Charles Chapin Tracy, missionary, philanthropist, educator, first ...

10 CHARLES CHAPIN TRACY
probably Strabo's " Plain of a Thousand Villages."
In the background the Tavshan, or Rabbit Mountains,
tower up more than 6,000 feet above the sea level, and
every morning the sun rises over one or other shoulder
of Ak Dagh, our Mont Blanc. The latitude is about
that of New York City, while the winters are short and
not excessively severe. The elevation of the plain,
nearly 2500 feet, tempers the heat of summer, and the
sky over all is the wonderful Mediterranean blue. A
majority of the days are usually cloudless. The
climate is dry and the stars shine clear. The region is
a winter grain country, wheat and barley being the
principal farm products. Cherries, apples, peaches,
plums, pears, apricots, and grapes are among the fruits
grown in abundance; potatoes, tomatoes, onions,
squashes, beets, beans, peas and other vegetables and
greens are raised without difficulty; English walnuts,
almonds and filberts in quantity represent the nut
crops. It is about seventy miles to the sea and the
ships at Samsoun, a progressive harbor city on the
Black Sea.
In 1867, Marsovan was hardly more than an overgrown
Turkish and Armenian village, with some 15,000
inhabitants. A cat might sometimes be seen to jump
across a street from one house roof to another. The
earliest missionaries had found only two houses in
the place with glass in their windows. But the people
in general were of friendly, responsive, progressive
types. The city had been frequently visited and
temporarily occupied by pioneer missionaries, when in
1860, Rev. and Mrs. J. Y. Leonard of Caesarea Station
received permission from the Western Turkey Mission