Omaha, in New Orleans--no mention even in Philadelphia, a bare 100 miles from Manhattan's midriff, where he disembarked. He is not, like Andrew Mellon or Rodolfo Valentino, a newspaper character.

Yet he is not unknown. The

Washington hostess will fill her house when she asks her friends to meet Admiral and Mrs. Bristol. The financier will forego the last golf of summer to talk out a cigar with the Admiral, privately. The heads of great churches will solicit conferences. And each of Admiral Bristol's public utterances in this country will be cabled to every chancellor of Europe.

Admiral Bristol--High Commissioner of the U. S. at Constantinople since August, 1919--has probably exerted more influence upon the scenes of ancient civilization than nas any other American. No U. S. official is more highly respected by the statesmen of Europe and the Near East, and certainly none is better known.

When Constantinople was under Allied control, the English were perpetually in a row with the French, the French with the Italians, the Italians with the defeated Turks. When the rows became serious Admiral Bristol settled them.

When the New Turks became lusty, Admiral Bristol (without instruction from the U. S. State Department) told them to quit massacring Armenians. They quit. With similar effect he told the Greeks to control themselves at the sight of a Turk.

Thousands of women and children deluded into peril by the White hope of General Wrangel, he succored. His was the first balm to heal the wounds of fire at Smyrna. Grimly he protected U. S. interests at Lusanne conferences. And last year he was the first diplomat to call on Mustafa Kemal, President of New Turkey.

For seven years he has sat serenely on the international powder box. A snapping-jawed, tight-lipped man, he has scared away the rascals. A jovial good fellow with pockets full of laughs, he has out-joked the wily villain. A great seaman, he has understood the fighting man.

Home again, he began at once on his first objective--to obtain U. S. recognition for Turkey. At the dock, he greeted reporters with a compactly-worded statement, as it were, announcing his text to Secretary of State Kellogg, Foreign Relations Chairman Borah and the rest of the U. S. Senate:

"The new regime in Turkey is a most remarkable evidence of a revolution in form and administration of a government. Briefly, an absolute monarchy has been replaced by a republic. Church has been separated from state and religion eliminated from all law codes. Religion of any kind may be taught in the churches and the mosques, but not in the schools. All persons born in Turkey, without regard to race, religion or nationality, have all rights of Turkish citizenship. The Turkish leaders without previous experience must evolve the new administration. There are bound to be mistakes and the evolution will be slow, but there are many evidences of progress.

"The Americans in Turkey who are engaged in business, in operating schools, in rendering relief to suffering humanity, and in philanthropic and missionary work, are desirous of having the treaty between America and Turkey ratified, and regular diplomatic relations re-established."