Mohammed VI

Little anxiety for the personal safety and comfort of former Sultan Mohammed VI of Turkey was felt in 1922, when eluding the Kemalists he fled from Constaninople aboard a British warship, and the Grand National Assembly of Turkey turned his realm into the republic of which Mustapha Kemal Pasha is now president.

Last week, however, despatches from San Remo, famed Riviera resort, described Mohammed VI, once both Sultan and Caliph, as no longer able to command the state and retinue which he has maintained until very recently. Gifts and contributions from wealthy Turkish sympathizers still enable him to keep up a modest villa, but it is alleged that a few weeks ago he was nearly evicted for nonpayment of rent, and it is said that he has been obliged to dispense with even the German governess who formerly attended his youngest son.

Observers recalled that all male members of the former Imperial House of Osman have been expelled from Turkey, including even Prince Abdul Medjid, whom the Kemalists suffered to act as Caliph from 1922 to 1924. At present over 250 members of this once omnipotent family are said to be living an all but hand-to-mouth existence. A few, of course, have capitalized the lure of royalty at Paris, but for the most part they are said to make their living in such pursuits as "hawking rugs along the Riviera . . . peddling fruits and vegetables . . . driving taxicabs."

Quoth emotional observers: "Many a dark night has passed since the great Osman, looking into a pool of blood, saw a star and the crescent moon there reflected and bethought him of a design for the Turkish flag.*

*Needless to say, the authority for this legend is nebulous. Another version has it that a white standard upon which the hero Osman fell was stained with his blood into the famed device. His scimiter, on which he lay, produced the crescent; similarly a diadem, crushed beneath him, prevented the blood from staining a white star-shaped patch.